SYDNEY REVIEWS “Meet Isabel and Nicki”

Below is Sydney's review of "Meet Isabel and Nicki!"

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• Chapter 2- NEW CONTENT: After watching The Parent Trap, Nicki thinks about what it would be like to have a twin that is more like her, who likes grunge and skateboarding, versus Isabel, who’s more into glitter and dancing. Nicki’s thoughts are interrupted when she and Isabel hear their parents talking about if they’re responsible enough to stay home by themselves, which motivates them to clean up after themselves fast. After they clean up, they celebrate the last night of Hanukkah with their parents and are both gifted journals and gel pens.

• Chapter Three: This is the part where the content from the journals begin, where Nicki shares her fears about Y2K and the twins create their Y2K countdown list

• Chapters Four, Six, Nine, Eleven is an expanded version of Isabel’s Journal

• Chapters Five, Seven, Fourteen, Seventeen is an expanded version of Nicki’s Journal

• Chapter Eight, Twelve, Thirteen, Fifteen, Sixteen, Eighteen, Nineteen, Twenty is an expanded version of both journals

• Chapter 10: NEW CONTENT - Nicki goes over to her new friends’s house to skateboard, but a neighbor pulls in and complains about the skateboarders. This motivates Nicki to be part of the skateboarding show at the New Year’s Celebration

The actual review:

I’ll admit, it took me a little bit to get into this book. A lot of it was ripped straight from the journal, and there wasn’t that much new details from it, when I was anticipating a lot more. I guess Kavi’s book spoiled me when it came to new details, and considering this one book dealt with two characters, it made sense that there wasn’t many new things. However, I did enjoy this more than I did the journals because I was able to have the whole story in one book, instead of one half of the story. While it would have been preferable for each story to stand on its own, it’s clear when reading this book that Nicki’s story is more impactful with Isabel’s contributions, and vice versa. Isabel and Nicki are fun, if not groundbreaking, characters and I do think the actual story, while a little simplistic and talking more about 90s pop culture than actual historical events, was cute, though at times due to 1999 being such a short time ago, it felt more like a Girl of the Year story instead of a Historical story. Even Courtney, who was from a decade earlier, had more historical events and context in her books than Isabel and Nicki’s did, but that isn’t the fault of the authors at all and they did great telling the story. It’s just the way that AG does books now. I do have to note that this book fixed a historical inaccuracy from the journal and actually talked about the 1999 Seattle World Trade Center protests that ACTUALLY cancelled the Millennium Celebration instead of just saying “Y2K cancelled it” like the journals did, and that was very appreciated.

Alright, now that I’ve talked about the actual book, here’s where my main issues with it stem from - the lack of books in general. Every other historical before Isabel and Nicki had at least 2 books, and came with their meet book. Every other doll - period!- before the dolls released in 2023 CAME WITH THEIR MEET BOOK. And what did we have to deal with this year? Journals. The dolls coming with journals that tell the Cliffnotes version of the story, and then details don’t make sense, and then we have to wait six months - or six and a half in the case of Isabel and Nicki - to find out the details and smooth out the rough spots in one single book. All while AG pumps out collaboration after collaboration while mostly ignoring the main part of the brand that created its founding. What the dolls are supposed to illustrate. The books! As a longtime AG fan, this release strategy has been really excruciating to deal with, but it was actually kind of worthwhile with Kavi’s book because there was more details to discover. With Isabel and Nicki’s, however, I’m feeling kind of scammed. Why did we have to wait six months for three chapters of extra content and then the longer version of what was summarized to us beforehand? Why didn’t this book actually come with the dolls? Why aren’t there more books?

Overall, I enjoyed this book for what it was, but I REALLY hope American Girl starts to reconsider their book releasing strategy soon. This isn’t it.

6.5/10