Amalia: Diary 2

California Diaries #9

by Ann M. Martin

Although she no longer loves him, Amalia still feels the pain of separating from her ex-boyfriend, James

Genres: Young Adult, Fiction, Middle Grade, Contemporary, Childrens, Diary, Mental Health

137 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1998

About the author

Ann Matthews Martin was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane. After graduating from Smith College, Ann became a teacher and then an editor of children's books. She's now a full-time writer.

Ann gets the ideas for her books from many different places. Some are based on personal experiences, while others are based on childhood memories and feelings. Many are written about contemporary problems or events. All of Ann's characters, even the members of the Baby-sitters Club, are made up. But many of her characters are based on real people. Sometimes Ann names her characters after people she knows, and other times she simply chooses names that she likes.

Ann has always enjoyed writing. Even before she was old enough to write, she would dictate stories to her mother to write down for her. Some of her favorite authors at that time were Lewis Carroll, P. L. Travers, Hugh Lofting, Astrid Lindgren, and Roald Dahl. They inspired her to become a writer herself.

Since ending the BSC series in 2000, Ann’s writing has concentrated on single novels, many of which are set in the 1960s.

After living in New York City for many years, Ann moved to the Hudson Valley in upstate New York where she now lives with her dog, Sadie, and her cats, Gussie, Willy and Woody. Her hobbies are reading, sewing, and needlework. Her favorite thing to do is to make clothes for children.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/annmma...

Reviews

[Jaclyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I find the beginnings of romance with Brendan cute, and I like the low-key realism of how the situation with James winds down, but this felt much more like a Maggie book than an Amalia one. In this, she helps Maggie go to therapy for her anorexia.

Minor gripe is with the session with Dr Fuentes. I like the realism of the dialogue, it feels very much like a real therapy session. But I've never gone to a therapist who's let the session run overtime, and especially for like 30 minutes or more overtime like Dr Fuentes does, simply because it takes longer than scheduled for the client to open up. I appreciate Dr Fuentes' kindness but it also kinda made me sad, coz it's setting up unrealistic expectations of how much flex there is in therapy sessions.

[Kiana · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is easily my favorite Amalia story in the California Diaries series. The last few books have had all of the characters sinking deeper and deeper into despair, but this is the first book where we really start to see the signs of recovery. After the horrors of her abusive stalker boyfriend James, Amalia learns to trust again and take a chance on another guy; her growing friendship with Brendan is short and sweet. It also, thankfully, doesn’t overpower the main story, which is even better—Amalia helping Maggie work through her anxiety and eating disorder. Amalia’s efforts aren’t easy, mostly because Maggie is very resistant to getting help—which makes her steps into healing all the more hard-won. (Points for a realistic therapist-patient conversation, too—the little details in Maggie’s initial session with Dr. Fuentes felt very accurate.) Basically, this is a book about healing and, after all of the stuff that happened in the series before, that’s a welcome change.

(However, we are in book nine and officially back in September of eighth grade—I HATE it when series do this. Let your characters grow up! Their voices were already better suited to tenth graders (and were never believable as eighth graders)—the least the series could let them do is actually enter ninth grade.)

3 stars.

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not sure how I feel about the illustrations' style, but I liked their inclusion to show how Amalia uses art to work through difficult situations. I would have liked to see this idea included more in the Claudia books in regular BSC. There certainly was a lot of 'fate'-like situations that came together a little too perfectly, like Amalia just happening to find the magazine article. There wasn't much about Sunny or Dawn, or Amalia's family issues which were expressed in her first diary, but a lot of hints towards what Ducky and Maggie's future stories might hold. So overall, the message is very strong and offers inspiration for people trying to help their friends while still living their own lives and not letting others' problems consume them, but the execution is very glossy and doesn't take much time to highlight flaws in Amalia's plans. I did like the mention of how Amalia's new crush feels more like a friend than an idol-worthy guy, and how it ties in other strong male/female pairings in the BSC universe, like Ducky and the California girls, or Claudia and Stacey's not serious, on/off again relationships with the popular guys in Stoneybrook. This is definitely a less intense diary compared to the more descriptive/emotionally intensive other stories.

[Samantha · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I liked this one slightly less than the first Amalia book, it was still good. It was interesting to read about Maggie's eating disorder from the prospective of someone who cared about her. It's so hard when you have a friend going through something like that, whether it's a mental illness, an eating disorder, a drug problem, etc and you're trying to figure out how to talk to them without being accusatory. It was nice to see how she was getting past her relationship with James and growing as a person, and how she was evolving. She was a really great character.

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my jumping in point to the series, but I generally liked it. A kid stepping in to do research about a friend’s disordered eating, using recommended talking points to bring the issue up, and then taking that friend to therapy? That’s pretty great stuff for young adult readers to be exposed to.

[Devon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Honestly the majority of this book focused around Maggie and not Amalia. Granted, it comes after a Maggie book, but Amalia had 0 character development and honestly I have a hard time remembering her personality from the first book even though I remember the central conflict. Kind of disappointing since I've been enjoying this series for the most part.

[Pamela · Rating 3 out of 5]

The good: Amalia is likeable and Lerengis isn't his usual obnoxious self. The bad: the book was more about Maggie's problems then Amalia. I get it's about her trying to help her friend, but I wanted to know more about the aftermath of her stalker boyfriend. Guess I should read her first diary.

[Avery Talks · Rating 4 out of 5]

This actually had a cute, age appropriate love story that was genuinely charming. Amalia is a great character and it makes me happy when good things happen to her. Dawn still sucks though. That'll never change.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is pretty much a continuation of the last book , just from Amalia's point of view. Add the garage band and a little romance and you have a fan in me!

[Nora · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amalia is the most together person in this group. I would want to be her friend!

[Christina]

Read my recap at A Year with the BSC via Stoneybrook Forever: www.livethemovies.com/bsc-blog/califo...

[Meg GlitteryOtters · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Leah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad. Felt like it was a continuation of Maggie's diary. Hardly anything happened to Amalia.

[Michaela · Rating 3 out of 5]

how come karen brewer gets a spinoff series but Abby, Jesi, and Mallory aren’t even included in friends forever?

[Ashley Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best friend Amalia trying to fix the world around her 🩷

[Leigh · Rating 5 out of 5]

These books would be awesome if Dawn wasn't in them. Also if the characters were at least in high school since it reads more like older kids. This book carries on from Maggie's story with Amalia determined to help her friend. Dawn is here but gets little mention which was great. Amalia some how manages to convince Maggie to see a therapist and Amalia gets dragged to the first session. The stalker ex boyfriend from the first book is still lurking but not as present as before. There's a new boy in school Brendan who's shy and sweet but after dating crazy Amalia is not into boys. The exciting part of the story involves their band Vanish and the Homecoming Bash. They are asked to play and offered a whooping $500 for the gig boosting them into professionals. But Maggie is losing her voice and her nerve and if course not eating much isn't helping, either and now the panic is on if they'll make it to their first ever paid gig, will it be a success or a horrible flop. I have to say next to Sunny I really like Amalia best. She's such a wonderful friend the type of friend everyone should have. Now onto Ducky next book as there are hints of what's been going on in his life with his friend Alex I'm interested to see where his story goes.

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Realizing you probably need to read this as a series, but I remembered enough from when I read these as a kid to just skip through the Amalia titles. This one touches on aftermath of Amalia's almost abusive relationship with James. I think the fact it doesn't go completely over the top makes this feel more realistic. And it ends in a sweet way with Amalia moving on with a new crush.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a very good book not amazing but good. If you have read the rest of the series read this one too.

I never really liked Ann M. Martin books and I still don’t. This series was okay but it was not the best series I have ever read. Anyways I still recommend the series.

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

Practically the entire book is Amalia worrying about Maggie, so it was a little boring.

[Boris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amalia has a stalker boyfriend who she has trouble shaking. Maggie has an eating disorder. She goes to a therapist. The band is a big success. Life goes on. A new boy is interested in Amalia.

[Tanya · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh... Amalia is not my favorite character. Interesting that there's more information about Maggie's eating disorder.

[Brittany · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this whole series of books. (I'm a sucker for books written as diaries). With this perticular book you can really feel Amalia's pain along with her happiness.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

So this book did a good job of eating disorder follow up. Thankfully. It was a fine read, but so different than the BSC. The issues discussed are deep.