Author(s): Tami Sussman

Confident Readers | Children's Book Council of Australia Awards

This hilarious and heart-warming middle-grade debut tackles how to be a good friend (and realise when you’ve been a bad one), leaving childhood behind, and, most importantly, how to get back up when it feels like the world has knocked you down. Natalie (Nutty to her friends) knows turning 12 is a big deal, and even though she doesn’t like change AT ALL, she’s prepping for: a) having the best bat mitzvah party anyone has ever been to b) graduating from primary school and c) hopefully getting a boyfriend. But there’s even more headed Nutty’s way that might change everything, like her parents running out of money and selling her childhood home, along with the reassuring family smell. Or when her best friend no longer feels like a girl and wants to leave the bat mitzvah group altogether. It seems only Natalie can keep her family, her friendships and her party from falling apart.