The Hard Kind of Promise Book

The Hard Kind of Promise by Gina Willner-Pardo is two hundred pages long and was published by Clarion Books, an imprint of Houghton Miffin Harcourt Publishing Company, in 2010. The Hard Kind of Promise follows Sarah Franklin, a seventh grader, as she strives to keep a promise she made in kindergarten with her best friend Marjorie. However, as Marjorie clings to her childish interests rather than fitting in with the popular kids, Sarah begins to wonder if she can keep her promise to stay best friends with Marjorie forever.

While Gina Willner-Pardo's The Hard Kind of Promise focuses on middle schoolers and growing apart as friends, this book's simple writing style would be great for fifth grade readers and older. I picked this book up on a whim from the library because the book's synopsis was really appealing to me despite the weird cover choice; a sunflower on a bench. I found The Hard Kind of Promise to be relatable as most kids have different friend groups and differing interests during different periods of their lives. I found Marjorie's character to be more normal than weird, but that's probably because I have similar interests. Honestly, the kids in the novel were unnecessarily mean to Marjorie just because she chose to watch old movies rather than talking about boys she thought were cute. The only ridiculous thing that happened was when Marjorie wore an old fashioned Victorian dresses and hats to cotillion practice.

Overall, I really enjoyed The Hard Kind of Promise by Gina Willner-Pardo even though it ended on a bittersweet note with Sarah and Marjorie realizing that part of growing up includes letting go of old friends in order to make new ones with similar interests. The only thing I didn't necessarily enjoy was Sarah's mom and dad. Sarah never really got to resolve any of the issues she had with her mom (who constantly critiqued her daughter's ideal career) or her father (who didn't understand that his daughter had no interest in sports). I understand that the author chose to include them to show why Sarah remained friends with Marjorie for so long because she, Marjorie, understood how the divorce made Sarah feel. I think that part really took a back seat to the progression of the overall story. That being said, I really did enjoy this book and I would give it 4.5 stars on goodreads.