Between Mom and Jo by Julie Anne Peters

Between Mom and Jo by Julie Anne Peters

Review by: Lauren

Copy from: I bought it

Amazon Associate: buy book, we get small percent

Official Summary:

Nick has two Moms. That makes him different than most everyone else at school.


And now his parents are splitting up.

Suddenly he has the same problem faced by lots of other teenagers:


How are you supposed to choose between them?

Review: Nick doesn't think it's weird to have two moms. He has "Mom" and "Jo" but they are both huge parts of his life. The problems usually come from the outside...people making fun of him, telling him his family is weird. So when the trouble starts showing up inside his house, that's the hard part. He wants his parents to stay together, but he can't stop them from drifting apart.

I liked that the beginning of the book were memories of Nick growing up. At the end of the chapter, there would be a present day Nick stating his thoughts about that particular time. It gives you a nice look into his life and how he grew up. Nick also keeps a scrapbook, and this is a nice way of showing that...little things he includes in his scrapbook have to do with various memories (like a watermelon seed).

After a point, it's just Nick and his life now. He has to deal with his mom getting cancer, Mom and Jo fighting, Jo moving out, Mom not wanting him to see Jo, and Mom falling for someone new. It's crazy and intense and Nick hates it. He just wants his life to be normal again.

I loved that Peters didn't make his moms perfect or saints. It would be easy to have a book with two moms showcasing them as the perfect parents. After all, with so much anger about LGBT men and women having kids...you wouldn't want a book going along with that, would you? But Peters doesn't focus on that. She simply shows a regular family going through their problems. Sure, Nick might have two moms...but that doesn't mean they are bad parents. They fight, they make mistakes. It's normal.

In the end, everything isn't sunshine and daises...but everyone has grown. They have all realized they have to move forward. They can't blame others, and they can't get mad about the things that life throws on them. Nick, especially, changes...and as he does, things begin to work out for him. They aren't perfect, but whose life is? He's finally getting back a new sort of normal.

I'm a big fan of Julie Anne Peters, and after read this one, I know I'll just keep grabbing her work off the shelves.