e-ALC, 06:53:37
Narrated by: Angel Pean and Tyla Collier
Release Date: September 9, 2025
Published by: HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
Read from: September 13-14, 2025
Stand-alone
Source: Netgalley (I received a free ALC from the publisher and Netgalley. This did nothing to influence my review)
Content Warning: N/A
For Readers Interested In: The Parent Trap movie, Family Diversity, Dual POV, Middle Grade, Contemporary, Most Anticipated, Own Voices, Racial/Ethnic Diversity, Realistic Fiction, Dual NarratorsBoston Globe–Horn Book Award–winning author Brandy Colbert gives The Parent Trap a fresh, funny, and delightfully unexpected update in this story of two girls—one raised by her single father, the other in the foster care system—who meet by chance . . . only to discover they’re identical twins.
Kenya Norwood likes things just the way they are. She’s lived all her life in Pasadena with her dad and grandmother, she’s attended the same school with the same friends since pre-K, and whether it’s at outdoor club or her own lunch table, she loves being the center of attention. Even as she’s about to start middle school, she knows one thing for sure: none of that is going to change.
For Liberty Perry, change is all she’s ever known. Her mother disappeared when she was a toddler, and ever since, she’s never stayed in one place for very long. But her new foster mother, Joey, seems different. Maybe in this home, in this school, change won’t come so quickly.
Except everything changes the day the girls meet—and Kenya and Liberty discover they are identical.
Neither Kenya nor Liberty is ready to find out she has a twin sister (in fact, they’re both unsure if they even want one), and when the girls learn the truth of how they were separated, it’s clear that no one else in their lives was ready for this, either. But soon, they realize that the connection they share might be even stronger than the things that kept them apart—and that teaming up might be the only way to set everything right.
*MY THOUGHTS*
I have been waiting for this book ever since I heard about it. I have no idea what we did to get another Parent Trap (this book) and another Freaky Friday in the same year, but THANK YOU MEDIA GAWDS lol I loved both of these when I was younger, so it’s no surprise that I RAN to this book as soon as it came out.
This book was so fun! Although one of them made me want to act like their IRL librarian, becaise she was being mean for no reason, I loved the characters. Kenya was used to having things one way and she loves it that way. But one day she gets word that there is someone that looks just like her in the school and people won’t stop gawking at her. As it turns out, it’s Liberty, who has moved around her whole life, from foster home to foster home. As Liberty is getting comfortable in her new home and school, she doesn’t realize there is another girl who looks exactly like her…..
I loved that this was completely different from The Parent Trap, but still had a few nods here and there to the original. Like the camping? And the pudding? Super cute! But even with all that, Colbert was still able to make this her own. She gave them a very real backstory that actullay had me in tears. Cobert is so good at everything she does. I DO wish it was a different reason than what it was, but it made sense. If she had to leave her child, I’m sure it wasn’t willingly.
The writing style is classic Brandy Colbert. It’s so good! I laughed, I got teary, and I also got ridiculously happy. I felt so much in this novel, and that is a sign to me that I loved it. But Colbert is already solidly in my “Auto-Buy” slot because of her YA, but now its because of her MG also. This was a lot of fun and I really hope she has another MG up her sleeve that shows these two again. I need another book that shows what happened to Joey and Kenya’s dad. In my mind, they made it work and they get together lolol
This was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed seeing this new take on an iconic movie. And the fact that I got to “relive” it with one of my favorite authors made this even more special. Here’s to another hit from Brandy Colbert.
Overall, I give this
