Story for the Week
Hello, my name is Nancy (hi, Nancy!), and I grew up a middle child.
Yes, I know I started a blog post a few weeks ago this same way, saying I’m the single mother of an adult child (When You Realize You Have an Adult Child). I’m also a middle child. I’m a middle child who is the single mother of an adult child. So there. 😜
Ahem…allow me to start again…. Hello, my name is Nancy (hi, Nancy!), and I grew up a middle child.
Common characteristics of a middle child:
- Easygoing… ✅
- Negotiator/peacemaker… ✅
- Independent… ✅
- Creative… ✅ (You’re reading this, right?)
- Loyal… ✅
- Less anxious… ✅ (My motto is generally “we’ll worry when we have to worry.”)
- Diplomatic… ✅ (My favorite quote about diplomacy is that it’s the ability to tell someone to go to hell so that they look forward to the trip. Story for another blog post. 😉)
I grew up sandwiched between a sister two years older than I am and a brother four years younger. I say this in the past tense because I don’t feel the impact anymore of being a middle child. At family gatherings, my middle-child nephew and I will definitely make a big deal about being middle children who are overlooked or ignored, but when you and your siblings are all 50+ years old…eh, probably not as big an issue. 🤣
When talking about being a middle child, I have always said that I didn’t think I had a horrible childhood. I don’t believe I turned out to be a screwed up adult as a result. (My daughter might disagree.) I just felt…glossed over. Not forgotten really, not ignored. I just didn’t always feel seen.
Part of it is probably my own fault. I AM an introvert, after all, so I voluntarily spent hours by myself reading in my room. I didn’t go to school football or basketball games. My extracurriculars were the school newspaper and yearbook. I didn’t get in trouble in school. I didn’t try to sneak out. As I look back on it as an adult, I didn’t act like I wanted or needed any attention or accolades. But when I was a teenager, I really felt like it was just assumed I was ok, and sometimes I wanted someone to check in.
Did I say anything? Heck no! Did it have an impact on who I was at the time? Absolutely! So much so that I read The Birth Order Book in high school. I wholeheartedly believed that, if I ended up as an adult with three children, there would quickly be a fourth. (Yes, that creates two middle children, but at least they would have each other.)
Years ago, I knew someone through church who had just had his third child with his wife. I laughingly told him that they should have a fourth, and he asked me why. I gave him my spiel about being a middle child. When I gave him a copy of The Birth Order Book and suggested he read it, he said, “Oh, you really believe this?”
A couple years later, we were talking and he told me about a special outing he planned with his middle son. I commented that I thought that was really nice for them to spend that individual time together. His response then was, “Yeah, he’s starting to show some of those middle child tendencies.” He had read the book, and he really believed it too.
The lesson really is that people are all individuals with their own needs and wants and idiosyncrasies, and it’s easy to kind of lump our kids together. At the end of the day, though, the oldest gets the privileges, and the youngest gets the attention. (My only child kid gets both, the lucky dog.) And the middle child has to kind of wait their turn unless they speak up and ask for it.
While I was reading the book below, the main character felt like a middle child to me. (She is.) And the author, one of four siblings, holds a degree in psychology, so even if it wasn’t intentional, she probably understands the birth order phenomenon pretty well.
Book Review
⭐⭐⭐⭐
4 Stars for The Break-Up Pact by Emma Lord
314 pages
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Publication Date: August 13, 2024
I received an advance copy of this title from NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.
Publisher’s Description
June and Levi were best friends as teenagers—until the day they weren’t. Now June is struggling to make rent on her beachside tea shop, Levi is living a New York cliché as a disillusioned hedge fund manager and failed novelist, and they’ve barely spoken in years.
But after they both experience public, humiliating break-ups with their exes that spread like wildfire across TikTok rabbit holes and daytime talk shows alike, they accidentally make some juicy gossip of their own—a photo of them together has the internet convinced they’re a couple. With so many people rooting for them, they decide to put aside their rocky past and make a pact to fuel the fire. Pretending to date will help June’s shop get back on its feet and make Levi’s ex realize that she made a mistake. All they have to do is convince the world they’re in love, one swoon-worthy photo op at a time.
Two viral break-ups. One fake relationship. Five sparkling, heart-pounding dates. June and Levi can definitely pull this off without their hearts getting involved. Because everyone knows fake dating doesn’t come with real feelings. Right?
************
Main Characters:
- June Hart – late 20s, owner of Tea Tide café in Benson Beach which she took over running after her older sister Annie died unexpectedly a couple years ago, recently labeled Crying Girl after her boyfriend broke up with her on camera and the video went viral
- Levi Shaw – late 20s, grew up in Benson Beach, went to high school with June and Dylan, was Annie’s best friend, moved to New York and works in hedge funds, recently went viral in online headlines when his fiancée ran off with an action movie star
- Dylan Hart – June’s younger brother, a university track and cross-country coach, planning his wedding to Mateo
- Mateo Diaz – Dylan’s fiancé, full-time professor at the same university where Dylan works, has known June and Dylan since he and June were 10 years old
- Sana Chen – freelance writer, June’s current best friend, trying to earn a full-time job with the pop culture website Fizzle
I love me some Emma Lord. 😊
June runs Tea Tide, a beachside café in the small community of Benson Beach, about an hour and a half bus ride from New York City. Business had been down after her sister Annie’s unexpected passing a couple years ago. June has struggled to keep coming up with scone flavors as specials of the week. She struggles even more to pay the rent and needs to figure out a way to change up the business plan without letting go of Annie’s dream.
These days, most of her “customers” just want a picture of June as Crying Girl. Her ex-boyfriend Griffin’s stint on the reality TV show Business Savvy ended with Griffin having a new girlfriend and breaking up with June on camera. The video of June’s devastation went viral…thus, Crying Girl. Can’t get much more publicly humiliated than that, right?
Levi left Benson Beach for college and never looked back. He and Annie had planned to pursue writing together, but something changed, and he headed to New York where he ended up in a career as a hedge fund manager. His fiancée Kelly, a high-end real estate agent, left him for an action movie star in the same month as June and Griffin’s split. When he starts to appear in all the headlines, he takes a leave from his job and heads back to Benson Beach.
When Sana suggests they fake date as #RevengeExes, June gains visibility for the café and Levi hopes to make Kelly jealous to win her back. Of course, June had a crush on Levi in high school, so spending time in such close proximity to him does nothing to help her quash the feelings that come roaring back.
This is kind of a new play on a second-chance romance because June and Levi were never a thing. I know some people prefer closed door romance. This one has a single chapter with some heat, and it’s a great story to boot. The execution of June and Levi’s love story does not disappoint.
Aside from the romance, I love the way Lord gives June some closure. She has struggled in the two years since losing her sister, but there are so many things she needs to find her way through. It almost feels like the classic idea that you have to hit bottom before you can find your way.
Finally, one of my favorite things about this author—besides her fantastic plotlines—is her ability to paint a picture and create realistic dialog (i.e., banter) that makes me smile.
“It’s only a matter of time before he’s pulled back into the orbit of the other lifeless hedge fund drones he calls coworkers, who break the time-space-sanity continuum by working thirty-hour days and turning their blood into Red Bull. I can count on none fingers the number of times he’s been home for more than a few days since he graduated from Columbia.”
“‘I’m not seven anymore,’ I remind him. ‘I’ll squish you’
“‘I’m not eight anymore,’ says Levi, affronted. ‘And you’re pocket-sized. Give my muscles some credit.’”
“‘That’s it,’ I say flatly. ‘I’m breaking up with you.’
“Levi doesn’t even glance up from the table. ‘Well, we had a good run.’”
If you’re looking for something fun, a little beach, a little romance…pick up The Break-Up Pact. You’ll be happy you did.
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