Meet Isabel and Nicki

Authors: Julia DeVillers and Jennifer Roy (yes, they are twins)
Illustrator: Maike Plenzke
Published in 2023

Summary

It's December of 1999, and nine-year-old twins Isabel and Nicki Hoffman have different reactions to the coming year. Isabel is excited, but Nicki is worried. One concern is the Y2K Bug (yes, it was a huge worry; my father-in-law was one of many computer programmers who helped mitigate the issue, just like the twins' mom is in the book). Isabel is far too involved with her many friends to worry, especially since one of them got the group space to dance in Seattle's New Year celebration--Nicki included! Plus the sisters just got pets for Hanukkah; a dog named Blossom for Nicki (after the Powerpuff girl) and a cat named Buffy for Isabel (for the vampire slayer).

Soon, it seems the twins' perspectives have flipped. Nicki stumbles across a group of young skaters, finding a whole new group of great friends. Meanwhile, Isabel's friends start to drift away, influenced by a stuck-up mean girl. They even kick her out of the New Year dance performance. The twins' differences are feeling more magnified too, leading to fights. Isabel's feeling pretty lost until she also finds a new friend, Kat--one who appreciates her for who she is and doesn't try to change her. The sisters even make up, agreeing to learn to communicate better.

Then Nicki falls while skateboarding, spraining her ankle badly. Isabel rallies to her aid, and together the twins bond, growing closer over their school's winter break than they have in a long time. Both girls find themselves gaining confidence--Nicki is making a zine to pass out with her skateboarding friends at the New Year's party, and Isabel stands up for herself to the mean girl.

A spanner's thrown in the works when the party is cancelled (that really happened; Seattle's mayor called it off, citing safety concerns in light of the WTO protests). Nicki and Isabel are bummed, but soon they realize that the mayor didn't say people couldn't celebrate, just that the official party was cancelled. Their dad owns a coffee shop--what better place for Seattle-ites to celebrate? They quickly plan a party and invite their new friends. Admission is one book, to be donated to patients at the nearby hospital that treated Nicki's sprain. The party is a blast, and Isabel even makes up with her friends who ditched her (it's brief, but I think it's handled well; Isabel doesn't let them get off scot-free and they're properly chagrined for their actions). The mayor even stops by to donate books!

Nicki and Isabel ring in the new year as friends, confident in their future and excited to see what it holds for them.

Inside Isabel and Nicki's World

This is a brief description of pop culture and news from the late 90s, focusing on Seattle. Y2K is mentioned, as is the advent of the 24-hours news cycle, which sensationalizes and often catastrophizes. Special focus is given to the rising representation of girls and women in the media, including the American Girl magazine.

Misc

The authors dedicate their book to the readers.

There was no year 0. It started at AD 1 or 1 CE depending on which you prefer (yes, the AD goes first). 2000 was the last year of the millennium. When it ended, then a new one began. (rant over)

I was born a few years before Isabel and Nicki, and grew up in the greater Seattle area. One thing that stood out as accurate before even opening the book was an alien symbol. Aliens were EVERYWHERE here in the 90s. Frankly, twins made sense to me too. In my tiny high school class of under 70 people, nearly a tenth of the students were twins. And considering one of my grandmothers is a twin, I thought twins were way more common than they really are.

Nicki and Isabel are fraternal twins. Once my kids and I saw a dad at a store with two toddlers, a boy and a girl. One of my kids speculated to me that they might be twins and the dad confirmed that they were twins. I asked him how often people wonder if they're identical, and he said I might be the first person to NOT ask that.

Hanukkah ran from December 3 to December 11 in 1999. The Hoffman family also exchanges gifts on Christmas, but no religious observation is mentioned.

If you find yourself in need of crutches, don't lean on them with your armpits. You're meant to have them a couple inches below your armpits. You end up with callouses on the side of your rib cage, not chafing in your armpits.

Accurate Seattle things: 
-It gets dark early in December. Sunset is around 4:15-4:25 most of the month.
-Grunge!
-"My cousin who goes to school in Olympia taught me how to make [zines]." Yep, that'd be Evergreen College, and yep, it'd have zines.
-Having a sprained ankle sounds right. I did that all the time. My parents ended up buying a pair of crutches after renting them so many times, and my nickname on the soccer team was The Broken Wonder.

Maybe inaccurate Seattle things:
-I've never known a Seattle-area adult born after about 1945 who had kids address them as Mr/Mrs/Ms LastName unless outside of a classroom.
-Having only lived in the Pacific and the Hawaiian Time Zones, I've never worried about the world ending at midnight on a given day. I'd have a heads-up because early time zones would get hit first: if Australia's still there when I wake up, the world didn't end.

Inaccurate Seattle thing:
-Mt. Rainier is too far west in the picture of the Hoffmans on the Space Needle observation deck. I understand wanting to include it because it's iconic and it seems nitpicky, but for someone who's very used to seeing the tallest peak in the state (more than 14,000 feet!), it immediately looks wrong to see it that close to Puget Sound. It needs to be a few inches to the left.