The Friendship Experiment by Erin Teagan

Summary: Future scientist Madeline Little is dreading the start of middle school. Nothing has been right since her grandfather died and her best friend changed schools. Maddie would rather help her father in his research lab or write Standard Operating Procedures in her lab notebook than hang out with a bunch of kids who aren’t even her friends. Despite Maddie’s reluctance, some new friends start coming her way—until they discover what she’s written in that secret notebook. And that’s just part of the trouble. Can this future scientific genius find the formula for straightening out her life?

Madeline Little believes that every problem, from a scientific experiment to navigating friendships, can be addressed with a standard operating procedure. As a scientist, it’s how she imposes order on her world. But her expectations are upended when she has to face middle school without her best friend and without her beloved grandfather. Her family’s life has always been shaped by Von Willebrand disease, the bleeding disorder that she and her sister share, and which her father and grandfather made their life’s work. But now her sister Brooke is displaying worse and worse symptoms, and Maddie’s determination to become a world-famous microbiologist is tempered by the setbacks she faces when she tries to help out in her father’s lab. Teagan paints a painfully accurate picture of a logical, fact-loving girl thrown into the emotional whirl of middle school. I loved the way that the story gives no easy answers, and when Madeline tries to repair her relationships, not everyone comes around. With the help of her family and a few good friends, she is able to find her way back to what matters to her, but it comes with a painful lesson: there is no standard operating procedure for life.

THE FRIENDSHIP EXPERIMENT is out now.

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