Emma's younger brother Jake has tonsillitis and makes life difficult for Emma, while the Cupcake Club girls are spoiling him with cupcakes and little gifts.

"In this latest misadventure, Nate, the all-time record-holder for detentions, gets to see how the other half lives as he follows his best friend Francis's example and becomes a total neat freak; has Nate totally flipped out?"--

Middle-school drama queen Nikki Maxwell worries about asking a boy to her school's "sweetheart dance."

The Dunwiddle Magic School (fifth to eighth grade) is intended for children whose magic is "upside-down" like Dory (who turns into a combination of a kitten and dragon) and Pepper (whose uncontrollable "fiercing" terrifies everyone around her)--so the Show Off, where fifth grade students are supposed to showcase their skills, does not really seem like a good idea.

As Nikki plans how she's going to spend her summer, things get more complicated after she starts hanging out with a visiting student.

For as long as Katie can remember, it's just been her and her mom. But that's about to change. First her mom gets a boyfriend. And then Katie gets an email from her dad, whom she's never met, saying he wants to get together. Katie's not sure she's ready for so much change in her life. With so much happening at once, Katie's counting on her friends in the Cupcake Club to help her find the sweet side of what seems like a sticky situation.

Spotting his grandmother standing in line at the local soup kitchen, Rafe decides to start a dog-walking business that he hopes will become a huge money-making empire to help his struggling family, a plan that is thwarted by two sabotaging twins.

Seventh-grader Zoey Albro focuses on caring for three younger siblings and avoiding rich classmates at school until her fascination with octopuses gets her on the debate team and she begins to speak out.

"Can Nate Wright get any cooler? Not according to Nate himself. He's already P.S. 38's rockin'est drummer, finest poet (check out his haiku about Brazil nuts), and deepest thinker--in his own mind. But does Nate have what it takes to hang with Marcus, leader of the school's most notorious posse? Or will he decide that being cool isn't all it's cracked up to be?"

Jamie Kelly looks back through her very oldest diaries, and is amazed at how dumb she used to be considering how smart she is now.