Because the protagonist, Maureen, and her twin Francine are just starting sixth grade—their first year of middle school—the challenges of impending adolescence comprise a central aspect of the ongoing conflict between the two main characters. The twins and their friends experience several different hardships, including navigating shifting friendships and social dynamics, overcoming academic challenges, coping with insecurities, and negotiating their personal identities amidst a host of changes. These challenges are significant and cannot be solved overnight, but ultimately, the characters find strategies to become successful participants in the more complex “civilization” of middle school.

As they slowly acclimate to life in middle school, the twins and their friends struggle to navigate shifting friendships and social dynamics, for in this setting, the student population and the social norms differ greatly from elementary school. In the first few days, for example, Maureen is not scheduled to have lunch with her sister or any of her friends, so she doesn’t know who to sit with and spends the first several lunches hiding in the library. This pattern illustrates the extent of her anxiety about navigating a new social setting. She explicitly reflects that “everything is different.