Finding My Own Team Canteen, a cover reveal and guest post by Amalie Jahn

Just like the kids in my middle grade debut, Team Canteen 1: Rocky Road, I was not even a little bit popular in seventh grade. Completely ignorant of the cruel reality of the tween hierarchy, I ran for student government secretary that year, fully believing I could win.

Of course, I lost spectacularly. 

After that failure, I tried for years to fit in with the kids everyone else voted for. To squish myself into someone else’s mold of what it was to be cool. I spent all my babysitting earnings on clothes that didn’t fit me from the name-brand stores I couldn’t afford. I listened to music I found annoying because I didn’t want to be seen with the wrong cassette tape in my Walkman. I played soccer (which I loathed) and hid copies of The Babysitter’s Club in my knock-off L.L. Bean backpack so no one would think I was a nerd who—gasp—read. In short, I did everything I could think of to make myself appealing to the kids at the top of the proverbial food chain.

But no matter what I did or wore or said, it was never enough for them.

I was never enough for them.

Eventually, I gave up. I stopped caring what they thought about me or said behind my back. And when I turned my attention from them, what I found was a bunch of other kids who had given up, too.

The ones with messy, complicated home lives they never talked about at school. The ones who listened to bands no one had ever heard of and wore hand-me-downs from cousins they’d never met. The ones with too curly hair and bodies that didn’t look anything like the ones in the latest issue of Seventeen magazine. The late bloomers. The bookworms.

The outcasts.

Together, we collectively stopped caring about the standards others set for us and started leaning on each other for support and strength.

We had a name for ourselves that I won’t share with all of you, but suffice it to say if we had met at summer camp instead of homeroom, we might have called ourselves “Team Canteen.” Looking back, middle school was one of those fundamental moments in my development of self—not only who I was becoming but also deciding the type of people I wanted to call my friends.

In the book, Claire, Billie, Raelynn, and Tasha are the leftovers. The kids no one else wants to associate with. They are, for me, a celebration of the kids who got me through middle school. And high school. And honestly, who still help me today. Drafting the manuscript for Team Canteen, I knew it was going to be part love story to all the outsiders in my own life and part instruction manual for the kids who are still trying to find their people today. To them, I would say, stay true to yourself and the right people will always find their way into your life.

And to anybody who needs someone to sit with in the cafeteria, you always have a seat at the table with Team Canteen.

Meet the author

USA Today Bestselling author Amalie Jahn is the recipient of the Literary Classics Seal of Approval and the Readers’ Favorite Gold Medal for her debut YA novel, The Clay Lion. Her first YA contemporary, The Next to Last Mistake, won the prestigious IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award in 2020 and A Walk Between Raindrops was selected by Kirkus Reviews as one of the Best Indie Books of 2023.  A TEDx speaker, human rights advocate, and active promoter of kindness, she lives in North Carolina with her husband, two children, and three extremely overfed cats.

Links:

Website – www.amaliejahn.com

Twitter – @AmalieJahn

Instagram – @amalie.jahn.official

About Team Canteen: Rocky Road

A hot pink boa that might be magic bonds 4 unlikely friends from summer camp and gives them the courage to face down the challenges they face back home.

This sassy, diverse series debut for tweens is perfect for fans of XO, Kitty, The Baby-Sitters Club, and Julie and the Phantoms.

On the final night of summer camp, Tasha, Raelynn, Claire, and Billie get busted stuffing themselves with ice cream in the mess hall’s walk-in freezer. But when they slip away without being punished, they’re convinced the pink feather boa Billie put on to stay warm is magic.

Back at home, each member of Team Canteen tests the boa’s powers as they face their own challenges. When her little cousin moves in with her destructive dog, Tasha struggles to find her place inside her adoptive family. Claire’s scared the kids at school will find out how hard life’s gotten since her dad lost his job. Raelynn longs to be someone other than her sister’s twin. And with a hockey-obsessed family charting his every move, Billie’s worried he’ll never be able share his dream of becoming a figure skater.

It’s going to be a rocky road from the start of the school year back to Camp Happy Hollow. Will the boa continue to protect Team Canteen, or will their friendship end up being the most magical find of all?

Alternating among the friends, Rocky Road is a smart, soaring celebration of the highs and lows of middle school, and the unbreakable friendships that see you through, no matter what comes next.

ISBN-13: 9781645952565
Publisher: Pixel+Ink
Publication date: 09/03/2024
Age Range: 10-14

Filed under: Guest Post