The Very Serious Diary of Glam & Beardy Volume I by Ruby Clyde & Rachel WD. Illustrated by Vincent Batignole.
Rating: 
Nothing is perfect, and as such, the reviews in this blog are chaotic. My main aim is to share my thoughts, joy and opinions on a book, not make a publication perfect review. This blog endorses authenticity, showing up and joy over perfection.
Disclaimer: Receiving a review copy from the publisher does not affect my opinion of the book. If you think I review it highly it is due to me knowing my taste well and therefore not requesting books I won’t enjoy. And I am not obligated to review the book if I do not like it, so you may not see bad reviews due to me preferring not to hype down a particular book. I only do reviews of books I disagreed with if I think it is worth bringing a topic or warning to light.
I love good middle grade series. Some of my favourite have been Diary of an Accidental Witch, The Boy Who Grew Dragons or Tales of the Chocolate Heart. So when Little Tiger had this up for review and request, I had to try it to fill my middle grade craving for a good series.
Glam & Beardy do not disappoint at all.
We start by getting to know Glam who is the last child of the Glamour family and is hoping to get the most glamorous familiar, since all kids get one around her age, except her. Hers just doesn’t seem to come at all. We get to know her family and that the kingdom has several “families” with different skills, like glamour or wisdom or strength.
It is also not common but not a bad thing if your familiar is from a different family (like Glam’s mum, who was born into Wisdom but has a glam familiar). Glam gets sad that she can’t find a familiar, and she’s not very glamorous, until she does meet her familiar Beardy, who is definitely a not glamorous familiar, but even worse, they’re not a defined skills from the kingdom, so Glam is convinced she has the wrong familiar.
This leads to an adventure to try to find a way to find the right familiar for Glam and the right kid for Beardy.
One of the things I really liked was that Glam’s family isn’t absent, on the contrary they are there for her even if she doesn’t always believe it or actually feel like it. I love stories where the parents/family are supportive and part of the story and not just absent or there for plot points.
There was also a lot about friendship, belonging and about skills, and the nice thing is that Glam is very much interested in history and anthropology rather than glamour, but still tries to be as glamorous as she can.
It was super cute to read, the illustrations are spot on and really fun, and there’s a lot f the world and story yet to find out, so I am very curious for the next volume. If you enjoyed any of the series I mentioned above, this is a must read for sure!