The following unabridged reviews are made available under license from their respective rights holders and publishers. Reviews may be used for educational purposes consistent with the fair use doctrine in your jurisdiction, and may not be reproduced or repurposed without permission from the rights holders.

Note: This section may include reviews for related titles (e.g., same author, series, or related edition).

From Kirkus

December 1, 2024
A summer vacation turns out to be anything but relaxing for Greg and a teeming horde of Heffleys. Gramma declines the offer of a grand birthday celebration, saying that "what would make her REALLY happy is if everyone else went to Ruttyneck Island"--though she prepares individual packs of her legendary meatballs. ("You knew exactly how much Gramma likes you by how many meatballs you got.") A gaggle of Heffley relatives and a dog stuff themselves into a small beach house, where overcrowding, personality conflicts, and simmering resentments become just some of the ingredients in a rolling boil of sitcom-style catastrophes, not to mention questionable decisions ranging from leaving the kids to make dinner unsupervised to labeling a cooler "HUMAN ORGANS" to keep random passersby from helping themselves. As usual, Greg supplies the setups in poker-faced journal entries interspersed with black-and-white drawings of slouched figures bearing frowny expressions of dismay or annoyance to cue the laffs. Gramma, it eventually turns out, not only (unsurprisingly) has plans of her own, but is also keeping a shocking secret about those meatballs. To go with the knee-slapping set pieces, Kinney slips in a tasty bit of family lore about how Greg's parents met, plus droll takes on such low-hanging comedy fruit as restaurant manners, viciously competitive board games, and social media influencers (Greg being one, albeit with zero followers, and his Aunt Veronica's little dog being another, with 3.8 million). An entertaining take on family values, Wimpy Kid style.(Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-12)

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

From School Library Journal

November 22, 2024

Gr 3-7-When Gramma's only birthday wish is that the entire extended family go on a trip to their childhood vacation spot without her, Greg finds himself crammed into a one-bathroom beach house with 12 people and a very snooty celebrity dog. As Greg's mom tries valiantly to engage everyone in stifling lighthouse tours and heated board game nights, the trip quickly devolves into a literal hot mess of sisterly squabbles, last-ditch sleeping arrangements, food fights, and even a family trip to jail. Kinney's trademark illustrations add comedic subtext to Greg's hapless stream-of-consciousness narration, and readers will both laugh at and sympathize with his plight. Additionally, readers will find plenty of laughs in familiar chaos agents like Uncle Gary, Rodney, and the twins. There's nothing particularly groundbreaking in this latest installment, but why "mess" with a good thing? Kids will be excited to read about Greg's latest woes. VERDICT Keep "Wimpy Kid" on the must-buy list.-Catherine Cote

Copyright 2024 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

From Publisher's Weekly

November 9, 2015
"Mom says the problem with society these days is everybody's got their nose in a screen, and nobody takes the time to get to know the people who live around them," laments Greg Heffley, who reluctantly kicks it old school in this 10th installment of the über-popular Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. When Mrs. Heffley gets the town to unplug for 48 hours, Greg tries (but naturally fails) to cash in on neighborhood foot traffic with a lemonade stand ("One guy had a problem with the fact that we were using the same glass for every customer"). Grandpa, who has moved in with the Heffleys to save money, is also full of "back in the day" stories; Greg and Rowley finally try playing kick-the-can, but quit of boredom after 30 seconds. A weeklong trip to "Hardscrabble Farm," where Greg and his classmates sleep in primitive cabins and do chores, is the final affront, though it reveals that Greg may come by his artful dodging honestly. Kinney's fans will find the same winning formula: at least one joke every two pages. Expect readers to line up for Greg's latest. Ages 8â€Â"12. Agent: Sylvie Rabineau, RWSG Literary Agency.

From Publisher's Weekly

November 10, 2014
Could a Heffley family vacation ever be anything but a series of escalating tribulations that would test Job's resolve? In this ninth Diary of a Wimpy Kid outing, Kinney detours from the more episodic nature of the earlier books to trace the family's doomed-from-the-start road trip, spurred by Greg's mother's subscription to Family Frolic ("There must be something wrong with our family," Greg muses, "because we can never measure up to the ones in the magazine"). Kinney maintains his knack for getting the details of family life just right (naturally, the only available lounge chair at a wildly overcrowded waterpark is the one with several broken straps). But between the inadvertent acquisition of a pet pig, an attack by a flock of seagulls, Greg getting medical attention at the vet, and baby brother Manny managing to knock the parked family car into drive, there's more out-and-out absurdity in this installment than in previous books. Readers won't care, though, and their own family vacations will look downright blissful by comparison. Ages 8â€Â"12. Agent: Sylvie Rabineau, RWSG Literary Agency.

From Publisher's Weekly

Starred review from November 26, 2007
Kinney’s junior-high diarist returns to chronicle another year’s worth of comic moments in this riotous sequel. Once again, school-related drama constitutes a good portion of Greg’s subject matter, from an ongoing correspondence with a pen pal (“I’m pretty sure 'aquaintance’ doesn’t have a 'c’ in it. You really need to work on your English,” Greg replies to the French student’s polite introduction) to mastering book reports by writing “exactly what the teacher wants to hear” (“There were a bunch of hard words in this book, but I looked them up in the dictionary so now I know what they mean”). As in the previous book, cartoons form part of the narrative, corroborating (or disproving) Greg’s statements. He claims that kids with last names at the start of the alphabet are smartest, and a side-by-side comparison of prim über-nerd Alex Aruda and gap-toothed Christopher Ziegel drives the point home. Additionally, Kinney fleshes out the often testy relationships between Greg and his slacker older sibling, Rodrick, and his little brother, Manny (when Greg gets mad at Manny for shoving a cookie in his video game system, the toddler protests, “I’m ownwy thwee!” and offers a ball of tinfoil with toothpicks shoved through to apologize). The hilarious interplay between text and cartoons and the keen familial observations that set Diary of a Wimpy Kid
apart are just as evident in this outing, and are just as likely to keep readers in stitches. Ages 8-up.

From Publisher's Weekly

Starred review from March 5, 2007
Kinney's popular Web comic, which began in 2004, makes its way to print as a laugh-out-loud "novel in cartoons," adapted from the series. Middle school student Greg Heffley takes readers through an academic year's worth of drama. Greg's mother forces him to keep a diary ("I know what it says on the cover, but when Mom went out to buy this thing I specifically
told her to get one that didn't say 'diary' on it"), and in it he loosely recounts each day's events, interspersed with his comic illustrations. Kinney has a gift for believable preteen dialogue and narration (e.g., "Don't expect me to be all 'Dear Diary' this and 'Dear Diary' that"), and the illustrations serve as a hilarious counterpoint to Greg's often deadpan voice. The hero's utter obliviousness to his friends and family becomes a running joke. For instance, on Halloween, Greg and his best friend, Rowley, take refuge from some high school boys at Greg's grandmother's house; they taunt the bullies, who then T.P. her house. Greg's journal entry reads, "I do feel a little bad, because it looked like it was gonna take a long time to clean up. But on the bright side, Gramma is retired, so she probably didn't have anything planned for today anyway." Kinney ably skewers familiar aspects of junior high life, from dealing with the mysteries of what makes someone popular to the trauma of a "wrestling unit" in gym class. His print debut should keep readers in stitches, eagerly anticipating Greg's further adventures. Ages 8-13.