When Antigone “Tig” Ripley’s frenemy Will makes the ridiculous pronouncement that girls are too snarky and jealous to be in a band together (“Girl bands are gimmicks. They don’t work.”), she considers the gauntlet thrown down. With the help of her grandfather—a former 1960s rocker—Tig takes up the drums and invites a few other middle-school girls to join her band, Pandora’s Box. The girls’ abilities vary widely, and their personalities are even more diverse, which means that making music as a band requires lots of practicing and working through challenges, heckling, and disappointments. Rue examines the benefits of hard work, the delight of pursuing your dreams, and the real meaning of friendship in this uniquely quirky story that will draw in even the most reluctant (and least musical) of readers. This effervescent novel captures the essence of both middle school—the bullies, the struggles, the temptations—and music. Rue has struck the perfect chord for middle school readers everywhere in this series starter.