Then
I came to California Diaries because of Dawn, and stayed because of Sunny. The diary format felt different from the BSC books — more immediate, more personal, like reading something I wasn’t supposed to. Sunny’s mother was dying. Ducky was lonely in ways that were hard to name. Maggie had a complicated relationship with food that the books handled carefully and directly.
These were BSC kids but the problems were bigger. I was old enough to want that.
Now
California Diaries was Martin’s attempt to write about the actual texture of early adolescence, and it holds up better than I expected. The diary format is well-used — each character has a distinct voice, which was a real achievement across seven books. Sunny’s arc in particular is wrenching: her grief over her mother is written without false comfort.
The series only ran fifteen books total but these first seven establish the world fully. What’s notable now is how the books trusted young readers to sit with ambiguity — situations that don’t resolve, feelings that don’t simplify. That was relatively rare in 1997 Scholastic and it’s still relatively rare.
Having all seven together feels right. These were always meant to be read as a set.