How to Make a Friend

This self-help parody is an inventive tale that is sure to delight STEM and science fiction fans. The main character is a young, mixed-race girl who, through first person narration, shows readers how to build a robotic best friend. A funny take on an instruction manual for kids on how to make a friend, this book is packed dead pan humour making it a funny read for older children.

The opening scenes of the book show the girl checking out a library book called “How to Make a Friend” that looks like a vintage instruction manual featuring children and robots from the 1960s/1970s. The illustrations move seamlessly between current female builder and vintage animations from within the pages of the library book. The narrator begins by telling readers how to build your new robot friend and then how to play with them (including what to avoid, like water fights). Sarcasm is on full display in the illustrations that show the two playing like having a tea party and the robot breaks the cups, or playing hide and seek and the robot is clearly visible behind a car, or building a treehouse that have obviously broken under the weight of the giant robot.

With the new friendship now built, the girl tells readers, “Don’t be alarmed or upset if your friend decides to make some other friends.” This good advice is useful for social-emotional learning in children who will inevitably deal with jealousy in their real-life friendships. Unfortunately for our narrator, her new robot friend begins building other smaller robots that, in the subsequent pages, start causing trouble and trying to take over the city through force and lasers. The narrator calmly tells readers, “If you’re worried about them (or for the city), make sure you tell a grownup.” Our brave female narrator takes on her new robot friend and powers him off before he destroys the city. In an easy, flexible tone, she tells readers, “Don’t feel bad. Some friendships just don’t work out… for one reason or another. It’s not your fault.” She encourages readers to try again, and, in the final pages of the book, readers see her and another boy at the library reaching for the same book and making plans to build a robotic dog together.

A great story for back to school, How to Make a Friend can function as a good tool for talking about making new friends, how to evaluate friendships that are not working out, and how to walk away from people who make bad friends. The humour in this book and the vintage illustrations are sure to give adults a chuckle too!