I have elected not to read and review this book due to time constraints. Thank you for the opportunity.

I adored every single minute of this - it is completely unputdownable! You will fall for Maggie 100%. I loved the adventure and the messages in this - stand up for what you believe in, work with your fear and be kind.

Maggie is a middle child in a town that reveres the eldest children. Just in time for her eldest brother to go to “camp” where he’ll be trained to fight in the war, she meets and befriends a “Wanderer” girl from outside of their community. Maggie betrays her new friend to garner favor in the community then realizes she’s made a horrible mistake. She learns that the mayor is selling the eldest children for food and supplies and will soon be selling her friend. Since Maggie is the only one who knows the truth, it’s up to her to makes things right. Entertaining and suspenseful.

A perfect middle grade novel for readers not quite ready enough for dystopian books such as The Hunger Games and for fans of The Giver and Orphan Island. Maggie is the middle child, her older brother has the honor of going off to fight in the war and is seen as a hero, her youngest brother is even treated better than her - a middler. Middlers are oven ignored by their own families. Where they live in the town of Fennis Wick, a town kept orderly and safe from wanderers beyond their boundaries where they are not allowed to cross. Maggie is warned her whole life that evil wanderers wait outside of the boundary and has learned to fear them...until she meets a wonderer girl and gets an idea to be a hero just like her older brother. Maggie devises a plan to capture the wanderer girl so the town will finally see her as a somebody - as a hero. She thinks this will finally get her noticed and seen, but when she steps outside the boundary, she realizes everything she's ever known within her town's boundaries may be all lies.

It's September and Maggie feels unworthy, invisible, and ignored. She lives in Fennis Wick, which is surrounded by a boundary. This boundary sets them apart from the dangerous and unknown. Her older brother is an eldest, Jed, he is known to be brave and heroic. He will soon go off and fight in the Quiet War like all of the eldests do. Maggie is just a middle child, and Trig is her youngest brother. No one praises those that are not eldest.

To get the recognition she wants, she is going to do the unthinkable and capture a wanderer. Rumor has it that there are a lot of wanderers outside of the boundary and she's destined to prove her value. As she goes about the cemetery near the hedge where the boundary is... she meets one–a wanderer. From then on the reader learns about the battle Maggie fights between wanting to believe that all wanderers are dirty, dangerous, and deceitful, and wanting to actually have a real friend. Plus, more disastrous events occur in Fennis Wick and outside of the boundaries.

This book was one that I could not put down. I had to read it in one sitting. The way Applebaum crafted Maggie into a character of "unworthiness", yet a determination to no longer feel invisible was riveting. In Fennis Wick, no one is allowed to cross the boundary but Maggie fights back-and-forth on whether it's worth it. There were moments where I was so happy for Maggie because she found someone that she could talk to and play with, but then I felt so nervous for her because I did not know if Una (the wanderer) was actually deceitful and was going to play a trick on Maggie. The terrible Mayor Anderson was also crafted in a way that was sinister in a sense. I think this book will be great for those who want to escape from reality and delve into a gripping story like this one.

While I was reading this book seemed interesting enough and kept my attention. However, once I finished I pretty much forgot everything about this book. Felt very reminiscent of The Giver by Lois Lowry. Solid middle grade dystopia, but it doesn't have a lasting impact.

I liked this story well enough, dystopian future where the eldest children are treated as special and then sent off to war to keep the rest of the village safe. The main character, Maggie is a middle child, so she is nothing special. Until she finds one of the dirty, deceitful wanderers and thinks she has a way to make a name for herself. Except that nothing is really as it seems. It had a most unsatisfying ending, where none of the evil, power greedy characters had any big consequences. Not my favorite.

4? 3.5? Maggie is a middler—middle child—in a community where eldests are all. Everyone knows eldests are bound for glory, off to camp when they come of age and then to fight in the Quiet War, doing the work of keeping their community shielded from its impact. Eldests win all the awards at school, even if their work is shoddy compared to middlers’, and Maggie’s tired of it all.

There has been a “wanderer” spotting at the border of Maggie’s community. “Dirty, dangerous, and deceitful,” wanderers belong to no community, shunned because they don’t send their eldests—or any of their children—to fight in the war. Maggie and the wanderer, a girl her age, meet, and things take off from there.

Applebaum writes well and the pacing is good. There are whiffs of The Giver and Among the Hidden here, though the book isn’t as overarchingly sociopolitical as those—the purpose not as large. I wish the book had been given a stronger cover. I’m wavering on purchasing it for my public library for that reason—the shades and general effect remind me of The House in Poplar Wood, a strong book whose circ quickly died at my library due, I think, to it not looking that appealing to kids as a face-out.

The Middler by Kristy Applebaum is a great dystopian novel for middle grade readers. Set in the near future during the "Quiet War," eldest children are honored for the heroic sacrifice they make to keep their world safe. The protagonist, Maggie, isn't an eldest; she is a middle child and feels overlooked and left out. She desperately wants to be a hero like her older brother. Middle children everywhere will relate to Maggie's feelings, and many others will relate to her secret desire to be noticed for something. During the course of the novel Maggie meets a new person and has to make decisions about friendship and obeying authority figures. Applebaum explores many important themes like friendship, loyalty, and responsibility while creating an exciting adventure. This is a great introduction to dystopian literature for younger readers.

I received an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Elements of The Giver abound in this middle story about (apparently) an apocalyptic future United States that requires community conformity and the sacrifice of all eldest children to the shadowy "Quiet War." Highly readable, I was hooked early on and found only the epilogue unsatisfying.