Review Detail

The Parent Agency

Middle Grade Fiction 239

Be Careful What You Wish For

February 25, 2016 (Updated: June 29, 2026)

Overall rating

4.0

Plot

4.0

Characters

N/A

Writing Style

N/A

Illustrations/Photos (if applicable)

4.0

Barry is tired of his parents. They are weird and boring and won't throw him the kind of James Bond birthday party he wants. His twin sisters are annoying as well. When he is approached by The Parent Agency to pick new parents after trying five different sets of them, he jumps on the opportunity. Using his list of things wrong with his parents, he asks for parents that are wealthy, famous, like him best, and basically are NOTHING like his boring parents. He has several birthday parties thrown for him, with various stages of success. His wealthy parents are also criminals, the famous parents are even more annoying, and in general, life is not an improvement even with amazing opportunities and material advantages.

Good Points

This has a very British, classic feel to it, and is definitely a goofy book. All of the parents, even Barry's own, are over the top in whatever their defining quality is. While Barry is demanding and judgmental of his own parents at first, he does learn a lot from being with different families, and it comes as no surprise when he starts to appreciate his own. The journey, however, is the amusing part of this. Parents who would allow a child to stick his head under a chocolate fountain, let him eat all of the candy that he wanted, or write and sing a song about the child on national television seem like a good idea... at the time!

While this is not a notebook novel, there are enough funny illustrations to intrigue readers of Big Nate and Wimpy Kid, and elementary aged readers who have ever been annoyed with their own parents (and this has to be almost all of them) will appreciate Barry's struggles with trying to get his own way.