Dork Diaries: Tales from a Not-So-Fabulous Life

Nikki Maxwell is the protagonist and point-of-view character of Dork Diaries. Nikki wants to be popular but fears she’ll only ever be seen as a dork. When she’s excited, she tries to act calm and cool on the outside, but inside, she’s “jumping up and down and doing [her] Snoopy ‘happy dance.’” (3)—a reference to the dog from the Charlie Brown stories, who shows excitement by waving his arms and legs around. Throughout the story, Nikki’s experiences lead her on a journey toward self-acceptance. In the early chapters, she wants nothing more than to be accepted by her school’s “CCP” (cool, cute, and popular) crowd. She denies her own tastes and interests, tries to seem as if she has more money and access to expensive things than she really does, and longs for attention from MacKenzie Hollister, a “popular” girl whom she actually dislikes. Her greatest fear is being labeled a “dork”—a term as nebulously defined as its opposites, “cool, cute, and popular.” Deep down, Nikki knows she doesn’t fit in with the CCP group. Her appreciation of Brandon’s offbeat humor, her distaste for people like MacKenzie who are nasty to everyone they don’t approve of, and her love of reading and