The Dork Diaries series is ongoing, and over 5 million books have gone to print in the United States, with translations in 38 languages across nearly 50 countries. Currently, there are 14 books, with book 15 (Dork Diaries: I Love Paris!) set to be released in May 2023. The books are written in a diary format, similar to other popular series, such as Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney and The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot. The novels are complemented by shorter in-between volumes that offer side stories about Nikki’s group, and Russel has also published a spin-off series, The Misadventures of Max Crumbly, which focuses on the title character. Max Crumbly first appears in Dork Diaries: Tales From a Not-So-Perfect Pet Sitter, and his books also detail the trials of middle school in diary format.

The Dork Diaries journal format is rendered in both text and images, including individual doodles at key moments and longer comic-strip-type groups of pictures where appropriate. In Tales From a Not-So-Fabulous Life, Russel often includes pictures at moments of high emotion or as a complement to the text. Single images are captioned in Nikki’s signature style, humor, and attitude.