The Outsmarters

Written by Deborah Ellis

Groundwood Books

978-1-77306-857-2

248 pp.

Ages 9–13

August 2024

 

We refuse to outmean them and we can never outspend them. We have to outsmart them. (p. 14) 

When you live in a small town and everyone knows your business, you have to be smart or even smarter to get through. Twelve-year-old Kate has to be very smart because her life is so convoluted, and she doesn't even know the half of it. She lives with her Gran after Kate's mom Alyssa abandoned her for her latest boyfriend and her addiction, but Gran is as curmudgeonly as they come. For a woman who runs The Junk Yard, a junk business that carries everything from toys to books, hardware and kitchen stuff, Gran is hardly a people person, and she passes on the hard lessons on life and business that she's learned to Kate. So, to make some money, Kate decides to set up a Philosophy Booth in an old shack on the property and charge "seekers" $2 to get answers to life's questions. Using a roulette wheel and cards with quotes from 32 philosophers from Buddha to Ovid, Kate starts making and saving her money so that she can help Mom leave her latest boyfriend, if she ever gets back in touch.

 

Through her six-week suspension from Grade 6 and into the summer, Kate reads a variety of people, from the crusty Ms. Prawn, their neighbour, who is always complaining about them and their cat Bargain, to junk yard customers Mrs. Doris Blight and Mrs. Jean Rutherford, and a teen Landon who needs advice about getting "them" off his back. Her advice always seems pertinent, and some seekers take it to heart. Without knowing it, Kate is opening up her world to new people and even friends, whom she's going to need when she learns some truths about her mother, Gran, and others.

That's the trouble with thinking. One you get started, it's damn hard to stop. (p. 73) 

Deborah Ellis has always tackled challenging issues in her writing, whether it be non-fiction or fiction and even short story collections. Her most recent books (e.g., Sit, Step, and My Story Starts Here: Voices of Young Offenders) look at everything from detention and abuse, to conflict and poverty. Similarly, some of her most popular books, including The Breadwinner series and Three Wishes: Palestinian and Israeli Children Speak, started important dialogues on children's lives in Afghanistan and the Middle East. While an Ontario location may seem more familiar to many North American readers, the story within is just as gripping as those in unusual settings because of the issues with which Kate a.k.a. Krate (you'll need to read the story to find out why) grapples. From abandonment by a mother with a drug addiction to bullying at school and a reluctance to connect with others as learned from those seemingly broken by life, Kate has been challenged. But, while Deborah Ellis never sugar coats life's challenges, she shows readers through Kate and Gran and Kate's seekers and new friends that there are opportunities to amend choices and open their once-closed worlds a little.

There are a lot of crusty characters in Deborah Ellis' The Outsmarters–of which Kate and Gran are but two–but when you've spent much of your life hurt and scarred by others and their actions or you're worried that someone is trying to take advantage of you or intends harm, that crust becomes a shield. But a shield is a defense and outsmarting someone is an offensive move, getting them before they get you. It's sad to think that outsmarting someone or putting up a shield are the go-to moves for someone as young as Kate but, be sure assured, that her experiences take her to where she can walk with others, accepting help and being an ally as needed.

A Soft Place to Fall

Written by Tanya Christenson

Red Deer Press

978-0-889956384

409 pp.

Ages 12+

January 2022

 

Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls;
the most massive characters are seared with scars. 

~ Kahlil Gibran 

Kahlil Gibran's words may end Tanya Christenson's debut novel, A Soft Place to Fall, but they work well as a preface to a story of struggles, challenges and loss from which triumphs emerge from the ordinary.

The story is told from the perspective of Creighton Fischer, a boy whose singing mom, Gracie Rae, left when he was just five, and whose father's work with the carnival has kept them moving for many years. When, after Creighton's Grade 7 year, Dad decides it's time for them to settle down, they move to Breton, Mom's old home town. Because of gaps in his learning and attendance, it is recommended that Creighton join an alternate school. There, under the compassionate and diverse teaching methods of Ms. Hayworth, Creighton becomes part of a unique cohort. The dozen or so students soon reveal themselves to be impacted by various traumas and disabilities but Ms. Hayworth's approach is to meet their needs and not slot them into the rigid curriculum. And by showing flexibility and empathy, she brings out the best in most of them. That is, except for Carlos a.k.a. Carcass. And for Creighton, he finds his first real friends in Carin, Ratchet and Schooner and the support system he and all of them need to brave the loss of loved ones, economic hardships, bullying, past traumas, criminal charges, and even love.

The twelve kids in Ms. Hayworth's class may attend L.O.S.E.R. (Lane Oslo School of Educational Reform) but they aren't losers. They may be flawed through trauma, mental health, disability or circumstances beyond their control but they are not losers. They are human. Their resilience may at times be shaky but it is undeniable and it thankfully allows them to persist.

 

BC's Tanya Christenson, a teacher and school counsellor, knows kids and she's written these kids as human as you and I. And she doesn't wrap up their struggles with happy endings, ribbons or balloons. Tanya Christenson makes their outcomes as real as the kids. They've suffered abandonment, abuse and upheaval, and they have endured. Sometimes they've triumphed over those struggles and  sometimes not, and like all of us, they have needed support and a soft place to fall. Because, after all, we will all fall some time, some way. I just hope that there will always be a soft place to fall, perhaps even land, for anyone challenged by life. And that's everyone.

The Chandler Legacies

Written by Abdi Nazemian

Balzer & Bray (HarperCollins)

978-1-06-303932-2

336 pp.

Ages 13+

February 2022

 

Through the voices of fourth-formers (sophomores) Beth Kramer, Sarah Brunson and Ramin Golafshar and sixth-formers (seniors) Amanda Spencer and Freddy Bello, readers will enter Chandler Academy in Connecticut, a microcosm of concentrated reality. All the good and bad of the outside world is focalized in that elite boarding school and readers are invited to view it from the multi-faceted perspectives of the story's protagonists.

The year is 1999 and Ramin is entering Chandler for his first time. He may have left behind his great love and the danger of being gay in Iran but he is now subjected to a new kind of homophobia and bullying. However, he finds a place of belonging within the Circle, an exclusive writing group under the guidance of Professor Hattie Douglas. Also invited into this group are Brunson, a driven young woman who writes for the newspaper, the Chandler Legacy; Beth, Brunson's former roommate, who is dealing with anxiety; wealthy, popular, and beautiful actor Spence; and athlete Freddy. Through their writing and Circle meetings, the five become friends and establish a support system that they may not have realized they needed. Their writing may allow them to explore who they are...

 

...even fiction is non-fiction, because it reflects the author's truth. (pg. 76)

 

...but it reveals what the others have been experiencing. And some of that is not good. In fact, some of it is abusive.

 

How these five young people, amidst their peers, teachers and families–good, bad and innocuous–grow into the extraordinary people of Abdi Nazemian's prologue and epilogue of 2008 is the legacy of their time together as Circle members at Chandler. Their legacy is what they learned, what they achieved and what they conquered. They are the Chandler legacies and these are legacies of which they should be enormously proud.

Author Abdi Nazemian jumped on the YA CanLit scene with Like a Love Story (2019), garnering much attention, including a White Pine nomination and selection as a Stonewall Honor Book. With The Chandler Legacies, he has again given voice to a diverse group of young people and exposed their vulnerabilities and strengths in dealing with the challenges of coming of age, including their sexualities, mental health, bullying, friendship, family and self-expression. Beth, Spence, Freddy, Brunson and Ramin each have their own stories, yet they come together to share one as students at Chandler and as young people who are trying to find their ways in a world that is not always just or easy. While there is an introductory comment from the author that some aspects of the story may be triggering–resources are provided if the reader chooses to seek outside help–Abdi Nazemian writes with sensitivity and without the motive of shocking readers. In fact, beyond sensitivity, he addresses the challenges the students are experiencing with compassion, leading them and the reader to understanding and grace.

 

There is a rawness to The Chandler Legacies which is not unlike the experiences endured by Ramin, Beth, Brunson, Spence and Freddy. They struggle with becoming the people they are destined to become, as they question, argue, learn and care. And still they thrive in their world within Chandler so that their legacy is one of hope and courage to do what's right for themselves and others.

Sully, Messed Up: Q & A with author Stephanie Simpson McLellan

Yesterday I reviewed Stephanie Simpson McLellan's new middle grade/young adult novel Sully, Messed Up from Red Deer Press. This story about bullying was so compelling that I asked author Stephanie Simpson McLellan if I could do a Q & A with her to learn a little bit more about Sully and his story. She graciously agreed.

Sully, Messed Up

Written by Stephanie Simpson McLellan
Red Deer Press
978-0-88995-637-7
312 pp.
Ages 11-15
April 2021

Reviewed here

Today I present that interview with author Stephanie Simpson McLellan about Sully, Messed Up.

Author Stephanie Simpson McLellan

HK:  When Sully wakes up on the first day of Grade 9, his face is messed up, with his nose, ears, mouth, nose and eyes relocating themselves around his head. Throughout the story, his facial landscape changes, but no one, except the Purse Lady, can see it. What was the purpose of giving Sully this transforming face?

 

SSM:  When I wrote the first draft of this story many years ago, my own three children were journeying through the often confusing and anxious space called adolescence. I remember well navigating this time myself. Every emotion feels so big and significant, and certainly anxiety – Sully’s prevailing emotion - can feel very physical. Most of us can relate to feeling sometimes that whatever emotion we’re feeling must be obvious – as plain as the nose on our face. So, at the most basic level, Sully’s messed up face is a metaphor for what he’s feeling inside.

Over the last year as I worked with Peter Carver on the book, I started to think also that it was an especially apt metaphor given that, with the popularity of social media, little is private. Both the good and bad things that happen to you— and everything in between—are very public. It’s like one giant bulletin board where everything about you is posted for everyone to see. No hiding! We even post emojis to tell people how we’re feeling, which is like giving people permission to look into your heart. In this vein, the metaphor of Sully’s messed-up face plays with how public everything is these days by taking it out of the digital space and putting it back into the physical world. Sully’s misery feels very public to him—so real and uncomfortable that surely everyone must be able to see his fears and insecurities.


HK:  I loved Mr. C’s fence of figurines whose scenes predict or illustrate Sully’s life and those of others in it. The characters you chose to represent each of the story’s characters, like Charlie Brown for Sully, Sleeping Beauty for Blossom and Madonna for the Purse Lady, were brilliant.  Please tell us about the inspiration for this fence, and how you chose the figurines to symbolize the characters.

 

SSM:  True Street, where the fence is located, is loosely based on a real street in my town that comes off Newmarket’s Fairy Lake Park. While I’ve taken some creative liberties with the actual geography and look of the house that sits on this short street, the real house actually did have a snake-rail fence about a decade ago, to which plastic figurines were affixed and often rearranged. While I never knew (or even saw) the owner, those figurines on the fence intrigued me, and I wondered what motivated someone to do this.

The character of each plastic figurine took some time to sort out. The final cast of characters is probably version six, changing each time I rewrote another draft. I wanted it to be at least somewhat plausible that each figurine could exist, and that readers would know who they were, but also wanted each figurine to reflect and reveal the character it represented. It’s a pretty eclectic mix, but then life (and high school as a subset of life) is a little like that – throwing people together from all sorts of backgrounds.


HK:  As an educator, I was saddened by the ineffectiveness and ignorance of Sully’s teachers and even his principal with regards to his bullying and the hazing carried out in the school. Why do you think they were all so oblivious of these goings-on? Or were they?

 

SSM:  My own kids had some great and not so great teachers. That’s probably true for all of us. I think, truthfully, that the bully/victim dynamic is tough on everyone, and as much as a school can say they don’t tolerate bullies, there are many things that make this difficult to regulate. For one, much of what happens to Sully occurs off school grounds. Secondly, Sully himself hides what’s happening from the teachers and other adults, fearing reprisal from the bullies. My goal wasn’t to paint the school administration as ineffectual but perhaps instead to reflect that there are some kids who fall through the cracks for one reason or another. In my son’s case, I knew there were teachers and administrators who cared, but it didn’t change the outcome. Mr. Green and Ms. Winters are parodies of real teachers I’ve known. The wonderful Ms. Wippet embodies many of the incredible educators I’ve encountered, but even Ms. Wippet can help only so far as Sully permits her to. 

HK:  Outside of bullies Tank, Ox and Dodger, so many characters could have altered the course of Sully’s story in Sully, Messed Up if they had spoken, listened or acted. Sully needed to speak up sooner, teachers and administrators needed to listen and open their eyes, and Sully’s classmates could’ve stepped up rather than act as silent bystanders or reinforcers who perpetuated the bullying with name-calling and laughter.  Which character or characters, outside of the trio of bullies, do you think was most important in that they could have changed everything for Sully by acting differently?

 

SSM:  Sully himself, as he came to realize, was the key to changing everything. Blossom and Morsixx tried very hard to help Sully but I believe that no matter how much we are loved and cared for by others, we are each ultimately responsible for ourselves. We make our own choices. It is up to us to advocate for ourselves. When I reflect back on some of my other books (such as Hoogie in the Middle and The Christmas Wind) I realize the thread of this is in much of what I write.

Eleanor Roosevelt said, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” I’m not saying bullies can’t gain power over others (history gives us enough of those examples), but I believe that on a personal level, you can shrink a bully’s power by refusing to consent to the opinion they have of you. Decide that their opinion is not valid and then live that. Making a decision like this changes the way you think, feel and act. It changes the choices you make.

At one point in the book, I quote Barack Obama’s eloquent line: “Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” I think all the people in the world could have come to Sully’s aid, but it was only when he was ready that he became able to change is outcome.


HK:  Tennyson’s poem “The Lady of Shalott” figures prominently in Sully, Messed Up, both as part of an English assignment but also as reflective of Blossom’s story. Why use this classic ballad to mirror one character’s story?

 

SSM:  My undergrad major was English Lit (with a minor in Economics) and I loved nineteenth century literature. “The Lady of Shalott” poem and the beautiful rendering of it by John William Waterhouse, always stayed with me. When I first conceived the character of Blossom (at a Motocross park in Chatsworth, Ontario where my son was riding), it was with the image of “The Lady of Shalott” in my head: someone ethereal and mysterious; strong and individual, but also someone under the control of something bigger than her and, thus, ultimately fragile.

HK:   Though readers cannot help but feel bad for Sully as a victim of bullying, he is not always a likeable character. He’s so wrapped up in his own issues, monumental as they are, that he can’t see how rude he can be to others like Winston and Blossom and Morsixx. Why make Sully worthy of both our sympathy and occasionally our scorn?

 

SSM:  Not all of us are born leaders and heroes, and certainly Sully isn’t either of those for much of the book. But I think most of us have, or have had, a little bit of this in us. A preoccupation with our own story, unable to see outside our own heads. I wanted to make Sully real, someone deeply flawed who would really have to work at creating the best version of himself. Throughout much of the book, he giftwraps himself as the victim Tank is seeking. He does understand this on some level but hasn’t grown enough to alter it. I do love books where the protagonist is a hero waiting to happen, someone who already has the right ingredients for greatness, but I wanted to pay homage to someone who might never have completely realized his own potential without first being dragged kicking and screaming to this point. I think there are real Sully’s in every school. Kids who are under the radar, who don’t believe in themselves, who are fearful and anxious. I wanted to volley the idea that even these “through the cracks” kids have the potential to pull themselves in a different, and perhaps better, direction.

HK:  If there was one message you would like readers to take from Sully, Messed Up, what would it be?

 

SSM:  I would like readers to reflect on the idea that we are each captain of our own ship. That change starts with us and if we’re not happy with our current reality, it’s up to us to make different choices – including asking for, or accepting, help from others.

• • • • • • •

Sincere thanks to Stephanie Simpson McLellan for agreeing to be interviewed and providing such thoughtful and honest answers to my questions. 

 

Learning even more about Sully, I encourage all educators and school administrators and parents to read Sully, Messed Up to help the young people in their lives.

 

• • • • • • •

Though Sully, Messed Up is Stephanie Simpson McLellan's first novel for young people, she has an impressive collection of children's picture books. Do check out these titles too.

Sully, Messed Up (2021)

The Sorry Life of Timothy Shmoe (2021)

The Christmas Wind (2017)

Tweezle Into Everything (2013)

Hoogie in the Middle (2013)

Leon's Song (2004)

The Chicken Cat (2000)

Sully, Messed Up

Written by Stephanie Simpson McLellan

Red Deer Press

978-0-88995-637-7

312 pp.

Ages 11-15

April 2021

Who is Sullivan Brewster? He's Sullivan to his mom, Rooster to his little sister Eva, and Van to his stepdad Bill. He's Sully to his friend Morty, who has changed his own moniker to Morsixx since reinventing himself over the summer before their first year in high school. And to those who don't know him or want to target him, he becomes Bella, Sally and a host of horrible nicknames. Is it any wonder that thirteen-year-old Sully doesn't know who he is or what he should be doing or who his friends are? He truly is messed up, and that doesn't even count the messing up he's getting from a trio of bullies named Tank, Ox and Dodger.

 

Sully's story seems to start on that first day of Grade 9 when he wakes up with his facial elements relocated around his head.

His nose, pink and dripping, hunkered sideways on his left temple. One of his ears–it was hard to tell which one from the unfamiliar angle–bulged where his nose should have been. The other protruded, antenna-like, right above his lips, which quivered, post-scream, in the middle of his forehead. (pg. 9)

But no one seems to notice. Still, Sully uses his long hair to hide his potential disfigurement. This instead grabs the attention of Tank, the overlord at Wild Forest Secondary, and his sidekicks Dodger and Ox. Worried that he will now become the victim of the Gr. 9 hazing called the Naked Niner, whereby a selected student is unclothed and photographed and publicly humiliated, Sully tries to stay out of Tank's field of view. Unfortunately, everything he does seems to garner him more unwanted attention. 

 

First, he believes his friend and locker partner Morty/Morsixx is drawing too much attention with his new emo boy look and attitude so Sully starts avoiding him by carrying his backpack everywhere, hiding out in the parking lot at lunch and abstaining from taking the bus. Even though Morsixx and Blossom, a new girl who adorns her face and arms with ink of vines and flowers, try to support him, Sully continues to reject their efforts. Then he's given the topic of menstruation for his Sex Education class and Dodger pranks him with countless tampons, earning him the displeasure of the principal and a host of new nicknames.

 

When he begins to walk to and from school, past a purple house on True Street, with its fence adored with an unusual assortment of figurines in ever-changing scenes, Sully becomes acquainted with the Purse Lady who gets his attention when she asks him, "What happened to your face?" (pg. 80) But who is she and why does Mr. C, the strange man in the purple house, seem to know her and Sully and maybe even what is happening in his life, all represented in the figurines of Charlie Brown, the Knight, Sleeping Beauty, Darth Vader and more?

 

School can be a place of refuge for some but for others, especially those who become marked as victims, it can be brutal. And for Grade 9 students, it can be especially challenging. With an implicit hierarchy of power and confusion about the supports which they may or may not have, those preyed upon by bullies may become even more isolated. This is Sully who confuses his friends with contributing to his victimization and who doesn't want to worry his family. He is awkward in discussions with his teachers and his principal and then makes further choices that complicate things for himself. But, while Sully has been victimized, Stephanie Simpson McLellan tries not to play up the young teen as a victim. He is instead confused or rather messed up. He's got all the basics–friends, family, the will– to make things right but, like his face, things just haven't fallen into place correctly. Fortunately, when he can see beyond his personal disasters and into those of others, Sully learns to stand up for himself and help himself adapt. This is an important message for young people and, amidst all Sully's struggles, it's one that Stephanie Simpson McLellan emphasizes. With some insight and a little help from others, Sully is finally able to put to rights his situation and find himself.

• • • • • • • • •

Tomorrow I interview author Stephanie Simpson McLellan about Sully, Messed Up. For middle-graders and early young adults and their parents and their teachers, this Q & A will speak to all of you.

Sugar Falls: A Residential School Story (10th Anniversary Edition)

Written by David A. Robertson

Illustrated by Scott B. Henderson

Colours by Donovan Yaciuk

HighWater Press

978-1-55379-975-7

48 pp.

Ages 14-18

May 2021 

In my family, silence has been the currency of injustice.

~ Senator Murray Sinclair, Foreword to Sugar Falls

 

Too many of the truths about injustices perpetrated against Indigenous peoples have been hidden, suppressed and ignored. With the original publication of Sugar Falls: A Residential School Story in 2011, some of those truths were told, based on the true story of Betty Ross, Elder at Cross Lake First Nation. Today with the release of this tenth anniversary edition of Sugar Falls, I hope even more readers are ready to hear those truths.

 

When a present-day class is given an assignment to look at the residential school system, with strict instructions to approach Elders with respect and an offering, Cree student April offers to introduce Daniel to her Kōkom, an Elder who survived it but whose story even April had not heard.

From Sugar Falls by David A. Robertson, illus. by Scott B. Henderson, colours by Donovan Yaciuk

April's Kōkom takes them into her round room "with all the sacred medicines and within the star blanket of the four directions" (pg. 4) where she would be safe. She prepares by wearing traditional attire, holding an eagle feather and doing a cleansing before she begins her story.

Abandoned at age five into the winter's cold by her own mother who had survived the residential school system, she is found and brought up as a daughter and sister in a loving family. A few years later, after he has a vision of darkness in her future, her father takes her to Sugar Falls where he teaches her to feel the beat of their hearts as drums in rhythm with that of the falls, and that "The beat of the drum represents the strengths of our relationships, between our ancestors, our traditions with Mother Earth, and with each other" (pg. 13) and that remembering this would keep her strong.

From Sugar Falls by David A. Robertson, illus. by Scott B. Henderson, colours by Donovan Yaciuk

Strength is what she will need when soon a grim priest comes and drags her away from that love and comfort to an ominously-large institution where Sister Marie scrubs at her skin and cuts her long hair. There Betsy meets Flora and begins an endless routine that includes prayer and chores and classes. Sadly there is also the abuse, a crack against the knuckles, a slap or a kick for speaking Cree, and the sexual abuse by the priest to whom the girls would close their minds and numb their bodies and pretend the visits were nightmares to be left in the night.

From Sugar Falls by David A. Robertson, illus. by Scott B. Henderson, colours by Donovan Yaciuk

Though Betsy can see across the water and envision home, she has made a promise to her father to be good and listen, so when Flora and a couple of other girls escape across the water, she remains behind. But Flora's death steels Betsy until one day "All I wanted to see was my family again, to wake up from the nightmare and have them by my side." (pg. 34) She walks into the water and remembers Sugar Falls. She is dragged back from the water but her resolve has returned and "no matter what they did to me, I held onto myself, my language and my spirit." (pg. 38)

 

From Sugar Falls by David A. Robertson, illus. by Scott B. Henderson, colours by Donovan Yaciuk

Betsy endured that place for several more years, and later attended high school in Winnipeg. She also changed her name to Betty to honour her friend Helen Betty Osborne who would be murdered.

I did it to keep her memory alive. My story, her story are stories that we should never forget, no matter who we are, they are important to all of us. (pg. 39)

Governor-General award-winning author David A. Robertson does so much in the telling of Sugar Falls. He honours Betty Ross by giving her story new life so that more will know of her courage and resilience and that of so many who endured and those who did not at the hands of a brutal system that never should have happened. Generations later, Indigenous people continue to live in the aftermath of that horrific injustice and with each story told, the silence is broken a little more, allowing an opportunity for justice to manifest.  By giving voice to Betty to speak of her past, from abandonment to loving family and residential school nightmare, and those of her granddaughter and non-Indigenous friend to hear her story from their own perspectives, David A. Robertson lets us see Betty as a survivor with heart, strength and compassion.

Because this is a graphic novel, less needs to be said in text and more can be carried by the artwork, and illustrator Scott B. Henderson and colourist Donovan Yaciuk take on their task with reverence and empathy. The despair of life at the residential school is clear in the starkness and gloom of the shapes, lines and colours of those scenes, with Scott B. Henderson and Donovan Yaciuk saving the brightness for outdoor scenes with family and the contemporary settings of school and Kōkom's home. It was clear where the lightness in Betty's life is, past and present.

Today, with the release of David A. Robertson's tenth anniversary edition of Sugar Falls, there is a new opportunity for the world to listen and see this story, to silence the silence and give survivors of the residential school system, both those who lived it and those whose legacy it is, a chance to tell their stories and have them remembered.

The Life and Deaths of Frankie D.

Written by Colleen Nelson

Dundurn Press

978-1-459747586

256 pp.

Ages 12+

April 2021

 

Who is Frankie D.? Before the girl with the skin that resembles scales had been found, at 10 years of age, dirty and dehydrated in an alley, who was she? Is she the Goth she has transformed into, embracing the darkness and hiding her lamellar ichthyosis under thick makeup? Or is she just an abandoned child, considered too hideous to love by a family? Perhaps she's related to the girl in the old-fashioned dress that keeps appearing in her dreams alongside a circus ringmaster? Whatever her story, it's both one she wants to know and not know. 

 

In the seven years since she was discovered, Frankie has endured fresh traumas, including at the hands of Foster Mom #2's Boyfriend #3. Still, the last two years with Kris Steffanson, the social worker who'd first drawn her out of that alley, have been as close to normal as she can remember. At home anyway. At school, where she is bullied by the Aprils–her name for the beautiful, normal, mean girls–Frankie takes very few classes but her art class with Mr. Kurtis offers her sanctuary before school and confidence for her drawing skills. So it's not surprising that Frankie begins to draw the characters that continue to appear in her dreams. 

When Kris gifts her with tickets to ComiCon, Frankie is thrilled. There she bumps into the new kid at school, Max, whom Frankie suspects is a foster kid too but she is most surprised by his recognition of the man in her ringmaster drawing as Monsieur Duval. At ComiCon, they spot a man who looks like Monsieur Duval and follow him to a booth called the Circus of Marvels and Wonders. There the man, Monsieur Philippe Duval, presents performers that include Concetta, the limbless woman; the contortionist Ahmed; conjoined twins Ella and Elvira; the hirsute Daniel; and Yuri, a magician with Albinism. They are also invited to another performance at a warehouse which Frankie learns is near the alley where she was found at age 10. 

At this event, Monsieur Duval reveals a sepia photo of the girl in Frankie's dream, a girl with ringlets, petticoats and skin like Frankie's, a girl named Frances, the only name Frankie knew when she'd been found in the alley. Then, Frankie is asked if she'd like to join them.

Frankie, with Kris and Max's help, tries to piece together what is happening but, with few people in her life who can give her answers or whom she can trust, it's a struggle for Frankie. Coupled with her dreams which are getting more and more elaborate, and include many of the performers at Monsieur Duval's side show, Frankie learns her place, and that of the others, in Frances's story. But shocking of all is what they want of her.

It's clear from the onset of The Life and Deaths of Frankie D. that there are many layers to Frankie's story and it's this deep mystery of who Frankie D. (D. for Doe) is that grips the reader. Colleen Nelson draws us in and it's impossible to step back from the question of Frankie's story, whether it's before she appears at age 10 or how she is connected to Frances, Monsieur Duval and the others. Her story is layered with the past and the present, and even the future, and then infused with other layers of trust and abuse and bullying and friendship. Fortunately, Colleen Nelson, who is a master in getting into the heads of young people dealing with trauma (check out Blood Brothers (2017), Finding Hope (2016) and The Fall (2013) as three superb examples of this), keeps Frankie's voice authentic, strong when needed, confused when vulnerable, and always real. Colleen Nelson doesn't do platitudes about being resilient ("Being resilient doesn't mean you're going to be okay. It just means you don't give up." pg. 134) or winning over the bullies (there are always bullies) or offer healing of Frankie's skin disorder. What she does so effectively is take the reader along with Frankie, as she dreams, finds her strengths, remembers and evaluates what is and what was, so that she might be able to have a what-will-be. Colleen Nelson makes us care, and shows us that we can be hopeful that Frankie will get the life she deserves, unencumbered by those who deem to use her to get the lives they desire.

☥🎪☥🎪☥🎪☥

An online book launch for The Life and Deaths of Frankie D., along with that for Deborah Kerbel's new middle-grade novel Like A Duck, takes place this Thursday, April 15, 2021. See details here.

My Story Starts Here: Voices of Young Offenders

Written by Deborah Ellis

Groundwood Books

978-1-77306-121-4

224 pp.

Ages 13+

October 2019

Reviewed from advance reading copy

Deborah Ellis's opening words "There but for the grace of God go I" from John Bradford are prophetic ones that resonate throughout her latest young adult non-fiction book as young offenders, recent and not, and others unmask family histories, criminal offences and misdeeds, judgements and outcomes. They are stories that could be anyone's but these are their own voices, told as they lived or recall, and they deserve to be heard.

Over twenty young people, named only by their first name and age, were interviewed by Deborah Ellis, a process which she explains in her introduction. Their stories include domestic abuse, poverty, addictions, bullying, foster care, loss, mental health struggles and family dysfunction. Their stories are as diverse as the individuals profiled and we learn a lot about each person beyond the crimes that drove them into the criminal justice system. But there are the crimes, from theft to assault, vandalism and arson, and trafficking of drugs and weapons. Still Deborah Ellis gives these young people the opportunity to explain. To explain where they came from, what they were thinking, what they were feeling, and how justice may or may not have been served. Many are hopeful, trying to see beyond their pasts and their pains and their crimes, and make futures for themselves and their families for which they might be proud. They're not perfect, but then none of us are, and some minimize their responsibilities for choices made while others own their decisions and circumstances.

I don't know if I'll ever get rid of the pain I'm carrying. Maybe I can turn it into something not so heavy. (Lindy, 19)

But Deborah Ellis does more than just give voice to these young offenders. She offers background information about anger, foster care, abusive relationships, witnessing abuse, restorative justice and the importance of a high school diploma. In a question accompanying each young offender's story, she makes the reader think about how they might address the issues which these young people have experienced and makes suggestions about how to make things better in her "Taking Steps" sections. Still the best advice often comes from the young people themselves.

That little thing that's in the back of your head, that says, "Don't do this!"? Listen to it the first time. (Beth, 19)

In addition to the twenty plus young people she highlights, Deborah Ellis also gives voice to past offenders and those who work with young offenders–these are each identified as a "Voice of Experience"–and family members of offenders. Their perspectives, from the distance of time and the other side of the justice system and from the heartfelt viewpoint of family, give different frames of reference to the hardships with which these young people have been dealt or are dealing. 

Deborah Ellis has always sought justice in letting those whose voices are rarely heard speak freely. From Three Wishes (2004) and Off to War (2008) to Kids of Kabul (2011) as well as Looks Like Daylight (2013), Deborah Ellis has let us hear what Palestinian and Israeli children, children affected by AIDS, soldiers' children, Iraqi refugees, and Indigenous kids have to say. She holds true what Maya Angelou acknowledges so eloquently in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings: "There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you."

With My Story Starts Here, Deborah Ellis has released the untold stories of young offenders and hopefully provided them with another step forward to healing.

The Moon Watched It All

Written by Shelley A. Leedahl

Illustrated by Aino Anto

Red Deer Press

978-0-88995-537-0

32 pp.

Ages 5-9

February 2019

The moon may watch over all of us, sometimes only shining light or hiding in the dark, but, like a watchful deity, it is omnipresent, guiding with a subtle beacon for those seeking direction.

An orphaned boy with only vague memories of a woman's voice and a gentle hand survives alone seeking food and clothing wherever and living in the forest. Elsewhere a woman known as Miranda lives in her home near the woods, rocking and talking to the moon.

She praised it, like she once prized her children, in a time before a time that was then.

From The Moon Watched It All by Shelley A. Leedahl, illus. by Aino Anto

After a man brutally chases the boy away–"Get you, Boy"–he runs far away, finding shelter in a chicken coop and food in an adjacent garden. The moon whispers to Miranda of the boy in the garden but it is not until she is ready to invite him inside for better food and shelter that the two become true companions, finding a way to be themselves with each other.

The Moon Watched It All may be marketed for ages five to nine but I think it is an allegory of such depth that it can and should be read beyond those ages. At its foundation, it is a story of an orphan boy, scorned and rejected, who finds a home with a woman alone who talks to the moon. But, in each, they find the family that they have lost.

From The Moon Watched It All by Shelley A. Leedahl, illus. by Aino Anto

Shelley A. Leedahl's intense story may be in prose form but its intensity parallels that of poetry, steeped in the melancholy of Miranda ...

Her face in the moon's unwavering spotlight. She was a lake unruffled, the coal fire's glow. 

... and the isolation and trepidation of the boy.

Night came calling, and he thought of boots, of heels, and the finger-quick hands. He thought of the children with sticks, and villagers who possessed the power to look right through him. The boy held out his own hand, and could not keep it steady.

From The Moon Watched It All by Shelley A. Leedahl, illus. by Aino Anto

There is a stillness of person and place that seeps into the story which is far more extensive in text and lyricism than in books typically for the very young. As such it has a strength of message that is both serene and profound. It bears being read over and over to capture the importance of the text and its voice of solemnity and grace.  I don't know if that comes from Shelley A. Leedahl's skill as a poet but her words lull and inspire and tug and reassure.

The same goes for Aino Anto's illustrations that take the readers through the forest and beneath the moon, watching and waiting as the boy and the woman do. This is Aino Anto's first picture book and her paintings evoke such emotion without indignation at what are sad circumstances for both the boy, whose identity is only that of Boy, and for Miranda, who endures the passage of time rather than biding it for hope. Or that was the situation until they make a family of their own.

I wept for a mother alone and forgotten and a boy ignored and abused. Each alone in their own ways, one speaking to the moon and one living outside in its light. And the moon watched it all as the two come together, as a waxing moon, growing into something important.

Sadie

Written by Courtney Summers

Wednesday Books

978-1-250-10571-4

308 pp.

Ages 14+

September 2018

If you notice that the book cover is larger than I usually post, it's because Sadie, the book and the girl, should not be relegated to the back or to a corner to be forgotten. In her life, Sadie was neglected and abused and she may have felt insignificant, but she is courageous and responsible, and she deserves to be noticed–and not because of her stuttering–and her extraordinary efforts appreciated.

Sadie begins with the murder of Sadie's thirteen-year-old sister, Mattie Southern, after she'd left their home in Cold Creek, Colorado, ostensibly to search out their mother Claire, who'd left 3 years earlier. Mattie had never given up hope on her mother, an addict who'd showered her meagre love and limited attention on her youngest daughter and essentially ignored or was hostile to her eldest.

I can't even put into words what it's like to swallow down a moment like that, but I can tell you exactly how bitter it tastes. (pg. 55-6)

Sadie had given all of herself to her baby sister and mothered Mattie even more, when at 16, it was just the two of them, abandoned and living in a trailer park run by their surrogate grandmother, May Beth Foster.  When Sadie disappears eight months after her sister's murder and her car found abandoned the next month, May Beth contacts WNRK New York to get some media attention and help. So begins a serialized podcast, The Girls, by producer West McCray, who pursues Sadie's story and consequently Mattie's as well.

The Girls explores what happens when a devastating crime reveals a deeply unsettling mystery. It's a story about family, about sisters, and the untold lives lived in small-town America. It's about the lengths we go to protect the ones we love. . . and the high price we pay when we can't. (pg. 1)

Sadie alternates between The Girls podcast and Sadie's telling of her pursuit of justice for her sister. West's podcast includes narration and interviews with persons of interest as he tries to locate Sadie, all the while unravelling her story. There's May Beth Foster who acts as his home base for information and clarification, and then the people Sadie meets along her journey. The chapters based on Sadie's pursuit of Mattie's murderer begin at an out-of-town diner where Sadie suggests she's looking for her father, always showing a photo of her family with Claire's ex, Keith. From that starting point, she gets one lead after another, desperate to locate the man she is convinced is responsible for Mattie's death. Mixed with reminiscences, many unsettling, as triggered by those she meets, Sadie must uncover Keith's story, told from the points of view of those who considered him a good guy and those who won't reveal much from the cloak of shame and trauma. Regardless, she pursues and inevitably helps in ways she might never know.

Courtney Summers always tells bold stories, whether based on zombies (This is Not a Test, 2012; Please Remain Calm, 2014), on sexual assault and shame (All the Rage, 2015), on bullying (Some Girls Are, 2010) or self-destruction (Cracked Up to Be, 2008). They immerse the reader in tense situations of agonizing brutality, emotional and physical, that rarely have happy endings. But that's reality. Life is not neat and it's not fair. It's raw and real and not for the faint of heart. Courtney Summers sugarcoats nothing. Nothing at all. Even as West McCray speaks to witnesses or persons of interest, they spin Sadie's story with an effort to make themselves look better. It's not honest but it's real. Take Claire, for instance. This woman cared more for the child who looked like her than the one who didn't (and blames that on her youth, her mother's death and May Beth); neglected her children in favour of her addiction; sends an abuser packing only when she suspects he might have attacked her favourite; abandons her children for years; and blames West McCray when he can't find Sadie. Yikes. Sadie's story is gut-wrenching in itself: bullied for her stuttering, neglected by her mother, abused by her mother's boyfriend, abandoned, becoming a surrogate parent to a resentful child, and grief-stricken for her beloved sister. Her story is almost too much to take.

Don't look for a happy ending in Sadie, and it's not because Courtney Summers ends Sadie with another tragedy. It's just hard to tell what kind of an ending Courtney Summers has given readers. While there is justice, Courtney Summers also leaves a gaping hole in Sadie's story that readers will need to fill, either with hope for a new story for Sadie or with another tragedy to complete her original one. Read Sadie and let me know what you think happened to this fierce young woman because her story is far too important to let her be forgotten.

Fifteen Point Nine

Written by Holly Dobbie
DCB
978-1-77086-523-5
240 pp.
Ages 13+
June 2018

The bullying that fifteen-year-old Agatha Murphy and others endure at the hands of “Those Girls” and the “Idiot Boys” who follow them around is physical, degrading and unconscionable.  They only see that Susan is overweight, that Carson is very small, that Travis is highly intelligent, and that Nicole has sweat issues. But it’s Aggie’s countless issues that are at the heart of Fifteen Point Nine. Aggie’s mother Jane is a paranoid alcoholic who scavenges and hoards and is oblivious to her daughter’s needs for food, clean clothes, and even a functional washroom. The bullies may ridicule Aggie for being dirty and smelling, as well as rummaging for food, but they and everyone else, including the school, doesn’t know about her mother and Aggie’s need to self-harm to relieve her anxiety and despair. Aggie may lighten that despair with barbed monikers including “The Torture Chamber” for school and “The Dump” for home, by ranking potential moments on her Official Romantic Scale, and by imagining outrageous scenarios that would whisk her away, but Aggie knows her situation is becoming intolerable.

I’m going to try to be more of a human being and less of a rodent, although it’s obviously something that I’m not very good at. (pg. 14)

In an attempt to take some control, Aggie decides to use an old camcorder to document the bullying in all its visual and audio horror. Unexpectedly, Susan becomes an ally in Aggie’s video endeavour, as do Carson, Travis and Nicole. These teens, deemed misfits by their cruel peers, become the Warriors Video Club and resolve to expose the bullies.

While Aggie continues to suffer at the hands of her horrid mother and the bullies, there are unexpected glimmers of something better, including  kindness from a school janitor and several moms, some Johnny Cash-infused wisdom from Jane’s newest suitor,

"Pain ain’t no good thing. Aint’t nobody out there gonna hand you a prize for storin’ shit in your heart.” (pg. 185)

and, most importantly, notes from an anonymous boy who wants her to attend the Winter Solstice Carnival dance. But, when a classmate commits suicide, Aggie’s perspective on survival and taking charge is put to the test.

Fifteen Point Nine may be Holly Dobbie’s debut novel but her teaching experiences with teens have served her well in telling the story convincingly. For those living through bullying, parental neglect, suicide of a peer and dejection, the authenticity of Fifteen Point Nine will hit hard, particularly in its harshness and near hopelessness. Still, Holly Dobbie makes it clear that, for those who do suffer at the hands of others, every day of survival is a victory and making it past fifteen point nine (just less than sixteen years of age) is a triumph.


(A version of this review was originally written for and published in Quill & Quire, as noted in the citation below.)

Kubiw, H. (2018, September). [Review of the book Fifteen Point Nine, by Holly Dobbie]. Quill & Quire, 84 (7): 37.

A Girl Like That

Written by Tanaz Bhathena

Farrar Straus Giroux

978-0-374-30544-4

369 pp.

Ages 13-18

February 2018

Zarin Wadia, sixteen, is A Girl Like That. She's seen as provocative, rebellious, and clever but her story is one of tragedy from birth to her death.

Zarin's death, along with that of a young man, Porus Dumasia, in a car accident is not a surprise ending. It begins the book with Zarin's guardians, Masi (mother's sister) and Masa (maternal uncle), and Porus's mother wailing over the dead teens. How they got there which is essentially Zarin's back story is the story of A Girl Like That. Told in multiple voices of Zarin, Porus, a gossipy classmate Mishal, and a boy Farhan with whom Zarin becomes involved, Tanaz Bhathena's first young adult novel is a study in nature vs. nurture for a teen whose origins were considered shameful and whose upbringing was rife with physical and emotional abuse. 

Memories...can be like splinters, digging into you when you least expect them to, holding tight and sharp the way wood did when it slid under a fingernail. (pg. 27)

Zarin is never made to feel like she belongs. Not with her Masi and Masa who take her in after her unmarried mother's death or at Qala Academy, the school she attends after they move from India to Saudi Arabia. She is shamed at home by her abusive and mentally ill Masi–and infrequently defended by Masa–for her illegitimacy, her gangster father and issues related to her being a girl. At school, a place where rumours are currency, especially for Mishal the anonymous BlueNiqab blogger and gossip monger, Zarin's classmates look down their noses at her for her heritage and standoffish ways. Still, Zarin endures. She hides the abuses and thumbs her nose at those who shame her. She smokes and she goes riding in cars with boys, an offense according to Sharia law.

And then her childhood Parsi friend, Porus, moves to Jeddah with his mother after the death of his beloved father. Zarin and Porus resume their friendship though it is an unconventional one, with Porus completely smitten and Zarin dating other boys and not sure she is capable of loving anyone. When Zarin is the victim of an assault by Farhan, her world at home and school dissolves into a muddy mess of anger, gossip, shaming, and revenge, with Zarin's desperately searching for courage and safety, within and without.

A Girl Like That is garnering much attention because of Tanaz Bhathena's story about gender inequality and religion-based social restrictions in Saudi Arabia. By focusing on a world that is intimate to many but foreign to so many others, Tanaz Bhathena is both honouring those who live Zarin's life and educating those unfamiliar with the restrictions and distinctions of living with abuse, segregation, cultural discrimination, gender inequality and religious policing.  But beyond the cultural milieu, A Girl Like That is still a statement about the need for self-expression, to fight self and others, to become who you are. Zarin's story is still a tragedy for the abuses inflicted upon her by family, both young men and women, and her cultures but she finds a way to fly, even without wings.

Because a bird only learns to fly when its wings are broken. (pg. 318)

The Whirlpool

Written by Laurel Croza

Illustrated by Kelsey Garrity-Riley

Groundwood Books

978-1-77306-032-3

96 pp.

Ages 10-14

May 2018

Don't be deceived by the simple cover illustration and the less-than-100 page count. The Whirlpool, a collection of seven short stories from award-winning picture book author Laurel Croza, is not an early reader.  Its stories are sophisticated and aimed at upper middle grades, covering a wide variety of issues from emotional abuse and grief to destiny and bullying.

In It's a Step, the narrator Charity lives with her mother and abusive father.  As her dad rails against her mom taking a job at Tim's, both mother and daughter find the means to take a small step to a better life.  In Book of Dreams, Mike finds the support he doesn't get at home from his mom and her latest boyfriend at a restaurant where he gets respect, appreciation and a turkey dinner. While a very different story in terms of characters, OH! is also about finding home. The Oh! So Perfect Hair Dolly goes from factory to store shelf and dreams of being named by a child. The desolation of being passed over during Christmas shopping and then being relegated to the reduced price bin is reflective of any child who has felt unloved.  

The Whirlpool is the story of fifteen-year-old Jasmine who is the brunt of swirling rumours at the whirlpool that is school about her having a baby. As she deals with the gossip and nastiness, Jasmine resolves to "look the whirlpool in the eye" (pg. 30) and reveal her story. A Beautiful Smile also looks at nastiness at school, this time with a young teen from the north standing up to a mean girl at her new Toronto school. Most satisfying is the public and clever way in which Nicola finds support and salvation.

Although all the stories have something important to impart, my two favourite stories are The Sunflower and Destiny. Though told from the perspective of a squirrel, The Sunflower is neither trite nor silly. It is an emotional story about loss and grief and making connections, and I defy anyone not to sob at its telling.  Destiny is a revealing story about following one's dreams, regardless of others' desires and opinions.  Johnny helped inspire his younger sister Dani to play hockey even when her father thought figure skating would be more appropriate. Dani persevered and changed her father's mind about her playing hockey. Now, with Johnny drafted to the OHL, she wants to help her brother accept his true destiny too.

Each story in Laurel Croza's collection is packed with emotional growth, from taking first steps to fulfilling one's destiny, or saving yourself, or accepting strengths and weaknesses as part of the whole package. The stories may be brief (each less than 20 pages) but they wallop you with the power of their storytelling, dialogue and message. My favourite, The Sunflower, does that all in five pages.

I shouldn't be surprised that Laurel Croza can weave such powerful tales. Her highly-acclaimed picture books, I Know Here and From There to Here, which were beautifully illustrated by Matt James, conveyed amazing stories in few words. But these stories are not picture book tales transformed into text. They are not for our youngest readers, though, because of the length of the books, parents and teachers might expect them to be so.  The stories in The Whirlpool collection deal with issues of abuse, gossip, abandonment, and death. While these are issues with which younger readers may be familiar, the older protagonists in Laurel Croza's stories suggest that older middle grade readers might understand the messages better.

I've always loved short story collections for the breadth of stories that can be told and the piecemeal manner in which the text can be read. They are potent teaching tools and convenient for reading in shorter time periods. With The Whirlpool, Laurel Croza has provided a worthwhile addition to the youngCanLit collection of short story anthologies as it enlightens, reassures and inspires.

Beware That Girl

by Teresa Toten

Delacorte Press

978-0-553-50790-4

336 pp.

Ages 14+

May 2016

Kate and Olivia.  Two eighteen-year-old seniors at a private school known as Waverly in New York City.  It’s hard to tell which girl is “that girl” mentioned in the title Beware That Girl.  Kate, the brilliant, manipulative liar who plans out every step she takes to ensure she gets the “big life she wants” or Olivia, rich and beautiful but emotionally fragile “just messed up enough” (pg. 4) for Kate to befriend.  The two secretive girls are “Two unlikely peas in a pod” (pg. 47) in more ways than one.

Kate O’Brian, a high-achieving Waverly scholar, is determined to get to Yale regardless of her current status as a basement boarder and employee at Chen’s Chinese Market and Apothecary.  Also working mornings at the school office, Kate searches for her ticket out of her miserable situation and targets Olivia Sumner whose record indicates missed school due to psychological issues.  The two girls become acquainted and, when charmed by the new director of fundraising, the charismatic Mark Redkin, to start a Student Advancement Committee, Kate gets Olivia, as well as classmates Serena, Morgan and Claire on board.  Soon Olivia has asked Kate to move in to the penthouse she shares with her globe-trotting lawyer father and their housekeeper Anka.

“Becoming friends was a kind of courtship.  A ritual of presenting your best self to the other.  Each knew not to push too much, too fast.  In their conversations, the girls reached for all their similarities willfully ignoring the differences.” (pg. 38)

It’s the differences and secrets that still separate the girls, neither being completely honest about their pasts and fears and desires.  They each have an agenda for their friendship, which becomes all the more complicated when Olivia becomes involved in an intimate relationship with Mark Redkin.  Recognizing him as a “player of biblical proportions” (pg. 120), Kate sees Redkin as more than a threat to their friendship, realizing that “Redkin was going for power, information and amusement.  What a trifecta.” (pg. 155)

Beware That Girl is a suspense-laden, surprise-ending story that provides a glimpse of a friendship based on the instability of secrets and schemes.  And even though there are moments of affability and benevolence–usually involving the irascible Mrs. Chen, the girls’ shared mutt Bruce, and the thoughtful Johnny who is crushing on Kate–Teresa Toten’s intimate portrayal of a friendship initiated in manipulation will disquiet the reader.  From the onset of the book, a scene in which one girl sits at the hospital bed of another while the police wait to question them, Beware That Girl is dominated by uncertainty and foreboding.  Teresa Toten may tease the reader with storylines that intimate which character should be heeded but you’ll never know for certain.  That is, until her crushing ending that reveals the strength of Teresa Toten’s plotting, story-telling and characterizations.  Don’t be alarmed if you have to reread the final four-page chapter–I did–just to assure yourself that this masterful writer has truly reconciled all those secrets and agendas in a bombshell of an ending.  She does and it is.

Forever Julia

by Jodi Carmichael
Great Plains Teen Fiction
978-1-927855-20-1
262 pp.
Ages 14+
April, 2015

Julia Collins must feel like she's living her life from out-of-body. And with the life she has, I might want out too. Her much-adored dad has passed from cancer just 6 months ago, and her Mom is so grief-stricken that she can't even bear to speak of him.  They now live in a small two-bedroom flat above their bookstore and money is an issue, though Julia had never minds thrift-store shopping with her long-time best friend and creative fashionista, Annika, who understands about Julia's issues with depression and anxiety and watches out for her constantly.

But now Julia is going out with the obscenely wealthy Jeremy Thurston, a.k.a. the Third, jock and popularity icon, and he is pressuring her to have sex, though she has made it clear that she is not ready.  The gutsy Annika can’t stand Jeremy and makes it clear every time he pulls some stunt, like kicking Julia out of the ski chalet where they were supposed spend the night when she refuses his advances yet again.  Sadly, in her mind, Julia is convinced that she can have it all: the wonderful dating relationship with Jeremy who calls her “beautiful”; new friendships with the popular girls; a scholarship to USC for architecture; and the best friendship she has ever had.  Imagine thinking,

Maybe if I convince Annika to tone down her wardrobe, Jeremy would see how incredible she really is and then maybe everyone would get along. (pg. 105)

Sadly naïve, but probably not atypical for a teen who is trying to work everything out.

Then Grandma, who generally splits her time between Arizona and the cottage, arrives to stay–in Julia’s room–while being treated for breast cancer.  Now both Grandma and Mom are watching her and what’s going on around her, and they’re not always pleased by what they see.

It’s not surprising that Julia questions everything that she feels but what’s worse is that she never trusts her feelings to be legit or honest.  Whether that’s because of her anxiety or depression is irrelevant.  All that matters is that the life that was once warmed with Dad and Mom happily living in a modest home and with a reliable and loving BFF is now a life she doesn’t even recognize as her own.  Who is the girl who lets herself drink when she knows it’s verboten with the meds she’s on?  Who is the girl who kisses her boyfriend in public like there's no one else around?  Who is the girl who apologizes to a guy who thinks nothing of stranding her at a ski resort when she doesn’t want to have sex?  Jeremy may get a tattoo, even a temporary one, that reads “Forever Julia” but Julia can’t be forever when she doesn’t  know who she is, who she wants to be, or who she can be.

Jodi Carmichael gets inside of this Julia and gives her a true voice, albeit one mixed and confused with guilt, grief, envy, desire, and affection.  Julia definitely morphs over the course of Forever Julia though I suspect she hasn’t come into herself completely, yet. Forever is a long time to be someone, to love someone, to trust someone, to be friends. It may be possible but maybe not.  Not everything can be forever: not life, not love, not lust, not even family nor  friends.  And Jodi Carmichael makes sure that Julia accepts this, even if only temporarily, in Forever Julia.

Switch

by Douglas Davey

Red Deer Press

978-0-88995-524-0

252 pp.

Ages 15+

2014

Back in 1988, when Sheldon Bates was seventeen, a confusing encounter during swimming practice sets him asking big questions about his sexuality. Now, through his personal notes from the time, footnoted with his current thoughts, Sheldon records that tumultuous year of discovery, fear, discomfiture, bullying, and understanding in Switch.

Though dating Jenny, to whom he is wildly attracted, Sheldon conducts a little experiment and some research, hoping to clarify for himself what he is feeling. His wish, "Please, please, please let me not be gay..." (pg. 22), suggests his ensuing stress and incomprehension, not surprising in a time when discussions of sexual orientation were verboten and information limited to a dictionary and a thesaurus. And, if he can't understand it, how will Jenny, best friend Dan or older brother Bill react? Sadly, not as he expects, and his personal issue becomes fodder for school gossip and verbal and physical abuse.

I ate. I slept. I went to class. I watched TV. I looked like I was awake but in fact I was sleepwalking through life with no clue how to wake up or get out. After a while, the terrible flow of days became a gray smear. (pg. 79)

Two things change everything. First, Sheldon is invited to join several other students at lunch in Room 115. There in Mr. Aiden's classroom, Sheldon feels safe. He can access a cupboard of relevant informational books and pamphlets. He can also choose to interact with a handful of students grappling with their own sexuality. Secondly, his English teacher, Mrs. Piedmont, assigns her students speeches, and Sheldon thinks about focusing on what he's going through as a possible topic. That decision will bring Sheldon both tragedy and deliverance.

I, for one, would never want to return to my high school years. Even without the aggravation of questioning your sexual orientation, teens have so much with which they must deal: puberty, body image, independence, career choices, responsibility. And not every teen has resources available to help them navigate those complicated treks. In the late 1980s, with no internet, with the AIDS crisis, and the secrecy virtually mandated by societal discrimination, the topic of bisexuality was still taboo, and kids like Sheldon would inevitably be left floundering for support. How he was able to survive, emotionally and physically, is both remarkable and gratifying. Douglas Davey, who was able to evoke that same trepidation and confusion in M in the Abstract (Red Deer Press, 2013), keeps readers repeatedly wondering how Sheldon will address his latest dilemma, or whether he will expose himself to more abuse by speaking publicly of his bisexuality, or when he will ask for the support of the school's administration or his parents. It is hard to believe the youthful Douglas Davey could present the 1980s of Sheldon's story so completely but that grey haze of being exposed to public scrutiny and discrimination is subtly exposed as a sign of the times and hopefully one that efforts have been made to rewrite.

Switch should belong in the 2015 version of Mr. Aiden's cupboard or, better yet, in high school libraries where everyone and anyone, regardless of sexual orientation, could share in the emotional turmoil of Sheldon Bates. Douglas Davey is providing us with the insight that, with greater awareness, could help us become more empathetic to those struggling with issues of sexual orientation. Let's hope we all accept Switch as that tool for learning.