Whenever You Are

Written by Martine Leavitt

Groundwood Books 
978-1-77946-109-4
192 pp.
Ages 12–18
August, 2026 

 

Seventeen-year-old Finn Kelly is missing. Now Warden Johnson, social worker Mrs. Allish, some guy from the Department of Correctional Services, and Doctor Williams are interrogating—or is that interviewing?—Clemence Todd about his friend's disappearance. Both teens have been in juvenile detention—sorry, Training School—and Clem, who is set to be released soon, tries to help Finn adjust. 

When you first get to this place,

rules are a rut to walk in

when you have no idea

who you are anymore

or where you're going. (pg. 19) 

Though the boys are very different, Clem being a poet and lover of English, and Finn being skilled at maths and sciences, the two form a fast friendship. But, when Clem, who is always aspiring to do Something Fine with his life, tries to help get some dental attention for a fellow student, CO Keeper, as Clem labels him, throws Clem and Finn into ad seg a.k.a. solitary. Clem writes poetry in his mind and declares to Finn on their rare yard breaks that he will do everything to help the young man. But Clem begins to worry about Finn. He was already concerned about Finn's physical health, but when Finn begins to talk of travelling to the past through some space-time wormhole, Clem is unsettled. After a notebook and pen startlingly appear in the tree in the yard, just as Clem wanted, he writes his thoughts, his feelings, his interactions with Finn down in poetry. When Finn disappears—escapes?—Clem uses the poetry in his notebook to help those questioning him to understand what transpired before Finn disappears.

 

Whenever You Are is a complex read of human dynamics, soul-searching, shame, time, space, poetry, and empathy. It's learning to understand yourself and others through challenges, through joys, and through compassion. Martine Leavitt, a master of storytelling and novels in verse, gives us two boys who are as similar as they are different. They've both been detained because of behaviours that lead to injury. Both were accidental, though one happened through conscious choice. Both look to do something better with their lives but accept what they have to do now.

...I know now that there's all this forever

 inside every moment. (pg. 183) 

Martine Leavitt makes the reader think about life in terms of poetry and in terms of space and time. Those who oversee what happens with boys—all labelled simply by one attribute, like Warden, Social Worker, Suit Dude, CO, Doctor—interpret what they see and hear and expect without always understanding. In fact, some never make an effort to do so. (Not surprisingly, the discussions with these characters are always written as prose.) But these young men see more of themselves and others than most of us ever do. They've had to look at what they've done and at the impact they've had on others. But one looks to the future, while the other speaks of travelling back to the past. 

 

Novels in verse is perhaps my favourite genre, and we are blessed with more than a handful of exceptional Canadian writers of it. (I could add to my 2018 booklist of novels in verse easily.) As she has done in her earlier novels in verse, Martine Leavitt impresses by challenging our ideas about how care for others and ourselves. Whether she's examining mental illness (Calvin, 2015) or the sex trade and abuse (My Book of Life by Angel, 2012) or incarceration and shame, Martine Leavitt gives real voice to her characters and their circumstances. She shows us their reality with poetic beauty and gritty spirit. For Clem and Finn, where and when they will land will depend on Martine Leavitt and the lives she has created with them. 

Go

Written by Deborah Ellis

Groundwood Books

978-1-77946-133-9
224 pp.
Ages 9–12

June, 2026 

 

What does the word "go" mean to you? Is it related to travel, to movement, or to leaving somewhere? Is it having a go at something, or playing the game? Is it the euphemistic word for passing away? Or does it relate to how something is functioning? Deborah Ellis, as she did in her earlier short story collections Sit (2017) and Step (2022), examines what a single word can and does mean in the lives of young people.

In three sections, titled "On Your Mark," "Get Set," and "Go," Deborah Ellis tells eleven stories. Each story is named for its main character, though three stories, one in each section, are related to one character named Brodie. Brodie's story begins with his incarceration for an accident on a stolen ATV that led to the injury of a farm worker. His story goes from court to four-month detention and finally release. For Brodie, "go" means going to juvenile detention, thinking about where he might like to go with his life, and choosing to go on.

 

Other stories in the "On Your Mark" section have Joan learning more about herself by dealing with her miserable grandmother and self-absorbed parents, and Janine who finds out about secret family and chooses to go forward with that knowledge and not stay silent. Their goings are just beginnings.

 

In the second section, "Set," Deborah Ellis's stories introduce injustices of the past in Diego Garcia, of the present with a boy in foster care when fires hit a community, and of Uyghurs detained in boarding schools, internment camps, and worse. In the final section, "Go," an unaccompanied Libyan boy is forced into the counterfeit trade, a family reconfigures itself after the death of both parents, and a boy's half-marathon run inspires others to action.

 

Deborah Ellis's protagonists may vary in their circumstances and their locations, but they all live with circumstances generally beyond their control. As young people, some barely teens, they are limited to the circumstances determined by their parents, their guardians, their foster families or the state, regardless of the choices they may make for themselves. It's this uncertainly of care that may quietly or publicly compel them to action. But Deborah Ellis gives them the resolve to decide which way they might like things to go. As in all her books, from her highly-acclaimed The Breadwinner series to more recent My Story Starts Here: Voices of Young Offenders (2019) and The Outsmarters (2024), Deborah Ellis gives voice to those who cannot be heard. Whether they are fictional or not is irrelevant. What is relevant is that they are making decisions about where their next steps go. They may be challenging  themselves to grow or to leave, to help others or to counteract the actions of others. But Deborah Ellis gives them the opportunity to express themselves and go wherever those next steps will take them.

 

• • • • • • • 

 

Sit (2017)

Step (2022)

Go (2026)