When a house appears one day at the end of Juniper Drive, Jacqueline “Jac” Price-Dupree’s reaction isn’t what you’d expect from most 12-year-olds, but Jac isn’t like most 12-year-olds. Five years ago, she was diagnosed with a cancer that should have killed her—but didn’t. Ever since, Jac has been haunted by the fear that it might return, so when she sees the house, she wonders if it’s a hallucination. If it’s a symptom.
Jac confirms that the house is definitely real when she, her friend Hazel and two neighborhood bullies become trapped inside it. As they search for a way out, the house conjures surreal terrors that all seem connected to Jac’s deepest fears, from a library filled with typewriters clacking out sickening missives, to a horrifying creature called the Mourner that stalks them through the house, to a message scrawled on the kitchen wall: “The House You’ve Been Entering Always. Welcome Home, Jac.”
Author Ally Malinenko’s second middle grade horror novel, This Appearing House, contains plenty of imaginative frights to creep out even the most fearless young connoisseur of scary stories. But by creating a house that’s haunted by Jac’s fears of her cancer’s recurrence, Malinenko brilliantly transforms her novel into a survival tale of the truest kind. In order to escape the house, Jac must find the answer to a question that every person who has lived through—or continues to live with—the trauma of serious illness must eventually confront: How do you keep living when you have come so close to death?
Through Jac, Malinenko also offers a vital corrective to narratives of disease and disability still commonplace in children’s literature. “Warriors. That’s what they called kids like her. But Jac didn’t feel like a warrior,” Malinenko writes. As she sensitively evokes Jac’s experience of diagnosis and treatment, Malinenko expertly captures the way stories that encourage people to “be brave” and “never stop fighting,” can become traps, prisons in which no admissions of fear or vulnerability can be admitted. Early in the novel, when Jac breaks a ceramic bowl she’d been working on in art class, her teacher offers a moving new perspective: “Everything breaks. . . . But everything can be remade. There is beauty in the breaking and remaking of a thing.”
At once an inventive and satisfying haunted house story and a powerful exploration of coming to terms with and beginning to heal from trauma, This Appearing House is a triumph.
By creating a house haunted by a young girl’s fear of the recurrence of her serious illness, author Ally Malinenko brilliantly transforms This Appearing House into a survival tale of the truest kind.
Kwame Alexander opens a planned historical fiction trilogy with The Door of No Return, which takes place in 1860, near the end of the transatlantic slave trade. Eleven-year-old Kofi Offin lives in the Asante kingdom, in what is now Ghana. Kofi holds deep respect for his grandfather, the village storyteller, who always begins his stories by saying, “There was even a time . . .” In this time, Kofi has a crush on Ama, a girl in his class. In this time, Kofi and Ama’s teacher forces them to speak English instead of their native language, or face the wrath of his cane. And in this time, Kofi’s older brother, Kwasi, will unintentionally alter the fate of their entire family, and Kofi will have to draw on all of his grandfather’s wisdom to survive.
Alexander has been convincing middle grade readers that poetry is cool since his 2014 book, The Crossover, for which he won the Newbery Medal. Like many of Alexander’s earlier books, The Door of No Return is told mostly in enthralling, action-packed verse. Alexander is an eloquent craftsman with a deep awareness of the power of every word in a verse novel, and that awareness shines on every page of this book. Typographic manipulation, such as changing the size of the text, is used sparingly, which makes those moments particularly impactful.
The book is not entirely written in verse, however. Each of its seven chapters begin with a prose story narrated by Kofi’s grandfather, Nana Mosi. These tales offer context and foreshadowing in equal measure, culminating in a heartbreaking ode to storytellers, “The Story of the Story,” in which Nana Mosi warns that “until the lions tell their side of the story, the tale of the hunt will always celebrate the hunter.”
Some of Alexander’s most beloved works, including The Crossover, incorporate sports as both subjects and extended metaphors. Alexander continues—and elevates—this approach in The Door of No Return through Kofi’s aptitude for swimming. Kofi receives his second name, Offin, because he was born in the very river where he now finds sanctuary after school.
The story of African Americans did not begin during the middle passage. Every person who was enslaved came from a home with a rich history and unique culture. Their stories have been told in excellent books for young readers, including Sharon Draper’s Copper Sun; Nikole Hannah-Jones, Renée Watson and Nikkolas Smith’s The 1619 Project: Born on the Water; and Ashley Bryan’s Freedom Over Me. But many more are needed, and there’s no one better to add to this vital canon than Alexander.
Kwame Alexander brings his deep awareness of the power of verse to this story of an African boy named Kofi, set near the end of the transatlantic slave trade.
How would a middle schooler navigate an unspeakable tragedy? That’s the subject Liz Garton Scanlon beautifully explores in Lolo’s Light, her second middle grade novel.
Twelve-year-old Millie is thrilled when she gets her first babysitting job. Her older sister isn’t available, so Millie gets to watch their neighbors’ 4-month-old baby, Lolo. The Acostas make the job easy, putting Lolo to bed before they leave so Millie just needs to check on her. As Millie revels in her new responsibility, she feels “something shift, like that exact moment [is] the end of her being a kid and the beginning of her being real, full-grown Millie.” The night goes swimmingly and the Acostas return home to find that all is well. But the next morning, the world turns upside down, because overnight, Lolo dies of SIDS.
Garton Scanlon clearly establishes that no one is to blame for this tragedy while also conveying Millie’s ongoing feelings of shock and anguish. As Millie grieves, she is also haunted—and comforted—by a light that seems to emanate from Lolo’s bedroom window whenever Millie walks past the Acostas’ house, which Millie believes is Lolo’s presence.
Millie receives support from numerous caring adults, including her parents, her teacher, her school librarian and a therapist, as well as the Acostas. Garton Scanlon makes superb use of Millie’s seventh grade science project, hatching chicken eggs, as a focal point for Millie’s sorrow, depression and growing anxiety. As Millie’s teacher tells her, “You are trying to make sense of something very big and ancient and scary. You’re trying to process how unbelievably fragile life can be.”
Despite its heavy topic, Lolo’s Light is ultimately a hopeful book about healing that captures how much hard work, along with time, the process can require. Garton Scanlon infuses the story with perfect moments of humor, too, such as the many puns that arise during the science project scenes. (Millie’s science project group’s name, “the Egg-ceptionals,” is only the beginning.)
In writing Lolo’s Light, Garton Scanlon undertook a monumental challenge. The result is a compelling novel that glows with understanding and empathy.
Author Liz Garton Scanlon undertakes a monumental challenge in Lolo's Light. The result is a compelling novel that glows with empathy and understanding.
When a house appears at the end of Juniper Drive, Jacqueline “Jac” Price-Dupree’s reaction isn’t what you’d expect from most 12-year-olds, but Jac isn’t like most 12-year-olds. Ever since she was diagnosed with cancer five years ago, Jac has been haunted by the fear that it might return, so when Jac sees the house, she wonders if it’s a hallucination. If it’s a symptom. The house fills Jac with terror even before she and her friends wind up trapped inside it—and before Jac discovers that the house knows her name.
Ally Malinenko’s This Appearing House is a surreal and horror-filled story about a girl who must confront her deepest fears and chart a path toward a new future.
Tell us about Jac and where she’s at when we meet her. Jac is a pretty anxious kid. She’s been through a lot, and she is nearing her five-year anniversary from her cancer diagnosis. She’s still NED—no evidence of disease. Fun fact: We don’t use cured when talking about cancer, because there is no cure. There is only no evidence of disease.
She’s also pretty angry. She’s tired of her mother worrying and hovering. She’s tired of the elephant of a recurrence in the corner of the room all the time. She’s pretty lonely, and at the start of the book, she’s asking the universe a pretty big question. She wants to know if she’ll get what everyone else gets—a full, long life—or if she’ll die young. It’s a lot for a 12-year-old.
Jac’s story is a pretty clear response to some of the cultural narratives that exist around illnesses such as cancer. For readers who might not be familiar, could you briefly describe those narratives? Why was it important to give Jac a different story? I was diagnosed with cancer when I was 37, and within the first couple of days I realized that warrior language (“you can fight this/you can beat this”) made me very tired very quickly. Because the truth was I wasn’t a warrior. I wasn’t brave. I was just doing what the doctors told me to do and I was hoping for the best.
Having a major disease like cancer changes you. It fundamentally splits your life into “the before” and “the after,” and while that gets smoother over time, the split is always there, like a scar. I wanted Jac to struggle with learning how to let go, because it was something that I struggled with. Letting go and moving on are not always the same thing. I also wanted to show that Jac was angry, and that anger in the face of an unjust world was a perfectly OK response to have.
Everyone looks to people who have been through trauma as some sort of inspiration. But we’re not. We’re just people that something happened to. We’re people who got unlucky and then very lucky.
“We teach kids how to fight monsters so that when a monster eventually turns up in their life, they’ll know what to do.”
This book isn’t your first foray into writing horror. What keeps you coming back to this genre? I loved reading horror when I was younger. I started with Stephen King at much too young of an age, when I would sneak a page or two off my oldest sister’s bookshelf, so I’m definitely a horror fan.
I think I keep writing horror because I respect it. Horror trusts that kids can handle it. We adults do so much gatekeeping and shielding with kids and I always wonder why. Kids know the world is scary. Look at the last few years alone! We don’t do them any justice if we pretend otherwise.
Middle grade horror makes one promise: It will take you into the dark but it will always always always bring you back to the light. We teach kids how to fight monsters so that when a monster eventually turns up in their life, they’ll know what to do. Honestly, it’s an honor.
Where did this haunted house originate? Haunted houses are typically metaphors for diseased minds, but I wanted this to be a metaphor for a diseased body. And I knew early on that the house was going to be there specifically for Jac, in this exact moment of her life.
What are some of your favorite haunted house narratives? Did they influence the house in this book? Growing up, I was obsessed with The Amityville Horror, but rereading it as an adult just makes me sad to see how awful and abusive the father is. That’s an interesting example, because I feel like it’s the most well known of the economic horror subgenre—the “we bought this house and it’s haunted but we don’t have any money to leave” plot.
I am also a huge Shirley Jackson fan (who isn’t?), so I have always been a fan of The Haunting of Hill House. In fact, the opening paragraph of This Appearing House is an homage to the opening paragraph of The Haunting of Hill House.
Jac experiences a lot of truly terrifying—and incredibly imaginative—horrors when she’s trapped in the House. Which one are you most proud of? Which one was the scariest for you to write? I’m probably most proud of the teeth scene. I had to fight to keep it in the book because my publisher thought it was too scary. In the original version, Hazel was really choking, so this version is a little softened, but yes, plates full of teeth, mouthfuls of teeth. I loved it.
The scariest one? At one point Jac is home and Hazel comes over to visit and Jac’s mother is acting very, very strange. It’s a scene that starts with a plate of eggs and ends with the kids running for their lives. That one was probably the most unnerving to write because you don’t want to have your mother, of all people, turn monstrous.
“Everyone looks to people who have been through trauma as some sort of inspiration. But we’re not. We’re just people that something happened to. We’re people who got unlucky and then very lucky.”
Tell us about the research that went into this book. Were you able to interview kids whose experiences are similar to Jac’s or talk to medical professionals who work with those kids? Even though I am NED (no evidence of disease), I still go for monthly treatment. I spoke with some nurses about their experiences with kids. A lot of what they had to say I gave to Jac, like this idea that kids want to talk about it because they’re scared, but their parents, who are also deeply afraid, tend to brush away those conversations. But they need to happen.
Jac’s mom doesn’t get a ton of “screen time,” so to speak, but her interactions with Jac are so impactful. What do you hope kids and grown-ups will take away from her character and her relationship with Jac? I think that Jac’s mom has a lot of unprocessed trauma, just like her daughter, and her way of dealing with it is to pretend it didn’t happen while simultaneously, consistently, fearing that it’s happening again. She goes through a checklist of symptoms when she sees Jac stumble, and that’s exhausting for her daughter.
I hope that it comes across that Jac’s mom does this out of love and fear, even though it’s probably not the best course of action. I want people to sympathize with her. Like her daughter, Jac’s mom also stood on the edge of that abyss.
I know what it’s like to love someone who is going through a life-threatening illness. Both of my parents had cancer, and I remember my father telling me, when my mother was diagnosed, that it was easier to be the patient than the caretaker. After watching what my husband went through when I was diagnosed, I think my dad was right. I hope that people are kind to Jac’s mom and see that, by the end of the book, she’s really trying.
This was an intense and emotional book to read, so I can only imagine what it must have been like to write. How did you take care of yourself as you worked on this book? Does crying on the floor count as taking care of yourself? I kid. I think the one saving grace I had was that I had some distance between my diagnosis and writing this. I couldn’t have done it right after I was diagnosed. My whole world felt upside down. But with some distance, I realized that I had some things I wanted to share. A story I wanted to tell. Because, truthfully, even though it’s on the book jacket, the word cancer is only used once in the book. Because I never thought it was a “cancer book.” To me, it’s about trauma. About the elasticity of trauma and the work that goes into healing that trauma. That was the story I wanted to tell.
What do you hope kids who feel trapped in their own Houses take away from Jac’s story? I hope they feel seen. I hope that they know that everything you experience, even the scary things—and maybe especially the scary things—makes you who you are. I hope they know that they might be different now, but that’s OK. All of it matters. And I hope that they remember that even if all the movies and books always depict the sick kid dying, that sometimes, the characters live. Just like they lived.
Did you trick or treat as a kid? If so, what was your favorite candy to receive? If we were to trick-or-treat at your house this year, what would we find in our buckets? Halloween has always been my favorite holiday and I definitely went trick-or-treating, probably longer than most kids! Milky Ways are definitely my favorite chocolate, but I do love Starburst. Especially the orange ones. If you went trick-or-treating at my house, it’s M&M’S for everyone!
If you found yourself in the opposite of a haunted House—a house filled with joy and delight and serenity—what would await you inside? Oh, I love this question. It would be filled with books and comfy nooks for naps and endless cups of tea and bottles of wine and all the best comfort food. It would always be dusk so the light would soften everything and the temperature would be just chilly enough so that you would want to snuggle in a blanket. And the house would know exactly what kind of music I’d want to hear without my even asking.
Author photo of Ally Malinenko courtesy of Bill Wadman.
Ally Malinenko’s This Appearing House is a surreal and horror-filled story about a girl who must confront her deepest fears and chart a path toward a new future.
A fresh and cleverly conceived take on the beloved 1985 film The Breakfast Club, Invisible is a colorful and engaging tale written by first-time graphic novel author Christina Diaz Gonzalez and illustrated by Gabriela Epstein (Claudia and the New Girl).
Diaz writes in both English and Spanish, the languages spoken by her archetypal characters. There’s George Rivera, the brain; Sara Domínguez, the loner; Miguel Soto, the athlete; Dayara Gómez, the tough one; and Nico Piñeda, the rich kid. Their heritage is linked to different places, including Puerto Rico, Cuba, Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Venezuela, but since they all speak Spanish, the kids keep getting lumped together at Conrad Middle School by fellow students and school administrators alike.
As Invisible opens, it’s happened again: Principal Powell won’t earn a community service initiative trophy unless 100% of students participate, so he informs George that he’ll be spending mornings with “students like you” helping grouchy Mrs. Grouser in the school cafeteria. The five kids greet each other with wariness that soon becomes bickering as they resist the idea they could actually have anything in common. Sure, they’re all varying degrees of bilingual, and yes, they’ve all been stereotyped because of it. But otherwise? Pfft! But when an opportunity to really help someone arises—one that will require creative thinking plus significant subterfuge—the kids have to make a decision. Can they work together to achieve a meaningful goal?
Diaz Gonzalez’s previous novel, Concealed, won the 2022 Edgar Award for best juvenile title, and she builds wonderful suspense here as the students strive to find common ground. Meanwhile, Epstein’s art conveys the group’s swirling emotions, from Dayara’s frustration (ugh, homework!) to George’s embarrassment (oh, crushes!) to everyone’s wide-eyed worry that they’ll be caught breaking Mrs. Grouser’s rules.
In an author’s note, Diaz Gonzalez explains that she knows what it’s like to be a student learning English as a second language “who may feel a little lost . . . when surrounded by words that they don’t yet understand.” Her own experiences fueled her desire to create “a single book that could be read and enjoyed no matter which language you [speak].”
With Invisible, she and Epstein have done just that. The book’s visual context clues and helpful dialogue bubbles (with solid outlines to indicate speech and dashed outlines for translations) bolster an already meaningful coming-of-age tale. Invisible celebrates individuality and community while transcending language barriers.
★ Twin Cities
Must a border also be a barrier? In their first graphic novel for middle grade readers, Jose Pimienta compassionately explores this question through the eyes of 12-year-old twins Teresa and Fernando.
The twins live with their parents in Mexicali, Mexico, just over the border that runs between the U.S. and Mexico. For years, they’ve happily been classmates at school and BFFs at home. They spend the summer after sixth grade in a bonanza of togetherness, filling their days with basketball and movies and tree-climbing, all portrayed by Pimienta in a kinetic, wordless double-page spread that hums with the joy of a strong sibling bond.
But the twins’ paths diverge when seventh grade begins. Teresa goes to school in Calexico, California, while Fernando stays in Mexicali. Fernando has noticed that Teresa has begun to rebuff their joint nickname, but it’s not until the first day of class that he realizes she is also eager to put space between them, to try new things alone.
Pimienta uses evocative, parallel-panel sequences to illustrate the twins’ vastly different experiences, in different countries, just several miles apart. Fernando’s friends, Tony and Victor, join his sister at school in Calexico, leaving Fernando lonely and adrift—and excited to see Teresa when she gets home each day. Teresa, however, feels stifled by her brother’s attention. She has so much homework, and she wants to do well so that she can go to college and perhaps even work in America someday. Tension builds between the twins as they contend with new friends and chores-obsessed parents.
Middle school is never easy, but it’s even harder when you think you might lose your best friend for reasons you don’t quite understand. In Twin Cities, Pimienta addresses this possibility from a place of sensitivity, sympathy and personal curiosity: In an author’s note, they reveal that they also grew up in Mexicali and were offered—but declined—the option to study in the U.S. “I still wonder what would have happened had I made a different choice,” they write.
That’s just one revelation among many to be found in Twin Cities’ notably substantive back matter, which also includes Pimienta’s musings on siblinghood and identity, character sketches, a map of both border towns and more. From start to finish, Twin Cities is a superbly crafted work of art and emotion that marks Pimienta as a creator to watch.
Will grumpy teachers, evolving friendships and mountains of homework spell disaster and doom for these heroes, or will lunchroom hijinks, video game extravaganzas and amazing discoveries prevail?
Breathtaking picture books, heartwarming chapter books and enthralling middle grade books await young readers—or anyone who enjoys a good story—in our list of most anticipated children’s books this fall.
Sam’s Super Seats by Keah Brown, illustrated by Sharee Miller Kokila | August 23
Author Keah Brown created the viral hashtag #DisabledAndCute to challenge widespread misperceptions and representations of disabled people, themes she also explored in The Pretty One, her essay collection for adult readers. In Sam’s Super Seats, her first picture book, Brown introduces Sam, a girl who has cerebral palsy, which means that sometimes she needs to sit down and rest. Engaging illustrations by Sharee Miller capture a fun shopping trip to the mall that Sam shares with her friends before the first day of school. Cheerful and conversational, Sam’s Super Seats is an intersectional addition to the back-to-school picture book canon.
Patchwork by Matt de la Peña, illustrated by Corinna Luyken Putnam | August 30
In recent decades, the Newbery Medal has typically honored longer works of children’s literature, so author Matt de la Peña defied both convention and expectation by winning the 2016 Newbery for Last Stop on Market Street, a picture book that also earned illustrator Christian Robinson a Caldecott Honor. De la Peña has been on a hot streak ever since, publishing two more books with Robinson (Carmela Full of Wishes and Milo Imagines the World) as well as Love, which features art by Loren Long.
In the meantime, illustrator Corinna Luyken has established a name for herself via thoughtful picture books, including the bestsellers My Heart and The Book of Mistakes, her 2017 debut,as well as through her work with writers such as Kate Hoefler (Nothing in Common) and Marcy Campbell (Something Good). Luyken and de la Peña’s first picture book together, Patchwork is a poetic ode to possibility that’s perfect for readers who love de la Peña’s lyricism and Luyken’s effortlessly impressionistic art.
A Taste of Magic by J. Elle Bloomsbury | August 30
We don’t like to pat ourselves on the back too much, but we did highlight author J. Elle’s debut novel, a YA fantasy called Wings of Ebony, as one of our most anticipated books of 2021, and the book went on to become an instant bestseller and establish Elle as one of the most exciting new voices in YA. So we were thrilled when Elle’s first book for younger readers, A Taste of Magic, was announced. The story of a young witch named Kyana who enters a baking contest in the hopes of using the prize money to save her magical school, A Taste of Magic looks enchantingly scrumptious.
Magnolia Flower by Zora Neale Hurston, adapted by Ibram X. Kendi, illustrated by Loveis Wise HarperCollins | September 6
Earlier this year, HarperCollins announced an ambitious new project: National Book Award-winning author and scholar Ibram X. Kendi would adapt six works by Zora Neale Hurston for young readers. Hurston is best known today as a novelist, but she also wrote short stories and collected folk tales as an anthropologist throughout the South. In this first volume, Kendi’s adaptation of one such short story is paired with vibrant illustrations by Loveis Wise, a rising star who has recently illustrated picture books by Ibi Zoboi (The People Remember) and Jeanne Walker Harvey (Ablaze With Color). We can’t think of two people more perfectly suited to bring Hurston’s work to a new generation of readers.
Spy School: Project X by Stuart Gibbs Simon & Schuster | September 6
In the decade since middle grade author Stuart Gibbs published Spy School, a mystery novel about a boy named Ben who attends the CIA’s top secret Academy of Espionage, Gibbs has written nine more books in his Spy School series. What’s more, he’s also released books in four additional blockbuster series, publishing 14 titles across them. This year, Gibbs publishes his 10th Spy School novel, the opaquely titled Spy School: Project X, in which Ben will go head to head with his longtime nemesis. How is it possible, we ask, to create such consistently thrilling, entertaining reads at such a rapid pace while also getting the recommended eight hours of sleep every night? Our current working theory involves clones, but if Gibbs wants to enlighten us, he knows how to find us.
Farmhouse by Sophie Blackall Little, Brown | September 13
In the 84-year history of the Caldecott Medal, only a handful of illustrators, including Barbara Cooney, David Wiesner, Leo and Diane Dillon and Robert McCloskey, have won multiple medals. Author-illustrator Sophie Blackall joined their rarified ranks in 2019 when she won her second medal for Hello Lighthouse. (She won her first in 2016 for Finding Winnie.) To create Farmhouse, Blackall incorporates mixed media into her illustrations as she tells a remarkably personal story about a family and their home.
Odder by Katherine Applegate, illustrated by Charles Santoso Feiwel & Friends | September 20
Author Katherine Applegate has been turning kids into readers with fantastical stories filled with heart for more than two decades, and we’re fortunate that the 2013 Newbery Medalist shows no sign of slowing down. In order to know whether you’ll love this novel in verse about a young sea otter whose life is changed at the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California, you really only need to look at the cover. Seriously, we dare you to attempt to resist its charms.
The Door of No Return by Kwame Alexander Little, Brown | September 27
Poet Kwame Alexander took the world of children’s literature by storm when he won the 2015 Newbery Medal for The Crossover, a novel in verse. Not content to rest on his laurels, Alexander won a Newbery Honor in 2020 for The Undefeated, a picture book for which illustrator Kadir Nelson also won the Caldecott Medal. The Door of No Return sees Alexander take another exciting, ambitious step forward, this time into historical fiction. The novel opens in West Africa in 1860 and follows a boy named Kofi who is swept up into the unstoppable current of history.
Meanwhile Back on Earth . . . by Oliver Jeffers Philomel | October 4
Author-illustrator Oliver Jeffers is one of the most successful picture book creators working today. He’s sold more than 12 million copies of titles that include Stuck, The Heart and the Bottle and, of course, The Day the Crayons Quit, which features text by author Drew Daywalt paired with Jeffers’ unmistakable artwork. Meanwhile Back on Earth continues a theme Jeffers has been exploring since his 2017 book, Here We Are, portraying a parent introducing their children to some aspect of human existence. In this case, Jeffers addresses the long history of conflict among people.
A Rover’s Story by Jasmine Warga Balzer + Bray | October 4
If you loved Wall-E and Peter Brown’s The Wild Robot, or if looking at the recently released photographs from the James Webb Space Telescope filled you with awe and wonder, you won’t want to miss Jasmine Warga’s middle grade novel A Rover’s Story. Warga has a knack for plumbing the emotional depths of a story, so imbuing a Mars rover with humanity and heart seems like exactly the sort of new challenge we love to see authors take on.
The Real Dada Mother Goose by Jon Scieszka, illustrated by Julia Rothman Candlewick | October 11
Author Jon Scieszka began his kidlit career with three postmodern picture books: The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!, illustrated by Lane Smith; The Frog Prince, Continued, illustrated by Steven Johnson; and The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales, another collaboration with Smith that earned a Caldecott Honor. In the three decades since, Scieszka has brought his signature humor to chapter books, middle grade novels and a memoir. He even served as the first National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. He comes full circle with The Real Dada Mother Goose, partnering with illustrator Julia Rothman to offer a new take on another beloved work of children’s literature, Blanche Fisher Wright’s The Real Mother Goose. We can practically hear the storytime giggles now.
I Don’t Care by Julie Fogliano, illustrated by Molly Idle and Juana Martinez-Neal Neal Porter | October 11
Picture books illustrated by multiple illustrators aren’t unheard of, though in such cases, each illustrator typically works individually, creating separate images and giving each page a different look and feel. It’s much less common for illustrators to truly collaborate and create artwork together, as Caldecott Medalists Molly Idle and Juana Martinez-Neal did with I Don’t Care, a quirky ode to friendship with text by bestselling author Julie Fogliano. We hope their work inspires more collaborative picture books in the future.
Our Friend Hedgehog: A Place to Call Home by Lauren Castillo Knopf | October 18
Caldecott Honor recipient Lauren Castillo published Our Friend Hedgehog: The Story of Us in May 2020—little more than two years ago, and yet it feels like centuries have passed since then. Castillo completed our Meet the Author questionnaire in February of that year. “What message would you like to send to young readers?” we asked her. “Be brave,” she wrote, with no way of knowing how much bravery we were all about to need. In Our Friend Hedgehog: A Place to Call Home, Castillo returns at long last to the woodsy world of Hedgehog and her friends for more stories of adventure and friendship, and we can’t wait to join her there.
The Three Billy Goats Gruff by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Jon Klassen Orchard | October 18
Author Mac Barnett and illustrator Jon Klassen first collaborated in 2012. The result of that collaboration, Extra Yarn, won a Caldecott Honor. They’ve since created five more picture books together, including Sam and Dave Dig a Hole, which won another Caldecott Honor, and the Shapes trilogy (Triangle, Square and Circle), all featuring Barnett’s dry wit and Klassen’s deceptively simple art. The duo will enter ambitious new territory this fall as they launch a planned series of reenvisioned fairy tales, beginning with the Norwegian story of The Three Billy Goats Gruff.
The Tryout by Christina Soontornvat, illustrated by Joanna Cacao Graphix | November 1
In 2021, Christina Soontornvat joined an exclusive club, becoming one of only a few authors to receive Newbery recognition for two different books in the same year. What’s more, Soontornvat’s two Newbery Honors were for two very different books, a fantasy novel (A Wish in the Dark) and a work of narrative nonfiction (All Thirteen). But Soontornvat has always had range, publishing fiction and nonfiction picture books and a chapter book series in addition to her middle grade titles. With The Tryout, Soontornvat takes on two more new categories in one book: graphic novels and memoir. Accompanied by illustrations from webcomic artist Joanna Cacao, Soontornvat tells a story drawn from her own middle school experiences that fans of Jerry Craft’s New Kid and Shannon Hale’s Real Friends will enjoy.
Pura Belpré Honor author Celia C. Peréz’s Tumble is the story of Addie Ramirez, who discovers that the biological father she’s never met is part of a family of legendary professional wrestlers. It’s a complex, emotional novel about loss, self-discovery and belonging—and a warmhearted ode to the art of professional wrestling.
Here, Pérez offers a peek into her childhood diaries, where she chronicled her love of wrestling and began a writing practice that hinted at the storyteller she would one day become.
When I was in middle school, I owned one of those faux-leather-bound diaries, the kind of item that comes to mind when you think of a 1980s childhood. It had a blue cover with One Year Diary in gold script and a little clasp that locked with a tiny key. The lock and key, a thin piece of metal, gave the illusion that the book could not easily be pried open, that you could really keep snooping siblings from reading your most personal thoughts.
According to 1986 me, reading was one of my two favorite things. I was into mysteries, teen romance series like Sweet Valley High and the novels of S.E. Hinton. (Yes, one could love the Wakefield twins and Ponyboy Curtis.) Still, it came as a surprise to adult me to discover that there was a time in my life when there was something I loved even more than reading. But there, in the entry for the second day in January, I declared my true love: watching professional wrestling.
My 1986 diary is a time machine of cultural references. There are mentions of the Chicago Bears’ Super Bowl win, the Challenger explosion, the opening of Al Capone’s vault, the royal wedding of Andrew and Fergie. Prince, Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Wham and Duran Duran, as well as Simon Le Bon’s post-Duran Duran band, Arcadia, all make appearances. And there’s wrestling. A lot of wrestling.
Occasionally, I wrote about typical adolescent things like unrequited crushes and too much homework, but I didn’t devote much space on the already limited pages to nonwrestling matters. The only mention of my birthday was squeezed in as a postscript—literally, “P.S. Today is my birthday”—at the bottom of the corresponding page, an afterthought to the more important event that was happening on May 28: wrestling at the Coconut Grove Exhibition Center!
“Perhaps I recognized that at the core of all the brawling was the thing I loved most: story.”
I wrote about WrestleMania II and The Wrestling Album, the record of songs performed by WWF stars that was released at the end of 1985 and included such classics as Junkyard Dog’s “Grab Them Cakes.” I detailed my viewing schedule: every Saturday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., and then at 7, 10 and 11 in the evening and on Sunday nights at 8. Apparently, out of desperation, I even watched “Hulk Hogan’s Rock ‘n’ Wrestling.”
By the end of the year, I was watching more than eight hours of wrestling every weekend. I watched anything that aired on our cableless TV, from Vince McMahon’s WWF (now the WWE) to the smaller productions coming out of different areas, or territories, of the country. On weekends in Miami, you could still watch Championship Wrestling from Florida, World Class Championship Wrestling from Texas, NWA Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling from North Carolina, and AWA wrestling from Minnesota. In one entry, I even mention a new wrestling show called G.L.O.W.
At the time, the WWF was eating through territories like Pac-Man inhaling dots. Despite its popularity and ubiquitous presence, the WWF was my least favorite of the hourlong shows I watched every weekend. It was the junky cereal in my wrestling diet.
While the smaller territories didn’t have the same flashiness or production quality as the WWF, there was something about them that appealed to me. They felt real in a way the WWF did not. Their rings felt less a stage for actors than a space for real people to settle scores. Wrestlers seemed more like everyday people. Among these were the Von Erichs, who were my favorites. (Yes, I was a member of the Von Erich Fan Club.) The villainous heels, wrestlers like Kevin Sullivan and Abdullah the Butcher, were less clownish and truly terrifying. There also seemed to be a lot more blood in the territory matches.
My childhood diary also reminded me that I kept several “wrestling notebooks,” though these have sadly been lost to time. I didn’t just fill these notebooks with profiles of wrestlers and recaps of matches; I also wrote stories in them. It wasn’t until I was an adult, long after I’d stopped watching wrestling, that I learned that the world of wrestling had its own storytellers, the “bookers” who created storylines. In hindsight, perhaps I recognized that at the core of all the brawling was the thing I loved most: story.
“We go along for the ride with the hope of a satisfying ending for the hero and for all of us.”
Wrestling is reminiscent of other forms of storytelling I’d grown up enjoying—namely, mythology and telenovelas. All three have a larger-than-life quality. There are secrets, betrayals, vengeance, tragedies and triumphs. The line between good and bad is at once clearly drawn and also sometimes nebulous. At times we find ourselves sympathizing with the heels, especially when we get a glimpse of their humanity. There are families—and where there are families, there is drama. There is always a hero who takes us on their journey in search of something that is missing: home, a championship belt, an origin story. There is always a villain who poses obstacles. We go along for the ride with the hope of a satisfying ending for the hero and for all of us.
Tumble, my third novel for young readers, was inspired by these storytelling forms that were such significant parts of my childhood. It’s a story about wrestling and about family. It’s a story about grappling with the scary feelings that come with growing up. It’s about hidden identities, origin stories and traveling between worlds. It’s a story about a hero, a girl named Adela Ramirez, who is tasked with finding the courage and wisdom to make her own choices and who invites readers to join her on the journey.
Life would be easier if it were more like professional wrestling. It would be simple to tell the good guys from the bad guys, the “faces” from the “heels.” Everyone would know who will win, and it would be simple to decide who to cheer for.
In Pura Belpré Honor author Celia C. Pérez’s Tumble, 12-year-old Adela “Addie” Ramirez is struggling with the fact that life isn’t quite as clear-cut as the wrestling matches she watches with her beloved stepfather, Alex, who has helped raise Addie since she was young. Addie will soon have a new sibling, so Alex has asked if she would consider allowing him to legally adopt her. But Addie can’t stop thinking about the one part of her life that Alex and her mom won’t talk about: the biological father she’s never met.
Professional wrestling is a big deal in Addie’s small town of Thorne, New Mexico, because the Cactus Wrestling League holds its matches in Esperanza, the town next door. With some help from her best friend, Cy, and the local historical society, Addie discovers that her biological father is Manny “The Mountain” Bravo, of the famous Bravo family of wrestlers. Eager to learn more about him, she insists that they be allowed to meet before she will discuss adoption further. As Addie gets to know the Bravos, she begins to learn that life is never as simple or as easy as right or wrong, good or bad, family or not family.
Tumble is a complex, emotional story about loss, self-discovery and belonging, about forgetting who you were and remembering who you are. Pérez’s depiction of Addie’s journey to connect with Manny and her extended family of grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins—all of whom she feels were unfairly kept from her by her mother—shines with honesty and touching authenticity. Addie experiences fear, awkwardness and a growing sense of connection and acceptance as she comes to understand that sometimes, people cannot change who they are, even if it hurts the ones they love.
Addie confronts a series of difficult choices, and although she wishes she could be like a luchadore and hide behind a mask, she must fight for what she wants and who she wants to be. Tumble reminds readers that sometimes heroes (and villains) are not who they seem—both in life and in a wrestling ring.
Celia C. Pérez’s tale of a girl who learns that the father she’s never met is part of a family of professional wrestlers shines with emotion and complexity.
“Why is that new girl on our new horse?” Norrie asks her best friend, Hazel, as the two arrive at Edgewood Stables, where they ride and help out around the barn along with their friend, Sam. It turns out that the new girl is Vic, who used to ride at tony Waverly Stables. The four preteens form the heart of the wonderful ensemble cast in graphic novelist Faith Erin Hicks’ Ride On, a lively tale of horses and friendship.
Vic has begun riding at Edgewood after falling out with her best friend at Waverly, and she and Norrie get off to a dramatically rocky start. Passionate Norrie reacts to the newcomer with a short fuse, declaring that Waverly is Edgewood’s rival (an opinion that no one else, particularly shy, reserved Hazel, seems to share). Vic, meanwhile, tells Norrie she’s not looking to make friends at Edgewood; she just wants to be left alone to ride.
The story of Vic and Norrie’s relationship includes twists, turns and plenty of emotional fireworks that feel immediate and authentic. Hicks captures the angst and confusion that so often characterize the early teen years as interests change and friendships blossom and wane.
Hicks’ sharp, focused illustrations enliven character interactions by zeroing in on facial expressions, especially Norrie’s cavalcade of wide-eyed, accusatory looks as she feels increasingly threatened by Vic. Onomatopoeia punctuates various scenes, such as a large, bright yellow “FWUMP!” when Vic falls onto her bed in frustration. Hicks skillfully uses color to spotlight characters within panels: Vic’s blue-tinged braids, Norrie’s pink polo shirt and Sam’s blue and gray hoodie all stand out against the browns and blacks of Edgewood Stables and its horses.
Of course, those horses are also at the center of the story. Ride On contains plenty of riding action informed by Hicks’ childhood as a “horse girl,” as she explains in an author’s note. Hicks movingly conveys the love between riders and horses, as well as the nerves and challenges experienced by both during competitions.
Ride On will leave readers eager for more of Hicks’ animated tales and ready to jump in the saddle themselves.
Faith Erin Hicks’ graphic novel is a love letter to “horse crazy” kids and a lively portrait of how friendships can blossom and wane during early adolescence.
Moving halfway around the world to a new country where everyone speaks a new language would be a challenging experience for just about anyone. But for 10-year-old Zhang Ai Shi and her parents, leaving Taiwan means a chance for a better life in the United States, a place known in China as “the beautiful country.”
In the fall of 1980, Ai Shi’s family moves into a cramped one-bedroom apartment on the outskirts of Los Angeles. Her parents use their life savings to purchase a fast-food restaurant, but it’s a struggle to make their business venture succeed. The restaurant is repeatedly vandalized, and Ai Shi’s classmates at school often make racist comments toward her. Ai Shi and her family all work hard, but money stays tight, and Ai Shi misses the friends and traditions she left behind in Taiwan. Even her birthday and Christmas are disappointing. Will Ai Shi ever feel at home in America?
With In the Beautiful Country, debut author Jane Kuo draws on her own experience of immigrating to the U.S. during the 1980s to create a moving story of family, heartbreak and, in time, hope. She portrays her young protagonist’s feelings of being torn between two cultures while capturing snapshots of the Zhang family’s journey and everyday lives.
Free verse written from Ai Shi’s perspective strikes the perfect balance between approachable and lyrical. As she contemplates her new life, Ai Shi wonders whether something can be ugly and beautiful at the same time. “And a person, / can a person feel two different emotions, / can a person be both grateful and sad, / at exactly the same time?” By embracing what they have, instead of dwelling on what they lack, Ai Shi and her family eventually realize that when they’re together, supporting one another, they’re truly home.
Debut author Jane Kuo draws on personal experience to create this moving story of a young girl who immigrates to the U.S. during the early 1980s.
Readers, prepare to meet the most memorable middle grade protagonist of 2022. Twelve-year-old Olive Miracle Martin, the instantly endearing hero of Hummingbird, is, in her own words, a “joy-kaboom.” After being homeschooled due to a medical condition called osteogenesis imperfecta (sometimes known as brittle bone disease), Olive begins attending Macklemore Middle School, where local legend tells of a magical, wish-granting hummingbird. Will finding the hummingbird make Olive’s deepest wish come true?
Author Natalie Lloyd brings a uniquely personal perspective to Olive’s story, imbuing her extraordinary hero with unforgettable warmth, honesty and heart.
You and Olive both have osteogenesis imperfecta. In what other ways are you alike? How are you different? Initially, I was very hesitant to write about a character who had the same disability that I do. I really wanted Olive’s story to be about more than her body, so I tried to smoosh the “bone stuff” to the background. But the more I revised Hummingbird, the more I realized that Olive’s disability is naturally a source of conflict for her, like it is for me. My disability informs how I move through my daily life and the world, and how I exist in my body. It’s only one part of the big constellation of my life, but it’s still a part. So we do have that Big Thing in common, Olive and I.
But we share other things too. Olive and I are both creative, and we both love love. We’re both ardent fans of Dolly Parton and Judy Blume. We both think that one true BFF can make all the difference in helping you feel like you belong. And we’re both a little weird. If I were a character in a book, I would be somewhere between Anne Shirley and Luna Lovegood, and Olive falls on that spectrum too. Even though I’ve always been a bit shy, I love theater. Olive is the same way. She puzzles over the dichotomy of wanting to stand out (in her heart-shaped sunglasses and bedazzled wheelchair) and wanting to blend in and be “normal.”
As far as our differences, Olive has a gentle boldness and assertiveness that I would like to have. Her confidence is still growing, of course, but she’s not afraid to ask hard questions and love completely, and I adore that about her.
Tell us about the word fragile and the role it plays in this story. Like Olive, being described as “fragile” has been commonplace for me for as long as I can remember. In a literal sense, it’s true. My bones break easily; my body is fragile. And yet, even though that’s true, there has always been a part of me that bristles at that description. Because I know there is so much more to me—to everybody—than a body.
In 2019, I had a hard reckoning with the word fragile. I walked through the kitchen late one night to check a door and slipped in dog drool. I heard the snap in my thigh before I hit the ground and knew I’d broken my femur. That’s supposed to be the strongest bone in a human body, but my femurs have always been fragile. It’s a painful break and a long recovery, so I felt like my world was paused again because of my fragile places.
I had tried so hard to lean into all the other aspects of who I’d become: I was a writer (which still feels like a dream come true). I was independent. I am married to a kind and wonderful man whom I describe as Gilbert Blythe with sleeve tattoos, and I loved the life we’d built. And then something in me broke, again, and I needed help with everything. I told my husband that I felt broken all over, and he said, “Your leg is broken. You aren’t broken.” It helped me get a grip on Olive’s whole story. She starts out on a mission to prove to everybody she’s not fragile. But really, the only person she ever has to prove that to is herself.
“So much of what I write comes down to how much I love and miss people. Every story is a love story.”
Olive’s narration sometimes shifts from prose into verse. How did this choice come about? What role has poetry played in your life? I wasn’t planning to write any element of Olive’s story in verse, but a whole draft came out that way. I showed it to my brilliant editor, Mallory Kass, and told her that something about it felt really freeing and right for this story, so we looked closely at the text together. I realized the places the verse felt the most important to me was when Olive was reflecting on her body. Those thoughts about her body—how it’s fragile, different and changing—break, just like her bones do. Mallory encouraged me to try writing the story with both forms, and it was the exact blend I wanted. I could lean into Olive’s humor a little easier and explore her world more fully in prose, but verse felt like the right carrier for her weightier thoughts about herself.
Poetry factored big into my middle school era. I wrote some terribly cringey poems that my parents still have. I also got a book of Emily Dickinson poems that’s still on my bookshelf. Back then, I mostly loved Dickinson’s work for its cadence and moodiness. I also loved how she compared big feelings (like hope) to ephemeral things in nature (like “a thing with feathers”). Middle school is also when I wore out Dolly Parton cassette tapes, singing “Eagle When She Flies” to my audience of Popples and Care Bears.
Between Emily and Dolly, I fell in love with poetry, and I still adore it. I used to say that I ate poems for breakfast, by which I mean: I would read a Mary Oliver poem every morning. I still try to do that. It makes my heart feel awake. And of course, I love folk and alt-country, singer-songwriter music—poetry with a banjo in the mix.
Olive’s grandfather is a well-known birder, and it’s a passion he shares with his granddaughter. Did your research include delving into birds and birding? If so, what are some of your favorite things that you learned? There’s a subtle connection Olive and I have: While my granny wasn’t a birder, she was obsessed with birds. She could name a bird by its song, and I always thought that was such a cool way to be connected to the world. I enjoy reading about birds and watching them, too.
“I’m smitten with the idea of big magic existing in a small creature.”
Sometimes when I see a hummingbird, I gasp. I know they aren’t uncommon but they feel special to me. I like their bejeweled feathers and buzzy wings. Reading about them was especially fun as I wrote this book. Here are some fun facts: Most hummingbirds weigh about as much as a nickel, they can fly backwards, and—this is my favorite—they remember human faces. There are also lots of legends and folklore connected to hummingbirds. I’m smitten with the idea of big magic existing in a small creature.
Olive’s story feels inextricable from its setting, and I think many readers will wish they could visit Olive’s fictional hometown of Wildwood, Tennessee. Why was creating such a strong sense of place important to you? Do you have any recommendations for real-world spots that might feel a little like Wildwood? It’s fun to create a town in a novel because I get to pack it full of spots I love. But I definitely understand the need to see the real inspiration. Some of my favorite go-to towns for inspiration in Tennessee are Lenoir City, Signal Mountain and Sweetwater. I also like to visit towns in the Blue Ridge Mountains, like Franklin and Hendersonville in North Carolina, when I need some fodder. If readers are ever able to visit the Smoky Mountains, I highly recommend it. That would give them a good idea of the scope of Olive’s natural world. It’s a misty, magical place full of woods and babbling brooks. And birdsong. And ghost stories. And a hummingbird, or two.
Hummingbird beautifully depicts so many different characters’ relationships to faith and spirituality. Was this an element of the book from the beginning? What was the most challenging part of incorporating it? Olive’s spirituality was always threaded through the book. The biggest challenge in writing about her faith was this: I want every reader, regardless of what they believe, to feel safe in my books. Olive’s personal wrestling with her faith is connected to mine. I’m a person of faith, but when bones break and I’m in pain (or when someone I love is in pain), obviously that’s hard to process. One of my favorite attributes of Southern fiction is how faith and folklore collide; it felt right for Olive to interact with both. And it felt right—and true—that the people Olive loves all have different relationships to faith, too.
“You get to take up as much space as you want on this planet in exactly the body you are in. You deserve to move through the world with joy and confidence. Your experience matters.”
Your books often include elements of magic, and Olive herself loves fantasy and fairy tales. What draws you to incorporating this into your work? What’s magical to you? I think we all write what we love to read, and I was once (and always) a queen in Narnia. I adored books like Roald Dahl’s Matilda and Lynne Reid Banks’ The Fairy Rebel and stories where magic was a flicker in a very real world. I’m still drawn to that gentle magic in books. Deep down, I love that the world is sometimes un-figure-out-able.
It sounds cheesy, but the best magic for me is love. There are certainly moments of little magic in every day: birds singing, dogs that snuggle, sunsets smeared on a mountain sky, cherry popsicles on a hot day, a perfect song lyric. But there’s no magic like love, like hearing the voice of someone you love. Like hugging someone you love and have missed. So much of what I write comes down to how much I love and miss people. Every story is a love story.
What did you learn about yourself from writing Olive’s story? I don’t want to spoil anything, but what Olive and I both learned is reflected in the last line of the book. And while my first hope for readers is that Hummingbird gives them joy-kabooms, I also hope that it’s found by anyone who needs that last-line reminder.
And I also learned this: You get to take up as much space as you want on this planet in exactly the body you are in. You deserve to move through the world with joy and confidence. Your experience matters. One thing I love about the KidLit community, and all the readers, writers, teachers, librarians and publishing people who abide in it, is our determination to create safe spaces where kids get to grow into their most authentic selves. It’s a deep honor to be a little part of that world.
With Moonflower, National Book Award-winning author Kacen Callender (King and the Dragonflies) creates a surreal, dreamlike wonder of a novel.
Twelve-year-old Moon, who is Black and nonbinary, longs to leave the world of the living, where they have “a hard time being happy.” Every night, they transcend their body and travel to the spirit world, a place where new lives are created, old lives are reincarnated and some lives are just in between. Humans ordinarily can’t enter the spirit world, so Moon is invisible to the spirits that dwell there, but the more time Moon spends there, the more visible they become.
Moon is determined to find a way to stay in the spirit world forever. They learn that a mysterious being known as the Keeper might be able to help them do so. Should Moon trust the Keeper—or could the Keeper have ulterior motives?
Moonflower is a captivating story, and Callender’s respect for young readers is clear on every page. The novel poses a big question: What is the purpose of being alive? The expansiveness of Callender’s story invites readers to ponder their own responses as they journey through fantastical worlds alongside Moon. Callender delicately balances awe and astonishment with the reality that human existence is often painful, but life is ultimately worth living.
Callender dedicates their novel to “the younger me who didn’t want to be in this world anymore” and to “anyone who has also wanted to leave this world.” Moonflower is the rare novel that meets young readers in what might be their darkest moment and leads them, with honesty and empathy, back toward the light.
Moonflower poses a big question—what is the purpose of being alive?—then invites readers to ponder their own responses as they follow protagonist Moon’s fantastical journey.
From the very first page of Natalie Lloyd’s Hummingbird, the unforgettable spirit of 12-year-old Olive Miracle Martin shines.
Olive has been home-schooled because she has a medical condition called osteogenesis imperfecta, which causes her bones to break very easily. Olive is filled with joy-kabooms (“joy and excitement all mixed together”) as she confesses that her “prayer, and wish, and wildest hope” is to attend Macklemore Middle School.
Olive’s parents agree that it’s time for her to try attending traditional school. There, she is soon swept up into a grand adventure: the search for a legendary hummingbird said to grant a wish to whomever finds it. The only problem is that everyone else in Olive’s small town of Wildwood, Tennessee, is on the hunt too. Nonetheless, Olive is certain she can locate the creature. When she does, she plans to make the biggest wish of all.
Lloyd situates Olive amid a large cast of characters and several memorable settings. Olive shares a warmly supportive home with her blended family, whose cottage is deep in the supposedly haunted Piney Woods near “a mountain town full of folktales.” Macklemore Middle School is an equally enchanting place that features unusual therapy animals (a sloth named Bon Jovi and a llama named Edna) and an aviary converted to a library.
At Macklemore, Olive makes new friends and takes an instant liking to her creative, encouraging teacher, Mr. Watson. Eventually, she auditions for the school play, a production based on the poetry of Emily Dickinson called “Hope Like Features.” These scenes link the novel’s avian motifs with the mix of wonder and isolation that deep-thinking Olive experiences throughout the novel.
At times, Lloyd’s prose shifts into lines of free verse poetry, and these moments are often among the novel’s most powerful. “Fragile is what I’ll always be. I get that. / But I am / a thousand other things, too,” Olive reflects. “I’m / whole constellations / of wonders and weirdness / and hope.”
Like Olive, Lloyd also has osteogenesis imperfecta, and she writes about living with a serious medical condition with sensitivity. Readers will quickly understand Olive’s frustrations and desires: There’s no ramp to the stage where she longs to perform, and when she drops her tray during her first visit to the school cafeteria, she wonders whether attending Macklemore might have been a mistake.
Hummingbird is a rare novel, as exceptional as the magical hummingbird at its center. Lloyd’s writing will bring to mind some of the most beloved creators of children’s literature, such as Kate DiCamillo and Judy Blume. With exceptional style and empathy, Hummingbird exquisitely addresses weighty themes in a jubilant yet realistic way, broken bones and all. As Olive herself declares, “Nobody can stick this bird in a tree. . . . I am born to fly!”
With exceptional style and empathy, Hummingbird exquisitely addresses weighty themes in a jubilant yet realistic way. This is a novel as rare as the magical bird at its center.
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