Symptoms of Being Human by Jeff Garvin Tags: Young Adult, Fiction, Coming of Age, LGBT2SQ+, Bullying, Self-Harm This Young Adult novel is one that youth and adults alike will not want to put down. Through the first person narrative, Riley a gender-fluid teenager navigates school, violence, family, therapy, relationships,anxiety, and finding self in the process. […]
fatty legs: a true story Christy Jordan-Fenton & Margaret Pokiak-Fenton Art by Liz-Amini-Holme This true story of 8-year-old Inuvialuit girl Olemaun Pokiak or Margaret as noted later in the story, unveils the 60-year secret of her nickname, “fatty legs” and her literacy journey. Through the first-person narrative, she recounts her experience in boarding school and […]
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian Sherman Alexie Art by Ellen Forney Based on Alexie’s own experience, his first novel for young adults takes us through the life of Junior, a budding cartoonist growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Dealing with medical challenges since birth, Junior gets picked on and beaten up […]
Children’s literature has always been messy and complex for me, partly because my identity has changed over time. My identity has become more understood as truth, as I can recognize it, is spoken, yet remaining messy and tangled like the mop of curls that lays upon my head. In the simplest sense, I am an […]