Taking in each page feels expansive, inviting, like I’m literally sharing a moment in time on every page with the little boy in the book, as if we were having a shared experience. The storyline also serves as a terrific platform for discernment about what we see on the surface, and what we see in the world when we apply more insight and awareness. This is a great book to add to this summer’s story rotation.
For more information about If You Want to See a Whale, visit https://us.macmillan.com/ifyouwanttoseeawhale/juliefogliano.
You Look Different in Real Life
If you have Young Adult (YA) literature fans in your family, or you’re a YA reader yourself, pick up a copy of Jennifer Castle’s new book You Look Different in Real Life as part of your summer reading list. Castle explains, “This story is set in the Hudson Valley, so I’m really excited for local readers in particular to check it out. I feel like it’s the kind of book parents and teens can both enjoy.” The novel explores the dynamics among five youths who are featured in a documentary series together: They were first filmed back in kindergarten at age 6, then filmed at age 11 and now at age 16.
The narrator, Justine, feels and notices everything, and the way that she reacts to whatever is happening affects me as the reader. Justine puts words to ideas that either seem to be missed by the others or that they just cannot express, and it’s done in such a charming, youthful way: “Sometimes I think of an invisible cord connecting Nate and Keira and Felix and Rory and me. It’s made of something thin and deceptively powerful, like the stuff Spider-Man squirts out of his wrists. Then I wonder who spun it. Was it Lance and Leslie? Was it everyone who’s ever watched the Five At documentaries? Or maybe it was me. All I know is that it’s always there. It stretches and winds but will never break.”
