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Just in time for National Poetry Month, Good Different is a novel in verse by Meg Eden Kuyatt. In lyrical prose, Kuyatt tells the story of Selah Godfrey who feels like a dragon in a world built for people. Because others perceive Selah as “dangerous, unpredictable, and damaged,” she draws to distract herself from the rough noises and loud textures that poke at her. A seventh grader at Pebblecreek Academy, a private school that prides itself on its family atmosphere, Selah wishes to be somewhere that allows her to be fully herself, a place where she can relax “and not feel like a freak” (9).Read More →

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Attracted to the bold, the risky, and the unknown, Hattie Darrow plays Don Quixote to Reid MacGregory’s role as Sancho Panza. Reid is content playing Hattie’s side-kick extraordinaire in pranks and at parties.  Where Reid is calm and reasonable, Hattie is spontaneous and daring; her energy luminesces around her.  From the time Reid met Hattie in middle school, Reid saw her potential and declared: “Being Hattie Darrow’s friend would make me better” (51). As the two are about to enter their senior year in high school, Hattie is still Reid’s social oxygen.  “Humiliation is a language [Hattie] doesn’t speak, and she doesn’t want [Reid] toRead More →

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Actually, David wears the headphones to keep him from feeling anxious, to help him cope with his symptoms of highly functioning autism.  He also makes notes in a notebook, to learn social norms and social cues, to remember names, and to make sense of all the parts of the world that confuse him.  These differences and his predilection for honesty and disclosure often get him in trouble.  So, when Kit sits at his table at lunch, David is surprised. A month after her dad’s death in a car accident, Kit is looking for quiet, for a port in the storm of confusing emotions. Grief hasRead More →