Welcome to Litsy!

What a lovely, touching, perfect coming of age story. Earlier this year David Nicholls gave me a wonderful middle aged love story, now this Shakespearean love of 16-year olds. This was just beautiful. Lovely, sad, easy yet beautiful storytelling. There are also huge mother/son dynamics here and they get me every time.

Sweet Sorrow, by David Nicholls (2019) [RE-READ]
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Premise: An average British teenager joins a Summer stock Shakespeare company to impress a girl, and distract himself from the anxieties of increasingly complex life.

Review: I think this is the most underrated book I‘ve read. This was my third time reading it, and I‘ve only loved it more every time. It perfectly captures the feeling of the end of high school.⬇️

I think I would use this in the classroom not as a book for the whole class. I would just have it in my classroom for students to read to understand that growing up is tough and a lot of people face the same challenges and that everything will be ok!

“The first step is getting you to admit that we need a plan.“

Love? Maybe is a heartwarming story about Piper, a teen learning about friendship, love, and self-discovery as unexpected surprises challenge what she thought she knew about relationships. This is a contemporary realistic book.

I don‘t remember these from my childhood, but Beverly Cleary understands kids of all ages #AuthorAMonth #BeverlyClearly

REHOMING 📚 I need to make some room on my shelves so I'm giving away books! If you would like me to send anything in this stack to you, please comment below. *US only per my postal budget 🙏

Run Away with Me, by Brian Selznick (2025)
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Premise: Two teenage boys fall in mysterious and magical first love in 1986 Rome.

Review: This was very sweet but ultimately I think it felt a bit too scattered. At first I thought there was some fantasy element to the pairing, but that turned out to be a misdirect. And there was a compelling secondary plot involving a mysterious book that deserved more attention. But overall this was fun.

A coming-of-age story about first love, family, and finding yourself.
Jeremy‘s figuring things out—his sexuality, his relationship with his newly-divorced dad, and whether Evan, the boy he meets on the Oregon Coast, might like him back. As they bond over birdwatching, they create a secret code—part game, part shield. Quietly powerful, this YA story hits hard and feels real.