A lyrical coming-of-age story from a three-time Newbery Honor winning author Thirteen-year-old Staggerlee used to be called Evangeline, but she took on a fiercer name. She's always been different--set apart by the tragic deaths of her grandparents in an anti-civil rights bombing, by her parents' interracial marriage, and by her family's retreat from the world. This summer she has a new reason to feel set apart--her confused longing for her friend Hazel. When cousin Trout comes to stay, she gives Staggerlee a first glimpse of her possible future selves and the world beyond childhood.
Finalist for the 2022 Lammy Award for Bisexual & the 2022 Heartland Booksellers Award A Book Riot Best Book of the Year “Audaciously human and raw. The Way She Feels is a rainbow during the rain.” —Mara Altman A witty and one-of-a-kind debut graphic memoir detailing and drawing the life of a girl with borderline personality disorder finding her way—and herself—one day at a time. What does it feel like to fall in love too hard and too fast, to hate yourself in equal and opposite measure? To live in such fear of rejection that you drive friends and lovers away? Welcome to my world. I’m Courtney, and I have borderline personality disorder (BPD), along with over four million other people in the United States. Though I’ve shown every classic symptom of the disorder since childhood, I wasn’t properly diagnosed until nearly a decade later, because the prevailing theory is that most people simply “grow out of it.” Not me. In my illustrated memoir, The Way She Feels: My Life on the Borderline in Pictures and Pieces, I share what it’s been like to live and love with this disorder. Not just the hospitalizations, treatments, and residential therapy, but the moments I found comfort in cereal, the color pink, or mini corndogs; the days I couldn’t style my hair because I thought the blow-dryer was going to hurt me; the peace I found when someone I love held me. This is a book about vulnerability, honesty, acceptance, and how to speak openly—not only with doctors, co-patients, friends, family, or partners, but also with ourselves.
As wry as Bill Bryson’s I’m a Stranger Here Myself, as insightful as Tracy Kidder’s House, here is smart, engaging tale of one man’s stuggle to restore his family’s new home—a decrepit old mansion—and discover himself With his pregnant wife and their 18-month-old son in tow, David Giffels scoured the environs of Akron, OH, in search of the perfect house. But nothing seemed right . . . until he spotted the beautiful, decaying Guilded Era mansion. A former rubber robber baron’s domain, the once grand house does need some repair . . . okay it’s a dump. So what if, there’s “nothing holding this place up but memory,”—the assessment of his father, a structural engineer? It wouldn’t be perfect if it were easy, and Giffels relishes the challenge. He’s a committed do it yourselfer who fears a life without struggle—and Home Depot. All the Way Home follows Giffels’s funny and sometimes frustrating journey as he and his young family turns a decrepit money pit into the the home of their dreams. From outwitting squatters (both four- and two-legged) to rebuilding termite ridden walls, battling wisteria vines and finding $14,000 in Depression-era cash hidden in a bathroom wall, Giffels takes readers along on the ultimate fixer-up trip. Throughout he shows them the heart of a young man on the brink of adulthood, happily struggling with his new roles as a husband and a father—a man trying to find his way without losing himself.
