Description: When twelve-year-old goth girl Juillet and thirteen-year-old surfer girl Summer meet, they set aside their painful pasts and begin to transform into they people they would like to be.
Brief description: Paul Mosier began writing novels in 2011 but has written in some fashion his entire life. He is married and the father to two daughters, one of whom has passed to the next dimension. He lives near his place of birth in downtown Phoenix, Arizona. He loves listening to baseball on the radio, eating vegetarian food, drinking coffee, and talking nonstop. He has written three critically acclaimed books for middle grade readers: Train I Ride, Echo's Sister, and Summer and July. Visit him on his blog, novelistpaulmosier.wordpress.com.
Review Quotes:
"Hilarious, tender and wise, Summer and July is a story about facing our fears and learning to embrace the world. Do not miss this luminous gem of a novel." - Katherine Applegate, Newbery Medal Winning author of The One and Only Ivan
"This novel is as much a love letter to California as it is a fish-out-of-water, new-friendship-or-budding-romance tale. For readers longing for escapade and sunshine, as well as those struggling with their own demons, Juillet and Summer are sure to bring companionship, understanding, and the urge to catch a few waves. " - Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books
"Capturing the urgency and intensity of middle-school friendships, what he gets right is important: the thin, confusing line between best buddy and queer crush; the simultaneous need for independence and parental presence; and the ways that adolescent identity is a dance between frustration and buoyancy that can reveal itself in friendship." - Publishers Weekly
"Engaging first-person narrative has emotional openness, wry reflection, and vividly drawn settings. There's something real and haunting about these vulnerable characters and their journey together. A beach book with some complexity as well as a happy ending." - Booklist