by Malinda Lo
First published 2022
Aria Tang West planned to spend her final summer before college on Martha's Vineyard with her best friends. Instead, after a graduation party disaster, her parents send her to California to stay with her grandmother Joan West, a working artist. Aria dreads the exile and expects nothing but tedium. Then she meets Steph Nichols, who tends her grandmother's garden. Steph opens doors to a world Aria never knew existed, introducing her to a community of working-class queer people. As the summer unfolds, Aria questions everything she thought she knew about herself and her future. The relationship with Steph forces her to confront desires she had never acknowledged. What began as punishment becomes transformation as Aria discovers parts of herself that will reshape her life permanently.
Genres: romance, coming-of-age, contemporary
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: fish-out-of-water, found-family
Setting: Martha's Vineyard, California
Period: final summer before college
325 pages · Hardcover · Dutton Books for Young Readers