First published 2018
Sequoyah's mother sits in jail, leaving the fifteen-year-old Cherokee boy to navigate the foster care system alone. The Troutt family takes him in at their rural Oklahoma home in the late 1980s. Years of instability have taught Sequoyah to keep his distance from others and bury his feelings deep. His scarred body tells the story of his troubled past. Everything shifts when he meets Rosemary, a seventeen-year-old girl also staying with the Troutts. She understands what he's been through. Both carry their Native American heritage and the wounds from bouncing between foster homes. Their shared experiences create an immediate connection. As Sequoyah's feelings for Rosemary grow stronger, their fragile world threatens to collapse. The foster care system offers no guarantees of permanence. Their damaged histories cast shadows over any hope for the future. Sequoyah must decide whether opening his heart is worth the risk of losing everything again.
Genres: fiction, family, american-fiction, coming-of-age, contemporary, adolescence, adoption, family-drama
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Oklahoma, United States
Period: 1980s
275 pages · Hardcover · Soho Press
Content warnings: abuse, child-abuse, depression, emotional-abuse, physical-abuse