And She Was

by Jessica Verdi

Overview

From rising star Jessica Verdi, an incredibly timely, sensitive, and riveting portrayal of a teen girl's relationship with her transgender mom.

Dara's lived a sheltered life with her single mom, Mellie. Now, at eighteen, she's dreaming of more. When Dara digs up her never-before-seen birth certificate, her world implodes. Why are two strangers listed as her parents? Dara confronts her mother, and is stunned by what she learns: Mellie is transgender. The unfamiliar name listed under "father"? That's Mellie. She transitioned when Dara was a baby, after Dara's birth mother died. She changed her name, started over. But Dara still has more questions than answers. Reeling, she sets off on an impromptu road trip with her best guy friend, Sam, in tow. She is determined to find the extended family she's never even met. What she does discover -- and what her mother reveals, piece by piece, over emails -- will challenge and change Dara more than she can imagine.This is a gorgeous, timely, and essential novel about the importance of being our true selves. The backmatter includes an author's note and resources for readers.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781338150544
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	03/27/2018
Sold by:	Scholastic, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	368
File size:	7 MB
Age Range:	14 - 17 Years

About the Author

Jessica Verdi is the author of And She Was, My Life After Now, The Summer I Wasn't Me, and What You Left Behind. She is a graduate of The New School's MFA in Writing for Children program and lives in New York. You can find her online at jessicaverdi.com.

Read an Excerpt

"I don't understand." It's a puny phrase for such an overwhelming feeling."I was assigned male at birth," she says quietly. "Marcus." The name comes out scratchy, as if it's grown weak with disuse. "I had all the anatomical boy parts, and everyone assumed I was a boy. But even before I fully understood the differences between boys and girls, I knew I wasn't what everyone wanted me to be. I couldn't tell anybody what I was feeling, though.""Which was what?" I press. I need to hear her say the words."That God had made a mistake. My body wasn't right. People didn't understand trans issues then the way they're starting to now. There was no Jazz Jennings or Laverne Cox or Chaz Bono or Transparent. I never even heard the words transgender or transsexual until I was out of high school."There they are. Those are the words.I've heard about transgender people, of course. I've watched the reality shows and followed the political campaigns to restrict public bathroom access -- when two of your childhood idols are Billie Jean King and Martina Navratilova, it's pretty much ingrained in you to care deeply about LGBTQ issues.If it were anyone else, I'd hug them and say, "As long as you're happy. I support you." Truly. But how am I supposed to do that now, when I'm finding out my own mother has lied to me -- intensely -- all these years? Lied about my origin and her past and the baby pictures and who knows what else. She didn't trust me -- respect me -- enough to tell me the truth. I'm feeling even more lost now than I did before. Mom's confession is not an answerit's a domino that's tipped over a thousand other questions.

Editorial Reviews

Advance Praise for And She Was:"Verdi just gets better and better with every book. And She Was is a beautiful, multilayered journey of love, understanding, and empathy that made me want to be a better daughter, ally, and person." — Dahlia Adler, author of Under the Lights"A heart-tugging, powerful story of family, identity, and the struggle for acceptance. A beautiful novel that treats every moment with incredible care, Jessica Verdi's latest is a different kind of love story — one about loving yourself, your family, and your life. And it features my favorite mother-daughter relationship since Gilmore Girls." — Corey Ann Haydu, author of OCD Love Story"An engrossing story about the collision of big, grand dreams and long-held life-saving family secrets. I could not stop turning pages and cheering for Dara." — Caela Carter, author of Tumbling"And She Was took me right back to my adolescence, a time when I was struggling to come to terms with my trans parent's identity while figuring out my own." — Emmy-nominated documentary filmmaker Sharon ShattuckPraise for What You Left Behind:* "Verdi eloquently details the trials and tribulations of being a single teen dad... [Verdi] holds nothing back... An excellent addition to YA collections." — School Library Journal, starred reviewPraise for The Summer I Wasn't Me:"This title is recommended as a quality piece of fiction in a teen collection, and especially as part of an LGBTQ collection." — VOYA MagazinePraise for My Life After Now:"Debut author Verdi paints Lucy's devastation and her tangled emotions with honesty and compassion... Information about living with HIV is peppered throughout, but Verdi's novel never preaches, instead telling Lucy's story with realism and hope." — Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher

12/01/2017
Gr 9 Up—When 18-year-old Dara finds her long-hidden birth certificate and discovers that her mother, Mellie, is a transgender woman, she sets off to find her biological mother's family and unravel some of the secrets surrounding her childhood. As she and her best friend Sam travel south, Mellie sends Dara long, brutally honest emails detailing her transition and the choices she made. Although this novel centers Dara's experience of learning about her mother's past, Mellie's emails are, by far, the strongest aspect of the novel. They provide a complex first-person narrative of Mellie's journey from childhood to adulthood, in an unflinching portrayal of the abuse, social rejection, suicidal ideation, and eventual self-acceptance. Dara's somewhat predictable road-trip story and budding romance with her best friend break up the intensity of Mellie's narrative and build suspense between the revelatory emails. However, the more complex elements of Dara's character, such as her professional tennis ambitions and class-related struggles, are never fully developed in the text. Instead, Dara's story ultimately serves as an opportunity for readers to learn about contemporary transgender issues by her side. VERDICT Despite its uneven character and plot development, this novel offers a compelling reading experience, making it a valuable addition to library collections.—Molly Saunders, Homewood Public Library, AL

School Library Journal

★ 2017-12-03
Eighteen-year-old white tennis phenom Dara is so good that her coach wants her to start competing in tournaments, and she'll need a passport—but her single mother, Mellie, is short on cash and has no interest in supporting Dara's tennis career.Mellie insists she lost Dara's birth certificate, but one day after Mellie leaves for work, Dara finds it in a locked box—along with other secrets that flip her world over. Her birth mother was struck by a car and killed before Dara turned 1, and Mellie—her father—is transgender and kept it all from Dara. Furious and hurt and accompanied by her Indian-American best friend, Sam, Dara goes to find her birth mother's family. Mellie's baffling series of lies to her daughter is revealed to have very good reasons, and the story behind them unfolds in a series of emails Mellie sends to Dara as she's on the road. Dara is the main character, but Mellie is the book's heart, and she's incredible: a complicated, soulful, talented, and loving transwoman whose emails could be their own book. Verdi's respect and care are evident in every character in the book, no matter how brief their appearance, especially boy-next-door Sam and Dara's wealthy, ultraconservative grandparents, who, although they do some terrible things, aren't written off as evil. Verdi's book is a triumph—an exquisite mirror in which trans parents and their children will see themselves. And for once, the reflection won't break their hearts. (Fiction. 14-adult)

Kirkus Reviews