Sunrise Nights

by Jeff Zentner, Brittany Cavallaro

Overview

Two young artists have a chance meeting on the last night of summer arts camp in this YA novel in verse and dialogue cowritten by acclaimed authors Jeff Zentner and Brittany Cavallaro.

Jude loves photography, and he’s good at it, too. Between his parents’ divorce and his anxiety, being behind a camera is the only time his mind is quiet.

Florence is confronting the premature end of her dance career as a degenerative eye disease begins to steal her balance. She’s having a hard time letting go.

The two meet at Sunrise Night, their sleepaway art camp’s dusk-to-dawn closing celebration, and decide to take a chance on each other. Their one rule: No contact for a year after the sun has risen. Over the course of three Sunrise Nights, will Florence and Jude find a deeper connection and learn who they are—and who they could be together?

 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780063324534
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	07/09/2024
Pages:	400
Sales rank:	84,999
Product dimensions:	5.80(w) x 8.30(h) x 1.40(d)
Age Range:	13 - 17 Years

About the Author

Jeff Zentner is the author of the New York Times Notable Books The Serpent King and In the Wild Light. He has won the ALA’s William C. Morris Award, the Amelia Elizabeth Walden Award twice, the Muriel Becker Award, and the International Literacy Association Award for Young Adult Fiction and has been longlisted twice for the Carnegie Medal. Before becoming a writer, he was a musician who recorded with Iggy Pop, Nick Cave, and Debbie Harry. He lives in Nashville.  

Brittany Cavallaro is the New York Times bestselling author of A Study in Charlotte and the Charlotte Holmes novels. With Emily Henry she wrote the young adult thriller Hello Girls. Cavallaro is also the author of the poetry collections Girl-King and Unhistorical and is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in poetry. She lives in Michigan, where she teaches creative writing at Interlochen. 

Editorial Reviews

★ 04/29/2024

High schoolers Florence, a dancer, and Jude, a photographer, meet while participating in the traditional “sunrise night,” the last day of art camp, during which campers stay out all night. Despite the pair’s individual challenges—Florence worries that a worsening eye condition will end her ability to dance and Jude struggles with heightened anxiety in the aftermath of his parents’ divorce—they make each other laugh, and think, and hope. They know there’s something between them, but since Jude has a girlfriend, and he and Florence live nowhere near each other, they agree not to talk again until the next sunrise night. Coauthors Cavallaro (Manifest) and Zentner (In the Wild Light) employ spot-on banter to deliver a romance teeming with an ambiance of endless possibility on the precipice of devastating heartbreak. As the teens bond over their shared love and conviction for their craft, between them spins a love story that is truly suspenseful. The will-they-won’t-they plot, ferried along by the duo’s alternating perspectives, will have readers struggling between racing toward the ending and lingering over the luminous verse. Protagonists read as white. Ages 13–up. Agents: (for Cavallaro) Taylor Haggerty, Root Literary; (for Zentner) Charlie Olsen, InkWell Literary. (July)

Publishers Weekly

"An ode to those magically elastic nights of summer, when anything and everything feels possible. A knockout!”  — Emily Henry, #1 New York Times bestselling author

"If there were any doubts that the combined forces of Zentner and Cavallaro would knock our socks off, this gorgeous book lays them to rest." — David Arnold, New York Times bestselling author

"Funny, lyrical, and utterly charming—Sunrise Nights is a whip-smart romantic stunner. I absolutely loved it." — Jasmine Warga, New York Times bestselling author

"An emotional duet. Together, the voices gradually create their own source of 'new light.' Beautiful!" — Margarita Engle, Newbery Honor-winning author and Young People's Poet Laureate Emeritus

“Coauthors Cavallaro and Zentner employ spot-on banter to deliver a romance teeming with an ambiance of endless possibility on the precipice of devastating heartbreak. Luminous.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Distinctive and charming.”  — Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books (starred review)

“Beautifully written. Offer[s] readers a memorable experience.” — Booklist (starred review)

“Will hook readers from the start. A smart, swoony, and witty romance.” — Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

2024-04-05
Two teens meet at an arts camp in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and form a lasting bond.

Florence, a dancer with nystagmus, an eye condition that affects her depth perception, is working through her grief that she may not be able to continue dancing when she meets Jude, a photographer. The closing tradition at Harbor Arts Camp is called Sunrise Night, an evening in which the teens are permitted to leave the camp to hang out in the surrounding town—all night if they wish (with check-ins). Jude is honest right away about having a girlfriend, but as the two move from one eccentric small-town venue to another, they realize they’re undeniably attracted to one another. They vow to meet up again at Harbor Arts the following summer but in the meantime to return home to Wisconsin (Florence) and Tennessee (Jude) and avoid all communication: “Total silence for a year.” In alternating entries comprising both verse and short prose passages from each of their perspectives, Florence and Jude’s story is told as a sort of comedy of errors taking place on three Sunrise Nights over three successive years. This protracted, slow-burn romance works thanks to their frenetic, philosophical, wildly funny, and poignant voices, which will hook readers from the start, even if the verse sections may strike some as a little too earnest at times. Florence and Jude are cued white.

A smart, swoony, and witty romance. (Romance. 13-18)

Kirkus Reviews