Tegan and Sara: Junior High

by Tegan Quin, Sara Quin, Tillie Walden (Illustrator)

Overview

From indie-pop twin-sister duo Tegan and Sara comes their bestselling contemporary middle grade graphic novel about growing up, coming out, and finding yourself through music and sisterhood—perfect for fans of Raina Telgemeier's Sisters and Sweet Valley Twins.

Before Tegan and Sara took the music world by storm, the Quins were just two identical twins trying to find their place in a new home and new school. From first crushes to the perils of puberty, surviving junior high is something the sisters plan to face side by side, just like they've always faced things. But growing up also means growing apart, as Tegan and Sara make different friends and take separate paths to understanding their queerness. For the first time ever, they ask who one sister is without the other.

Set in the present day, this effervescent blend of fiction and autobiography, with artwork from Eisner Award–winner Tillie Walden, offers a glimpse at the twin sisters before they became indie-pop icons, exploring their shifting relationship, their own experiences coming out, and the first steps of their musical journey.

A prequel of sorts to the authors' bestselling adult memoir High School, now an 8-episode Freevee television series!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780374313029
Publisher:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publication date:	05/30/2023
Series:	Tegan and Sara , #1
Pages:	304
Sales rank:	136,062
Product dimensions:	7.90(w) x 5.60(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	10 - 14 Years

About the Author

Tegan Quin and Sara Quin have sold well over one million records and have shared the stage with artists like Taylor Swift, Paramore, and Katy Perry over the course of their career. They sang "Everything Is AWESOME!!!" in The Lego Movie and are executive producers of the TV series High School based on their bestselling adult memoir. In 2016, they created the Tegan and Sara Foundation, which fights for health, economic justice, and representation for LGBTQ+ people. The twin sisters currently reside in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Tillie Walden is a cartoonist and an illustrator who is a twin from Austin, Texas. She has published numerous graphic novels, including her Eisner Award–winning memoir Spinning. She lives in Vermont with her family.

Editorial Reviews

★ 05/01/2023

Gr 5–8—Indie pop stars Tegan and Sara Quin team up with graphic novelist Walden to create a heartfelt, visually stunning coming-of-age story for tweens and teens. Twins Tegan and Sara have always been close, but after a move and a transition to middle school, they must contend with new friends, bullies, puberty, secrets, and worst of all—drifting apart. The story is largely based on their lives, but is set in present day (Tegan and Sara were actually teens in the 1990s). Walden's art, paired with the authors' lyrical words, create an emotionally resonant reading experience that is sure to mesh with adolescents' big feelings. Walden uses different color schemes to highlight each twin, accentuating their points of view and their growing distance. Although the twins experience some anxiety and emotional turmoil through friend drama, new romantic feelings, and beginning to question their sexuality, this is largely a very wholesome, comforting read that celebrates the power of shared creativity to bring people back together. Supplemental material contains photos and notebook pages of Tegan and Sara with their first musical efforts. VERDICT A first purchase for middle school libraries and highly recommended for fans of Svetlana Chmakova and Molly Knox Ostertag.—Catherine Cote

School Library Journal

2023-03-14
The high and lows of preteens navigating school and life, inspired by the Quin sibling pop duo’s actual childhoods.

Identical twin sisters Tegan and Sara have moved and are entering a new junior high in Calgary where they’ll be in different classes, making everything even more intimidating. They navigate a slew of awkward, messy moments—making new friends and keeping faraway ones, getting their first bras and first periods, crushing on cute classmates, trying to be cool but still appreciating dorky parents, and living separate lives while trying to remain close to each other. Eventually they find their stepfather’s guitar in the garage, and making music together not only mends some rifts in their relationship, but begins a meaningful, far-reaching creative journey. The setting has been updated for modern audiences and includes cellphones and Taylor Swift references. The narrative switches between depictions of the characters going through real life (drawn in purple tones) and interludes in which the twins, color-coded with light blue for Tegan and pale maroon for Sara, share their innermost thoughts, feelings, and reflections with readers. The story is sweet, focusing on the all-important relationships of tween life. Walden’s illustrations are, as usual, wonderfully expressive. They transition smoothly from busier scenes to quieter ones along the story’s emotional beats. The White twins’ circle of friends includes queer kids and people of color.

Tugs at the heartstrings like a well-tuned guitar. (authors’ note) (Graphic fiction. 9-13)

Kirkus Reviews

04/03/2023

Twin musicians Tegan and Sara Quin (High School, for adults) collaborate with Walden (Clementine) to deliver a fictionalized contemporary accounting of their 1990s junior high school years in this jam-packed graphic novel. Following a move to Calgary, 12-year-old Tegan and Sara begin their first year of junior high. Things get off to a rocky start, however, when the siblings realize that, for the first time, they’ll be in separate classes. Headstrong Sara and soft-spoken Tegan are initially agitated at their classmates’ inability to tell them apart and experience anxiety over their separation, but as the year unfurls, they encounter differing social, physical, and emotional firsts. Even as they embark on opposite personal paths, the pair’s discovery of their mother’s boyfriend’s old guitar soon brings them closer together than ever before. Humorous asides to the reader from Tegan and Sara—rendered in blue and red, respectively—are interspersed throughout; Walden winningly depicts densely detailed drawings via frameless, amorphous panels with a purple tone that mixes the twins’ individual hues. While some slang and musical references feel forced, the emotions and character interactions are timelessly resonant. Ages 10–14. (May)

Publishers Weekly

An Indie Bestseller
A Texas Maverick Graphic Novels Reading List Selection
A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection

“A heartfelt, visually stunning coming-of-age story . . . Walden’s art, paired with the authors’ ­lyrical words, create an emotionally resonant reading experience that is sure to mesh with adolescents’ big feelings . . . Highly recommended for fans of ­Svetlana Chmakova and Molly Knox ­Ostertag.” —School Library Journal, starred review

“The high and lows of preteens navigating school and life, inspired by the Quin sibling pop duo’s actual childhoods . . . Walden’s illustrations are, as usual, wonderfully expressive . . . Tugs at the heartstrings like a well-tuned guitar.” —Kirkus Reviews

“The latest book from rock's favorite multihyphenate twins . . . Tweendom may be nobody's favorite era, but it's also undeniably formative—a time when swirling questions of identity and purpose and who you want to be as a person start to solidify in real and surprising ways. As young queer girls navigating those rocky shoals and simultaneously beginning to find their voices through music, who better to speak to that moment?” —Entertainment Weekly

“Popular twin-sister musicians Tegan and Sara share a fictionalized tale of their early adolescence in this first book of a planned duology . . . Fans of the duo’s work will love this and so will anyone who understands how awkward and important junior high can be.” —Booklist

“Timelessly resonant.” —Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher