Birthday

March 15, 2019
Two best friends fall in love despite the changes in their lives and societal pressures that threaten to tear them apart.Inseparable childhood friends, transgender girl Morgan and cisgender boy Eric spend every birthday together. A September snowstorm brought their families together in the hospital on their shared day of birth. As they navigate puberty and high school, Morgan struggles to understand and love herself. Cancer took her mother away, and she fears rejection from Eric and her football coach dad if she tells them she's not a boy. On top of family tension and worries about his friendship with Morgan, Eric hides his own concerns about his sexuality and his future. In a narrative that follows Morgan and Eric from year to year on their birthday, Stonewall Award Winner Russo (If I Was Your Girl, 2016) captures the intense longing of two teens who feel trapped in their small, football-obsessed Tennessee town. Morgan's self-acceptance is an intimate, honest journey with an ultimately hopeful resolution that acknowledges the diverse struggles and experiences of transgender people. While the story ends on a happy note, grief, economic struggle, abuse, discrimination, suicide, and divorce play significant roles in the narrative and the characters' development. The slow-burn romance between Eric and Morgan is affirming and worth the wait. Apart from Morgan's Latina friend, Jasmine, the cast is white.An emotional, winning touchdown. (Fiction. 14-18)

COPYRIGHT(2019) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

April 8, 2019
Stonewall Award winner Russo (If I Was Your Girl) tackles teen love, heartbreak, sexuality, and gender identity in this novel told over the course of six years through the alternating voices of transgender girl Morgan and cisgender boy Eric, two childhood best friends who share the same birthday. As the story opens in their Tennessee town on their 13th birthday, Morgan has realized that the gender she was assigned at birth doesn’t fit who she truly is. The only person Morgan wants to share this information with is Eric; Morgan reasons that if Eric accepts her, then everything will be fine. But her attempts to tell Eric fail, and by day’s end, Morgan feels even more alone. Russo’s narrative revisits the characters each year on their birthdays, and over time Morgan moves closer to embracing her true self while dealing with bullies and harassment. Meanwhile, Eric navigates an abusive father, a desire to play guitar over football, and a growing attraction to Morgan. Russo weaves together a series of short stories, encapsulating each year of development in a snapshot without losing character depth. A realistic picture of the challenges that teens may face when finding themselves and falling in love. Ages 13–up. Agent: Hayley Wagreich and Joelle Hobeika, Alloy Entertainment.

Starred review from April 15, 2019
Grades 9-12 *Starred Review* Morgan has an urgent secret that he keeps, even from his lifelong best friend Eric: he desperately wants, no, needs to be a girl. Oblivious, Eric, who is straight, only suspects Morgan might be gay, and Morgan himself wonders if he might be. Though Morgan doesn't know it, Eric has his own secret: he can't stop wondering what things would be like if his friend were a girl. But what could these feelings mean? Grappling with how to be his authentic self, Morgan angrily decides to deny his truth and be the most masculine boy he can, leaving Eric to feel his friend is disappearing. Will they, as they turn 18, be able to resolve their feelings about themselves and each other? Readers will gradually find out, since both' first-person points of view are represented in alternate chapters. The story proceeds a year at a time, skipping from one birthday to the next, from 14 to 18, as readers learn more about the Eric and Morgan's tangled, complex feelings and their parallel lives. Russo does a superb job of capturing and dramatizing Morgan's agony and Eric's confusion, exciting her readers' deep empathy. Beautifully written, this is an altogether singular contribution to the gradually growing body of transgender literature and, indeed, to mainstream literature as well.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)

May 1, 2019
This dual-point-of-view novel visits Morgan and Eric, close friends from a small town in Tennessee, on their shared birthday each year from ages thirteen to eighteen. Morgan is transgender, secretly so (and male-presenting) for much of the book, and birthday messages left behind by her deceased mother are painful reminders of the son Mom had imagined her to be. Eric's father is physically abusive and objects to Eric's friendship with Morgan, both because he feels they're too close and because he views Morgan as effeminate. That friendship eventually takes on romantic elements?and related strain. Russo (Stonewall Award winner for If I Was Your Girl, rev. 7/16, and herself a transgender woman from Tennessee) doesn't shy away from the difficulties of these dynamics in a town whose residents display ignorance about and hateful attitudes toward people with queer identities; the two protagonists' first-person narrations provide close looks at their internal conflicts (which, in Morgan's case, include suicidal ideation, eventually leading to a suicide attempt). But telling this story over a period of years is a smart approach, one that shows how a very difficult situation can reach a mostly happy ending?even if it takes a long time to get there. shoshana flax

(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

July 1, 2019
This dual-point-of-view novel visits friends Morgan and Eric on their shared birthday each year from ages thirteen to eighteen. Morgan is transgender, secretly so (and male-presenting) for much of the book. Eric's father objects to the friendship, which eventually takes on romantic elements--and related strain. Russo doesn't shy away from heavy subjects, including abuse and suicide, but also shows how a difficult situation can reach a mostly happy ending.

(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)