Drew

Starred review from December 9, 2013
The husband-and-wife team of Cooper (Real Man Adventures) and Glock-Cooper (Beauty Before Comfort) makes its YA debut with a thought-provoking exploration of identity, gender, and sexuality, first in a four-book series. Ethan Miller’s freshman year starts with a major surprise when he wakes up as a girl, and is promptly informed by his parents that he’s a Changer, part of a race that spends four years living in different bodies before settling on a permanent one. As “Drew Bohner,” Ethan must navigate high school from a female perspective, for good and bad. Drew makes new friends and enemies, joins the cheerleading squad, and learns more about the Changers and their cultlike methodology, but as Drew tries to adapt to her new life, she’s always aware that more changes are yet to come, which could spell doom for any chances at friendship or romance. While numerous questions remain to be answered, and the premise is a little convoluted, Drew’s story unfolds with sympathy and complexity. An excellent read for any teens questioning their sense of self or gender. Ages 12–up.

April 1, 2014

Gr 9 Up-Ethan wakes up on his first day of high school to discover that he is no longer the same person he was when he went to sleep-overnight he was transformed into a beautiful girl. His parents inform him that his father was a Changer and that this is the first of four transformations. He will experience each year of high school in a new body, and at the end of his senior year, he will get to choose which body he will live in for the rest of his life. The premise is similar to David Levithan's Every Day (Knopf, 2012), except in this universe the character experiences each identity for an entire year. In the body of a girl named Drew, Ethan gets to feel the highs and lows of being a girl, from receiving the kindness of strangers to having her first menstrual cycle during cheerleading tryouts. Luckily, this is more than just a "message" book about how we all need to be more understanding of each other. The imaginative premise is wrapped around a moving story about gender, identity, friendship, bravery, rebellion vs. conformity, and thinking outside the box. By the end of this book, readers will be invested in this character and will want to know what Ethan's future holds and how he will physically and emotionally transform over the next installments.-Andrea Lipinski, New York Public Library

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