Taylor Before and After

This book, like young adulthood itself, is complex and multilayered. The reader must navigate two alternating story lines: life "before," and life "after," a tragic event that upends a family, a community, and most important to Taylor, the delicate balance of social acceptance. Taylor tells her stor......more

Wow. This book was not what I expected, when I set to read a young adult fiction novel about a girl in the paradise of Hawaii. I was surprised in so many great ways, pulled into this girl’s family, friendships, and her relationship with her own mind and heart. Taylor, her friends (and frienemies), a......more

This book helps teens work through life challenges, both internal and external in a gentle yet hopeful way. It has an interesting and unique format of 2 timelines told through journal entries, but the change in voice makes it easy to understand. We can all relate to main character, Taylor, in her qu......more

I felt like Taylor was writing right to me and I was her friend. She is honest, and the struggles she goes through are real. Her entries before and after show how life changes people, for bad and good, and what we can do about it. And what we can't. Middle schoolers will connect with how it feels t......more

After several of us fell in love with Taylor and her story, we will be adding this to our preteen-teen-adult book club in New York City! We can’t wait to share this fresh, deep, relatable, smart, fun, humorous, sometimes heartbreaking but always heartfelt, novel with our readers have of many ages. T......more