NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK • A “tender beautiful and radiantly
outraged” ( The New York Times Book Review ) novel that follows a year of seismic romantic
political and familial shifts for a teacher and her students at a boarding school for the deaf
from the acclaimed author of Girl at War “For those who loved the Oscar-winning film CODA a
boarding school for deaf students is the setting for a kaleidoscope of experiences.”— The
Washington Post ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: NPR The Washington Post Publishers
Weekly Booklist True biz (adj. exclamation American Sign Language): really seriously
definitely real-talk True biz? The students at the River Valley School for the Deaf just
want to hook up pass their history finals and have politicians doctors and their parents
stop telling them what to do with their bodies. This revelatory novel plunges readers into the
halls of a residential school for the deaf where they’ll meet Charlie a rebellious transfer
student who’s never met another deaf person before Austin the school’s golden boy whose
world is rocked when his baby sister is born hearing and February the hearing headmistress a
CODA (child of deaf adult(s)) who is fighting to keep her school open and her marriage intact
but might not be able to do both. As a series of crises both personal and political threaten to
unravel each of them Charlie Austin and February find their lives inextricable from one
another—and changed forever. This is a story of sign language and lip-reading disability and
civil rights isolation and injustice first love and loss and above all great persistence
daring and joy. Absorbing and assured idiosyncratic and relatable this is an unforgettable
journey into the Deaf community and a universal celebration of human connection.
