AN INDIE'S INTRODUCE PICK!

In this modern take on Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, debut writer Jess Callans delivers a tender, queer coming of age story about finding your voice and choosing to live authentically, even when it's easier to blend in.

Puberty, AKA the ultimate biological predator, is driving a wedge between soon-to-be 13 year old Ollie Thompson and their lifelong friends. Too much of a girl for their neighborhood hockey team, but not girly enough for their boy-crazed BFF, Ollie doesn't know where they fit. And their usual ability to camouflage? Woefully disrupted by all the changes around them.

When a school project asks them to write an essay on what it means to be a woman (if anyone's got an answer, that'd be great), and one of their new friends is the target of bullying, Ollie is caught between the safety of fleeing from their own differences or confronting the risks of fighting to take their own path forward.