Kauakanilehua Mahoe Adams

A Native Hawaiian girl fights back against the confines of her strict family and wrestles with the meaning of home and belonging in this powerful, romantic, debut young adult novel in verse. Aouli Elizabeth Smith is adrift: unheard at home and an unbeliever at church, fighting her sister and losing her best friend. Overflowing with feeling, she pours her secrets and herself into poetry when the world threatens to sweep her away.The one place she feels tied down to earth is in her aunty Ehu’s backyard. Those sun-soaked Saturdays with her extended Native Hawaiian community living near Seattle are precious to her—especially when a new boy, Nalu, turns up with eyes that seem to pierce right into her soul. Under the maple trees, the fragments of her life fit together, if only for an afternoon.Then, an unspeakable truth about her father shatters this one perfect corner of her life.As Aouli’s world constricts around what others wish she could be, language fails her. But maybe love can give her the words to set herself free.This debut novel-in-verse by Kauakanilehua Mahoe Adams soars from the page, wrestles with hypocrisy, and proclaims a message of love with resounding emotional truth.