Overview

From award-winning author Shannon Stocker comes a moving and empowering YA novel that explores what it means to find your voice and learn to advocate for yourself. Twyla has always believed things happen for a reason, but when she starts having severe health issues and doctors won’t listen to her concerns, she finds herself questioning everything, including her diagnosis … and wondering if her mother’s death holds the answer. Twyla enters high school sure of three things: Her best friends will always be there for her, the next four years will be amazing, and her mom was right when she said there’s a reason behind everything. Then she gets extremely nauseous and has trouble concentrating during a field hockey game. The doctors say it’s only a mild digestive issue, but Twyla is convinced they’re wrong. Making things worse, her friends start ghosting her outside of school, even though they tell her everything is fine, and her dad is becoming more distant each time she asks about her mom’s life before she died. As Twyla’s illness intensifies and her diagnosis stays the same, she finds herself feeling like her world is unraveling. It’s not until she begins researching her symptoms herself—and discovers something in her mom’s old records that could hold the answer to her condition—that she believes there could be some sort of reason for everything she’s facing. But will anyone listen to her in time? Stronger at the Seams: Is a contemporary fiction novel for readers 12 and up and adult fans of YA Comes from Shannon Stocker, the winner of the 2023 Schneider Award for Listen: How Evelyn Glennie, a Deaf Girl, Changed Percussion and an advocate for children with disabilities and chronic disease Is a powerful coming-of-age story about family, friendship, and self-advocacy  

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9780310162353

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Reviews

Shannon Stocker. Blink, $18.99 (288p) ISBN 978-0-310-16235-3 Fourteen-year-old Twyla Vogel thinks that helping her Louisville, Ky., high school's field hockey team win games should be her only concern. Instead, she's preoccupied with how sick she feels; dealing with frequent nausea and declining appetite during games, sleepovers, or school dances has taken its toll. Worse, her two best friends are spending more time together without her, a teammate seems determined to undermine her at every opportunity, and she's developed confusing feelings for her childhood friend Elliot. Following a discouraging doctor's visit during which she's diagnosed with constipation, Twyla searches for answers herself. Spurred by her recent studies in AP biology, Twyla wonders if her illness could be linked to her late mother's genetics. Twyla's accessible narration depicts her tumultuous situations: her physical struggles, her distant relationship with her father, grief over her mother's death five years earlier, her changing friendships. Based on the author's family experiences, as discussed in an endnote by Stocker (Listen: How Evelyn Glennie, a Deaf Girl, Changed Percussion), it's a compassionate interpretation of one teen's difficulties navigating health concerns and medical advocacy. Most characters cue as white. Ages 13--up. Agent: Allison Remcheck, Stimola Literary. (Oct.) * Publishers Weekly *

Author Information

As the mother of one child with brain cancer and another with ADHD, Shannon Stocker is passionate about advocating for children with disabilities. She’s authored picture books such as the 2023 ALA Schneider Family Book Award winner Listen: How Evelyn Glennie, a Deaf Girl, Changed Percussion and Warrior: A Patient’s Courageous Quest, among others. Although Shannon completed medical school, her own disability (RSD/CRPS) prevented her from doing a residency—a plot twist for which she is now grateful. She believes that whether or not everything happens for a reason, we all feel broken sometimes … but it is also possible to become stronger at the seams. Shannon lives in Louisville, KY with her husband Greg, her children Cassidy and Tye, way too many critters, and a hidden stash of dark chocolate. Stronger at the Seams is her debut YA novel.

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