Otherwise

Series Name: Gravel Road® Verse

A law has been passed. There will be no more genders. Everyone must appear gender neutral. No more boys. No more girls. Just Otherwise. Same bland clothes. Same fuzzy heads. Spark dreads the countdown leading up to the finality of the new laws passage. Her parents are for it. They're tired of conforming to society's standards. But they allow her to take off for a quick camping trip to gather her thoughts. At the campsite, she meets Whistler. And the attraction is instant and mutual. But who is Whistler? And what is Whistler? Boy? Or girl? This gender-bending story in verse will make readers question everything they thought they knew about love, chemistry, and cultural norms.

Hard-hitting, contemporary young adult fiction in verse. Just like prose, a novel in verse tells a story. But verse is unique because readers access the text through short chapters, or poems. The varying lengths of the chapters are ideal for a striving reader, giving them breaks to collect their thoughts, to imagine the characters in their mind’s eye, and to set the scene like a frame in a movie. Books are 160 to 268 pages.

ISBN: 9781622508914

Format: Paperback

Grade Level: YA

Approximate Grade-Level Equivalent for Series: 1.6 to 3.5

Lexile Level: HL570L

Key Words/ Themes: Realistic Fiction, Poetry, Verse, Gender Equality, Sexuality, Coming of Age, Teen, Young Adult, Hi-Lo, Hi-Lo Books, Hi-Lo Solutions, High-Low Books, Hi-Low Books, ELL, EL, ESL, Struggling Learner, Struggling Reader, Special Education, SPED, Newcomers, Reading, Learning, Education, Educational, Educational Books