Lily and Dunkin by Donna Gephart (2016)

Lily Jo is a few days away from starting her first day of eighth grade. For most kids, it’s a hard year. Most students are just finding out who they want to be, and until they do, insecurities are on the rise. While Lily Jo is going to face the typical hardships of the school year, she’s got a big one that not many people have: she is transgender. But right now, the world still sees her as Tim, including her father. So when she runs into the new boy, Dunkin, in the neighborhood, she’s pretty thrilled. Dunkin doesn’t know anything about her, and could be part of the fresh, new start she’s looking for. However, Dunkin has his own problems. He has bipolar disorder, the same diagnosis that his father has, and just moved from his childhood home. Right now, his whole life is filled with the unknown, and associating himself with Lily wouldn’t help him gain any social life. Life keeps throwing Lily and Dunkin together, though, and it seems like they might just be what the other one needs.

Until about a month ago, I had never heard of Lily and Dunkin, which is really disappointing. I feel like this story offers a lot to both kids and adults, and should probably be a school reading. Now, I am not a big fan of school readings, but people need to read this book, and that might be the only way to make sure it reaches out. Luckily for me, Donna Gephart herself reached out to me and sent me a signed copy of Lily and Dunkin, which I am so happy about.

It seems that even when I was in middle school I wasn’t reading middle grade books. I think what had happened is that when I was twelve, I was so sick of reading children’s books that I went straight into YA. That being said, Lily and Dunkin was the first middle grade novel I’ve read in a long time.Within that time, I had forgotten how great middle grade novels are. They certainly deal with just as deep of issues as YA, but they have a simplicity to them, which I appreciated in this book. I liked that there was a lot of layers to the story, but they were also explained very thoroughly and were presented in a such a way that was comfortable. I also really enjoyed Donna Gephart’s writing. I feel like a lot of times authors try to have poetic and overly beautiful writing, but sometimes it’s nice to have writing that feels more like documentation- that the writing, while not necessarily an art, is able to communicate human communication and feeling through the messy truth of words.

Dunkin was a character that was really personal to me, and I think to Donna Gephart, too. Like Dunkin, I have a bipolar disorder, and so does Donna Gephart’s son. And I found a lot of similarities between myself and Dunkin, even some I didn’t want there to be. While I was not diagnosed until my sophomore year of high school, when my family and I think back, it was evident that it was affecting my life in eighth grade. Also, like Dunkin, I moved away from my childhood home when I was an early teenager, and it was really hard for me to cope with. To be honest, I still got really mad at Dunkin at certain points. He acted like a total jerk to Lily for the majority of the story, and for some reason, Lily kept giving him more chances. In general, I think Lily was a really sweet girl that let people walk all over her. A big conflict that she faced is trying to get her dad to accept her as transgender. Maybe it’s because I have really “high” standards for parents, but I thought her dad was an example of how not to act toward someone who is transgender. Just like with Dunkin, Lily kept giving her father more and more chances to change, which I don’t think I would be able to do.

Regardless of my frustrations with Lily and Dunkin as characters, I think they need to be read. Right now, the United States has elected a presidential team that for one is very anti LGBT, and for second, wants to abolish the very insurance that provides for so many people with mental health issues. I hope that every person comes out of this book with a passion for protecting people like Lily and Dunkin, we don’t have a government that’s doing so. Together we can make sure that Lily and Dunkin (and everyone else) are safe to be healthy and loved. And for that, I hope everyone reads Lily and Dunkin.

4 Stars