Stars for WHEN THE MOON WAS OURS

Last year Anna-Marie McLemore broke out on the literary YA scene with her debut novel, THE WEIGHT OF FEATHERS, which was a finalist for the 2016 YALSA William C. Morris Award.

Now McLemore is back with WHEN THE MOON WAS OURS, a second stunning novel tinged with magic, about a girl with roses that grow from her wrist who happens to be hiding the truth, a boy with past secrets who paints moons and hangs them in trees, and four sisters rumored to be witches, who could ruin them both.

WHEN THE MOON WAS OURS is on the 2016 National Book Awards Longlist for Young People’s Literature and has THREE starred, rave reviews:

“Love bests every opponent in this surreal exploration of familial bonds and sexual identity. Amid the ordinariness of the small-town setting, McLemore winds arabesques of magical realism. Readers who stick with this novel will be rewarded with a love story that is as endearingly old-fashioned as it is modern and as fantastical as it is real.” — School Library Journal, starred review

“With luminous prose infused with Latino folklore and magical realism, this mixes fairy-tale ingredients with the elegance of a love story, with all of it rooted in a deeply real sense of humanity. Lovely, necessary, and true.” — Booklist, starred review

“McLemore mesmerizes once again with a lush narrative set at the thresholds of identity, family, and devotion. Luxurious language infused with Spanish phrases, Latin lunar geography, and Pakistani traditions is so rich it lingers on the tongue, and the presence of magic is effortlessly woven into a web of prose that languidly unfolds to reveal the complexities of gender, culture, family, and self. Readers will be ensnared in this ethereal narrative long before they even realize the net has been cast. ” — Kirkus Reviews, starred review

Read the Booklist interview with Anna-Marie about WHEN THE MOON WAS OURS.

WHEN THE MOON WAS OURS will be available on October 4, 2016. THE WEIGHT OF FEATHERS will be available in trade paperback on March 28, 2017.