Jumpstart the World »

Catherine Ryan Hyde is the author of Becoming Chloe,The Year of My Miraculous Reappearance, Diary of A Witness, The Day I Killed James, the national bestseller Pay It Forward, and Love in the Present Tense, amongst many other books.

Elle is a loner. She doesn’t need people. Which is a good thing, because she’s on her own: she had to move into her own apartment so her mother’s boyfriend won’t have to deal with her.

Then she meets Frank, the guy who lives next door. He’s older and has a girlfriend, but Elle can’t stop thinking about him. Frank isn’t like anyone Elle has ever met. He listens to her. He’s gentle. And Elle is falling for him, hard.
But Frank is different in a way that Elle was never prepared for: he’s transgender. And when Elle learns the truth, her world is turned upside down.  Now she’ll have to search inside herself to find not only the true meaning of friendship but her own role in jumpstarting the world.

Tender, honest, and compassionate, Jumpstart the World is a stunning story to make you laugh, cry, and honor the power of love.

Publishers Weekly

Just before Elle's 16th birthday, her mother dumps her in her own New York City apartment (her stepfather " want a teenager around"). Alone, except for a one-eyed cat who mostly hides, she is grateful for neighbors Frank and Molly, whom she grows close to. Elle develops a crush on kind and wise Frank, but when she learns he is transgender, she wonders what this means about her own identity. Readers will be moved by Elle's thoughtful and honest narration, which genuinely reads like someone sorting through a complex situation--and her complicated emotions (when Frank offers help with her sick cat, she thinks, "It's not that I didn't appreciate his help. And it's not like I was judging him for his life choices. It's more like... If I could just have more time to swallow things"). While some plotting seems clichéd, such as Elle's decision to become a photographer so she can "remind the world to be what it knows it should be," even these familiar turns underscore the author's message about a universal need for love and acceptance. Ages 14–up. (Oct.)