Wonderings and Reflections on Growing Up Gracefully
September 7, 2015
Fletcher, a British actress and host of the YouTube channel It's Way Past My Bedtime, debuts with what she calls "the manual I yearned for when I was a teenager." Her own black-and-white line illustrations are interspersed throughoutâthe kinds of doodles one might see in the margins of a student's notebook. Dividing the book into eight "acts" (with titles like "How to Get Your Heart Broken Only Just a Little Bit"), Fletcher discusses how to navigate social and home life, school, professional goals, and relationships, bolstered by examples from her own life; for example, after jumping between relationships, afraid to be alone, she spent much of a year single in an effort to become more independent. Fletcher openly addresses the ebbs and flows of adolescence, pursuing goals, and sometimes letting go of them: "If you decide to change those dreams after having wanted them for so long, it doesn't make you a failure. It makes you smart, realistic and above all honest with yourself." Ages 12âup. Agent: Hannah Ferguson, Hardman and Swainson Literary Agency.