Watching Traffic

Emily has finally finished high school in the small town where she has lived her whole life. At last, she thinks, her adult life can begin.

But what if you have no idea what you want your new life to look like? What then?

While Lincoln gets ready to go backpacking in Australia, Melissa packs for university on the east coast, and a new guy named Tyler provides welcome distraction, Emily wonders whether she will end up working forever at Pamela's Country Catering, cutting the crusts off party sandwiches and stuffing mushrooms. Is this her future? Being known forever as the local girl whose mother abandoned her in the worst way possible all those years ago? Visiting her spacey grandmother, watching nature shows on TV with her dad and hanging out with Robert the grocery clerk? Listening to the distant hum of the highway leading out of the town everyone can't wait to leave?

With poetic prose and a keen eye for the quirks and ironies of small-town life, Jane Ozkowski captures the bittersweet uncertainty of that weird, unreal summer after high school -- a time that is full of possibility and completely terrifying at the same time.


Binding Type: Hardcover
Publisher: Groundwood Books
Published: 08/09/2016
ISBN: 9781554988433
Pages: 192
Weight: 0.80lbs
Size: 8.60h x 5.60w x 0.60d

Review Citations: Kirkus Reviews 07/01/2016
Publishers Weekly 08/22/2016
Kirkus Reviews Fall Preview 08/15/2016 pg. 73
School Library Journal 09/01/2016
Horn Book Magazine 11/01/2016 pg. 85
Hornbook Guide to Children 01/01/2017 - Superior,Well Above Average