Octopus Moon

As an aspiring marine biologist, 10-year-old Pearl Graham has always felt connected to the loggerhead turtles at the Florida aquarium where her mother works (their beaked noses and protective shells remind her of herself). But recently she has felt more like the exceptionally sensitive octopus, with “no barrier between what an octopus feels and its world.” Previously enjoyable activities and traditions have become excruciating, and with the mean voice in her head getting louder, “pretending to be/ Used to Be Pearl” is draining, prompting Pearl to withdraw from her family and friends. She’s initially annoyed when her parents bring her to a therapist, but when she’s diagnosed with depression, she’s comforted by the fact that it’s a treatable illness “like diabetes or asthma.” As she comes to understand more about her diagnosis, Pearl learns to manage her “dark fog” and realizes that her beloved grandfather also has the same illness. Pyron (Stay) employs a raft of apt ocean similes to elucidate Pearl’s depression with complexity in this perceptive, instructive, and hopeful verse novel, taking care to note that the moon is always full, even when “we can’t see that from/ down here.” Characters read as white. Ages 10–up. Agent: Alyssa Eisner Henkin, Birch Path Literary. (Mar.)