The House You Pass on the Way

Fourteen-year-old Evangeline lives with her interracial family on a rural farm, feeling isolated and struggling with questions about her own identity and sexuality. When her cousin Staggerlee comes to visit for the summer, Evangeline finds someone who understands her feelings of being different and questioning her place in the world. The story explores themes of racial identity, sexual orientation, family relationships, and the challenges of growing up feeling like an outsider in small-town America. This coming-of-age novel sensitively addresses LGBTQ+ identity exploration and the complexity of mixed-race identity in the 1990s.