It’s the first day of the #TransRightsReadathon, so to start it out right here’s a review of a recent favorite middle-grade novel I really enjoyed. You can’t go wrong with cryptids!

Dear Mothman by Robin Gow.

Harry N. Abrams, 2023

ISBN: 9781419764400

Available: Hardcover

Buy:  Bookshop.org

This middle grade verse novel dealing with grief, identity, and monstrosity is lyrical and vivid. Sixth graders Lewis and Noah (closeted trans boys) have been best friends for years. Lewis has a great imagination and Noah is pulled along in his wake in exploring all kinds of strange things. In the time just before Lewis was killed in a car crash, he had been obsessed with cryptids, especially Mothman. Noah deals with the loss by writing journal entries to Mothman in a journal he leaves in the woods each night. He wants to believe that Mothman is real even if he can’t see him, and decides to do his science fair project on whether Mothman exists.

Noah also begins to make friends with Molly, Hanna, and Alice, and develop feelings for Hanna, while slowly coming out and deciding how much of himself, and Mothman, he wants to share.

Although he is outed to his classmates before he’s ready, the people around him accept the news pretty quickly, even if they don’t entirely understand. Unfortunately, they are not as accepting of the existence of Mothman, which leads him to run away to do a solitary search in the woods that changes him, helps him deal with his grief over Lewis, and move forward.

Noah is autistic and that comes through clearly and is written with respect and sensitivity, as is the bisexuality of two of the characters.

Noah’s grappling with monstrosity, magic, and the unknown isn’t subtle, but Gow gets the kinds of thoughts on paper that you would expect a journal of private thoughts (or written to a cryptid of dubious existence) to contain. In the acknowledgements. Gow credits a childhood fascination with monsters with his ability to understand his own identity. Recommended for grades 5-8.

Reviewed by Kirsten Kowalewski