This was a DNF for me. It started out too slow for me and felt a little immature at times. I do think YA and historical fiction lovers will like this book.

It was interesting to follow Ethan and Juniper in this story. This story was not my favorite, but i really liked it anyway.

This was such a heartbreaking story. The ending had me in tears. The plot being about 1950s racism and finding friends during that time. Had heavy moments and sad moments but happy ones as well.

I'm going to be completely honest; I kept putting off reading this book because I wasn't super excited about it anymore. I had had it on my NetGalley shelf for over a year, so I didn't see the harm in letting it continue to sit there for a while. I finally picked it up because it fulfilled a readathon prompt, and I'm mad at myself for not reading it sooner.

The Invincible Summer of Juniper Jones is a beautiful and raw exploration of friendships and racism in the 1950s. It follows Ethan, a bi-racial teenager, as he spends the summer in Ellison, Alabama, as a "lesson" from his dad for getting suspended from his school back home. He struggles to fit in because no one in the town accepts people who are different from them, until he meets Juniper. Juniper is a whirlwind of happiness and excitement, and she and Ethan embark on an invincible summer.

I loved this book. It was important and heartbreaking; I couldn't put it down. I cried for the last 10 or 15% of the book, full on tears that just kept falling. Ethan and Juniper were both amazing characters, and their friendship was beautiful. I got angry at the stuff Ethan went through, and I was happy when they were happy together. This book was not as lighthearted as I thought it would be, but I am still so happy I picked it up. This is a book I will be thinking about for a long time, and I would highly recommend it.

Content warnings for racism, death, bullying, divorce.

A huge thank you to NetGalley and Wattpad Books for the ARC of The Invincible Summer of Juniper Jones by Daven McQueen.

Holy emotions. I am still not over this one and feel emotional just thinking about it. It's one I will be thinking of for a LONG time

Fairly predictable. I mean, we have a small southern town in the 50s, a biracial kid new to town, and a quirky white girl determined to be his friend. This was only going to end one of a few ways..The intent is clear but the execution is tired.

*Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this eARC to review!*

There is not a whole lot I can say about a story this beautiful to do it justice, I think its a must read for everyone! Puts you right in the middle of a hot summer in Alabama, drinking a root beer float with your best friend, which is what this story is really about. I wish I could say the parts about race were more shocking, but this is still a reality here in the US for a lot of places. I knocked a star for weird grammar/punctuation/spacing, because this was a Wattpad story, but I feel it should of been edited to be easier to read. Overall, I recommend everyone pick this one up!

Wow! This story depicts the reality of well meaning white people being colorblind. Ethan must learn to navigate a world that doesn’t want him while living with people who are unwilling to recognize his reality.

The story is beautifully written and the plot is full of emotions and keeps you hooked. However, I felt that it was not my cup of tea since the target audience seemed to middle school readers. I had expected a bit more from the writing as an adult. But this was a brilliant story regardless.
Definitely would recommend to middle school readers!

I have no words for this book. This book is amazing, beautiful, and heartwarming! The historical spices of this book got me on the hook. It was an enjoyable read and a fast paced one. It is an attention seeker since I put on a lot of my attention as well as my emotions in this book. It is brilliant and exceptional. Thank you for the e-arc.

This book was truly amazing. It’s was so beautiful and heartbreaking at the same time. Ethan, a mixed boy from Washington, is sent to a white town in Alabama after he got into some trouble at home. His parents are separated and his father sends him to spend the summer with his white aunt and uncle to teach him a lesson. This is an absolutely wonderful book. The kind that makes you feel every emotion the characters feel and care about their futures.

Thank you Netgalley for the eARC (even though I have clearly reviewed it very late).

This story and beautiful and beautifully written. As an adult reader of a middle grades book, I unfortunately spent most of the book waiting for the other shoe to drop. You can't just write a story set in 1955 about a mixed race boy and his white girl best friend in Alabama without expecting something to go wrong. It eventually gets there, and this really is a book about black pain, but for kids. I can imagine for middle grade readers, that they may not be expecting the main turn of events and it could lead to valuable conversations for them (as long as they have an informed adult to talk to). But as an adult reader, this one just hurt.

There's a lot of feeling right now about how if we need more books about black pain, and instead a shift towards normalizing black authors writing just about black life, or sci-fi/fantasy, and for adult fiction, I feel like that it's getting to be time for that. But seeing as how American society still has so many people that are openly hateful towards black people, it is still very important to have informative fiction like this for young readers.

I read so many reviews about this book warning me that it would be a heart-breaking and magnificent story and that it would make me cry. But somehow I still wasn't expecting this beautiful, tragic, meaningful portrait of friendship and the sob fest that would come along with it. McQueen's characters are wonderful, interesting, and nuanced, and the writing brings the reader directly into their experiences. I highly recommend this book (with content warnings below)!
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CW: death of parents, death of a child, hate speech, gaslighting, use of the n-word, antisemitism, drowning, white supremacy, the KKK

This was a powerful YA book on racism- what it was like to be a young, black boy, initially innocent to the world’s terrors, but after spending a summer in the South, in the 1950s, his eyes are opened to the truth. Ethan realizes that life has quickly become very different for him in this small town, but that summer is made easier by his new best friend, a young, spirited girl, named Juniper Jones. You can feel the love and excitement in their friendship and adventures, and the pain in their difficult experiences. You hope and your heart breaks. I would not normally think that a YA book would be so powerful, but this one certainly was.

What a beautiful, important and wonderful story that tackles so many important issues. A must-read for everyone! Beautifully written and very memorable

This book broke my heart.
Ethan and Juniper were such sweet friends. I loved how much they cared about each other. Juniper may not have fully understood what Ethan goes through. But she did know what it's like to be judged for something you are born with.
This book was so heavy. I don't usually read historical fiction, but I'm glad I read this one. Reading it was hard at times and at one point I was even sobbing.
Throughout this book I was all kinds of angry.
I know my privilege as a lighter skinned person, but my heart was still aching for my ancestors and for everyone who is facing racism every day.
After I closed this book I had to sit in silence and let it all sink in.

Books like this one are so necessary and I hope that everyone picks it up. No matter how old you are.
It's a read I'll never forget.
Read this book!
I really hope to read more of Daven McQueen's work in the future.

Oh my god I loved this Book.
Juniper Jones was a force to be reckoned with and this book glorifies the courage of a girl who chose to overcome the prejudices of her time.

This book deals with a lot - bullying, racism, and all with a gentle hand, not preachy but still felt like the message was delivered with a lot of heart.

Thank you to the oublisher and netgalley for an ARC. 4 stars for the YA book that moved me to tears!

Hi, I lost the eARC of this book so I won't be able to review this book. I hope you understand. I really wanted to read it but unfortunately my phone got formatted and I lost the copy.

This book was such FOMO bait for me. I felt like I kept seeing it everywhere and everyone loved it. While it was a lovely, heart-warming book, I didn't think it lived up the hype that readers put behind it.

Ethan is sent to small town Alabama for a summer with relatives as a punishment for bad behavior. His dad things it will straighten him up after he gets into a fight at school. To Ethan's surprise, the town is still very racist and very white. Ethan is mixed race and very obviously doesn't fit in. He crosses paths with one Juniper Jones, the town "weird girl" and the two become inseparable and spend the summer checking items of their summer bucket list.

I believe this book is YA and it definitely reads that way. Some YA tends to skew a bit older but this definitely has a younger voice despite its tough topic. Which I think would really benefit the right reader. I don't know if I was the "right reader" despite reading a decent amount of YA fiction. Juniper was supposed to come across as quirky and painfully happy all the time but she just read as very immature and childish for a teenager. Ethan was well written as he struggled with how black or white he appeared to society and looked for answers about his family to understand who he wanted to be going forward.

Don't get me wrong. It was an enjoyable read but I felt like because of the sweetness at parts, it came across like a movie of the week instead of a really thoughtful, honest look at how a teen would deal with obvious racism. It would be a great middle grade read but I feel like I've read other YA books, maybe targeted towards older readers, that got the idea across better.

This was a fascinating book to encounter. I do not use this word lightly since I had forgotten what the story was about (when I started reading it), and to see it unfold had me sobbing into the comforter I had tucked myself into during the reading. It is young-adult in the truest sense. The characters are younger and act their age despite being thrown into grave situations.


It took me a while to understand the relationships and who’s-who of the characters and where they fall in the race spectrum. Once I did, I enjoyed the experience (harrowing as the events are).
Our lead protagonist is not the eponymous Juniper Jones but Ethan Harper. He is born in a time where parts of the country do not recognize his existence as something positive. Due to a fight, his father ships him off to his aunt’s where he is to stay for the summer. There are a lot of things his father did not take into consideration when this decision was made. Some of these things are evident to both Ethan and us the readers the minute he starts to look around. Fortunately, there is a beacon of hope, a wild-haired, fast-talking Juniper Jones who decides that it is finally the summer that she unravels her master plan and has found the perfect side-kick. Her every action, naïve and otherwise are all endearing, making her entry a fresh breath of air into a tense situation.
Finally, this works as a work of historical fiction that depicts a very vivid picture of what life must have been like immediately after the abolition of slavery. I highly recommend this to anyone who finds the synopsis (or my review) even remotely interesting.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 5 out of 5.

I received an ARC thanks to Netgalley and the publishers, but the review is entirely based on my own reading experience