If you enjoyed last year's book, True Biz by Sara Novic, you should definitely check this one out. Don't let the fact that it is YA deter you from giving this one a go. One of my favorite things about this book is that it shows that being deaf is not a monolithic experience. There are many different levels of hearing loss, and each person who is deaf or hard of hearing experiences the world in different ways. Lilah is hard of hearing and wears hearing aids. However, her hearing aids are not a "cure" or "fix all" for her hearing loss. She still struggles in mainstream school with friends who often forget she is hard of hearing. She applies for a job as a summer camp counselor at a summer camp for deaf/blind children that she attended when she was younger. Her summer at Grey Wolf is filled with ups and downs, but Lilah learns a lot about herself over the course of the summer. She even has a romance that she wasn't expecting. Give me a Sign also shows what it is like to navigate being deaf or hard of hearing in a hearing world, and the lack of accessibility and ignorance that these characters face is heartbreaking and ridiculous. I read this book in one sitting, and these are characters that I won't soon forget. I wouldn't mind if this book got a sequel.. This is Anna Sortino's first novel, but I have a feeling that we will be seeing more of her. Thank you Penguin Teen for the digital ARC.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It gave wonderful insight into Deaf culture and the Deaf community - plus was a great teen romance! The summer camp setting was a lot of fun. The relationships between Lilah and her family, Lilah and the young campers she's overseeing, Lilah and the other counselors - including her love interest Isaac -were all well-drawn and believable. The final conflict was harrowing and all too real. Highly recommended!

[Thank you Penguin Teen for the gifted copy, out 7/11!]

Anna Sortino’s GIVE ME A SIGN is your perfect 2023 YA romance read. Lilah never feels like enough—not with her hearing parents, whose sole goal for Lilah seems to be to have her pass as hearing; not with the rest of her hearing classmates, who seem to think that having some hearing loss means that she isn’t “deaf enough”; not with the rest of the hearing world, where she navigates miscommunication and listening fatigue; and not even with her friends, who don’t understand what she needs to be able to communicate. But then she finds herself at a summer camp for the deaf and blind as a counselor and in a community where she finally feels like she belongs.

At camp, Lilah navigates romance, hot lifeguards, friendship, and Deaf identity—finally confronting the “strange realm, here in the middle.” I felt warm all over following Lilah’s journey as she became more comfortable with ASL and her own place on the spectrum of Deafness (and, naturally, my heart fluttered at how wonderfully attentive her cute co-counselor was at helping her learn ASL and making sure she felt included). My heart also ached, because a summer camp focused on disability pride is an experience I would’ve loved to have as a disabled kid growing up all alone.

What a wonderful middle grade/young adult novel about going to summer camp and realizing your true self. Lilah has always been self conscious of her hearing loss and refusing to accept that she may need further accommodations but when she gets a job at a summer camp for deaf and blind kids, she discovers more than she ever knew.

This book is such an important read to see how un-accommodating society is to those who are even slightly disabled. Closed captions on movies and tv should be default. Understand those who aren’t understand you may need a different way to communicate. And sign language not being widely know can really get in the way of miscommunication, as shown in this book time and time again. The frustration people feel for what seem like minor inconveniences to us could be major to others.

This was a quick read and definitely the perfect summer read and romance