Yearbook

Wise-cracking underachiever Lester Smith, class of '97, muddles through his senior year in this funny, moving debut novel.

It's 1996, senior year of high school has just begun, and Lester is at a total loss. He should be studying and making plans for life after graduation. (His best friend, Freesia, is applying to 37 colleges.) Instead, he wanders the back roads of his small town on the Puget Sound, visiting the local beaches and ignoring all his schoolwork. His father recently abandoned the family, his mother is more than slightly distracted, and his younger sister, Grace, is finding it hard to adjust to both their new family situation and ninth grade.

But Lester is smart and funny, and despite his general apathy, he does feel strongly about a few things: he loves his friends, Milton's Paradise Lost, the Ramones, and "the yearbook arts," as he calls them. Eventually he even comes to appreciate Mr. Traversal, the new Yearbook teacher who prefers that students call him by his first name, Jeff. When Lester and Jeff run afoul of the school's insufferable interim principal, they come up with a plan to create an "underground yearbook." This renegade project and Jeff's unlikely mentorship provide the spark that helps Lester to accept his past and to give his future a second chance.

From bright new talent Jesse Edward Johnson comes this hilarious and moving debut novel about learning to believe in yourself again. Whether you have yet to start high school or you graduated decades ago, you re sure to love Yearbook and the whip-smart Lester Smith.

"Lester Smith, the unlikely hero of this coming-of age story, captivates even as he infuriates. He's snarky and smart and will totally break your heart. For fans of John Green and Rainbow Rowell, Yearbook is your next favorite read."T. Greenwood, author of Where I Lost Her, Two Rivers, and Bodies of Water

Jesse Edward Johnson is a writer and artist based in the Pacific Northwest. He has a Ph.D. in English from UCLA, where he taught literature for five years. He has taught at Richard Hugo House in Seattle, and at San Quentin Prison. Yearbook is his first novel.