My New Verse Novel--The Language Inside

This has been an intense June so far, with a heavy dose of bookmap homework on a new novel due in advance of the SCBWI Tokyo Writers' Retreat in Gotemba June 8-10; the SCBWI Tokyo Translation Day 2012--Bringing Japanese Teen Literature to the World on June 16; and the final editing of my new YA verse novel The Language Inside.

At last, I"m happy to reveal the cover of The Language Inside.

And the flap copy:

Emma Karas was raised in Japan; it’s the country she calls home. But when her mother is diagnosed with breast cancer, Emma’s family moves to a town outside Lowell, Massachusetts to stay with her grandmother while her mom undergoes treatment.

Emma feels out of place in the United States, begins to have migraines, and longs to be back in Japan. At her grandmother’s urging, she volunteers in a long-term care center to help Zena, a patient with locked-in syndrome, write down her poems. There, Emma meets Samnang, another volunteer, who assists elderly Cambodian refugees. Weekly visits to the care center, Zena’s poems, dance, and noodle soup bring Emma and Samnang closer, until Emma must make a painful choice: stay in Massachusetts, or return early to Japan.

And the full jacket design:

Thank you to my editor Francoise Bui at Delacorte/Random House. The Language Inside is due out in May 2013. ARCs coming soon!