A Summer of Dragonflies by Natasha Deen

In Natasha Deen's novel, Gupta "Guppie" Persaud's father lands a year-long teacher-exchange position in New York City, which means the whole family has to get there first, via a three-week road trip across America with no air conditioning and no cell service. For a teenager already dealing with what the book calls her "terminal shyness," being sealed in a van with her family for three weeks becomes its own kind of pressure test, well before she even reaches the new city waiting on the other side of it.

The dragonfly of the title runs through the book as a recurring image of change, which tracks with a story that's less about the destination than about who Guppie becomes over the miles it takes to get there. Dancing Cat Books' 172-page edition, filed under young-adult and family fiction, keeps the stakes grounded in ordinary teenage anxiety rather than reaching for anything bigger than a girl finding her voice under uncomfortable circumstances. It's a fit for a teen who recognizes their own shyness in Guppie, or any reader who's been through a family move and knows the trip itself can be as hard as landing somewhere new.