Heart with Joy

In Heart with Joy, fifteen year old Julian Hale's life is turned upside down when his mother suddenly moves from North Carolina to Florida under the pretense of running her parents' motel and finishing the novel she has been writing for years. While Julian has always been closer to his mother and wants to go with her, she tells him he has to stay with his father until the end of the school year. When Julian's father decides to run a marathon, Julian agrees to help him train, and the two develop the sort of close relationship they've never had before. Also, with the help of an elderly neighbor who loves to spend her days bird-watching, Julian learns that the most important thing in life is to follow your heart. And Julian's heart leads him to a passion for cooking and a young cashier at the local grocery store even as his own parents drift apart. By the end of the novel, Julian is forced to choose between staying with his father and going to live with his mother. Heart with Joy is an uplifting coming of age novel about the importance of following your heart and trusting that it will take you where you need to go.