4.5/5 stars
This book follows a young deaf girl who doesn’t feel understood and goes to a summer camp for the deaf and blind where she finds herself and love. Sortino is a fantastic writer who knew what type of story they were writing. I could feel all the emotions going into this book as the storyline was very well written. I learned a lot in this book and following Lilah’s story made me feel connected to her. She grew so much in this story and I loved it. The side characters were fun, and I loved the romance development between Lilah and Isaac, a friend-to-lovers trope. The ending was great and overall this story was just amazing. This is perfect for those who love the camp rock aesthetic with Jenny Han’s writing style.

*this e-arc was sent to me by the publisher to give an honest review in return*

This was a beautiful story about a deaf girl just wanting a good summer and finding so much more, I especially loved the characters and the story, I was highly rooting for them!

Lilah is a hard of hearing girl with hearing parents. They sent her to mainstream school and she has hearing friends, relying upon lipreading and hearing aids to function in daily life. The only time she's been exposed to ASL is at the camp for the deaf and blind she went to for a few summers as a kid. Lilah often struggles with feeling "deaf enough" and wonders if she belongs in the Deaf community. When she returns to the camp she went to as a kid as a counselor, her plan is to brush up on her ASL. She's not expecting to make good friends and find love but life has a way of surprising you.

In a lot of ways this is a cute and fluffy summer romance. Lilah deals with the normal struggles of being a teenager. But there's also the backdrop of the struggle of being deaf in a hearing world, depravation of language, and acceptance of disability. Differentiating between sign and spoken English by using italics was super clever. I do think it'd be really cool to see this as a graphic novel.

I was interested in this just from the summary of the novel. I book about Deaf Culture, finding your place in the world and in your community. I was wrapped up. I want to thank Net Galley, Penguine Group, and Anna Sortino for allowing me to have an e-arc of this for an honest review.

Lilah's journey goes beyond being a teenager trying to find her place in the world. Lilah is also trying to find her place among both the hearing and Deaf communities. When she doesn't fit into either fully. However, at Camp Gray Wolf she fits in despite these differences. She's able to be included with others who are also a part of the Deaf community. This involvement in the camp was amazing to watch because you could tell that not only was Lilah becoming more confident in herself but she was also becoming more confident with who she is.

On a more technical side of things, I was extremely happy to see that Anna utilized blank space for words that Lilah didn't pick up or italics for sign and utilizing the grammar for some of the sign was great too. I think it was a perfect opportunity to talk about the differences and the things that people do when they are around different people. I also found the interaction with 100% hearing individuals to be interesting, in a thought-provoking way that allows you to really think about how we as able (talking about myself here) bodied individuals sometimes make others work just as hard to be a small part of the conversation when we could be making an equal effort.

More than anything this is a great novel, while yes, it is YA and Teen, I would absolutely say this has a place in a classroom as a piece that we use to show how we can all be working toward a middle ground instead of making others feel left out.

This book is a such a beautiful and unique story of finding your place in a world and making yourself heard when the world is clearly shutting you out and think of you as something needed to be fixed. This book is also about Deaf representation, written in a unique way: the description of ASL is amazing in the book, easy to understand and learn too if you want to!

Being a lighthouse for many disabled young teens and an example for non-disabled ones how to listen to them, this book is perfect for merging two worlds into one, teaching us more of Deaf community and joy.

Moreover, Give Me A Sign is such a fun and cute story about love, family, friendship, endless summer nights and new beginnings! ✨

Give Me a Sign Follows Lilah who is hard of hearing and she always finds herself in the in-between. She is too Deaf for the hearing or not Deaf enough. Until she becomes a jr counselor at gray wolf summer camp for the Deaf and Blind where she attended as a kid. Lilah hopes to learn more about ASL and Deaf culture. And maybe have a summer romance.

This book is beautifully written, Anna Sortino is an amazing author. Although this books did take me longer to finish than normal but after about 25% I was hooked and couldn't put it down.

I loved the characters, they were all funny and especially the young campers. This is honestly a great summer read. Friends to Lovers. I recommend this book for everyone to read.

I want to thank Netgalley and the publishes for letting me read Give Me a Sign I for a honest review.

this was such a cute friends to lovers YA romance. i absolutely adored the deaf representation that was presented in the characters. this book definitely tugged at my heart strings more than i had expected! lilah was such a beautiful person and character… i found her struggle to identify as being deaf emotional. as someone who has a chronic illness, i could relate to that. this book has great insight into deaf culture as well!

it reminded me of a course i took in undergrad called Disabilities in Film. we watched movies that portrayed a plethora of disabilities and did a deep dive on accuracy, stereotypes etc. when we got to deaf culture, we watched some law and order episodes, coda, and sound and fury! all of which i highly recommend. (just like this book🙂)

Thank you to netgalley for my advanced copy of this book!

I liked the premise and the deaf culture and I think it had so much potential, but unfortunately for me, the characters fell a little flat. I loved the author’s acknowledgments at the end and I think it’s an important and beautiful story she told, I don’t want to diminish the rep in this book- I’d still highly recommend it.

The camp was a fun setting as well. I just wish the characters felt a little more developed. I also would’ve liked to have seen the relationship with her brother more because I feel like we didn’t get enough of them together.

This heartfelt story is about not feeling like you fit the mold yet you’re perfect the way you are and you fit in perfectly. It definitely gives a voice to the deaf community and how they can interact with those around them. I love summer camp stories probably because I never got to experience it as a kid myself, but this story made me feel like I was right there with them going through the emotions.

Definitely a thought provoking read that all should check out, especially if they know someone or just want to connect with the aspect of someone who’s deaf.

Thank you for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this novel! It was a very intriguing read. I loved how you got to glimpse into the daily life and struggles that the deaf community faces. I also thoroughly enjoyed reading the budding romance between Lilah and Issac. I was captivated by this read from the very beginning and I would definitely recommend this novel!

Seeing hearing aids on the cover made me want to read this book and I'm so glad I did! I know little about Deaf culture from school, tv shows, friends, and some of my own research after finding out my son is HOH. I know there is so much more to learn but I'm just so excited to see YA stories with this kind of representation.

Lilah feels stuck. She's not hearing enough or deaf enough. I understood some of her frustrations but there were so many other things I had not thought of. I also enjoyed the different aspects and glimpses into other people's experiences with their identity in the Deaf world. I loved how she was able to learn from her friends and campers to explore her identity and speak up for herself.

Super cute story and I can't wait to get a copy for my classroom library!

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Young Readers Group for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinion and review.

I absolutely adored the various aspects, emotions, and the journey I went on with Anna Sortino's 'Give Me a Sign'

Lilah's character goes through so much development in the 320 pages of this story and I could have read 200 more if it meant watching her grow. It really is such an easy read that exposes you to Deaf culture, the identity struggles both HOH and CODA kids go through, and ASL as a whole.

Love love love. Can't say enough good about it. 5 lovey dovey summer camp and representation filled stars.

Thank you so much Penguin group and Netgalley for this e-arc!

I have always loved the idea of sign language. The ability to talk with one's hands and body is intriguing. But I never had a reason to learn beyond the alphabet. However, a friend of mine had a daughter born deaf, and that brings the community just one step closer. I also have a friend from high school who became a sign language interpreter. I have no idea what led him to this career path, but I have gone to him more than once with questions for my other friend—all that to say why I was interested in this book.

Obviously, I've never been deaf or hard of hearing. I don't know anyone who is personally besides my friend's daughter. So I can't speak to the experiences that anyone else might have had. And I want to be careful in the wording of what I'm trying to say. One thing I have learned is that emotions happen to us. We don't choose which emotions we feel. Emotions are triggered by thoughts that we have though, and we do have control over our thoughts. We can choose to let a thought linger in our minds. We can expand upon it, dwell upon it. And we can even decide that a specific idea doesn't suit us or fit with our values and decide to change our thoughts. Changing our thoughts can trigger different emotions. Sometimes we can think very similar thoughts, but a perspective change allows us to feel differently. This is called "metacognition" which basically means thinking about our thinking. I say all of that to say that I didn't always agree with Lilah's thoughts and thus her feelings.

1) Lilah assigns motivation to hearing people who use ASL when she can't possibly know someone's heart. I know sometimes people's motives are quite clear even if not expressly stated. But she struggles with Mackenzie's character so much, which I'll discuss more later. But she says, "I don't want people to assume my less-than-perfect signing skills means I'm just another hearing person trying to use ASL for clout." And another character, Natasha, says (but Lilah agrees), "It's not fair she gets this many followers when Deaf creators have to work so hard." And then later Natasha says, "Lessons should come from within the Deaf community in order to be accurate and properly reflect Deaf culture, not from hearing people..."

You can't know someone's motivations for wanting to learn ASL any more than their motivation to learn any other language. Obviously, Mackenzie was in the wrong to portray herself as an expert or a teacher when she is very much a student. But what would be wrong about Mackenzie using her YouTube channel to teach once she becomes fluent in the language? We wouldn't require all teachers of Spanish to be native Spanish speakers, or further, native Spaniards. Someone doesn't have to be born into a culture to be an expert on it or to teach it. We have professors that teach about ancient historical societies, but we don't fault them for this because they didn't live in the right location or period of time. We can even liken this to Eminem infiltrating the rap game back in the early 2000s. He took on a culture that many would say wasn't his to infiltrate. Some people call this cultural appropriation, but I don't view it that way. So the idea that interpreters or teachers need to be deaf seems preposterous to me. And also, shouldn't we want as many people as are interested to learn sign language? No matter what the reason for wanting to do so? And where do all of the hearing parents who love their children with all their hearts fit into this? Not to mention the siblings who might be hearing and grow up learning ASL right alongside their deaf/hard-of-hearing sibling. I know my friend's son has interpreted for his sister among kids who are hearing because he's learning almost as quickly as she is. Obviously, there is a difference between learning for exploitation and learning for a desire to communicate. I only zero in on this because the only hearing person in this book that uses ASL without being on the hearing loss spectrum is Mackenzie who is looked down upon throughout the entire book.

2) Having never been in the shoes of a deaf/HOH person, I can't tell anyone who is what their experience is or should be. Similar to point number one, people who misunderstand your diagnosis are not necessarily malicious, intending to put down, or to offend. The entire conversion around 44% is, I'm 100% sure, an indication of perhaps frequent interactions with "hearies", as hearing people are called more than once in this book. Obviously, Bill and his wife were morons. But I don't think they were malicious morons. And Lilah is even annoyed that they don't seem to know the term "audiologist." I've harped on this before, but we can't be mad at the world for not knowing everything there is to know about our unique condition or medical diagnosis. Do you know how many "weird" diagnoses there are in the world? Even common ones like Type 1 Diabetes have so many misconceptions, and the only people who understand the disease are those who live with it or are intimately acquainted with it or are doctors or nurses themselves. I have a rare uterine condition, but I'm not angry about people asking me about it or not understanding what it is or the effects that it has had upon me. And I don't think the majority of people I encounter are horrible people because they don't understand. They are simply uninformed.

Lilah specifically says about this conversation that "Bill doesn't realize he just said that he doesn't want his grandson to become someone like me." Insensitive? Sure. 100%. Malicious? No. I know plenty of people who wouldn't hope for their grandchildren to have a diagnosis of Down syndrome or autism. But once they have received those diagnoses, they've seen joys and blessings that only could have come from their grandchildren (or children) being exactly as they are. Does this mean that Bill is an evil, hate-filled person? Not at all. Uninformed? Yes. Does Bill need to change? Maybe. But Bill doesn't know what he doesn't know. Who carries the burden of this situation? The person who has the knowledge. Is that fair? Probably not. But what else are you going to do about it? You can't educate the entire population. Since you can't change the thoughts or knowledge that others have, you are responsible for your thoughts towards those people and how those thoughts cause specific emotions to rise within you. Change your thoughts, and thus change your emotions.

3) "It's not long ago that "deaf and dumb" was the actual label. The incorrect assumption that those who use a visual form of communication aren't as intelligent." Say what? Dumb comes from Old English and literally means "silent". The 19th century is when dumb began to take on any connotation towards lacking intelligence. The phrase "deaf and dumb" would literally conjure in my mind someone who can't hear or speak. And many deaf people choose not to speak. The assumption that the character is making here that people assume deaf people are lacking in intelligence may be true of individuals, but no way should this assumption be applied to the whole of hearing humanity.

I was sad over the conversation that Lilah had with her mother about Max's potential need for a cochlear implant. Max is eleven at the time and has been immersed in the hearing world and not given much exposure to the deaf community or culture. My friend who became an interpreter said you wouldn't believe the number of parents who make no effort to learn sign language. And this breaks my heart. For the kids and the parents. Obviously learning a new language isn't going to be easy, but isn't the ability to communicate with your child worth the effort? I know my friend is struggling to learn ASL as quickly as her daughter who now goes to a school for the deaf, but she's putting in the effort. Communicating with her daughter is a priority. And I don't know that faulting Max's parents for wanting him to have the implant is wrong either. Of course, Lilah's point was that Max shouldn't be consulted, and ultimately in the book he was.

4) "People like to watch me. One time someone took a video of me and my mom talking. When I go places, they watch like I'm an animal at the zoo." This is another example of assigning motivation. In this case, Isaac is the one "talking." I know it can't feel good to be stared at, but you don't know people's hearts most of the time. You can't know why they are staring or even videoing. We assume the worst about people. But the truth is that we just can't know what other people feel in their hearts or think in their heads. And if we can't know without them telling us, then it's better (for us and for them) to assign them pure and positive motivations rather than evil or negative ones.

I did love this quote: "Miscommunication is a fact of life. We just have to deal with it more often than most people."

I have had a lot to say about the portrayal of the character's attitudes in this book that I can't say that I liked or appreciated. The last thing I'll say about that is that even in the author's note at the end, the author talks about how she didn't see representation of characters like herself in the books she read growing up. I've touched on this before in this Discussions Only We Know post about diversity. Anna Sortino saw a gap in her reading experiences where there were no characters that represented her experiences. And she went out and wrote that book. I give her kudos for that. Instead of simply complaining about the lack, she stepped into the gap and provided what was missing. I will definitely be on the lookout for a future release because I enjoyed the actual story even when I struggled with the characters' mindset. (You can tell the mindset comes from the author instead of the main character because the same thought process seems to be shared by every other major character and not challenged by supporting characters at all.)

After I've dissected all of the character's perspectives that I took issue with, I do have to say that I actually enjoyed the story. I liked Lilah's seeking to find herself and where she fits in within the community and how she straddles the line between hearing and deaf. I liked Isaac and understood his hesitancy to get to know Lilah when she wasn't able to communicate with him as easily. But I loved that he worked with her to teach her more signs so that she could communicate with him and others easier. I loved that Lilah worked so hard at it. I loved the approach she took with Blake to get her to open up to the idea of signing and learning. I even liked the ending which isn't sad exactly but also isn't your typical happily ever after. Overall, I truly did enjoy Give Me a Sign.

Favorite quote:
-Sometimes there's purpose to being in the middle.

Give Me a Sign gets 3 Stars. The story was interesting enough to keep me reading and not wanting to put it down. But the perspective of the characters was a struggle for me and took my rating down. Have you read Give Me a Sign? What did you think? Let me know!

What a great view of the struggles and challenges that people who are deaf or hearing impaired face every day, expertly written into a story about summer camp and the struggle with relationships that everyone goes through. It also highlights the positives of learning American Sign Language for everyone, not just those who need to use it. ASL provides communication for those who need it and as a society we are leaving out a portion of the population because it is not readily known. It opened my eyes to this fact and the limited accommodations that are provided for those who are deaf or hearing impaired. Thank you to the author, the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

When I saw this on Netgalley I was so excited because it sounded like a book I would like and it was about deaf characters which I've never read about before.

I really enjoyed reading about deaf characters. It was interesting and educational, especially on how inaccessible some things are, like drive-throughs. I loved how when the characters were signing, the text was italic, and also sometimes there were descriptions of the sign (and I knew some because I follow some deaf creators).

However, the plot was kind of boring. Conflicts happened and then were solved and it just felt repetitive. Also, the characters were sort of underdeveloped in my opinion. I think there were just a bit too many of them for a 300-page book. The main character Lilah had also no real personality other than feeling out of place in the hearing world and the deaf one. I wish there would've been a bit more development, I think I would've enjoyed the characters more.

As for the romance, I thought it was cute that their sign names were Spider and Bug, but it felt bland. Very insta-lovey. They were at the camp for 2 months, yet it didn't feel that way chemistry-wise. It read very young which didn't make sense since they're supposedly 17/18.

Overall, not as great as I expected but I really enjoyed reading an own-voices book and I would recommend this for the deaf representation, but not really for the plot itself.

this book was an amazing insight and representation into the Deaf community. it was a beautiful story of a girl struggling to find her place and identify herself, and i learnt a lot along the way as well!!

thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for the chance to read an advanced readers copy :)

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I read this as an arc from NetGalley. I ABSOLUTELY LOVED THIS BOOK!! I 100% recommend this book!! I just wanted to say that Anna Sortino did an amazing job!!

I relate to this book so much!! I am hard of hearing and I do wear hearing aids. I relate to Lilah so much! I totally understand where she is coming from when she says that she feels like she doesn’t belong in the hearing world but she also feels like she doesn’t feel belong in the deaf world either. Lilac decided to be a junior counselor at the Deaf summer camp that she used to go to when she was younger. She fell in love with Isaac who was a counselor at the summer camp. Isaac helped her learn American Sign Language (ASL). By the end of the book Lilah had learned to identify with being Deaf and to not be afraid.

This is such a sweet summer read, and I definitely will be purchasing to put into my class library. I loved the representation of deaf culture, and as a hearing reader, I found this to be an accessible introduction to the deaf community.

This book is such a sweet read that really shows the perspective of a deaf person really well since the author is also deaf. As a note, I am neither dead or hard of hearing, so it was really insightful to learn more about the community from someone who is a part of it. I loved the representation and how deaf/vision-lost people were the main characters. I think it was so important to have characters like Mackenzie present because it provided a real teaching moment for hearing people reading this book to know how to handle themselves better. Aside from the amazing representation, the story was so cute! I thought Lilah was really trying to figure out who she was and where she fit in - all so hard when you are 17! I think the book showed her age perfectly where she made mistakes, but also really grew as a person. Issac was the same way. Navigating life as a teen/young adult is hard enough without the experience of being deaf and I think this book showed all of it so well. I like how it ended and really just enjoyed this read. Some transitions were a little rocky, especially with small time jumps, but the emotional scene was done so well! Really a worthwhile read! 4⭐️, 0.5🌶

this book was so sweet and perfect for the summer! i also am not more informed and knowledgable about the deaf community and it was really interesting to learn about. the summer camp vibe is perfect for summer and the romance fits perfectly with the main idea of the story. this was a quick and easy read!