For most of the year, Sarah Ponakey lives in the city far away from her Cree community. But during the summer, Sarah gets to spend time back home with her friends, family, and her beloved Kôhkom. Unfortunately, Sarah feels like she straddles her two worlds, existing in both but belonging to neither one as fully as she would prefer. While this divide is not always easy to navigate, Sarah does her best to find a place for herself while embracing her culture and heritage. This brief story is designed to be accessible to newer middle grade readers who appreciate storytelling that addresses familiar issues without diving in too deep. Illustrations are interspersed throughout the novel, and frequent dialogue helps to keep the momentum of the novel flowing. Readers would benefit from being familiar with previous stories in the series to better understand Sarah’s background in this novel. Told from Sarah's perspective, the narrative offers readers a glimpse into Sarah’s thoughts and feelings as she interacts with the people around her. Cree words are incorporated into the text, as well, using context and English definitions to ensure the reader’s understanding. Children who are raised in communities different from those of their heritage cultures will find points of connection in Sarah's story, and this book also serves as a window to readers unfamiliar with Sarah's Cree background. This is a positive addition to library collections for newer middle grade readers.

An engaging story about a young girl learning more about her First Nations heritage and dealing with negative or uncomfortable emotions in positive ways. This read a little young for the majority of my middle grade students, but I think it could be useful for teaching inferencing and using context clues. I didn't realize it was the second book in a series at first, so it gave me an interesting perspective for how a student might approach reading this if they were unfamiliar with Sarah and her story. Although there were no illustrations in this ARC, the descriptions were helpful and the characters were well-developed. I enjoyed reading about Sarah and her relationships with her friends and family.

This was a fun story. I did not read the first book so I was a little confused at the beginning. I think I will go back and find the first book.