Jacqueline Woodson's young adult novel “The House You Pass on the Way” is the story of a young girl struggling with her parents’ interracial marriage and her emerging and confusing feelings for her friend Hazel.

The novel is narrated by Evangeline Ian Canan, fondly called “Staggerlee.” She is fourteen years old and the middle child of five with a black father and a white mother. When Staggerlee’s parents married, her father’s family disowned them because they could not tolerate having an in-law who’s white; for twenty years, Staggerlee’s family have kept to themselves, even within their small community, until the day her father’s sister, Ida Mae, breaks the news in a letter that their other sister Hallique has died. Ida Mae, her husband and their adopted daughter Tyler (nicknamed Trout) want to make amends and settle their differences.

Ida Mae asks if Trout could visit Staggerlee's family during the summer, and they agree. Trout and Staggerlee are the same age, have the same ancestral background and have a lot of things in common: including a secret.

Staggerlee told Trout that she kissed her friend Hazel once when she was in the sixth grade, but she didn’t tell her that Hazel became callous afterwards when she’d found out that Staggerlee’s grandparents were famous musicians and that she’s from a well-to-do family. Hazel also squealed to her other friends about Staggerlee’s mother being white, isolating Staggerlee--until Trout arrives and changes her world.

Staggerlee feels different, as all lesbian teenagers her age do, and it makes her detached from her family, her school and the world; Woodson captures this in a very subtle yet unique way. Woodson also shows how one girl can make a difference in the life of another, and how important it is to have someone with whom to share your burden. When Staggerlee meets Trout, she begins to open up to what the world can offer.

But Trout also has her own share of problems: Trout told her aunt Hallique about having kissed a girl, and Hallique told Ida Mae before she died, and that’s why Trout was sent to visit Staggerlee's family: to make her into “a lady.” “She said when I come home from here, all these feelings I have better be gone,” Trout tells Staggerlee. The adults' efforts to change Trout, to get her to act ‘lady-like’ or ‘more feminine,’ is a realistic representation of what many young gay girls experience.

Somehow, Staggerlee sensed this even before Trout told her the truth; she saw it in Trout’s eyes and knew this ‘feeling’ between them was growing. They can’t help what they're feeling, no matter how hard they try to forget or ignore it, it’s there.

It is admirable that Woodson incorporates Staggerlee’s issues with her parents’ interracial marriage. It is unfortunate but also realistic that death is the thing that finally brings her father’s family to their senses after twenty years.

This book is one of several that Jacqueline Woodson had written and published, and while it's fairly short, it tackles a number of important social issues while also telling a good story. Regardless of your race or sexuality, the love and warmth of family and friends is a universally uplifting and freeing theme, and The House You Pass on the Way delivers this and more.

Amazon.com: "The House You Pass on the Way"