About Seattle Reads 2026

“True biz (adj./exclamation; American Sign Language): really, seriously, definitely, real-talk”

True biz? The students at the River Valley School for the Deaf just want to hook up, pass their history finals, and have politicians, doctors, and their parents stop telling them what to do with their bodies.

This revelatory novel plunges readers into the halls of a residential school for the deaf, where they’ll meet Charlie, a rebellious transfer student who’s never met another deaf person before; Austin, the school’s golden boy, whose world is rocked when his baby sister is born hearing; and February, the headmistress, who is fighting to keep her school open and her marriage intact, but might not be able to do both.

As a series of crises both personal and political threaten to unravel each of them, Charlie, Austin, and February find their lives inextricable from one another—and changed forever.

Sara Nović is the author of the New York Times bestseller “True Biz” and “Girl at War,” both of which won the American Library Association’s Alex Award. Her latest book is “Mother Tongue: A Memoir.” She is an activist and an instructor of deaf studies and creative writing, and lives in Pennsylvania with her family.