Sprout

In the small mill town of Tolsbury, Mass., 13-year-old Sprout Sprowder is careful to keep her flower-producing antlers—which she calls her “plantlers”—hidden from everyone but her florist mother, wearing an ever-present pageboy cap. When Sprout inadvertently reveals her plantlers to E.B. Shaw, a boy her own age with a phenomenal memory and a knack for trivia, she worries he’ll use her secret against her. Despite Sprout’s fears, the two become fast friends as they team up to investigate reports of another girl apparently sporting plantlers. Sprout is eager to meet someone like herself, but when the director of nearby Longmore Institute, a private asylum, takes an inexplicable interest in Sprout, she discovers that there’s more to her plantlers—and to Tolsbury—than she anticipated. Sprout’s sparkling first-person POV—brimming with sassy confidence and snarky humor—relays this funny and heartwarming adventure by Tyng (Clara Poole and the Long Way Round), which straddles the line between cozy fantasy and fast-paced thriller. The protagonists cue as white. Ages 8–12. (Mar.)