Cover Crush: Barely Missing Everything by Matt Mendez

Barely Missing Everything by Matt Mendez is his debut; a contemporary novel about two friends who take a road trip that changes their lives completely. Yes, this story sounds like it will break me, but do I have hope that friendships and found family can make me whole by the end? Yes. I love the bright colors and illustrated cover. It really conveys the image of this road trip story (which is becoming a favorite trope of mine!). I also think I said this before, but I am loving the slew of illustrated covers hitting the market. I am a huge fan of this style, it really lends to being creative. Barely Missing Everything is coming out on March 5th, but be sure to add it to your TBR now!

Barely Missing Everything

by Matt Mendez
Published by: Atheneum/Caitlyn Dlouhy Books
on March 5, 2019
Genres: Young Adult, Contemporary
Pages: 320
Bookshop
Goodreads

Juan has plans. He’s going to get out of El Paso, Texas, on a basketball scholarship and make something of himself—or at least find something better than his mom Fabi’s cruddy apartment, her string of loser boyfriends, and a dead dad. Basketball is going to be his ticket out, his ticket up. He just needs to make it happen.

His best friend JD has plans, too. He’s going to be a filmmaker one day, like Quinten Tarantino or Guillermo del Toro (NOT Steven Spielberg). He’s got a camera and he’s got passion—what else could he need?

Fabi doesn’t have a plan anymore. When you get pregnant at sixteen and have been stuck bartending to make ends meet for the past seventeen years, you realize plans don’t always pan out, and that there some things you just can’t plan for…

Like Juan’s run-in with the police, like a sprained ankle, and a tanking math grade that will likely ruin his chance at a scholarship. Like JD causing the implosion of his family. Like letters from a man named Mando on death row. Like finding out this man could be the father your mother said was dead.

Soon Juan and JD are embarking on a Thelma and Louise­–like road trip to visit Mando. Juan will finally meet his dad, JD has a perfect subject for his documentary, and Fabi is desperate to stop them. But, as we already know, there are some things you just can’t plan for…