Overview

This groundbreaking book, first published in 1982, is the story of two teenage girls whose friendship blossoms into love and who, despite pressures from family and school that threaten their relationship, promise to be true to each other and their feelings.

A landmark in LGBT fiction, this captivating story of two teenage girls who fall in love is a “classic of the genre” (Publishers Weekly)

When Liza Winthrop first lays eyes on Annie Kenyon at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, she knows there’s something special between them. Soon, their close friendship develops into a deep and intimate romance. Neither imagined that falling in love could be so wonderful, but as Liza and Annie’s newfound sexuality sparks conflict in both their families and at their schools, they discover it will take more than love for their relationship to succeed.

One of the first books to positively portray a lesbian relationship, Annie on My Mind is a groundbreaking classic of the genre. The subject of a First Amendment lawsuit over banned books and one of School Library Journal’s “One Hundred Books that Shaped the Century,” Nancy Garden’s iconic novel is an important story for anyone discovering who they’re meant to be.

"No single work has done more for young adult LGBT fiction than this classic about two teenage girls who fall in love." (School Library Journal)

The 25th Anniversary Edition features a full-length interview with the author by Kathleen T. Horning, Director of the Cooperative Children's Book Center. Ms. Garden answers such revealing questions as how she knew she was gay, why she wrote the book, censorship, and the book's impact on readers – then and now.

Of the author and the book, the Margaret A. Edwards Award committee said, "Nancy Garden has the distinction of being the first author for young adults to create a lesbian love story with a positive ending. Using a fluid, readable style, Garden opens a window through which readers can find courage to be true to themselves."

Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

Listening Length: 7 hours and 14 minutes

Narrator: Rebecca Lowman

Audible.com Release Date: December 23, 2008

About Nancy Garden

Nancy Garden was an American writer of fiction for children and young adults, best known for the lesbian novel Annie on My Mind. She received the 2003 Margaret Edwards Award from the American Library Association recognizing her lifetime contribution in writing for teens, citing Annie alone.

A versatile writer, Nancy Garden has published books for children as well as for teens, nonfiction as well as fiction. But her novel Annie on My Mind, the story of two high school girls who fall in love with each other, has brought her more attention than she wanted when it was burned in front of the Kansas City School Board building in 1993 and banned from school library shelves in Olathe, Kansas, as well as other school districts. A group of high school students and their parents in Olathe had to sue the school board in federal district court in order to get the book back on the library shelves. Today the book is as controversial as ever, in spite of its being viewed by many as one of the most important books written for teens in the past forty years. In 2003 the American Library Association gave the Margaret A. Edwards Award to Nancy Garden for lifetime achievement.

In Remembrance: Nancy Garden (1938-2014)

About Rebecca Lowman

Rebecca Lowman is an actress and audiobook narrator who has won numerous Earphones Awards. She has starred in numerous television shows, including Law & Order, Big Love, NCIS, and Grey's Anatomy, among many others. She earned her MFA from Columbia University.