In Heart With Joy, fifteen year old Julian Hale's life is turned upside down when his mother suddenly moves from North Carolina to Venice, Florida under the pretense of running her parents' 9-room motel and finishing the novel she has been working on for years. While Julian has always been closer to his mother and wants to go with her, she tells him he has to stay with his father until the end of the school year. Three weeks after his mother leaves, Julian's father decides to run a marathon. This surprises Julian because he has never seen his father exercise, but once he agrees to help him train the two develop the sort of close relationship they've never had before. Also, with the help of an elderly neighbor, Julian learns that the most important thing in life is to follow your heart. And Julian's heart leads him to a passion for cooking and a young cashier at the local grocery store. By the end of the novel, Julian is forced to choose between staying with his father and going to live with his mother. Ultimately, Heart With Joy, is a literary coming of age novel that explores how sometimes the things you need most in life have been there, right beside you, all along.