Before you read, I’d like to dedicate this post to all the families and victims hurt in this morning’s tragedy. For those who for some reason haven’t heard, a lone shooter mercilessly massacred fifty people and injured just as many at a gay nightclub (called Pulse) in Orlando, Florida. Police are still investigating into further detail, but it is a known fact that this wasn’t just a random shooting. This was a hate-fueled attack meant to kill and harm innocent people.
If anyone is reading this, don’t pray for repentance or hate, but pray for the families and friends that have been affected by what many are calling the worst mass shooting in United States history. Do not call for gun control. Reports are coming in that the gunman was posing as a security guard and guns were not allowed in the club. If there is anything we should call for, it’s for the acceptance of LGBTQA+ people everywhere, and to fight homophobic attacks like this with love and understanding.
To everyone affected by the shooting, everyone is hearing your cries. And to everyone else, I have a quote for you from a Holocaust survivor named Henry Golde, “Hate is nothing, and love is everything.”
~*~*~*~*~
Gay literature is an iconic part of the LGBTQA+ community, especially towards teenagers and young adults, so in celebration of LGBT Pride Month, I’ve decided to make a Top 10 list for the best gay young adult novels I wholly recommend. Now, there are a few rules to this for anyone who’s reading. The first rule is that these entries have to have an LGBT person as the protagonist and not just as a side character. Second, it cannot be explicit and must be readable for anyone from fourteen to even nineteen years of age. And third, having no more than two of an authors’ works is acceptable by my standards because granted, I haven’t read every gay book for young adults; heck I’m even including ones I’ve reviewed on here already. And keep in mind that this is a recommendation list and not a list of the greatest LGBT young adult novels.
With that said, here’s the Top 10 List of LGBT YA Novels I Recommend.
If you ever grew up in the 90’s and early 2000’s like I have, you might also look at fighter-jet/plane action movies like “Top Gun”, “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow” or even a bad Michael Bay film like “Pearl Harbor” the same way I do. They are fun and seem like okay films, but there comes certain times where you want to see yourself in a jet or fighter plane like an action hero. With “Top Gun” I remember the video game more than the movie, since it focused more on interactions with characters rather than dogfights.
In Cori McCarthy’s “Breaking Sky”, it feels more like a futuristic “Top Gun” if the setting and characters were more interesting. Is it a good young adult book though, as well as a good thrill for literary thrill-seekers?
In the far future, it is the Second Cold War (technically aren’t we in one right now?) and Continue reading →
Okay so this week’s read is a recent one you’ve probably never heard of called “Username: Evie”, but you probably know the author and his team. From what I know, the author of this is a new one. His name’s Joe Sugg, though most of you better know him as the British Youtube personality named ‘ThatcherJoe’.
And with him to help make this comic come to life are the ‘Sugg Squad’, consisting of Amrit Birdi, Matt Whyman, Joaquin Pereyra, and Mindy Lopkin. Looking these guys up as well as Joe Sugg, I never would’ve guessed right away he wrote comics, especially with the art style involved. . And after finding this at the local book store, I decided to give it a quick read and honestly?
Whenever I read books about a group of strangers meeting in an isolated place and being thrust into a horror story, I often can’t help but roll my eyes. If you remember my review of ‘The Rules’ in October, you may recall it kind of left a foul taste in my mouth. It was by no means terrible, but it left me wanting more variety and depth. I wanted an original story with new characters, a sense of chilling atmosphere, and be genuinely scared and care for the characters.
Well…Ruth Ware’s chilling novel ‘In a Dark, Dark Wood’ is that book. Continue reading →
Science fiction novels involving machines gone astray is practically a dime a dozen, from Isaac Asimov’s classic short stories to works such as ‘The Matrix’ franchise turning AI entertainment into a clichéd genre. In almost every fictional work, there’s always an innocent AI, a prejudiced character that sees the AI as an abomination, and a heroic bystander who will end up choosing between humanity or the AI (or heck, even destroying the AI to save the world). There’s more variety to other works, but to me that’s the basic gist of AI in science fiction.
So how does new-coming author Tim Floreen make his latest book ‘Willful Machines’ more of a diverse addition to the genre? Making the main character gay of course.
Interesting choice.
It is the (obviously not very) near future, where the world is becoming more obsessed with technology. After a newly created AI name Charlotte escapes destruction via downloading onto the internet, she begins a campaign of cyberterrorism on America. Her demands? Release her other robotic counterparts and let them live equal to humans.
Years later, a new American president has been elected under a new political party that is against AI and values traditional values. Things get complicated though when it is believed that the president’s son, a closeted (and once suicidal) robotics student named Lee Fischer, may be Charlotte’s next target. With only his gruff bodyguard and his best friend at school, Lee doesn’t know who to trust with his life (and secret), probably not even Nico Medina, the new boy in school he has a crush on.
Obviously this is a weird setup for a story the more you think about it, hell Kirkus Reviews called it a mixture of ‘The Terminator’ and ‘Romeo & Juliet’, which I can honestly say best matches the description of the book. It is a weird mixture, but the author of this clearly knows it and embraces the strangeness and the commentary to get out of this type of story.
Going in, the main character Lee reminded me of Caleb from the film ‘Ex Machina’, who’s a quietly meek but intelligent and well-spoken young man. He’s a loner, but not to the point of disliking human interaction. And although he still carries suicidal thoughts due to his insecure sexuality, you feel the pain and anguishing struggle.
Nico is also a very likeable character, being a good contrast to the robotic-loving Lee. He’s devilishly handsome but also so eccentric. He’s happily jubilant to breathe life, loves reading Shakespeare, and adores eating the terrible food at Lee’s school. Nico is less of a fictional character and more like the eccentric but good-looking Chilean exchange student you meet in college or a frat house. And when you put him and our main character together, their chemistry is beautiful, especially after a grave secret of Nico’s is revealed (which I won’t dare give away).
The rest of the side characters are good, especially Lee’s best friend named Bex (who reminds me of every liberal feminist you ever see at high school) and his bodyguard named Trumbull, but it is also a problem. Throughout the novel, it feels like the story wants to focus more on Nico and Lee’s relationship, and that’s fine. However, when you have a novel like this where the main character is questioning his sexuality and is genuinely afraid of what his friends and the world will think, it is necessary for us to know about the relationships between themselves and Lee. Don’t get me wrong: they do that, but not as much as I would’ve liked.
For example, there’s a scene in the beginning of ‘Willful Machines’ where Lee and his father, the anti-robotics POTUS, are meeting in his dorm room and questioning why Lee is into robotics. It is a good scene and plays out very well when he meets and approves of Nico as a new friend, but I wanted some more of Lee’s father. Despite his views and policies on family values, the President seems like a father who genuinely loves his son, and only wants what he believes is best for him. He’s kind of (more like is) the football coaching father who has a nerdy son who wants to enroll in Caltech.
Aside from, that I do love the other interactions of Lee and Nico with the other characters, even if I could’ve used a bit more.
Outside of that, ‘Willful Machines’ provides extraordinary commentary on freewill and the idea of whether or not we make choices or our choices make us. One of Lee’s teachers says this one intriguing quote about how humans are no different from machines because the choices we make are based on genetics and in our DNA. That’s a fairly good point, considering how some people believe they choose to be smart when in fact it can be due to good genes (i.e. good programming). She even goes on to say if God exists, humans may be no different from machines, and it is beautifully simple enough to understand for younger readers.
And not only is the ending of this tragic like ‘Romeo and Juliet’, but the ending leaves itself up for a good sequel I hope to read soon. I grew to adore the main couple and want to know what’ll happen.
Drenched in modern gothic storytelling and thrilling commentary on AI, Tim Floreen’s ‘Willful Machines’ is a great science fiction novel for both the straight reader and the questioning one.
To celebrate Valentine’s Day this month, I thought I’d review a random romance novel that caught my eye. Looking at the cover, ‘Everything, Everything’ by Nicola Yoon seems like an average book in the YA romance section. However, knowing what it’s actually about and reading it from cover to cover, I couldn’t stop reading it even on school nights. It has a good personality, engrossing leads, and a touching but cynical atmosphere that’d make ‘The Fault in Our Stars’ blush. It did keep me interested, but maybe I was expecting a little more, but I’m getting ahead of myself.
Madeline Whittier is a young teenage girl who has an extremely rare disease called severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID), which makes her literally allergic to the outside world (yeah, remember the movie called ‘The Boy in the Plastic Bubble’? That’s this in a YA romance). Besides taking online classes and spending her days in a white house built with an airlock, Madeline is catered by her overprotective mother and a loving nurse. She never changes routine, and always wonders about the world outside.
But one day, a new family moves next door to Madeline, and the oldest boy is a teenager her age named Olly. Unlike her, he embraces the outside and spends his days either doing parkour on the roof or dressing like a Goth off the set of ‘American Horror Story’. As predicted, Madeline falls head over heels for him, and he begins to see the tragedy of her lifelong predicament. However, will Madeline risk her life for a chance of real happiness?
This is a book that cynics like myself may hate because of the choices and life-threatening decisions Madeline makes to see her love interest. On the one hand, you understand how this is the first time she’s probably been in love, but you do have to side with the mother when it’s life-threatening.
However, going into the first two-thirds of the story, this kind of reminded me of the popularly criticized book ‘Into the Wild’, with the main character being cooped up in one place for a long time and making piss-poor decisions of living one day to live life like it was meant to be lived. Sure his decisions are stupid and the risks he takes are beyond insane, but at the same time you have to admire the passion he holds into following his dreams and how naïve but gently determined he is.
Madeline is the same way. She’s a person who’s never been sick like a regular person, never smelled fresh air, and knows not much about the outside world than what she’s seen on a laptop or in books. Even knowing the risks she’ll take to just see Olly across a living room, you have to admire the naïve passion she owns, the intellectual optimism, and the cynical pessimism she has for the future. It is almost like seeing an animal in a cage, but with a human being.
Then we have Olly, who at first is at first nothing but eye candy in the first third of ‘Everything, Everything’, until you start to learn more about him next to Madeline. He may dress like a Goth, but he’s surprisingly intellectual when it comes to mathematics and astronomy. Olly knows the risks of seeing Madeline much like she does, but is also passionate to know the girl more. Much like the book, his personality shines as the story progresses.
In fact, I love how the novel tell you about the character in a simple way to know their struggles and understand what’s going on. For example, there are chapters where Madeline and Olly are sending texts and IMs to each other over the course of several weeks and that’s it. Over their conversations, they hint at what we miss in-between chapters, and give vague enough answers for us to know how protective Madeline’s mother is, and how violent Olly’s father is. It is the right balance of giving details without giving answers.
Aside from the decisions Madeline makes in the first two-thirds, my only main problem is surprisingly the ending. I won’t try to spoil anything here, but the climax of the film feels out-of-synch with the rest of the book. For a majority of the novel, we believe Nicola Yoon is giving us a quirky but dramatic tragedy, but suddenly gives us a sudden twist that was never built on. Granted, the ending chapter is bittersweet yet heart-warming, but I never felt that the ending of ‘Everything, Everything’ lived up to its full potential.
Overall, ‘Everything, Everything’ has all the greater elements that should be in a good YA romance novel. It isn’t great, but it is dramatically entertaining with a sweet couple and an enriching personality. If you enjoy this kind of thing, I highly recommend it for anyone in the spirit of Valentine’s Day!
‘God of Clay’ is the first book in Ryan Campbell’s ‘Firebearers trilogy’, and a personal favorite of mine. This is an intriguing YA(ish?) novel for those like me that love diversity, especially if it’s in African tribalism. I mentioned this book before in my review of ‘The Golem and the Jinni’, and how amazing it was in feeling like a legend or a fairytale, except it has modern story telling with fleshed out characters, a simple storyline, and a mythos that feels too genuine to be fiction. With that said, there are a few things in ‘God of Clay’ that may turn a few heads. It’s not a problem or anything, but it is worth talking about later on.
In a vast African land of animal deities and spirits, a tribe of humans have settled near the edge of a massive jungle next to their savanna home. After losing their lands to a wrathful god of fire named Ogya, they hope to start anew while praying for miracles. And in this nomadic tribe are Clay and Laughing Dog, two brothers (and sons of the tribe’s King) more polar opposites than mine. Clay devotes himself greatly to the gods and worships without hesitation while Laughing Dog believes them to be nothing but ancient legends. After both brothers make a bet that end up with Clay having an injured foot, Laughing Dog ends up being banished by his father as punishment and for endlessly mocking the gods. Clay soon becomes depressed, and prays for a miracle.
That miracle comes to him one night in the form of an anthropomorphic leopard named Doto, the son of the forest god Kwaee, who has been tasked by his despicable father into kidnapping a human and finding out why they have come to his forest. Kwaee loathes humanity, and sees them as vermin who burn and destroy in the name of Ogya. After Doto manages to convince Clay that he himself is (technically) a god, the reverent human ventures with the leopard on their journey. At first, Doto mirrors his father’s views on the human, until he begins to realize how similar he is to Clay, and that they may share a bond that transcends taboo in their world. However, little do they know that the two of them have a shared destiny that will change both them and their worlds forever.
In the three years that this has come out, I am absolutely shocked that this has not gotten that much attention or reviews by other critics. Granted it isn’t published by a massive publishing company, but it doesn’t excuse the fact that this is an intelligently written book that I frankly believe deserves to be adapted into a film someday (I said it, so believe it!).
Let’s firstly talk about the two main characters Doto and Clay. Clay is presented as a meek but confident human who worships his gods with great devotion. He may not be strong or intelligent in the wilderness, but he’s very optimistic when he wants to be. This highly contrasts to Doto who is basically a self-righteous little child that sees Clay as nothing more than subordinate. Even so, he has this fragile belief that he’ll gain the love and attention of his uncaring father by following his bidding. This allows us to understand his mindset and know why he acts the way he does toward Clay, and we begin to warm up to him more as the both of them tear down the barriers of god/mortal to survive on their journey. This eventually leads to both the leopard deity and human mortal wondering why there’s a divide between gods and humans and if it can and should be broken.
Laughing Dog’s story is also very wonderful to read. Here we have a young man who’s convinced that the gods are nothing but myths and legends, and is angered and bitter that the people and elders of his village do not see his point of view. However, he’s not a stick in the mud or an asshole; you understand that he only wants to help his tribe survive in the harsh environment and sees the reliance on gods as an obstacle for progress towards a better life. What I love about this is that Laughing Dog isn’t a one-sided villain who hates religion for the sake of it, he only wants his tribe and the rest of humanity to rely on themselves and not in faith. ‘God of Clay’ wonderfully touches on issues such as the separation of church and state, belief vs. faith, tradition vs. change, and it makes you question (in the words of the novel):
“How far would you go to follow your gods? And how hard would you fight to defy them?”
Much like another small personal favorite of mine named ‘Things Fall Apart’ by the late Chinua Achebe, ‘God of Clay’ makes itself timeless and beautifully descriptive by telling the culture and daily life of this tribe, which it helps us connect to the characters. Campbell even incorporates actual African tribal culture into their world. For example, Clay mentions to his companion that whenever a woman gives birth, it’s tradition for her to name the child after the first thing she sees. Reading the novel, you hear every mosquito buzz by your ear and feel the heartbeat of the African landscape through every page that your fingers touch. Combine all of that with a good plot and complex characters, and it’s an addictive read.
Before you go buy this book (which I still highly recommend), I should probably warn you of a scene that comes up later in the book. It’s not a major spoiler, since it is highly hinted at early on in the novel, but this may be a huge turn-off for a few readers. Remember how I mentioned that the main character’s bond transcends taboo in their world?
See…Doto and Clay have a physical attraction for each other. Yes, a physical attraction between a walking-talking leopard deity and a human. There’s especially a scene in the third act where they get sexually intimate, but only for half a page. Going in, I didn’t know and thought it’d be a general friendship, but Ryan Campbell went the extra mile. And honestly, it could’ve been kept hidden, but I didn’t mind there being a romantic relationship between Doto and Clay, since it makes them even more interesting and makes you wonder if gods in their world are allowed to fall in love with humans, especially if both of them are male. Did a sex scene need to be in there? Probably not, but it didn’t last a whole page and I’ve read MUCH MORE mature content that’s allowed in school libraries.
Overall, ‘God of Clay’ is a perfect novel for the bookworm interested in cultural commentary and the perfect novel for fantasy-lovers. With a twist on African lore and a fictional realm you’ll never want to escape, go read Ryan Campbell’s first book in surely a phenomenal trilogy.
Tom Delonge is a man that continues to boggle my mind the more I research about him. Not only is he an author, but he’s a songwriter, a film producer, and a guitarist in his own band ‘Angels & Airwaves’. Combine all of that, and you get the creation of a multimedia project featuring the titular character, Poet Anderson.
And here’s a link to the trailer of the short film if you’re interested in that too:
For those who don’t know, Poet Anderson is a character that Delonge created in 2008 and is basically a heroic teenager who has the ability to manipulate dreams and nightmares in a mindscape of sleep. Since then, Poet has appeared in graphic novels, songs written by Delonge, and even an animated short film called ‘Poet Anderson: The Dream Walker’ (which is amazing on its own and I highly recommend looking for online). And now, with the help of New York Times bestselling author Suzanne Young, Tom Delonge gives us a written book that will tell the origin story of Poet Anderson in ‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’. Does it hold up?
It does, but it may be clunky enough to turn off a lot of readers.
The book begins with two orphaned brothers named Jonas and Alan Anderson, who travel for work and are secretly Lucid Dreamers, humans who have the ability to become aware of their dreams and control them in the Dream World, a reality shared by humanity’s collective unconsciousness. Unfortunately after a car accident places Alan into a coma, Jonas is left alone in Seattle with no money, no other family, and no place to call home. All he can do is go to school, visit the hospital, and roam the dreamscape in hopes of finding his brother and waking him up.
A few weeks later, everything turns upside down for Jonas when he discovers he is a destined Poet, a Lucid Dreamer who guides lost dreamers from their nightmares to safety along with having unimaginable powers over the dreamscape. News of this has now made him a target for a diabolical Lucid Dreamer named REM (whose design is just creepy!), who wants Jonas’s abilities to escape into the Waking World and plunge it into nightmarish chaos.
Still desperate to save his brother, Jonas takes up the pseudonym ‘Poet Anderson’ and must fight his way through REM’s forces with the help of a Dream Walker named Jarabec in the Dream World, and the support of his love interest Samantha in the Waking World.
After seeing the short film originally and getting hyped on the idea of a novel series involving the memorable Poet Anderson, I didn’t know what to expect. And after reading this, I have to say that even as a stand-alone novel, it can be a clunky read for some people. Sometimes it feels like Delonge and his co-author are not letting scenes play out and are more concerned of letting plot points into the story. For example, the second and third chapters confused me by hastily introducing characters we wouldn’t know about until two-fifths later into the book. It felt out of place and would’ve been better to go through another edit.
Other than that, the rest of the book flows not only smoothly, but surprisingly well, almost like a lazy river fluidly floating to the climax of a ravaging waterfall. ‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’ not only gave me what I expected from the plot of a dream-related YA novel. In fact, this almost reminds me of an anime movie I watched last year called ‘Paprika’ (directed by the legendary animator Satoshi Kon) about a young woman with two different identities trying to stop the abuse of a dreaming device. Not only did it have the same type of character of having two identities, but it made up for its similar problems by having imaginative dreams, dark themes and backgrounds, and a sense of innovation to the thin line between fantasy/reality. IT was really damn good at what it did best.
‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’ does the same thing.
The characters and their designs (both in and outside the novel) are just very imaginative, and show off their personality in a way that you can hear and know what their voices sound like in your ear. Jonas/Poet’s voices can differentiate from an awkward but kindhearted loner into an independently semi-confident badass with a bowler hat, black suit, and umbrella. Jarabec is also very likeable being the wise old man who doesn’t sound monotone in his writing because he wants to sound important, but knows what he says is important. He’s the one who’s seen what his role as a Dream Walker can do to a person in the Waking World. He knows the risks, and is warning Jonas that becoming a Poet can be dangerous and is meant to not be taken lightly.
Then we have the villain of this named REM. How do I start with this guy? I didn’t see or hear of him until I read the book, but this is a very mysterious villain. He always talks to Poet/Jonas like he has absolutely nothing to fear; the nightmarish villain almost reminds me of Bill Cipher from ‘Gravity Falls’, being a dream villain who is powerful enough to destroy his foe, but also has a dark sense of humor mixed with ruthlessness. He’s even intimidating enough to have his creepy face larger than Poet’s on the front cover!
The Dream World in the novel is incredible based on the words of our authors, even if you haven’t seen or read anything Poet Anderson-related. It’s bright and shiny in some places, and is obviously a metaphor for the Internet and doing whatever you can’t do in the Waking World. One of the things I loved reading this is how in the Dream World Jonas and Sam are more open to each other than they can be in the Waking World and it feels natural. They’re actually adorable sometimes.
Surprisingly, my only other complaint with ‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’ besides the first few chapters is that I was hoping to explore more of the Dream World. I mean, this is a place where the impossible can become reality and is endless with creative possibilities, but I often feel like I’m in a futuristic setting. But you can make the argument that since the Dream World is a collective unconsciousness that it would make sense it’d be formed as a giant city for people to do random things, much like any other city.
Overall, Tom Delonge and Suzanne Young’s first co-authored book is fun. Another edit may have helped this flow better in the beginning, but ‘Poet Anderson of Nightmares’ is an exciting read for anyone interested in the idea of Inception meeting Blade Runner.
~*~*~*~*~
If you have any questions or already have an opinion on the novel, feel free to leave any comments. Thanks!
After hearing about the Supreme Court’s recent ruling, I thought I’d celebrate with everyone by posting my opinion on a book I read last month, but never got the chance to say my opinions on it. The book I’m talking about is a quirky gay romance novel that caught my attention with the cover and didn’t leave me disappointed. It is called ‘One Man Guy’ by Michael Barakiva.
Alek Khederian is a fourteen year-old Armenian teenager that lives in an Armenian family outside New York City. As his freshman year has come to a close, Alek’s parents want him to go to summer school in order to raise his grades up. Reluctant to give up going to tennis camp and bound by the wishes of his traditional parents, Alek expects the worst of spending three months with the same bullies and the same weird looks from other students.
However, he never expected to become friends with sophomore Ethan, the ‘cool’ kid at his school. Ethan is described by Alek as independent, confident, and very willful in his life. He hangs out with the troublemakers at school, dresses in whatever he wants, and doesn’t care about breaking rules once in a while At first, it seems as though Alek is invisible to him, until Ethan suddenly coaxes him to come with him to a Rufus Wainwright concert in New York City. From there, everything changes.
After a wonderful day with Ethan, Alek slowly starts to come out of his bubble and hang out more with his new friend, despite the fact that he reveals himself he is gay. Not only that, Alek himself may be starting to fall in love with him.
‘One Man Guy’ is the name of a song made by the actual Rufus Wainwright, and it tells not only about homosexuality, but also pertains to the loner and individual in us all. ‘One Man Guy’ is basically a book about an Armenian teenager discovering he likes boys, and starts to become more independent because of his first boyfriend’s support.
Alek and Ethan are one of the most adorable and well-written characters I’ve seen recently in YA gay literature. Alek is presented as a meek teen that respects his parents and is proud of his heritage, but wants to be accepted among his peers and be involved with what other teenagers do.
Ethan is also a very likeable as a character as well. I expected him to be just an average ‘cool kid’ with no defining personality to him like in other novels, but ‘One Man Guy’ took me by surprise and made an individual out of him. Ethan is portrayed just as Alek said he is, but also has a sense of direction and street smarts to him, which can make Alek the perfect foil for when they first meet. Bottom line, both of them make this book. Still, out of all the side characters, my favorite would have to go to Alek’s best friend named Becky, whom reminds me of a lot of teen girls I remember going to high school. She’s the kind of eccentric girl that is supportive and caring, even if she can be stubborn and selfish at times.
The only characters I have mixed feelings for have to be with the parents. Don’t get me wrong; they’re well-developed with the dynamics with their son. It is obvious Alek loves his parents, and they love him and want what they believe is best for him. However, they often feel less like characters and more like the type of strict parents you’d see on a family sitcom. In fact, Alek’s parents almost remind me of Fran Drescher’s fictional parents on ‘The Nanny’, even though it is weird considering Michael Barakiva is an Israeli/Armenian himself, and he doesn’t take this opportunity to dive more into the Armenian culture than he could’ve.
That doesn’t mean it ruins the novel, far from it. Another fun element of ‘One Man Guy’ has to go to the writing and sense of atmosphere. I love the quiet and calm moments, the moments when Alek comes out of his bubble and opens up more whenever he and Ethan go out on dates. My favorite scene that involved Ethan and Alek is when they visit New York City again, and a couple chapters are solely dedicated to them interacting with residents and shopping for a new look for Alek. There’s no bullying, no awkward moments, or no social commentary. It’s just both of them feeling freely and being themselves.
So what’s my opinion on ‘One Man Guy’? It’s a really good gay romance novel both fitting for gay and straight people. This gives a good depth into a part of the culture wars that still happen today, with Alek’s parents wanting him to keep with tradition, and Alek wanting to be a part of modern America, yet they need to find a common ground in order for him to live a full life on his own. What keeps it from being great are the few stereotypes and lack of explaining Armenian history, but there’s more than enough substance and Armenian cooking culture to pull people into the depths of its pages.
~*~*~*~*~
If you have any questions or already have an opinion on the novel, feel free to leave any comments. Thanks!
Scott Westerfeld is a genius. Once in a while I come across a novel that cleverly blends two narratives in a unique way; however, Afterworlds has taken this to a whole new level.
Our first character is Darcy Patel, a teenage girl who is excited and terrified that her first novel, coincidentally named Afterworlds, is going to be published. She quits college, and while experiencing apprehension about having her book edited and published, begins dating another writer new to the scene. I won’t tell you who, because, honestly, you won’t expect it.
Then we have our second main character, who is another teenage girl simply named Lizzie. After a near-death experience during a terrorist attack, she realizes she is what others call a “psychopomp” – a spirit guide who also acts as a grim reaper for ghosts. Enter Yamaraj, a Hindu boy who protects souls from rogue reapers and evil spirits.
What do these two narratives have in common? Lizzie is the main character of Darcy’s soon-to-be published novel.
Afterworlds is one young adult novel that all writers should read. It vividly shows the stress and fear involved in the complicated process of having a book or story published.
I also enjoyed the narrative structure. It’s like watching Suzanne Collins as she writes the first Hunger Games book, but both narratives are entertaining enough to keep you interested.
The chemistry between Yamaraj and Lizzie seems somewhat flat, mainly because they don’t see each other very much. However, you can make a constructive argument that Westerfeld wrote it that way to show how much Darcy can improve.
Either way, I never got bored. If Afterworlds sounds intriguing to you, check it out and feel what it’s like to step into the shoes of an author.
~*~*~*~*~
On a side note: I had this review published in the nationwide magazine Teen Ink, which is copyrighted under my alias DomusVocis. Here’s a link to it: http://www.teenink.com/reviews/book_reviews/article/745913/Afterworlds-by-Scott-Westerfeld/
If you have any questions or already have an opinion on the novel, feel free to leave any comments. Thanks!
Reader's Boulevard 