An old-fashioned queer coming-of-age story with romance, laughs, and some underwritten characters.
A teen grapples with his sexuality and switching schools in Gellman’s YA novel.
Simon Bugg leaves his longtime best friends (Mags, a Chinese American lesbian, and Neel, a girl-obsessed straight boy of South Asian heritage) in Columbia to begin his senior year at a new high school in Rockville, Maryland. He and his mother, Lindsey, and his stepmother, Carole, recently moved to Rockville for Lindsey’s important new job. After one of his regular anxiety attacks causes him to miss the first day of school, Simon meets Hector, a gay barista at Starbucks. The next day, Simon makes another potential friend, PJ. When Simon and PJ go out for bubble tea after school, PJ holds Simon’s hand; Simon reacts with shock, hurting PJ’s feelings. Hector becomes a mentor to Simon when the distraught younger boy vents to him about the incident and realizes that he’s gay. The novel echoes familiar queer narratives in which the protagonist struggles to come out for an ample portion of the story. The momentum sags in some sections as characters go about their normal lives and engage in mundane conversations. (Simon describes doing laundry: “I choose the gentle cycle and wash it in cold water just like Mags’ mom.”) In other sections, the pacing of the novel is much too fast—after Simon realizes that he’s gay, he immediately believes he’s in love with PJ, who quickly becomes the most important thing in Simon’s life; he stares and obsesses constantly. The teenage characters’ dialogue is also sometimes unconvincing—Simon says “OMG” and “cray-cray” in his inner monologue, and characters use phrases like “pulling my leg,” making it difficult to accept them as believable adolescents. The novel does have bright points: It offers moments of winning humor, and the sincerity of the diverse cast is endearing.
An old-fashioned queer coming-of-age story with romance, laughs, and some underwritten characters.Pub Date: April 14, 2026
ISBN: 9781648909146
Page Count: 238
Publisher: NineStar Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 18, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away.
A Mexican American boy takes on heavy responsibilities when his family is torn apart.
Mateo’s life is turned upside down the day U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents show up unsuccessfully seeking his Pa at his New York City bodega. The Garcias live in fear until the day both parents are picked up; his Pa is taken to jail and his Ma to a detention center. The adults around Mateo offer support to him and his 7-year-old sister, Sophie, however, he knows he is now responsible for caring for her and the bodega as well as trying to survive junior year—that is, if he wants to fulfill his dream to enter the drama program at the Tisch School of the Arts and become an actor. Mateo’s relationships with his friends Kimmie and Adam (a potential love interest) also suffer repercussions as he keeps his situation a secret. Kimmie is half Korean (her other half is unspecified) and Adam is Italian American; Mateo feels disconnected from them, less American, and with worries they can’t understand. He talks himself out of choosing a safer course of action, a decision that deepens the story. Mateo’s self-awareness and inner monologue at times make him seem older than 16, and, with significant turmoil in the main plot, some side elements feel underdeveloped. Aleman’s narrative joins the ranks of heart-wrenching stories of migrant families who have been separated.
An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-7595-5605-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head.
The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.
Autumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart; their mothers are still best friends. Growing up, Autumn and Finny were like peas in a pod despite their differences: Autumn is “quirky and odd,” while Finny is “sweet and shy and everyone like[s] him.” But in eighth grade, Autumn and Finny stop being friends due to an unexpected kiss. They drift apart and find new friends, but their friendship keeps asserting itself at parties, shared holiday gatherings and random encounters. In the summer after graduation, Autumn and Finny reconnect and are finally ready to be more than friends. But on August 8, everything changes, and Autumn has to rely on all her strength to move on. Autumn’s coming-of-age is sensitively chronicled, with a wide range of experiences and events shaping her character. Even secondary characters are well-rounded, with their own histories and motivations.
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: April 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4022-7782-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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