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katymaryreads's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Thoroughly enjoyable and informative. Maybe even too informative - although the explanations given by the non-binary character to her clueless but well-meaning friend rang true to the situation they were in. Lovable, believable, infuriating, flawed characters. A good quick read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Homophobia and Transphobia
Moderate: Racism
jackie_reads_314's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
I wish I wasn't traumatized from my own childhood growing up LGBTQ, because that would have made this read more enjoyable for me. The characters are so well written, and there is so much nuance surrounding all the hard conversations that the kids and adults had to face. Though not everything was resolved, it was a much more realistic ending than what is usually encountered in middle grade materials. I would say it is for middle school students, and would be a little cautions to give this to a 5th grader. I cannot say it was a delightful read, but it was very comforting to finish and to be able to reflect on my own experiences and how I want to educate the kids in my life.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Transphobia
Moderate: Bullying, Homophobia, and Outing
libscote's review against another edition
emotional
informative
medium-paced
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.5
I liked but didn't love this book. Annabelle makes a new friend, Bailey, at school. Bailey is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns. This causes Annabelle to learn new things about her family, and also about her school community, which may not be as welcoming as she thought.
I think this book would be a good introduction for kids who don't already know a lot about the LGBTQIA+ community, as this book does a lot of explaining about the meanings of those terms (particularly the LGTQ parts). I had some questions about the behaviors of some people in the book, but after talking to friends who have a connection to the parts I had questions about, they seemed more realistic to me. Turns out I didn't know more than I thought! I do like that this book emphasizes that we are always learning about ourselves.
I think this book would be a good introduction for kids who don't already know a lot about the LGBTQIA+ community, as this book does a lot of explaining about the meanings of those terms (particularly the LGTQ parts). I had some questions about the behaviors of some people in the book, but after talking to friends who have a connection to the parts I had questions about, they seemed more realistic to me. Turns out I didn't know more than I thought! I do like that this book emphasizes that we are always learning about ourselves.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Transphobia and Homophobia
sweetpotatocat's review
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Moderate: Homophobia and Transphobia
rachel_23's review
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Homophobia and Transphobia
Minor: Infertility and Pregnancy
thebookpaiges's review
emotional
hopeful
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Dysphoria, Homophobia, Racism, and Transphobia
Moderate: Bullying, Pregnancy, Ableism, Deadnaming, Infertility, and Lesbophobia
Minor: Animal death
anna_wa's review
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
tense
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Okay, this book was too good. I wanted to cry like, 100 times (sadness and happiness equally) but still managed to slam through it in 3 days.
I have been trying my best to do one last minute power-through of as many books actually released in 2022 as I could before 2022 ends, and when I saw Kyle Lukoff wrote this one, I was instantly curious because I had read and adored his picture book When Aidan Became A Brother. As soon as I read the description I was hooked and knew I had to check it out from the library immediately before they closed for the holiday.
At the very beginning of the book, I thought this was going to be a story of Annabelle as a queer child stuck in a homophobic family in a small town, because of the way her dad reacts to a poster for a pre-Pride drag brunch when she and him are visiting Seattle and because of the way her mother seems uncomfortable when she brings up her new friend Bailey and uses the right pronouns for them. I was preparing to be very angry at everyone who isn't Annabelle and Bailey and root for them to escape their small homophobic+transphobic town into a better life - just like a lot of the lesbian books I remembered reading in the 2000s and early 2010s when I was figuring out who I was.
However, that is not the story that I got at all.
And I apologize, spoilers are going to start now because there is no way I can talk about this book without spoiling the initial biggest plot twist.
A few days after Annabelle brings Bailey over to her house and there's a big showdown where her dad is extremely disrespectful and nonbinary-phobic, Annabelle's dad drives her to a location where nobody else will overhear the two of them and he tells her, for the very first time in her life, that he is a trans man and he is the one who was pregnant with her, not her mother.
Suddenly everything Annabelle has understood about herself and how she came to be is flown into a loop and she falls down a rabbithole of a zillion questions. But the most important question at that moment is: "Then why were you so mean to Bailey?"
The answer to that is very long (and more than a little nonbinary-phobic) but part of it is that he was betrayed by his own trans community when he got pregnant and he "learned" that it was better to just pretend not to be trans at all and to move somewhere where nobody else knew about who he used to be.
Yeah, so you can see why I cried a lot. But Annabelle and Bailey keep hanging out, and Bailey keeps bringing in their new city-kid ideas with them, and slowly Annabelle's dad starts to break out of his shell more and more and slowly, but surely, he starts to heal from his past and embrace the present and future.
There are sooo many important conversations in this book - conversations between older generations of queer people and younger generations of queer kids, conversations about school discrimination and how all it takes sometimes is one kid and one parent to set it in motion (and also about how sometimes all it takes is kids and parents to change it), and even conversations about climate change too.
I highly recommend this to parents, educators, and EVERYONE to be quite honest. Kyle Lukoff is amazing whether it is picture books or written books. <3
I have been trying my best to do one last minute power-through of as many books actually released in 2022 as I could before 2022 ends, and when I saw Kyle Lukoff wrote this one, I was instantly curious because I had read and adored his picture book When Aidan Became A Brother. As soon as I read the description I was hooked and knew I had to check it out from the library immediately before they closed for the holiday.
At the very beginning of the book, I thought this was going to be a story of Annabelle as a queer child stuck in a homophobic family in a small town, because of the way her dad reacts to a poster for a pre-Pride drag brunch when she and him are visiting Seattle and because of the way her mother seems uncomfortable when she brings up her new friend Bailey and uses the right pronouns for them. I was preparing to be very angry at everyone who isn't Annabelle and Bailey and root for them to escape their small homophobic+transphobic town into a better life - just like a lot of the lesbian books I remembered reading in the 2000s and early 2010s when I was figuring out who I was.
However, that is not the story that I got at all.
And I apologize, spoilers are going to start now because there is no way I can talk about this book without spoiling the initial biggest plot twist.
A few days after Annabelle brings Bailey over to her house and there's a big showdown where her dad is extremely disrespectful and nonbinary-phobic, Annabelle's dad drives her to a location where nobody else will overhear the two of them and he tells her, for the very first time in her life, that he is a trans man and he is the one who was pregnant with her, not her mother.
Suddenly everything Annabelle has understood about herself and how she came to be is flown into a loop and she falls down a rabbithole of a zillion questions. But the most important question at that moment is: "Then why were you so mean to Bailey?"
The answer to that is very long (and more than a little nonbinary-phobic) but part of it is that he was betrayed by his own trans community when he got pregnant and he "learned" that it was better to just pretend not to be trans at all and to move somewhere where nobody else knew about who he used to be.
Yeah, so you can see why I cried a lot. But Annabelle and Bailey keep hanging out, and Bailey keeps bringing in their new city-kid ideas with them, and slowly Annabelle's dad starts to break out of his shell more and more and slowly, but surely, he starts to heal from his past and embrace the present and future.
There are sooo many important conversations in this book - conversations between older generations of queer people and younger generations of queer kids, conversations about school discrimination and how all it takes sometimes is one kid and one parent to set it in motion (and also about how sometimes all it takes is kids and parents to change it), and even conversations about climate change too.
I highly recommend this to parents, educators, and EVERYONE to be quite honest. Kyle Lukoff is amazing whether it is picture books or written books. <3
Content Warnings
Graphic: Medical trauma and Transphobia
Moderate: Pregnancy and Homophobia
franklola's review
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Moderate: Transphobia
Minor: Homophobia and Pregnancy
emily_mh's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.25
Before starting in with my review, I wanted to share my two cents regarding two common criticisms that I’ve been seeing of this book. The first is that the book is confused as to which age demographic it is targeting, as it purportedly has a juvenile MC but also deals with complex topics. However, I personally don’t think Annabelle is juvenile, she’s just acting her age which is literally 12 years old. I’m pretty sure I acted the exact same way at that time of my life. Regarding it being “too complex” for middle-graders, I’m not sure that we, as adults who were middle-graders in a very different time (e.g. for me around 2009-2011) are the best judge of what middle-graders in 2022 find complex to understand. Furthermore, the reason that queer discourse seems complex is because it isn’t educated about in schools when it really should be. It should be normal to be thinking about these topics in depth from an early age. Why are we criticising this book for a fault of society? Regardless, I thought it made queer discourse very accessible to a young audience anyway.
The second common criticism is that this book lacks direction. I wholeheartedly disagree. This is a character-driven story clearly demarcated by Annabelle coming to terms with herself, her family, and her peers, and learning about queer identity and social issues along the way.
Now onto what I want to say. This book just exudes joy and hope. It was incredible seeing such detailed queer rep in a MG book and I can see how life-changing it could be for queer kids! I LOVED reading it. I learnt so much about queer discourse that I have never been exposed to. I appreciated that the book showed in lots of cases that there’s no obvious right answers to questions of identity, that so much is still unknown or is incredibly dependent on individual circumstance, that answers can change over time. I also liked how it illustrated how what we might find acceptable now could change in the future, as has already been the case in the queer community.
Admittedly, a couple of things were a LITTLE convenient, for example Annabelle’s relationship with Julian, Mike’s rapid character development, etc. , but none of those things could significantly overshadow how much I loved this read.
As a side note, the audiobook was phenomenal! Cassandra Morris is definitely a favourite narrator of mine. She really brought the story to life; it was like I was reading a movie, if that makes sense.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Transphobia
Moderate: Racism and Homophobia
Minor: Fire/Fire injury, Pregnancy, Colonisation, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Car accident, Slavery, Kidnapping, Medical content, Ableism, Blood, Death of parent, Infertility, Religious bigotry, Bullying, Vomit, Death, Animal death, Panic attacks/disorders, and Violence
Moderate: climate change, disownment Minor: menstruation, death of pet, homelessness, sick parentimstephtacular's review
challenging
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Dysphoria, Transphobia, and Homophobia
Moderate: Medical content, Gaslighting, Bullying, Grief, Lesbophobia, Medical trauma, and Pregnancy
Minor: Ableism, Sexism, and Racism