Reviews with content warning for Outing - I Wish You All the Best

At the end of I Wish You All the Best I was left wanting more. More of Ben, more of Nathan, more of the dynamic between everyone because I absolutely adored this book. That beginning left me feeling so many things - anger, connection, frustration, hurt, jarred. And throughout the book I felt like I was being swept away with so many emotions and following along with Ben and their feelings.

What I think this book does really well at is showing the other side of reality and coming out. We are starting to really see an uptick in LGBTQIAP+ literature (which I am very grateful for). However, many of the books out there portray a lot positive coming-outs, which we need to feel hopeful, but at the same time we also need the ones where there isn't a positive coming out, like in the case of Benji coming out to their parents and being kicked-out.

I am not saying we shouldn't have all the positive examples of coming-out but for some of us coming-out was not a positive experience and we are left wondering, hoping will it get better? How can we move on from this? Can we still be accepted? Benji feels all of this and more, struggling through anxiety and depression and fear of coming out ever again. I connected with them on such a large scale.

My only critique would be that I wanted more, I wanted more of the characters, of the ending plot, of Nathan and Benji. More of Benji growing and gaining confidence. However, it seems like there is a Novella that is available to us so definitely picking it up :).

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emotional hopeful 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

4.25

Ben De Backer's story is necessary and important. It is also emotional and beautiful.

In this book important topics

like identity, sexuality, family, therapy, anxiety and how to recover from a terrible event

are addressed respectfully and in a way everyone can understand them. It is about

what it means to be nonbinary, people being different than expected and different types of love (among other things)

.
I'm not nonbinary so it's not my place to say something about the quality of Ben's representation. The intentional imperfect portrait of their support system seems realistic though. Hannah, Thomas and Nathan are trying their best but also make mistakes

with pronouns and other gendered words

. It is one of the possible situations that could happen in real life.

Deaver calls attention to things that make Ben uncomfortable

like gendered clothing, gendered toiletries, coming out

, which shouldn't be an issue in modern society but they still are. Thus, the book invites reflection and discussion.

Overall a cute and meaningful story, that isn't romance heavy but has a lot to do with love.

Content Warnings