Reviews with content warning for Hate crime - Stay Gold. No dejes de ser tú mismo

Reviews tagging 'Hate crime'

Stay Gold. No dejes de ser tú mismo by Tobly McSmith

88 reviews

journey2's review against another edition

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

Sometimes I need to take my own advice. If you are not loving a book...it's okay to quit it. And you probably should.
But I wanted to see how it ended.

~☆~ minor spoilers~☆~

Stay Gold was not a good read for me. I found this book frustrating. The characters annoyed me and everyone seemed extremely superficial.

Pony is relentless about the "friend zone" thing with Georgia. She continues to say no to his advances and he continues to pursue. Yes, she likes him, but she has clearly said no and he will not give up and keeps asking for more; including love bombing her with a grand gesture, until he can eventually win her over.

Our main love interest, Georgia, is so obsessed with her image and social standing right til nearly the end and her change of heart is supposed to be endearing, but by the time we got there I was just so tired of how fake she was.

I know that in high school everybody's figuring out who they are and who they want to be, but absolutely every character was so fake and two dimensional. In the end, superficial apologies and excuses like "it's just locker room talk" etc seem to 'fix' every off-colour comment or remark. Pony's dad was absolutely horrible to him throughout the entire book and his mom was kind of just complacent and didn't fight for him. A couple sentences at the very end of the book are supposed to redeem him but they just felt forced. Even though lots of things ended up being happy or at least happier, I found this book extremely problematic, frustrating and annoying and I do not recommend it.

I'm curious as to what the purpose of the storyline about Pony's job served. It didn't really go anywhere except to allow Pony to be nosy and intrusive into somebody else's business and then he got to have a warm fuzzy feeling afterwards. On that note, Pony continued to stick his nose into business that is not his own and it was very annoying. There was a time when Pony and Georgia stuck their noses into something so personal that I actually took time away from the book because I was exasperated. He was rewarded for it eventually, but it was annoying to read.

This book was 100% not for me and was just completely filled with red flags.
I could go on, but I won't!

Also it's list of trigger warnings is a mile long

Content Warnings

beastbark's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful reflective sad 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

stailysh1's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted relaxing 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

4.0

I think this book is great for what it is. It reads like it was the author's high school fantasy, but in the case of this book, I believe that's excusable because this book could really help a lot of people who need it. It shows the mentality behind being both in and out of the closet and focuses on visibility. The ending kind of pushes being out and visible, which I find challenging because that is not safe or desired by everyone who is part of the LGBT+ community, especially transgender individuals. The main characters are generally lovable and funny, and work through their flaws and grow together. All in all, it's an enjoyable and (mostly) light read that should be taken for what it is: a YA LGBT+ novel with a happy ending.
**Please read the content warnings before diving into this book.**

Content Warnings

sage_alexandra's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

Content Warnings

elskabee's review against another edition

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funny 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

3.5

It's hard to say much about this book because it's painfully generic. Like almost every teen romcom trope feels like it's here except one of the main characters is trans. Buuuut being really stereotypical doesn't make it bad, just not a standout. I laughed at a decent amount of the jokes and the characters are complex and I was rooting for their relationship.

I'd say please check for trigger warnings especially to do with transphobia and suicidal ideation. This book has a happy ending and for most of it a fairly light tone but it's not exactly cosy. It is about queer youth in Texas after all.

Content Warnings

mxbluet18's review against another edition

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emotional inspiring lighthearted sad 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? No

5.0

Trigger warnings for Stay Gold include: transphobia, misgendering, deadnaming, homophobia and suicidal ideation.
☆
☆
🔷“Pony, you are not alone. All these people love and support you without even meeting you. This hard time will pass. You just be strong.”🔷
•
This book is everything I could want in a romance book. It's fairly light-hearted for the most part, but still discusses some more sensitive topics with due care.
~
It had trans representation, in multiple forms, both from the perspective of out and proud trans people, and stealth trans people. I also like that the romance was present but not exactly the full focus (which is how I prefer my YA romance books to be).
~
It might sound stupid, but even in fiction, having a trans or non-binary character's deadname brought up feels gross and wrong. That's one piece of information I'd never once even think of wanting to know about any trans person, nor would I ever use it for them (unless asked) even if I didn't like them.
~
🔷“Well, now you have a son named Pony, and if you don’t accept that, you will lose him. Maybe we all will.”🔷
•
I think this is an important note to end on, even if it's somewhat of a delicate and hard topic to talk about. Accepting trans people, and using the name and pronouns they ask is literally suicide prevention. The statistics of trans youth who either make an attempt on their life, or sadly end their life, are far too high. But making small changes to the words used to talk about and to those trans people might just save a life.

Content Warnings