Reviews with content warning for Biphobia - Autoboyography

Reviews tagging 'Biphobia'

Autoboyography by Christina Lauren

54 reviews

cutepatzie's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous challenging emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing 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: Yes

Love the characters, love the story, and love plot. I never thought that book about Mormons, gay love, and writing a book will be good... But it is. It's cute, funny, and sometimes sad. It heart breaking that even now people can be themself fully without fear that family, friends or even their one religion will not abandon them. I love this book and wish that have maybe a small special.

Content Warnings

iamsammie27's review against another edition

3.0

emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Content Warnings

blupies's review against another edition

4.0

challenging emotional hopeful medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I really enjoyed this book but I feel like a version of this story being told from Sebastian’s perspective would have been more impactful, Tanner as a protagonist got under my skin sometimes. However I do understand that Tanner’s perspective is more lighthearted than what Sebastian’s would have been and that this makes his perspective more palatable to a wider group of people.

Content Warnings

lucnmn's review against another edition

2.0

emotional lighthearted reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I've been meaning to read this one for a while and to be honest, I am pretty disappointed although my 14/15 year old self would've probably enjoyed "Autoboyography" way more. The main character was not that interesting and likeable to me and I didn't think that he and his love interest Sebastian had real chemistry. It was very much insta-love and then too many obstacles for my liking. Obviously I get why it was difficult for them to get together and the parts about religion were somewhat interesting but I felt like many things were just dragged endlessly in order to fill pages. Did I hate this book? No. But it also wasn't anything profoundly good and not even that entertaining. Also, I hated how they developed his friendship with his best friend Autumn because it very much fitted all the stereotypes we hear about bisexual people all the time. And how dumb can you actually be to write a book in a seminar about you and your crush by using your actual names? Wasn't the main character supposed to be smart? And I quickly also want to stress that the book was written by two straight authors and I feel like one could lowkey tell which is why I normally tend to rather read queer authors. Anyways, wouldn't really recommend this book but it wasn't terrible either.

Content Warnings

rosie_rb13's review against another edition

4.0

emotional funny hopeful slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Content Warnings

pjv's review against another edition

4.0

challenging emotional medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Content Warnings

lizziealex's review against another edition

2.5

hopeful lighthearted sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Sebastian and Tanner both deserve better. I lost the plot several times, and I’m not sure I picked it back up.

Tanner and Autumn hooking up was not great

Content Warnings

elliizzzabeth's review against another edition

4.0

emotional funny hopeful reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

Very interesting read. It was good but not overwhelmingly amazing. If you get a lot of second hand embarrassment then you probably won't like the first half. It is a lot of Tanner writing about how hot he thinks Sebastian is, and then a presumed straight and homophobic Sebastian reading it. How Tanner doesn't curl up and die every time this happens is beyond me. Also I can't tell if its because the authors are romance writers or because the protagonist is a teenage boy but this kid is Horny. Every two sentences he's fantasising about about getting Sebastian's kit off. Which again brings me to ask: how is he not more embarrassed Sebastian reads this stuff? I was glad the book moved to the romance quickly without dragging out a big 'will they won't they' and that there wasn't some awful outing scene (at least not on screen).
The penultimate chapter is a strange shift from first person to third person. The audiobook version I listened to had an interview section at the end and the authors said this was a deliberate switch from Tanner's book draft to 'real life' but it was still jarring. Honestly when I read it I thought it was the other way around and we were now reading Tanner's idealised ending to the book. It was an odd choice for sure, especially as it goes back to first person for the epilogue which doesn't fit with the 'you were reading his manuscript' view. I wish it had all stayed in first person and it had been left open whether this was Tanner's draft or not.
Overall not groundbreaking in terms of writing but it was a good exploration of Mormonism and discovering your sexuality within the church. Especially topical with all the shit that BYU is pulling with their honor code at the moment.

Content Warnings