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3.61 AVERAGE
3.61 AVERAGE
Wow - I bought this book the first day it was available in the bookstore and I should have read it right away! I love how we see the negative side of sex - other YA books don't have the narrative that sex isn't always pretty. Hunter and Aidan's relationship and leaked texts show this and I was living for it!!! Hunter and Kaivan on the other hand shows us the not so light side of dating in the eye of the public. The book was amazing and really tackled many topics that I wasn't sure could be done correctly in a single book - 10/10 would recommend.
medium-paced
adventurous
emotional
funny
lighthearted
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:
Yes
a gay guy in a boyband faces backlash in every facet of his life as he navigates life as a queer figure.
okay so i adore abid khorram and his writing so much, i loved darius in "darius the great is not okay" and i loved hunter. khorram has a way of writing these characters where they are multi faceted and their struggles are very real. hunter was a stand out character for me in this; he is an open gay public figure, and faces as much backlash for this as you would expect, but it gets worse when his ex, aidan, releases their sexts to the public as an act of revenge. now hunter is being disparaged in the media for not being the "perfect" queer role model, and what the hell is a "perfect queer role model" anyway?? hunter entire journey throughout the book was incredibly well written, and even when he crashed out at the end of the book, i understood why, even if i was like "bitch, what are u talking about". i loved the way sex was discussed in this book, especially in the way that hunter was shamed for 1) having sex as a gay man (safe sex too btw) and 2) being a bottom. we see the way that hunter's sex life became a focus even though HE WAS A MINOR and it was really no one's business. gay people are allowed to exist, until they don't follow heteronormative society patterns and then they get torn to shreds in the media and public image. this part of the book was incredibly well done, and stood out to me.
another part i thought was done well was the racism, espcially the discussion of colorism and racism in queer spaces. our cast of characters are public figures, and those who are poc face microaggressions and straight up racism.
now to the parts i didn't like LMFAO. so- hunter is part of a boy band, and these characters are very underdeveloped. they exist only to let hunter know he is not the only one experiencing hate crimes/microaggressions and because hunter needed a boy band. there was no distinct differences in the characters to be completely honest, and i wish there wasn't because the glimpses we got were really good! but they all sort of blended together in order to teach hunter a lesson.
i didn't really like hunter's relationship with kaivan. i wasn't a fan until the last chapter, and throughout the story it felt like kaivan didn't really like hunter either. kaivan makes passive and rude remarks about hunter being in a boy band that wasn't resolved until the last chapter? while the context made sense it came off as rushed in a way and left a bad taste in my mouth. and to be completely honest, i wish their relationship didn't start so soon in the book. hunter just gets out of hsi first ever long term relaionship and his ex literally releases REVENGE PORN of him, and then he just gets with kaivan? throughout the entire book i just kept thinking that it felt like hunter wasn't ready for a relationship and i wish instead of them getting together, there was more growth and recovery from hunter BEFORE instead of DURING, which i felt twisted the relationship for me. at the end, i found myself really liking them, and they were quite cute, i just wish hunter had more recovery first.
SPEAKING OF RECOVERY: hunter's ex literally leaks their SEXTS, an INTIMATE moment of VULNERABILITY that aidan released to directly HARM and HURT hunter. right? and we spend more then half of the book seeing the repercussions of this, hunter is sexually harassed and humiliated by the media debating his sex life, aidan is fucking dick. then, we're just expected to forgive him? aidan comes back and apologizes and we hear how bad his mental health is, BUT LITERALLY HE DID THE SAME TO HUNTER?? he posted that shit on THE WORLD WIDE WEB!!! i don't care how depressed he was that was fucking horrendous and the way we were supposed to forgive him??? fuck NO
anyways-
all that being said i did really like the book. the topics of sex positivity, queer sex, queerness in the public eye, racism in the media and musics, etc, was done exceptionally well and i loved reading about. it made me think and have discussions on it with a friend which was really fun. i just have. few gripes here and there! i NEED to read more books by khorram omg.
okay so i adore abid khorram and his writing so much, i loved darius in "darius the great is not okay" and i loved hunter. khorram has a way of writing these characters where they are multi faceted and their struggles are very real. hunter was a stand out character for me in this; he is an open gay public figure, and faces as much backlash for this as you would expect, but it gets worse when his ex, aidan, releases their sexts to the public as an act of revenge. now hunter is being disparaged in the media for not being the "perfect" queer role model, and what the hell is a "perfect queer role model" anyway?? hunter entire journey throughout the book was incredibly well written, and even when he crashed out at the end of the book, i understood why, even if i was like "bitch, what are u talking about". i loved the way sex was discussed in this book, especially in the way that hunter was shamed for 1) having sex as a gay man (safe sex too btw) and 2) being a bottom. we see the way that hunter's sex life became a focus even though HE WAS A MINOR and it was really no one's business. gay people are allowed to exist, until they don't follow heteronormative society patterns and then they get torn to shreds in the media and public image. this part of the book was incredibly well done, and stood out to me.
another part i thought was done well was the racism, espcially the discussion of colorism and racism in queer spaces. our cast of characters are public figures, and those who are poc face microaggressions and straight up racism.
now to the parts i didn't like LMFAO. so- hunter is part of a boy band, and these characters are very underdeveloped. they exist only to let hunter know he is not the only one experiencing hate crimes/microaggressions and because hunter needed a boy band. there was no distinct differences in the characters to be completely honest, and i wish there wasn't because the glimpses we got were really good! but they all sort of blended together in order to teach hunter a lesson.
i didn't really like hunter's relationship with kaivan. i wasn't a fan until the last chapter, and throughout the story it felt like kaivan didn't really like hunter either. kaivan makes passive and rude remarks about hunter being in a boy band that wasn't resolved until the last chapter? while the context made sense it came off as rushed in a way and left a bad taste in my mouth. and to be completely honest, i wish their relationship didn't start so soon in the book. hunter just gets out of hsi first ever long term relaionship and his ex literally releases REVENGE PORN of him, and then he just gets with kaivan? throughout the entire book i just kept thinking that it felt like hunter wasn't ready for a relationship and i wish instead of them getting together, there was more growth and recovery from hunter BEFORE instead of DURING, which i felt twisted the relationship for me. at the end, i found myself really liking them, and they were quite cute, i just wish hunter had more recovery first.
SPEAKING OF RECOVERY: hunter's ex literally leaks their SEXTS, an INTIMATE moment of VULNERABILITY that aidan released to directly HARM and HURT hunter. right? and we spend more then half of the book seeing the repercussions of this, hunter is sexually harassed and humiliated by the media debating his sex life, aidan is fucking dick. then, we're just expected to forgive him? aidan comes back and apologizes and we hear how bad his mental health is, BUT LITERALLY HE DID THE SAME TO HUNTER?? he posted that shit on THE WORLD WIDE WEB!!! i don't care how depressed he was that was fucking horrendous and the way we were supposed to forgive him??? fuck NO
anyways-
all that being said i did really like the book. the topics of sex positivity, queer sex, queerness in the public eye, racism in the media and musics, etc, was done exceptionally well and i loved reading about. it made me think and have discussions on it with a friend which was really fun. i just have. few gripes here and there! i NEED to read more books by khorram omg.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I tried to read this book a few years ago and couldn’t get past the first chapter but I always wanted to try again eventually and honestly, I would’ve been perfectly content to not 😅 while this story had a lot of potential, there was really not much I enjoyed about how any of it was executed. I think maybe if it was in Kaivan’s pov, it would’ve been more interesting but idk. Hunter was just annoying and while I’m glad things worked out better for him in the end, I just didn’t enjoy being in his head 🤷🏻♀️ I also just didn’t feel any kind of real connection between Hunter & Kaivan so I wasn’t really rooting for them either 🤷🏻♀️
funny
lighthearted
reflective
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
hopeful
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I would say I enjoyed this read overall. I'm a sucker for a boy band setting, and I liked a lot of the observations about fame and fandom and the warmth that can come with belonging to the LGBTQ community. The plot kept me turning pages for sure. At the same time, the way the narrative handled some of its own major plot points made me want to rip my hair out.
Throughout the book there are times when Hunter has his head up his own ass (see: it not even occurring to him that his bandmates face racism), and he rightly gets called out for this by other characters. But at some point it feels like Kiss & Tell can't decide whether its protagonist is "allowed" to feel shitty over the discrimination he does face, or whether he should just put up and shut up because other people have it worse. Yes, Hunter is a white dude with all the privilege that entails...but he's also openly gay, in a culture that is still very much divided on whether that's an acceptable thing to be. Not only that, but the main plot kicks off with his ex posting their sexts all over the internet, which is obviously traumatic. Yet every other character's patience for what Hunter just went through seems remarkably short; I lost track of the number of times he tried to talk about the struggles of being LGBTQ (again, in the wake of a massively public and traumatizing event that was exacerbated due to his sexuality), only to be smacked down with something to the effect of "get over it, we deal with racists and you don't hear us complaining!" I think this was a terrible way to get your intersectionality points across, actually. (Bonus points for exactly none of his POC bandmates actually being fleshed-out characters.)
Then there's Kaivan. He starts dating Hunter right after their label suggests it, and a lot of their relationship is sweet. But throughout their chapters together the book kept planting what felt like red flags - like, Kaivan is too interested in taking selfies with fans to notice his boyfriend is about to have a panic attack! He wants to photobomb strangers' proposal pictures and shake every single person's hand! He gave like five separate interviews talking about how boy bands, and Kiss and Tell specifically, were trash - and despite his later insistence that he was just trying to play straight, he still acted surprised that the boy band guys had any talent after he was out, including while he and Hunter were dating. Frankly, he comes off looking like a dick, and I thought we might be heading for the plot twist that he only wanted to date Hunter for the publicity.
But instead the two above issues collide in the stupidest of breakup fights, wherein Kaivan accuses Hunter of only wanting to date him to prove how "woke" he is, which...is so far out of left field that it almost feels left in from an earlier draft? Except that then Hunter starts panicking inwardly about "oh no, what if I did do this shitty thing even though it was never implied once in all my 300 pages of inner monologue?!" and then Kaivan all but calls him a slut and then they break up. As they should. But because this is a romance for some reason, they still get back together in the end, even though none of the real issues in the relationship have been resolved and the only issues that were raised were fucking made up. Hunter has a revelation near the end that "maybe we're all assholes", and at that point I can't say I disagreed.
On the whole I would still recommend this book, because it was fun and had interesting things to say about a lot of topics. For every one of Kiss & Tell's strengths, though, there was an equal and opposite downside. Like, there are all these references to racism and intersectionality and how diverse the main band is, but the only character of color with any depth is Kaivan and the other boy band members get nothing. The moments of joy and safety Hunter finds with other LGBTQ people are some of the best in the book, but then you have things like Callum's existence/the disdain it inspires in our MCs because Kaivan is allowed to say whatever "to survive" but a gay teenage country singer isn't, or those fucking thinkpieces about how Hunter ~betrays his community~ by existing in a way that isn't Queer Enough (that I still suspect the reader is meant to agree with), and I just don't know. I'm not sure how I feel about the moral of a story about a traumatized gay person being that he needs to try harder and do more and also reconcile with every person who hurts him.
But hey, there are obviously conversations being sparked in this book that I haven't seen much in teen lit, so I'm sticking to that three-star rating.
Throughout the book there are times when Hunter has his head up his own ass (see: it not even occurring to him that his bandmates face racism), and he rightly gets called out for this by other characters. But at some point it feels like Kiss & Tell can't decide whether its protagonist is "allowed" to feel shitty over the discrimination he does face, or whether he should just put up and shut up because other people have it worse. Yes, Hunter is a white dude with all the privilege that entails...but he's also openly gay, in a culture that is still very much divided on whether that's an acceptable thing to be. Not only that, but the main plot kicks off with his ex posting their sexts all over the internet, which is obviously traumatic. Yet every other character's patience for what Hunter just went through seems remarkably short; I lost track of the number of times he tried to talk about the struggles of being LGBTQ (again, in the wake of a massively public and traumatizing event that was exacerbated due to his sexuality), only to be smacked down with something to the effect of "get over it, we deal with racists and you don't hear us complaining!" I think this was a terrible way to get your intersectionality points across, actually. (Bonus points for exactly none of his POC bandmates actually being fleshed-out characters.)
Then there's Kaivan. He starts dating Hunter right after their label suggests it, and a lot of their relationship is sweet. But throughout their chapters together the book kept planting what felt like red flags - like, Kaivan is too interested in taking selfies with fans to notice his boyfriend is about to have a panic attack! He wants to photobomb strangers' proposal pictures and shake every single person's hand! He gave like five separate interviews talking about how boy bands, and Kiss and Tell specifically, were trash - and despite his later insistence that he was just trying to play straight, he still acted surprised that the boy band guys had any talent after he was out, including while he and Hunter were dating. Frankly, he comes off looking like a dick, and I thought we might be heading for the plot twist that he only wanted to date Hunter for the publicity.
But instead the two above issues collide in the stupidest of breakup fights, wherein Kaivan accuses Hunter of only wanting to date him to prove how "woke" he is, which...is so far out of left field that it almost feels left in from an earlier draft? Except that then Hunter starts panicking inwardly about "oh no, what if I did do this shitty thing even though it was never implied once in all my 300 pages of inner monologue?!" and then Kaivan all but calls him a slut and then they break up. As they should. But because this is a romance for some reason, they still get back together in the end, even though none of the real issues in the relationship have been resolved and the only issues that were raised were fucking made up. Hunter has a revelation near the end that "maybe we're all assholes", and at that point I can't say I disagreed.
On the whole I would still recommend this book, because it was fun and had interesting things to say about a lot of topics. For every one of Kiss & Tell's strengths, though, there was an equal and opposite downside. Like, there are all these references to racism and intersectionality and how diverse the main band is, but the only character of color with any depth is Kaivan and the other boy band members get nothing. The moments of joy and safety Hunter finds with other LGBTQ people are some of the best in the book, but then you have things like Callum's existence/the disdain it inspires in our MCs because Kaivan is allowed to say whatever "to survive" but a gay teenage country singer isn't, or those fucking thinkpieces about how Hunter ~betrays his community~ by existing in a way that isn't Queer Enough (that I still suspect the reader is meant to agree with), and I just don't know. I'm not sure how I feel about the moral of a story about a traumatized gay person being that he needs to try harder and do more and also reconcile with every person who hurts him.
But hey, there are obviously conversations being sparked in this book that I haven't seen much in teen lit, so I'm sticking to that three-star rating.
Adib Khorram's debut novel Darius the Great is Not Okay is one of the most moving YA books I've ever read, and I was super psyched to see him writing something so completely tonally different than that duology! I really liked that this book was willing to have some hard conversations—about white privilege, how to be a "good" queer person in the eyes of society, and what activism actually means—and that it did so in a way that rarely felt preachy or like we were in an after-school special about the dangers of...being the only openly queer member of an up-and-coming boy band? Khorram isn't ever afraid to shy away from tough stuff, like Hunter's ex's toxic behavior, or the way that his own experiences with discrimination as a queer person make him blind to the prejudices some of his non-white bandmates (as well as his new love interest, Iranian-American Kaivan) are victim to, and he explores these topics in a way that feels really authentic. You get the sense that everyone in this book is just trying to do their best, and when they inevitably fail, they learn from their mistakes.
Unfortunately, something was just...missing for me. I felt like there wasn't a really strong sense of plot, and despite it ostensibly being about a boy band, I didn't have a real sense of who Hunter's bandmates were. You get a lot of Ashton, since they grew up together and are the closest out of the gang, but the other three boys feel like they're barely in it—which, given that it's the three non-white members failing to get any time on the page, honestly made it a little jarring toward the end when they point out that he hasn't made any effort to ask what they go through as non-white people in the public eye. Overall, an immensely readable book (and quick! I appreciate that hugely now that I'm in my last semester of grad school and it's finals!), but one that just lacked a certain Something for me.
Also annoyed (not really) that, given the nature of the book, I had either One Direction or 4town stuck in my head the entire time I was reading. IT MAKES NO SENSE. I never had a One Direction phase! Not even a little! 4town isn't even a real band! (They still slap tho)
Unfortunately, something was just...missing for me. I felt like there wasn't a really strong sense of plot, and despite it ostensibly being about a boy band, I didn't have a real sense of who Hunter's bandmates were. You get a lot of Ashton, since they grew up together and are the closest out of the gang, but the other three boys feel like they're barely in it—which, given that it's the three non-white members failing to get any time on the page, honestly made it a little jarring toward the end when they point out that he hasn't made any effort to ask what they go through as non-white people in the public eye. Overall, an immensely readable book (and quick! I appreciate that hugely now that I'm in my last semester of grad school and it's finals!), but one that just lacked a certain Something for me.
Also annoyed (not really) that, given the nature of the book, I had either One Direction or 4town stuck in my head the entire time I was reading. IT MAKES NO SENSE. I never had a One Direction phase! Not even a little! 4town isn't even a real band! (They still slap tho)
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
reflective
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes