Scan barcode
A review by iamrainbou
The Boys in the Back Row by Mike Jung
3.0
Mix feelings about this one, I don't think the story was quite successful.
For starters, the synopsis is very misleading. The whole convention that mentions? It doesn't happen until the last 80 pages of the book. That doesn't mean is terrible, but if I have known more about this book, I would probably haven't picked it up.
The story follows two boys that are best friends while they navigate middle school and band and bullies. They're quite close and not scared of showing affection and love, so of course, bullies have a great time calling them queer and gay. For a book that promises to be about boy friendship and toxic masculinity, there's a lot, and I mean A LOT of homophobia. And sure, it's called out and challenged, but honesty, it's also exhausting to read about. Because here's the thing, they are not queer themselves so the story centers homophobia around straight boys?
Here is where I think Mike Jung wasn't successful, stories about friendship and toxic masculinity and challenging homophobia in society are so important. I agree. But I don't understand the point of a book that revolves around bullies being homophobic when the characters are not gay? It feels quite insulting, to be honest. Yes, the book tackles other themes but it's overwhelmed (or at least, I was overwhelmed) by the amount of homophobia in almost every single chapter. The whole climax of the story is a gay character being outed, a side character, and a character that I had a lot of trouble with.
This boy is one of the bullies and I hate this trope, the bully is homophobic because they're queer themselves. Having internalized homophobia doesn't excuse terrorizing others and I feel like this trope always tries to sympathize with the bully and NOT HERE FOR IT. And it was especially hard in this book because he's just a secondary character and being the Worst, while the straight boys were the ones confronting the homophobia?
As I said, I just feel super weird about the whole book and with a lot of conflicting feelings. I don't know, maybe I just need to sit down for a while and think about this story.
ARC was provided by Levine Querido in exchange for an honest review.
For starters, the synopsis is very misleading. The whole convention that mentions? It doesn't happen until the last 80 pages of the book. That doesn't mean is terrible, but if I have known more about this book, I would probably haven't picked it up.
The story follows two boys that are best friends while they navigate middle school and band and bullies. They're quite close and not scared of showing affection and love, so of course, bullies have a great time calling them queer and gay. For a book that promises to be about boy friendship and toxic masculinity, there's a lot, and I mean A LOT of homophobia. And sure, it's called out and challenged, but honesty, it's also exhausting to read about. Because here's the thing, they are not queer themselves so the story centers homophobia around straight boys?
Here is where I think Mike Jung wasn't successful, stories about friendship and toxic masculinity and challenging homophobia in society are so important. I agree. But I don't understand the point of a book that revolves around bullies being homophobic when the characters are not gay? It feels quite insulting, to be honest. Yes, the book tackles other themes but it's overwhelmed (or at least, I was overwhelmed) by the amount of homophobia in almost every single chapter. The whole climax of the story is a gay character being outed, a side character, and a character that I had a lot of trouble with.
This boy is one of the bullies and I hate this trope, the bully is homophobic because they're queer themselves. Having internalized homophobia doesn't excuse terrorizing others and I feel like this trope always tries to sympathize with the bully and NOT HERE FOR IT. And it was especially hard in this book because he's just a secondary character and being the Worst, while the straight boys were the ones confronting the homophobia?
As I said, I just feel super weird about the whole book and with a lot of conflicting feelings. I don't know, maybe I just need to sit down for a while and think about this story.
ARC was provided by Levine Querido in exchange for an honest review.