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A review by citronella_seance
Date Me, Bryson Keller by Kevin van Whye
4.0
**Disclaimer** This turns into something a little more in-depth than a normal review because I have a lot of thoughts on the nature of LGBTQ+ romance for teens and I wanted to take this opportunity to talk about it.
Kai Sheridan is your normal teenager, he likes to write, loves his family, and has a small but super close group of friends that he knows he can trust with anything. Except for…the fact that he’s gay. Kai has known for a while that he’s gay but he’s never told anyone about it. He’s pretty sure his friends would accept him, but he’s a little less sure about his family. Either way, he hesitates coming out because he doesn’t want to be known as “Kai Sheridan…the gay one.”
He’s hid it pretty well, until he gets swept up in a school-wide dare and ends up asking out one of the most popular students, Bryson Keller. Bryson hasn’t really dated throughout high school under the excuse that high school relationships are stupid, that they’ll never make it through college. They’re just a waste of time. Despite that, though, Bryson is pretty confident that if he WANTED to, he could have a new date every week. Hence where the dare comes in. For a good chunk of senior year, Bryson has to say yes to the first person who asks him out at the beginning of each week and dump them at the end of the week. They aren’t “real” relationships, it’s just a game.
Until the week that Kai asks Bryson out on a rather helpful burst of confidence. Of course, nothing was ever said in the dare rules that it HAD to be a girl, just that it had to be the first person to ask him out. So, Bryson and Kai start dating.
I love fake dating troupes, they’re typically pretty cheesy but my little heart loves them anyway. This one did not disappoint. Bryson and Kai keep their pretend relationship a secret but as they spend time together so Bryson can fulfill the dare, they start to fall for each other. Hard.
Throughout the novel there are some rough parts, they get caught by one of Brysons friends who doesn’t accept him potentially being gay. Kai’s mom finds out and has a less than accepting initial response. But, in the end, everything works out and Kai and Bryson live happily ever after, so to speak.
When I finished the novel, I was conflicted. I felt like some parts were TOO easy, that everything fit together a little too well. But I quickly realized there’s absolutely no reason they shouldn’t. We live in a world full of heteronormative fairy tales. No one questions if it was “too easy” for Cinderella and The Prince to end up together. No one questions if the stars aligned just a little too perfectly for the ultimate jock boy to fall in love with the bookish girl. There are heaps upon heaps of straight stories where, after a little bit of conflict, everything just falls into place and no one really questions it.
Why, then, should an LGBTQ+ romance be any different? Why do we have this pre-conceived notion that LGBTQ+ youth books need to highlight a central struggle that never ends or that the characters need to always be sad or that more “work” needs to be put into the story for those characters to get their happy ending? I think it’s become we have buried a bias so deep inside of ourselves, as a society, that says if you’re different you have to be upset about it. But really, there’s nothing to be upset about. Sometimes two young men can fall in love over the course of a week and everything turns out okay, because why not, our society is FULL to the brim of the exact same story told from the perspective of straight people.
I loved this book and everything it stands for. The only reason I gave it four stars instead of five was because I felt like sometimes the dialogue was a little bit unrealistic for real life teenagers, but I absolutely adored Kai and Bryson. They deserve happiness and they deserve to have it come as easily as it does for every other straight couple that has ever been written.
Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House for providing me with a free eBook of Date Me, Bryson Keller, for the purpose of this review.
Date Me, Bryson Keller is out Tuesday, May 19.
Kai Sheridan is your normal teenager, he likes to write, loves his family, and has a small but super close group of friends that he knows he can trust with anything. Except for…the fact that he’s gay. Kai has known for a while that he’s gay but he’s never told anyone about it. He’s pretty sure his friends would accept him, but he’s a little less sure about his family. Either way, he hesitates coming out because he doesn’t want to be known as “Kai Sheridan…the gay one.”
He’s hid it pretty well, until he gets swept up in a school-wide dare and ends up asking out one of the most popular students, Bryson Keller. Bryson hasn’t really dated throughout high school under the excuse that high school relationships are stupid, that they’ll never make it through college. They’re just a waste of time. Despite that, though, Bryson is pretty confident that if he WANTED to, he could have a new date every week. Hence where the dare comes in. For a good chunk of senior year, Bryson has to say yes to the first person who asks him out at the beginning of each week and dump them at the end of the week. They aren’t “real” relationships, it’s just a game.
Until the week that Kai asks Bryson out on a rather helpful burst of confidence. Of course, nothing was ever said in the dare rules that it HAD to be a girl, just that it had to be the first person to ask him out. So, Bryson and Kai start dating.
I love fake dating troupes, they’re typically pretty cheesy but my little heart loves them anyway. This one did not disappoint. Bryson and Kai keep their pretend relationship a secret but as they spend time together so Bryson can fulfill the dare, they start to fall for each other. Hard.
Throughout the novel there are some rough parts, they get caught by one of Brysons friends who doesn’t accept him potentially being gay. Kai’s mom finds out and has a less than accepting initial response. But, in the end, everything works out and Kai and Bryson live happily ever after, so to speak.
When I finished the novel, I was conflicted. I felt like some parts were TOO easy, that everything fit together a little too well. But I quickly realized there’s absolutely no reason they shouldn’t. We live in a world full of heteronormative fairy tales. No one questions if it was “too easy” for Cinderella and The Prince to end up together. No one questions if the stars aligned just a little too perfectly for the ultimate jock boy to fall in love with the bookish girl. There are heaps upon heaps of straight stories where, after a little bit of conflict, everything just falls into place and no one really questions it.
Why, then, should an LGBTQ+ romance be any different? Why do we have this pre-conceived notion that LGBTQ+ youth books need to highlight a central struggle that never ends or that the characters need to always be sad or that more “work” needs to be put into the story for those characters to get their happy ending? I think it’s become we have buried a bias so deep inside of ourselves, as a society, that says if you’re different you have to be upset about it. But really, there’s nothing to be upset about. Sometimes two young men can fall in love over the course of a week and everything turns out okay, because why not, our society is FULL to the brim of the exact same story told from the perspective of straight people.
I loved this book and everything it stands for. The only reason I gave it four stars instead of five was because I felt like sometimes the dialogue was a little bit unrealistic for real life teenagers, but I absolutely adored Kai and Bryson. They deserve happiness and they deserve to have it come as easily as it does for every other straight couple that has ever been written.
Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House for providing me with a free eBook of Date Me, Bryson Keller, for the purpose of this review.
Date Me, Bryson Keller is out Tuesday, May 19.