A review by betwixt_the_pages
Romeo for Real by Markus Harwood-Jones

3.0

On the surface, Romeo has it all: success on the basketball court, a group of good friends, the companionship of the beautiful Rosie. Deep down, he knows something is wrong: All he feels for Rosie is friendship, and all he feels for his friends' intolerance is guilt. Everything changes when he meets the openly gay Julian at a party and finds himself sharing a kiss with him. In spite of their obvious attraction, Romeo now feels less sure of himself than ever, and leaves without even telling Julian his name.

With Rosie's support, Romeo begins exploring his sexuality -- and ends up running into Julian again. Realizing how little he knows about other sexual orientations and gender identities, Romeo begins to see the world in a whole new light, and he and Julian begin to fall in love. But his homophobic friends and family can't accept him as gay. After a violent confrontation with one of his old friends, Romeo becomes determined to prove that his love for Julian is real and right.

Romeo for Real will give readers the courage to take pride in who they are and whom they love.

Rating: 2.5/5 Penguins
Quick Reasons: cute Romeo retelling; there was a LOT happening in a very small amount of time here; relevant, but could have been handled/written better; I had a hard time suspending my disbelief for parts of this; certain things happened a little too quickly

HUGE thanks to Markus Harwood-Jones, Lorimer Publishing, and Netgalley for sending a free egalley of this title my way! This in no way altered my review of or opinions on this read.

I hate to admit it, Penguins, but I wasn't particularly impressed with this read. As much as I love my retellings, this one fell short overall--while the subject matter was relevant, I feel like it could have been handled in much different (and, at times, in much better) ways. So...let's dive into the grit and grime, shall we?

There were a lot of problems with this book, in my humbly royal opinion. The biggest one? The way the more sensitive portions of the story were handled and written. While I understand that, realistically, there are people who go through their reckoning in violent ways at times...I also feel like there was MUCH too quick a resolution to happen, particularly in the case of two of these characters. For Rome--he got into trouble, only to be immediately "not" in trouble when things about his life came to light. He was let off the hook for some really rotten choices WAY too quickly for me to fully believe and buy into his character arc.

"You make me better at being me," said Rome, holding Julian close. "I want to do it. Let's show everyone how strong love can really be."

Much like Romeo's insta-love for Juliet (and, before her, Rosaline), there was insta-love...or maybe more like insta-lust? It was dramatic, but...there were no fireworks. There was no chemistry, in ANY of the interactions. There was a lot of self-hatred, and a lot of unjustified violence, and A LOT of mistakes. I couldn't get into the characters' heads. I couldn't see them, visualize them, understand them. Several of them flip-flopped so hard, I thought I was maybe reading about Magikarp in the midst of a Pokemon battle.

It's harsh...but I didn't enjoy this. I think that, with a little more fine-tuning and a lot of fleshing out, this could have been a much different read. As it is, the characters--and their journeys--didn't make much sense in the end. "Alas, Poor Yorick"....and onto the next one!