"Out in the Library: Materials, Displays and Services for the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Community," which provides resources to help explain the importance of having inclusive collections and programs, and provides assistance if complaints arise, is now available:

http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/oif/iftoolkits/glbttoolkit/glbttoolkit.cfm

- Martin Garnar

English teacher turned author Kim Wallace began writing the Erik & Isabelle at Foresthill High series after more than a decade of working in the public school arena. After witnessing the disenfranchisement and discrimination against gay and lesbian youth, she felt compelled to write a four-book high school series that would embrace the lives of a typically invisible, and often misunderstood, population. Erik & Isabelle bloomed out of a desire to reach a group of young people in critical need of connection, love, and understanding. Wallace earned her B.A. in History at UC Santa Barbara, Master’s in Education at UCLA, and Educational Administration credential at Sacramento State University. Currently, she works as an alternative high school vice principal in addition to running her own publishing imprint, Foglight Press. She was a finalist for the 2006 Lambda Literary Award for Young Adult Fiction.

What motivated you to write about teens in high school?
I knew that I wanted to be a high school teacher the moment I entered high school as a ninth grader. Four years later, I started teaching at the high school I graduated from. Even though high school is painful, awkward, and difficult in a multitude of ways, I feel drawn to and compassionate towards that age range. Now, fifteen years later, I'm still working at the high school level, currently as a principal. For some reason I just "get" that stage of life and feel like my own survival can inspire kids who can't quite see the light at the end of the tunnel on their own.

Why did you self-publish?
I didn't plan to, at first. I was picked up by a publisher soon after I finished my first book in the Foresthill High series and we were under contract for a year. Then, right before getting ready to go to press, there was a dreaded several-month silence where no one would return my calls or emails. Soon after, I got my manuscript back in the mail with a letter saying that the company was going through "a transition", which essentially meant a change of ownership, and they voided my contract. I went back to the drawing board and sent out a new batch of queries and got a lot of great feedback on my book. The main issue for the publishers was that my audience was too niche and too difficult to market to in their minds-one finally admitted that they just couldn't make money off of it. I knew my audience firsthand and felt that I could find them and that they deserved to have a book series like this to connect to. Thus started my self publishing venture.

How can people purchase your books?
The best ways to order books are through www.Amazon.com or other book-oriented websites or through my own website: www.foglightpress.com.

Who has had the greatest influence on your writing?
There are so many sources of influence who fostered my growth as a writer. The writers who inspired me were Anne Lamott, who reminds me to tap into my sense of humor, Toni Morrison, who challenges my diction and prose, and Sharon Olds, the poet who speaks the truth and turns brutality into beauty. I also credit my sophomore English teacher in high school, Clare Le-Pell, who saw something more in me than I did.

Who's your favorite YA author?
I love YA authors--we are kindred spirits, a rare breed of people who adore teenagers, the messier the better. Some who I personally enjoy reading are Alex Sanchez and Julie Anne Peters. They bridge that gap between adolescence and sophistication, which is an admirable balancing act as a writer.

What are you reading now?
Currently, I'm reading a lot of non-fiction articles as the political and economic climates dominate our collective consciousness. To counter those serious topics, I tend to use Rumi like a salve.

Is there anything else you would like to add?
Evolving as a creative artist is important to me. I've just begun work on a new project called Missed Connections. It is a collection of vignettes inspired by "Missed Connections" personal ads placed in local newspapers and on Craigslist. It hinges on the fantasy we all harbor that there is someone "out there" we're destined to encounter, fall in love with, or connect with in some meaningful way. It's for and about those of us who are dreamers, hopeful lovers, and unrequited romantics. This work is stretching my writing voice(s) and I can't wait to see what it results in.

Interviewed by John Bradford, Editor
Head, Automation & Technical Services,
Villa Park Public Library
Librarian, Leather Archives & Museum

Violence Against Women in Contemporary World Religion: Roots and Cures. Edited by Daniel C. Macquire and Sa'diyya Shaikh. Cleveland: The Pilgrim Press, 2007. 248 p. Hardcover. ISBN: 9780829817676. $60.00

A companion volume to Heterosexism in Contemporary World Religion, reviewed in our Summer 2008 issue. Both of Macquire and Shaikh’s collections were prepared by the Religious Consultation on Population, Reproductive Health, and Ethics and declare the same goal: to identify elements within the world's religious traditions which will help overcome their inherent tendencies toward heterosexism and violence against women, respectively. All of these faiths originated in deeply patriarchal cultures, which are often reflected in their sacred writings and subsequent religious practices, but each also contains teachings, conceptual symbols, or interpretive traditions which renounce violence and support the full equality of women and GLBT persons.

The contributors to both volumes are a diverse set of theologians and religious scholars who write primarily from within the tradition being discussed. Attention is given to a variety of traditions: essays in the present volume address Buddhism, Hinduism, traditional Chinese teachings, and African traditional beliefs, as well as the three Abrahamic faiths.

Unfortunately, Violence Against Women is an uneven collection compared to the previous volume, which treats all faiths with sensitivity and insight. The three chapters on Christianity are rightly critical of the long history of misogyny in the Christian tradition, but disappointingly offer few suggestions on using life-affirming elements of Christian theology to counter it. Given that the central goal of the project is to show how religions "contain the cures for the misogyny they have caused and abetted," these are serious flaws.

Reviewed by Ruth Ann Jones
Special Collections Cataloger
Michigan State University Libraries

Prism Comics: Your LGBT Guide to Comics #5. Atlanta: Prism Comics, 2008. Softcover. 160p. ISBN:0975976432. $7.95

Anyone familiar with trends in YA reading, as well as literacy teaching strategies, knows that the current hot topic is Graphic Novels. Well beyond the Snoopy and Spiderman of yesteryear, these new titles offer something for readers of every ability, taste, and orientation, and they’re being published at an ever-increasing rate. Which begs the question: how do librarians decide what’s best in general, much less what’s best in service to their special populations? And how does a reader know which titles would be worth checking out or even purchasing? To address this dilemma, Prism Comics began publishing an annual guide to LGBT titles and storylines, the fifth edition of which is in current release.

A fun read in and of itself, Prism Comics: Your LGBT Guide to Comics #5 offers reviews, artist and author interviews, convention dates, excerpts, and amusing one-off extras like “Top 10 Signs You Are a Mad Scientist.” Beyond its own merits, the guide offers solid information on LGBT titles, storylines, and characters in graphic works by a variety of publishers. While libraries of more limited means or smaller LGBT patronage might want to save their money for purchasing complete titles rather than merely a review, more affluent libraries would do their LGBT patrons a great service by providing them with this excellent and entertaining resource.

Reviewed by Amanda Clay
Librarian
Lakeview Elementary School

Owensby, Jack. Deliberate Indifference: A Gay Man’s Maltreatment by the United States Department of Justice. Kernersville, NC: A-Argus Books, 2008. 293p. Paperback. ISBN: 9780977197170. $22.95

At times compelling, Deliberate Indifference author Jack Owensby’s earnest attempt to tell the story of Chris Wehner’s horrific experience within the penal system–is nonetheless flawed, if not quite fatally, by its attempt to serve as a paean to its subject.

The distinction between Jack’s voice and Chris’s voice is never quite clear. Are we really hearing Wehner’s words unfiltered? It’s very hard to say. I might have been roused to righteous indignation at the callous, unfair treatment relayed by Wehner if I had seen any corroborating evidence of the story’s truthfulness. This may seem harsh, but the book could have made its case far more effectively with the inclusion of other voices and proper documentation, i.e. footnotes and a bibliography.

At one point, Wehner states matter-of-factly, “Although I was a convicted felon, I was still a citizen of the United States. Punishment may have been earned, but abuse certainly was not.” No one could possibly argue with this sentiment. Hopefully, Detective Ammon and any others who may be responsible for illegal acts against Wehner will be held to account. Unfortunately, this repetitive work is not, I think, likely to persuade many to take up Wehner’s cause.

Deliberate Indifference is recommended for LGBT-specific collections; marginally recommended for public libraries of all sizes; and not recommended for academic libraries, except perhaps as part of a McNaughton or leisure reading collection.

Reviewed by David C. Murray
Reference Librarian
Temple University Libraries

Michaelson, Jay. Another Word for Sky: Poems. Maple Shade, NJ: Lethe Press, 2007. 104 p. Paperback. ISBN: 9781590210611. $14.95

In 1946, the artist Yves Kline divided the world between himself and two other artists. The three would concentrate their artistic energies on their assigned spaces: earth, air, and sky. Kline got the sky, the void that would long characterize his work. In this ethereal, unnamable space, Jay Michaelson begins his book, Another Word for Sky, an erudite collection of poems that juxtapose such complex subjects as time, desire, religion, sexuality, and loneliness. These themes are invoked in ways and combinations that reveal truths about the world and what it means to be human.

Michaelson explores ideas which language cannot possibly explain; perhaps that is the point. In this place of impossibility, Michaelson contemplates such things as: Purim 5756—a terrible bombing in Jerusalem; the anti-Semitism of Dante Alighieri; longing for a man in his, “holy nakedness” during a ritual bath; love and faith though the metaphorical coupling of Abraham and Isaac; and the eternal tensions of the seasons, time, and love. Throughout the book, the intangible, the unknowable are paramount to human experience.

Michaelson’s words render something far more interesting than an answer to any particular question. He inspires awe, not just for his language and mix of ideas, but also for his ability to always be “moving towards a place whose borders are not drawn,” a place or a feeling that is “not of the heavens—just a place that’s another word for sky.” Highly recommended.

Reviewed by David S. Vess
Visiting IMLS Portal Librarian
& Assistant Professor of Library Administration
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Johnson, Troy. Family Outing: What Happened When I Found Out My Mother Was Gay. New York: Arcade Publishing, 2008. 256p. Hardcover. ISBN: 978155970871. $25.00

Not to be confused with Chastity Bono’s book with the same title, Troy Johnson’s memoir, Family Outing, is about growing up the son of a lesbian mom in the 1980’s and 90’s. Johnson opens his story by recounting the difficulties his sister and he faced as the children of a lesbian, feminist mother—-he received a doll as a Christmas present instead of his Barbie-deprived sister. He then takes the reader on a tour of his troubled younger years. Johnson convincingly channels his younger self in his prose—the humor owing much to National Lampoon. A self-described juvenile delinquent susceptible to moments of rage, he traces the cause of his behavior to learning about his mother’s sexual orientation at the age of ten from one of his mother’s ex-lovers.

In college, after almost being expelled for a homophobic outburst, Johnson faces the truth about his feelings about his mother, her lesbianism, and finally accepts her. The should-be “moment” of the memoir, a conversation shortly thereafter with his mother about writing a book for kids of gays, feels forced and oddly unemotional. The book ends with the adult Johnson and his girlfriend celebrating at the San Diego pride parade.

In author Scott Douglas' advance praise, he accurately describes the book as such: “This book isn’t about growing up with a gay mother as much as it is about simply growing up.” Recommended for public libraries with significantly large LGBT collections.

Reviewed by Analisa Ornelas
Seattle Public Library

Davidson, James. The Greeks and Greek Love: A Radical Reappraisal of Homosexuality in Ancient Greece. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2007. xvi, 634 p. Hardcover. ISBN: 9780297819974. $44.77

The radical reappraisal spoken of in the subtitle of this book is James Davidson’s disagreement with Kenneth Dover’s 1978 Greek Homosexuality (Vintage Books) and with subsequent Foucaultian takes on Dover. Both Dover and those who followed him offered interpretations of homosexuality which tended to focus on anal penetration and on power relations, as well as a largely uniform description of the phenomenon in the ancient Greek world.

Davidson, drawing on a multitude of sources—myths, vase paintings, Platonic dialogues, plays, architecture, and histories—sometimes produces interpretations which are more fanciful than convincing. However, one conclusion he draws, that there existed various homosexualities in the ancient Greek cities and among Greek cultural groups (Cretan, Spartan, Theban or Boeotian, Athenian), is convincing. His ultimate position, that the one shared characteristic of all these types of homosexuality is an emphasis on same-sex, largely male, coupling is somewhat controversial.

Nonetheless, this book is a necessary item in any collection (academic or public) that holds either Dover’s earlier work or Foucault’s writings on sexuality.

Reviewed by David Woolwine
Assistant Professor of Library Services
Hofstra University
Hempstead, New York

The Butch Cook Book. Edited by Lee Lynch, Nel Ward, and Sue Hardesty. Newport, OR: TRP Cookbooks, 2008. 216 p. Paperback. ISBN: 9780979270109. $18.95

The Butch Cook Book is a compilation of recipes from the kitchens of many butch Lesbians, and covers a complete range of foods, from hors d'oeuvres to desserts. Or, to use the butch terms: beginnings to sweet talk. There are also recipes for drinks, pet foods, and food for “the morning after.”

The recipes themselves are easy to follow and include basics (Hummus) and comfort foods (Mac and Cheese), to complicated entrees and desserts, including a good selection of meat and vegetarian dishes to satisfy the most demanding butch diner.

Scattered throughout the cookbook are articles on and about butch history, along with other bits and pieces of amusing and useful information. There is a biography for each of the contributors and each chapter heading has a line drawing involving food and power tools. Some of the drawings were rather odd, so because I was unsure of what power tools have to do with cooking, I contacted one of the authors, Nel Ward, and asked why. Her succinct answer: “it’s a butch thing.” So find those power tools and dig out that blender and serve up a dinner from The Butch Cook Book.

I recommend this book for GLBT archives and public libraries, in addition to cookbook collectors within the GLBT community.

Reviewed by Norman Eriksen
Assistant Division Manager
Languages Literature and Fiction
Brooklyn Public Library

Brooks, Adrian. Flights of Angels: My Life with the Angels of Light. Vancouver, BC: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2008. 272 p. Hardcover. ISBN: 9781551522319. $27.95

San Francisco in the 1970s was a city of action: artistic, social, sexual, and political. In this atmosphere, radical art and theater flourished, giving birth to such groups as The Cockettes and the Angels of Light. Born of East Coast affluence, Adrian Brooks’ inner drive as a poet and artist soon brought him to San Francisco and into the heart of this “magical vortex.”

In telling his story, and the story of the Angels, Brooks allows readers to experience these transformative times and meet the broad spectrum of individuals whose contributions—both positive and negative—made the queer arts scene in California and America what it is today.

Brooks’ story is fascinating; the people and events with which he was involved make juicy reading for anyone interested in queer history, theatre history, or the history of the Bay Area. The only drawback is, unfortunately, Brooks himself. His arrogant, self-congratulatory tone is tempered only occasionally with false modesty (his claim to understand the sufferings of the poor because he only allowed his trust fund to pay him the equivalent of a monthly welfare check is laughable), and toward the book’s end, the writing becomes fragmented, with people and events introduced and then forgotten. Despite these flaws, Flights of Angels remains an interesting read, and though its audience may be limited, those who seek out this story will not be disappointed.

Reviewed by Amanda Clay
Library Media Specialist
Lakeview Elementary
Norman Oklahoma

Bosman, Ellen, and John P. Bradford. Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered Literature: A Genre Guide. Edited by Robert B. Ridinger. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited, 2008. Genreflecting Advisory Series. Hardcover. 422 p. ISBN: 9781591581949. $60.00

Ellen Bosman’s and John Bradford’s genre guide is an essential resource for reader's advisory and collection development for libraries needing to expand their existing collections of GLBT literature. Three initial chapters introduce GLBT RA services, and provide background that is helpful to both gay and straight library staff preparing to assist library patrons to better use this genre. Then follow 13 chapters, each covering a specific type of literature, ranging from science fiction to graphic novels to life stories. These chapters provide a definition of the literature type, describe its characteristics, provide historical overview, and explain the chapter’s organization.

The entries include bibliographic information, a brief annotation with awards received, subjects assigned to the entry, and valuable "read-alikes" for RA work. A bibliography, author / title index, and subject index conclude this outstanding contribution to Libraries Unlimited's Genreflecting Advisory Series.

Reviewed by Dave Combe
EP Foster Library
Ventura, CA

Beam, Jeffery. The Beautiful Tendons: Uncollected Queer Poems, 1969-2007. Brooklyn, NY: White Crane Books, 2008. 131p. Paperback. ISBN: 9781590210406. $14.95

This collection of poems, unpublished in book form until now, covers roughly a thirty year period, and is an excellent opportunity for readers who may not be familiar with Jeffery Beam’s poetry to become acquainted with his style.

The back cover of the book sums up this reader’s experience of the poems as “lyrical, metaphysical poetry,” a conversation between our physical world and our spiritual being. While Beam’s male lovers serve, in large part, as the subject matter for his poems, their erotic passion and the sense of solitude that comes from the loss of a lover are universal emotions to which all readers can relate.

A man of many creative talents, Jeffery Beam’s publications include nine books, numerous articles, three audio publications, and one lyrical opera. He has also served as the poetry editor of Oyster Boy Review. Beam is a library assistant to the Biology Librarian in the Botany Library on the North Carolina University–Chapel Hill campus.

While The Beautiful Tendons does contain images that some patrons might find offensive or inappropriate, it is recommended for libraries that have a GLBT or modern poetry collection.

Reviewed by TJ Lusher
Assistant Dean
Automated Library Systems
Northern Illinois University

Wilde Stories 2008: The Best of the Year’s Gay Speculative Fiction. Edited by Steve Berman. Maple Shade, NJ: Lethe Press, 2008. 239 p. Hardcover. ISBN: 9781590210772. $15.00

Wilde Stories 2008 is the first in an annual anthology series reprinting gay-themed fantasy, horror, and science fiction stories published the previous year. Steve Berman’s introduction makes his reasons for this series clear: “As the ‘interstitial’ and ‘slipstream’ literary movements gain momentum, more and more authors are interweaving their traditional gay themes-–coming out, homophobia, and self-as-other–-with a bit of the strange and weird.” Gay culture, according to Berman, as seen in glossy magazines and graphics-heavy websites, is one that only claims to welcome differences. Despite the value of the alien/monster as a metaphor for outsiders, “any guy who shows a deep-seated inter-est in dragons or rocketships is a social reject, a nerd,” someone who finds himself lingering in a different kind of closet.

Hal Duncan’s witty “The Island of the Pirate Gods” and Joshua Lewis’s “Ever So Much More Than Twenty,” a touching fantasy about time and love, are among the collection’s best. In “Lycaon,” Peter Dubé has something new to say about werewolves, desire, and memory. “The Emerald Mountain,” by Victor J. Banis and “An Apiary of White Bees,” by Lee Thomas are also not to be missed. On the strength of these five I look forward to Wilde Stories 2009.

The remaining entries include conventional ghost stories, and some less predictable tales involving time travel and magic mushrooms, extraterrestrial sex-tourists, more werewolves, and a pair of kinky thieves. Finally, a short excerpt from a novel presents a coming-of-age story with magical realist elements. Recommended for general collections with an interest in gay or imaginative literature.

Reviewed by Joyce Meggett
Division Chief for Humanities
Chicago Public Library

Rode, Michelle. Water Seekers. Round Rock, Tex: Prizm Books, 2008. Paperback. 212 p. ISBN: 9781603703581. $13.95

Michelle Rode’s Water Seekers is set 30 years after a nuclear apocalypse. Each chapter is narrated in two parts: the present day by an unnamed narrator and in a topically related account, an omniscient narrator—an “old one” named Zara—recalls life before the disaster and reveals experiences from childhood onward.

The unnamed narrator, a young loner traveling from camp to camp in the Southwest desert looking for work in exchange for food and water, has been listening to rumors of a place in the North called the Great Lakes, where water is supposedly easy to come by. He plans to check these rumors out and is convinced by Zara that traveling in a group would be safest. Ultimately, a group with varying survival skills set forth. They encounter storms, hostile camps, quicksand, and illness as they search for something no one is sure even exists.

Though the main characters in this novel are not gay or lesbian, there is minor positive/neutral lesbian content in the story. Recommended.

Reviewed by Nancy Silverrod
San Francisco Public Library

Kelly, Christopher. A Push and a Shove. New York: Alyson Books, 2007. 312 p. Paperback. ISBN: 9781593500481. $14.95

Christopher Kell’s first novel shows the destructive effects of bullying and sexual obsession. Terrence O’Connell first called Ben Reilly “gaywad” when they were in seventh grade in 1986. Ben didn’t fight back because he knew that Terrence’s name-calling was true—and because he was in love with Terrence. Terrence’s bullying continued until their junior year in high school when he followed Ben home one day. Ben knows he will always remember Terrence saying, “Don’t fall.”

Ten years later, a violent incident at the Staten Island high school where Ben teaches revives his bad memories. Ben vows to locate Terrence and get revenge—by seducing him. Finding that Terrence is a successful magazine writer in New York, Ben contacts him. Can “old enemies” become “new friends”?

Nobody knows a bully as well as his victim. And Ben is relentless in his pursuit of Terrence. Kelly drenches the cat-and-mouse scenes between the two young men with sexual tension and clever dialogue. Ben thinks he knows what he wants; Terrence doesn’t know who he is. When they go mountain biking in Vail, push finally comes to shove. They both find that getting revenge can really be a bitch.

A Push and a Shove is a swift-moving, entertaining, yet disturbing novel. Winner of the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Debut Fiction, this novel is highly recommended for gay fiction collections.

Reviewed by W. Stephen Breedlove
Reference Librarian/Interlibrary Loan Coordinator
La Salle University Library

DeSimone, Lewis. Chemistry. Maple Shade, NJ: Lethe Press, 2008. 304 p. Paperback. ISBN: 9781590211571. $19.95

Relationship dynamics always seem to follow a somewhat typical pattern in the beginning: boy meets boy, they date, and they start to get more serious. It is with this last phase that this story gets interesting. Neal meets Zach, and everything is great, until it is discovered that Zach's lethargy and indifference is caused by a chemical imbalance. Neal sticks by Zach's side through the various ups and downs, but is forced to examine his soul for answers that he may not be prepared to admit.

Chemistry is very coherent picture of having to deal with a loved one who is suffering a mental illness, from diagnosis through treatment. The book easily flows as you learn about both of the lovers' pasts and how they have come to breaking points within the relationship. Neal is more the intellectual, who has had very typical relationships. Zach's past has left him at a point where he can no longer commit to the confinements of a relationship for any length of time. Neal comes to realize that Zach is consuming his time and energy when his friend Martin forces him to reflect on what is keeping him tied to Zack. Martin is a true friend to Neal, never judging him or pointing blame.

In the spectrum of gay fiction, Chemistry is an adult version of Stephen Chbosky's The Perks of Being a Wallflower. Suitable for any library's adult collection.

Reviewed by
Johnnie N. Gray
Interlibrary Loan Librarian
Paul and Rosemary Trible Library
Christopher Newport University

Buchanan, James. The Good Thief. Albion, NY: MLR Press, 2008. 229p. Paperback. ISBN: 9781934531440. $14.99

James Buchanan’s The Good Thief is a work of fiction that combines several genres. Nate and Caesar meet by chance and kindle a spark that wouldn’t have ignited had they known anything about each other beforehand: Nate is a cop with the LAPD and Caesar makes a living by breaking into houses.

As in much romantic fiction, opposites attract, but fight the attraction. As in erotic romance, they fall into bed pretty quickly. There is sexually explicit lovemaking by page ten, and the reader is treated to equally graphic encounters with regularity.

Another genre element added to the mix is that of the crime novel. In what starts out as a routine robbery, Caesar discovers evidence of a crime far more monstrous than his own. He finds himself with no other choice but to reluctantly turn to Nate, resulting in a case that pits the both of them against the power structure of the LAPD (and throws them together for a lot more erotic action).

Due to Buchanan’s devoted following, The Good Thief is recommended for larger fiction collections that don’t shy away from erotica.

Reviewed by
Michael Colby
Shields Library,
University of California, Davis

Wallace, Kim. Erik & Isabelle: Freshman Year at Foresthill High. Sacramento, California: Foglight, 2004. 225 p. ISBN: 0975584804. Paperback. $12.00.

Wallace, Kim. Erik & Isabelle: Sophomore Year at Foresthill High. Sacramento, California: Foglight, 2005. 224 p. ISBN: 0975584812. Paperback. $12.00.

Wallace, Kim. Erik & Isabelle: Junior Year at Foresthill High. Sacramento, California: Foglight, 2006. 227 p. ISBN: 0975584820. Paperback. $12.00.

Wallace, Kim. Erik & Isabelle: Senior Year at Foresthill High. Sacramento, California: Foglight, 2007. 220 p. ISBN: 0975584835. Paperback. $12.00.

Meet Erik, the ninth grader who lives under the command of his military dad, starts the day with pushups, and shhhhhhhh—he happens to be gay. Meet Isabelle, a rightbrained freshman who marches to her own drummer, has a mind of her own, and is the only out lesbian at Foresthill High. Erik and Isabelle are best friends.

Freshman Year: “Faggot,” Erik hears as he walks down the hallways of Foresthill High, but the word is echoing within his mind from the many times he has heard it before. Isabelle breaks the spell when she calls his name and their story begins in a narrative that bounces back and forth between Isabelle’s and Erik’s lives. Isabelle uncharacteristically falls in love with Mandy, a cheerleader, and discovers that sometimes preconceived notions aren’t true. Erik also meets another gay boy, Jeremy, first on the internet and then in person during a track meet.

Sophomore Year: As the school year begins, Isabelle encourages her friends to join her in finding a way to “impact our sophomore year in some fabulous way.” Erik decides to create a 10K race, and donate the money they’ll raise to charity. Erik and Isabelle search for and find love, but happy endings can seem unlikely in a society that often makes it impossible to be openly gay. Erik goes to San Francisco for Thanksgiving vacation and ends up spending time with his gay cousin, who shows him another lifestyle. Isabelle decides to impact their sophomore year by creating a public service announcement about acceptance and diversity, which starts a dialog among her peers.

Junior Year: Eleventh grade is no less trouble-free for Erik and Isabelle than previous years. They stumble in their romances and continue to endure homophobia from their classmates and peers. But both friends confront each challenge with bravery and maturity. The end of Junior year closes in triumph, with a promise of even more excitement for Senior year.

Senior Year: Erik spends the year studying abroad in Germany, and meets someone who changes his life. Isabelle and her girlfriend want to run for Prom Queens, and must fight against the religious right to do so. By the end of senior year, both Erik and Isabelle have found a path for their future.

If stories provide avenues for people to see themselves in literature, then these books do a great job as they deal with teen issues, spirituality, bullying, suicide, coming out, and more. The first two books offer a litany of situations and struggles faced by many gay youth. The third and fourth books contain stronger plots, while offering hope for gay kids. Wallace has created believable characters that mature from uncertain ninth graders—complete with all their inherent drama—into settled young adults. Occasionally the narrative becomes confusing as it switches between Isabelle’s and Erik’s lives. Although there are sexual experiences in these stories, the sex isn’t graphic. I am looking forward to see what Wallace comes out with next. Recommended for high school and YA collections.

Reviewed by Sharon Flesher-Duffy
Library Media Specialist
Nashua High South (NH)