Nick Burd

The last summer before Dade goes to college is a time when everything changes. And that's not a bad thing - he wouldn't mind a change from his closeted friend with benefits and hostile, homophobic peers and a way to get away from his parents' crumbling marriage. When he meets Alex Kincaid, he finds that he can and should be willing to expect more for himself.

Nick Burd presents us with an incredibly well-written tale about Dade and the people in his life. This coming-of-age story is one that seems to capture what it means to grow up, to go from being a teenager to being an adult. There's no instant moment that it happens, but when it does, we change as people and we change how we see the world. And Dade is no exception.

Content warning: mentions of suicide… (meer)

This was an easy, fairly lightweight book to read. It covers some familiar territory, the coming of age of a gay teenager in his last year of high school. It was somewhat ordinary, with a plot twist at the end that was not completely predictable. There were moments that did not seem to work, yet these were not sufficient to derail the narrative. I'm not sure that any of the characters were all that interesting, much less convincing, but the story held my interest and for that I have to give it credit.… (meer)