Teen life is hard
enough, but for teens who are LGBTQ, it can be even harder. When do
you decide to come out? Will your friends accept you? And how do you
meet people to date? Queer is a humorous, engaging, and honest
guide that helps LGBTQ teens come out to friends and family, navigate
their social life, figure out if a crush is also queer, and challenge
bigotry and homophobia. Personal stories from the authors and
sidebars on queer history provide relatable context. This completely
revised and updated edition is a must-read for any teen who thinks
they might be queer or knows someone who is.
I would like to first thank NetGalley, Zest Books, and Lerner Publishing Group for giving me the opportunity to read this book. I received this in return for an honest review. This book is coming out on Tuesday, October 1, 2019.
This book is definitely an interesting one. Though, I am not the audience they intended. I'll grant that. I did like this book and I think that this should be available widely to teenagers. I rated it a 4/5 stars because it was good, but it wasn't perfect. There were a few times that I definitely didn't agree with what they were saying. The first one that stuck out to me was their definition of transgender. I have many transgender friends. None of them also identify as bigender/genderfluid/nonbinary. Transgenderism is going from one gender to another. Then bigender is feeling like you are both genders at the same time. You are not male or female. You are male and female. Genderfluid is shifting back and forth between multiple genders on what you happen to feel that day. Genderfluid people could feel male/masculine on Tuesday, and female/feminine on Wednesday. Nonbinary people do not feel like they are any gender (they are also the gender set most commonly using the they/them and ze/zer pronouns and other gender-neutral ones that I have forgotten at the moment.).
Now then, onto my proper review:
Being queer as an adult is a challenge, being queer as a teen is just about impossible in certain communities. This book is a guide for teenagers who are at the minimum questioning their own sexual or gender identities and want to just read up on the spectrum of those identities that is out there. Some teens don't know really what gender they are or what gender they are interested in. This book is a guide to help teens figure that out and learn something about themselves along the way.
While a lot of information in this book is sound, and I definitely agree with a good number of the helpful hints, there are a few places where things could have been different. Sections could have been expanded upon and turned into their own chapters. Example: the internet section. There is so much more to it than just what they put. People these days, even teenagers, try to coerce one another into sending nudes, looking for hook-ups, sexually explicit role plays (I participate in a few of these myself, but I'm a legal adult and I only participate with other legal adults of at least 21 years old not just 18 to protect myself).
I would have liked to see more detailed information and less artwork in some of the sections. There were places where the art didn't even make sense to me. I wasn't sure what two men in tuxedos had to do with not giving out personal information on the internet.
Even though I disagree with some of the things in the book, they were mostly due to my own upbringing. This book is actually a really good guide for teens and maybe even some adults who are questioning their gender or orientation. I would recommend that it is read with an open mind. Also teens reading this should keep in mind that information changes constantly with the definition of some words in the LGBT+ community.
Now then, onto my proper review:
Being queer as an adult is a challenge, being queer as a teen is just about impossible in certain communities. This book is a guide for teenagers who are at the minimum questioning their own sexual or gender identities and want to just read up on the spectrum of those identities that is out there. Some teens don't know really what gender they are or what gender they are interested in. This book is a guide to help teens figure that out and learn something about themselves along the way.
While a lot of information in this book is sound, and I definitely agree with a good number of the helpful hints, there are a few places where things could have been different. Sections could have been expanded upon and turned into their own chapters. Example: the internet section. There is so much more to it than just what they put. People these days, even teenagers, try to coerce one another into sending nudes, looking for hook-ups, sexually explicit role plays (I participate in a few of these myself, but I'm a legal adult and I only participate with other legal adults of at least 21 years old not just 18 to protect myself).
I would have liked to see more detailed information and less artwork in some of the sections. There were places where the art didn't even make sense to me. I wasn't sure what two men in tuxedos had to do with not giving out personal information on the internet.
Even though I disagree with some of the things in the book, they were mostly due to my own upbringing. This book is actually a really good guide for teens and maybe even some adults who are questioning their gender or orientation. I would recommend that it is read with an open mind. Also teens reading this should keep in mind that information changes constantly with the definition of some words in the LGBT+ community.
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