Teen Voices – Page 2

GayYA Recommends: You Know Me Well by David Levithan & Nina Lacour

By Vee|2020-03-28T13:40:49-05:00June 5th, 2016|Categories: Archive, Blogathon 2016, Book Club, Book Review, New Releases, Readers on Reading, Teen Voices|Tags: gay, lesbian, Representation|

Who knows you well? Your best friend? Your boyfriend or girlfriend? A stranger you meet on a crazy night? No one, really? Mark and Kate have sat next to each other for an entire year, but have never spoken. For whatever reason, their paths outside of class have never crossed. That is until Kate spots Mark miles away from home, out in the city for a wild, unexpected night. Kate is lost, having just run away from a chance to finally meet the girl she has been in love with from afar. Mark, meanwhile, is in love with [...]

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Friendships Are Hard.

By Nadia|2020-03-28T13:41:39-05:00May 27th, 2015|Categories: Archive, Guest Blogs, Teen Voices|Tags: gay, LGBTQIA, Queer Guys|

by John Hansen By most standards, I've won the queer lottery. I live in one of the first U.S. states to have legalized gay marriage; I have parents who went through only a minimal learning curve when I came out to them; I attend a high school that not only has a gay-straight alliance, but whose gay-straight alliance is active enough that the school newspaper often reports on its activities. I'm lucky. I know that. And yet, here I am: seventeen years old, proudly queer, out to everyone I know online—but I'm still beyond terrified to tell anyone [...]

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Tumblr Teens: BookMad for Diversity

By Vee|2020-03-28T13:41:40-05:00May 20th, 2015|Categories: Archive, Guest Blogs, Readers on Reading, Teen Voices|

by Manda/BookMad “People talk about coming out as though it’s this big one-time event. But really, most people have to come out over and over to basically every new person they meet. I’m only eighteen and it already exhausts me.” – Everything Leads to You by Nina Lacour This ongoing call for diverse characters—of all races, of all genders, of all sexual/romantic orientations, anything you can name under the sun—isn’t so widespread because readers are hungry for new and interesting characters to paint the ever-changing, complex fictional worlds they’ve built inside their heads. It runs much, much deeper [...]

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Review: Remember Me by Melanie Batchelor

By Vee|2020-03-28T13:42:08-05:00January 23rd, 2015|Categories: Archive, Book Review, Teen Voices|Tags: Poetry, Queer Girls|

Melanie Batchelor was fourteen years old when she wrote the subject of this month’s review, Remember Me. Had I not known that, I would’ve filled this review with a thousand praises for her nuanced, accurate characterizations and deceptively simple poems that create a gripping, compelling read. Remember Me by Melanie Batchelor (Bold Strokes Books, 2014) Since I am aware of the fact that Batchelor is, in fact, deeply precocious, and possibly one of the most promising young writers of this generation, I will instead fill this review with a thousand praises for her nuanced, accurate characterizations [...]

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Review: Stranger by Rachel Manija Brown and Sherwood Smith

By Vee|2020-03-28T13:42:18-05:00January 13th, 2015|Categories: Archive, Book Review, Teen Voices|Tags: Aromantic, asexual, Black, gay, Latin@, PoC, Polyamory, Queer Girls, Queer Guys, Trauma|

Stranger (Viking Juveline, 2014) Many generations ago, a mysterious cataclysm struck the world. Governments collapsed and people scattered, to rebuild where they could. A mutation, "the Change,” arose, granting some people unique powers. Though the area once called Los Angeles retains its cultural diversity, its technological marvels have faded into legend. "Las Anclas" now resembles a Wild West frontier town… where the Sheriff possesses superhuman strength, the doctor can warp time to heal his patients, and the distant ruins of an ancient city bristle with deadly crystalline trees that take their jewel-like colors from the clothes of [...]

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Sneaky Stand-Up Stands Up to Homophobia

By Karina|2020-03-28T13:42:20-05:00December 26th, 2014|Categories: Archive, Teen Voices|

I don’t care if you dislike memoirs. I don’t care if you aren’t a fan of hip hop, stand up comedy, deaf people, or Jews (Actually, I do care about those last two, a lot actually). But you should be reading Kasher In The Rye: The True Tale of a White Boy from Oakland Who Became a Drug Addict, Criminal, Mental Patient, and Then Turned 16. Yeah, interested now, right? Kasher In The Rye is one of my favorite books. Ever. It’s not even just my favorite memoir, it is in my top ten favorite books. [...]

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On Queer Characters of Color

By Shelly|2020-03-28T13:42:20-05:00December 17th, 2014|Categories: Archive, Guest Blogs, Teen Voices|Tags: Black, Intersectionality, PoC, Representation|

Black Lives Matter Series: Day 3 – Previous Posts: Black Lives Matter, But Where Are We? - I Was Made To Believe There Was Something Wrong With Me – Introduction to Black Lives Matter Series by Aleah Things have grown and changed drastically in the literary world over the years, leading authors to write characters with more racial and sexual freedom. As a straight African-American young woman in support of Gay Rights, I love to see YA novels featuring intertwined sexual and racial diversity. Sadly, while the publication of LGBTQ books is constantly on the rise, those featuring teens of color are few. (When [...]

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Interview With Laura Lam

By Vee|2020-03-28T13:42:24-05:00November 15th, 2014|Categories: Archive, Author Interview, Book Club, Teen Voices|Tags: Fantasy, Intersex, Non Binary, Speculative, steampunk, Trans|

Sooo only like a month late, here is our interview with Laura Lam, author of our October and November Book Club books, Pantomime and Shadowplay! We had a lot of fun with this one, since Kathleen and I were also joined by Sarah and Laya, two of the awesome people behind lauralamfans.tumblr.com! Our transcript for it should be up soon. In the meantime, we're right in the middle of our Shadowplay book club! So grab a copy, join us on #GayYA Book Club on Tumblr, and let's discuss this wonderful book! (also check out the same tag on [...]

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Welcome to the Mainstream

By Vee|2020-03-28T13:42:24-05:00November 14th, 2014|Categories: Archive, Teen Voices|Tags: gay, Non Binary, Other Media, Representation, Trans|

by Karina Rose Twenty three million worldwide downloads. Hundreds of sold out shows. One hovering glow cloud that watches us all as we point and scream at it in praise. Welcome to Night Vale. It’s hard to even find a place to begin when talking about the cult hit podcast Welcome To Night Vale, as even from the beginning its listeners have been shocked, terrified, and confused, but above all else in love instantly. I can’t even describe Night Vale, and I talk about it literally every day. The only way I could imagine it would make sense [...]

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Review: Pantomime by Laura Lam

By Vee|2020-03-28T13:42:27-05:00October 25th, 2014|Categories: Archive, Book Club, Book Review, Teen Voices|Tags: Fantasy, Intersex, Non Binary, Speculative|

by Georgie Penney Compared to my usual reading choices, this was the furthest out of my comfort zone that I’ve read in a long time, and I’m so glad that I decided to give it a go. Pantomime starts as the tale of two apparently unlinked young people: the young would-be trapeze artist Micah Grey, and the noblewoman who calls herself Gene who’s about to be married off, should her parents get their way. These boy-girl dual storylines are increasingly common in YA so I assumed something along the lines of a love story, albeit an unusual one. [...]

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