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cyphomandraTwo people with the same name tell alternating chapters of an intersecting story; both male (and white), one straight and determined not to care (but doing so despite himself), one gay (and closeted) and hating himself.
I’d hoped I’d like this more than I did – yes, it’s witty and smart, and it has up-to-date references to indie music and social media, and there are two moments (one per Will) I really liked, but then it is also all present tense, and the emo Will has lost all his capital letters. More importantly, Tiny Cooper – fabulous gay friend of the straight Will and eventual boyfriend of the gay one – is a great character, but one who has weird effects on the narrative. He drives a lot of it (he is, obviously, the Fairy Godmother of the book) and takes over numerous scenes, but all his direction is about the Wills, not himself, and in many ways he’s oddly static. And he’s responsible for the biggest problem I have, which is the musical he produces, which is somehow about Will (straight) while being about himself, and which just sounds embarrassingly dire in every tiny detail (okay, except the ex-boyfriends chorus), as well as being responsible for an ending in which suddenly everything is apparently about Tiny, who is suddenly being hooked up with a nonWill character.
However. It’s still enjoyable, it has at least two gay characters, no car crashes, and two sensible female characters (Jane, and no-caps Will’s mother – I am really not sure about Maura, whom I dislike while feeling she is shortchanged by Will quite considerably), and, as I said, one moment per Will that really worked (depressed Will’s rant about deserving things, and conventional Will’s sudden discovery that his clothes are really really wrinkled) and I think there are plenty of people out there who will love it. For the others, I am also sticking in a link to another experimental format high school same sex male romance story with references to Neutral Milk Hotel that I liked in a less ambivalent fashion, best summarised as “sunny bi-curious jock meets cranky indie kid” with bonus capslock declarations of love and Bon Jovi soundtrack (This Year’s Prom King, by Shukyou, here, and no, it’s not fanfiction).
I’d hoped I’d like this more than I did – yes, it’s witty and smart, and it has up-to-date references to indie music and social media, and there are two moments (one per Will) I really liked, but then it is also all present tense, and the emo Will has lost all his capital letters. More importantly, Tiny Cooper – fabulous gay friend of the straight Will and eventual boyfriend of the gay one – is a great character, but one who has weird effects on the narrative. He drives a lot of it (he is, obviously, the Fairy Godmother of the book) and takes over numerous scenes, but all his direction is about the Wills, not himself, and in many ways he’s oddly static. And he’s responsible for the biggest problem I have, which is the musical he produces, which is somehow about Will (straight) while being about himself, and which just sounds embarrassingly dire in every tiny detail (okay, except the ex-boyfriends chorus), as well as being responsible for an ending in which suddenly everything is apparently about Tiny, who is suddenly being hooked up with a nonWill character.
However. It’s still enjoyable, it has at least two gay characters, no car crashes, and two sensible female characters (Jane, and no-caps Will’s mother – I am really not sure about Maura, whom I dislike while feeling she is shortchanged by Will quite considerably), and, as I said, one moment per Will that really worked (depressed Will’s rant about deserving things, and conventional Will’s sudden discovery that his clothes are really really wrinkled) and I think there are plenty of people out there who will love it. For the others, I am also sticking in a link to another experimental format high school same sex male romance story with references to Neutral Milk Hotel that I liked in a less ambivalent fashion, best summarised as “sunny bi-curious jock meets cranky indie kid” with bonus capslock declarations of love and Bon Jovi soundtrack (This Year’s Prom King, by Shukyou, here, and no, it’s not fanfiction).
