KISS & TELL follows boy band member Hunter Drake as he learns how to be himself -- and realizes that he's not alone in facing challenges.
Hunter's recently broken up with his long-time best friend and boyfriend Aidan, and is beginning a stadium tour with his super popular boy band, Kiss & Tell. Along the way, he has to deal with media coverage, label management, and the public expecting him to be a certain sort of gay. But then when some private texts are posted online, his image takes a hit and he's expected to revamp his look -- and asked to fake date.
I really enjoyed the way author Adib Khorram incorporated news articles, texts, tweets, documentary transcripts, and so on. While most of the story's told in prose, the other elements fleshed out the story; for example, literally showing how some want (expect?) Hunter to be a virgin, and others want him to be outspoken for sex positivity. All at the age of 17. I'm afraid my descriptions aren't making this sound like a fun book, but it was (amidst the serious themes) -- think part road trip, part teenage crush.
It was frustrating to see Hunter be so obtuse to the challenges of the Vietnamese-, Brazilian-, and Indian-Canadian band members, as well as those of Kaivan, a gay Iranian-American boy in the opening band. At the same time, I'm not sure it was unrealistic for a teenager to be so focused on himself and unmindful of the challenges facing others. While there's resolution, I'd absolutely read a follow-up continuing the band's journey from the perspective of any of the other Kiss & Tell members!
Hunter's recently broken up with his long-time best friend and boyfriend Aidan, and is beginning a stadium tour with his super popular boy band, Kiss & Tell. Along the way, he has to deal with media coverage, label management, and the public expecting him to be a certain sort of gay. But then when some private texts are posted online, his image takes a hit and he's expected to revamp his look -- and asked to fake date.
I really enjoyed the way author Adib Khorram incorporated news articles, texts, tweets, documentary transcripts, and so on. While most of the story's told in prose, the other elements fleshed out the story; for example, literally showing how some want (expect?) Hunter to be a virgin, and others want him to be outspoken for sex positivity. All at the age of 17. I'm afraid my descriptions aren't making this sound like a fun book, but it was (amidst the serious themes) -- think part road trip, part teenage crush.
It was frustrating to see Hunter be so obtuse to the challenges of the Vietnamese-, Brazilian-, and Indian-Canadian band members, as well as those of Kaivan, a gay Iranian-American boy in the opening band. At the same time, I'm not sure it was unrealistic for a teenager to be so focused on himself and unmindful of the challenges facing others. While there's resolution, I'd absolutely read a follow-up continuing the band's journey from the perspective of any of the other Kiss & Tell members!