difficult but worth reading; a lot of hurt and not much comfort

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This is one of the hardest books to review that I've read this year. Because I wasn't invested in the main character, but I flew through it in 2 days, and a lot of it really hurt (so maybe I was invested in the mc after all?)...

I didn't connect with the main character or the story / storytelling like I did with Darius the Great, and I prefer the quieter, geekier Darius.

However. This book does a fabulous job of making Hunter flawed and giving him character growth. He's out as a gay member of a boy band, and he's being torn apart by it.
a) He cares deeply and wants to do good for his community
b) he's insecure and lets the Label push him into performing a specific kind of 'queer' identity even though he hates it.
c) he knows he has privilege because he is white but he still feels like he's being attacked - because he is. Both from outside critics and the people at the Label who should be protecting him.
d) he's hurting and angry and feels like he isn't allowed to be which leads to resentment and lashing out.

The structure of the book works really well to highlight how unfair it all is. Interspersing the story with snippets from critical articles, text messages, comments, interviews, etc. really drives home how awful it is to be famous and have all these people feeling entitled to weigh in on things that should be private.

I have recently discovered BTS (I know, behind the times) and seeing some of the ways their fans (and detractors) treat them made this book feel very real and also hurt more than it would have, I think.

I do think it all gets resolved too easily at the end, but I am willing to believe that once Hunter opens up to his fellow band members and manager that things will change. We don't get to see any of that change though, so it ends up being a whole lot of pain without really feeling like things are getting better. It's like a hurt/comfort story but without the comfort and with a whole lot of hurt.

I also think that Hunter's fellow band members could have used a lot more fleshing out. I still can't keep most of them straight and even the ones that feel like their own characters are very cardboard cutout-y.

I have read a couple of other queer boy/girl band books recently and they captured my attention and emotions more easily because they gave POV chapters to more of the band members and so everyone felt more well-rounded.

Despite its flaws, however, this book is worth a read if only as a critique of how we treat famous people in general and boy bands in particular, especially ones with members who are queer and out (or not).

*Thanks to Bookishfirst and Dial Books for providing a copy for review.