Elle wrote 'Combines the coolness of Queer As Folk with the tenderness of Adrian Mole'. I love Adrian Mole. And I love Queer As Folk. And I love a book about gay teen coming out. Except that in this novel, Jarold (Jaz) has already come out. He is trying to get what any gay teen tries to get.
A life.
So, along with Asian Alice (Al), Jaz tries to make sense of his life, stuck with parents he can't stand, with a sister he calls The Nun, schoolmates who bullies him - Fabian, Tweedle Dee, Tweedle Dum and F**k Face. And oh yeah, the gay teacher in school tries to ruin his night when he catches him and Al in the pub, especially because Jaz and Al are underage.
Jaz meets Jon, and nothing happens, because this book aims to ruin the fun of reading. So, instead of hot steamy sex, we have Jaz unable to get his thing up, and Jon gets the surprise to know that Jaz looks older than his real underage age.
This gay novel won Betty Trask Prize in 2007.
This gay book is nowhere near Adrian Mole's goofiness. Nor funny. Instead, I found myself hating Jaz, and thinking that he was the worst gay character ever created - other than all those in Dante's Cove, The Lair and the B-Grade gay themed films. If people start bashing gay guys after reading this gay book, I won't be surprised. Jaz was irritating.
The way the book was written - I'm like, She's like, He's like... How much can one take reading the whole book where dialogs are started that way... I was going crazy.
No one seems to be doing anything right in Jaz's eyes in the book, other than Grandma and the idiotic fag hag Al. Mary (the girl who has a crush on Jaz), Higgs, the school teacher or anyone else. Jaz is a selfish bastard, who goes nowhere near Queer As Folk kinkiness, spicy and tempting life and sex style.
Considering the time I took to finish reading this gay teen story book, Will Davis's My Side of the Story is the longest short book I have ever read. Every chapter that is still waiting for me to read on is like a torture.
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