Being a teen is painful. You’re no longer a kid, you’re not yet an adult, and no matter who you are, you’re not quite sure it’s okay to be yourself.  In library school we learned about the Search Institute’s 40 Developmental Assets for Teens, which tells us that an extra caring adult in the community, someone who is not a parent, can make a difference for teens by helping to bolster them during this difficult time. I thought back to my own teen years, which were painful, and I thought about those few teachers who were there when I needed someone. A kind word could go a long way, even if I was feeling miserable. I strive to be that person for the teens in my library. If they’re gay, if they’re an artist, if they want to go to college, if they don’t want to go to college, they can tell me, whatever it is, and I’ll listen.  If something is really wrong, I will help them find help. Most days, it’s just regular teen stuff, for that I’ve got a smile, and I can always recommend a book.

I have empathy and compassion for a lot of different teens. I feel that way about some of the fictional teens I read about as well. I thought I’d share a few books featuring some of my favorite gay or questioning characters. These are characters I find interesting, inhabiting stories I find compelling. That they are gay or wondering if they might be, is a fact about them, not the main idea. These are books I keep in mind to recommend, to gay teens, who might see themselves in these characters, and to straight teens, who might see someone who’s not so hard to relate to after all.

Totally Joe by James Howe

We first meet Joe in Howe’s anti-bullying book ,The Misfits, but he comes to life more fully in this sequel told in journal entries as he writes his “alphabiography” from A-Z. Joe loves cooking, and he loves his friends and family. More than anything, Joe is young and goofy. His coming of age/coming out story is somewhat predictable, but the fact that he’s doing this in middle school makes this a great book for younger teens.

The Mortal Instruments Series by Cassandra Clare

While flamboyant, “freewheeling bisexual” warlock Magnus Bane is often the focus of gay commentary on this popular urban fantasy series, it is his love interest, the quiet, messily dressed, Alec Lightwood that I think of as the relatable one here. Alec is very mature in his role as the eldest sibling, and as a soldier in the world of the Shadowhunters, but he is still young emotionally. He is inexperienced in romantic relationships and often unsure of how to express himself. The duality of this makes him very human in the midst of the series’ high action supernatural events.

Huntress by Malinda Lo
Lo’s more recent book, Adaptation, has a great protagonist who is interested in both sexes, and some steamy scenes, but Huntress sticks in my mind because high fantasy is not a place you find many gay characters.  The cross between Chinese mythology and British fair folk makes for an interesting and diverse setting. Kaede is the archetypal hero, the one you’ve read about before, the one you root for and kind of want to be. She falls for Taisin, who is in training as a sage, a sort of magical monk. The two are poised to save their world, but it may cost them their relationship to do it.

Ask the Passengers by A.S. King
Astrid Jones is the kind of cranky intellectual I hope walks into my library.  She professes her love to strangers who will never know about it and talks to Socrates. Her stubborn insistence that she thoroughly work through issues that confuse her: her sexuality, her budding romance with her co-worker, and her feelings about her family, before she discusses them is as endearing as it is frustrating.

The Realm of Possibility by David Levithan

Levithan’s lyrical writing is a draw for all of his books, The Realm of Possibility, a novel in verse, stands out because it shares different struggles in a variety of teen voices. The magical Jed, a boy who seems like someone we all used to know in high school, who appears, and gives gravitas to small moments, is the thread that weaves these stories together.

Pink by Lili Wilkinson

Ava is tired of being an ultra-liberal, black-clad, intellectual. She’s tired of her parents’ celebration of how edgy she is, and she is becoming tired of her girlfriend, Chloe. She thinks it might be time to try something new, so she dons a pink sweater and joins stage crew for the school musical. Stage Crew is populated by some strange and interesting people. Ava finds herself becoming a part of their group, but doesn’t necessarily figure out exactly who she wants to be. The ambiguity of the ending might be the best part of this book.

Debbie Harry Sings in French by Meagan Brothers

You don’t get a lot of books about teen cross-dressers. In fact, I can only think of this one. After the death of his father and a stint in rehab for alcohol abuse, Johnny tries to start over by moving in with his Uncle. He meets a girl, he listens to music, and he falls in love with both.  He finds inspiration and comfort in Blondie, and finds himself wanting to emulate their tough, beautiful, lead singer Debbie Harry. With the support of his girlfriend he finds the courage to step out, in heels.

Erin Daly is a Youth Services Coordinator at Chicopee Public Library. Find her on Twitter: @ErinCerulean

One of my favorite ways to discuss diverse literature is with the concept of “mirrors and windows”- which is to say, some books will reflect one’s experience, while others will open the reader to a new perspective.  Mitali Perkins describes it well here. A lot of times, I see people misusing it as a dichotomy; either this book will be a mirror of your own life, or a window into someone else’s. That ignores what I think are the best books, which- as Mitali mentions- are the ones that manage to do both. Seeing aspects of yourself in a character largely unlike you is maybe the best way to gain empathy you hadn’t ever realized you lacked.

I relate to characters for a wide variety of reasons. I’m not going to say that the gender of romantic interests, particularly in relationship to the gender of the protagonist, isn’t on that list of reasons at all, or that it shouldn’t be, but it strikes me as profoundly sad that there often seems to be an assumption that that’s all that’s necessary: if you’re a queer kid, you’ll relate to queer lit, and if you’re a straight kid, you’ll learn about a new life experience through it.

Well. No. Sorry, but no.

I connect with characters because of who they love and how they love and who they don’t love and why they don’t love them. I connect with characters because of how they approach romantic relationships and sexual relationships and familial relationships and platonic relationships. I connect with characters because of their interests and their talents and their skills and their flaws. I connect with characters because of choices they make and choices they don’t make, because I would make those same decisions or because I would make the opposite ones. If you remove any aspect of that, how can the characters seem real enough to be relatable?

I like stories about queer characters, and stories that deal with queerness, but I am over stories that reduce characters to nothing but sexuality. Those stories are neither windows nor mirrors. They’re black holes. And to say to any reader who falls outside prescriptive heteronormative standards that they should read queer lit for better self-understanding is missing the point.

I’d like to say this is a double standard- “You wouldn’t just shove any book with boys and girls kissing at a heterosexual kid and think they’d relate, would you?”- but the truth is, yes. Many people would do just that. Which is an issue in and of itself, but that’s an issue for another, equally long post.

The problem is that a lot of books with straight protagonists reduce their characters’ relationships to the interactions of non-matching genitalia, which assumes- well, many things, not the least of which being that biological sex and gender are the same thing. But that means that somehow people have books are queer-friendly when they reduce characters’ relationships to the non-heteronormativity of their sexual encounters.

In truth, those stories aren’t friendly. They’re antagonistic. They’re reducing human beings to secondary sexual characteristics. We say so often that we want queer kids to be treated the same as straight kids, but maybe the answer is that we need to treat ALL kids like people.

This is hard. I get that. Adults want nothing less than to treat teenagers and children like people, because people are complex organisms that have opinions we disagree with and do things we wouldn’t do and aren’t moldable. It’s so easy to say that their brains haven’t fully developed and their interests are nothing like ours and it’s our job to help show them the way. But in the process, I think we’re relying too much on the idea that there is a single way to be shown.

In my life as a full-fledged adult, I know a lot of grown-ups. Some are straight. Some are gay. Some are bi. Some are trans*. Some are aromantic. Some are asexual. Some are queer without any further detail, because they don’t want to share it with the world or none of the terms quite fits or they don’t feel comfortable with labels. And for many of these people, I have absolutely no idea which (or how many) of these categories they fall into, because it has nothing to do with my daily interactions with them.

But media teaches us that most teenagers are obsessed with sex (particularly if they self-identify as male) and romance (particularly if they self-identify as female). Even if they have other interests, their primary focus is on romantic or sexual relationships. In fact, characters who aren’t obsessed with the secondary-sex characteristics of their desired partners are often seen as immature. I just don’t believe that that’s true.

I thought about a lot of things in high school. I thought about the gossip circulating my classes, and how not to be the subject of it, and whether my best friend was intentionally avoiding me or if we just hadn’t crossed paths. I thought about homework that I didn’t want to do and why my teachers were so mean and what sadist came up with gym class. I thought about how exhausted I was and whether marching band practice would end early and whether I’d be home in time to set the VCR for new episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Frankly, with all of that, I didn’t have TIME to devote as much energy to thinking about sex as most fictional protagonists seem to do. And I wasn’t even working as a spy, never mind living in a post-apocalyptic wasteland where every move could be my last.

Am I saying avoid these things in stories? Of course not. Romance can be important. Sex can be important. There’s both a need and a market for stories primarily about queer romantic and sexual relationships, and there always will be, the same way there will always be one for heterosexual ones. But that doesn’t mean that is the only choice when it comes to talking about queer characters. If interest in romance and sex doesn’t vary by character and by situation, something is wrong- no matter where on the gender or sexuality continuums anyone falls.

A lot of the queer stories submitted to me try to course-correct the default of straightness by doing exactly the same thing, but with same-sex couples. I understand and empathize with the urge; everyone wants their experience to be normalized. But this kind of normalizing excludes a different reader, while simultaneously making the story far, far less than it could be. It’s great to think about a gay Twilight or a gay Looking for Alaska or whatever. But what I look for when going through submissions is a story that’s wholly its own, about characters who feel like real people, not a clever re-characterization of something that already exists. Too often, it feels like rich straight white characters get the story first, and then everyone else has to follow.

 When there are enough stories that don’t take into account the way you live your life, even if individually they may be great, collectively they are neither windows nor mirrors. They become a single, monolithic brick wall. But one of the things I love about YA literature is that we aren’t content to just let it stay that way. Authors are writing vivid, complex characters, many of whom don’t just fit the dominant paradigm but have their adventures anyway. It’s slow, but it’s happening, and it’s valuable every time.

When I was in grad school, I spent a lot of time thinking about how queerness was portrayed in children’s literature. It’s exciting for me to be in publishing now, and not just see the change sweeping the field, but be a part of it.

I was absolutely thrilled when Gay YA asked me to write a guest blog for their fantastic site (though baffled as to why they asked me- I’m just a regular blogger), and then even more thrilled that they gave me a second chance after I completely spaced on the deadline. Sorry about that, guys!

So they asked me to talk about reviewing in general as well as spotlighting GLBT books on my blog. I’ve been doing this for almost 6 years now; I started June 23, 2007 and have been going ever since, moving from Myspace (yes, remember that?!) to Blogspot in 2009. It’s been a wonderful journey and I hope to keep going for many years to come. I absolutely love being a part of the children’s book community and getting to talk books online and in person at book events with other book-obsessed people. It’s fantastic!

I love sharing my thoughts on all kinds of books with my readers through my blog. While I do mainly review Young Adult, I have also ventured into picture book, middle-grade, adult, and non-fiction territory. Luckily, my readers go along with me on those posts too.

Since the beginning, I’ve definitely kept my eye out for GLBT YA though I will admit I haven’t spotlighted it as much as some other blogs. I do the best I can, and I have run two GLBT-themed weeks over the years on my blog, featuring reviews and guest posts (One such week can be found here- http://bookchicclub.blogspot.com/search/label/GLBT%20Week; the other is on Myspace and therefore no link since I didn’t tag anything).

Spotlighting GLBT YA on my blog is something I love to do when I’m able to do it, and not only by just posting a review but also interviewing the author or have them writing a guest post. I’ll be reviewing Openly Straight by Bill Konigsberg soon (absolutely loved his debut, Out of the Pocket), which I’m really enjoying so far. I also have Nora Olsen, whose new book Swans and Klons is out now, doing a guest post, which I just got in my inbox today, so cannot wait to post that.

As a young gay man, GLBT YA is very important to me. I was a happy teen for the most part and never really had the struggle that many teens do with their sexuality (though I was not out until college) and with being bullied, but I did feel the loneliness every so often. I wanted what so many of my friends had- a relationship, someone to really confide in and be with, even if it was fleeting as so many high school romances are- and still do to this day (I’ve been single for a few years now).

Reading the debut books from David Levithan, Brent Hartinger, and Alex Sanchez helped me feel less alone and were released during my high school years. I had to kind of sneakily check them out from the public library so my parents didn’t see. No joke, I didn’t know other gay people existed anywhere near me until I was a junior in high school and there was this gay boy in the summer theatre program I worked Stage Crew for (and then of course 4 high school friends came out to me after I graduated high school). I loved those books and cherished them so much. And while the world is getting better, it’s not totally perfect when it comes to GLBT people and their rights, so I feel there is still a need to push any new GLBT book into the hands of teenagers to help them get through these years. I feel good whenever I post a review of a GLBT book or let a GLBT author sound off on my blog because it feels like I’m doing something to help, even though it’s just something very minor. I have the hope that it’s helping someone somewhere, which is also what I want to do with my own writing someday.

Thanks again, Gay YA, for letting me take over your blog for a day and ramble on about random things. I will be constantly checking for comments so feel free to leave any questions for me!