Queer romance at the end of the world: the best new young-adult fiction
Vesuvius
(Atom, £9.99), the debut from Cass Biehn, is set in Pompeii just before that fateful eruption. For modern readers who may feel as if our own world constantly teeters on the brink of disaster (or has perhaps toppled over), there's an immediate appeal here in this tale of two star-crossed boys – one thief, one temple attendant – whose paths cross when the former steals a sacred relic.
Mercury's helmet is said to contain tremendous power, but when Felix steals it, he's mainly concerned with its monetary value. In a reverse Pascal's wager, he holds fast to one rule: 'magic isn't worth the cost of belief'. Loren, on the other hand, is all too aware the supernatural exists – all his life he has seen flashes of the future, though he's been cautioned not to share them publicly. When he encounters Felix, he instantly recognises the boy from his apocalyptic visions – 'the living counterpart of the nightmarish ghost who caused the destruction' of the city.
There's adventure, political intrigue, and reflections on what it means to be a hero – all wrapped up in a love story that reminds us, as Biehn notes in their preface, 'queer people existed in ancient times as they exist today'. The umbrella term is useful here, acknowledging the historically and culturally specific ways in which sexuality is conceived of and spoken about, and Biehn pleasingly resists the urge to impose modern labels. Loren confesses he is 'not… for women', a certainty that comes 'as a bright shock' to Felix, who understands the fluidity when one wants a 'dalliance' but is all too aware that settling down involves a woman. A wealthy man may have 'a boy on the side', but never an equal; to want a 'companion' is impossible.
Other concepts are slightly shakier for the period; there are conversations about virginity, historically policed for women but not men, that don't quite ring true, and there's a fuzziness over what 'childhood' might mean. These are nitpicks, of course, and more forgivable is the dialogue that moves between faux-archaic and contemporary idiom – if we are to be relentlessly purist, we would not be reading this text in modern English, after all.
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This gripping adventure is part of a wave of classical-myth-inspired YA fiction and pop culture more generally, and one suspects the generation of kids who grew up on the Percy Jackson books and are now writing their own novels have more than a little to do with this. There are tropes and indeed some phrases that will be too familiar to readers – within two lines we have 'Loren's thudding heart skipped' and 'Felix's copper curls tangled like a storm-tossed ocean' – but if you are inclined to swoon over a queer romance at the end of the world (raises hand) you'll let it slide.
That sense of queer history, and a historical Italian setting, is also at play in Brian Selznick's
Run Away With Me
(Scholastic, £19.99), albeit a tad more recent. Rome, the summer of 1986. Danny wanders the streets while his mother works on old books, and meets a strange, beautiful boy. 'Angelo and I expanded and contracted across the city, a murmuration of two that shifted and changed shape but always felt complete and alive, no matter how big or small the space between us.'
It is like being in a myth, though he is aware how unhappily most end – 'People were usually transformed against their will into trees or constellations or deer killed by their own hounds'. Angelo is 'all sweat and cherries and rain', and together they will uncover the secret of the Monda Museum and its founders.
Selznick, best known for his illustrated children's novel
The Invention of Hugo Cabret
, bookends the lyrical text with charcoal drawings, lending to the dreamy, delirious first-love feeling of it all. Gorgeous.
Abdi Nazemian
Slightly later in the 1980s we might move to New York and find ourselves in the world of novelist and screenwriter Abdi Nazemian's
Like A Love Story
(Little Tiger, £8.99), featuring three teenagers in a quasi-love triangle against the backdrop of the Aids crisis. Reza has just moved to the city, and is sure of two things – he is gay and it will kill him. He will not let his mother bandage a minor wound: 'Just in case my blood is toxic. Just in case you can get it from having too many thoughts of boys in locker rooms.'
Meeting Art, out and proud at school, is a jolt, but even Art sometimes wonders: 'I don't know how I'll ever begin to live while this disease is raging. Who will love me when all they'll see when they look at me is the possibility that I may kill them?'
The terror, which may feel melodramatic for contemporary readers – as I write this there is news of yet another medical breakthrough in the prevention of HIV transmission – is legitimate, as we learn when we meet Judy (Art's best friend, who falls hopelessly for Reza) and her dying, fiercely activist uncle Stephen.
It's hard not to veer toward cliche when writing about truly awful historical moments, but Nazemian earns every single activist slogan, every entreaty to both fight and celebrate. There is nuance and care here, as various issues are explored; novels offer space beyond the simple binary of with us/against us that is so prevalent in our polarised society. Stephen noting, 'there's a difference between denying sick people access to life-saving drugs and expressing an opinion about how to define queer film' is a particularly welcome line. Thoughtful, emotional, haunting – I loved it.
Josh Silver
British author Josh Silver is always good on sideways glances at contemporary treatments for mental health, approaching the topic with tremendous empathy and knowledge but unafraid to squint a little at panaceas. In his latest,
Traumaland
(Rock The Boat, £8.99), the new silver bullet is 'optogenetics', a 'cutting-edge neuro modulation' that is 'a quick, effective and innovatory new therapy, set to revolutionise mental healthcare'.
Eli is unaware of all this at first – but he does know he has been through something traumatic, and it's left him unable to feel anything. Seeking out dark thrills at an underground club leads him into a tangled web of conspiracies (don't go clubbing, kids), and makes him determined to uncover the truth of his alleged accident. Silver's pacy writing and twisty plot makes this a delicious read as well as providing much food for thought.
Finally, sometimes one just needs a sapphic rom-com involving a princess and a scholarship student at a boarding school in a tiny fictional European country. This premise, too, is part of a broader trend in YA and romance – glamorous escapism, but make it gay. It's a little bit progressive and a little bit conservative, a repackaging of old ideas with a rainbow ribbon, often with little reflection, but in the best hands, it's tremendously pleasing.
And we are in good hands with the always-reliable Sophie Gonzales, whose
Nobody in Particular
(Hodder, £9.99) offers a sharp eye on public scrutiny – 'The media has been writing incessantly about me since six months before my birth,' Princess Rose recalls – while also providing a sweet, hopeful love story.
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