Vanilla - Hardcover

Merrell, Billy

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1338100920 ISBN 13: 9781338100921

Publisher: PUSH, 2017

Synopsis

A bold, groundbreaking novel about coming out, coming into your own, and coming apart.

Vanilla and Hunter have been dating since seventh grade. They came out together, navigated middle school together, and became that couple in high school that everyone always sees as a couple. There are complications and confusions, for sure. But most of all, they love each other.As high school goes, though, and as their relationship deepens, some cracks begin to show. Hunter thinks they should be having sex.Vanilla isn't so sure. Hunter doesn't mind hanging out with loud, obnoxious friends.Vanilla would rather avoid them. If they're becoming different people, can they be the same couple? Falling in love is hard. Staying in love is harder.

About this title

About the Author

Billy Merrell is the author of Talking in the Dark, a poetry memoir published when he was twenty-one, and is the co-editor (with David Levithan) of The Full Spectrum: A New Generation of Writing About Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Questioning, and Other Identities, which received a Lambda Literary Award. Merrell is also a contributor to the New York Times-bestselling series Spirit Animals, and has published fiction, poetry, and translations in various journals and anthologies. Born in 1982, he grew up in Jacksonville, Florida, and received his MFA in Poetry from Columbia University. He now lives in Brooklyn, New York, with his husband, author Nico Medina.

Reviews

Gr 10 Up—A novel in verse depicting three gay teens as they navigate life and love. Hunter and Vanilla have dated since middle school. Hunter really wants to have sex with Vanilla, who is less-than-excited at the prospect. The couple breaks up over Vanilla's unwillingness; they then have to learn how to navigate a friendship after a relationship. Angel, aka Clown, also narrates some of the chapters in this book, but serves only as a bystander and observer of Vanilla and Hunter's relationship. Vanilla is a romantic asexual, and once he understands this, he is relieved that he is not weird or wrong for not wanting to have sex. While the diversity of characters in this book is to be celebrated, its treatment of consent and asexuality is not. Hunter frequently states things like: "I think of Vanilla and how vanilla he is,/ and I want to hold him and tell him/ it's okay if he says he isn't ready,/ even if I don't believe him—/or that if he isn't ready,/ it's for all the wrong reasons." Hunter and many of the secondary characters continually pressure Vanilla to have sex even when he clearly isn't interested, and the message that there could be "wrong reasons" not to have sex is disturbing and potentially damaging. The acephobia throughout as well as issues with consent make this a difficult purchase to recommend. VERDICT Purchase Kathryn Ormsbee's Tash Hearts Tolstoy instead for solid asexual characterization.—Jenni Frencham, Columbus Public Library, WI

Edition details

• Publisher: PUSH
• Publication date: 2017
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1338100920
• ISBN 13: 9781338100921
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 320