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stuckinatimeloop's review against another edition
emotional
funny
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
fun little read. i loved the mc's development from an annoying bitch to a respectable bitch. and gordon. gordon. i was reading for him and him only. i fucking loved the dynamic between him and clark. i wish his story had you know, more of a conclusion to it or maybe a spin-off about him. charles too, his story kinda faded out towards the end.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Vomit
Moderate: Homophobia and Lesbophobia
zohannah's review against another edition
funny
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body shaming, Bullying, Physical abuse, Grief, Violence, Vomit, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Misogyny, Transphobia, and Hate crime
delz's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Kings, Queens, and in-Betweens is exactly what it is titled. There are drag kings, drag queens, and lots of other representation in this book. Nima is 17, living with her dad & her mother is MIA. Nima has two friends, Charles, and Ginny who she is infatuated with unfortunately she is not into girls. Nima’s dad is a real hippie so their relationship is very laid back and he is super understanding. Nima works for a close family friend, Sue, who was also Nima’s moms best friend. There’s also Gordon who’s kind of an enigma, since he likes to bully Charles and Nima but Nima keeps reaching out because she knows there is something more to Gordon. Every year a kind of fair comes through their town and that’s when the story gets interesting. Nima begins to explore her identity, she questions the status of her life and the people closest to her. She discovers some pretty big secrets and she befriends the most amazing drag queen, Deirdre, or Dee Dee, who quite literally takes her under her wing. This was a really sweet coming of age story with lots of heartache, romance, and friendship.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Lesbophobia, Bullying, and Homophobia
Moderate: Vomit and Infidelity
Minor: Outing and Alcohol
someonelikeblue's review against another edition
emotional
funny
hopeful
medium-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body shaming, Abandonment, Vomit, and Infidelity
Moderate: Transphobia, Bullying, Lesbophobia, Homophobia, Alcohol, and Adult/minor relationship
space_bandit's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Vomit and Homophobia
Moderate: Bullying, Transphobia, Infidelity, Adult/minor relationship, and Abandonment
Minor: Lesbophobia
botanicalprofanity's review against another edition
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Lesbophobia, Homophobia, Vomit, and Alcohol
half_bloodreader's review against another edition
DNF - 64%
Contemporary YA
Biracial sapphic girl
Written in 1st person, past tense.
Biracial sapphic girl
Written in 1st person, past tense.
"something else might be waiting for me on the other side. Something that might color me outside the lines and flow into other parts of my life."
Nima's mother suddenly left 1,5 years ago. A traumatic event that led to big feelings of inadequacy and self-consciousness, like she wasn't interesting enough to make her mother stay.
Wanting to change, she starts with the local festival, in part influenced by being rejected, in part by wanting to fill a hole inside, and in part by her mother:
"I thought about all the times she tried to drag us to see the smaller, stranger acts at the south end of the festival and how both Dad and I looked at her skeptically before leading her back to the main tent for the usual circus antics. Maybe she’d left us because we’d held her back. Maybe she needed to see something beyond our familiar, small world."
"I thought about all the times she tried to drag us to see the smaller, stranger acts at the south end of the festival and how both Dad and I looked at her skeptically before leading her back to the main tent for the usual circus antics. Maybe she’d left us because we’d held her back. Maybe she needed to see something beyond our familiar, small world."
There, she watches drag for the first time, feels an intense pull towards an older girl she knows nothing about ( it's reciprocal for some reason) and meets Deidre, who's like a glittery fairy godmother and the only character I love. She's just perfect.
Deidre reminded me of how there's always welcoming people at events and communities. Of how I've been welcomed and welcomed others in return to the communities I belong.
I really wanted to finish this and see more drag and Deidre, but the characters just kept pumping my blood pressure. What was amusing at the very beginning, became second-hand embarrassment (so much), exasperation and disgust (if you know, you know).
They're all a terrible salad forced upon us, like someone just picked the worst flavoured ingredients. From mc "bad decisions" Nima, to her "if you won't cheat on my husband with me I'm leaving for greener pastures" mother, her best friend "spineless" Charles, "I kiss people I've rejected when they're vulnerable but I'm not gay" Ginny and Gordon, who's questioning his gender and for that hardship alongside his awful father gets some understanding from my part, but his queerphobia is still not a pill I'm ready to swallow, sorry, not when it hurts others.
I'm not a pearl clutching "it has underage drinking, how dare" reader, but even I was annoyed about how easily minors kept getting alcohol. Especially when it was in queer spaces, perpetuating the idea that lgbtq+ people corrupt minors!! This coming from someone whose country's legal age for drinking is 18 (legal adult age for everything really).
Cw: underage drinking
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcohol, Homophobia, and Vomit
loverofeels's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
i love books about gender nonconformity <333 i wish this one was just a little better
the author is a former drag king who very clearly put a lot of love and community experience into writing about the drag scene, which was wonderful to read about
HOWEVER it was super weird to me that the main character, who is 17 (as in doesn't turn 18 for 9 months) and just finished her junior year of HIGH SCHOOL has a love interest who is "at least 21" and has been living independently for years!! it felt like the weirdness of this age gap would so easily be resolved by 1) having the main character be an 18 year old who just graduated high school 2) having the love interest be an 18 year old who just graduated high school or 3) not including the romantic subplot between them at all. it's a major red flag to me that the love interest didn't even blink at hearing that nima is a minor who is no less than four years younger than her :\
the author is a former drag king who very clearly put a lot of love and community experience into writing about the drag scene, which was wonderful to read about
HOWEVER it was super weird to me that the main character, who is 17 (as in doesn't turn 18 for 9 months) and just finished her junior year of HIGH SCHOOL has a love interest who is "at least 21" and has been living independently for years!! it felt like the weirdness of this age gap would so easily be resolved by 1) having the main character be an 18 year old who just graduated high school 2) having the love interest be an 18 year old who just graduated high school or 3) not including the romantic subplot between them at all. it's a major red flag to me that the love interest didn't even blink at hearing that nima is a minor who is no less than four years younger than her :\
Content Warnings
Moderate: Alcohol, Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Abandonment, and Vomit
technicolour's review against another edition
emotional
funny
lighthearted
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
Fairly enjoyable, but ultimately a bit dissatisfactory.
The good:
- a queer coming-of-age story that doesn't centre around coming out, but instead of discovering queer culture and the local queer scene
- the relationship with her easy going and supportive dad
- intergenerational queer friendships
- showing an otherwise-anxious person wanting more from life and chasing it
- the "queer scenes are small, everyone has dated everyone" messy lesbian drama
The bad
- the way gender is written about for the trans characters could be described as clumsy at best. Deirde (an otherwise great character) is written as a trans women but is exclusively described as a drag queen, rather than trans woman who also does drag. I don't think the word trans is used at all through the book. When describing trans-feminine characters, the author often dwells on how masculine they are: tall, big, strong, muscular, referencing Adam's apples. It's really not great.
- on another gender point, the titular "in-betweens" are no where to be seen. There's no non-binary characters nor is it ever brought up as a concept.
- the drag scene could have been explored better. It's shown as just a type performing, and that performing is fun! It is stripped of it's cultural, political, and gender identity significance.
- words for queer identities are frequently thrown at characters as slurs, and I wish this was balanced out by more characters delighting and claiming words to describe themselves more.
- it includes my least favourite trope: homophobe/transphobe is secretly gay/trans
- there's a storyline of a parent running off for over a year, which I don't think is given the weight it deserves
- so much vomit
The good:
- a queer coming-of-age story that doesn't centre around coming out, but instead of discovering queer culture and the local queer scene
- the relationship with her easy going and supportive dad
- intergenerational queer friendships
- showing an otherwise-anxious person wanting more from life and chasing it
- the "queer scenes are small, everyone has dated everyone" messy lesbian drama
The bad
- the way gender is written about for the trans characters could be described as clumsy at best. Deirde (an otherwise great character) is written as a trans women but is exclusively described as a drag queen, rather than trans woman who also does drag. I don't think the word trans is used at all through the book. When describing trans-feminine characters, the author often dwells on how masculine they are: tall, big, strong, muscular, referencing Adam's apples. It's really not great.
- on another gender point, the titular "in-betweens" are no where to be seen. There's no non-binary characters nor is it ever brought up as a concept.
- the drag scene could have been explored better. It's shown as just a type performing, and that performing is fun! It is stripped of it's cultural, political, and gender identity significance.
- words for queer identities are frequently thrown at characters as slurs, and I wish this was balanced out by more characters delighting and claiming words to describe themselves more.
- it includes my least favourite trope: homophobe/transphobe is secretly gay/trans
- there's a storyline of a parent running off for over a year, which I don't think is given the weight it deserves
- so much vomit
Content Warnings
Moderate: Homophobia, Transphobia, and Abandonment
Minor: Vomit
flameoflareon's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
If you really like YA, you'll probably have a better time with this book than I did. For me, the best part of this book was the title. The 17yo MC pursuing (and in turn being pursued by) two 20+ year olds, Winnow being the main one, was really off-putting to me, especially as no one, including the adults, showed any concern about it. On top of odd narrative choices, there were a lot of odd writing choices as well. For example, Jill revealing to Nima what happened between her and her mom was all through dialogue but it was descriptive and detailed to the level of prose, and at no point did Nima say, "ew stop describing the feel of her lips on your neck, she's my mom and even if she wasn't, I'm a child."
Content Warnings
Graphic: Vomit
Minor: Transphobia and Homophobia