Reviews

Kiss & Tell by Adib Khorram

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nikolinaza's review against another edition

4.0

After a messy breakup with Aidan resulting some leaked sexts, Hunter found his life to be constantly under surveillance. People turned their back on him because he was not a 'good example' for those gay teens out there. To reclaim his good image, The Label decided to pair him with Kaivan, the drummer of one of the rising star, PAR-K, which happen to be his tour opener. Their mutual feelings were authentic--but with all those camera following them around, troubles started to brew.

Books about the life of the famous people has always been intriguing for me. Compared to Darius The Great Duology, Kiss & Tell has a more vibrant, chaotic, reckless, life-of-the-party vibe, with a lot of lighter ambience. But just like his two previous works I've read, there's also a heavy issue we need to talk about so badly: the stereotypes of gay people. Especially the bottom ones.

I am quite familiar with LGBTQ+ works of fiction. You could find them literally anywhere--fanfics, AUs, fan arts, etc etc--and it has become more and more popular each day. It's nice to see LGBTQ+ people getting more acceptance, but what bothers me while enjoying those fictional work is how nearly all of them picturing the bottom character as someone feminine, seductive, and most importantly, looks innocent but slutty.

*sighs*

I mean, there's nothing wrong to fit in those criterias I've said before, but that doesn't apply to every single bottom out there, you know? As a straight girl who has no experience of being gay or even more, a bottom, I feel deeply, extremely uncomfortable when nearly every bottom character was reduced to that stereotypes. And after reading the stereotyped bottom representation through Hunter, I kind of understand more how hurftul is that. Imagine forced being someone you're not just because you want to be accepted in the eyes of the society who judged you constantly for being a whore for having a consensual sex with your boyfriend, and also criticizing you because you don't look feminine enough to be a bottom.

Welp, kudos to Adib Khorram for bringing this up. There's more than enough bottom fetishizing here and we definitely don't need to see more.

Another thing I really like from this book was all the main characters. That being said Hunter, his bandmates (I feel so bad for not mentioning their name--Owen, Ian, Ashton, Ethan), Kaivan, and Aidan. They were a great and real depiction of teenager--hot-headed, stubborn, emotional, and making a lot of mistakes. Not someone who were young but had the level of wiseness as those of monks. They felt so real and humane enough to be relatable.

The problem with this book was that the story only centered around Hunter, Kaivan, and a little bit more of Aidan. I mean, I do enjoy those cutesy Haivan moments, but I feel like most of them just fell flat and did only a little significance for the whole story. I mean, I get it--their 'fake dates' has to be seen on camera, BUT this book has a lot more than that. We don't need to be distracted by Haivan taking a walk in a park together when there's a lot of problems to deal with back home--or in this case, the tour bus. For example, Hunter's writer's block, his fights with people around him, etc. It's a shame that Hunter's bandmates were only there for the emotional gurus when they could have more important roles for Hunter and also for the band.

4 out of 5--I kind of hoping there would be a book for each band members because I would love to know them more deeply.

P.S. I have no idea why did my brain kept on repeating Momoland and Natti Natasha's song 'Yummy Yummy Love'... And imagining Kaivan singing that to Hunter

bahar's review against another edition

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lighthearted fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.5

cheriii_16's review

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1.0

it was literally the oppression olympics. i was really looking forward to this because the premise was super interesting, the whole social media aspects and fake dating are things i love to read but this was just disappointing. the writing was also bad, idk why but i was cringing at like every line