Matthew reads, I guess...

  Today I’m talking about Riley Weaver Needs a Date to the Gaybutante Ball which, I’ll be honest, I knew about because I read Jason June’s other book, Out of the Blue , and loved it. It was one of my favourite books in the year I read it, so it only made sense I’d read June’s next book. The blurb says that femme, gay teen podcaster Riley Weaver has made it to junior year, which means he can finally apply for membership into the Gaybutante Society, the LGBTQ+ organisation that has launched dozens of queer teens’ career in pop culture, arts, and activism. The process to get into the Society is a marathon of charity events, parties, and general gay chaos, culminating in the annual Gaybutante Ball. The one requirement for the ball? A date. Then Riley overhears a superstar athlete, Skylar, say that gay guys just aren’t interested in femme guys or else they wouldn’t be gay. Riley confronts Skylar and makes a bet to prove him wrong: Riley must find a masc date by the time of the Ball o...

  Today, I’m talking about Ander & Santi Were Here by Jonny Garza Villa. I’m fairly certain that this is one of those books that because I read Villa’s first book, Fifteen Hundred Miles From the Sun , I ended up following them on social media and then ended up seeing this book when it was announced. I know it wasn’t one I read or bought immediately after its release, and I have no idea why. I think it might have been the case of I just had other books on my TBR before I felt like I could get around to buying this one. The blurb says that The Santos Vista neighbourhood of San Antonio, Texas, is all Ander Lopez has ever known. The smell of pan dulce. The mixture of Spanish and English filling the streets. And especially their job at their family’s taqueria. It’s the place that has inspired Ander as a muralist, and, as they get ready to leave for art school, it’s all of these things that give them hesitancy. That give them the thought, are they ready to leave it all behind? To ...