Born female, all Jordan wants is to slip under the radar and live the last year of high school as a boy. His parents and siblings support him, but he’d rather be recognized for his acting and musical talents than his gender issues. When Shakespeare’s Puck gives him three magical potions—true sight, true seeming, and true love—Jordan discovers being true to himself isn’t as simple as he thought. Jordan must navigate the confusion of first love, a controversial role in the fall musical, and his transgender identity, while fairy magic creates a net of complications over everything he does. In order to unweave the spells laid over his friends—his supportive older brother, James, his playwright friend, Pepper, and Maria, another transgender student—Jordan needs to understand exactly how far he’ll go to reach his goals of finding true love, true sight, and true seeming.
AnnaLund's rating:
A sincere and lovely story about how it is to live in the wrong body. I was taken aback by the sweetness in this writing, and very impressed by the heart.
To take A Midsummer Night’s Dream, put it on a high-school stage, and have all the crazy happen for real also in the school? Nothing short of gĂ©nial! Shakespeare would SO approve!
The language and the truths in this story were mesmerizing, and here are a couple of examples that truly made me sit down and think and feel:
“We fall for the face we see, and it only lasts until the truth of a person comes out.”
“She makes a funny little sound as she does so, and that noise hits me right in the stomach, a sucker punch of Oh, hey I like that.”
See, the strange thing is, this story is half in first person present, under the form of a Journal, and half in third person past, for the actual storytelling, and if you know me, you know I positively hate first person present.
And yet, and yet—here? It just works. Which goes to show that if you know how to write, it truly doesn’t matter what tense your prose is in.
What matters is what you are saying. Here, the message is clear, sweet, loving, and beautiful.
I’m a little bit in love with this Jordan. I’m sure you’ll fall in love too. Read it.
4.5 stars
***
I was given a free copy of this book by the publisher, Harmony Ink Press/Dreamspinner Press, and a positive review wasn’t promised in return.
Buy this book:
Thank you for reading, hope
you liked this review.
Buylinks are provided as a courtesy and do not constitute an endorsement of or affiliation with this book, author or booksellers listed.