Boy Meets Boy short review

Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan

Paul is a pretty average teenager. He goes out with his friends, he goes to school, he takes part in extracurricular activities.

He has problems of course, like any teenager. His – closeted - friend Tony can only go out if his extremely religious parents think he’s going out with a girl. Paul’s best friend Joni keeps going out with the wrong guys and his ex-boyfriend Kyle has issues.

Then, of course, there’s Infinite Darlene, homecoming queen and star quarterback.

And then, Paul meets Noah. The Boy. And everything changes.

I sped through Boy Meets Boy yesterday. At 185 pages it’s a quick read, and Levithan has a nice writing style.

Paul is engaging as a character, moving through his somewhat charmed life pretty easily, and his somewhat rocky relationship with Noah is sweet.

I did have a couple of issues with it – Jodi’s boyfriend Chuck through most of the book is basically a caveman, and she does a terrible thing to Paul that I don’t think was properly dealt with, but perhaps I should be philosophical and say something like, well, not all loose ends get tied up.

Anyway.

A few weeks ago, I read Every Day by Levithan, which I recommend to everybody – it’s original and heartbreaking and all of the best things.

Boy Meets Boy – as far as it goes – is a sweet, somewhat tender coming of age love story, if a little problematic in some of the finer details.