Release
Date: August 5, 2015
Pages
or Words: 27,600 words
Categories:
Contemporary,
LGBT Fiction,Young Adult,
Fiction, Transexual,
Lesbian
Romance, M/M Romance
Publisher:
Prizm Books
Cover
Artist: BSClay
Jesse
Harvan comes home from school one day to find his parents have
discovered the gay pornographic magazine hidden under his bed.
Disgusted, they decide to send Jesse to Camp Grady, a summer camp
which prides itself on converting people's sexuality.
Once
at the camp, Jesse meets the other inmates: Charlie, a disabled
African-American gay teenager, Natalie, a transgender girl, her
sister Lita, Japanese lesbian Sakura, and last of all, Minister
Grady's son Jacob, who works for the camp under duress. These teens
must learn to bridge their differences and get along if they’re to
beat their common enemy and keep their identities–and
sanity–intact.
I sit in the back of an old school bus that has been converted
for the camp’s use. It rankles that I didn’t even get to say
goodbye to Sam. Mom and Dad wouldn’t let me near him. I tried to
send him an e-mail, but it was blocked. I didn’t have time to
figure out how their new family-filter software worked. The next
morning, I was on a plane to Pennsylvania, Mom and Dad accompanying
me like this was some kind of family vacation. They left me at the
airport and went their own way, transferring me directly to camp
custody so that I wouldn’t get infected with any gay on the way.
I
know I’ll be going back home eventually, but it doesn’t feel like
it right now. I feel like Camp Grady will go on
forever.
My greatest fear is that the me who goes home won’t be the same as
the one sitting here right now.
What
if they can change me? What if they do have the power to fix me? That
thought in my head argues with its natural opposite: I’m not
broken. I won’t change. There’s nothing they can do to change who
I am.
Last
night I scared myself. I went onto the Internet and looked up ex-gay
camps, which surprisingly were not filtered out. There are people who
claim that they work. That they’ve thrown away partners, friends,
and husbands because they’ve been ‘cured’. I read reports of
abuse and beatings that made my stomach clench. I cried myself to
sleep for the first time in a long time. I’m genuinely scared. How
can something like this be legal? Apparently in California it isn’t.
I wish I was a San Francisco kid. Maybe then my parents would be
cool, and I wouldn’t feel so alone in the world.
Victoria
was born in the United Kingdom but emigrated to the United States at
age 21. She’s bisexual, genderqueer, happily married, and still
shouts in a British accent. She lives with her husband in
Pennsylvania where she spends a lot of time playing and talking about
video games, especially Japanese role-playing games.
Parker
Williams, MM
Good Book Reviews, Just
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Book Junkie, BFD Book Blog,
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Tales and Reviews, Scattered
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Lolly, Wake Up Your Wild Side,
Fangirl
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Moon Dreaming, Vampires,
Werewolves, and Fairies, Oh My, My
Fiction Nook, Ogitchida
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Book Reviews,
Inked
Rainbow Reads
Congratulations on your new release! Thank you for the interesting introduction to The Camp and the chance for the giveaway.
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