It's Our Prom (So Deal With It)

March 19, 2012
When Azure’s principal asks her to join the senior prom planning committee to increase its inclusivity, the gay student recruits her bisexual friend Luke and her crush Radhika for help. But their plans for a drag show and a tattoo and piercing artist spell trouble. There are other logistical problems as well, and both Azure and Luke want to ask Radhika to the dance. Peters (She Loves You, She Loves You Not...) offers a thoughtful premise, but readers may initially be turned off by the slow pacing of this book, told from Azure’s and Luke’s alternating perspectives; there are lots of meetings at which little is decided. Additionally, the subplots—the production of Luke’s school musical (he’s the “writer, producer, choreographer, director and star” of his coming-out story), Radhika’s ambivalence about going to Yale—are not all well developed, and the characters’ happy endings are perhaps overly neat. By the time the protagonists show up at the prom they have fought for, though, readers will be onboard with the resulting over-the-top fun. Ages 12–up. Agent: Wendy Schmalz, Wendy Schmalz Agency.

March 1, 2012
A ho-hum and largely affectless take on what is now well-trodden ground in LGBT teen fiction. Peters (She Loves You, She Loves You Not, 2011, etc.) gives her tale to two narrators. Excitable Azure is a lesbian who works in a thrift store and has a clandestine crush on her straight friend Radhika. Mechanically-inclined Luke is bisexual and producing a play based on his coming-out experience--and also has secret feelings for Radhika. After Azure's apparent protest the previous year that prom was not inclusive enough, the school principal asks her to join the prom-planning committee. Azure ropes in Luke and, eventually, Radhika too, and suddenly a small group of students and one inexperienced teacher are scrambling to put together a nontraditional prom on a shoestring. Meanwhile, the love triangle deepens, Luke's brother's friend harasses Luke and an old girlfriend reappears in Azure's life. Though it is an adequate romance, little is new here: Luke's play and its production feels derivative of and inferior to the musical extravaganza in John Green and David Levithan's Will Grayson, Will Grayson (2010), and Madeleine George, Brendan Halpin, Brian Sloan and others have written LGBT teens at prom with far greater panache. Furthermore, a premier LGBT author and her editors should know better than to refer to transgender people as "transgenders." Fails to dazzle. (Fiction. 12 & up)

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April 1, 2012

Gr 9 Up-Azure has a secret crush on her best friend, Radhika, but so does her other best friend, Luke, who happens to be bisexual. When Azure's principal asks her to join the senior prom committee to make it more inclusive, she jumps at the chance, but having no idea how to organize a prom, she enlists her friends' help. From the first meeting, organization goes awry with a clueless advisor and only one member who has ever been involved in planning the event. Fundraisers fall flat, the hotel ballroom burns, and friendships are almost lost, but predictably, in the end, the committee pulls off the best-attended prom ever, replete with royalty, poetry slam, and a drag show. The story is told in alternating chapters by Azure and Luke, with subplots revealing familial issues, such as Radhika's strained relationship with her education-minded parents, old and new romances, and Luke's coming out "musidramedy." While many readers will be a step ahead of the next plot twist, they should still enjoy a fun read about a Denver high school whose idea of inclusivity goes beyond the norm to include all "geeks, freaks, and uniques."-Betty S. Evans, Missouri State University, Springfield

Copyright 2012 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2012
Grades 8-11 Peters takes a walk on the lighter side with this prom story told through two protagonists (and best friends) who are both crushing on the third member of their circle. Bisexual Luke and lesbian Azure are both smitten with straight Radhika, whose micromanaging Indian parents are pushing hard for her to excel at absolutely everything. All three friends end up on the Prom Committee, trying to come up with a less expensive, more inclusive senior prom for their Denver high school. Alternating narratives from Luke and Azure paint a clear picture of out, confident teens who embrace and appreciate their strengths. There are plenty of comedic missed and mixed messages, but Peters does not shy away from addressing homophobia in schools, in both students and faculty, and the impact of a nonsupportive family. Peters' fans may be initially surprised by the fluffier subject matter but will appreciate her supportive portrayal of gay teens. Romance readers will enjoy this alternative peek at prom and think more carefully about their own schools' prom society and customs.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)