May the Best Man Win

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Well Done, Son" Guy: Lukas hopes that if he becomes Homecoming King and gets accepted into a top college, he can finally earn his parents' pride and save their marriage. after all that, having multiple chapters of friendship, love, power of community, butterfly and roses was just so messed up. the whole book y'all were the worst to each other, all characters, and now suddenly it's all peace and quiet among each other? how? Flipping the Bird: Sol flips Lukas off for making a campaign video for himself that featured footage of pre-transition Jeremy. But history can only move forward. And I refuse to let my transition define me. This is my senior year. It should be my time to shine. To lead the cheer team and SGA. Be crowned on the Homecoming Court. A few things I loved: The diversity of the characters! The second-chance-enemies-to-lovers romance! The friendships! The Homecoming King premise! The character growth! The character dynamics!

I think this is a really important addition to the YA contemporary canon, especially as a piece of trans fiction, but I can already tell that it's going to be polarizing and get a bad rap for having "unlikeable" characters. It's definitely one of those narrative car crashes you can't look away from, and I think I kind of loved it. With that said, I'm still processing what that means. Roaring, raging, and riotous, May the Best Man Win is a queer lovers-to-exes-to-enemies-to-lovers romance that will have you rooting for both Jeremy and Lucas to win homecoming king—and each other’s hearts. Overall this book was beautiful and fantastic and it made me cry so much! *remembers* I couldn't have asked for anything more...well maybe a less annoying Jeremy? But even Jeremy himself changed and I was really satisfied! Thank you Z.R. Ellor for writing this magnificent fantastic book! This will always stay in my heart ( ´◡‿ゝ◡`) Jan Carson, in a recent essay for the Stinging Fly, expressed a similar sentiment. In workshops, she saw students struggle to “make shit up”, instead producing “slightly amended accounts of incidents which had happened them”. There was no creative leap, no departure from the me/my/us, to the “other”. But as any decent writer or reader will tell you, seeing things from other perspectives is what literature is for.

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I flinch. The cheer team planned to wear pink and pearls for our yearbook photo. I bought the perfect outfit to immortalize my place as captain, but an untimely acne breakout distracted me on my way out the door this morning, and I left it at home. CWs: sibling death; ableism and internal ableism; misgendering, deadnaming, and transphobia; homophobia; bullying; racism; references to sexual harassment/assault; references to abusive parents and divorce; underage drinking; infidelity; graphic physical assault this is honestly on the edge of problematic but: the side characters deserved so much more. they were just there as plot devices which is...quite frustrating. especially sol and naomi, the "non-binary kid" and the "asian girl", as described in the book. i personally just can't handle characters who feel like they're there for diversity points and to further the plot. to use so the main characters can become closer. just...no please.

Olivia accepts Jasper's proposal. Edwin Clark's weasily actions helped elevate Jasper to a heroic level. He shrugs. But as I try to slide past him, he gives up on the glitter and puts a hand on my arm. “Hey. Are you okay?” he asks. And then I remember my blotchy red face and the cursed garment bag I’m holding. His voice is genuine and warm. Concerned. And I hate it. Because who the hell gets concerned about the feelings of their exes, especially after how mean I was to him? He probably just sees me as a hysterical girl he needs to calm down. Jeremy isn’t a character that you’re prone to like right from the start; he’s angry, he often lashes out, he has a tendency to only think of himself, and sometimes, anger and spite take over his entire personality. But, all cards on the table, I loved him immediately because I understood where he was coming from. As you go through the story, you learn Jeremy’s reasons for acting the way he does, how most of what he ends up doing is a protection mechanism because he always has to keep an eye out for any sort of disruption or hatred being flung his way. If you don’t sympathise with him from the beginning, I guarantee that you will by the end of the story because his journey is filled with so much growth that really spoke to me. My mom’s bringing my outfit, don’t worry,” I say. “I found this adorable salmon dress shirt and a tie covered in silk rosettes.” I don’t mention that I went to six different stores to find the XXS size, and I bought the super-skinny tie online. Years of practice mean I know my way around the mall, but even I could barely find formal clothes that don’t make me look like a kid playing dress-up in his dad’s suit.This villainous behavior was a good contrast to the good-natured Jasper Dale, who displayed courage and thoughtfulness. Something however, should be said for the boy who fell into the well. After all, if it wasn't for Teddy, Olivia might have reconsidered Edwin's proposal. Criticism

like it didn’t have all the tension and yearning i wanted sure?? but i did think the romance was written in a really interesting way! and there were mentions of neopronouns! and a nonbinary side character who i am in love with! and i liked the writing! and i didn’t actually get bored while reading for once! (i swear it’s just easier to talk about things you dislike than like ok)And when I say that they're truly battling it out for Homecoming King, I don't mean some light sabotage, spying, or shenanigans. I mean they are actively trying to hurt one another and hurt each other's chances, and they do things that could potentially harm themselves and other people, both physically and emotionally. There are times when they definitely cross the moral line, and it's purely because there is so much at stake for each of them. It is an ugly battle between two ruthless, unforgiving exes, and truth be told, that take-no-prisoners approach was one of the biggest draws of the story for me, because the book is not attempting to romanticize or sanctify either character, which is something we rarely see especially in queer YA fiction. Because the world values our lies over our truths, our silence over our voices, our deaths over our lives. “Our story is supposed to be about suffering,” I tell the GSA. “I propose we shine.” But Caldwell seems to burst open the notion of Irishness completely, interrogating, first, her own “complicated relationship” with the place she’s from, then setting out her wish to portray the “fresh narratives, perspectives and multiplicities that are coming from immigration to a place so long and persistently defined by emigration.”

edit AGAIN: when i first read this i gave it 4.5 stars bc i had been so excited for it for so long and it was hard to even give it something THAT low despite...being deeply disappointed by it. but current topics has finally motivated me to give it the rating it has in my heart at last so!! yay!! On top of that, this book has a great, diverse cast of secondary characters, some absolutely mischievous shenanigans and authentic and relatable autism representation. May The Best Man Win follows Lukas and Jeremy, two senior boys who are both competing for the spot of homecoming king. The catch is that Lukas and Jeremy used to date before Jeremy came out.Roaring, raging, and riotous, May the Best Man Win is a queer lovers-to-exes-to-enemies-to-lovers romance that will have you rooting for both Jeremy and Lucas to win homecoming king—and each other’s hearts." — The Nerd Daily TW: Transphobia, dead naming, misogyny, bullying, attempted sexual assault, harassment, violence, homophobia, ableism Jeremy and Lukas were both very unenjoyable characters. They both had good personality traits but the bad definitely overweighted them. Their friends are constantly mistreated and it was so frustrating. It was tiring to see them just give out a simple apology and suddenly everything was fixed. The friends honestly deserved better. This work will shake you up a little. It will be like going to a “Foreign Movies No Subtitles group”, as two of Yan Ge’s characters do, or, as one of Lisa McInerney’s characters does, dating Gérard Depardieu without speaking any French. You might be expected to recalibrate your balance, to learn and relearn. Which is what’s great about it. You will gain something, if you hop aboard, look around; as the great American short story writer Lorrie Moore said, “see what can be done”. Niamh Donnelly