First finish of June, We Are Totally Normal by Rahul Kanakia. It’s about a boy who’s questioning his sexuality in his junior year of high school. It was supposed to be his best year ever.

It often seemed like Nandan was using his relationship to get closer to his ex-girlfriend, because he really just wanted to be friends with her and run in her circle. There was a lot of what could be read as internalized homophobia — it was painful. The level of disgust in Nandan’s internal thoughts made the ending seem unrealistic, especially without the space to truly process what he’d been thinking. I hate that I’m disappointed in this one.