As someone who was a big fan fiction reader and Tumblr user as a teenager, the entire premise of this book is one that I absolutely would have been all over at Noah’s age, as much as I might have denied it at the time. Lee perfectly captures the yearning for love (or at least for a partner) that chronically-online teens experience as a reaction to an environment that doesn’t seem to love them all that much. Everything about Lee’s world feels real, teenage exaggeration and all, and while the story itself is mostly lighthearted, not everything is too smooth-going for the characters to make it feel unnatural.
I think the main thing that held me back from giving this five stars is Noah himself. He starts off the book with an understandably sour attitude, and it’s clear from the beginning that he’s incredibly self-absorbed, more so than you’d expect from a teenager. While this fades as the story goes on, I found him to be an unlikable protagonist – that isn’t to say it’s a bad thing; it just changed the tone of the story for me, and made his contrast with Devin all that more stark. I would have liked to maybe see more glimpses of Noah’s best qualities earlier on in the book, because as it is, we don’t really get that until maybe the last third of the story.
This is a very cute read that I’d recommend for anyone who likes solid, diverse YA romance. It’s great to know that trans kids have stories like this to see other trans kids finding love and acceptance, even if it’s not some grand love story.