Simon Spier, middle child in a very close-knit family is sixteen years old and gay. Not that anyone but his pen pal Blue knows this, until class clown Martin looks over his shoulder at the library and discovers his secret. Simon suddenly finds himself blackmailed. Help Martin get a chance with his friend Abby, or Martin outs Simon to the whole school. This might also mean that Blue’s identity is in some way compromised. Simon doesn’t want to help Martin, but feels he doesn’t have any other choice.
Simon doesn’t really do drama, except in the sense of being part of the school musical. The fact that there are tensions among his life-long friends after Abby was added to the mix, and he’s slowly falling more for Blue, who he’s falling for, even though he doesn’t know which of the boys in school it is, means Simon’s life is becoming a lot more eventful and constantly pushes him out of his comfort zone. Will Simon continue to let Martin blackmail him? Will his friends Nick and Leah adjust to the fact that Nick is in love with Abby? Will Simon ever discover the true identity of Blue, and do they have a chance as a couple if he does?
Once again, I’m not the first of the Cannonballers to review this, and I’d also seen it very favourably written-up over on Forever Young Adult. My full thoughts on the book, plus how lucky kids today are to have such amazing stuff to read (they have NO idea), can be found here.
Ahhhh, I need to read this!
Yeah, you do.