The first books that portrayed gay characters in a positive light with no consequences for being gay were often banned, and in the end those that flourished were the novels that ended in tragedy, with the main characters dead or rejecting their attractions. I would later come to learn that this was incredibly common in earlier LGBTQ+ fiction. I found this almost more unsettling than anything that happened in the novel. I personally am not squeamish with my books, but I couldn’t help feeling like the mistakes and consequences characters faced in the book were written to be punishment for being gay. Sounds like a perfectly normal coming of age story, right? But this novel also has large amounts of internalized homophobia, racism, drug dealing, sexual assault, and a tragic death of a main character. He has a part time job, struggling parents, and complicated relationships with two potential love interests. The Vast Fields of Ordinary follows a gay teenager, Dade, through high school, coming out, and his love life. I read it the summer of 2010, and it was a very strange and tragic introduction to the genre. The first book I read that had LGBTQ+ characters was a young adult book called The Vast Fields of Ordinary, by Nick Burd.
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