Title: ⟫ Pictures of You (‘90s Coming of Age #1)
Author: ⟫ Leta Blake
Rating: ⟫ 4.5/5
Blurb: ⟫
Growing up gay isn’t easy. Growing up gay in Knoxville, Tennessee is even harder.
Eighteen-year-old Peter Mandel, a private school senior—class of 1991—is passionate about photography. Peter doesn’t have many friends, preferring to shoot pictures from behind the scenes to keep his homosexuality secret.
Enter Adam Algedi, a charming, worldly new guy who doesn't do labels, but does want to do Peter. Hardly able to believe gorgeous Adam would want geeky, skinny him of all people, Peter's swept away on a journey of first love and sexual discovery. But as their mutual web of lies spins tighter and tighter, can Peter find the confidence he needs to make the right choices? And will his crush on Daniel, a college acquaintance, open a new path?
Join Peter in the first of this four-part coming of age series as he struggles to love and be loved, and grow into a gay man worthy of his own respect.
This new series by Leta Blake is gay fiction with romantic elements.
Book 1 of 4.
Warning! These books contain: New Adult fiction, ‘90s gay life, small city homosexual experiences, Southern biases, sexual exploration, romance, homophobia, bisexuality, and twisted-up young love. Oh, and a guaranteed happy ending for the main character by the end of Book 4.
Review: ⟫ I saw the first three books offered for review at GRR and I hesitated – could I cope with a cliffhanger like that? Was it worth it?
Having read book 1, then I can categorically say that to me, the wait will be worth it. I decided to review each book that I have (books #1 – 3) after I had read them as that seemed the most fair. So this review only covers book 1 and I have waited to read book 2 so that it doesn’t influence things.
Peter Mandel is gay. It’s the 90s, AIDS has struck down many in the gay community, and in the small Southern town in which he has grown up, being gay is something that gets you beaten up – or worse.
I really enjoyed this story. Told entirely from Peter’s perspective, it’s an extremely insightful slice of life. Peter isn’t the popular kid, the jock or anything like that – he’s a loner who takes photographs, tries to avoid being noticed, and has changed schools due to bullying. He meets Adam at orientation and there begins a transformative experience that forces Peter to learn a lot about himself, about rights and wrongs, how it feels to be on both sides of the equation and life in general. Amidst all of that, he’s trying to pass his senior year and hide a huge aspect of his personality from practically everyone.
There were elements of this book I hated, some that made me cry (growing up in the 80s/90s, I kinda know some of the experiences that Peter had but from the race perspective and the writing brought some of that back), but many elements that made me think and feel happy. And that is perhaps the best way of describing this book – it makes you live in Peter’s shoes and feel what he’s feeling. The confusion, the frustration, the hurt and the joy – it all comes through from the page.
Although it’s a ‘cliffhanger’ the ending felt appropriate as it represented the end of a period in Peter’s life and being on the cusp of something new and different. I closed the book and sat and ruminated on many aspects of it, allowing myself to soak in what I had learned about and from Peter before considering opening book 2. I think it’s going to be a difficult thing to wait for book 4, but in the meantime, I have books 2 and 3 to keep me going.
A solid 4.5 from me. I received an ARC from GRR.
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