When Love Comes to Town

When Love Comes to Town

by Tom Lennon

It's the 90's in Dublin, Ireland, and Neil Byrne is finally becoming who he was always meant to be.  He's finishing his exams and preparing for his future.

He's also preparing to live as a gay man instead of hiding as a gay teen.

For the first time in his life, Neil starts to go out and meet other gay men to try and figure out this society that's eluded him all this time, but in which he feels he belongs.

Surrounded by family and school friends who constantly disparage gays and tell off-color jokes, Neil's more than a little afraid of what will happen if the truth gets out.

But what will happen to his heart and soul if he never is true to himself?

Final thoughts:  Interesting take on the problems of one teen coming to grips with his own being, as well as the fears and prejudices of those around him.  Just twenty years after it was written, it's hard to imagine what it must have been like for a teen in heavily Catholic Ireland before social media and cell phones, let alone what it must have been like for a gay teen.  Sadly, Neil is never really a sympathetic character and the constant interior monologues, especially toward the end, become difficult to follow.  It felt more like the author didn't want to take the time to describe certain scenes, so he just had Neil stream-of-consciousness monologue those moments. OK for today's teens, but probably much more impactful when it was originally written in 1993.

Rating: 3/5

Positively

Positively

by Courtney Sheinmel

Emerson "Emmy" Price was diagnosed with HIV when she was only four years old.  Her mother died from complications due to AIDS when Emmy was just 13.  And now Emmy's entire world has flipped.

She's living with her dad (who abandoned her and her mother soon after the diagnosis) and his new wife, who happens to be very pregnant.

For a while, whenever she does something, Emmy thinks, "This is the first time I've done _____ without a mother."  Later, she thinks about how her mother will never be able to see her do things ever again.  After a while, Emmy even questions the purpose of taking her medications at the same time every day, three times a day.  Would it really matter if she was a little late?  Would it be so horrible if she skipped a dose?

Her dad and stepmother keep trying to reach out to her, and Emmy knows that they are doing it because they love her, but every thought of being nice in return makes her feel like she's betraying her mother.

After going a little crazy and scaring her stepmother, Emmy's dad decides she needs to get away for a while.  So he sends her to Camp Positive, a six-week summer camp that solely designed for HIV-positive girls.  While she doesn't want to go, Emmy has no choice, and now she's with a group of girls just like her.

Will it make a difference?

Final thoughts:  I liked Sheinmel's earlier book, My So-Called Family, so I had good feelings walking into this one.  She could have treated this subject in a very dark way, and Emmy can be very dark, but the overall feeling is one of positivity.  My only complaint would be that the writing from Emmy's point of view felt younger than her 13 years.  I occasionally felt like she was around nine or ten, just by the sentence structure and vocabulary.  Overall, though, a good book and a great resource for kids who are dealing with HIV/AIDS in their own homes and bodies.

Rating: 4/5