First published 2017
Tanner Scott has one semester left at Provo High before he escapes Utah and goes back to living openly as bisexual. He plans to do as little as possible. Then his best friend Autumn dares him to enroll in Seminar, a class where honor roll students spend four months writing a complete novel. Tanner signs up mostly to prove the whole thing is ridiculous. He is wrong about that. The class is run by Sebastian Brother, a Mormon student who sold his own Seminar novel the previous year and now mentors the new cohort. Tanner notices Sebastian immediately. Within weeks he is completely in love with him. The problem is real and specific: Sebastian is devout, his faith shapes every decision he makes, and a future with Tanner is not one his community will accept. Tanner has to decide how hard to push for something that may never be possible, and Sebastian has to decide whether the life he has always planned is the only life available to him. The book they are both trying to write keeps pulling them together even as everything else insists they stay apart.
Genres: coming-of-age, contemporary, young-adult, contemporary-romance, young-adult-romance
Vibes: bittersweet, emotional, intimate, introspective, tender, thought-provoking
Tropes: coming-of-age, forbidden-romance, friends-to-lovers, internal-conflict, slow-burn
Setting: Provo High, Utah
Period: contemporary
410 pages · Paperback · S&S Books for Young Readers
Content warnings: homophobia