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yikeslou's review against another edition
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
Pony is a sweet, hilarious, and relatable MC who is surrounded by a troop of assholes (mostly teens which is semi excusable, they're still finding themselves and learning etc etc, kids are inherently a little self centered, still frustrating to read). Everything wrapped up VERY quickly compared to the slow burning romance plot, but hey I love a happy ending so I can't complain too much
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Hate crime, Suicidal thoughts, and Transphobia
Moderate: Alcoholism
Minor: Deadnaming, Death, Eating disorder, Sexual assault, Lesbophobia, Outing, Alcohol, and Dysphoria
readingwithkaitlyn's review against another edition
challenging
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body shaming, Bullying, Deadnaming, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Mental illness, Misogyny, Sexual assault, Terminal illness, Transphobia, Violence, Lesbophobia, Outing, Toxic friendship, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Child abuse, Death, Drug use, Infidelity, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Medical content, Alcohol, and Sexual harassment
Minor: Alcoholism, Biphobia, Child death, Death, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual content, Suicide, Excrement, Vomit, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury
use of f slurloiseigenraam's review against another edition
dark
emotional
funny
informative
inspiring
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I really appreciate this book for the story it tells, but it being a YA story I'm just 'too old' to really appreciate the teenage drama that is going on in the book. Things like the prank war between the football team and the cheerleading squad or the 'jokes' Georgia made really had me rolling my eyes.
Besides that, I did enjoy the book and the story. I found it very interesting, and heart wrenching, to see the world through a transgender boy's eyes. I really liked Pony as a character too. Lets just not talk about his name though... I also sobbed my eyes out ofc. I agree with all the reviews saying this book should come with trigger warnings. Please look those up if you have any triggers before you read this book.
I definitely recommend this book for the transgender POV and learning more about that. And if you're a younger reader, you might also enjoy the whole story around that too.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Transphobia, and Violence
Moderate: Emotional abuse, Homophobia, and Suicidal thoughts
Minor: Deadnaming
wrinnola's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body shaming, Bullying, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Transphobia, and Violence
Moderate: Bullying, Cursing, Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Suicidal thoughts, Lesbophobia, Outing, and Dysphoria
Minor: Drug use, Mental illness, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Vomit, and Toxic friendship
maxmaxmax's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Child abuse, Deadnaming, Hate crime, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Medical trauma, Outing, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail
journey2's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
Sometimes I need to take my own advice. If you are not loving a book...it's okay to quit it. And you probably should.
But I wanted to see how it ended.
~☆~ minor spoilers~☆~
Stay Gold was not a good read for me. I found this book frustrating. The characters annoyed me and everyone seemed extremely superficial.
Pony is relentless about the "friend zone" thing with Georgia. She continues to say no to his advances and he continues to pursue. Yes, she likes him, but she has clearly said no and he will not give up and keeps asking for more; including love bombing her with a grand gesture, until he can eventually win her over.
Our main love interest, Georgia, is so obsessed with her image and social standing right til nearly the end and her change of heart is supposed to be endearing, but by the time we got there I was just so tired of how fake she was.
I know that in high school everybody's figuring out who they are and who they want to be, but absolutely every character was so fake and two dimensional. In the end, superficial apologies and excuses like "it's just locker room talk" etc seem to 'fix' every off-colour comment or remark. Pony's dad was absolutely horrible to him throughout the entire book and his mom was kind of just complacent and didn't fight for him. A couple sentences at the very end of the book are supposed to redeem him but they just felt forced. Even though lots of things ended up being happy or at least happier, I found this book extremely problematic, frustrating and annoying and I do not recommend it.
I'm curious as to what the purpose of the storyline about Pony's job served. It didn't really go anywhere except to allow Pony to be nosy and intrusive into somebody else's business and then he got to have a warm fuzzy feeling afterwards. On that note, Pony continued to stick his nose into business that is not his own and it was very annoying. There was a time when Pony and Georgia stuck their noses into something so personal that I actually took time away from the book because I was exasperated. He was rewarded for it eventually, but it was annoying to read.
This book was 100% not for me and was just completely filled with red flags.
I could go on, but I won't!
Also it's list of trigger warnings is a mile long
But I wanted to see how it ended.
~☆~ minor spoilers~☆~
Stay Gold was not a good read for me. I found this book frustrating. The characters annoyed me and everyone seemed extremely superficial.
Pony is relentless about the "friend zone" thing with Georgia. She continues to say no to his advances and he continues to pursue. Yes, she likes him, but she has clearly said no and he will not give up and keeps asking for more; including love bombing her with a grand gesture, until he can eventually win her over.
Our main love interest, Georgia, is so obsessed with her image and social standing right til nearly the end and her change of heart is supposed to be endearing, but by the time we got there I was just so tired of how fake she was.
I know that in high school everybody's figuring out who they are and who they want to be, but absolutely every character was so fake and two dimensional. In the end, superficial apologies and excuses like "it's just locker room talk" etc seem to 'fix' every off-colour comment or remark. Pony's dad was absolutely horrible to him throughout the entire book and his mom was kind of just complacent and didn't fight for him. A couple sentences at the very end of the book are supposed to redeem him but they just felt forced. Even though lots of things ended up being happy or at least happier, I found this book extremely problematic, frustrating and annoying and I do not recommend it.
I'm curious as to what the purpose of the storyline about Pony's job served. It didn't really go anywhere except to allow Pony to be nosy and intrusive into somebody else's business and then he got to have a warm fuzzy feeling afterwards. On that note, Pony continued to stick his nose into business that is not his own and it was very annoying. There was a time when Pony and Georgia stuck their noses into something so personal that I actually took time away from the book because I was exasperated. He was rewarded for it eventually, but it was annoying to read.
This book was 100% not for me and was just completely filled with red flags.
I could go on, but I won't!
Also it's list of trigger warnings is a mile long
Content Warnings
Moderate: Bullying, Cursing, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Transphobia, Suicide attempt, Outing, and Sexual harassment
beastbark's review against another edition
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Hate crime, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Transphobia, and Violence
Moderate: Homophobia
Minor: Sexual content
that_bookworm_guy's review against another edition
dark
emotional
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
This is a hard book to review because right up until the ends, I really didn't like the characters. I get the point being made, I do. Some of the trans information and statistics were well done and a good addition.
First of all, I defo want to put here that I am a trans man. So this is my view as just 1 trans person.
First of all, the romance. I'm defo not great at reading romance, but I definitely didn't find it cute. This could just be me, I'm really aware that romance just isn't my thing. But it felt so focused. I hated, hated how Pony chased Georgia after she said she didn't want to date him. He was counting down the days it had been since they kissed and was purposely making situations hoping for a kiss. And then after a big love show, she turned him down because he is trans and she was worried about her image. I know this is meant to be a point of growth for the characters as she learns that it doesn't matter but yeah, I didn't like this.
Max, a trans friend, keeps putting pressure on Pony to be out and proud as a trans man when he keeps repeating that he wants to live stealth after what happened before. Then threatens that if he isn't out he will end the friendship. Emotional blackmail. Nope. As a trans person, I don't know a single trans person who would do this to another trans person. He does apologise later, but only after Pony comes out and gets attacked. Max is an incredibly shitty person and apologising is the very least, but yeah, I defo wouldn't trust or forgive someone for doing that. This is such a harmful situation, Pony should have 100% cut Max out of his life at the first sign of emotional manipulation. I really hope trans youths know that they don't ever have to come out like this. I live stealth in my life at work and I would 100% cut out a friend who expected me to share things online such as Facebook where it could risk outing me. Because respect is the least I ask for. Let alone from another trans person.
The book also got very dark very suddenly at the end. I understand it happens in life. That trans people get assaulted, and that trans people are at a higher risk of suicide. But I just don't think this was handled well at all. It was almost sudden with no warning.
If you're expecting a cute romance with some hard hitting bits, then it's worth looking into the TWs. Because this gets incredibly dark.
There is also theme throughout where Georgia is trying to find out Pony's deadname. It's revealed in the end, and although Georgia says that she didn't really need to know what it was and it doesn't matter, it would have been a much nicer thing if the name was never revealed to the reader. If it truly doesn't matter, then don't mention it. I understand the point that was trying to be made, but it would have made a bigger point to not make a huge point of it. The first 2 letters are revealed part way through the book and I feel like it almost leads the reader to want to figure out his deadname.
I've rated this 2.5/3* simply because there were some good points in this book and I was semi enjoying the train wreck of the romance thinking that it was just me not enjoying romance, but there are definitely some huge red flags with the romance.
First of all, I defo want to put here that I am a trans man. So this is my view as just 1 trans person.
First of all, the romance. I'm defo not great at reading romance, but I definitely didn't find it cute. This could just be me, I'm really aware that romance just isn't my thing. But it felt so focused. I hated, hated how Pony chased Georgia after she said she didn't want to date him. He was counting down the days it had been since they kissed and was purposely making situations hoping for a kiss. And then after a big love show, she turned him down because he is trans and she was worried about her image. I know this is meant to be a point of growth for the characters as she learns that it doesn't matter but yeah, I didn't like this.
Max, a trans friend, keeps putting pressure on Pony to be out and proud as a trans man when he keeps repeating that he wants to live stealth after what happened before. Then threatens that if he isn't out he will end the friendship. Emotional blackmail. Nope. As a trans person, I don't know a single trans person who would do this to another trans person. He does apologise later, but only after Pony comes out and gets attacked. Max is an incredibly shitty person and apologising is the very least, but yeah, I defo wouldn't trust or forgive someone for doing that. This is such a harmful situation, Pony should have 100% cut Max out of his life at the first sign of emotional manipulation. I really hope trans youths know that they don't ever have to come out like this. I live stealth in my life at work and I would 100% cut out a friend who expected me to share things online such as Facebook where it could risk outing me. Because respect is the least I ask for. Let alone from another trans person.
The book also got very dark very suddenly at the end. I understand it happens in life. That trans people get assaulted, and that trans people are at a higher risk of suicide. But I just don't think this was handled well at all. It was almost sudden with no warning.
If you're expecting a cute romance with some hard hitting bits, then it's worth looking into the TWs. Because this gets incredibly dark.
There is also theme throughout where Georgia is trying to find out Pony's deadname. It's revealed in the end, and although Georgia says that she didn't really need to know what it was and it doesn't matter, it would have been a much nicer thing if the name was never revealed to the reader. If it truly doesn't matter, then don't mention it. I understand the point that was trying to be made, but it would have made a bigger point to not make a huge point of it. The first 2 letters are revealed part way through the book and I feel like it almost leads the reader to want to figure out his deadname.
I've rated this 2.5/3* simply because there were some good points in this book and I was semi enjoying the train wreck of the romance thinking that it was just me not enjoying romance, but there are definitely some huge red flags with the romance.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Deadnaming, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Lesbophobia, Outing, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail
cryscries's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.75
I’m being generous about the rating because genuinely the first half of the book was cute - cringe but cute. The second half was not as great and overall there was just a lot of things about this book that I wish was developed a bit better.
Pros: there is a trigger warning in one of the pages before the story begins in the paperback version.
Cons:
1. It was hard to root for the main two characters - especially the main love interest. Georgia is supposed to represent probably a typical cis person reaction but i found it so hard to feel bad for her and her issues. I find her to be rather self centered (even tho she is characterized to kinda be insecure) - throughout the story even though she “gets better” as a person it still doesn’t make up for how she’s acted in the rest of the book. Very passive with standing up for her friends and pony, thoughts of outing him out of jealousy, definitely needs new friends who should be supportive.
2. Everything kinda just works out in the end for pony but it feels a little lack luster in the end of how he gets to where he is - his change feels more said than done.
3. Major problems with the side character max- tho I feel there was a lot of stereotypes in this book, o felt Max’s character was rather toxic. FIRST THINGS FIRST, you do not need to come out if you are not ready and you do not need to come out to show that you are supportive of the community. Do things at your own time. I had problems with max being rather pushy towards pony in wanting him to come out when it is definitely not safe to, have him drop the friendship because pony doesn’t want to be out, and then says he’s proud of pony for coming out at the cost of being beaten up because “it happens everyday”
There were some cute moments in this book but there was too much problems to overlook that.
Pros: there is a trigger warning in one of the pages before the story begins in the paperback version.
Cons:
1. It was hard to root for the main two characters - especially the main love interest. Georgia is supposed to represent probably a typical cis person reaction but i found it so hard to feel bad for her and her issues. I find her to be rather self centered (even tho she is characterized to kinda be insecure) - throughout the story even though she “gets better” as a person it still doesn’t make up for how she’s acted in the rest of the book. Very passive with standing up for her friends and pony, thoughts of outing him out of jealousy, definitely needs new friends who should be supportive.
2. Everything kinda just works out in the end for pony but it feels a little lack luster in the end of how he gets to where he is - his change feels more said than done.
3. Major problems with the side character max- tho I feel there was a lot of stereotypes in this book, o felt Max’s character was rather toxic. FIRST THINGS FIRST, you do not need to come out if you are not ready and you do not need to come out to show that you are supportive of the community. Do things at your own time. I had problems with max being rather pushy towards pony in wanting him to come out when it is definitely not safe to, have him drop the friendship because pony doesn’t want to be out, and then says he’s proud of pony for coming out at the cost of being beaten up because “it happens everyday”
There were some cute moments in this book but there was too much problems to overlook that.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Deadnaming, Hate crime, Homophobia, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Transphobia, Outing, Gaslighting, and Dysphoria
am_brooker's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Deadnaming, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, and Transphobia