Reviews tagging 'Sexual content'

Continental Divide by Alex Myers

1 review

seawarrior's review

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adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This book was a wonderful experience to read, even during the most terrifying passages. As an East Coast boy who grew up dreaming what it would be like to leave to the West, the back cover description immediately drew me in, and the story only got more engrossing from there. Even the passages describing things that should have been sort of dull made me want to read without stopping. 

I loved following Ron's journey from wanting to prove himself as a 'real' man to learning to accept himself as a transgender one. That sort of grieving denial isn't always approached with wisdom in our community, and definitely not by the world at large. Once Ron realized that he does have the option to come out to people and be treated with respect and kindness, his surprise mirrored my own. When you spend your life being rejected for being transgender, and experiencing or witnessing violence towards those who are out, it really does get difficult to remember that all people aren't out to harm you. And equally importantly, it can be hard to remember that when people do wish to harm you, you don't have to withstand that violence alone.

The most rewarding part of this book for me was reading about Ron finding a place to belong and feel like himself
in the Forest Service
. A little over a year ago I quit working at a place where I always felt a sense of terror simmering under my surface, knowing that the guys I worked with were the tough, masculine type who'd call me slurs or possibly do something even worse if I didn't earn their respect. After leaving that job and entering more accepting and less aggressive environment, it's hard to even make sense of why I felt like it was necessary to earn their type of twisted respect at all. It seemed like safety at the time, but as I'm growing up and growing older and growing less angry, I'm learning that what matters is to surround yourself with people who respect who you are when you're not putting on a courageous front, and you love you, and who will stand up for you. Through those types of people, we learn to know and respect ourselves. Essentially, I feel like Ron discovered the same thing, and it was reliving to witness. The only qualm I really had with this story was the significance age gap between him and his love interest. It wasn't really predatory, but I still found it unnecessary and off-putting. 

I would definitely recommend this story to other readers. I didn't find it difficult to read, and it was easy to get lost in the pages describing Ron's life in the West. The story does get very upsetting in some parts though, so I'd also recommend going through the list of content warnings first. 
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