A review by brokenrecord
If This Gets Out by Cale Dietrich, Sophie Gonzales

2.0

2.5 stars. This was fine but not what I was looking for. I generally prefer more of a slow burn, but here,

Spoiler

they kiss fairly early on, and then it leads to a classic misunderstanding between them for awhile because Ruben thinks Zach is straight and Zach needs space to figure out his feelings, but they barely interact during that period of tension. When they finally talk and get together halfway through the book, that's basically it for the relationship development. At that point they're together and happy about their relationship but have to deal with the external pressure from the band management and not being able to come out. There's a little at the end about Zach being more go with the flow and less determined to come out because he just wants everyone to be happy, but after like one talk he's like, "Oh actually I do want to come out and be with you, screw the band."

It's not that it was terrible, but the story ended up being more about the band being overly managed/controlled, when I thought I was getting an m/m romance in the setting of a pop band. The romance almost felt secondary to the band as a whole. The characters also came off a bit younger than I was expecting. I mean, it's YA, and the characters are all 18, so it's probably my own fault for not adjusting my expectations, but I guess I would've liked something with band members maybe more in their 20s. I also felt like some of the resolution at the end was a little too easy and tied up too neatly, and the romance got super cheesy by the end.

Spoiler

The coming out on stage scene felt overly scripted, rang completely false, and made me cringe.

I mean, again, this was fine, it's not a terrible book, and if it sounds like it'd be up your alley, you probably won't be disappointed, but it fell flat for me.