Rainbow Boys
Rainbow Boys by Alez Sanchez is the book before Rainbow High and Rainbow Road, and is a wonderful and informative book on how three boys live their lives either being gay, coming out to their parents, and accepting who they truly are.
Rainbow Boys focuses on three boys:
- Jason Carillo: Good looking basket ball jock; beautiful girlfriend; popluar; confused; has issues with his father.
- Kyle Meeks: Great swimmer; on the swim team; nice and friendly; smart; gay; afraid to come out to his parents about being gay; totally in love with Jason
- Nelson Glassman: Gay; independent; has opinions on a lot; bold; not afraid to stand out; proud of being who he is; and might be in love with his best friend, Kyle.
It is told in third person and switches from Jason to Kyle to Nelson. At the beginning of the book, Jason is walking around the block, building up his courage to finally walk into a building where they host Rainbow Youth Meetings on Saturday mornings.
Rainbow Youth Meetings is a place Gay's and Lesbian's to socially interact with each other and learn about HIV, ADD, how to prevent from getting it and other important topics.
Jason heard about the meeting from some people on "Rainbow Youth Hotline," a hotline for gay's, lesbian's, bisexual's and confused people to call if they ever needed advice.
When Jason finally walks in, he's surprised to see Nelson Glassman and Kyle Meeks there. Nelson, you see, is the school 'fag' and Kyle, well, Kyle is just a great swimmer that Jason says "Wha's up?" to when they see each other.
Throughout the whole book, you can see how each teen deals with their problems and how cruel some kids at school can be to the 'queers.' Rainbow Boys has also shows how sometimes your sexuality affects you academically, and that's just not right. It shouldn't matter whether your gay or not.
In Rainbow Boys, they also start a GSA [Gay-Straight Alliance]. It can help the gay students so that they won't be abused or harassed because their different. It can also help inform you more about gay's and lesbian's.
At the end of the spectacular book, there is information about, organizing a peer group, violence and hate crimes against gays and lesbians, human rights campaigns, issues with Parents, HIV [Human Immunodeficiency Virus] and AIDS [Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome], teen sexuality, gay and lesbian teen suicides, gay and lesbian teen service on the internet as well as information on youth activism and advocacy.
Curious to find out more about Jason, Nelson and Kyle? Or are you utterly repulsed by gays and lesbians? Either way, READ IT.
