Eli is a trans man who’s returning to Florida for Christmas after his comedy career stalled; Nick is a divorced father whose life has stalled.

It feels like an authentic portrayal of Eli – a trans person who moved away from a red state; who looks down on people who stayed behind; who expects aggression or hatred at every turn; who doesn’t see the work his parents and others have done to make him comfortable. He is the stereotype of an annoying white gay, and in that sense it’s an excellent character study.

The problem is, I wasn’t rooting for him to be happy, or to end up with Nick.

Although the book is nominally split between their two points of view, Eli dominates the narrative. Nick has a lot of interesting history that’s never explored, like being one of just a few Asian children at the local school – an area of discussion that disappears into a sinkhole along with the school itself (literally). We could have had an interesting scene with Eli considering how he’d behaved towards Nick, but nothing.

There are several explicit sex scenes which felt very out of place. It feels like the author is going for sex positivity, to show that trans people can have sex – but the couple’s confidence didn’t fit the awkward, exploratory vibes in the rest of the book.

Although it’s a very different genre, this reminds me of Compound Fracture. Both have trans characters in a conservative part of the USA – but where Fracture is a story of a character who loves their home and desperately wants to stay, this book has characters who can’t wait to leave.

This book didn’t really work for me, and I think I’d have DNF’d if I wasn’t reading it for book club.

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