Openly Straight discussion

I must highly recommend the novel, "Openly Straight" by Bill Konigsberg. This is a story of labels and the desire to change ones' label or even to become labeless; then it takes to just being accepting of each person and their label. The main character, Rafe. is an openly gay guy who has unique and colorful parents. Even though his parents, along with his school, friends, and community were all very accepting of his announcement of being gay, he found himself being labeled as "the gay guy" and needing to search for who "he" was... was he just "the gay guy"? On a need to find himself and create himself he chooses to attend a private, all boys boarding school, across the country for his Junior year. Somewhere were he is not known as the gay guy. He chooses to keep this piece of information to himself as he meets his new classmates and school. Rafe has a wonderful personality and I laughed the whole booked through! Rafe will learn about himself in ways he didn't expect, including that hiding information, such as him being gay, can feel like a lie and a betrayal. He also gets to learn what life is like as being someone other than "that gay guy", like being "a jock". Rafe will go through every emotion and awkward situation that you can imagine, and keep you wanting to turn the page. This is my first LGBT novel that I have read, with a narrative from a young gay man. I adored the main character along with the supporting characters and how they all interacted. I highly recommend this to all students. Labeling applies to everyone in some way. At some point everyone wonders what life would be like as a different "label" and this story takes you on that journey and finds its way back to being able to just accept who you are and others.