Back in 2019, I Wish You All The Best by Mason Deaver got published. This book is a queer YA novel with a non-binary main character. I wanted to read this book ever since it got published, but I was unfortunate. The English ebook and audiobook was not available in my country. I remained positive and the book remained on my radar. In late 2022, a Dutch publisher picked it up for translation which means that I was finally able to read it. You just don’t know how excited that made me. Little spoiler alert: I’m happy I’ve done so.
About the book
Title: I Wish You All the Best
Author: Mason Deaver
Publication date: May 14, 2019
Publisher: Push
ISBN: 9781338306125
Number of pages: 329
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
When Ben De Backer comes out to their parents as nonbinary, they’re thrown out of their house and forced to move in with their estranged older sister, Hannah, and her husband, Thomas, whom Ben has never even met. Struggling with an anxiety disorder compounded by their parents’ rejection, they come out only to Hannah, Thomas, and their therapist and try to keep a low profile in a new school.
But Ben’s attempts to survive the last half of senior year unnoticed are thwarted when Nathan Allan, a funny and charismatic student, decides to take Ben under his wing. As Ben and Nathan’s friendship grows, their feelings for each other begin to change, and what started as a disastrous turn of events looks like it might just be a chance to start a happier new life.
At turns heartbreaking and joyous, I Wish You All the Best is both a celebration of life, friendship, and love, and a shining example of hope in the face of adversity.
Expectations
Before reading, my expectations were quite high. I anticipated this book for years and many people in the book community were raging about it. I’m trying to diversify my reading as much as possible and a book with a non-binary main character was new to me. There were not many non-binary main characters back then. There still are not many, but it’s slowly changing (as far as I’m concerned). However, this is the first Dutch book – allbeit in translation – with non-binary rep I’ve stumbled upon. Mason Deaver identifies as non-binary and that makes this story own voices. Despite the fact I’m definately not the right person to judge the representation (I use she/her pronouns), I was curious about Ben’s story. I expected a coming out that didn’t go smoothly – understatement – and that readers get a good glimpse of the coming out process and the aftermath for someone. This book fully met these expectations.
Characters
Are you looking for a book that is so much more than a coming out? Then this book might be for you. From the first page it already becomes clear that Ben is really nervous to come out as non-binary to their parents. They already postponed it several times and in fact is still doing that within the first few pages. They wait for the right moment and blurt it out. You already know their parents’ reaction from the synopsis of the book. Ben gets kicked out of their house and has no clue where to go. They decide to call their sister Hannah and her husband Thomas from a payphone. Ben and Thomas actually never met, because they haven’t seen his sister in like 10 years. They can only hope they are welcome to stay at their place. To be fair I’m not shocked by the reaction of Ben’s parents as I found their dad really homophobic from the first moment I got to know him. Thankfully Ben is allowed to stay at Hannah’s and Thomas’. From that point onwards, you follow their journey from wanting to keep a low profile, suffering from and dealing with anxiety and panic attacks, to eventually self acceptance, self-love and the feeling to be able to be fully themselves with their friends. And especially with Nathan. Deaver excecuted this process very well in my opinion. You immediately feel for Ben when he is struggling and you just hope all goes well for them and everything will work out in the end. You already feel sympathy for Nathan as well. Inspite his struggles, he is a positive and happy guy. He actually finds out he is struggling later on in the book. All characters are excecuted well, but especially these two. However, the side characters are excecuted in the right way for the role they play in the book. Okay I hope i make sense as I struggle a lot with English when writing this review. In fact I wrote my Dutch review first and am translating it.
Writing
Deaver’s writing is easy to follow and therefore the book reads easy despite its heavy themes. I found some little spelling mistakes in the translation, but to be fair that’s fine with me. It’s impossible to get everything flawless isn’t it? The book read that easy to me that I actually put it down for several days just to be able to savour it longer.
Plot
The plot immediately intrigued me when I started this book. This is partially because of the writing, but also of the confrontational coming out that goes so horribly wrong. Ben did well, it’s nearly impossible to prepare such an important thing. Their parents’reaction still managed to shock me, although I knew that this was going to happen. Their entire behaviour throughout certain events later on was disturbing as well. Because this novel is character driven, the plot itsself is not extremely strong. Is this a bad thing? No, absolutey not. It fits this type of story well and a strong plot is not really necessary for character development. For me, character development is more important in contemporary novels than a strong, action-packed plot with high stakes. This book touches upon important themes such as (found) family, friendship, self-acceptance and mental health. I find it very refreshing that romance is not the main theme for once. This often is the case in other queer contemporary novels, so that’s what makes this book unique. Of course there is some romance, but it’s not dominating the book.
Conclusion
In the Netherlands, it seems like I Wish You All the best my Mason Deaver has stayed quite under the radar. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’ve not seen it as often as other types of books. However, I find it a bit sad though as this novel deals with such important themes and topics. The characters are excecuted well, something that really has to be done because its a character driven book and the plots leans on them and their development. I’m not the right person to judge the representation, but I got a good glimpse of the struggles Ben could face identifying as non-binary. the writing is accessible and easy to follow. Actually I haven’t found anything negative about this novel and I’m glad I finally have been able to read it.
Have you read this book already?
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