Isaac by Curtis Garner

Isaac is a coming of age novel about first relationships, obsession, and finding who you are over a summer. Isaac is seventeen and is just finishing school, waiting to find out if he’ll get a place at his chosen university. He starts using an app to find men for sex, but when he meets twenty-eight year old Harrison at a party, he is suddenly infatuated, and their relationship takes over. As Isaac feels more and more that he cannot please Harrison, and pushes away the other people in his life, he has to ask himself difficult questions about what is really good for him.

This is a novel about queer growing up in the modern age, without focusing too hard on the digital elements to distract from the timeless story of unhealthy relationships and self-worth. It is set over a summer, but moves quite quickly through it, and the ending gives enough space to going beyond that time to see how Isaac moves forward, rather than just ending on a turning point without resolution. I liked how tender the ending is, not some romanticised perfect ending but showing signs of Isaac finding ways to keep growing and know that the summer isn’t the start and end of everything. Alongside this, there’s also Isaac’s relationship with his mum, which also faces turbulence, but ultimately is always safety for Isaac to return to. The writing style is straightforward, and the general vibe makes the book feel like the next step to growing up, capturing adolescence and mistakes, darkness and tenderness.

There’s some difficult topics explored in the novel, like toxic relationships, abuse, and body image, which are worth being aware of going in, and in particular it shines a light on some of the ways the modern world has impacted these things, without being entirely focused on apps or social media (for example, Isaac’s body image issues are more based on real life than because he’s seeing a lot of Instagram posts or something). It captures that moment when you think you’re an adult but really you’re still very much working out who you might even be and how others might see you, and ends with hope.