Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli

✨🌈“My parents have a way of ruining things like this...It's like they have this idea of me, and whenever I step outside of that, it blows their minds.” 🌈✨

Becky Albertalli’s ‘Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda’ revolves around Simon, a teenager who is in the closet. His parents, mainly his father, unknowingly comments and jokes which seem to assert gender stereotypes. This discourages Simon from accepting his own sexuality. Fear of judgment and change, Simon hesitates to come out to his friends.

One night, in an anonymous post on the school blog, one of the students states that he’s gay. Simon, after pondering for a while, decides to communicate with him. He confides in him and they start conversing over mails. Simon quickly falls for his epistoler.

Unfortunately, one of the guys, Martin, from the school sees these mails on the library computer and decides to blackmail Simon into being his wingman and set him up with ones of his friends. What follows is a story that grips the reader and takes them on a journey with Simon- he does everything so keep his secret and does anything to set up Martin and his friend, Abby; all the while falling in love with Blue. His fear of losing Blue drives him to make certain decisions which are detrimental not only to his friends but to him as well.

The plot is quite hilarious, adorable and heartbreaking. When Simon finally decides to come out following everything he has endured, he starts with his family. His mom accepts him but his father finds it quite difficult to do so initially, who finally comes around and apologises to Simon for being insensitive. Simon apologises to his friends for the pain he causes them. The story finishes with Blue and Simon finally getting together.

It is a good YA teen romance novel with well crafted queer characters; the general plot is enjoyable and the sensitive topics and themes are dealt with in a tasteful manner.

Albertalli’s writing is simple yet effective- it transports readers into the world she has created. Her balance of the upsides and the downsides in the story is note-worthy. The funny moments are actually quite hilarious, the adorable moments are heartfelt and the sorrowful moments are quite tear-jerking.

The movie, ‘Love, Simon’, based on the novel, goes a pretty good job of adaptation. Of course, I am not entirely happy with the creative liberty taken by the writers but the movie overall was wholesome. The trailer actually, in my opinion, was very well done. The whole campaign-like the notion of “Why is straight the default?” in which the heterosexual characters come out as straight to their parents and they react in an exaggerated manner- this really caught my attention because it raised the question about why is it that homosexual people have to announce their identity as opposed to just being accepted without it being a big moment.

I highly recommend the book as well as the movie to anyone who wants to read or watch a heartfelt and romantic story about a closeted boy coming to terms with his identity.

🧡🏳️‍🌈This concludes the pride month content. I hope you guys enjoyed the content.

Do let me know in the comments on things you’d like to see on this blog, going further. I am open to suggestions. 🏳️‍🌈🧡