Pride Must be a Place, by Kevin Craig

[Ulysses]

Pride Must be a Place
By Kevin Craig
MuseItUp Publishing, 2018
Four stars

I mostly loved this book – loved the writing, loved the characters (especially the central teenager, Ezra Craine), loved the story arc that took things in slightly different directions than the basic coming out in high school story.

In a provincial Canadian town, Ezra has to deal with a hostile and (he’s sure) homophobic father on the one hand, while on the other hand coping with his second-best friend Alex Mills. Alex has been friends with Ezra since middle school, but is much more obviously gay (or so Ezra thinks) and thus a target. When the school jock king, Will Severe, bloodies Alex’s nose once too often, Ezra decides – with the encouragement of his best friend Nettie, that their high school needs a gay-straight alliance. The book is essentially the story of the creation of this alliance, and the various complications – some of them pretty dark – that ensue.

The twist in this book is the unhappy truth that not all gay people are automatically good people. The rather painful moral dilemma raised in this book – and effectively raised – is this: at what point does one lose sympathy for someone gay, even when they have been victimized – sometimes violently – by homophobes? This is central to Ezra Craine’s journey to realizing what really matters to him in a friendship. When does redemption come for a bully? When does friendship die? At what point do victimization and social prejudice no longer excuse bad behavior?

I held off one star on this mostly wonderful book, because I am not happy EVER with the idea that a gay person EVER “has it coming.” I was also not happy with the idea that bloody violence against another person is EVER justified. Sure, people disappoint us and might deserve to lose our friendship, but nobody ever deserves to be beaten to a pulp. Never.

Secondly, I think the parents in this book – a flaw I see in too many YA LGBTQ books – were far too weakly drawn and inactive, with the major exception of Marc Tremblay’s amazing family. Ezra’s own father gets a pass that he really does not deserve.

I urge people to read this and decide for themselves. Craig’s a wonderful writer and this book will really make you think.