By L.C. (Lev) Rosen
(Little, Brown and Company, 2020)
To be sure, the recent upsurge in book bans is out of hand. In some school districts, all it takes is one parent to raise an objection for a book to be shelved…or rather, unshelved. Those in the book banning game can connect online to share titles and strategies. I’ve read about parents checking out all the offending books in a library and never returning them. Late fees? Shrug. It’s not like the head librarian is going to put a lien on their house where the offending books are probably more securely stored than blessed guns. Another parent donates new copies of the titles that went AWOL and they become perpetually overdue again.
It sounds childish, doesn’t it? Just like taking down Pride flags and seeing them replaced again and again until, as we saw a few months ago, someone gets fed up with the tit-for-tat and settles things with one of those blessed guns.
Free speech and the First Amendment have nothing on the big bang that comes with the Second Amendment.
The subject matter in L.C. (Lev) Rosen’s Camp is welcome. It’s needed in public libraries and high school libraries. It’s the kind of book that will ruffle feathers.
What’s all this talk about a young adult romance novel about a summer camp for queer teens?
Gays? A demisexual lesbian?
A counselor in drag?
Someone using the they pronoun?!
Sigh. If only the feathers were from dazzling boas rather than another delivery from the Pillow Guy.
L.C. Rosen
But then Rosen ups things a notch and I wonder what his motives are. I’m not sure if Camp is on banned book lists, but that may be Rosen’s objective. Ban bait. Word of mouth can be great for book sales (even though a ban from library shelves means many young readers will not be able to afford access to the targeted book).
First, a basic rundown of the story. Randall Kapplehoff is a sixteen-year-old gay camper who’s been going to Camp Outland every summer since he was twelve. Hudson Aaronson-Lim is another gay camper, same age, same number of stints at the camp. Randall has crushed on Hudson since the beginning. The problem is that Randall has never been on Hudson’s radar, much less gaydar. This is on the surface an opposites attract story in which Randall has spent his latest year away from camp trying to become Hudson’s ideal guy—a jock, not a musical theater geek; more muscle, less flab; deeper voice, less animated inflections; a drab, thrown together suitcase of bro clothes instead of a matchy wardrobe with Barbie tones. Randall—no, wait…he’s Del now, arrives at Outland as a “new” camper, all femme signs suppressed. Del’s going to be the “masc4masc” guy Hudson’s BoyDate profile says he’s looking for. He’ll make Hudson fall for him. He won’t be another of Hudson’s two-weeks conquests from summers past. This is going to be love. 4ver.
Yeah, I know. One big mess of a premise. But isn’t that adolescence? For all of us who ever teared up and sniffled listening to Janis Ian sing “At Seventeen,” the teen years are about survival and hoping the beatings to one’s self-esteem only leave emotional scabs without the scars. This summer adventure should not end well for Del/Randall.
But, hang on. This is a romance. It’s not life. A romance is REQUIRED to have a happily ever after.
I think that made me even more uncomfortable.
I hoped that the story would take a turn, opening up a new love path for the main character. Stop obsessing over the “masc” character! Let Randall finally see his femme best friend, George, returning with hair all over his body, as boyfriend material. Let snarky supporting character Montgomery suddenly declare he’s spent all these summers pining for Randall who’s been pining for Hudson.
SPOILER, NOT SPOILER, ALERT (it’s a romance, people!): this is a love story about Del/Randall & Hudson. It’s basically Grease Goes to Camp without the hand jive. Like Danny Zuko, Hudson isn’t just the player he’s known to be. He has a soft side. And, like Sandy Olsson, Randall’s trying to shake his Sandra Dee.
So…two boys find love. This is enough to incense book banners. Young gays are not allowed happy endings. Bring on the book banning debate. I’d jump in the melee. Let Camp remain camped out on bookshelves. Let it be checked out aplenty.
But then Rosen gifts book banners with more fodder. His young adult novel includes sex on the page. For much of the book, things are relatively watered down with multiple references to thighs touching when sitting in the mess hall, underwater kisses at the pool and erections remaining under clothing. Hands creep up under a t-shirt and slide under shorts to touch buttocks.
Both boys want more. It’s going to happen. Rosen gives the reader ample notice it will happen. But there’s still a higher ground message at play. First love, then, uh, you know…that.
The first aid kit at this queer camp is generously stocked with condoms and lube. It’s responsible. It’s pragmatic. How many people who’ve gone to camp have had a number of sexual firsts…or seconds or thirds? Teens of any sexual orientation have sexual experiences. There are banned books that include straight teens having sex. This allows someone seeking to remove Camp from a high school library to say they are undiscriminating in terms of sexual repression.
Sex is a difficult subject to write well. I find the same to be true with sports. Watching or participating in a tennis match, a triathlon or a basketball game can be exciting. On the page, it gets too technical in the telling. How do you make breathing or a racing heart sound exciting? In sports, it’s so calculated. Bottom of the ninth, a come from behind win. An unheralded teammate becomes the hero, the underdog team the victor. Rah-rah, no exclamation mark. As for sex, it’s a lot of switched positions, references to moaning and then that crossing of the finish line. Reading about it doesn’t come close to the real thing.
I mention this to make the point that the big sex scene doesn’t add much to the story. The key storytelling parts are the feelings of doubt and anticipation, the fumbling or the mastery of technique and how the episode changes (or doesn’t change) the participants, individually and collectively. Earlier this year, I read a work of gay literary fiction (for adults) in which the writer’s description of a sex romp included something akin to: “They tried every position possible…and a few more.” What? Lazy, clichéd writing. If the couple invented something, well then put THAT on the page. It may get tedious in describing the positional shifts, but what a reward for conscientious bookworms. Let readers embark on new adventures in the bedroom!
SPOILER ALERT. (Again.)
No new positions in Camp. I suppose part of the cringe factor for an adult reading about sex in a young adult novel is that the characters are underage and the reader isn’t. Yeah, eww. I braced as I read the pivotal chapter. My mind cued up a general maxim oft-stated for writers: Less is more. Rosen ignores this.
First comes a cliché. The characters get drenched in the rain. They take cover in their tents and, yes, they have to get out of their wet clothes. They’re naked in their (separate) sleeping bags. But then Rosen gets clever after the boys kiss. Since the story has been about how a masc and a femme character find common ground, Hudson says, “[T]here’s something I want you to do to me.”
Del/Randall says, “Okay,” [his] voice a little breathier than [he] means for it to be…
“Paint my nails?”
The boys share an intimate act. Nail polish in lieu of lube. Kudos to Rosen!
Hudson then says, “Can I do yours?” [“Can I do you?” would’ve been even better.]
Afterwards, Hudson says, “It felt…nice. Thank you. I’m glad it was you.”
Let painting nails be the euphemistic act. Make a few references to going beyond as the boys emerge from their tent the next day. Happy endings and whatnot.
But Rosen goes for it. Sex! It plays out over SEVEN pages. He avoids any references to the penis, but the action is clear enough with words like hard, stroking, deeper, panting, moaning, blow job, coughing, fingering. It’s seven pages, after all.
I see book banners frothing. Indignation! Harm! Innocence lost!
Cue counter-indignation. Censorship! Homophobia! Peddlars of Victorian courtship! Righteous talk about art and free speech.
Hello, publicity. An increase in online sales and ebooks checked out. Mission accomplished, I suppose.
I feel sorry for librarians and principals who get pulled into the fray. How much Extra Strength Tylenol will this latest battle require? What accusations must they endure? What relationships are damaged?
I’m all for queer stories with diverse, queer characters. Teens deserve books that reflect their world and their wonderings. Many literary advocates will say sex shouldn’t be censored, even when it comes to seven consecutive pages. Rosen does a decent job of including the main character’s thoughts throughout the protracted, consensual scene. It’s some parts realistic, some parts cliché. That can happen with any scene that runs long. Del/Randall mentions the elephant involved in the likely kerfuffle over free speech when the character thinks “this is not how it happens in porn.” Yes, porn is where so many teens make more sense of what fuddy-duddies may still refers to as “the birds and the bees.”
Camp is not an instructional manual. It’s not setting out to correct shaky sexual scenarios played out in porn. And yet seven pages may overshadow the more than three hundred fifty pages about whether the divide between femme and masc gays can be narrowed or eliminated. This is the topic Camp should be tackling, without inviting distractions. In this regard, Rosen takes a copout stance. It’s not actually femme versus masc because, in the end, Hudson’s true nature isn’t all that masc. This is the part of the story I wish Rosen considered tweaking. Let characters be different and come to respect their differences. Let opposites truly attract instead of blurring out. Overall, Camp is a pleasant enough excursion, happy endings and all.
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