Showing titles in Coming of Age

Madison Archer was a perfect daughter, with perfectly dark secrets. She did not mind that her father used her as a pawn in a business deal. She knew this role well, but meeting Jackie Westin sent her perfect world into a tailspin. Jackie introduced Madison to a different kind of love in a different kind of world, a world that would bend everything Madison believed about life. This is a tale of forbidden love, in a world of dark secrets, betrayals, and intrigue.

It’s 2003, and artist Dawn Levit is stuck. A bookbinder who works in conservation at the Met, she spends her free time scouting the city’s street art, hoping something might spark inspiration. Instead, everything looks like a dead end. And art isn’t the only thing that feels wrong: wherever she turns, her gender identity clashes with the rest of her life. Her relationship, once anchored by shared queerness, is falling apart as her boyfriend Lukas increasingly seems to be attracted to Dawn only when she’s at her most masculine.

Cory is the golden boy. He lives a charmed existence. That is until a disturbing revelation and an accident drastically alters his life. Suddenly, he is no longer sure if his friends and teammates will remain true or turn on him if they discover his secrets.

Mei loses her Japanese mother at age six. Growing up in suburban Surrey, she yearns to fit in, suppressing both her heritage and her growing love for her best friend Fran. Yuki leaves the Japanese countryside to pursue her dream of becoming a concert violinist in London. Lonely and far from home, she finds herself caught up in the charms of her older teacher. Haruka attempts to navigate Tokyo's nightlife and all of its many vices, working as a hostess in seedy bars. She grieves a mother who hid so many secrets from her, until finally one of those secrets comes to light.

At St. Stephen's Academy, the students are on the verge of revolt. While the younger boys plot an insurrection, the older ones are preoccupied with sneaking out of bounds, thrashing each other, tearing each other's clothes off - or some combination of the three. Morgan Wilberforce, for one, can't take it any longer. Everything Wilberforce touches turns to disaster in his desperate attempts to fight off desire, boredom, and angst.

Introvert Gina Mulley is determined to become a tattoo artist, and to find somewhere she belongs in her conventional Long Island town. But this is 1985, when tattooing is still a gritty, male-dominated fringe culture, and Gina’s whimsical style is far from the norm. Luck is on her side: Gina’s older brother Dominic owns a tattoo shop, and he reluctantly grants her one year to prove herself.

Adam plays “Bud”, the all-American boy-next-door on one of the most popular TV shows of the 1950s, but Adam has a secret. The boy-next-door likes boys instead of girls, and no one can know. Adam’s life becomes increasingly complicated, as his studio assigns him a girlfriend and he falls for a male co-star. The truth becomes ever harder to conceal, as Adam becomes increasingly famous and his face begins to appear on magazine covers. All Adam has ever wanted to do is act, but can he lead the life he wants to lead and maintain his secret?

The Good Little Catholic Gay Boy is a poignant coming-of-age story that follows the life of Ryan, a 15-year-old boy who grapples with his identity in the confines of a strict Catholic household. Raised to believe that being gay is inherently wrong, Ryan battles with his innermost feelings that persist despite relentless prayers and punishments. The age of eighteen promises freedom, but can he find happiness? This heartfelt tale will resonate with the experiences of many LGBTQ+ individuals who have faced the challenges of self-acceptance, coming out, finding love, and navigating the hurdles ...

Raised in a brothel at the edge of a dying empire, a boy of no known origin creates his own identity. He is Sparrow, who sings without reason and can fly from trouble. His world is a kitchen, a herb-scented garden, a loud and dangerous tavern, and the mysterious upstairs where the ‘wolves’ – prostitutes and slaves from every corner of the empire – conduct their business.

The disturbing disappearance of yet another young, red-haired gal from the Irish Travellers’ Caravan site has everyone on edge. Then Shamus Maguire’s 12-year-old sister, Erin, vanishes. While searching for clues to his sister’s disappearance, Shamus meets Lash Boswell, an older man from a Romani caravan. Lash decides to help Shamus, and they set out together to find the truth about the many disappearances.

Dawson Angel is a teenager in small-town Kansas who has just told his best friend he is gay and soon regrets that decision. To make matters worse, he has also fallen in love with the neighbor boy, a handsome young Mennonite named Derek. Nothing seems to go right as the week progresses in this engaging tale of youth that reminds one of a modern Catcher in the Rye.

Twenty-three year old, Amanda Barkley works as a kindergarten teacher and part time server at Sisco’s, the most popular bar in town where most of the bands who perform there go on to become some of the biggest names in music. One day a blast from Amanda’s past arrives back in town. Her former next door neighbor, Billie Layne, one of the biggest rock stars of the decade has returned home. The one person she wants to see most of all is Amanda who she hasn’t talked to since she left six years ago after a big fight between them. When Billie was offered a recording contract, but had to ...

The members of an elite girls swim team are the reigning queens at their South African boarding school. And then Italian student Fiamma Coronna joins their ranks. Beautiful, athletic, and suddenly commanding all the coach's attention, Fiamma is the envy of every girl on the team—until the summer she walks into the rural grasslands surrounding the school and disappears.

Amar can’t wait to tell everyone his wonderful news: he’s found The One, and he’s getting married. But it turns out announcing his engagement on a group chat might not have been the best way to let his strict Muslim Bangladeshi family know that his happy-ever-after partner is a man—and a white man at that.

When Obiefuna's father witnesses an intimate moment between his teenage son and the family's apprentice, newly arrived from the nearby village, he banishes Obiefuna to a Christian boarding school marked by strict hierarchy and routine, devastating violence. Utterly alienated from the people he loves, Obiefuna begins a journey of self-discovery and blossoming desire, while his mother Uzoamaka grapples to hold onto her favourite son, her truest friend.

Michael and Francis are the bright, ambitious sons of Trinidadian immigrants. Coming of age in the outskirts of a sprawling city, the brothers battle against careless prejudices and low expectations. While Francis aspires to a future in music, Michael dreams of Aisha, the smartest girl in their school, whose eyes are firmly set on a life elsewhere. But one sweltering summer night the hopes of all three are violently, irrevocably cut short.

Rainbow Reader Purple: “Destructive Love” This book includes content from the original, now super-secret manuscript, “Moments in Time: It is never too late to come out,” and has been modified, embellished and enhanced based on reader interest in the characters from the original series. There is really only one moment in time we can cherish, that we remember through all of the good and bad times in our lives. If you can take that one moment of time and cherish it forever, it can bring joy where there is sorrow; happiness and hope where there is despair. This is a secret that we hold ...

Marguerite Demers is 24 when she leaves Paris for the sleepy southern village of Saint-Sulpice, to take up a job as a live-in nurse. Her charge is Jerome Lanvier, once one of the most powerful men in the village, and now dying alone in his large and secluded house, surrounded by rambling gardens. Manipulative and tyrannical, Jerome has scared away all his previous nurses.

Love, Sex, Hate, and Bullying whilst growing up in the Thatcher years. Matt grew up gay in the 1980s, in a landscape shaped by political correctness, multiculturalism, and Section 28. When he comes face to face with one of the guys who bullied him and his friends, all those years ago, he's forced to reflect on everything that happened, how much of it was due to the political climate and restrictions to free speech. Remembering those first fumblings with teenage boys—a time of innocence locked inside a condemning society, he wonders what can be done to reduce bigoted views and ...

Rainbow Reader Silver and Gold: “True Love’s Kiss” Fiction is a lie, but there is truth behind every lie. Georgie’s 30 year journey spans the entire Rainbow Reader series and can be read in any order. However, for readers interested in following the timeline in complete continuity, the proper reading order for the series begins with the unpublished, “Pink: The Secret Manuscript,” and continues directly into “Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue and Purple.” The timeline continues quite chronologically into the three “Moments in Time” novels. Following the three “Moments in...