Reading this just days after our entire school district shut down due to a mass shooting threat--and not the first this year--was occasionally difficult. But I appreciate the way the topic was handled in the book. And I'm thankful for the ray of hope for a better world at the end. It is sorely needed in a time when queer folks are under attack, from having our books banned in schools to state legislatures passing laws against trans kids to Pride celebrations being terrorized.

As a fellow queer Missourian, I, too, hope this is just the dark before the dawn. Here's to more families like the Boones and fewer like the Sturgises.