What happens when you are the gay teenage son of a devout conservative homophobic preacher in a small town? Young adult novel, Release by Patrick Ness is the story of a day in the life of seventeen year old Adam.

They’re your parents. They’re meant to love you because. Never in spite.

Adam knows who he is, but has to hide it from his parents. Knowing that his parents wouldn’t accept him if they knew means he struggles with his self worth and lives a double life. His funny, open minded friend Angela is his solid ground. The ‘yolk’ as he calls it is only till he finishes school. Simultaneously Adam is dealing with an exploitative, lecherous boss, the end of one relationship with Enzo, and the beginning of another with the sensitive, thoughtful Linus.

Why did everyone no longer a teenager automatically dismiss any feeling you had then? Who cared if he’d grow out of it? That didn’t make it any less true in those painful and euphoric days when it was happening.

Release has a dual supernatural narrative about a Queen and a Faun that is set in the spirit world. The queen’s spirit is entwined with a murdered teen and she wants revenge.

It may cost you, my Queen. It may cost you dear.”
“All the best journeys do, faun.”

At first I was confused by the dual narrative, but as the story progressed, I started to anticipate it, wanting to know what that narrative was about. It’s an unusual literary device, and the novel would have been great with Adam’s narrative as a stand alone. But the supernatural-magical-realism twist does add an unusual angle, and right at the end the two stories overlap, entwined by a drop of blood.

Marty: Dad’s right about you. You got lost on your journey somewhere.
Adam: That’s what everyone says who never bothered to go on a journey in the first place

Release is about freeing yourself, coming out, religion, sex, sexual harassment, love, heartbreak, friendship, logical family, toxic relationships and knowing yourself.