Adam

By Ariel Schrag

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE. A sweet and subversive coming-of-age novel by award-winning memoirist and screenwriter Ariel Schrag.

When Adam Freedman—a skinny, awkward, inexperienced teenager from Piedmont, California—goes to stay with his older sister Casey in New York City, he is hopeful that his life is about to change. And it sure does.

It is the summer of 2006. Gay marriage and transgender rights are in the air, and Casey has thrust herself into a wild lesbian subculture. Soon Adam is tagging along to underground clubs, where there are hot older women everywhere he turns. It takes some time for him to realize that many in this new crowd assume he is trans—a boy who was born a girl. Why else would this baby-faced guy always be around?

Then Adam meets Gillian, the girl of his dreams—but she couldn’t possibly be interested in him. Unless passing as a trans guy might actually work in his favor . . .

Ariel Schrag’s scathingly funny and poignant debut novel puts a fresh spin on questions of love, attraction, self-definition, and what it takes to be at home in your own skin.

“An insightful, funny, and unexpected love story.”—Aimee Mann

"[An] audacious coming-of-age novel.”—Miami Herald

"Compulsively readable."—Bookforum

"Hilarious...Schrag's riotous, poignant debut novel will leave you reeling."—SF Weekly

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Release date: Jun 10, 2014
• ISBN: 9780544227637

Ariel Schrag

ARIEL SCHRAG is the author of the novel Adam and the graphic memoirs Awkward, Definition, Potential, and Likewise. Potential was nominated for an Eisner Award and Likewise was nominated for a Lambda Literary Award. Schrag has written for TV series on HBO and Showtime. She lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Reviews for Adam

[gayla.bassham · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I sincerely hope this is the worst book I read this year. It was just awful, and the ending manages to be both highly offensive and wildly implausible. Yuck.

[bravenewbks · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I think it is possible that Ariel Schrag sat down at her desk one day and said to herself, "Self, I think you should write a novel that will introduce teens to important concepts of queer theory, and to some of the realities of trans men and women's lives, but from the perspective of a cis hetero male so they don't reject it out of hand."

And so she did.

[primosparadise · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Didn't like it. It was as if HBO took over the Afterschool Special series and said "let's see how much we can shock you" while still feeling like the outline was written by John Green. I don't think the writing was anything special and frankly, the subject matter was not in my wheelhouse. Can't see why this is in the TOB at all; I really think it is there because it is the closest thing to a main stream book that delves into the current gender issues dialogue. I just think that there is a book out there that can treat the subject matter with a little more respect with a lot less despicable characters and without making it seem that the sex is the only reason these characters exist at all. Plus, come on, getting away with deceiving someone by misrepresenting your sexuality when that other person has spent their life struggling with their own identification is massively sh*tty.

[ridgewaygirl · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Adam is seventeen, lives in an affluent suburb of Berkeley, California and attends a private high school. He's also directionless, insecure and hanging onto inclusion in the popular group through the skin of his teeth. He's looking to escape all of that when he convinces his parents to let him stay for the summer with his college-age sister and her roommates in Brooklyn. His sister, Casey, is a lesbian and through her Adam meets a variety of lesbians and trans men. Adam is preoccupied with sex (he is seventeen, after all), but also dreams of romantic love, which he finds with a pretty red-haired girl.Adam is a young adult novel, and Ariel Schrag is writing for older teenagers. I'm no longer the audience for this book, and had to set aside my irritation with the simplicity and repetition of the genre. In many ways, this reads like a Very Special Episode, but airing on late night HBO. Which is not to downplay the importance of a book about lesbian and transgender issues that is aimed at heterosexual teenagers. Schrag treats her characters like real people, so that just because a character is a trans man doesn't mean he can't also be an oblivious jerk. Adam, himself, is a complex guy, with his insecurities and concern that he look and behave in exactly the right way as well as the real affection he has for the girl he likes and his relationship with the sister he admires and worries about.On the other hand, there were a few serious flaws in this novel. There's a secret Adam is keeping from his girlfriend, a secret which forms the central conflict in the book. Yet, at the last minute, Schrag pulls her punch here and makes that secret not a big deal, and that secret is revealed in a scene in which there is a question of consent that should have been treated as more than not a big deal, especially considering the personalities of the characters before that point. There were two fairly significant issues dropped into the novel towards the end that were there as far as I could see only to provide a bit of interest as the novel wrapped up, and a lot of lessons about gender issues that felt like they'd been copied directly from the author's research notes. This isn't a novel without merit, but it's too flawed to be able to recommend it whole-heartedly. It will be interesting to see what Ariel Schrag writes next, as she shows potential and a willingness to dive into difficult issues.

[stephiewonder · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This book was vile. Pretty much full of the white cis male gaze and the exploitation of lesbians and trans people. Even if some of the settings and characters were interesting and authentic, they were tainted by an unreliable narrator who only cared about having (straight) sex with (lesbian) women.

[krau0098 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I got a copy of this book to review through Amazon Vine. I had heard a lot about this book and occasionally read and enjoy GLBT contemporary fiction. So I was curious to see what this book was about. It was a decent book, very engaging and it gives interesting insight into trans-male communities.Adam hangs with the popular crowd by virtue of his best friend, who is kind of a jerk. Adam knows he is hanging onto popularity by the tips of his fingers and when his mom offers him the chance to spend the summer in New York with his sister (who is in college) he jumps at the chance. Adam knows his sister is a lesbian (his parents don’t). His sister is very involved in the GLBT scene and Adam finds himself immersed in this scene for the summer and dealing with all sorts of grey areas between gender.Well done book about a teenage boy who spends the summer with his sister. There is a lot in here about the lesbian community and the trans-male community. Also a lot about the pains of going through your late-teenage years and early 20’s.There is, as you might expect, a lot of talking about sex...a lot a lot. That's pretty much what the story is about. Adam's number one goal on arriving to New York is to find his dream girl and have sex with her. However, this is also a coming of age story...Adam grows and learns a lot from his experiences in New York.I am a bit conflicted about saying this appropriate for YA. There is a lot about sex toys, sex operations, and even some very graphic bondage scenes. The sex scenes are very graphic as well. Although Adam is seventeen, all of the other surrounding characters are in their 20's. So I guess I would say older YA or new adult might be the more appropriate audience for this book.I applaud Schrag for really delving into the dirty details of the GLBT and trans-male crowd. The story is well written and engaging. However, there was sooo much sex in here that it actually got a bit numbing and boring to read about. There were a couple times where I was like..."Oh great another scene with girls doing it with a strap-on...yawn". Maybe that is the point, Adam is inundated with sooo much that he becomes a bit numb to some of it…My only complaint about the above is I think it portrays the lesbian and trans-male community in this very sex-hungry and promiscuous light. I am going to go out on a limb here (being sarcastic) and say that there are lesbians and trans-males that like their sex life private (as in not having sex in public places or in front of lots of people) and monogamous...just like there are heteros who span all sides of the arena. I wish that we had gotten to interact with some young people who were in a loving relationship for the long haul no matter what their gender or non-gender was. What is portrayed here is mainly a group of sex-hungry individuals who are struggling to define their identities...it’s just something I had trouble relating to. I wasn’t like that and my gay friends weren’t like that at that age either.Anyway, it's an interesting read. Just beware of the content if you are disturbed or offended by graphic sex scenes or bondage. The whole story ends kind of abruptly and without much closure, but that mimics real life fairly well.Overall this is an engaging read that I enjoyed for the most part. It gives an interesting look into the lesbian and trans-male cultures of New York City and is also an interesting coming of age story about a boy finding his way. The sexual content is pretty graphic so I would recommend for older teen and new adult readers.