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There seems to be a market for gently written queer love stories coming out of America in recent years, however James Acker is delivering something different.

In the wake of Heartstopper there seems to be endless high school love stories about young lovers coming out and finding each other. Their stories are lovely and touching but whilst it鈥檚 great to see more visibility theres something endlessly generic about many of these stories.

Surprisingly many of them are written by women, often straight women, so finding queer love stories about men, written by men, seems to be somewhat more of a rarity.

However US author James Acker is certainly bucking this trend.

His debut novel The Long Run, released in 2023 was a rough and gritty exploration of masculinity and sexuality in a small American town that was hard to put down.

Bash and Sandro, two of the schools star athletes are an unexpected love story that tackle coming out and finding love without some of the hang up鈥檚 and tropes we鈥檝e come to know in many a queer YA story. The pair navigate their sexual awakening with often dark and moody awkwardness, they are brooding and complicated and don鈥檛 know what they鈥檙e doing. Bash comes from a broken home, his mother is dead and his father is long gone, no living with his step father. His life is consumed by sport and his mates. Sandro lives in the chaos of a loud Italian family, slipping into the background, an unexpected foot injury leaves him struggling mentally and physically as he finds his life turned upside down. Neither Bash nor Sandro identify as anything but straight until a chance drunken kiss at a party changes everything.

Their story is less about coming to terms with their sexuality and more about realising that somewhere along the road to their random friendship they fell in love and neither quite knows that to say or do about it. Their journeys both separately and individually are rough and raw, challenging and real. Whilst The Long Run is definitely a queer YA novel, Acker writes in a manner that makes you feel this story is written for anyone.

After closing the door on Bash and Sandro Acker returned with his second offering in 2024 delivering Teenage Dirtbags. It was another home run for Acker as he delivered another raw and compelling story. Teenage Dirtbags explores the complex relationship between Phil and Jackson. Formerly best friends the two are now ice cold and haven鈥檛 spoken in years, the quick tempered and grungy Phil lives in the shadows of Jackson, the seemingly put together class president who has everything going for him.

Teenage Dirtbags however shifts its focus much more towards the technology centred heart of the modern high school experience, while it may be somewhat less relatable for those who didn鈥檛 go to school in the age of Instagram, the experiences are universal. Phil finds himself thrust in the limelight when his new social media driven boyfriend Cameron outs him in a romantic gesture at their school prom, filmed for all the world to see, making Cameron the darling of the internet. However the joy from their viral moment is short lived as Cameron reveals his true colours, dumping Phil, all in the name of social media.

What follows leads itself somewhere into Mean Girls territory, but not in a way that is tacky or overdone. Reunited through their shared hatred for Cameron, Phil and Jackson reconcile with a goal of bringing down their common enemy. As Jackson infiltrates Cameron鈥檚 inner circle the pair, with the aide of their angsty friend Ronny find ways to slowly dismantle the group and exact their revenge.

Whilst the story couldn鈥檛 be further from that of Bash and Sandro in The Long Run, Teenage Dirtbags is just as gritty and raw. Phil, Jackson and Ronny are all equally complex and provide depth and personality to what could have otherwise been a cliched story.

They explore nuances of high school life, the pain of friendships lost and gained and what it truly means to find yourself and your people when you鈥檙e still trying to find and understand yourself.