MC: I couldn't agree more. And thank you so much for telling your story and giving us this amazing lesson. Understanding Boyfriend: Bryson beats up his former best friend Dustin after he exposed his private relationship and puts the heavily-closeted Kai in the face of relentless slandering. Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Writing an article about one's sexuality and relationship without permission will definitely get you into trouble. Small Role, Big Impact: Louise Keaton, is mentioned sparingly in the novel but if it wasn't for her spilling soda on Kai's blazer, he would have never been late for drama class, get paired up with the equally late Bryson and initiated The Bet out of frustration. Don’t get me wrong, there are some cute parts in this novel! Kai and Bryson go on dates, have fun, get overly romantic & sappy. It’s sweet at times! Bryson’s mom and sister are very cool with him not being straight (in stark contrast to Kai’s mom). It’s not all bad.

The story ended abruptly, which is fine, though I would love to find out where Kai and Bryson end up going to school. But that’s just an epilogue I would have loved to read. I find it amusing that I’ve never heard of Tisch before, and now, two YA books in a row mention it. KVW: If you'd asked me a couple of months ago, my answer would probably be different, but given everything that's going on in the world, it's a very strange experience. There's a lot of excitement, but there's also anxiety because I feel like it came out and there's really so much going on. Did it get the attention it needed? It’s weird to find the joy in that moment, but I'm happy and proud of what I put out. And I'm glad that readers are finding it and have been messaging me that it's resonated with them, so that makes it all worth it. But being a debut author during a global pandemic is really an experience. Date Me, Bryson Keller is a 2020 LGBT young adult novel written by Kevin Van Whye about the budding relationship of two male high schoolers and the obstacles they have to overcome. You could say, well this still happens to LGBT youth! To which I say, you’re totally right! But it’s a matter of choosing how to write about those things. Books are not real life, they need to have some balance. If you have unsupportive parents, consider having another supportive figure in mc’s life from the start. If you decide to out your mc, stop to think why are you doing that. Is it solely to show the few characters who are better than the asshole who did the outing? Is it so those characters can make a speech about how bad outing someone is? Where the quibbles arose for me is... probably my annoyingly erratic inability to suspend disbelief. So the location of this story which is (as far as I can deduce) about 15-20 minutes outside Los Angeles in contemporary times. They attend a prestigious private academy wherein all the students are vying for spots at places like Stanford. California is arguably one of the most liberal and open-minded states in the union and these students are the new generation so the notion that the vast majority of the student body would not only be homophobic but viciously so was a bit hard to swallow in California. Maybe Alabama or Idaho but Cali? Big city, intelligentsia Cali????Without giving away any spoilers, my favorite scene was their date. I had so much fun writing about two boys just being able to have fun and date freely. It was a dream date experience which was so fun to create. KVW: I actually owe a huge debt to my editor, Chelsea Eberly, at Random House. She came in with the right questions to get me to push Bryson Keller to be who he was. I often say that the Bryson Keller that was in my first draft and the one that's in the final draft are worlds apart. And that's because she wanted Bryson to feel as real and developed as Kai, even though it's not his story.

There’s also a strong supporting cast of friends and family members, some of whom are quite perceptive, some oblivious. They’re well-drawn, and even the “villains” are more than caricatures. Although I do not like the device of a conniving teenage girl making trouble for the gay guys, at least in this case she wasn’t motivated by jealousy or spite. Well, maybe a tiny bit of spite, but she was mostly driven by ambition, which made her more credible, and less of a stereotype. The Beard: Louise Keaton was Kai's ex-girlfriend of two weeks before he couldn't pretend to be straight anymore. As short as The Beard was, it did the job well in convincing Kai's family he was straight but not interested in dating until proven otherwise. I did not know how Bryson and Kai would spend their week together. I let the story carry me there. I had little events that I hoped to include and built the story around them. What I did know from the get-go was that this story went beyond the week of the dare. Because I wanted to explore the after and the fallout of it all. Kai’s sister, Yazz, was a total show stealer for me! She’s supportive and funny and spot-on in the way she sees people. Any chance you would ever return to her character – or maybe anyone else from this charming story (I’m sorry, I’m a bit obsessed with this cast of characters)? So yes, there was a *brief* bit of martyr behavior in the book, which thankfully wasn't allowed to linger for very long.

But Kai Sheridan never expected Bryson to say yes to him. As the days go by, he discovers there's more to Bryson beneath the surface, and dating him begins to feel less like an act and more like the real thing. Kai knows how the story of a gay boy liking someone straight ends. With his heart on the line, he's awkwardly trying to navigate senior year at school, at home, and in the closet, all while grappling with the fact that this "relationship" will last only five days. After all, Bryson Keller is popular, good-looking, and straight . . . right? One night at a party his classmates come up with a dare: he has to date the first person who asks him out each week. They're to date Monday-Friday, then when the next week rolls around, he'll date someone new. If he falls in love or says no at some point over the three-month period, he has to ride the bus to school. It becomes quite a contest, and soon every girl wants to ask Bryson out. Disappeared Dad: Bryson's father is not in the picture anymore after abandoning his old family to start a new one.

Thank you for saying that. Being an ex-film student that makes me happy! I don’t exactly have a dream cast but I did use certain actors for visual reference. When I was drafting the late Cameron Boyce was my Kai and for Bryson it was a French model/actor Maxence Danet-Fauvel. I also think actor Brandon Flynn gives off some Bryson Keller vibes. With Date Me, Bryson Keller releasing in May, what’s next for you? Are you working on another project already? If so, can you spare a few tidbits with us?Having a personality is actually another problem in this book. No one really feels… like they do… It’s more like a few traits slapped together to make a shape of person. A quirk here or there, because those are supposed to make characters more believable. And that’s the best case scenario. The worst? Making a character a racist, homophobic caricature because the author needs them to do something shitty to move the plot forward. Meet Shannon. Meet Dustin. There are a lot of complaints I could make about the story itself: Bad dialogue ran rampant. The boyfriend was ‘too perfect’– definitely one we might dream up, but can’t exist. The flow of the story was choppy. The narrative too simple most of the time, the majority of the characters 1-dimensional... Everyone knows about the dare: Each week, Bryson Keller must date someone new--the first person to ask him out on Monday morning. This is a school dare and every girl in dying to date Bryson, but with just a few weeks left in the semester, Kai unexpectedly asks Bryson to date him. Bryson agrees and HERE IT BEGINS.

The Ace: Bryson is the captain of the academy's soccer team, an excellent actor with a keen eye for directing and as Kai discovers, whips up scrumptious diner-styled breakfasts. I love a good trope, and have spent countless hours on tvtropes.org. Three of my faves are first and foremost the fake-dating trope. I also love “Oh no! There’s only one bed.” Another trope that I adore is ‘enemies-to-lovers’. I love it in all its shapes and forms. Your debut novel had a very cinematic feel to it! If Date Me, Bryson Keller were to get the big screen treatment, who would be your dream cast for Kai and Bryson? I hope the writer works on his craft and learns to develop a more intense storyline, because he’s got the chops to go far. But he definitely needs to learn to develop a full story.Trial-Period Dating: Bryson is dared to go out with someone new each week, namely the first person who asked him out on Monday morning and continue to do so until Friday afternoon. Since he never specified the suitor's gender, fellow male student Kai asks him out. After their Big Damn Kiss on Friday, Bryson calls off The Bet and they start going out for real. MC: Definitely. Rom-coms, queer literature, it's all so in the moment and so relevant. And it's such a good time too, because I feel like queer teens, especially, need to see themselves in this type of story. They want to see, and I want to see, and I'm sure so many other people want to see, more characters like this coming into a more mainstream narrative and becoming more commercial, because there are so many queer teens out there. This is a story that, personally, I would have loved to have when I was in high school.