Name: Two Boys Kissing
Rating: 4.055555555555555 (90 reviews)
ISBN: 9780307931900

David Levithan

Jede Sekunde zählt

Two Boys Kissing

Izaac Richards

You will even miss him stealing the sheets. 

Love is so painful, how could you ever wish it on anybody? And love is so essential, how could you ever stand in its way? 

 Good first dates are more than short stories. They are first chapters. On a good first date, everything is springtime. 

And when a good first date becomes a good relationship, the springtime lingers. Even after it's over, there can be springtime.

Linus Rogge

Zweifel ist ein akzeptables Risiko für das Glück

Mit manchen Menschen muss man nur ein Wort wechseln und hat schon das Gefühl, sie seit Jahren zu kennen. Das bedeutet nur, dass ihr euch schon früher hättet begegnen sollen. Ihr spürt die Zeit, in der ihr euch schon hättet kennen sollen. Diese Zeit zählt auch jetzt noch. 

An intense and imaginatively structured novel from the bestselling author of Will Grayson, Will Grayson, Every Day and Boy Meets Boy New York Times bestselling author David Levithan tells the based-on-true-events story of Harry and Craig, two 17-year-olds who are about to take part in a 32-hour marathon of kissing to set a new Guinness World Record. Remarkably, and to powerful effect, the story is narrated by a Greek chorus of the generation of gay men lost to AIDS Following the bestselling Every Day, Two Boys Kissing showcases David's trademark sharp-wit, warm-hearted tales of teenage love, and serves as a perfect thematic bookend to David's YA debut and breakout novel, Boy Meets Boy, which celebrates its 10th anniversary in 2013 Ground-breaking cover featuring a photograph sourced by David Levithan himself, taken by a fan. Hauntingly beautiful and tear-jerking cover to cover, perfect for fans of John Green and Alyssa Brugman. Will Grayson, Will Grayson has sold over 10,000 copies and Every Day over 3000 copies in Australia and New Zealand Early reading copies available

Katherine Yang

We put our lives in other people’s hands, and for the most part, they looked at us blankly and said, What lives? What hands?

Honestly, I put this off for so long because of the title, but having just finished this in the quiet hours of mid-ish-night, I am so moved. David Levithan is one of my favourite authors in both the YA and LGBTQ genres and it's because he is so acute in distilling these huge, amorphous feelings into words that are either exquisitely beautiful or shocking identifiable in their plainness.

The experimental structure and narrative voice of this novel is certainly unusual, and something I had to get used to in the first few parts, but I love it. It works so well. It's intriguing and compelling and is brilliantly powerful in the climaxes of the individual stories. The Author's Note explains Levithan's choice:

In the end, I decided to write a story about the generation of gay men that went before me looking at the generation of gay men that came after me. (My gay “generation” is a very short one—I came of age in the five or six years that existed between the height of the AIDS epidemic and the proliferation of the Internet, the former defining the generation before me, and the latter defining the generation after me.)

The collective second-person future-tense narrative voice is the lingering ghost of the LGBTQ generation that was defined by the AIDS epidemic. They string the novel together, introducing, commentating on, and almost interacting with the characters. ("We try to block him, and he walks right through us. We try to pound on his car, raise an alarm, but we can’t do anything.") They watch over Harry and Craig, Peter and Neil, Ryan and Avery, Cooper, Tariq, and all the teenagers that are going through what they've all been through, reassuring them, grieving for them, and cheering for them. The voices serve as a commentary on generational legacy and progress. "We were going to be your role models," they say, but they couldn't, and so they entreat the reader to play their cards right so that "the next generation will have so much more".

Cooper's suicide attempt scene is where the narrative voice absolutely shines. 

Listen to us. We fruitlessly demand that you listen to us. We shit blood and had our skin lacerated and broken by lesions. We had fungus grow in our throats, under our fingernails. We lost the ability to see, to speak, to feed ourselves. We coughed up pieces of ourselves and felt our blood turn to magma. We lost the use of our muscles and our bodies were reduced to collections of skin-encased bones. We were rendered unrecognizable, diminished and demolished. Our lovers had to watch us die. Our friends had to watch as the nurse changed our catheters, had to try to put aside that image as they laid us in caskets, into the ground. We will never kiss our mothers again. We will never see our fathers. We will never feel air in our lungs. We will never hear the sound of our voices. We will never feel snow or sand or take part in another conversation. Everything was taken away from us, and we miss it. We miss all of it. Even if you cannot feel it now, it is all there for you.

The voices capture that frustration and despair of a whole community when nameless tragedies occur on a too-regular basis, magnifying an already terrible scene into the heart-wrenching devastation of history, of brutal precedence and prevalence.

The novel flits from tender and nascent connection to mature and transforming love, from easy acceptance to tight-lipped exclusion, and from moments to monuments. And what a monument it makes.

Originally reviewed May 26, 2015 | Imported from my Goodreads account

Alberto

Dos chicos besándose

Jude Moon

Es un libro que debería leer todo el mundo, porque te hace ver la homosexualidad desde un punto que la gente no está acostumbrada a ver y es brillante. Super recomendado.

Julia Lotz

Inhalt: »Harry küsst Craig und spürt etwas, das größer ist als sie beide, etwas, das über den Kuss hinausreicht. Er greift nicht danach – noch nicht. Aber er weiß, dass es da ist. Und damit wird dieser Kuss anders als all ihre anderen Küsse zuvor. Das weiß er sofort.«

Craig und Harry wollen ein Zeichen für alle schwulen Jungs setzen. Dafür küssen sie sich. 32 Stunden, 12 Minuten und 10 Sekunden. So lange dauert es, um den Weltrekord im Langzeitküssen zu brechen. So lange dauert es, sich über die Gefühle füreinander klarzuwerden, nachdem man sich doch eigentlich gerade getrennt hat. So lange dauert es, das Leben aller schwulen Pärchen in der Umgebung für immer zu verändern …
Geschickt verwebt David Levithan all ihre Geschichten zu einer großen Geschichte über homosexuelle Jugendliche von heute. Vor allem aber beschreibt er in poetischen Worten die Liebe in all ihren Facetten. (Quelle: Verlag)
Meine Meinung: Als mir Two Boys Kissing vom Verlag vorgestellt wurde, war ich sofort Feuer & Flamme. Ich habe leider zuvor noch kein Buch von David Levithan gelesen. Allerdings sprechen die Rezensionen zu seinen Büchern für sich. Was mich, abgesehen davon, dass der Name des Autors mich schon beeindruckt hat, auch noch an dem Buch interessiert hat, war zweifelslos das Thema. Wer meinen Blog und meine Rezensionen schon länger verfolgt weiß, dass mir das Thema LGTB besonders am Herzen liegt und irgendwie so mein Thema ist. Da konnte ich natürlich nicht nein sagen bei einem Buch, das von homosexuellen Jungs handelt. Das Thema ist gerade in der heutigen Zeit so unglaublich wichtig und man kann gar nicht oft genug betonen, wie wenige Bücher es im Gegensatz dazu gibt, die solche Themen behandeln. Allein deshalb ist Two Boys Kissing schon ein Juwel, das von jedem gelesen werden sollte.
„Gute Dates sind mehr als das. Es sind erste Kapitel. Ein gutes erstes Date ist wie der Frühling. Und wenn aus einem guten ersten Date eine gute Beziehung wird, hält der Frühling an. Auch wenn er eigentlich vorbei ist, kann es immer noch Frühling sein.“ - S. 48
Mit großen Erwartungen bin ich also ans Lesen gegangen und musste dann feststellen, dass meine Erwartungen nicht unbedingt erfüllt wurden. Ich kam besonders durch die Erzählperspektive nicht gut in das Buch hinein und es hat lange gedauert, bis ich mich damit zu Recht gefunden habe. Die Geschichte wird erzählt von Engeln bzw. Geistern. Wie auch immer ihr sie nennen mögt, es sind all die Männer, die während der „AIDS-Seuche“ (Annahme laut Nachwort des Autors) gestorben sind und nun auf die homosexuellen Jugendlichen herabblicken und ihre Geschichten erzählen. Diese besondere Erzählperspektive ist so einzigartig, dass sie den größten Respekt verdient. Dennoch schafft sie meiner Meinung nach nicht, eine Bindung zwischen dem Leser und den Protagonisten aufzubauen, was ich gerade beim Thema LGTB sehr schade finde. Ein weiterer Punkt für meinen schweren Einstieg in das Geschehen war sicherlich die Tatsache, dass gleich mehrere Geschichten parallel erzählt werden, die auch am Ende des Buches nicht zu einem Strang zusammenlaufen. Die Vielzahl von Protagonisten war am Anfang schlicht und einfach zu unübersichtlich. 
„Wenn man die Wahrheit sagen will, ist der erste Satz immer der schwerste.“ – S. 81
Das sind wirklich die beiden (ein riesengroßer und ein kleinerer) Kritikpunkte, die für mich ganz klar gegen Two Boys Kissing sprechen. Allerdings finde ich das Thema so wichtig und auch inhaltlich schön verarbeitet, dass das Buch definitiv einen zweiten Blick wert ist. Außerdem ist der Schreibstil von David Levithan unglaublich poetisch und wortgewaltig. Man verschwindet völlig in den Seiten und wunderschönen Zitaten und wird, wenn man mit dem Lesen aufhört unsanft in die Realität zurückgeholt. 
„Man kann Worte schenken, aber nicht wegnehmen.“ – S. 84
Bewertung: Mit dem poetischen Schreibstil, dem wichtigen Thema und der tollen Verarbeitung dessen lohnt sich bei Two Boys Kissing auf jeden Fall ein zweiter Blick und ein Platz auf der Wunschliste. Leider erschweren die vielen Einzelstränge und besonders die Erzählperspektive das Lesen und haben es mir mit dem Buch nicht immer leicht gemacht. Deshalb kann ich leider nur 3 von 5 Füchschen vergeben, möchte allerdings am Ende noch einmal betonen, wie wichtig dieses Thema ist, weshalb sich die Anschaffung dieses Buches trotzdem lohnt. 
Vielen herzlichen Dank an Fischer für das *Rezensionsexemplar.
Mehr Rezensionen findet ihr auf missfoxyreads.blogspot.de!

An intense and imaginatively structured novel from the bestselling author of Will Grayson, Will Grayson, Every Day and Boy Meets Boy. Seventeen-year-olds Craig and Harry are trying to set a new Guinness World Record for kissing. Around them, Ryan and Avery are falling in love, Neil and Peter are falling out of love, and Cooper might be somewhere, but he is also, dangerously, nowhere. Narrated, Greek-chorus style, by the generation of gay men lost to AIDS, this novel is a thematic companion to David Levithan's groundbreaking Boy Meets Boy, which celebrates its tenth anniversary in 2013. Two Boys Kissing is trademark Levithan: warm, sharp and real. It is also something new and completely extraordinary. David Levithan is an award-winning and New York Times bestselling author of young adult books, including Boy Meets Boy, Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist (with Rachel Cohn) and Will Grayson, Will Grayson (with John Green). He lives in New Jersey and spends his days in New York, editing and publishing other people's books. textpublishing.com.au 'Two Boys Kissing is wise, respectful and honest, and David Levithan writes with integrity and sensitivity about young love without titillation or sensationalism. I wholeheartedly recommend this extraordinary book.' Readings Monthly 'Levithan never descends into the trite or sentimental. His observations are sharp and insightful...The book made me smile, made me cry, it made me sad and angry and at the end gave me an incredible sense of gratefulness and awe for the beautiful fragility of life and love. Would I recommend this book? You bet!' OutInPerth 'Two Boys Kissing is phenomenal. Beautiful. And I highly recommend it. Everything about this novel was authentic and moving.' YA Midnight Reads 'David Levithan's poignant novel follows the stories of gay teens joined through an unconventional protest.' Entertainment Weekly 'Two Boys Kissing reveals [Levithan's] command of an intriguing, complex narrative with an unusual point of view: the first-person plural. This 'we' is the combined voice of men who died during the AIDS pandemic several decades ago. As the boys' stories become more closely entwined and connect in a satisfying finale, the reflections of these 'shadow uncles' lend a quality of retrospection that is rare (and refreshing) in YA literature.' Washington Post 'A landmark achievement from a writer and editor who has helped create, in literature, a haven for queer youth.' Publishers Weekly 'genuine moments of insight and wisdom...Inspiring.' Kirkus Reviews 'a masterpiece' Dennis Abrams, Publishing Perspectives 'Messages about identity, relationships and life in general that are valid for both boys, girls and adults, gay or not. A powerful novel.' Weekend Herald 'What this story does brilliantly is put the reader in the shoes of those young men who are coming to terms with being gay...Levithan is a much-loved author who writes with sensitivity on issues relevant to young adults. This realistic novel about gay boys is both timely and profoundly moving.' Herald Sun 'David Levithan's latest release is timely and important but, most of all, it is astonishingly sophisticated...Levithan has outdone himself.' Courier Mail

Rowan Myers

I'm a member of the LGBTQIA+ community born in the beginning of the 80s. It was a weird time because I was young when AIDS devastated the community, still a baby when people were dying. But I was absorbing all the hate, learning how people could ignore their fellow man in the name of allegedly charitable gods. I came of age when nobody talked about my sexuality openly (I didn't come out until uni) but everyone knew, and that's why I got beat up walking home from a friend's house. At school at lunch. In the bathroom. I went to a university where people protested the gay-straight alliance club. People from nearby towns drove to hold banners and pass out flyers about how me and my friends were going to hell while we were trying to eat lunch, to study for exams. 

But I was also around for when it started to get better. I cried when Holland legalized gay marriage. I wept when my state (kicking its feet, screaming - I lived in TX at the time) HAD to legalize it. When the country as a whole legalized gay marriage.

But I still cry when I see trans sisters shot. When I see the SCOTUS waffling on making it illegal to fire employees for their sexuality and/or gender identity.


So yeah. I'm biased reading this book. Going in, odds are I was going to really like it. But Levithan has a really engaging format (the narrators are a Greek chorus of deceased gay men from the 70s and 80s who are now watching over the characters in the book). It's a well-written book.

And yes, it made me cry.

lucia arenas

No tengo palabras para expresarlo, este libro es simplemente fantástico. La narración, tan hermosa, y la historia tan profunda. Inspirador. Lo amé.

"No empezamos como polvo. No terminamos como polvo. Somos más que polvo. Eso es. todo lo que te pedimos. Sé más que polvo"

jess

i probably would have enjoyed this book a lot more if i was a gay boy but as a panromantic girl it was kinda awkward tbh

Ashley J Brown

I wasn't sure about this book. I found it while I was at the bookstore and thought it looked interesting... and it was

It's a small 196 page book. Within those pages are some of the deepest sentences about the LGBT community. I ended up attached to the characters Cooper especially. I would recommend this book to anyone with an open mind.

Amanda Kordeliski

A chorus of men who died of AIDS observes and yearns to help a cross-section of today's gay teens who navigate new love, long-term relationships, coming out, self-acceptance, and more in a society that has changed in many ways.

Rio (they/them)

I really loved the approach of this book to narration and the constant references to the past and how the queer community lived those years. This is a book I’d really recommend if you’re looking for a glimpse of reality on what people in the LGBTQ+ had to go through in the past and the differences with the present time.
There are many, many beautiful sentences in this book and a lot of truth. Give it a read if you have time!

From the New York Times best-selling author of Every Day, another thoughtful and original perspective on the things we do for love. The two boys kissing are Craig and Harry. Theyr'e hoping to set the world record for the longest kiss. They're not a couple, but they used to be. Peter and Neil are a couple. Their kisses are different. Avery and Ryan have only just met and are trying to figure out what happens next. Cooper is alone. He's not sure how he feels. As the marathon progresses, these boys, their friends and families evaluate the changing nature of feelings, behaviour and this crazy thing called love. Praise for Every Day: ‘Every Day is a wonder.’ Patrick Ness, author of Chaos Walking trilogy and A Monster Calls

Georgia Carr

Yet another David Levithan book that manages to hit me absolutely everywhere all at once. I swear, his words are a direct line to my heart (and tear ducts). 

Two Boys Kissing is the story of Harry and Craig, Peter and Neil, Avery and Ryan, and Cooper. It's about human emotion, real thoughts and problems faced by people everywhere, every day. 

I absolutely love David's style of writing. I've read eight of his books now and they keep getting better. He uses words to create pages of people who are so real, so very palpable. There are passages that I read which made me turn away because they just made me feel so intensely overwhelmed with emotion. I don't know what it is, but David Levithan makes me cry so much. Maybe it's that he seems to be describing my exact feelings sometimes, maybe it's that he creates real people who make me feel less lonely for a while. I honestly don't know why, but I do know that he will always rank as one of my favorite authors. 

This story is narrated by a chorus of men who have struggled, men who are no longer living. As other people have said, I guess that could detach from the characters and their thoughts, but I never got that. I always felt in touch with each character and the narration sometimes helped with this. 

Avery and Ryan meet at a prom during the early pages. Harry and Craig broke-up before the book's beginning, but they partake in a marathon of kissing to try and beat the world record. Peter and Neil are together and dating. Cooper's not with anybody. There are different threads going on, different people to keep up with, but it never feels hard to do so. The transitions are smooth and the individual story lines aren't clunky or confusing. 

There's really nothing to fault here. I just loved it.

A chorus of men who have died of AIDS observes and yearns to help a cross-section of today's gay teens who navigate new love, long-term relationships, coming out, self-acceptance and more in a society that has changed in many ways. By the author of Boy Meets Boy.

Archer

It was one of the books that was sad because of the queerness, not just sad and queer. That said, it was really good and I learned a lot.

Jimena Vázquez Oliver

Listen. A book narrated by an omniscient Greek opera composed of those who died during the AIDS pandemic? Yeah, I cried. Full of beautiful moments and endless quotes that left me breathless. 11/10 do recommend.

Jordan Robinson

So many feels. 
This book is so important. And beautiful. And painful. And able to warm and wrench your heart at the same time. I'm thankful this book exists.

Lisa Collins

Ana Koljanin

I enjoyed this book. It showed different sides of LGBT community in America and things they need to go through that are pretty much true. Bullying, family acceptance, self accept.. All those things in one book written amazingly.

Find this review and more at 
  kimberlyfaye reads
.


  
    “The first sentence of the truth is always the hardest. Each of us had a first sentence, and most of us found the strength to say it out loud to someone who deserved to hear it. What we hoped, and what we found, was that the second sentence of the truth is always easier than the first, and the third sentence is even easier than that. Suddenly you are speaking the truth in paragraphs, in pages. The fear, the nervousness, is still there, but it is joined by a new confidence. All along, you've used the first sentence as a lock. But now you find that it's the key.”
  

Every now and then I read a book that I just know will stick with me forever. When I find one of these special books, I want every person I know – and even ones I don't – to read it. That was definitely the case with Two Boys Kissing. This book was truly something special and I can't recommend it highly enough.

  
    “If you let the world in, you open yourself up to the world. Even if the world doesn't know that you're there.”
  

I read the audiobook version, which I was pleasantly surprised to find was narrated by the author himself. The book itself was powerful, but having the author read his own words made it that much more so. There's something about listening to an author reading their own words and realizing how much of themselves they put into the characters and the story, that made this one even more powerful and special then it would have been with a different narrator. You could hear his passion for the story in each word he spoke. And those words? They were beautiful and honest. The only drawback of reading this one in audiobook format is that there's no way to highlight the beautiful passages... and there were a lot of them. Had I read this in eBook format, I'd have highlighted half the book. I had to go seek out quotes on Goodreads.

  
    “...he hopes that maybe it'll make people a little less scared of two boys kissing than they were before, and a little more welcoming to the idea that all people are, in fact, born equal, no matter who they kiss or screw, no matter what dreams they have or love they give.”
  

Two Boys Kissing is inspired by a true story. Many of them, actually. While it's true the book mostly centers around Harry and Craig's endeavor to break the Guinness World Record for the longest kiss, there are several other characters whose stories are every bit as important to this book. Harry and Craig's bold gesture has a huge impact on these other characters who are attempting to navigate tricky situations on their own.

  
    “Love is so painful, how could you ever wish it on anybody? And love is so essential, how could you ever stand in its way?”
  

This book was gorgeous and thought-provoking. I know it will stick with me for a very, very long time. It moved me to tears, made me appreciate the struggle of my gay friends, and most of all, made me realize that while progress has undeniably been made, there's still so much more left to achieve. I've recently read that some parents are petitioning schools to remove this book from their libraries. Now, I'm not going to get on my soapbox on this, but all I can say is that I hope that while the parents aren't open-minded enough to give this book a shot, that the school officials will take a few hours and read this beautiful, powerful book and realize taking it out of libraries would do more harm than good, by far.

  
    “You can give words, but you can't take them. And when words are given, that is when they are shared. We remember what that was like. Words so real they were almost tangible. There are conversations you remember, for certain. But more than that, there is the sensation of conversation. You will remember that, even when the precise words begin to blur.”
  

I wasn't sure how the Greek Chorus of gay men would work in this book. It took a little bit of time for me to fully embrace it, but it wasn't long before it became one of my favorite things about this book. Their voices were so honest and it was incredibly moving listening to their thoughts on the events taking place in current day, as compared to their struggles. I got entirely wrapped up in each individual character's story, though I don't think any moved me more than Cooper's. His voice – and the rest of the voices – were so authentic and believable. I've listened to friends talk about some of the same struggles and I think that's what made this book so personal to me.

  
    "We know that some of you are still scared. We know that some of you are still silent. Just because it's better now doesn't mean that it's always good.”
  

There's not one thing I would change about this book, except to maybe make it longer. The world needs more books like this, more writers like David Levithan. This was an emotional and hopeful read. We've come a long way, but there's still so much further to come.

  
    “We do not start as dust. We do not end as dust. We make more than dust. That's all we ask of you. Make more than dust.”

Two Boys Kissing Jede Sekunde zählt

Reviews

Highlights