LITTLE F

A gay 13-year-old embarks on a multistate misadventure after running away from home.

Spencer could have it a lot worse, but he also could have it a lot better. He’s white and upper-middle-class, growing up in Phoenix. But he’s also transparently queer at a suburban junior high in 2010, which means he’s a major target for bullies. After a schoolyard gay-bashing sends Spencer to the hospital and his mother assumes he was an antagonist rather than a victim in the fight, he decides he must escape the Southwest. With the help of his sole friend, a purple-haired teen witch named Joy, Spencer plots a course for Provincetown, Massachusetts, the location of a long-held fantasy in which he’s being raised by a sophisticated gay uncle. Spencer’s hitchhiking almost immediately goes awry, and a Dickensian odyssey ensues that winds through Texas and Louisiana and brings Spencer into the orbit of Velvet, a handsome, rough-and-tumble teenager headed to New Orleans to see his estranged sister. Spencer’s narrative voice is a delight, striking a skillful balance between anxiety, longing, awe, and wit as he gradually acquires survival skills and discovers the world beyond his conventional upbringing. (Upon first encountering drag queens: “Blush cut up the sides of their faces like spray paint; their faces looked like murals of faces. Their mouths were luscious and muscular, working around the songs like they were eating them, and their hair looked like bird’s nests or war helmets, like Marie Antoinette or Dolly Parton.”) There’s a tidiness in the novel’s denouement that might strain some readers’ credulity, but for others, Tea’s sincerity and generosity toward her characters will be a balm. It’s a pleasure to see the world through Spencer’s eyes.

A comical, tender, queer coming-of-age, where the journey is the destination.