Getting It

Sanchez, A. (2006). Getting it. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN-10: 1-4169-0896-X

Why read this book
Find out how Carlos and his buddies figure out wassup with having sex and having relationships. Inspired by Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, Carlos complicates his situation by asking a gay guy in his school to help make him more attractive to Roxy, the girl Carlos has his eye on.

Plot summary
Fifteen-year-old Carlos is troubled because his three best buddies have all had sex and he hasn’t. He has his eye on Roxy, a cheerleader at his high school, but Carlos can’t imagine that she would even notice him in the hallway. After seeing another student, Sal, who is rumored to be gay, relaxing in the library with a bunch of girls, Carlos decides to ask Sal to give him a make-over. The plan goes well. Sal helps Carlos get on top of his game by cleaning up his bedroom, his eating habits, his wardrobe, and his hairstyle. Before long sparks are flying between Roxy and Carlos.

All Sal wants for his services is a little cash for expenses and Carlos’ help in getting a Gay Straight Alliance going at their school. It proves harder for Carlos to deliver on his half of the bargain than it was for Sal to deliver on the make-over.

Critical evaluation
Alex Sanchez is more interested in engaging young readers with social issues than writing great literature, which is fine. The story becomes more interesting once Carlos’ too-easily-accomplished make-over is finished and Carlos has a chance to explore his attraction to Roxy. Here the common confusions associated with first encounters with sex and relationships are revealed gracefully through the plotting. Carlos wants sex, but he also wants a relationship with Roxy, and he’s confused when she’s willing to get physical quickly on his secret visits to her house but won’t talk to him the next day at school. Combined with his failure to carry through on his promise to help his new friend Sal start a Gay Straight Alliance at school; his feelings of rejection from his father, who has started another family with a new baby son; and his discomfort with his mother’s relationship with a potential new step-father, Carlos’ frustrations with Roxy manifest in what his parents see as typical anti-social, irrational teen behavior. Since the reader knows what’s going on with Carlos, it’s easy to sympathize with him, but it takes Sal’s advice for Carlos to realize that he can’t expect people around him to be sympathetic until he tells them wassup.

Getting It falls within Susanne Noble’s third category of optimism in young-adult literature, the category she finds most rewarding for her students: “… the optimistic ending in which the character actually takes the step, and the reader sees the positive consequences of making this decision” (Noble, 1997, p. 3). Although Carlos doesn’t get either sex or a relationship by the end of the novel, he gets an understanding of what they are about and how they relate to each other that leaves him and the reader confident that he will succeed before too much longer.

About the author
Alex Sanchez was born in Mexico City in 1957 and moved with his family to the United States when he was five years old. He has said that his life as a closeted gay adolescent in the 1970s informs much of his current writing, which is aimed at providing stories that LGBTQ youth can identify with and learn from (biography.jrank.org, n.d.). After graduating from Virginia Tech in 1978, Sanchez worked in Los Angeles hoping to become a screenwriter. He later earned a master’s degree in guidance and counseling from Old Dominion University in Virginia and worked for many years as a youth and family counselor. He published his first young-adult novel, Rainbow Boys, in 2001. It tells the stories of three high school boys, each gay in their own ways, who find love and friendship with each other. Rainbow High (2003) and Rainbow Road (2005) continue their stories through the end of high school and the beginning of college. Sanchez’ other books include the middle school novel So Hard to Say (2006); The God Box (2009), which explores gay issues among students of faith; and Bait (2009), the story of a sexually-abused 16-year-old who is figuring out how to make his way forward in life.

Genre: Romance; LGBTQ issues

Curriculum ties
Getting It is good independent reading for teens, but it doesn’t provide a lot of opportunity for literary analysis, historical connections, or insights into contemporary social issues.

Book-talking ideas
• Wassup with sex and relationships? Are they the same thing, something connected but distinct, something completely separate? Read about what some 15-year-olds figure out about this topic.

• Do you think the TV series Queer Eye for the Straight Guy could be remade with gay high school guys helping straight teens become more attractive to girls?

• Note the Latino names of the characters, the Spanish slang, and the Latino heritage of the author. These might pique the interest of potential Latino readers, but the Latino context of the story is quite muted and does not provide particular insights to the Latino experience in the United States.

Reading level/interest age
The protagonists are 15 years old and the reading level of the novel is appropriate for that age. Older and younger readers who are dealing with the same issues of sex and relationships would probably find the novel engaging as well. I suspect Sanchez identified the protagonists as 15-year-olds because this is in the middle of the range in ages when many young people are first experimenting with sexual intimacy.

Challenge issues
Physical intimacy between 15-year-olds is likely to offend some adults. Although the sexual interactions are mild (kissing, the fondling of bare breasts, an attempt at oral sex interrupted at the last minute by a mother’s return home), they are described clearly.

The gay theme is less likely to draw challenges in this novel than in other novels with LGBTQ content because it is political rather than sexual. Gay life among teenagers is presented as a normal aspect of the teen scene, but the romantic themes play out among non-gay students.

Responses
• Remind the challenger of the policy (in the case of the San Francisco Public Library) to present “all points of view on current and historical issues. Materials should not be proscribed or removed because of partisan or doctrinal disapproval.”
• Note that the theme of the novel values emotional intimacy over sexual intimacy.
• Refer the challenger to favorable book reviews from respected library journals.
• Note that Getting It received an award from the Gustavus Myers Center as an outstanding book that advances human rights.

Why I chose to read this book
I am writing a study of author Alex Sanchez, so I want to read all of his young adult novels.

References
biography.jrank.org (n.d.). Alex Sanchez biography (1957 – ) – Sidelights. Retrieved October 11, 2009, from http://biography.jrank.org/pages/615/Sanchez-Alex-1957-Sidelights.html

Gustavus Myers Center (2007, December 10). The 2007 Gustavus Myers Center outstanding book awards advancing human rights. Retrieved October 11, 2009 from http://www.myerscenter.org/

Noble, S. (1997). "Why don't we ever read anything happy?" YA literature and the optimistic ending. The ALAN Review 26(1), 1-7. Retrieved September 30, 2009, from http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/ALAN/fall98/nobles.html

Sanchez, A. (n.d.). Rainbow Boys, Bait, and other novels about love and friendship –- for teens and adults. Retrieved October 11, 2009 from http://www.alexsanchez.com