This book absolutely warmed my heart. I fell in love with the story and the characters, and was so happy with the representation in this novel. At the very core, this was a story about being true to yourself and being happy. It tells us that our families are made up of the people who love and support us even if they're not related by blood or law. It tells the reader these truths through the relationship of Xavier and Skylar. These two were adorable and I loved watching them grow as people and grow together as a couple. Heidi Cullinan captured Xavier's passion for art so beautifully and had me aching to see the paintings she described. Just as beautiful was watching Skylar shed his false exterior and accept who he really was. This was my first time reading about a character who falls on the ace/gray spectrum and I hope to read more in the future. I was also drawn into the setting- Benten College, which is absolutely drenched in Japanese culture. Xavier and Skylar's group of friends were charming, and while some were more developed than others, they became family over the course of the book. My favorites were Zelda, a fierce friend of Xavier's from the beginning who is unafraid of anything and Unc, a wonderfully cheerful fraternity brother of Skylar's who was always willing to lend a helping hand. Overall, I absolutely loved this book and hope I get to read more about these characters again someday.

When I first came upon this novel, I thought it was going to be a manga, or at least include some manga panels throughout. I was disappointed when it came to that. Despite not being from my typical genre, I really enjoyed this novel. Of course there were moments that made me cringe, but overall this was a great feel good romance. A wonderful connection was formed between the two main protagonists that build up beautifully.  I really liked how the novel was very intimate without being explicit.

Additionally, I learned a lot about the LGBTQ+ spectrum. It was very enlightening for me. I was even satisfied with the conclusion, which is not always the case when it comes to romances.

Antisocial by Heidi Cullinan tells the story of college students Xander Fairchild, a grumpy and antisocial art student with a love for drawing manga, and Skylar Stone, a silver-tongued frat boy. Even tho it doesn't seem like they have anything in common, other than the fact that they are both attending Benten College, destiny brings them together and into a journey of self-discovery, love, friendship and independence. If you like happy endings and love conquers all stories you will love this book. Even more if you have a soft spot for manga and Japanese culture in general. However, if you are expecting the typical love story with steamy sex scenes, you wont find those in here. What you will find is a strong romantic bond based on trust and mutual understanding.

I really enjoy uplifting stories like this one, where the struggles the characters face are not there to bring drama, block the way or fill up pages, but rather aid to further develop their personalities and push them in the right direction. At some point, I felt like the way the story unfolded was too good to be real and my brain struggled to accept it, that is, until I let myself enjoy it like I would with a Disney movie. If you, like the author, think that "there’s no such thing as too much happy ever after" don't hesitate and dive into this story right away. What makes this book special for me is how it incorporates gray sexuality. Even tho it is a constant theme throughout the story, it is weaved across the narrative in such a way that it doesn't take the spotlight away from the main theme which is love and friendship. A great book to cuddle up with.

Beautifully written examination of a non "traditional" same sex relationship, sensual and intimate this shows how two men can find the perfect partner without the need for physical exchanges.

However, for me, the emphasis on Japanese culture which anchors the whole narrative - as it isn't something which interests me personally - made the story as a whole a bit too much as everything was hooked on it from their relationship, to their friends, to their college experiences and into their lives afterwards.

It was a homage to Japan as well as to asexual love, to anime and manga, religion and language and it just isn't something which floats my boat.

"Art is not finished, only abandoned."

Sometimes, you start a book, and a few pages in you get the feeling you had underestimated the importance of it, whether it be the importance of it to you personally or to the world as a whole.

I did just that with this book, and I did it in both ways.

I stumbled upon Love Lessons last year, and ever since I have been a devoted fan of the author. Her books are always cute, quirky, romantic, diverse, and hilarious. When I read the Love Lessons trilogy, I was in love with them. When I read the Roosevelt series, I felt educated on the lives of those who don’t fall under the umbrella of neurotypical.

But when I read Antisocial, I felt a personal connection to not only the characters, but the story itself. Was it because I could relate to some of the struggles of the characters? Yes. Was it because I have a lot of odd interests that were center stage in this book? Also yes. But the reason this book hit me personally, is because I could tell it was personal to the author.

Xander and Skylar weren’t the typical quirky, but otherwise average guys that usually get portrayed in New Adult romances. They were awkward and scared, and their relationship showcased that. If you’re looking for suave quips and sexy times, this book is probably not for you.

This is a spoiler, but it’s such an important aspect of the novel that I have to discuss it. When most people read New Adult, they expect beautiful people in their early twenties, and lots of sex. Whether it’s just an accurate depiction of discovering your sexuality in college, or suits with wealth and kinks, there is almost always lots of sex in New Adult novels. That’s a given.

Well, not in this case. There is no sex in this book. No. Sex. These characters fall in love, and are in a relationship for a majority of the novel, but they never once even go so far as a deep kiss. Why? Because Xander is an awkward college boy and Skylar falls somewhere under the gray area of sexuality.

New Adult (and Young Adult) aim for representation and diversity. This is what that representation and diversity should look like. There is nothing wrong with people having sex, but it’s important for there to also be representation for those who don’t need a physical act to consummate their relationship, because their love is real to them and that’s all that matters.

This was a breath of fresh air from the typical steamy, and often, unrealistic sexual encounters I’ve read in other books. It was a story of two boys who loved each other just as much as any other couple, but didn’t need that physical element to prove anything.

On top of handling minority sexualities, like asexual, pansexual, and demisexual, this book tackled the effects parents have on their children whether intentional or unintentional, and mental illness. One of the characters has a severe anxiety disorder, and another has depression.

After all these heavier topics, I would like to clarify that overall this book was just as cute and fun as all her novels, if not even more so. It had everything.

Perfect read for fans of New Adult, LGBTQ, and of course, romance.

A good story, well written. Catch is, you have to understand and enjoy Manga or most of the story will make no sense to you.

All readers have said at one time or another (to put it mildly) that a book was not for them. In this case, this book was quite literally not for me.

At first blush, it looked like a perfect fit. A gay romance set in a college described as “Japanese culture-soaked." I enjoy reading and writing gay romance. I’ve also studied Japanese culture both casually and in a formal school setting since I was ten years old. But that’s precisely what puts me outside the audience for this book.

This became sadly clear to me upon reading two specific passages about the setting of the school. The first was this:

“The legend [of the school’s founding], as Xander had been told, was that in the 1870s a group of rich, eccentric friends from New York toured Asia and fell in love with Japan. They came home full of half-baked Shinto beliefs and a passion to start a Japanese revolution in the US. When their efforts to instill Japanese philosophy didn’t take, they decided what they really needed to make their ideas catch on was an academic institution to further their interests, and thus Benten College was born. Except by the time the college was actually founded, it was the late nineties, they’d grown older and more eccentric, and in the case of several of them, significantly poorer. The few who still had money had held on to it by being less mad with their ideas, and they insisted the college had to appeal to the masses. Compromises were made. In the end, Benten College was just another run-of-the-mill academic institution, except that this one was radical enough to accept men and women. All Eastern traces were gone.”

Upon reading this, my brain flooded with questions. Why isn’t the Meiji Restoration, the relevant time period, named or referenced in any way? Shinto is mentioned almost indifferently, and one of the important things going on then was the separation of Shintoism from other religions, and its becoming the official religion of Japan. What did these travellers intend to accomplish with the vaguely titled “Japanese revolution?” Why a school? Would it be like a Filipino cultural school or Chinese school? Why is the coeducational nature of the school’s charter worth pointing out when by the late 1890s, coed colleges in the US numbered over 100? Japan did have coed schools at this time, but that was influenced by Europe and America, not the other way around.

Granted, this “historical aside” is only intended to give a bit of flavour in the way of world-building, but this isn’t a fantasy novel. For all that it’s fiction and this school and city are fabricated, Japan and the United States are both real countries with real history.

But minor world-building can probably be overlooked. The real deciding factor in my decision to declare this book “not for me” was a passage that followed almost immediately after.

“The college was rich with Japanese culture, though bizarrely low on people of actual Japanese heritage, and it had always been that way. Occasionally in the college’s history they’d had Japanese instructors for the Japanese language and culture classes, and there were Japanese international students when the college recruiters did their job properly, but mostly the college was a bunch of rich white people, a handful of people of color, and an explosion of Japanese culture that made no sense when you looked at it from the outside. Not much from the inside, either, to be honest.”

There was no mention of any display of Japanese culture before this point, aside from a school periodical to which one of the main characters contributes a manga. A mention is made of Japanese pop culture, but that is only expanded upon to mean manga and anime. Never mind FRUiTS street fashion, 可愛さ / kawaisa, variety shows, celebrity worship, JPop, novelty food, video games, Akihabara, gashapon, or even light novels. No. Just comics, and cartoons aimed primarily at teens and children.

“Cultural appropriation” is in and of itself a neutral term. But cultural exploitation is not. “Japanese culture” represented in this book is reductive, lazily researched, and cannot even produce a character of the ethnicity in question.

This book obviously already has a devoted fan base, but it is not for me. I do not wish to wade through the parts that upset me just to get to the romance, when I can find gay romance without problematic elements elsewhere. Possibly even from the same author.