I wanted to like this book, really I did, but I found it mostly confusing and rushed. I'm sure many will like it, I'm just not the right reader for this book.

People should stop judging stories or books just because they come from Wattpad, because they miss stories like these.
What I liked most about the book is that they used the element of magic in a more original way than what I'm used to reading. Let's see, the general of the school of magic and young people with powers is there, but I feel that the author took a very different direction and I loved it. The whole subject of the school and the rebels became super dark and intriguing, full of conspiracies (Oh, I love it) And the story has a good rhythm in general, which takes you to the end of it almost without realizing you're finishing it. Well, at least I, I did not see it coming, I was very immersed in everything that happened.
I loved Johnny and Alison, and I liked their relative relationships with the other characters. Anyway I do not know if I bought the main love story... for the end yes, I was super happy for them, but in the middle it was a bit strange, some desciones and all that. But first love is weird, so, it's not something that bothers me too much.

If you are in the mood of magic, love, adventures and more magic you should read this book.

To be perfectly honest; I am very, very skeptical when it comes to Wattpad. I believe that we can find truly great stories in there, but... you know, 90 % is a trash. I wanted to read an LGBT novel, that's why I gave Gay Wizard a chance. And, as I said, as it's from Wattpad, I didn't have high hopes. But? In the end, it was better than I thought.

The main protagonist is Johnny, whose friend Alison is crazy about magic stuff. Once they both try a spell which somehow works, and because of that, they are brought to Institute, a place collecting wizards. Johnny and Alison aren't planning to stay in there, and soon they understand that there is even a bigger problem at the Institute than they would imagine.

The idea's good. But, there are many books talking about magic. And I don't mean Harry Potter or Carry On, which were both mentioned in some review I've read before. Johnny and Alison are thrown into an unknown world for magicians, and I really felt the lack of explanations. A huge lack of explanations.
For example, how the whole Institute is working. Firstly I thought that it's some kind of a magic school, and it seemed so, but then I realized that the kids aren't allowed to produce magic. Johnny was all learning himself - and those times I was wondering how the magic is working in there. Like, Johnny mentioned several times that it's hard to cast a spell, how you have to imagine it in your mind etc., but then it's pretty easy for him to build a wall in his mind so people can't read his thought. Excuse me? Feyre Archeron from A Court of Thorns and Roses took several months to learn how to protect her thoughts. I don't think it's that easy. Most of the spells I would find pretty difficul were very easy in there.
But I have to say, as I was reading further, the Institute started to make sense. So, if you're also skeptical about the world Institute represents, just keep reading. It takes some time, but it's worth it. When it came to it, I was like "Wow!"

As I said, the main character is Johnny. It wasn't hard to get used to him and I don't have anything against him, he was a nice character. Actually I'm glad it was him who was chosen to tell the story, because, apart from Blake, he's definitely my favourite.
But I couldn't stand Alison. I don't know why, I was always mad at her from how stupid she was. The friendship between her and Johnny was also a bit weird, like they were best friends, then they didn't see each other for weeks and it was fine, but then suddenly they couldn't live without themselves? I don't know.
My most favourite character is definitely Blake who made jokes about everything and I laughed the most at his scenes. But, if Gay Wizard has a Gary Sue character, it's him. Sometimes I felt like he's capable of everything, that when Johnny didn't know something, Blake always did. It was unrealistic for me.

Important in this story is also a romance between Johnny and Hunter. Personally I think that the romantic line was described well, although I think that they've fallen for each other very, very quick. But it was beautiful in the end.
There are many plot-twist which are predictable but also unpredictable. Sometimes I was a bit bored, then I wasn't, especially at the end I wanted to know what happens next. So yes, during reading I was curious, so that's the reason I'm rating this book a better 3 stars. It was better than I expected.

Huge thanks to NetGalley and Wattpad Books for providing me an ebook for an honest review.

I'm a Gay Wizard has a great premise with good characters. I feel the writing has fallen short and needs a little more editing.

I received this book via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I wanted to love this book. I really, truly did. Being part of the LGBTQAI+ community myself, I’m always happy to see an own voices author, and I always wish for them to succeed.

That being said, I… did not enjoy this book. The premise itself sounded interesting enough, the start of it seemed promising – and then it was just very thoroughly meh.

First off, the pacing is…. interesting. There are no “filler chapters”, something meaningful or dramatic happens in every chapter. It gets exhausting, and I found myself starting to roll my eyes at some of the things that happened. I’m 25, I assume this is a YA book (a point I’ll get into later), so this might be a case of “I’m too old for the book”, but I don’t think so.

Secondly, the character actions in relation to the plot – this area might contain small spoilers, so please skip this if you don’t want to know anything about what happens in the story. Basically, the characters want to find the “Defectors”, which is dangerous and nobody should find out about it. And yet they… run around and ask random people conspicuous questions? Tell other kids they’ve known for all of, what, two months that they want to break out and have a way of finding the Defectors? Come on. I’m not saying they should be suspicious of everyone who crosses their path, but… a little discretion?

Thirdly, how things work. Magic: Apparently one way to do it is to close your eyes and imagine something is going to happen – and it does. That seems disappointingly easy, really. I’m not impressed with how magic works in the world, in general. Whenever any of the characters ever did magic, it always worked as intended, too. Seems fake, but okay.

And lastly, the writing itself. This may yet change, since I assume the book might still be in the editing process, so please take this part with a grain of salt. But the writing felt juvenile and younger than the supposed YA audience. If not for the (short, mostly vague) sex scene, I’d think this was a middle-grade novel. Many short sentences, just, in general, a writing style that didn’t scream “finished” to me. Attempted showing instead of telling, that still didn’t really work for me.

“Hunter scowled, balling his fists. The sight of Hunter so mad shook them, so they hurried away.”

Really? He scowled and balled his fists, and that was “so mad” that it “shook them”? I’m underwhelmed.

“I grabbed a piece of glass—it cut me. “Ow!” I dropped the shard.”

This. This is what I mean by short sentences, and that it doesn’t seem very finished to me. Again, this might change in the final version, so if it does, everything in this part should be disregarded. But basically, those few sentences made me go, “ugh” for how… yes, juvenile they seem. I could imagine a kid writing something like this in a report about what they did that weekend.

It’s disappointing that I did not enjoy the book because again, the premise is so, so interesting, and parts of the plot have a lot of potential! I actually hope that it’s just me being a picky reader and that plenty of other people will enjoy it. But I couldn’t give it more than two stars, sadly.

I was given an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for a review.

First things first: THAT cover! amazing, full points for that awesome, colourful and artistic cover.

On to the rest.

I’m a Gay Wizard is a wattpad book, and I don’t know if I subconsciously went into this one with some preconceived prejudice about what a wattad book is, i.e. After *cough cough*, but I didn’t really enjoy it.

I don’t think there was anything inherently wrong with the plot of I’m a Gay Wizard but I did think it read like an early draft of a novel. One that needed some re-writes focused on the writing style. For me, it felt, dare I say it…like some good fanfic of an otherwise awesome book. again, I don’t think that is necessarily a huge negative mark against the book but, it just wasn’t what I was looking for right now. And perhaps this is mostly why I wasn’t a huge fan, because like I said before, the premise itself was good, interesting, intriguing. I’m here for wizards and I am especially here for gay wizards, because I feel like that’s never a combination we see in literature. I could be wrong but I’ve never come across a gay wizard. That’s why I was originally so excited to get this one from netgalley. So Santoni definitely gets points for originality, but misses the mark on the execution, in my opinion.

This concept had a lot of potential, but it didn't live up to it. While not tagged as a YA book, it really felt like one. The single sex scene was particularly childish and just didn't feel like it felt in a novel for adults. The writing was uneven. Sometimes good and sometimes less so. I would assume there's still some rounds of editing to go after the ARC I read considering there were <editorial break>s scattered throughout. The pacing was all over the place as well but was mostly just way too fast. It felt like it was written for someone with a much shorter attention span. That's not unusual with fanfic and other stories on places like wattpad, but for a published novel I personally expect more. I liked the characters so it was sad not to have them given as much depth as they deserved.

I think this will be an enjoyable read for a particular type of audience, unfortunately I am not it.

I come from the era of Fictionpress and this novel reminded me of far too many of the original slash fiction one might have found on there. The thing is, this had the trappings of everything I love: magical school, dark secrets, cute gays but they never came together in a way that worked for me. There were glimpses of brilliance in some of the passages and the plot itself is good but I found myself skimming more often than not. I suspect part of the problem is that this was very much a serial published as a novel. Serials have a different pace compared to completed novels and it showed. When read from start to end in one go, it dragged. I found myself skipping entire scenes and at one point a chapter because I was losing interest.

Now, the writing itself...well it felt uneven. As I stated previously there were passages that were brilliant, but there were also passages that felt really clunky. In particular the one and only sex scene where the orgasm is signified through a single page with the word "boom." It just felt very twee? And some of the banter had a forced feel, like the joke were put in because they were funny, not because it's something that worked for the conversation or the character.

Another issue I found myself struggling with was the whole Asuras, Devas and Maras thing. I'm buddhist, so those names and concepts are not new to me but they felt more like window trappings than anything substantial. The mythos of the novel's world didn't match with the mythos of the asuras, devas or maras that we find in real life. And I felt this was really a missed opportunity, because I would have loved to read a YA fantasy novel with hindu cosmology. Instead, it really felt more like the thought process was "oh those names sound cool and mystical, let's use them." I honestly would have preferred made up names to a religion being co-opted.

All in all, this needed someone to edit it as a novel and not a published serial and I foresee this being a problem for many wattpad published novels.

Not a fan of this book. The premise was great but the execution could have been better, the protagonist's internal voice was also slightly irritating.