FIFTEEN HUNDRED MILES FROM THE SUN by Jonny Garza Villa was the gay Happily Ever After romance I longed for as a teen! With a fun and refreshing voice, the long distance relationship was sweet and incredibly authentic for teens nowadays. This book tackles the intense, nuanced struggles queer Latinx kids face with care and compassion. It’s a story of love, hope and healing that we all need right now.

Jonny Garza Villa has a very long and successful career ahead of them, and I can’t wait to see what they write next!

Very enjoyable story about a senior in high school falling in love for the first time, coming out to not so great results from his father, and exploring his options for his first year at college. I loved that this depicted a long distance internet relationship that works out--these kinds of relationships are so common for queer youth, but it's not something I see a ton of in YA.

Fifteen Hundred Miles From The Sun is a story about knowing who you are and having the courage to live your truth. It is heavy and the author's addresses this in their author note, but it is also full of joy.

I loved Julian, Jules as their friends call him, he was such a cool character to read this book from, His struggles with living his truth brought me to tears. I wanted him to live his best life and was so happy when he did.

While I loved some aspects of this book, I will say that at times I felt like it was trying too hard. Especially when it mentioned the "Latinx aesthetic," I'm still not really sure what they mean by that but it did bother me at the time when I read it. The extensive Selena references were also a bit much for me, and as a 90s kid and Texan - trust me, I get it. It just felt like in those parts, like it was trying too hard.

I however did like it overall and think many will love it.

I would like to thank the author for the review copy. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

An uplifting, heartfelt coming of age story about first love, long distance relationship, and the struggles of queer, young people. Fifteen Hundred Miles from the Sun by Jonny Garza Villa is a celebration of self-worth and your authentic, loveable self.

The story followed Julián "Jules" Luna, a Chicano teen who accidentally outed himself to the world after a drunken night of fun with his friends. This was supposed to be finally the opportunity for Jules to live the life that he wanted, if only his fears becoming true were not part of it. Then Mat, his Twitter crush from Los Angeles, reached out to him and there, their relationship developed. From getting into his dream college, blooming relationship, and the constant changes ever since he came out, would Julian finally able to control the life that he wanted?

As much as I had fun reading it, this novel was hard to read at times, but it was always ever hopeful. It tackled difficult themes and all were discussed with care and sensitivity. The story dove deep into Jule's fears, worries, and difficulties that many queer teens might experienced, and the author portrayed this raw, mixed emotions that these situations might bring in realistically. Nevertheless, this novel also highlighted different kinds of love one received. From Jule's friends, her sister, and from Mat. I adored how Jule's friends were such a great support during the time when he came out. Also, Mat, even when the romance a little bit rushed for my taste, I couldn't deny that he and Jules' chemistry was on point. There were a lot of sweet moments, but there was enough angst and drama to help their relationship grow. I liked it was build on trust since there were miles away from each other.

I loved the Mexican culture and heritage in this novel. The author clearly conveyed his love for the culture and community. However, prejudices that came with it were also explored. What I loved the most was definitely the mouthwatering food that were mentioned in it. They also blended Spanish language in the dialogues. Even when I do not know the Spanish language, it was still easy to follow. The characters that the author breathe life into were diverse and likeable. I especially love Jule's friends. They always looked out for each other, and they were the kind of people everyone should have in their life.

Overall, Fifteen Hundred Miles from the Sun by Jonny Garza Villa is a coming of age story brimming with tenderness, hope, and pride.

4/5 stars!

cw: parental and physical abuse, outing, homophobia, bullying

OMG how I loved this book. I think I’m putting it in the Best Books I’ve Read This Year category.

Right off the bat, Julián and Mat definitely give me Ari and Dante vibes. The way their relationship develops is so sweet, and they are so wonderful together. 🥰 I feel like this book actually has quite a bit in common with *Aristotle & Dante Discover the Secrets of the World*, in terms of characters, setting, and certain themes. (This makes it all the more fun when the narrator confesses to secretly owning a copy of A&D.)

It’s a beautiful story that I think will be relatable to many young people. Julián Luna is a closeted teen trying to make it through high school so he can leave home and openly be the person he truly is. Julián is an easy-to-root-for character from the beginning and I found myself totally invested in his welfare early on.

I love Julian’s sister and friend group from school; they are really great people and are very supportive of him. And Mat’s family is a delight. I also really enjoyed the of-the-moment feel of the book. Julián talks about being on Twitter and Instagram and uses abbreviated teenspeak (in both English and Spanish) and über-current pop culture references that make it clear he’s very much a teenager circa 2020. In fact, a main plot point revolves around his use of Twitter. I think this all serves to make the story feel very realistic and relatable.

Some very serious topics play a significant role in this story but the heavy and the light are blended well. There’s so much love and hope in this book, it’s a joy to read.

I would recommend this book to literally anyone; it’s a wonderful story, wonderfully written, with a lot of heart - but I think those who would most benefit from it are teens like Julián - kids in the LGBTQ and/or Latinx/Chicanx communities, whose stories aren’t told often enough.

Thanks to NetGalley and Skyscape for the ARC.

Fifteen Hundred Miles from the Sun is a beautiful and vulnerable debut. From the very first chapter, I was hooked with the story of Jules and his journey after accidentally coming out on twitter. From start to finish, this book was real and it made me cry, both happy tears and heart-wrenching ones.

One thing I really loved about this debut was that it had the perfect balance of cute, sweet romance moments, and intense, authentic struggles that queer people, and especially queer people of color, face every day. This book tackles some serious issues and can hurt to read at points, but it is also so full of love. Love within Jules' long distance relationship with Mat, love between Jules and his friends, and love between Jules and his family. All of the connections between characters felt so real and shone throughout the book, which made it easy for me as a reader to fall in love with the characters myself.

I also think the author presented and talked about Jules' heritage and being Chicanx in such a realistic and truthful way, from talking about what Jules' heritage means to him, to addressing prejudices in the community itself. Overall, this book blended so many intricate details and issues together so well, and I couldn't put it down.

Fifteen Hundred Miles from the Sun is a coming-of-age story of joy. It is beautifully gay and filled with love, friendship but also sorrow and hardship. Jonny Garza Villa gives us a content warning at the beginning about this, and I appreciate knowing beforehand what was going to be discussed in this book.
There were many things I loved from this book, and the first one was the friendship dynamics between Julián and his squad. They made me laugh, cry and look back to my own group of friends from high school. I loved how supportive they were, how they would literally fist-fight anyone who dared to mess with their best friend. That love and loyalty are always refreshing to see in contemporary YA books where many friendships are shown to fall out of grace when something changes. I also really loved seeing family members being supportive; having family members that love you unconditionally is so important, and we see how it can affect a person to have family members that support them, but also that reject them. Homophobia is very common in BIPOC households, but I like how the author showed us how it doesn’t have to be the norm, presenting us a BIPOC household (Mat’s household) that was 100% supportive. The relationship between Julián and Mat was beautiful and well developed, and they had me grinning and rooting for them the whole time.
The writing style was great, keeping you hooked throughout the whole book. Although sometimes it felt like the story was going nowhere, and it dragged a bit, after a few pages you quickly got back on track! You do get a lot of social media slang and how most teenagers speak, so take that into consideration when reading it. Personally, I would have liked it if the characters were a bit more developed and that we got to see more of each of them, especially Mat. There was also this scene where Julián mentions what he thinks is the ‘Latinx aesthetic’ that sounded weird to me. But I will not look too deep into it.
Overall, this was a great queer, romantic contemporary YA that I am so happy to have read, and I definitely recommend it if you are looking for a book where things start rough but get better as you go.

honestly, the start of this book is very very slow. like, i even had thoughts of dnfing this book at sometimes, since it was quite slow and also had this whole day to day life of Luna, or Julian, but i'm going to call him Luna, since most of his friends did call him this. and most of his day to day life was just not interesting, since all he did was really talk about what he did every minute of the day, which just got boring and slow after awhile. but, then it kind of picked up after awhile and started jumping to major events. and i do feel like the start of this book was honestly quite slow, and then once it hit maybe 40% into this book, it honestly picked up and got to be more interesting and everything flowed more. and then i feel like once it got to about 75% i feel like this book did slow down again. probably because they were both separated again, so it just slowed it all down. with that being said, i wasn't the biggest fan of this book to jump to the major holidays since i feel like we were just missing some of Luna's day to day life. and i feel like there was so much that could have happened between thanksgiving and christmas, when we just skipped all those days. and they played it off that nothing happened, and i feel like things probably happened, and it wasn't like he did nothing during those days.

i will say that the times were they haven't met yet in real life, and it was mostly just them talking via text or dm was pretty boring, and also just confusing. since, it might just be the arc/ebook version were you couldn't tell who was saying what, so you just had to guess. which was annoying and also just boring since i feel like it took away from the story.

but, this is also not a soft or easy read. like, it does tackle some very hard topics of abuse and homophobia from your father, which i do think was done so well. and i honestly think it was hard to read about, but it really was done well and that i do think it was cool that they didn't stray away from the harder topics when writing this book. and also that it did have those intense moments, but also had those lighthearted moments.

i also really liked that this book was very 'romance' heavy, in a sense that we didn't only get to see mat x luna, we also got to see friendship and family love between all of the characters. and i feel like the author does such a good job with showing the different types of love that one person could have and that every love that you feel doesn't need to be just pure romance between a couple, that you could also have love between friends and family members.

trigger warnings- trigger warnings- homophobia, emotional abuse, physical abuse, child abuse, domestic abuse, bullying, panic attacks / disorders, death of parent, hate crime.

This was a beautiful, inclusive yet heartbreaking story of first love, coming out and finding a sense of self in a continuously cruel world, especially in certain latinx and chicanx communities and families as explored by the writer here.

This novel explores many poignant coming-of-age issues but by far my favourite thing about it was the characters. Each character - even those who were antagonistic - was absolutely full of life and zest. I wanted happy endings for everyone I came across in this story and that takes some special talent!

I think my main issue with this story is the HEA vibes that a first love over the Internet provides. I'm not sure that is the safest message to be providing to young people, but that is TOTALLY the cynical side of me talking!

I recommend this to those who are fans of people making their own HEA despite some familial difficulties!

3.5 Stars

Fifteen Hundred Miles from the Sun by Jonny Garza Villa broke my heart, then put it back together. Following a boy who accidentally comes out online, then finds himself in a relationship with his Twitter crush, this one contains both hard-hitting and heartwarming scenes. I especially enjoyed the realistic characters and their connection. Despite my enjoyment of Jules and Mat, I found the writing very dialogue-heavy, and I would have liked to see more descriptions throughout the book. However, this is still such an important read that I’m sure will touch many.

After accidentally outing himself on Twitter, Julián is prepared for rejection from those around him. What he doesn’t expect is for his Twitter crush to like him back, from the other side of the country. This is a deeply personal story, and it contains many heavy themes as Jules faces homophobia at school, during his soccer games, and from his own father. At the same time, though, Jules has a supportive group of friends and a caring boyfriend, who bring more lightness to the story.

❀ STRONG MAIN CHARACTER

Jules is a strong main character, and I enjoyed his voice. He has a difficult home life since his father refuses to accept him for who he is, and I really sympathized with him coming out before he was ready. There are times when Jules can’t be strong, and I liked getting to see these moments of vulnerability as well as strength. Mat is also a lovable character, and he is so supportive of Jules. I loved their conversations online, and both of them speak and act like teenagers, which I always love to see. It’s easy to feel their connection, although their relationship is a bit insta-lovey.

❀ DIALOGUE-HEAVY

While I appreciated the important themes of this book, I didn’t love the writing style. This one feels very dialogue-heavy, which takes away from the emotion in certain scenes at times. Characters often have short monologues explaining how they feel, and I personally prefer being shown emotion through actions. I did enjoy the snappy dialogue between Mat and Jules, but I would have liked to see a little more description.

❀ HEAVY THEMES WITH A SWEET RELATIONSHIP

Fifteen Hundred Miles from the Sun by Jonny Garza Villa is a story of pain, but also one of joy. I enjoyed reading about Jules and Mat’s online relationship, and both of them are realistic characters. While I do appreciate everything this book accomplishes, I found that the dialogue-heavy writing style takes away from some of the emotion of the story. I would still recommend this to those looking for a book that balances heavy themes with a sweet relationship.

*DNF*

I have been trying to read this book for a month now and every time I pick it up, I can't get into it. I am just not a fan of the writing style. While the synopsis and cover instantly drew me in, within the first several chapters I was overwhelmed with all the different characters and figuring out who is who. I also haven't taken Spanish since high school, which probably further pulled me out of the story as I found myself having to translate lines on each page to figure out what the characters were saying. I can definitely see the story resonating with queer, bi-lingual youths but it was just not for me.

A heartfelt, sweet debut. I found it at times overly simplistic, but I appreciate that it was unafraid of shying away from difficult things, without sacrificing an overall sense of joy. This is one I’m sure will find many adoring readers and touch plenty of hearts.

Thank you to NetGalley and Skyscape for the advance review copy!

TW: homophobia, accidentally coming out, violence, abuse, unsafe home

This was 70% cute and 30% hard-hitting which for me was the perfect balance.

I love the relationship between Luna and Mat but I also loved the relationships between Luna's group of friends.
Also Mat's family! Also Luna's sister and Güelo! I loved them all.

This was a beautiful coming-of-age story and at the same time a cute romance with a hopeful tone to it.

I have so many quotes underlined, most of which almost made me cry, that I'm sure I will read and reread till the end of days.

I'm so thankful to Netgalley and the publisher for sending me an advanced reader copy. If you're reading this, I hope you give this story a chance because I can assure you it is worth it.

I enjoyed it! It was a great debut novel for the author, but I feel like it could’ve been a lot better. Either I’m severely numb from all the other heart-wrenching books I’ve read before this, or the author could’ve used a boost in the angst-writing department. It had all the right ingredients to make this coming of age story a whole lot more emotional, but it failed to really deliver the blow in areas that could’ve had that “omg this punched me in the feels” kind of feel.

For Jules and Mat, I don’t know...I had some pretty high expectations for how their first meeting would go. Especially since I was so ready for something EXCITING to happen by the halfway mark (I still think the chapter count could’ve been docked by half). And that’s a problem I think most contemporary novels have. Needless to say I was very underwhelmed, and their relationship kinda fell flat for me in the end.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the eARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Wow. This was such an amazing read. It had me feeling every emotion. Masterfully written, super cute. I loved every second of reading this one!

This is a terrific #ownvoices YA debut about coming out, living authentically, and falling in love for the first time.

Julián’s coming out is cringeworthy; he gets drunk at a party and outs himself on Twitter. Jules isn’t sure what to expect afterward, but in some ways it’s not as bad as he feared. He does experience some harassment, but he also has friends and family who are supportive, as is the cute boy Jules starts talking to online, Mat. (Too bad Mat’s in California and Jules is in Texas, though.) Even though he didn’t intend to do it, coming out is something of a relief because it allows Jules to be fully and openly himself. Well, almost.

The sticking point is Jules’s father. He’s all machismo, the exaggerated form of toxic masculinity found in Latinx culture. The emotional damage Jules sustains from his father’s abusive attempts to keep him from displaying any behavior that might be considered “gay” isn’t glossed over in the book. It’s heartbreaking to imagine how many kids experience the kind of treatment that leads to the self-hatred that Jules has struggled with as he’s grown up.

The other relationships in Jules’s life are much more positive, though. Jules’s sister Xo, his grandfather, and his friends are all in his corner, and they are an antidote to the sadness Jules experiences because of his father. All of Jules’s friends are well-written, fully formed characters, and I really loved the way their strong bonds of friendship are highlighted in the story. There’s a lot of love and happiness in the scenes they share, which counteract the darker moments in the book.

The romance between Jules and Mat is also a source of light in the story. Literally, they are light—Jules’s last name is Luna, which means “moon,” and Mat’s full name is Mặt Trời, which is “sun” in Vietnamese. Their long-distance relationship isn’t always easy, but it’s also full of happy moments. Jules and Mat are just adorable, really. And when they call each other “Moonlight” and “Sunshine” . . . Well, that’s just completely squee-worthy.

By the end of the book, when Jules is finally able to embark on a future where he is free to live and love, I was cheering. Highly recommended to anyone who enjoys YA contemporary novels! (Just have a Spanish language/slang translation website handy, maybe—my terrible high school Spanish got a real workout. 😆)

A copy of this book was provided through NetGalley for review; all opinions expressed are my own.

This was undoubtedly a cute, easy, and quick read, but not even the heavy themes that are touched upon could take it much further past that point.

Lacking a level of gravitas, better pacing, and some more-than superficial character development, this unfortunately turned out to be a merely enjoyable read, rather than a particularly stand-out one.

4.5 stars. Such a great book! It's been so long since I've read a YA novel with such an authentic voice — so sweet and funny yet heartbreaking at times, Fifteen Hundred Miles from the Sun perfectly captures the inherent messiness of teenage years and is served by fantastic characters who ring so true, you know? The friendships dynamics in particular are really well-done. Moreover, the way Jonny Garza Villa deals with heteronormativity and bigotry hit me hard — but in a good way, if that makes sense (do look at the content warnings though, because when I said that it was heartbreaking at times, I meant it). I'm so happy that queer teens get to have this book. I'll be recommending it to every teen I know for sure.

CW: anti-gay prejudice, anti-gay slurs, bullying, depiction of sex (not explicit), parental abuse (physical), parental abandonment, mention of the death of a parent

This book took me on an emotional rollercoaster! I loved everything: the characters, the story, the romance. Watching Julián get the chance to openly be himself was amazing and freeing, though his coming out does lead to some of negative consequences he feared, like bullying and feeling unsafe. Without spoilers, things get bad for Jules but he does find love and support from friends and family and Mat, his Twitter crush. The relationship that blooms between Mat and Jules is sweet and intense. They are literally the sun and moon dynamic, with Mat pouring out love and hope into some of Jules' darkest nights, and Jules being a steady support for Mat.

If I could pick one word to sum up this book, it would be vibrant. Jules and his friends, Mat and his family, they all bring the best energy and heart to this story. They have great conversations, do typical high school stuff, party, joke, and support each other no matter what. I love the diversity of this cast of characters: Julián is Mexican-American, Mat is Vietnamese-American, Jules' friends are Latinx and Black, and the text is peppered with Spanish and, later, Vietnamese.

Fifteen Hundred Miles From the Sun is a beautiful story about coming out, finding love, friendship, and looking to the future with hope instead of fear.

I was surprised how quickly I got attached to all these characters, especially with it being a contemporary book. I truly loved Jules and Mat and Xo and the rest of Jules' friends so much. They all felt so alive. This book was just fantastic in so many ways and I can't wait to read Jonny Garza Villa's next book.