While quarantine has prevented us from having the summer of our lives with lots of fun and adventure, it gave us Simon James Green’s new novel, Heartbreak Boys, which is all we ever needed to have a fantastic summer by way of literary travelling. Nate and Jack are going on a roadtrip across the UK and we get to come along! We were lucky enough to talk to Simon about all things roadtrips, summer, and his new characters that are destined to steal your heart.
Congratulations on another fabulous book, Simon! Where did the inspiration for writing a roadtrip novel come from?
Thank you! I’ve always loved roadtrip stories – they have an epic quality, both in geographical terms, but also because the trip is usually a metaphor for some kind of major character growth along the way. Often, of course, they are set in the US, so I really wanted a UK-based trip, which would naturally be less glamorous!
Besides a lot of fun and a lot of romance, Heartbreak Boys features some more serious but important themes, such as bullying and the effects it can have. How important is it for you to insert these themes into your books?
Comedy will always be first in my mind because I really want to see books out there featuring LGBTQ+ kids which aren’t full of trauma and where they get their happy ending. But I also think one of the powerful things about comedy is that you can use it as a way in to discussions about more difficult subjects. Homophobia and bullying is a real thing for a lot of LGBTQ+ people, so including it is both a reality, and also a way of understanding how some of the characters behave. If I can ease people in to that through the lens of comedy, then all the better – I think real life can be a rollercoaster like that, laughing one moment, crying the next.
Nate and Jack have two different approaches to being themselves, to being gay and out. How important do you think it is for readers to see different kinds of gay characters, especially at an age where coming out might be one of their concerns?
Everyone is different, and everyone’s experience is different and valid. I’ve always believed that the body of LGBTQ+ literature is richest if it includes the widest possible range of gay characters – everyone should see themselves and their experience in the pages of a book. I think this is particularly important for younger readers, so they understand there’s no one ‘way’ to be gay.
Instagram and social media play a huge role in Heartbreak Boys, as Jack and Nate try to “outdo” their exes in terms of having a fantastic summer, even if it only looks like it in pictures. What is your take on this “faking realities online” matter?
Well, I think most of us are complicit in it – how many of us post about our crushing disappointments or all the boring things that happen during our day? Social media is usually just the highlights reel, but the book also touches on the fact it’s not exclusively social media which does this. In so much of our lives, we only tell people certain things, or we might downplay something that went wrong, or an upset. People constantly have a mask on, being the type of person they think other people want to see. Heartbreak Boys is about cutting through that and seeing the real person underneath.
Is there a main message you want your readers to take away from this book?
Always be yourself, do your thing, do it with passion, and never let anyone take that away from you.
You are doing a lot of work with young adults in schools, what have you learned from them and are your experiences with these kids in some way inspiration for your books?
The teenagers I meet and work with are always brilliant. I’m permanently inspired by their enthusiasm, their passion, and their openness. Things have definitely improved for LGBTQ+ teenagers, but they still face bullying and homophobia, so there’s still work to do. Listening to their stories always gives me ideas for my books, whether it’s a theme, a character, or a storyline. Also, listening to the way real teenagers talk is essential if you’re going to write convincing dialogue.
Shortly before Heartbreak Boys, you published a children’s book called Llama Glamarama, which features a Llama that is unapologetically glamourous. How was working on a picture book for you?
I absolutely loved it. I enjoyed the challenge of writing a story in so few words, but even better was the process of collaborating with the illustrator, Garry Parsons, who brought so much to the project in terms of the character of the llamas and their sense of humour – as well as their glamour, of course!
Do you have anything on the horizon that you can tell us about?
My debut middle-grade book released on September 3rd. It’s called Life of Riley: Beginner’s Luck, and it’s about a ten year old boy who gets cursed by a fortune teller at a fairground and whose life then becomes one disaster after another. Riley has to find a way to remove the curse before his new best friend, Brad Chicago, realises he’s just become mates with the unluckiest kid on the planet. I’m also working on three books for next year, including a new YA title.
And lastly, if you were to go on a roadtrip with three fictional characters, who would you pick and why?
I think, for pure comedy value, I would have to pick Noah, Harry and Bambi Sugapops from my Noah novels – it would be endlessly entertaining, and can you imagine the bickering along the way?!
