Just Your Local Bisexual Disaster

by Andrea Mosqueda

Overview

In this voice-driven young adult debut by Andrea Mosqueda, Maggie Gonzalez needs a date to her sister's quinceañera - and fast.

Growing up in Texas’s Rio Grande Valley, Maggie Gonzalez has always been a little messy, but she’s okay with that. After all, she has a great family, a goofy group of friends, a rocky romantic history, and dreams of being a music photographer. Tasked with picking an escort for her little sister’s quinceañera, Maggie has to face the truth: that her feelings about her friends—and her future—aren’t as simple as she’d once believed.

As Maggie’s search for the perfect escort continues, she’s forced to confront new (and old) feelings for three of her friends: Amanda, her best friend and first-ever crush; Matthew, her ex-boyfriend twice-over who refuses to stop flirting with her, and Dani, the new girl who has romantic baggage of her own. On top of this romantic disaster, she can’t stop thinking about the uncertainty of her own plans for the future and what that means for the people she loves.

As the weeks wind down and the boundaries between friendship and love become hazy, Maggie finds herself more and more confused with each photo. When her tried-and-true medium causes more chaos than calm, Maggie needs to figure out how to avoid certain disaster—or be brave enough to dive right into it, in Just Your Local Bisexual Disaster.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250822062
Publisher:	Feiwel & Friends
Publication date:	05/24/2022
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	336
Sales rank:	453,940
File size:	3 MB
Age Range:	14 - 18 Years

About the Author

Andrea Mosqueda is a Chicana writer. She was born and raised in Texas’s Rio Grande Valley. She currently lives in Brooklyn with her partner and works in the publishing industry as an assistant editor. When she’s not writing or editing, she can be found doing her makeup, drinking too much coffee, and angsting over children’s media. Just Your Local Bisexual Disaster is her first book.

Editorial Reviews

04/04/2022

Mosqueda’s whirlwind debut features a love tangle set in Texas’s Rio Grande Valley. Sixteen-year-old Chicana Magdalena “Maggie” Gonzalez is “good at life but bad at love.” Openly bisexual and romantically closed off, she insists that friendships and her planned future career as a photographer are all she needs. But those strong relationships offer too many options when, needing a date to her sister’s quinceañera, Maggie can’t decide who to ask. There’s longtime best friend Amanda Guevara, who Maggie was in love with in middle school; Maggie’s amicable and overly flirtatious ex-boyfriend, Matthew Maldonado; and new girl Daniela “Dani” Mendoza, who has her own romantic insecurities. She hopes that throwing herself into a school photography project will help her come to a decision, but she quickly discovers that love, relationships, and the disasters they often present can’t be navigated in photography’s two-dimensional plane. While the teens’ voices sometimes feel overly adult, and outdated pop culture references fail to support the modern setting, the story’s themes of honesty and establishing personal boundaries are its strength. Frank discussion of toxic relationships and conflict resolution will endear readers looking for healthier romances in their narratives. Most characters cue as Chicanx. Ages 14–up. Agent: Lauren MacLeod, Strothman Agency. (May)

Publishers Weekly

09/30/2022

Gr 9 Up—Sixteen-year-old Magdalena "Maggie" Gonzalez is growing up in the Rio Grande Valley surrounded by her rich Chicanx culture. She's a Libra, an aspiring photographer, openly bisexual, and in desperate need of a date to her youngest sister's quinceañera . But with conflicting romantic feelings for three different people, how does she decide whom to ask? By using social media for a school assignment, of course. For a semester-long art project, Maggie creates a finsta where she posts her photography and journals in the captions to navigate through her feelings about her childhood best friend Amanda, her ex-boyfriend Mathew, and Danie, the new girl in town. Messy feelings, a dramatic love triangle, and relatable characters will hook readers into this masterful and satisfying debut novel about honesty, accountability, privacy, and boundaries. VERDICT A solid purchase for teen collections.—Kayla Fontaine

School Library Journal