That’s why I will always defend young adult fiction because at least it’s made for young adults. Yes, although they were not necessarily books that I should have been reading when I was a teenager. That’s why I think the most responsible thing we can do as adults and educators and librarians is giving people as much information as possible.ĭid you have any books you read growing up that had a major impact on your life? So I think we have a responsibility as adults to say this is what the internet is like now and this is how you need to stay safe. I wasn’t inundated with guys in my DMs on Snapchat or Instagram, which is what I see happening to my teenage nieces now. In my childhood, I wasn’t seeing hardcore pornography. That felt like a good thing to me and I still think that’s true because the internet has only gotten more powerful. According to Vanderbilt University, in 2022, This Book Is Gay became the ninth most-banned book in America. But as the movement by conservatives to prohibit information about LGBTQ+ topics in public schooling has taken hold around the U.S., Dawson’s book has come under fire. So I said yes.”įirst published in 2014, Dawson’s how-to about gay relationships has become a staple for sex ed classes.

But when I was a teenager, this would have answered so many questions. “Other than the fact that I had been a teacher, I didn’t feel that I was the best authority to be telling anybody about how to find a partner at that time when I was in my 20s-given that my love life was such a hot mess. “To reach out to all the LGBTQ+ youth in the world felt like a huge undertaking,” Dawson says. But when she was approached in 2012 by her publisher to create a comprehensive guide to LGBTQ+ sex education, she tells Rolling Stone she was initially unsure about tackling such a massive project. Juno Dawson didn’t want to write This Book Is Gay.ĭawson, a U.K.-based author, had spent seven years as a sexual education and wellness teacher.

This Book Is Gay by Juno Dawson