Some Girls Do

Dugan is one of my absolute favorite authors of queer YA, and this romance between out-and-proud track star Morgan and closeted Ruby is a perfect illustration why, merging a fun high school setting and passionate main characters with the very relevant situation of managing your public level of queerness. It’s thoughtful and sweet, romantic and funny, and above all, real. 

Some Girls Do presents both sides of falling in love: from the confident, openly gay Morgan and from the stand-offish, closeted bisexual Ruby. Both characters make mistakes and say silly things — and they learn from this. Their differing experiences and expectations surrounding "coming out" makes this book frustrating, relatable, and beautiful.

You may have noticed a trend here—every book I’ve recommended has been a pandemic release. It was one of the hardest recorded times for authors to release books so I wanted to highlight some of my favorites that you might have missed. But all of Jennifer Dugan’s books are worth reading. She writes about messy girls and queer joy in her signature laugh-out-loud, tell-it-like-it-is prose. In Some Girls Do, an elite track star is forced out of her Catholic high school simply because she’s queer. She’s ready to be out and proud, but she falls for a closeted bisexual… show more.