In much of YA fiction there seems to be two kind of boy characters:

1) the sensitive, shy, cute (but doesn’t know it) dorky dude who mucks things up somehow and is then rescued in some way by a girl.

Or

2) the more aggressive and douche-y type, who is either an uneducated bully, or a popular snobby type who is taking advantage of people in some way.

I don’t usually figure out ahead of time which type my boy characters are going to fall into, but eventually most YA male characters—mine included—end up heading in one of these directions.

In Boy, interestingly, it turned out that the two best friends at the center of the story are these two types. GAVIN is shy and passive and when his popular friends think he should date GRACE, he goes along with it. GAVIN’s best friend CLAUDE, on the other hand, is aggressive and privileged and tends to push hard for what he wants, and usually gets it.

In Boy, though, as I worked my way through the story, I saw that neither of these two was as black-and-white as the stereotypes they represented.

Gavin, for instance, is not passive because he’s such a sweet guy. He’s passive because his father verbally abuses him. So while he appears kind-hearted and attentive to others, he’s actually broken in his own heart, and not terribly available as a friend, or boyfriend.

Claude on the other hand, who presents as 100% jerk, is actually genuinely loyal and loving to his girlfriend, even as he continues to be outwardly obnoxious and arrogant. We see that he’s almost stuck in his role as “most popular kid”, even when it begins to falter.

So nobody is really one thing or another.

One thing I noticed as I wrote the book: these two friends need each other. They fill in each other’s failings. Gavin gives Claude someone he can be open and vulnerable with. Claude gives Gavin consistency and social stability.

I really enjoyed writing about these two popular kids who appear to have it all, but who are suffering under various family and social stresses just like anyone else. I hope you enjoy reading them just as much. Check out the extended excerpt of Boy, available until July 17.

I have a friend I was especially close to in college and in my early twenties. I was in a band when we first met, the only band on our college campus who dared to write their own songs and be part of the Punk/New Wave movement of that time. We were terrible of course, but we did draw to us other like minded people. My friend was a photographer and graphic designer and so he became our Poster Maker, and designed our first record cover. My friend was practically a part of our band as he helped us make decisions about things, and helped us develop our style and approach.

After college I gave up the band and started writing. He began to shift as well from photography into short 8mm art films. We collaborated on these and continued to compare notes on what was going on around us (NYC in the 80s), what we liked, what we didn’t like, what we were trying to do ourselves.

When we weren’t both in NYC, we wrote letters, lots of letters, to keep each other posted on what we were doing, seeing, getting into, etc.

Years later, we met up again and agreed to send each other back the letters we wrote. Before I sent his, I went back and read my friends letters to me. This took several nights and really took me back to how I thought back then, as a 19, 20, 21-year-old especially. How excited I was by things, but also we both took so seriously the idea of where we wanted to position ourselves in the artistic world. What kind of artists were we going to be?

The other thing I thought was what a great record this was, of how someone first stumbles on a love of art of some kinds. How you go from “wanting to be a rock star” to actually “loving the process of writing songs.”

This was the origin of Boy, the story of a high school kid, Gavin, who doesn’t really know what exactly he wants to do, but has a certain attraction to artistic expression. Those first clumsy attempts, those first ideas of what kind of art you want to make, they are so important, and so thrilling in a way when you’re making them. Even if you don’t know yet, if you actually will become that person.

In this case, i think my character, really will become a photographer. He seems to have the bug. I hope by reading the book, other kids will see what it takes, and how exciting it is, to really dedicate yourself to something. To become that thing. It sure was fun for me!

Read our featured extended excerpt of Boy today (Available until July 17)! Plus, read Blake Nelson’s Girl on Riveted’s recently launched Wattpad profile where we’re serializing it now!