Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston
"First Son Alex Claremont-Diaz is the closest thing to a prince this side of the Atlantic. With his intrepid sister and the Veep’s genius granddaughter, they’re the White House Trio, a beautiful millennial marketing strategy for his mother, President Ellen Claremont. International socialite duties do have downsides—namely, when photos of a confrontation with his longtime nemesis Prince Henry at a royal wedding leak to the tabloids and threaten American/British relations.
The plan for damage control: staging a fake friendship between the First Son and the Prince. Alex is busy enough handling his mother’s bloodthirsty opponents and his own political ambitions without an uptight royal slowing him down. But beneath Henry’s Prince Charming veneer, there’s a soft-hearted eccentric with a dry sense of humor and more than one ghost haunting him.
As President Claremont kicks off her reelection bid, Alex finds himself hurtling into a secret relationship with Henry that could derail the campaign and upend two nations. And Henry throws everything into question for Alex, an impulsive, charming guy who thought he knew everything: What is worth the sacrifice? How do you do all the good you can do? And, most importantly, how will history remember you?"
“That's the choice. I love him, with all that, because of all that. On purpose. I love him on purpose.”
― Casey McQuiston, Red, White & Royal Blue
This book is fantastic! I struggle to review popular books like this because you hardly need my opinion when there are so many wonderfully written reviews that sing its praises. But I’ll just say that it made me cackle aloud so many times my fiancé thought I’d lost my mind. The characters were lovable and flawed and felt like real people even though their situation wasn’t relatable at all. This was a wonderfully good read!
Genre: new adult, contemporary, lgbtqia+
Representation: bi, gay, trans, latinx
Content Warnings: Addiction, Alcohol, Anxiety, Blackmail, Cancer (mentioned), Death (parental, mentioned), Drug abuse (mentioned), Forced outing, Grief, Homophobia, Invasion/violation of privacy, Neglect (parental), Panic attack, Politics, Racism, Sexual abuse, Sexual harassment (mentioned), Sexually explicit scenes