Don't Judge a Book by Its Cover

Most Popular Guy in the School, Book 1

By: Robbie Michaels

Narrated by: Michael Stellman

High school can be some of the best years of life - and some of the toughest. Mark Mitchell's strategy for surviving is to emulate the mighty turtle: pull back inside his protective shell and keep a low profile to avoid trouble. And it works - nobody bothers him. Of course, nobody really knows him, either, even in a town so small it seems like everybody must know everyone else.

Mark certainly knows Bill Cromwell, whom he meets officially when his father volunteers him for manual labor at the school. Bill is his polar opposite: outgoing, gregarious, athletic. But when a massive snowstorm traps the two boys together for three days, Mark learns that being popular doesn't mean you can't be bullied or abused - or gay. And that bullying doesn't stop at the school doors.

Mark isn't naive. He's seen the news reports of gay teen suicides, and he's determined not to become a statistic. But it's not himself he's worried about.

©2012 Robbie Michaels (P)2014 Harmony Ink Press

Great storyline

I am unfamiliar with this author and narrator. I am an avid reader and listener to audiobooks having read/listened to hundreds of books. The story synopsis intrigued me so I took a chance.
The storyline is great. The writing could have used a little more polish, but it seemed to improve as the story progressed. The same goes for the narration. While I am not giving this book a raving review, I will most definitely look for more books from this author. He has definite potential. The narrators have a wonderful voice, and I am quite sure that his inflection and vocal animation will improve as time passes. Maybe the flack of feeling of his reading is reflective of the director more than the narrator. I wasnt there, so that is something on which I can only speculate.
I hope that both the author and the narrator continue to follow their passion and their hearts and I so look forward to reading and listening to both of them in the future.

Cheesy Title, Awesome Book

If you could sum up Don't Judge a Book by Its Cover in three words, what would they be?

I was a little leery about getting this book, because I thought the title was very cheesy. I am really glad that I took the chance. I loved the story! Mark and Bill were very believable characters. I became emotionally invested in their relationship. There was a few lulls in the story, but most if it was a complete page turner.

What did you like best about this story?

The characters were very well defined. I felt like I knew these characters.

Lovely

This was a lovely book. It begun in typical geek loves the school jock fashion however it developed into way more than that. Albeit a little short, this book won't let down anyone who seeks an easy to listen to, captivating gay novel that does not focus on sex and seduction. It's sweet and quite innocent, with a good story to go with it. Highly recommended.

It says this is book 1. Where are the rest?? I hope they appear on Audible soon.

Simply wonderful 😊👍

I was intrigued by the title at first. I purchased this book a while ago. I worked a great deal all my life & I would come home and use my Audible credit to buy a book. I seldom had time to listen. Sorry for the dialogue, but I'm no longer working and I am slowly going through my library, 1500+ books, try to finally listen to them. So, again I was intrigued by the title just recently.

I thought this was going to be a simple coming out high school gay romance 💕. As that, it was good, I liked the characters and even the sex scenes were truly loving, caring and felt real to me.

Then all hell broke lose. I don't know if I would of picked this book up if I knew it was going this way! Bill, one the main characters, came to school all beaten up, though, that is horrible, but it is not unusual in coming out stories, but it was much more than that.

I come from an alcoholic abuses family. I know this behavior because I lived it, along with my two brothers and two sisters. Running into this here caught me emotionally off guard, and brought back memories, I would like to forget.

So I love this book and I love that this subject is here, but I did have to take a break & finish crying.

I truly love this book, and though there seems that the sequel books are not in Audible's library, but they are available in Kindle library and I plan to read those in the future.

I love the narration, it's wonderful. I want to thank Audible for having this book in its library. But I want to thank Robbie Michaels for writing this book and sharing it with me! I do recommend the book. Knowledge is power, but it's not always an easy road. peace and love to all, especially those dealing with abusive families. 💕

Wish fulfillment fantasy at its best and worst

When a snow storm ends up marooning athletic Bill Cromwell, the "most popular boy in school," at the home of (and in the bed of) Mark Mitchell, a gay boy who's made an art of being invisible, a sweet and unlikely relationship is born.

That's the beginning of this book's scenario and it is charming and an intriguing bit of wish fulfillment. The story is told in the first person with Mark as the narrator and voice actor Michael Stellman is a great choice whose voice fits the main character well. The narrator has an odd mix of world weary, angsty teen ennui that Michael Stellman embodies well.

However the book is flawed in a few ways. While it's clear that the POV is that of a high school senior, the sometimes fussy prose sounds too old for the kid narrator. And hearing that youthful voice describing another high-schooler as a "man" so many times felt inorganic somehow.

Also my "willing suspension of disbelief" is challenged again and again. The domestic abuse intervention described in the plot was unlike anything I've ever heard of. The over-earnest anti-hate assembly segment seemed to morph into a wish fulfillment fantasy/fever-dream more typical of a queer-nation refugee than the author that penned the first part of the story.

When the "fever-dream" ends and the story goes on to other topics, it becomes more engrossing again, however I did also have trouble believing that a guy who suffers that level of domestic abuse is popular at school. This kinda thing does damage to the psyche.

Part way through the book I started to become certain that Robbie Williams was a mother & part time author rather than the man that I first envisioned when I read the name.

Mom led the domestic abuse intervention
Mom led the protest that got Bill reinstated in school after a somewhat preachy anti-hate school assembly
Mom planned the boys' cross country campus visit/trip to UCLA


Another credibility issue... Why doesn't Mom object to her teen son sharing a bed with another boy? Finally, discovering the contents of the steamer trunk made restoring credibility impossible for me. This tale became a complete wish fulfillment fantasy tale.

Only at the very end does the meaning of book's title become clear... and I'm not sure that it was apositive addition to the book as a whole. Though I've still not decided who the author is its clear... the author is clearly a "book lover."

Overall I enjoyed this book and I'll probably even listen to it again but I can't help but feel that the makings of an even better book were here but unrealized.

One last audio-book note: In this book I encountered what has to be my first audio-book equivalent of a typo... the narrator used the word Sutterfuge. I'm assuming that Subterfuge was intended but it was clearly not what was said. A minor point, but for me, a memorable one.

Beautiful story.

Some of the conclusion seemed a little bland. Like the author wanted everything to end "happily ever after" and didn't know how to do it within the realms of probability. That aside...it was a very beautifully written and executed story.

Don't miss this one!!

Wow that was a wonderful story. One of the best gay stories I've listened to since signing up for Audible books.

Did not finish

So I'm going along, listening to this book, thinking it's a pretty good (if a trifle formulaic) high school coming out nerd/jock thing, when all of a sudden we're hit with The Strangest Plot Development In History™. I'll avoid too many spoilers, but let's just say the protagonist's mother ends up secretly being the president of some sort of weird Intervention Brigade, and they do their thing, and it was so absolutely bizarre and unbelievable that I stopped listening.

Which is a shame, because the first 40% of the book was really good. I liked both characters, I liked the plot, I liked the contrivance that threw them together, and the coming out scene was really good. Oh, and the narrator is excellent.