Today on the site, I’m delighted to welcome author and gay blogging pioneer Lee Wind to the site to reveal the cover of A Different Kind of Brave, a romantic YA adventure releasing March 5, 2024 from Duet Books! Here’s the story:

Nicolas “Nico” Hall is sixteen when he escapes from Dr. H’s religious gay reprogramming institute in California. On his own, he assumes one identity after another to avoid recapture as he flees south to Peru, and then Mexico.

Seven days younger than Nico, Samuel “Sam” Jonas Solomon is a privileged Upper West Side only child who idolizes James Bond. When his heart is broken, he vows that, like Bond, he’s never going to trust in love again. Then he meets Nico, and his heart won’t listen to any logic.

Nico’s survived by living only for himself—until his love for Sam has him risking his freedom for others. And as much as Sam wants to be like 007, he discovers that James Bond is a terrible role model.
Together, Nico and Sam set out to free the other teens trapped in Dr. H’s Institute, plunging readers into a globe-trotting, high stakes adventure with the heroic courage of the James Bond movies and the ongoing romance (and queer group of friends) of Heartstopper.

And here’s the inspiring cover by Choi Messer!

Buy it: Amazon

Lee Wind is not currently a spy, but he did spend fourteen years undercover (what most people call “in the closet”). Today he writes the books that would have changed his life as a young gay kid. He is the author of the nonfiction Junior Library Guild Gold Standard selection No Way, They Were Gay? and the novel Publisher’s Weekly named a Top Five Independently Published Young Adult Book of 2018, Queer as a Five-Dollar Bill. He also runs the popular blog I’m Here. I’m Queer. What the Hell Do I Read?—words his teenage self only dreamed of saying. Lee lives in Los Angeles with his husband of more than twenty-five years, and they have a grown daughter. Visit Lee online at leewind.org.