Guest Post: Crushing It by Erin Becker

Guest Post: Crushing It by Erin Becker

Today we are thrilled to welcome debut author, Erin Becker to discuss queer visibility for the Middle Grade audience. Her debut Crushing It is about two teen girls who play soccer and have a lot going on, with their home lives, and at school, as well as on the field. Finishing 8th grade is a lot, but heading into high school and just starting to find who you are is heartwarming. Full of poetry, soccer, and young love, Crushing It is available now!

Crushing It

by Erin Becker
Published by: Penguin Workshop
on August 6, 2024
Genres: Contemporary, LGBTQIA+, Middle Grade
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On the soccer field, Magic Mel is in her element. She's ready to lead her team to victory at the city championship in her new role as captain. Off the field, however, is a totally different story. Mel can't get a handle on her class presentation, her friend group has completely dissolved, and her ex-friend-current-teammate, Tory, is being the worst. The only place she feels like herself is in her text conversations where she shares her secret poetry with BTtoYouPlease.

Tory McNally, on the other hand, is keeping everything together, thank you very much. So what if her mom is more preoccupied with her craft projects and new husband than her, or that she's down to one IRL friend because of annoying, overly peppy “Magic” Mel? She's perfectly fine, and even when she maybe isn't, she's got NotEmilyD to text with.

As the championships loom closer, everything around Mel and Tory starts to get more and more complicated: the dynamics on the field, the rift between their friend group, and, as they connect anonymously online, maybe even their feelings for each other...

From debut author Erin Becker comes an action-packed but tender novel about first romance, identity, and learning how to be brave when it matters the most.

Guest Post: Erin Becker

Telling the Stories of Young Queer Women
for the Middle Grade Audience

Crushing It is an enemies-to-first crushes story about two eighth grade girls on the same soccer team, with a You’ve Got Mail–style twist. It’s a story about first romance, but also about finding yourself and figuring out who you are. And the role romance can play in that journey.

“Magic Mel” Miller is the captain and lead goal scorer of her soccer team. Everyone knows her as the star forward who struggles in school. But at home, she secretly writes poetry that she only shares with her anonymous online friend from her school’s messaging platform, whose screen name is BTtoYouPlease. Meanwhile, Tory McNally is the put-together midfielder with a perfect ponytail and everything under control. But off the field, Tory can’t seem to find her place with a new stepdad, a new stepbrother, and a distracted mom who doesn’t have time for her anymore. Usually, Tory keeps her problems to herself—she’s perfectly fine, thank you very much. But when she’s chatting with NotEmilyD, suddenly, she begins to open up.

As BTtoYouPlease and NotEmilyD grow their friendship—and maybe something more—the anonymity allows them to try out new possibilities for who they can be. 

“Magic Mel” doesn’t have to be just a soccer star. Tory doesn’t have to be perfect. They can just…be themselves. Even when they’re still figuring out what that means.

I had so much fun using this You’ve Got Mail trope to write Mel and Tory’s enemies-to-crushes story. It builds suspense, of course—when will they figure out each other’s real identity? But it also reflects a really beautiful aspect of what queer relationships can offer: the space to try on a new version of yourself, outside the realm of what’s expected and outside the role society has always asked you to play.

It was especially meaningful for me to explore these themes in a coming-of-age story for the middle grade audience. At that age, you still have so many questions about the kind of person you want to be. Where do you fit in amidst your friends, family, and wider community? Getting to portray a romantic relationship between two young women as a positive force for self-discovery, in particular, felt really special.

When I was Mel and Tory’s age, there wasn’t much media aimed at kids that included LGBTQ+ stories. The (small) handful of queer stories that did exist in the wider cultural landscape were much more likely to feature queer men. In writing Crushing It, I was honored to contribute to this current golden age of queer stories with my own book about two young girls falling for each other. It was fun to get to use these romance tropes—which, growing up, I only saw in books and movies about straight relationships—to write about Mel and Tory and their friend group.

Mel and Tory are very different. They have different relationships to their own queerness, their own femininity, and their own awareness of their burgeoning crushes on each other. Their story shows that there’s no right or wrong way to be a young queer woman. And no right or wrong way to be a young woman generally.

Ultimately, I think one of the best ways to work against stereotypes is to just let characters be themselves. Mel and Tory are a little rough around the edges, a little messy. As Mel says: it’s okay to be “more questions than answers.” You can still get your sweet, fun romance story, even while you’re still figuring it all out.