Alex Sanchez is one of several new voices in young adult literature that explores gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and questioning (GLBTQ) themes in his fiction. Sanchez's 2001 Rainbow Boys takes the familiar high school triangle plot and gives it a new twist, positing it in the form of gay romance and awakening. "I've been told my writing is fundamentally about relationships," Sanchez told Authors and Artists for Young Adults (AAYA). "What brings people together and pulls them apart, particularly in terms of love, friendship, family, gender, culture and sexuality." As Sanchez further noted in his interview, young adult literature has undergone a "sea change" in the past ten years, allowing the exploration of subjects taboo only a decade ago. Speaking with Toby Emert of the ALAN Review, Sanchez reported that a decade earlier "the story lines and characters would've been very different." At that time, according to Sanchez, "only...