The Boyfriend Academy: The brand new, must-read gripping queer M/M dark academia dystopia romance for 2026!

I went into The Boyfriend Academy not really knowing what to expect. It is a dark academia dystopian romance, set in a future based on events and circumstances happening in our present life. The storyline just kept getting better and better as all of the different layers were revealed, making it very hard to put the book down. Just when I thought I had figured things out, a new twist or piece of information was introduced. This happens right until the very end. I am pleased with how everything wrapped up but I will be mulling the entire last quarter of the book in my head for quite some time.

This dystopian dark academia novel takes place in the year 2105. At the academy, boys are forged into the men society demands – strong, obedient, perfect. Graduate, and the world is yours: a home, a career, a wife. But fail… and you’re no longer useful to society. Dylan Cecil is just trying to keep his head down and graduate and be the kind of man his parents would have been proud of. But when his friend, Blake, disappears, Dylan can’t silence the questions gnawing at him, even as whispers of danger shadow the school’s gilded halls. In order to graduate, they must pass eight tests that will decide who is worthy of manhood . Dylan is paired with Roman Edwards, a boy as magnetic as he is unknowable. In a world rebuilt on order and obedience, Dylan must decide: will he become the man the academy wants – or the man he really is? I enjoyed this, although not as much as I thought I would. I liked the dystopian setting, and the dark academia is almost always a hit with me, but I didn't like that there was only one "acceptable" type of man, and that was a straight man. Anything else was unacceptable, so if you were having feelings towards other men, that would come out during one of the trials they had to endure - there was no way around it. Overall, I give this a 3.5 rounded up to a 4.

I found this book to be an interesting read. It's set after a time when many people die. So the king decides that men and women should have a place in the world to make children to repopulate. They must go to these special schools to learn how to behave properly. This book was a hard read. It felt like we went back in time, where queer and trans people had to pretend to fit into society. Dylan Cecil is gay. He has to navigate his feelings for the new guy and make a choice that will improve the future. I was a little surprised by the ending, considering how much they wanted to fight back. I could say more on this, but I'm going to leave this here. I enjoyed this book for what it is.