Johnathan Van Ness, costar of "Queer Eye," talks about his struggles of being a victim of sexual abuse and being HIV positive. As soon as I heard that Johnathan Van Ness had a book coming out, I knew that I had to read it. I pre-ordered the book on Amazon and received it the day that it was available to the public. As soon as I received the notification that it was delivered, I rushed downstairs to get it.
As soon as I began reading the novel, I knew that I would like it. If you have ever watched the show, you will innately read the book in his voice. You will hear him telling you about his journey and his struggles. The book is written in a very conversational manner, but that matches the fact that he is telling his story and what happened in his life. There are also parts of his story where he educates you on what is going on the in LGBTQ+ community. He explains about what living with HIV really means. It means that "you can be treated as a felon for living with HIV" even though being an undetectable HIV positive person means "there are so few copies of the virus in your blood that the test cannot detect them (page 203)." Reading those words and so much of this book educated me on topics that I had never really looked into. I just remember hearing that being HIV positive leads to AIDS, which then causes a very scary death for many. That is not the case anymore. There is now a way to take one pill a day, and end up being able to live a normal life and be classified as undetectable.
If you are looking at reading something soon that will broaden your horizons and will educate you on topics you did not know you are not educated in, I would highly recommend reading "Over the Top" Johnathan gives you a very open story about his life and how he has gotten to where he is today.
