The son of the first female President And the young Prince of England bring their “feud” to the front cover of every magazine and tabloid in the world the two are forced to uphold a fake friendship for the press but what started off as simple lighthearted banter and joking messages back and forth turned to a passionate romance across continents.
Red White and Royal Blue is a story a coming of age story and a quest to find your true identity at its core, but it deals with far more than that. This book addresses heavy topics like having to mask your identity. Mental health, addiction racism, and misogyny. Alex Claremont-Diaz is the son of the first female President and while he acts like a happy-go-lucky person he struggles with his mental health, this struggle while not heavily acknowledged by his peers and family is shown to us as readers quite frequently. Although Alex has a good relationship with both his parents the strain of their divorce caused him to overwork himself academically to give himself something else to think about. Alex seems to frequently overwork himself and it causes him immense stress he begins to crack under the pressures but in doing so he has also isolated himself over the years, breaking off any friendships he had and has nobody to turn to but his sister and his newfound friendship with prince Henry.
Prince Henry is the youngest prince and with his older brother being “perfect” and being the prince he has high expectations. With his older sister still dealing with the aftermath of heavy addiction, Henry feels this pressure to be perfect. Henry tells Alex “The options I’d like… they don’t seem to be options at all. I have people who interest me, but I shouldn’t pursue them. At least not in my position”. Being a prince, being gay has never been an option for Henry so he constantly hides his true identity and intentions behind masks. As Alex gets to know him he reveals all these small things and details that he has to hide because of who he is as a public figure. Henry constantly struggles with his identity and he feels as though what he wants should happen for him so as soon as something good happens he runs away.
Although both Henry and Alex have their own struggles they find a way to help each other through them and what once started out as a “feud” turned into a blossoming friendship and a passionate romance.