Heartstopper: A Story of Queer Struggle and Success

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LitStack is very excited to bring you this LitStack Rec by Kiyo Mizuki, of their enduring fondness for the Heartstopper series.

Heartstopper by Alice Oseman
A Story of Queer Struggle and Success

Alice Oseman’s comic series Heartstopper is universally relevant to young people, queer and otherwise. I discovered the graphic novel in my final two years of high school following the release of the print version of the webcomic in 2019. At that point, the series was only two volumes in total. Heartstopper will be releasing its sixth and final volume sometime in 2025.

Oseman, who identifies as aromantic and asexual, is British, and published her debut, Solitaire, in 2014. From Oseman’s site, “Alice Oseman is the creator of LGBTQ+ YA romance comic Heartstopper, and the writer, creator, and executive producer for the Emmy Award-winning television adaptation for Netflix, produced by See-Saw. Alice has written every episode and been involved at every stage, from casting to music.”

Transcending Barriers In Storytelling

The Heartstopper series follows Charlie Spring, freshly 15, as he navigates another year of high school at an all-boys school after suffering relentless bullying the previous year. Through the series, Charlie navigates friendships and new relationships while struggling with his own identity and its impact on those around him, especially his crush-turned-boyfriend, an upperclassman named Nick Nelson, 16. The story explores the lives of Charlie’s friends and loved ones as well, expanding upon its cast of queer characters, including Elle Argent, a transgender girl who previously attended Truham Grammar School for Boys, and the lesbian couple that Elle meets at her new all-girls school, Darcy Olsson and Tara Jones. Tara and Elle are both women of color.

Despite being a very particular tale of two queer British high schoolers, the series transcends barriers in storytelling and has been adopted as a favorite by people around the world of varying ages, races, and sexualities. Some are attracted to the story, while others are fans of the straightforward and cute art style. The characters are drawn in a doodle-like style with pastel-like coloring and accents. The Heartstopper comic is not heavily shaded or rendered like other webcomics sometimes are. For many queer youth, myself included, the acceptance of Heartstopper into mainstream social media and middle and high school libraries is seen as an acceptance of ourselves, even if just a little bit. 

The story opens with the main characters, Charlie and Nick, young and relatively innocent boys, and follows them into their later high school years as they head off to college. Their story spans young love and high school bullying to encompass other serious themes that occur as the characters develop, such as eating disorders and relationship struggles. This can be said for all the characters, not just the main coupling. 

Relatable Characters 

On pages 23-24 of the first volume, eating lunch on the field at Truham Grammar School, Charlie talks to his best friend Tao Xu (Elle’s partner) about his budding friendship with Nick. Tao tells Charlie, his brows furrowed, that he has a crush on Nick. Charlie whips around in startlement and promptly denies this by saying he doesn’t “fall for any boy who’s nice to him” and that “Nick is probably straight anyway.”

Charlie goes on to have a longer conflict with Tao, and in the course of the first two books, their friendship explores queer friendships and how relationships change friend-group dynamics. This part of the Heartstopper series is told with sensitivity and an understanding of what it means to be a young person grappling with complex friend issues. The story refuses to talk down to its audience, and in this reader’s opinion, treats teenage issues with an adult seriousness that other teen and YA series do not.

Creating Inclusion and Support

Because of scenes like this, this comic series means a lot to its readers, especially to readers like myself, who are currently in college or graduating as undergraduates, as we grew up with the characters and their struggles. The stories Oseman tells about the Heartstopper boys are relatable to a wide range of people, giving them something to connect and bond over.

For me, Heartstopper played a role in my coming out to my friends and the school community at large towards the end of my senior year. The messages of self-acceptance and not hiding who are stuck with me, and when I felt safe, urged me to share my story with others, and modeled ways for me to talk about my identity, that I was neither straight nor cisgender.

Heartstopper’s story helped me to come to terms with my sexuality and gender. I was in high school and my friends were behaving in ways similar to how Tao reacted to Charlie. This series helped me to realize that I was different but that my friends needed communication, and it wasn’t the end of the world. Heartstopper allowed me to see that I was just as normal as anyone else, a person with struggles and successes.

Heartstopper Continues to Create a Safe Space

Now, with the forthcoming release of the sixth volume, as Charlie and Nick’s story comes to a close, and as the third season of Netflix adaptation arrived on October 3, Heartstopper continues to give a supportive and inclusive space to younger queer people, and to anyone who seeks it. This series creates a safe, and culturally important, space simply by existing for its readers.

~ Kiyo Mizuki

About Alice Oseman

Alice Oseman was born in 1994 in Kent, England, and is a #1 New York Times bestselling writer and illustrator. As well as writing and illustrating Heartstopper, Alice is the author of two Heartstopper novellas, Nick and Charlie and This Winter, and four YA novels: Solitaire, Radio Silence, I Was Born for This, and Loveless, winner of the YA Book Prize. She also writes and executive produces the Emmy Award–winning television adaptation of Heartstopper. Visit her online at aliceoseman.com.

Titles by Alice Oseman

Other LitStack Resources

Be sure and look at our other LitStack Recs for our recommendations on books you should read, as well as these reviews by Lauren Alwan, and these reviews by Rylie Fong, Allie Coker, and Sharon Browning.

About Kiyo Mizuki

Kiyo Mizuki is a writer of nonfiction, fanfiction, and a YA novel in progress. They are a digital artist who is inspired by Japanese anime and manga as well as Korean manhwa and a reader of manga, YA, classic literature, and graphic novels. They are a fourth-year student at the University of California, Santa Cruz, majoring in Creative Technologies, a new major, and the first of its kind in the UC system. Find Kiyo on Tumblr at: https://kiyo-cant-write.tumblr.com/

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