As the First Son of the United States, 21-year-old Alex is a natural in the spotlight and has already spent most of his life pursuing his dream of having his own political career. Fiery, passionate, and impulsive, Alex has moved through the world confidently. He enjoys his role as American royalty, loves his family and his country, especially his home state of Texas, and is laser-focused on becoming the youngest Congressman ever elected. Alex’s ambitious focus is called into question when he begins to fall in love with Prince Henry of Wales, whom he considers his archnemesis because Henry was rude to him at the Olympics. Meanwhile, Henry’s public persona clashes with Alex’s, and he believes Henry to be boring, haughty, and uninspired. Once Alex starts to fall for Henry, though, he understands that he is wrong, not just about Henry but about himself. Throughout the novel, Alex struggles to understand who he is in the wake of this powerful attraction, and the romance disrupts the path he was sure he wanted for himself personally and politically.  

Once Alex becomes romantically involved with Henry, he begins a major arc of self-discovery as he questions his sexual identity and understands that, on some level, he has suppressed his attraction to men throughout his life. After struggling with the possible consequences, he comes out to his friends and family, and eventually the world, as bisexual. Furthermore, once Alex starts to fall in love with Henry, he starts to question his entire life plan as well. Their relationship seems to slow Alex down, and as he questions his career path, he is continually drawn to doing as much as possible to help others and to going to law school. Falling in love with Henry and the resulting public scandal causes Alex to reevaluate his singular focus on ambition, and a second, slower life path becomes more attractive to him. Returning again and again to a deeper, quieter part of himself through love, Alex literally returns home with Henry at the end of the novel, emphasizing that his new future with Henry is a homecoming, too. 

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