Scraps: A Gay Skateboarding Romance Novel
About this ebook
🌈 MLM Teen Gay Romance
🏞️ Small-Town Secrets
🌿 Breathtaking Montana Landscapes
🛹 Heart-Pounding Skateboarding Action
When Gus Shepard’s quiet artistic life is upended by his mother’s death in 2003, he’s sent to the rural town of Livingston, Montana, to live with his estranged woodworking father. For Gus, it’s a place filled only with grief, painful childhood memories, and too much sawdust—until he meets Bridger Owens, a local skateboarder with a rebellious streak.
Drawn together by a deal—Gus will build Bridger a handcrafted board in exchange for skateboarding lessons—the two form an unexpected bond, inspiring each other to reach for bigger goals and make the most of their short summer. What starts as friendship soon blossoms into a tender romance they must keep hidden in a town where everyone already knows each other’s secrets.
In a town this small, escaping feels impossible.
Being… gay? Unthinkable.
Immediately suspicious, Bridger’s jealous skate crew leader, Max Stevens, resents Gus and his growing closeness to his best friend. And the coolest skater girl in Livingston, Tara Shae, senses that Gus, like her, doesn’t quite fit the town’s mold. As whispers turn into confrontations and family pressures mount, Gus and Bridger’s fragile relationship is tested at every turn.
Through late-night swims, daring skate sessions, and moments of breathtaking vulnerability, Scraps paints an unforgettable picture of discovering young queer love in the early 2000s. Will Gus and Bridger risk everything to hold onto what they’ve found, or will the weight of their separate worlds pull them apart?
Why Readers Love Scraps:
🌟 Perfect for fans of Call Me by Your Name, Mid 90s, Perks of Being a Wallflower, and Heartstopper.
🌟 A richly detailed LGBTQ+ romance that celebrates love, courage, and self-discovery.
🌟 Explores themes of family, belonging, and breaking free from small-town expectations.
“Inspired by the viral success of the Scraps short film that captivated millions worldwide, Scraps is a deeply moving, visually evocative story of love, identity, and the risks we take for a shred of love that’s real.”
Grab your copy today and immerse yourself in the breathtaking summer that Gus and Bridger will never forget.
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About the author
MATTHEW FRANCIS (1995-) is an American chef, writer, producer, and director born in Duluth, Minnesota. Before graduating from the Culinary Institute of America in 2016, Matthew worked in various restaurants around the country and has always been a deep lover of queer romance fiction and sci-fi/fantasy stories. He taught himself how to write scripts, direct, film, host, edit, and market digital video by launching his cooking YouTube channel and founding FrancisFilm while in college. There he also wrote his first queer poems and short stories. Since then, Matthew has directed and produced over 4100 recipe videos for multiple major media companies including BuzzFeed Tasty and Dotdash Meredith’s food brands FOOD & WINE, EatingWell, Allrecipes, Better Homes & Gardens, Serious Eats, Southern Living, and more. His two novels are "PRAX and the Hazardous Countdown" and Scraps. The Scraps novel is a continuation of the Scraps Short Film (2025). The Scraps feature film is currently in pre-production.
In his free time, Matthew is always writing new stories, cooking up delicious meals, playing in local queer sports leagues, or slaying monsters in Dungeons & Dragons. He hopes to continue growing his career in food media and writing diverse queer stories of every genre. He wants his work to impact real people’s lives and support voices that are craving to be noticed. Later in life, Matthew plans on buying farmland to focus on creating a sustainable homestead, community kitchen, and food studio where he can cook more food, write more novels, produce more films, and build a family of his own.
