By Matthew Wexler
“Safety’s all relative,” says Farshid, an Iranian-American 9th grader navigating hormones and social structures in Adib Khorram’s latest novel, One Word, Six Letters. The award-winning author of Darius the Great Is Not Okay brings readers inside the world of a Kansas City high school, where an incident at a school assembly prompts a reckoning of self-discovery and accountability.
That incident in question is inspired by a real-life moment in the author’s career, when, during a school visit, a student shouted an anti-LGBTQ+ slur that became the impetus for the book. Khorram uses the moment as a springboard to examine the cause and ripple effect across school, family, and community.
When a school assembly becomes a turning point
Alternating POV between chapters, Khorram traces the fallout between Farshid, who assumes the word was meant for him as he internally grapples with his sexuality, and Dayton, an otherwise good kid pressured in the moment to blurt it out at a school assembly on a $20 bet.
When asked in an interview to describe One Word, Six Letters in five words, Khorram said, “Second person sad boys book,” which is only half true.
Yes, the author employs “you” throughout the narrative, forcing the reader to sit in the lived experiences of his central characters. While I found the approach heavy-handed, I can understand how the device might land differently for the primary YA audience and subsequent discussion.
Is the book sad? In the sense that many of us still must navigate the characteristics that make us unique with fear and dread, yes. But One Word, Six Letters also offers hope, including a school that supports an LGBTQ+ affinity group and a family that accepts Farshid as the young man he’s becoming.
At its core, One Word, Six Letters offers a prescient examination of how we move through the world.
When Farshid and Dayton are forced to work on a school project together, the boys get into an argument about who has it worse: Dayton for the cancel culture he’s enduring or Farshid, who responds, “It’s not the same! They’re doing it because of what you did, not who you are.” And that’s a reckoning we all have to live with.
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Fast facts: ‘One Word, Six Letters’
Adib Khorram’s new YA novel turns a real-life slur into a story about who bears the cost of a single word. Smart, timely, and quietly hopeful.
- One Word, Six Letters by Adib Khorram
- Published March 24, 2026
- 224 pages
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