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the_lobrarian's review against another edition
"Is there anywhere that you feel like you can be your full self." I ask.
"No!" she yells, slapping the table and laughing. It's a huge, contagious laugh, and it cuts through the noise of the bar. A few college kids look over at us. "Never! I don't think I've been my full self anywhere. I don't even think that's a thing."
We laugh, because it is kind of funny, and because we both understand on some level that the idea of a whole self seems like the dream of a much younger person, who has yet to make the hardest decisions - the kind that thrust a person down one path instead of another; the kind that are immutable. We laugh because we both know now it's not possible. But as we part ways that night, and I watch the blinking taillight of her bike disappear into the darkness, I grieve the person who used to think it was." [p. 218]
juliasilge's review
3.0
I had a really hard time getting going with this collection of essays, because that first essay about the tornado just was not for me. I'm glad I stuck with it, though, because the essays about relationships, gender, being from a specific place, motherhood, etc were great.
tani's review
2.0
Fair acknowledgement to start: I don't read a lot of things like this. It's not really my jam, and that probably influenced my rating. That being said, here are my thoughts: The writing was good, but also just too much for me. I am not a huge connoisseur of prose, and I'm sure that also influenced my rating. When you present me with a collection of essays, particularly when they're at least partially based on personal experience, I kind of expect to connect to the author a bit. I didn't feel that here. Instead, the prettiness of the writing made me feel quite disconnected. I also wasn't a huge fan of the mixing of topics. She tries to tackle a lot in each essay, and sometimes it was just too much for me. It felt unfocused, and I didn't walk away feeling like I understood Melissa Faliveno any better.
mystimayhem's review
5.0
I loved this book so much. I need a signed copy in my life. Faliveno put words to do many experiences that I share as a queer small town Wisconsin woman. Reading tomboyland was realizing that someone else out there understands. Specifically and truly understands. From the culture of tornadoes, being a woman with the desire to be strong, ruminating on solitude after a break up, feeling conflicted about guns and gun culture, family dynamics that are quintessentially Wisconsin. Everything hit home for me.
bugboi32's review
3.0
There were pieces of this book that I loved. As a queer, trans, person of color that was born and raised in the midwest, I found the essays on tornados and guns to be really well written. They truly captivate both the unassuming beauty and charm of the midwest as well as the ugliness that stems from poverty, colonization, and isolation. I loved the pieces that shared the complexity of living a childless life. The author does an okay job analyzing how their race factors into their lived experiences growing up in the midwest. I did not appreciate the fatphobia. While not overt, it's quite clear that the author values lean, muscular bodies and believes that to be the marker of androgyny.
The writing is inconsistent. At times extremely well-written with beautiful sentences flowing across the page. At other times, clunky & repetitive.
Overall, I would recommend this book. It has a place. The stories of queer people in the midwest should be shared.
The writing is inconsistent. At times extremely well-written with beautiful sentences flowing across the page. At other times, clunky & repetitive.
Overall, I would recommend this book. It has a place. The stories of queer people in the midwest should be shared.
coldprintcoffee's review
5.0
I wanted to write a longer review for this, but I do think 49 notes and highlights will speak for itself. This collection of essays explores all the questions to which in the end we don't receive clarity and easy answers. An exploration of identity and being and how we carry pieces of those with us as we move about the world; how we differ in our concept of ourselves in comparison and contrast to how others perceive us; vivid recounting of formidable and poignant events that made us, us - it hits all these things, and hard. Many of the highlights I chose had to do with Midwestern identity, stoic and not so emotionally vulnerable families, Catholicism, tornado chasing and admiration of chaotic women, the contradictions that feel inherent in our choices: her deliberation of the function and implications of owning and using a gun feel spot-on to me. Rage that women feel and how little it's expressed. Overall, stupendous read.