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3.79 AVERAGE
3.79 AVERAGE
@ tay
recommend!! about 2 queer girlies living in dc!! it flip flops between dc in the 1950s and now! v cool!
recommend!! about 2 queer girlies living in dc!! it flip flops between dc in the 1950s and now! v cool!
Had some conflicted thoughts about this! Kind of wish it was just in the past perspective. Parts of it felt unnecessary, parts felt underdeveloped, but also parts were really awesome! so..
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
A heartwarming YA on the parallel lives in DC to two queer teens - Abby in the 2010s who is navigating her parents crumbling relationship and societal expectations and Janet in the 1950s who is reckoning with her queerness and its implications on her loved ones in the midst of the Lavender Scare. A bit eye roll inducing at times - especially with respect to Abby's emotional realizations - but a cute queer YA set in DC? sign me up.
god i loved loved loved this book!! it's such a good, well-written story with fantastic, imperfect characters that i'll love forever.
note: i would've given it 5 stars if it weren't for the ridiculous amount of times the n-word is used to describe a black character in the 1950's part of the story. i get it, its the 50s, historical accuracy whatever. but most of the time it was completely unnecessary to use that word and could easily have been replaced by 'black' in at least 90% of the instances.
note: i would've given it 5 stars if it weren't for the ridiculous amount of times the n-word is used to describe a black character in the 1950's part of the story. i get it, its the 50s, historical accuracy whatever. but most of the time it was completely unnecessary to use that word and could easily have been replaced by 'black' in at least 90% of the instances.
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I really did enjoy this book but I dont think I am the right audience. It read much more YA than I anticipated. Very compelling story about the drastic differences in queer experiences
If it was possible to give half stars, I would give this book a neutral 2.5/5
My problem with this book is more a personal one: reading it I just realized that maybe YA just isn't the genre for me (anymore). It was just hard for me to get into the story with the constant, explicit explaining of everything, the history, the motivations of the characters… It seems to be a good introduction to important events in queer history if you don't know them yet but with a bit of background knowledge it just seems to fall a bit flat.
Merged review:
If it was possible to give half stars, I would give this book a neutral 2.5/5
My problem with this book is more a personal one: reading it I just realized that maybe YA just isn't the genre for me (anymore). It was just hard for me to get into the story with the constant, explicit explaining of everything, the history, the motivations of the characters… It seems to be a good introduction to important events in queer history if you don't know them yet but with a bit of background knowledge it just seems to fall a bit flat.
My problem with this book is more a personal one: reading it I just realized that maybe YA just isn't the genre for me (anymore). It was just hard for me to get into the story with the constant, explicit explaining of everything, the history, the motivations of the characters… It seems to be a good introduction to important events in queer history if you don't know them yet but with a bit of background knowledge it just seems to fall a bit flat.
Merged review:
If it was possible to give half stars, I would give this book a neutral 2.5/5
My problem with this book is more a personal one: reading it I just realized that maybe YA just isn't the genre for me (anymore). It was just hard for me to get into the story with the constant, explicit explaining of everything, the history, the motivations of the characters… It seems to be a good introduction to important events in queer history if you don't know them yet but with a bit of background knowledge it just seems to fall a bit flat.
emotional
informative
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
While I struggled at times due to the slow pace and the back-and-forth between eras, I am always a sucker for historical fiction. I truly enjoyed the connected stories that emerged.
Talley, Robin. Pulp. Harlequin Teen, 2018.
Abby's magnet school requires every senior to complete a special project connected to one of their classes. Abby chooses her creative writing class and delves into the world of 1950's lesbian pulp fiction. She begins researching one particular author and is captivated both by her story and by the story she writes. Abby is determined to meet this author, if possible, but since she wrote under a pen name, this is proving to be very difficult.
The best word I can use to describe this book is "meta." There is Abby's story of living in 2018 and going to protests and working on her senior project, and then there's the story of Marian Love, the author she is researching, and there is the story that Marian herself is writing in the 1950s. There are times when it feels a bit like one of the holodeck episodes of Star Trek: the reader is not always sure which layer of story they are reading.
I loved Abby's research and the disparity between the world Marian was forced to live in and the world Abby is growing up in. I, too, am now tracking down as many of these pulp novels as I can get my hands on. Although there aren't many teens who can relate to attending a school where they are encouraged to attend protests (or where their teachers join them at protests) or where they can work on such a large capstone project, I think most teens will be drawn in by Abby and her group of friends and will enjoy reading about Abby's research into the "ancient history" that is the 1950s. Highly recommended.
Recommended for: teens
Red Flags: homophobic language, particularly in the scenes of Marian's life; quite a bit of sexism as well in Marian's life - all of this is appropriate for the time period described
Overall Rating: 5/5 stars
Read-Alikes: Afterworlds by Scott Westerfeld, Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell
Abby's magnet school requires every senior to complete a special project connected to one of their classes. Abby chooses her creative writing class and delves into the world of 1950's lesbian pulp fiction. She begins researching one particular author and is captivated both by her story and by the story she writes. Abby is determined to meet this author, if possible, but since she wrote under a pen name, this is proving to be very difficult.
The best word I can use to describe this book is "meta." There is Abby's story of living in 2018 and going to protests and working on her senior project, and then there's the story of Marian Love, the author she is researching, and there is the story that Marian herself is writing in the 1950s. There are times when it feels a bit like one of the holodeck episodes of Star Trek: the reader is not always sure which layer of story they are reading.
I loved Abby's research and the disparity between the world Marian was forced to live in and the world Abby is growing up in. I, too, am now tracking down as many of these pulp novels as I can get my hands on. Although there aren't many teens who can relate to attending a school where they are encouraged to attend protests (or where their teachers join them at protests) or where they can work on such a large capstone project, I think most teens will be drawn in by Abby and her group of friends and will enjoy reading about Abby's research into the "ancient history" that is the 1950s. Highly recommended.
Recommended for: teens
Red Flags: homophobic language, particularly in the scenes of Marian's life; quite a bit of sexism as well in Marian's life - all of this is appropriate for the time period described
Overall Rating: 5/5 stars
Read-Alikes: Afterworlds by Scott Westerfeld, Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell