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elliv's review
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Short stories set mostly in Indonesia about queer people. Some recurring themes of mothers ruining their gay sons' lives and feeling regret, loneliness, outsider-ness, and religious trauma.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Homophobia, and Suicide
james1star's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Overall I think this short story collection was very decent and I’d certainly recommend it. The title may be ‘Happy Stories, Mostly’ where ‘very rarely’ should really replace that last word because these aren’t, for the most part, happy stories. Each of the twelve stories are varied but a running thread is present too. Pasaribu included many themes throughout, including: queerness (the dominant one), grief, belonging, colonialism, religion, missed opportunities, alternative paths one might’ve took, environmentalism, and a general idea of living in contemporary (and future) Indonesia. From the blurb, ‘these tales put queer characters in situations and plots conventionally filled by hetero characters’ and I’d say this is very accurate where some (parts) of the stories have a foundation in the character’s queerness but many are general stories about the other topics mentions but just so happens to include queer characters which I loved.
I haven’t read any of Pasaribu’s poetry yet but am definitely intrigued to do so. I found the chat between the author and translator Tsao to be very interesting and helped to understand better a few of the stories, specially the shorter ones. Pasaribu encourages you to take your time in reading the stories and coming back to them as well and this is something I will certainly be doing. I really like the discourse on the happy/sad gay representation in books with this quote from Pasaribu holding its own: ‘I mean, hetero readers hate sad-all-the-time fictional gays, but give zero effort to make us, who are gay in the flesh, happy. It's a sad irony.’ He later adds: ‘As sad as it may sound: for them, happy gays are a sign of social progress. But, lets be real; can you, as a queer, be happy in the way the heteros are happy in Indonesia?’ I’d say this happiness having a limit isn’t something I’ve really thought about as a gay man before but is definitely interesting and seeing the debate from an Indonesian’s perspective was beneficial. I got a sense that the stories were linked at times but it wasn’t concrete in my mind so via the process of rereading I might better consolidate this. The longer stories I did prefer as I found there more to unpack but as a collection it was good.
Overall rating is 4 ⭐️
These are the breakdown of my individual ratings:
- Enkidu Comes Knocking on New Year's Eve - 2.5 ⭐️
- A Bedtime Story for Your Long Sleep - 4 ⭐️
- What's your name Sandra? - 4.25 ⭐️
- A Young Poet's Guide to Surviving a Broken Heart - 4 ⭐️
- The true story of the story of giant - 4.75 ⭐️
- Three Love You, Four Despise You - 3 ⭐️
- Metaxu: Jakarta, 2038 - 3.5 ⭐️
- Deep Brown, Verging on Black - 3.5 ⭐️
- Welcome to the Department of Unanswered Prayers - 3.5 ⭐️
- Ad maiorem dei gloriam - 3.75 ⭐️
- Our Descendants Will Be as Numerous as the Clouds in the Sky - 4.75 ⭐️
- Her story - 3.75 ⭐️
This averaged out to 3.77 but with the inclusion of the chat between author and translator and the opening notes on the term ‘hampir’ I chose to round it up.
This opening note was actually by far my favourite element of this book which I’ve included here:
‘Hampir, the Indonesian for almost, only
a letter away from vampir - the bloodsucking demon.
What does it mean to be happy? Also, what does it mean to be almost happy?
To almost get in, to be almost accepted, to be almost there, but, at the same time, to be not there/accepted/in.
So, in a world where we celebrate disneyfied heterosexualities, for queer folks, what is happiness?
Often, it becomes the bloodsucking demon, the vampir, the hampir.’
Content Warnings
Moderate: Suicide, Colonisation, Homophobia, Death, and Grief
Minor: Rape, Pedophilia, Cancer, Religious bigotry, and Murder
serendipity421's review against another edition
emotional
lighthearted
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Homophobia, and Suicide
paperknotbooks's review
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
There’s loneliness stitched into all of these stories. And a lot of nesting of fables/stories within the stories, which I found quite charming!
My favorites were “A young poet’s guide to surviving a broken heart,” “the true story of the the giant,” and “Ad maiorem dei gloriam.”
My favorites were “A young poet’s guide to surviving a broken heart,” “the true story of the the giant,” and “Ad maiorem dei gloriam.”
Content Warnings
Moderate: Suicide and Death
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