Scan barcode
A review by simonlorden
Good Angel by A.M. Blaushild
3.0
This book was April 2018's Sapphic Book Club read hosted by @sapphicliterature.
‘Hey baby, did it hurt when The Light carved you from stardust and burned wings of bone onto your back?’
*vague hand gestures*
So, we have Iofiel, an angel who joins a course meant for demons to help a friend, and thus ends up kinda stuck between the two sides that are meant to be enemies. We also have a shitton of angel lore, including sexuality and gender.
All angels are originally meant to be "triple A" -- asexual, aromantic and agender. Most of them seem to have a binary gender (although there were several nonbinary side characters, but none of them were super relevant) and that's all fine, but if they happen to be alloromantic and/or -sexual, then we have a problem, because that's a sin.
I originally found the concept of aroace being the default really interesting, even if it's only in the case of angels, but honestly, I was really uncomfortable with the way sexuality, romantic attraction, kissing, etc were all presented as sins to be avoided. I also feel like that a lot of the conversations/explaining about romance/gender/sexuality kept going in circles, and it was more frustrating to read than enlightening.
Regardless of this, I was fond of Iofiel and her little group - Archie and Maalik were both great, and Santiago and Damien were even more great. I also really, really loved a minor character, Lupe, and I enjoyed the portrayal of Lucifer as well.
That being said, something about the main plot (Apocalypse and all) really didn't work for me, and I kinda lost interest/track of what was happening towards the last 30%.
Kudos to the worldbuilding because I could see there was a lot of thought to it, but yeah, sometimes it was overwhelming or repetitive.
tldr; This was an okay book and I was fond of the characters, but I'm kind of "meh" on the way sexual and romantic orientation is treated, and I wasn't really into the main plot.
Representation:
- Iofiel is asexual, and maybe aromantic? she starts out with aroace being a default but then questions
- I think Archie is ace and/or aro as well, because he talks about not having interest in sex or understanding romance
- there are some minor nonbinary characters using they/them but I think only one of them really speaks more than once. that being said, all angels are /meant/ to be agender originally, so it's possibly more of them are nonbinary and just use different pronouns? Iofiel states she is a girl, though
- there is a recurring f/f side pairing that is relatively important
‘Hey baby, did it hurt when The Light carved you from stardust and burned wings of bone onto your back?’
*vague hand gestures*
So, we have Iofiel, an angel who joins a course meant for demons to help a friend, and thus ends up kinda stuck between the two sides that are meant to be enemies. We also have a shitton of angel lore, including sexuality and gender.
All angels are originally meant to be "triple A" -- asexual, aromantic and agender. Most of them seem to have a binary gender (although there were several nonbinary side characters, but none of them were super relevant) and that's all fine, but if they happen to be alloromantic and/or -sexual, then we have a problem, because that's a sin.
I originally found the concept of aroace being the default really interesting, even if it's only in the case of angels, but honestly, I was really uncomfortable with the way sexuality, romantic attraction, kissing, etc were all presented as sins to be avoided. I also feel like that a lot of the conversations/explaining about romance/gender/sexuality kept going in circles, and it was more frustrating to read than enlightening.
Regardless of this, I was fond of Iofiel and her little group - Archie and Maalik were both great, and Santiago and Damien were even more great. I also really, really loved a minor character, Lupe, and I enjoyed the portrayal of Lucifer as well.
That being said, something about the main plot (Apocalypse and all) really didn't work for me, and I kinda lost interest/track of what was happening towards the last 30%.
Kudos to the worldbuilding because I could see there was a lot of thought to it, but yeah, sometimes it was overwhelming or repetitive.
tldr; This was an okay book and I was fond of the characters, but I'm kind of "meh" on the way sexual and romantic orientation is treated, and I wasn't really into the main plot.
Representation:
- Iofiel is asexual, and maybe aromantic? she starts out with aroace being a default but then questions
- I think Archie is ace and/or aro as well, because he talks about not having interest in sex or understanding romance
- there are some minor nonbinary characters using they/them but I think only one of them really speaks more than once. that being said, all angels are /meant/ to be agender originally, so it's possibly more of them are nonbinary and just use different pronouns? Iofiel states she is a girl, though
- there is a recurring f/f side pairing that is relatively important