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A review by yourbookishbff
When Stars Have Teeth by Dani Trujillo
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
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? Yes
4.0
For readers who read Trujillo's debut, Lizards Hold the Sun, we're shifting focus within the Yellowbird family to Calehan's sister, Buffy. Set a few years after the conclusion to Lizards Hold the Sun, When Stars Have Teeth is set in San Francisco, where Buffy works as a grants writer for the Urban Indian Center. Buffy is the prickliest female main character I've read outside historical romance in a LONG time. Santiago, meanwhile, is an all-star golden retriever, absolutely the most patient, resilient, open-hearted male main character I've read. The two meet when Santiago brings his abuela to the Urban Indian Center for programming, meals and community.
What I love most when reading Trujillo's romances is how beautifully she weaves in cultural foods, language, family traditions and community work into her love stories. Her writing is atmospheric and highly descriptive, and I am reminded how little of this perspective exists in the romances I read. I'm so grateful she's bringing her stories to larger audiences and building happily-ever-afters for contemporary Indigenous characters.
I was also struck in this how vividly she depicts Buffy's mental illness. While Buffy is suffering from - what appears to be - chronic depression, and my own experience is centered in OCD and panic disorder, there were moments I felt gutted by how insightfully she depicts intrusive thoughts. This, in particular, will stay with me:
"In her mind, she wrote her thoughts along the windows and doors of the shops lining the street. Once the words were etched into the building and she walked past, she left the thought behind. Easier said than done, truthfully, but there were no rules about repeating your thoughts."
I've spent so many years trying to trick my mind into releasing upsetting thoughts, using visualization and a million compulsions to distract myself, and this image - writing thoughts along buildings to escape them as you walk away - felt so real to me, and speaks to how viscerally Trujillo writes Buffy's experience with depression and anxiety.
Buffy and Santiago's romance will feel really hot-and-cold to some readers, as Buffy struggles with what she wants and deserves. The pacing in the final third - where we begin to cover longer spans of time and the two make pretty big relationship jumps - reflects the big swings that Buffy and Santiago experience throughout their relationship. That said, it's a beautiful conclusion, and once again Trujillo keeps family and community support at the heart of the HEA.
More thoughts on mental health and prickly female main characters: Buffy reminds me a bit of the female main character in After Hours on Milagro Street by Angelina Lopez, in that both are terrified of emotional intimacy and insist on physical intimacy first, and both have complicated family relationships, significant grief and trauma, and a tendency to push people away for fear of being left. Where they diverge for me is in character development. I felt like After Hours on Milagro Street brings the reader into full understanding of the character's trauma and emotional needs, and I felt like we didn't quite make it there for Buffy. Some spoilery thoughts: I was left wishing for more resolution for her outside the romantic relationship - her mother's death, chronic depression, fear of abandonment and anxiety are incredibly raw, and I didn't see how she had a path forward independently (I get nervous when the love interest IS that path). That said, I found Buffy's struggles with mental illness compelling and relatable - her fear of being too much for anyone to love, too exhausting to commit to, her sense of futility and explicit discussion of suicidal ideation (as a callback to her mother's death), are very real and I'm grateful that her character is given space to be sad and angry, particularly by Santiago. As a side note, readers who haven't read Lizards Hold the Sun may need more context on her mother's death, which gets more explanation in the first book.
What I love most when reading Trujillo's romances is how beautifully she weaves in cultural foods, language, family traditions and community work into her love stories. Her writing is atmospheric and highly descriptive, and I am reminded how little of this perspective exists in the romances I read. I'm so grateful she's bringing her stories to larger audiences and building happily-ever-afters for contemporary Indigenous characters.
I was also struck in this how vividly she depicts Buffy's mental illness. While Buffy is suffering from - what appears to be - chronic depression, and my own experience is centered in OCD and panic disorder, there were moments I felt gutted by how insightfully she depicts intrusive thoughts. This, in particular, will stay with me:
"In her mind, she wrote her thoughts along the windows and doors of the shops lining the street. Once the words were etched into the building and she walked past, she left the thought behind. Easier said than done, truthfully, but there were no rules about repeating your thoughts."
I've spent so many years trying to trick my mind into releasing upsetting thoughts, using visualization and a million compulsions to distract myself, and this image - writing thoughts along buildings to escape them as you walk away - felt so real to me, and speaks to how viscerally Trujillo writes Buffy's experience with depression and anxiety.
Buffy and Santiago's romance will feel really hot-and-cold to some readers, as Buffy struggles with what she wants and deserves. The pacing in the final third - where we begin to cover longer spans of time and the two make pretty big relationship jumps - reflects the big swings that Buffy and Santiago experience throughout their relationship. That said, it's a beautiful conclusion, and once again Trujillo keeps family and community support at the heart of the HEA.
More thoughts on mental health and prickly female main characters: Buffy reminds me a bit of the female main character in After Hours on Milagro Street by Angelina Lopez, in that both are terrified of emotional intimacy and insist on physical intimacy first, and both have complicated family relationships, significant grief and trauma, and a tendency to push people away for fear of being left. Where they diverge for me is in character development. I felt like After Hours on Milagro Street brings the reader into full understanding of the character's trauma and emotional needs, and I felt like we didn't quite make it there for Buffy. Some spoilery thoughts:
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness
Moderate: Death, Infidelity, Sexual content, Grief, Death of parent, Colonisation, and Classism