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A review by dreamerf641c
Drew by Allison Glock, T. Cooper
1.0
I really wanted to like this book, but I just couldn't. The idea of living each year of high school as a different body (or with a different body) was fascinating, but the writing and plot couldn't maintain the idea.
First of all, you'd think a book about the same person a in a different body would be exploring how a person is perceived differently, and really making points about everyday sexism, or how similar people really are. Instead, you have gender steoretypes that are confirmed by the text. Ethan loves skateboarding more than anything else in the world, but as Drew never skates ANYWHERE or seems to miss it at all. There is relatively little body horror (If I woke up as a man tomorrow, I can tell you right now that it would take a lot longer than months for me to react as a man rather than a woman. And there are a lot more differences than having a period between male and female bodies), and you'd think a book that makes a lot of folks think about transgender issues would explore more the longing for your 'correct' body, or even explore what it feels like to be misgendered by everyone. But that's... not touched on at all.
Sexuality in this book wasn't really touched on. You know that the this Changer culture really values procreation, but what if you want to be a woman, and want to love another woman? What if you're bisexual? What if you aren't? None of the changer families seem to be anything other than heterosexual, and that probably should have been touched on.
What was with the swearing? It's far more distracting to put in fake swearing that it would have been to just avoid cursing. And for an American author, there were a lot of Britishisms. I would assume- I know for a fact that no one in America is going to call a sports bra a "jog bra" or tampons "cotton mice", and there were a few curses that are not of America either.
I hated how easily Ethan was let go of by Drew. Seriously. I hated it. This book seemed to exist on the premise that lady hormones would make you into a lady. And that's not true. Yes, our culture (which loves the idea of science explaining our cultural choices) loves the idea that woman were gatherers and men were hunters (probably not based entirely in reality- there are some interesting articles on this), and that it comes down to chemistry. But Drew was raised as Ethan, and that should have affected Drew's view of the world. And it didn't.
Okay, so basically, the biggest reason I didn't like this book is that I don't think it added anything to a debate about how people view the world, or how people relate to each other.
But the laziness of making your main character utterly uninterested in the BIGGEST CHAIN OF THEIR LIFE so that you don't have to get bogged down in plot and explaining how things work is awful. There was a lot of weird mini plot holes, or things that didn't quite jive, but you, the reader, have no idea if it'll ever be filled in because Drew doesn't fill you in. Drew reads the Changers Bible (which... really?) but you don't get excerpts or anything that freaks Drew out. You never meet other Changers of Drew's age (other than Chase- which is pretty weird. Why would you have mixers without making sure that people are mixing? Also, if this book is going to have four other parts, you can't go back to Drew's previous friends- unless they are staying at the same school for four years? That might be happening, not sure. But having other Changers would have allowed the changer world to get fleshed out more, which would have helped, because right now it's a creepy cult AND THAT'S IT. I dont' have any more canon information)
Anyway, plot holes and a reinforcement of gender stereotypes.
What fun.
First of all, you'd think a book about the same person a in a different body would be exploring how a person is perceived differently, and really making points about everyday sexism, or how similar people really are. Instead, you have gender steoretypes that are confirmed by the text. Ethan loves skateboarding more than anything else in the world, but as Drew never skates ANYWHERE or seems to miss it at all. There is relatively little body horror (If I woke up as a man tomorrow, I can tell you right now that it would take a lot longer than months for me to react as a man rather than a woman. And there are a lot more differences than having a period between male and female bodies), and you'd think a book that makes a lot of folks think about transgender issues would explore more the longing for your 'correct' body, or even explore what it feels like to be misgendered by everyone. But that's... not touched on at all.
Sexuality in this book wasn't really touched on. You know that the this Changer culture really values procreation, but what if you want to be a woman, and want to love another woman? What if you're bisexual? What if you aren't? None of the changer families seem to be anything other than heterosexual, and that probably should have been touched on.
What was with the swearing? It's far more distracting to put in fake swearing that it would have been to just avoid cursing. And for an American author, there were a lot of Britishisms. I would assume- I know for a fact that no one in America is going to call a sports bra a "jog bra" or tampons "cotton mice", and there were a few curses that are not of America either.
I hated how easily Ethan was let go of by Drew. Seriously. I hated it. This book seemed to exist on the premise that lady hormones would make you into a lady. And that's not true. Yes, our culture (which loves the idea of science explaining our cultural choices) loves the idea that woman were gatherers and men were hunters (probably not based entirely in reality- there are some interesting articles on this), and that it comes down to chemistry. But Drew was raised as Ethan, and that should have affected Drew's view of the world. And it didn't.
Okay, so basically, the biggest reason I didn't like this book is that I don't think it added anything to a debate about how people view the world, or how people relate to each other.
But the laziness of making your main character utterly uninterested in the BIGGEST CHAIN OF THEIR LIFE so that you don't have to get bogged down in plot and explaining how things work is awful. There was a lot of weird mini plot holes, or things that didn't quite jive, but you, the reader, have no idea if it'll ever be filled in because Drew doesn't fill you in. Drew reads the Changers Bible (which... really?) but you don't get excerpts or anything that freaks Drew out. You never meet other Changers of Drew's age (other than Chase- which is pretty weird. Why would you have mixers without making sure that people are mixing? Also, if this book is going to have four other parts, you can't go back to Drew's previous friends- unless they are staying at the same school for four years? That might be happening, not sure. But having other Changers would have allowed the changer world to get fleshed out more, which would have helped, because right now it's a creepy cult AND THAT'S IT. I dont' have any more canon information)
Anyway, plot holes and a reinforcement of gender stereotypes.
What fun.