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A review by saroz162
Flight by Sherman Alexie
2.0
I was lent this book my a friend of mine who is very, very different from me. She feels things very deeply, and she has a huge social conscience. Because she's not a long-time friend, I'm having a little bit of trouble figuring out why she gave me this book: is it because I (academically) study children's literature - although really, this is issue-based YA literature? Is it because we had briefly discussed Sherman Alexie, and this is her favorite Alexie novel? Is it because it made her feel all sorts of feelings and she wants to share that cathartic experience, Oprah's Book Club-style? I don't know. I think it may be a combination of all of these things. I've even come up with some possibilities that are rather more troubling (such as that she is trying to "tell" me something about her own youth with this story of a disaffected, violent, and abused young man). I just...don't know. And that really bothers me.
What I do know is that if I follow my most superficial theory - that the book made her cry and she thinks I will be emotionally impacted as well - it fails, simply because we are so different. I've never been someone who enjoyed issue-based YA literature, even when I was its target audience of a young teen. Books like "Are You There God, It's Me, Margaret" just turned me straight off because I either found them boring or extremely manipulative. Flight belongs in that second camp: I can tell Alexie's a good writer, and I would like to read some additional material by him. But the entire point of the book is to bring awareness to an issue - the different perspectives of racism - and while I do believe there are many teenagers who would feel enlightened or empowered by the story, I just come out feeling like I've been hit over the head with a shovel. I learned about racism a long time ago, and I've learned even more about it since. I will continue learning. However, a book like this, which mostly serves to put "a human face" on racism, doesn't impact me much in my 30s. It just makes me feel annoyed, as if I'm being taken for a fool.
Because I know I'm not the target audience, and because I'm still confused about my friend's intentions in giving me the novel, I have trouble putting a rating to Flight that is anything but totally subjective. I didn't enjoy the book. It didn't make me cry. I finished it, because I respect my friend, but I will never recommend it to anyone else. However, I can easily imagine there are other, probably younger readers who will find it both significant and meaningful.
What I do know is that if I follow my most superficial theory - that the book made her cry and she thinks I will be emotionally impacted as well - it fails, simply because we are so different. I've never been someone who enjoyed issue-based YA literature, even when I was its target audience of a young teen. Books like "Are You There God, It's Me, Margaret" just turned me straight off because I either found them boring or extremely manipulative. Flight belongs in that second camp: I can tell Alexie's a good writer, and I would like to read some additional material by him. But the entire point of the book is to bring awareness to an issue - the different perspectives of racism - and while I do believe there are many teenagers who would feel enlightened or empowered by the story, I just come out feeling like I've been hit over the head with a shovel. I learned about racism a long time ago, and I've learned even more about it since. I will continue learning. However, a book like this, which mostly serves to put "a human face" on racism, doesn't impact me much in my 30s. It just makes me feel annoyed, as if I'm being taken for a fool.
Because I know I'm not the target audience, and because I'm still confused about my friend's intentions in giving me the novel, I have trouble putting a rating to Flight that is anything but totally subjective. I didn't enjoy the book. It didn't make me cry. I finished it, because I respect my friend, but I will never recommend it to anyone else. However, I can easily imagine there are other, probably younger readers who will find it both significant and meaningful.