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bejulien 's review for:
Disappoint Me
by Nicola Dinan
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
!!! NICOLA DINAN ID DO ANYTHING FOR YOU !!!!
I loved Nicola’s first book, Bellies, so much that i was counting down the days until this one came out. She did not disappoint.
As yall know, i’m a sucker and a half for character forward stories and poets-turned-novelists and the writing here… made for me i swear.
This story follows two timelines - Max and her new boyfriend Vincent in “present” time, and Vincent a decade before when on a gap year in Thailand. The book starts with one of Max’s poems with a line of how a person is no fewer than two things. I think these 300 pages are all about what things we are, what things we want to be, and what things we THINK we should be. It does that by exploring familial relationships (e.g. expectations from parents), the dynamics of different kinds of closeness that have emerged from long term friendships, and how men (and the world) react to and treat trans women. And more, but a lot to get into in one tiny review.
You get it from all sides — expectations coming from friends and not just parents, what you want to be maybe being more heteronormative than you thought you needed to be, what things you are not necessarily always what you wish you were (e.g. stubborn like your brother, more forgiving than “society”).
It takes a few minutes to digest after reading; i recommend you do. Although not much really ~ happens ~, you were buoyed along with prose at a steady pace, overcoming waves of what finding yourself in your 30s actually looks like. I loved Bellies a bit more, but this was still a great and quick read.
quotes i liked:
I loved Nicola’s first book, Bellies, so much that i was counting down the days until this one came out. She did not disappoint.
As yall know, i’m a sucker and a half for character forward stories and poets-turned-novelists and the writing here… made for me i swear.
This story follows two timelines - Max and her new boyfriend Vincent in “present” time, and Vincent a decade before when on a gap year in Thailand. The book starts with one of Max’s poems with a line of how a person is no fewer than two things. I think these 300 pages are all about what things we are, what things we want to be, and what things we THINK we should be. It does that by exploring familial relationships (e.g. expectations from parents), the dynamics of different kinds of closeness that have emerged from long term friendships, and how men (and the world) react to and treat trans women. And more, but a lot to get into in one tiny review.
You get it from all sides — expectations coming from friends and not just parents, what you want to be maybe being more heteronormative than you thought you needed to be, what things you are not necessarily always what you wish you were (e.g. stubborn like your brother, more forgiving than “society”).
It takes a few minutes to digest after reading; i recommend you do. Although not much really ~ happens ~, you were buoyed along with prose at a steady pace, overcoming waves of what finding yourself in your 30s actually looks like. I loved Bellies a bit more, but this was still a great and quick read.
quotes i liked:
“For many years it's been hard to separate love from anxiety, from push and pull. The manic rush is more a desire to be loved than love itself, a desire that explodes at any sign that love may recede, that it is in short supply.”
re: being told someone couldn’t tell you were trans:
“Worry is matched by flattery, because there's part of my brain that still hears the statement as too much of a compliment, which makes taking genuine offense hard.”
“Half of queer culture is fronting as an artist while working in an office. It's the new, more grueling system of artistic patronage.”
“It's funny that for some of us, being a beautiful woman in a beautiful dress that beautiful men want to fuck is a dream, and for others it's hell on earth, and sometimes it's both at once.”
“And then I'd explain that it's always bothered me, that I've never really liked it, and then the question becomes: why didn't you say something earlier?
And that speaks to something else even more embarrassing. Spineless-ness. But I'd rather be spineless than stop being spineless and have people think I'm spineless.”
“I'm trying to regulate my aversion to this kind of all-suffusing love, because I'd much rather he cared than not, but it's hard to receive care without believing I'm in danger, in need of it.”
“Yes, these are things that I've long assumed were never meant for me, but perhaps I haven't spent enough time reflecting on how that's a gift. My life would be terrifying to Emily-it is insecure and often alone—but her life is terrifying to me.”
“Nostalgia demands some admission that the present is not so good.”
Content Warnings
Graphic: Transphobia
Moderate: Sexual violence, Vomit