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A review by futurama1979
Beauty Queens by Libba Bray
1.0
Disclaimer: I read this book for a class.
Basically, oh god, where to start. I guess: I take notes on every book I read for a class and I had 9 full pages of single spaced typed notes for this, and that's how many things I took issue with.
The pacing was so off. Reading this gave me the exact feeling that watching a classic kids' movie again as an adult and realizing everything was moving way, way too fast and simply to enjoy because it was made to cater to a 5 year old mind and attention span gave me. Only this book was written for a YA audience and was just paced utterly inanely. Bray moves too quickly from one thing to the next - not to mention incorporates a ton of extraneous elements - to actually develop her character arcs at all, or follow through on any of the bonds she has her characters forge. The speed Bray forced this story along at by default made the characters shallow, the plot shallow, the stakes shallow, because none of it was given enough time. And somehow this book is still 400 pages, which tells you exactly how much crap was shoved in to negate that length.
The plot kind of goes like "a plane crashes on a deserted island. at first the only issues are waiting for rescue and personality clashes between the ensemble cast made up of a diverse group of people, but they soon come to rationalize that rescue isn't coming and they have to build shelter and come up with systems for food and water. However, the island isn't what it initially seemed... not only are there remnants of an old civilization, like a temple, but there's another group of people, operating out of underground bases hidden in the jungle whose interests directly conflict with the survival of the survivees. Oh, and there's a crazy girl with guns in the jungle." If you're thinking, hey, kinda interesting, what I just described word for word was the premise of the TV show LOST. Which this book rips off not just the character development set-up and POV changes from but also most of the plot points of. Don't worry; if you're not a fan of LOST, that's not the only thing this book rips off.
The things that made the story unique - the relentless quips and attempted humour, the crash victims being pageant contestants learning to claim their identities, and the intercuts of "Words from our Sponsors" and "Commercial Breaks" - had me really interested because I'd never seen the exact combination of things that went into this book. But as it went on, I realized how derivative most of it was, how surface level. The things that stand out as unique at the beginning are beat like dead horses before the halfway point and Bray keeps on beating them.
I haven't even touched on the cruel stereotyping of every minority character, that vicious brand of 'woke' white woman racism, the liberal cis woman's loud championing of yet obvious discomfort with trans women, and I don't think I will at length. But: when you're a white author writing minority characters as exclusively their struggles and stereotypes for an audience of young readers, maybe "but it's satire!" isn't the trump card you think it is.
It's a bummer this book sucked so bad, because there were the beginnings of a lot of interesting themes and character dynamics. Just the beginnings, really. There are some moments that are better than others, some little wisps of this story that make me think I should have given it, like, a 1.5 star. But then I remember the rest of it.
Basically, oh god, where to start. I guess: I take notes on every book I read for a class and I had 9 full pages of single spaced typed notes for this, and that's how many things I took issue with.
The pacing was so off. Reading this gave me the exact feeling that watching a classic kids' movie again as an adult and realizing everything was moving way, way too fast and simply to enjoy because it was made to cater to a 5 year old mind and attention span gave me. Only this book was written for a YA audience and was just paced utterly inanely. Bray moves too quickly from one thing to the next - not to mention incorporates a ton of extraneous elements - to actually develop her character arcs at all, or follow through on any of the bonds she has her characters forge. The speed Bray forced this story along at by default made the characters shallow, the plot shallow, the stakes shallow, because none of it was given enough time. And somehow this book is still 400 pages, which tells you exactly how much crap was shoved in to negate that length.
The plot kind of goes like "a plane crashes on a deserted island. at first the only issues are waiting for rescue and personality clashes between the ensemble cast made up of a diverse group of people, but they soon come to rationalize that rescue isn't coming and they have to build shelter and come up with systems for food and water. However, the island isn't what it initially seemed... not only are there remnants of an old civilization, like a temple, but there's another group of people, operating out of underground bases hidden in the jungle whose interests directly conflict with the survival of the survivees. Oh, and there's a crazy girl with guns in the jungle." If you're thinking, hey, kinda interesting, what I just described word for word was the premise of the TV show LOST. Which this book rips off not just the character development set-up and POV changes from but also most of the plot points of. Don't worry; if you're not a fan of LOST, that's not the only thing this book rips off.
The things that made the story unique - the relentless quips and attempted humour, the crash victims being pageant contestants learning to claim their identities, and the intercuts of "Words from our Sponsors" and "Commercial Breaks" - had me really interested because I'd never seen the exact combination of things that went into this book. But as it went on, I realized how derivative most of it was, how surface level. The things that stand out as unique at the beginning are beat like dead horses before the halfway point and Bray keeps on beating them.
I haven't even touched on the cruel stereotyping of every minority character, that vicious brand of 'woke' white woman racism, the liberal cis woman's loud championing of yet obvious discomfort with trans women, and I don't think I will at length. But: when you're a white author writing minority characters as exclusively their struggles and stereotypes for an audience of young readers, maybe "but it's satire!" isn't the trump card you think it is.
It's a bummer this book sucked so bad, because there were the beginnings of a lot of interesting themes and character dynamics. Just the beginnings, really. There are some moments that are better than others, some little wisps of this story that make me think I should have given it, like, a 1.5 star. But then I remember the rest of it.