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oshgrin 's review for:
Little Fish
by Casey Plett
Oof this book was intense. There was a lot I really enjoyed about it: the tender, loving, messy, relationships; the multiple woven plot threads; the themes of rural vs urban and tradition vs modernity; and, of course, the deep trans love shared between friends and family. Some reviewers complained about the prose, but I found Plett’s writing totally engaging and often beautiful. I really couldn’t put it down!
However, this book made me feel like shit most of the time I was reading it. There is a fine line between sharing and processing complex, painful, real-life experiences and romanticizing suffering, and I would say my biggest critique of this book is that I felt it leaned just a bit too much into the latter camp. It unflinchingly toes-up with some very heavy topics, all of which are very worth talking about, but I couldn’t help but feel frustrated by how often the narratives of each story thread dissolved into even more hardship and self-destructive behaviors. I don’t need or want queer stories that are all sunshine and daisies, but I do think it’s powerful to have stories of queer hope and connection and healing, and I get tired of so many queer narratives still ending up “burying their gays”. I acknowledge that the current social climate makes being trans and reading about trans pain all the more gut-wrenching, so that could very well be informing some of my feelings. I definitely recommend this book, but mostly to queer folks who are trans or who are in loving relationships with trans people, and not so much to people who are seeking this book out as a starting point for learning about trans issues.
Also, as a sidenote with no bearing on my rating: I read this as an audiobook, and I didn’t love the narrator. Her voice was very appealing and she read smoothly, but I found some of her line deliveries to be stilted, and she made no differentiation between character voices which made it difficult to follow who was speaking sometimes. I only mention this in case someone is debating whether to read the book in print or listen to it.
However, this book made me feel like shit most of the time I was reading it. There is a fine line between sharing and processing complex, painful, real-life experiences and romanticizing suffering, and I would say my biggest critique of this book is that I felt it leaned just a bit too much into the latter camp. It unflinchingly toes-up with some very heavy topics, all of which are very worth talking about, but I couldn’t help but feel frustrated by how often the narratives of each story thread dissolved into even more hardship and self-destructive behaviors. I don’t need or want queer stories that are all sunshine and daisies, but I do think it’s powerful to have stories of queer hope and connection and healing, and I get tired of so many queer narratives still ending up “burying their gays”. I acknowledge that the current social climate makes being trans and reading about trans pain all the more gut-wrenching, so that could very well be informing some of my feelings. I definitely recommend this book, but mostly to queer folks who are trans or who are in loving relationships with trans people, and not so much to people who are seeking this book out as a starting point for learning about trans issues.
Also, as a sidenote with no bearing on my rating: I read this as an audiobook, and I didn’t love the narrator. Her voice was very appealing and she read smoothly, but I found some of her line deliveries to be stilted, and she made no differentiation between character voices which made it difficult to follow who was speaking sometimes. I only mention this in case someone is debating whether to read the book in print or listen to it.