A review by gabsalott13
Pet by Akwaeke Emezi

4.0

Meme Corner: today’s first review meme nearly wrote itself, and the other one comes with a fond RIP.

Pet was pushed up on my TBR thanks to high praise from Michaela, and I am still thinking about her review’s take on this book’s setting, the (dys?)topic town of Lucille. Everyone should check out Michaela’s inquiries on “what it means to live in a world where all the hard work has supposedly already been done.”

In their YA debut, Akwaeke Emezi is both generous and restrained in the depiction of Lucille, a place that cherrypicks from the best parts of our present world--for instance, I loved the familial intimacy and glimpses of collective living structures. It also moves into quasi-utopian territory: many of the experiences described here as matter-of-fact are stunning departures from our current world, and I think narrating these differences through a child’s voice allows us to not feel thumped over the head. Most of this story’s adults are eager to believe in a resolved, static Lucille, and with the picture Emezi paints, it’s clear why. As we got closer to the introduction of Pet and the dangers in this book, a part of me just wanted to just stop reading. As the creature later says, I didn’t want to "throw a stone and break the picture" (94) of this world that seemed so much like the one I want.

As many have noted, Pet touches on many of our societal problems, namely the protection of “monsters” through our desire to preserve ignorance as bliss In addition, I think those following the discussion around Adrienne Maree Brown’s [b:We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice|55608932|We Will Not Cancel Us And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice|Adrienne Maree Brown|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1602267500l/55608932._SX50_.jpg|86039465] will appreciate this book’s discussion of what Jam rightfully calls “limited” notions of justice. In a time when many people are trying to learn more about how we can move away from punishment-oriented responses to harm, I think this book poses great questions about the limits of a certain sort of vigilante justice.

I did want more of a resolution from this book, by which I mean I wanted to learn much more about Lucille’s systems, and how they might parallel with our own visions of a post-revolution society. What is the history of Lucille’s rehabilitation centers, and how do they actually operate? In the minds of characters like Aloe, they seem to be nicer prisons, which made me think about how this book might intersect with concepts discussed in [b:Prison by Any Other Name: The Harmful Consequences of Popular Reforms|48734385|Prison by Any Other Name The Harmful Consequences of Popular Reforms|Maya Schenwar|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1573242781l/48734385._SX50_.jpg|74101195]. Also, how might the founders’ concepts and constructs of a post-revolution society intersect with theories of “no futures”? To my understanding, this theory wrestles with the idea that we can’t accurately envision a future separate from antiblackness, oppression, and other systems of harm because we’ve internalized these systems so much that they even impact our freedom dreams. (I’m learning about “no futures” from Joy James and RAW, a community organizer and incredibly brave thinker who I learn much from following on Twitter.) While these unresolved questions did lead to me docking a star, above all, they’re a testament to how Emezi crafts a world that warrants deep interrogation of our own.

In summary, I found Pet to be incredibly clever, visionary, and timely. It has pushed Akwaeke Emezi’s adult work up on my TBR, and I am looking forward to reading their two earliest novels when my library holds come in.

Finally, the trigger warnings for this book are listed a few rows below (special thanks to Michaela for modeling this formatting!)

.
.
.
.
.

TW: suspicion, intimation, and censored description of child abuse. Also, if your religious upbringing makes you sensitive to depictions of “righteous”/angelic horror and torture, or if you are queasy when it comes to bodily maiming, you may want to skip pages 191 to 196.