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A review by rereader33
What I Carry by Jennifer Longo
2.0
2022 January Buzzword Challenge
Prompt: read a book that has "what" in the title.
This book was so, so disappointing. Books, especially YA, dealing with foster care and the foster care system are sooooo rare and I was soooo stoked to read a book tackling this issue. And funnily enough, the foster care aspects were the only redeeming qualities about it. Everything else was garbage.
Something that frustrates me about books dealing with sensitive/important topics is that anyone outside of the main characters have little to no nuance and/or are cardboard-cutouts of characters. This novel is no exception, but to an obnoxiously unrealistic extreme. If you're a decent person, you're amazingly perfect, wonderful, and might as well be God's gift to mankind. If you're a bad person or even slightly antagonistic, you're a horrible caricature of evil and meanness. Muir was the only person with any nuance and possessing more than one personality trait, but that doesn't stop her from also being a judgmental asshole and #notlikeothergirls. Although the only reason why she's #notlikeothergirls is because she's nice to people in general, so take with that as you will. Oh, and Natan? He's exactly what every psuedo-feminist thinks men are like and is so outrageously unrealistic in his speech and thoughts on women that I could not take him seriously. Yes, I hated him and he was a creep, but he was so over-the-top evil in his misogyny it was impossible to see him as a person. I swear, Saturday Morning Cartoon villains had more depth and nuance them him, Tiana, and Katrina. Speaking of them...
I was not prepared for the amount of girl hating/shaming that was present in this book, but boy was it there and infuriating. Folks, little piece of advice: if you're only way to make a girl unlikable is to make her a stereotypical "mean girl," either rework the character or don't put her in your work at all. The mean girl trope is beyond overdone, incredibly insulting, and does not make for an interesting antagonist/villain. Oh, pro tip #2: if the only way for your female protagonist to combat the mean girls is to be just as petty and judgmental to them as they are to her, go back to the drawing board because that shit is WEAK. Seriously, Muir is just as judgmental and rude to them as they are to her, but it's okay cuz she's the main protagonist and is a "good person"? Spoiler alert--NO, IT'S NOT. Writers, stop writing this shit. It's 20-fucking-22, this shit's not acceptable anymore and hasn't been acceptable ever, so KNOCK THIS SHIT OFF.
I could write more, but I'm honestly too exhausted. This started of so strong and was dealing with am underrepresented topic, but all the other bullshit ruined it. 2 stars for the topic, read it for that but that's about it. Thank you for coming to my rage-fueled Ted Talk.
Prompt: read a book that has "what" in the title.
This book was so, so disappointing. Books, especially YA, dealing with foster care and the foster care system are sooooo rare and I was soooo stoked to read a book tackling this issue. And funnily enough, the foster care aspects were the only redeeming qualities about it. Everything else was garbage.
Something that frustrates me about books dealing with sensitive/important topics is that anyone outside of the main characters have little to no nuance and/or are cardboard-cutouts of characters. This novel is no exception, but to an obnoxiously unrealistic extreme. If you're a decent person, you're amazingly perfect, wonderful, and might as well be God's gift to mankind. If you're a bad person or even slightly antagonistic, you're a horrible caricature of evil and meanness. Muir was the only person with any nuance and possessing more than one personality trait, but that doesn't stop her from also being a judgmental asshole and #notlikeothergirls. Although the only reason why she's #notlikeothergirls is because she's nice to people in general, so take with that as you will. Oh, and Natan? He's exactly what every psuedo-feminist thinks men are like and is so outrageously unrealistic in his speech and thoughts on women that I could not take him seriously. Yes, I hated him and he was a creep, but he was so over-the-top evil in his misogyny it was impossible to see him as a person. I swear, Saturday Morning Cartoon villains had more depth and nuance them him, Tiana, and Katrina. Speaking of them...
I was not prepared for the amount of girl hating/shaming that was present in this book, but boy was it there and infuriating. Folks, little piece of advice: if you're only way to make a girl unlikable is to make her a stereotypical "mean girl," either rework the character or don't put her in your work at all. The mean girl trope is beyond overdone, incredibly insulting, and does not make for an interesting antagonist/villain. Oh, pro tip #2: if the only way for your female protagonist to combat the mean girls is to be just as petty and judgmental to them as they are to her, go back to the drawing board because that shit is WEAK. Seriously, Muir is just as judgmental and rude to them as they are to her, but it's okay cuz she's the main protagonist and is a "good person"? Spoiler alert--NO, IT'S NOT. Writers, stop writing this shit. It's 20-fucking-22, this shit's not acceptable anymore and hasn't been acceptable ever, so KNOCK THIS SHIT OFF.
I could write more, but I'm honestly too exhausted. This started of so strong and was dealing with am underrepresented topic, but all the other bullshit ruined it. 2 stars for the topic, read it for that but that's about it. Thank you for coming to my rage-fueled Ted Talk.