A review by runningjenw
Sticker by Henry Hoke

4.0

Part of a series of books that examine the ordinary life of everyday things, Sticker (Object Lessons) is so much more than I expected. Sticker is a memoir told in stickers. For those of us who grew up in the 80's and 90's, there are some especially fun throwbacks. Do you remember stickers from your childhood? What about the constellation stickers that were meant to go on a bedroom ceiling and mimic the night sky? What about the fruit sticker on the Chiquita brand banana? Did you ever buy a CD that came with the Parental Advisory sticker on the front? I bet most of you haven't given much thought to these stickers in quite some time. I hadn't either! This slim volume contains multitudes pulled from the every day banality of stickers and brings meaning into them in a unique way. Each sticker evokes a memory in the author, from something simple, like a sticker meant to signal harmful chemicals on household cleaners, to something meaningful like the 'HH' sticker that is most likely meant to represent a town, but instead, under the context of a white supremacist rally that the author is protesting, comes to mean "Heil Hitler". I was drawn in by the stories and the writing style. This book is a fast read, with a big punch.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the E-ARC.