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A review by bella_loca13
The Queer Girl is Going to be Okay by Dale Walls
4.0
This book feels very personal to me. When I had first heard about it, I was amazed by how familiar this story felt to my own life: a queer latinx aspiring filmmaker looking for queer love by way of documentary making. Is this book about me? This book became a very anticipated read for me, and I couldn't wait to start reading it as soon as I got my hands on it.
I resonated a lot with the characters because of the issues they faced in this story. Each character faces their own set of issues —all very much aligning with the coming of age theme: getting into college, feeling like a failure, coming out, searching for love and ultimately finding your place in the world. I really loved the portrayal of everything these characters were feeling, and being at a similar point in my life, I could relate to a lot of it. The issues are very real and stand true for so many queer teens,, including me.
"No matter what happens, you will use your hands and your heart and your huge brain to make great movies. You could go home and take care of your dad, and write scripts or develop documentary ideas. At the end of the day, you are a star who will make incredible things happen. Look what you've already done. You're going to be okay, no matter what." (pg.219)
This kind of hopeful writing made me feel like what was being said was for me, the reader, as well as the characters. It was beautiful and I had so much fun reading it for that aspect.
Unfortunately where the book fell flat was the storytelling. The foundation for the world, characters and story was no where near built. Though, the challenges the characters faced were very real and well portrayed, if you took those away from the characters, there wouldn't be anything else to look at. There was a lot of telling instead of showing. The characters are best friends, because the author told us so... but there was no substance to back this up. And it was like this with so many aspects of this book, where things weren't very well though out. This was such a shame because Walls is a FANTASTIC writer. I highlighted so many passages of this book where I was touched. The writing was BEAUTIFUL, and Dale is such a promising writer, it was really upsetting that the story didn't share the same property.
At the heart of this book, is a story about a girl searching for queer love. Dawn spends the whole book looking for a definition for queer love, she wants to know what it is and she wants it in her life, she just can't quite figure it out. We follow Dawn as she begins, frustrated by wanting queer love, to know what it is and never being able to get it. In the end, she is left with a whole new perspective on queer love and how it had found its way into her life before she even knew it.
I resonated a lot with the characters because of the issues they faced in this story. Each character faces their own set of issues —all very much aligning with the coming of age theme: getting into college, feeling like a failure, coming out, searching for love and ultimately finding your place in the world. I really loved the portrayal of everything these characters were feeling, and being at a similar point in my life, I could relate to a lot of it. The issues are very real and stand true for so many queer teens,, including me.
"No matter what happens, you will use your hands and your heart and your huge brain to make great movies. You could go home and take care of your dad, and write scripts or develop documentary ideas. At the end of the day, you are a star who will make incredible things happen. Look what you've already done. You're going to be okay, no matter what." (pg.219)
This kind of hopeful writing made me feel like what was being said was for me, the reader, as well as the characters. It was beautiful and I had so much fun reading it for that aspect.
Unfortunately where the book fell flat was the storytelling. The foundation for the world, characters and story was no where near built. Though, the challenges the characters faced were very real and well portrayed, if you took those away from the characters, there wouldn't be anything else to look at. There was a lot of telling instead of showing. The characters are best friends, because the author told us so... but there was no substance to back this up. And it was like this with so many aspects of this book, where things weren't very well though out. This was such a shame because Walls is a FANTASTIC writer. I highlighted so many passages of this book where I was touched. The writing was BEAUTIFUL, and Dale is such a promising writer, it was really upsetting that the story didn't share the same property.
At the heart of this book, is a story about a girl searching for queer love. Dawn spends the whole book looking for a definition for queer love, she wants to know what it is and she wants it in her life, she just can't quite figure it out. We follow Dawn as she begins, frustrated by wanting queer love, to know what it is and never being able to get it. In the end, she is left with a whole new perspective on queer love and how it had found its way into her life before she even knew it.