So I went to Goodreads to update my list and to read the reviews there. After all I'd heard of this book, these reviews surprised me. Tons (like 85) Barnes and Noble readers give the novel 4.5 stars. Goodreads gives this book about 3. So I'm reading and then, then, I hit this review.
You'll enjoy it. I did.
"Had to read for controversial/banned books lesson for YA lit. class. Review: Dated (1982) book about a girl in high school who falls in love with another girl. Aside from being confused about their sexual orientation, the girls are not very good at practicing restrain or self-control. Personally, a disturbing subject and more so because of the point of view.
...
...Wait for it...
I am forever grateful for my friends in BYU 32nd ward who were with me throughout the day helping me get through this book. It was a serious ordeal for me and their love and support was the only thing that got me to the end." -- Goodreads (emphasis added)
sigh. I'm happy she was able to "get through" her "serious ordeal." Later she says she wanted to read an LBGTQ book, so props to her. Still, "serious ordeal"? I hope she came out with a greater appreciation and less "ew, gross."
(can i also just say that I want to take a YA lit class? PLEASE?)
Anyway, on my TBR list. So many books are. I'm in a little over my head, but oh well. I always romanticize things in my head. Summer will be wonderful. I will stay within a really air conditioned home and read in a quiet room (HA!). I will do all these things. I forget how tired the heat makes me. Or how easily distracted I get.
ALSO.
(Because I posted on it yesterday...)
As for the bin Laden thing: I've heard so many different reactions. Mine, obviously, was one of "glee." We got the bastard! But I have appreciated hearing different perspectives. They made me think and continue to think. Still, as of this moment, I'm glad the asshole is gone.
And for right now, that's all I want to say.
YA lit classes own so hard. I took one for my graduate work, and at my internship I spent a lot of time talking to teenagers about what they're reading (I work in a high school library). Plus that's pretty much all I read myself. :B
ReplyDeleteBut srsly. WOE! WOE TO THIS GIRL for her very serious ordeal! How hard it must have been to read about people so very unlike oneself. Q fucking Q. Pathetic.
Man, how predictable was the source of that judgmental and offensive comment (*rhetorical question*). It really puts on loud display the culture of ethnocentrism and narcissism. She assumes so much. The poor thing ... reading about something outside her own little close-minded reality must have been quite an ordeal for her.
ReplyDeleteI think my favorite part was "the girls are not very good at practicing restrain or self-control"
ReplyDeletetsk tsk, girls.
i always hated this when my friends would talk like this, especially after i met my husband.
like, for reals kids: you don't want to go apeshit on your love? you didn't have "difficulty" practicing restraint and self-control? god help you! are you human?
get the hell away from my mote, i think i see a beam in your eye.
I read this book last year and I think it's probably the least sexual sexuality-themed YA book or coming-of-age story I've ever read. Which makes me wonder if that reviewer has ever commented on the restraint and self-control of characters in heterosexual YA books.
ReplyDelete