YA Contemporary

Review of Leah on the Offbeat by Becky Abertalli

June 5, 2018 by Roger Hyttinen Leave a Comment

I was so excited for this book and was really looking forward to delving into the Simonverse once again.

THE STORY

So the story picks up on year after the events where Simon Vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda left off. Leah on the Offbeat is a continuation of the Creekwood series, with Simon vs. The Homo sapiens Agenda being Creekwood #1. Though it can be read as a standalone, it is advisable to read Simon first as this would help to give you a better feel for the characters. Not only that, Simon is well worth the read!

Leah and her friends are busy getting things in order for their senior year, including where to go to University. Because of this pressure of which school to go to and whether that will mean leaving a boyfriend/girlfriend behind, tensions are running high, especially once friends of hers begins to fight and her rock-solid circle of friends begins to crumble slowly.

But this novel really revolves around the fact Leah is bisexual, though she hasn’t told any of her friends, not even Simon. It’s not that Leah’s bisexuality is a big deal — she’s entirely comfortable with her sexuality.

What’s throwing her for a loop is that she’s falling hard for a girl in her circle of friends with whom she’s not even all that close. In fact, Leah seems to have deliberately kept this person at an arms distance…and now we know why.

Once Leah realizes the depth of her crush on this girl, she then has to figure out what to do: Should she pursue the girl of her heart and break her own heart in the process because Leah’s nearly 100% sure she’s straight? Or deny her feelings, keep her sights on her future and put the drama aside?

But when this girl begins flirting with Leah and throwing her all kinds of crazy mixed signals, Leah doesn’t know how to deal, fearful that she’s misinterpreting the girl’s signals. So instead of risking her heart and entering into a potentially humiliating situation, she shuts it all down. Risk averted. The question is: what it the right thing to do?

WHAT I LIKED

I felt a bit nostalgic given that this book takes place near the end of our favorite characters’ senior year. It reminded me of the uncertainty and anxiety that I felt during that time as well as the fear of losing friends and the fear of the unknown.

And that’s not even mentioning what was going to happen to those long distance relationships? Did they even stand a chance? I thought the author did an excellent job of fleshing out all these aspects and in so doing, brought back my own vivid memories of that time period in my own life.

The struggles of Leah and her friends were things most teens face, especially during their last year of high school so, in this way, the story was entirely relatable. I felt like I was back in high school (with both the good and the bad).

I thought Abertalli handled the romance aspect quite well and liked how it wasn’t hurried or rushed. The angst and drama surrounding the Leah and her crush was cute and worked for me, so that made it extra sweet when Leah and her crush finally get together; though I wish it would have occurred a bit sooner.

It was cute that Leah’s crush was seriously flirting with Leah though she refused to see any of the signs, convinced that the object of her affections is 100% hetero. Hence the angst.

I also enjoyed the banter between Leah and her crush — as well as the banter between all the other character’s as well, a lovely device I’ve noticed in all of Abertalli’s novels.

I also loved the fact that there was a road trip — I’ve already said in the past that I’m a sucker for a road trip story. While this wasn’t such a story per se, I did enjoy the trip that Leah and her crush took while they were both still trying to figure the other one out.

And of course, the “event” that occurred during the trip marked a turning point in the novel, followed by plenty of drama and just the right about of angst.

I loved that we got to see many of our favorite (and not-so-favorite) characters from the first book: Simon, Blue, Nick, Abby, Anna, Morgan, Garrett and even the dreaded Martin. We also get some sweet Simon and Blue coverage, for which I was especially grateful.

I also really loved the secondary character of Leah’s mother. She was the ultimate cool mom who possessed an extraordinary amount of patience with Leah. She was also quite funny, and her comments caused me to giggle out loud quite a few times.

What’s nice about these characters, is that though they are a lovable and fun group of people (well, maybe except for Martin), they are also flawed, which renders them all the more human and relatable. We see this is Abertalli’s other novels as well, and she always does an excellent job of pulling it off.

What especially worked for me in this book was that though this story followed a plus-sized protagonist, her weight was not the focus of the story. In fact, Leah doesn’t give a damn about what anyone thinks about her size — she is perfectly happy with her body, and she sums it up nicely when she says:

I swear, people can’t wrap their minds around the concept of a fat girl who doesn’t diet. Is it that hard to believe I might actually like my body?

So rather, this story was about those things that many teenagers have to deal with in discovering who they are in their rapidly changing world.

I also loved how comfortable Leah was with her own bisexuality, though it did confuse me why she hadn’t yet told her friends — especially the gay ones — that she was bisexual.

Maybe to her, it wasn’t something that needed explaining. It simply “was.” As with the Simon book, I feel the author does a masterful job of normalizing LGBTQ relationships and once again, I was overjoyed to see the positive portrayal of LGBTQ people.

So many LGBTQ books in the past were depressing and tragic, so it’s refreshing to read once again a story that’s uplifting and positive.

That being said, I loved the amount of diversity in this book: we had people who were bisexual, gay, straight, fat, skinny, as well as plenty of characters of color. I also loved how the one racist comment was jumped upon immediately and was not merely allowed to slide by.

And for someone who loves Harry Potter, the many Harry Potter references are always appreciated.

Okay, so now let me address the negative points.

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE

Okay, so I hate to say it, but I didn’t like Leah at all. I loved her a lot in Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda but in this book, she rubbed me the wrong way.

Her overly abrasive personality got in the way of me enjoying this book, and because of it, she was for me an unsympathetic character. She was nearly always snarky, angry, negative, sarcastic, cynical, exceptionally moody, and pretty much rude to everyone around her.

It’s challenging to empathize with a character who seems so hostile to everyone and everything.

I just had a tough time connecting to Leah’s character, especially when she shuts down anytime something goes wrong, or somebody says something she doesn’t like. I found myself thinking quite a few times that she was a whiny brat.

I can’t deny it: she was pretty much a shitty person throughout the majority of the time in the book. She rarely apologized to anyone and treated her mom like absolute crap, which I found especially annoying, considering how nice her mom was to her and how she supported Leah in everything she did.

There’s a huge difference being a character being self-confident and outspoken, and a character being an asshole.

Oh, and there was also the lying, such as when she lied to Garrett about attending his game. Speaking of Garrett, I also didn’t like the way Leah strung Garret along. It was apparent that he had a massive crush on her but she never once thought of letting him down gently and telling him she wasn’t interested.

I have to admit that I also found it a bit difficult buying into the premise of the story. In Simon Vs. The Homo sapiens agenda, we are introduced to Leah, and the girl (I”ll refer to Leah’s crush as “the girl” in order not to give anything away) and they are both completely straight — Leah even confesses her crush on Simon.

Now in this book, Leah is all of a sudden bisexual, and she has a HUGE crush on the girl and supposedly has for quite some time — and the girl, who was also very straight in the last book, now suddenly has a crush on Leah. I had a difficult time buying it.

It also didn’t seem like the book at all that much of a plot — or at least not that engaging of one. There really weren’t any plot twists or surprises to mention of. It was basically thus: angry bi-girl falls for a girl whom she thinks is straight. Straight girl flirts with bi-girl. Bi-girl is mean to straight girl. Will straight girl and bi-girl get together?

VERDICT

The writing itself was excellent and engaging, and I enjoyed the angst and conflict between the characters. I also enjoyed spending time with all of my favorite characters again from the Simonverse, and there was plenty of humor and snark to keep it light and entertaining.

I laughed out loud on plenty of occasions. I also enjoyed getting inside of Leah’s head and seeing the world from her point of view.

Unfortunately, I didn’t love it as much as I hoped I would. There was no point in this book that pulled on my heartstrings at all.

I think that the change in Leah’s personality from the Simon book to this one was a little too jarring for me and I ended up, much to my surprise, somewhat disliking her character — and it’s not easy to love a book when you don’t like with the main protagonist.

Overall, while I did have some problems with Leah’s characters, I didn’t hate this book. But I didn’t love it either.

I just didn’t connect with the characters as much as I did with the first book in this series. I do love Becky Abertalli’s writing and will definitely continue to read her books in the future. In fact, I can’t wait for her collaboration with Adam Silvera (I already preordered it).

This book, however, just wasn’t quite a home run for me.

You can check out Leah on the Offbeat here at Amazon or at The Book Depository.

Review of The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo

May 19, 2018 by Roger Hyttinen Leave a Comment

This is the second novel written entirely in free verse that I’ve read, the first being A Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds. I’ve really warmed up to this succinct type of format and would definitely read more of this type of novel. It’s such a unique way to tell a story and the more I’m exposed to this type of storytelling, the more it resonates with me. And this is coming from someone who is not a fan of poetry.

The Story

While reading this, I felt as though I were reading an autobiography, but all in verse.

The book follows Xiomara Batista, a teenage Dominican girl, who has a twin brother. It’s interesting to note that her name — Xiomara — literally means “one who is ready for war” and this name fits her perfectly. Because of her mature and shapely body, is the target of sexual harassment from her peers – consisting of endless groping, objectification and lewd comments — causing her to continually defend herself with harsh words and her fists. She’s not one who hesitates in doing battle when necessary.

This quote from the book sums the harassment she had to experience nicely:

”I am the baby fat that settled into D-cups and swinging hips so that the boys who called me a whale in middle school now ask me to send them pictures of myself in a thong.”

So in this way, there is a good amount of body shaming and body guilt in this story, not only by the boys at school but also by her mother.

She also often has to defend her brother, Xavier, a shy meek boy who is also bullied at school. I love how Xiomara never refers to her brother by name, but only as “Twin” because, according to her, she is the only one who can call her that.

Her mother is ultra-religious to the point of being extreme, and from the story, it seems that her entire world revolves around her religion. There is no middle of the road with her — everything is black and white, and not to be questioned.

Xiomara, however, questions her religion but keeps her questioning to herself, fearing her mother’s wrath. It’s worth mentioning that the manner in which her mother force feeds Xiomara her religious beliefs borders on abuse and she uses her religion to harm both Xiomara and her brother emotionally.

Another secret that Xiomara has kept from her mother is her poetry — notebook after notebook worth, in which she pours all of her frustrations, her hopes, her dreams and her doubts. It’s through her poetry that she find freedom — the freedom to breathe in her otherwise constrictive, suffocating world.

There is also a boy named Aman that Xiomara has been seeing. It’s worth mentioning that dating of any kind is a huge no-no and her mother expressly forbids it until she’s in college. Her mother has a very low opinion of men in general for which we learn the reason as the story progresses.

So her English teacher invites and urges Xiomara to join her school’s slam poetry club which she wants to do more than anything, but she knows that this is something her mother would never agree to and would no doubt severely punish her if she found out about it.

But regardless of her fear, Xiomara joins the club and skips her Confirmation classes to do so.

And it’s through this club that Xiomara experiences a who new level of freedom. But the question is: how long can she keep it up without her mother finding out?

Of course, Xiomara is unable to hide who she really is indefinitely, and it’s no surprise that it all coalesces into a gigantic explosion.

WHAT I LIKED

First off, I loved Xiomara’s teacher. She really struck a chord with me because I had a similar teacher when I was in high school who encouraged me to pursue writing. I even had an extra assignment to keep a writing journal that I had to turn in every week. I can’t underestimate the importance of teachers like this, who encourage you when other’s don’t. So it’s because of this teacher that Xiomara dared to take that frightening first step.

The story is told from Xiomara’s perspective, so we get a peek at what’s really going on in her head. Though to the world she shows only her tough exterior, we see a confused and vulnerable girl instead with at times raging emotions as she pours her heart into her poetry.

I found Xiomara’s character so relatable even if you don’t necessarily come from a home with strict, religious parents because that sense of not belonging or insecurity are feelings that we’ve all experienced at one time or another.

I especially liked the strength and conviction she exhibited even when faced with what seemed like insurmountable obstacles, such as her mother forcing her to obey the laws of the church or the blatant sexism and harassment she encountered at school.

So though her writing, we see Xiomara’s views on body image/body shaming, religion, sexuality, family, womanhood, sexism, and abuse, all very intense but important topics.

I also loved how via her inner strength, she moves past her mother’s rules and abuse as she begins to explore her sexuality and learns to understand that her feelings toward Aman are not wrong, wicked, evil or sinful.

This story is a phenomenal exploration of a young girl who, though constantly told that she’s not feminine enough, devout enough, or good enough, moves past these judgments to a place of pride at who she is — an admirable positive message to any young person who may face similar judgements in their lives.

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE

I’m hard-pressed to come up with anything I didn’t like about this novel. I would have loved to have learned more about “Twin” and about his and Xiomara’s relationship. Because the story is recounted through Xiomara’s singular perspective, the other characters weren’t entirely as developed as they could have been. I would have enjoyed learning more about her mother’s past and what events brought her to the religious extremism. This was touched on a bit in the novel, but more detail would have been welcome.

My one real niggle with the book was in Xavier’s portrayal. He’s gay and is portrayed as timid, shy and unable/unwilling to fight his own battles. In fact, his sister has to step in and fight his battles for him repeatedly. These kinds of stereotypes really bother me in stories — where the gay person is portrayed as weak and emasculated. Sure, I do understand that this was used as a plot device to illustrate Xiomara’s aggressive nature. But I wish the author could have done so in a different way, without resorting to negative gay stereotypes.

FINAL VERDICT

I was utterly blown away by this book so much so that I devoured it in one day. This is a powerful, revelatory and sometimes raw coming of age story with a courageous and admirable main character.

Child abuse is a subject that I especially struggle with, so I found parts of this difficult to read, similar to my experience with The Dangerous Art of Blending In, another book I read recently.

But though The Poet X is heartbreaking and raw in places, it is ultimately hopeful and positive, as compromise is reached. I wish I had read this book when I was a teen.

In summary, this is a touching and emotional story of survival and of triumphing to become one’s authentic self, and I recommend it, even if you’re not one who typically goes for poetry. As I said, I’m not a poetry person, but this book blew me away. I loved it and gave it 4 stars.

You can check out The Poet X here at Amazon or at The Book Depository

Review of The Miseducation of Cameron Post by Emily M. Danforth

May 16, 2018 by Roger Hyttinen Leave a Comment

Miseducation of cameron post book cover The Miseducation of Cameron Post was on quite a few banned books list so it immediately attracted my attention (I love me some banned books!).

This story takes place in the early 1990’s follows a young lesbian teen named Cameron Post whose parents are suddenly killed in a car crash. As it turns out, Cameron, who was 12 years old at the time, had been kissing a girl — her friend Irene— hours before her parent’s death. So she ending up linking these two events in her mind creating some major guilt and in her preadolescent mind, wonders whether the death of her parents just might be God’s way of punishing her for her forbidden kiss.

And all this takes place right off the bat in the story.

So Cam is then sent off to live with her grandmother and her ultra-conservative and ultra-religious Aunt Ruth in Miles City, Montana. As Cameron steps into her teenage years, she comes to accept that she is a lesbian and makes another gay friend (ahem…a friend with benefits), Lindsey who teaches her the “gay” ropes and who lovingly refers to Cam as a baby dyke, which always gave me a chuckle

So I thought this was going to be sort of a coming-of-age tale of a young lesbian girl figuring out who she is.

But then the story took quite a surprising and disturbing turn — Cameron is outed to her Auth Ruth, and as a result, things don’t end up too well for our heroine, as Aunt Ruth takes drastic action, intent on “fixing” her niece. She sends to her God’s Promise church camp, one of those “pray away the gay” compounds.

And our story gets quite interesting from there.

WHAT I LIKED

I loved the character of Cameron as she was quite the firecracker. One author’s blurb on the back of the book said “If Holden Caulfield had been a gay girl from Montana, this is the story he might have told” — and I definitely have to agree, given that I just read Catcher in the Rye and Holden is still fresh in my mind.

Like Holden, Cameron was so realistically portrayed and she felt so real to me that she almost jumped off the page as I read about her adventures…and misadventures.

So though she did have somewhat of a strong ego and independent streak, it was these qualities which allowed her to reject the judgment of those authority figures in her life and maintain her self-esteem through it all.

This was especially true when she realizes that often, the people who are supposedly in charge really don’t have a clue about what they’re doing and are just winging it as they go along. That’s pretty much adulthood in a nutshell.

Now while Cameron certainly can be snarky at times, she’s also intelligent, strong, surprisingly adaptable and brave, and she’s able to maneuver through any shit storm that comes her way.

There really is so much to like about this story. I loved the vivid, detailed descriptions and the author brought the location to life. The storyline was also gripping with wonderfully snappy dialog and unique characters that were not clichés or cardboard cutouts, with all of this leading to a marvelously done story.

And speaking of the characters, I also enjoyed the varied cast of secondary characters, most of which were nicely developed and each relevant in their own way to the plot.

Now to the author’s credit, she doesn’t portray the Christians in this story has mean-spirited hateful bigots. In fact, there weren’t any real villains in the story per se. The counselors like Rick and Lydia, and even Cameron’s Aunt Ruth, all felt that they were doing the right thing and believed that what they were doing was in Cameron’s ultimate best interest (though I have to say that I despised Aunt Ruth).

Still, in general, I have a difficult time reading stories about these ”gay conversion therapy” camps whose goal it was to cure teen girls and boys of homosexuality. Thankfully, this type of therapy seen these days as a form of child abuse and these types of institutions are on the decline, at least to my understanding.

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE

I felt that the book was a little on the long side. I remember thinking a couple of times, “this is really dragging” so in this way, it could have used a little snipping here and there.

I also was not a fan of the ending. You know, if you’re one of those folks who likes things nicely tied up at the end, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. In fact, I found the ending rather abrupt. It’s not that it ended on a cliffhanger or anything – there just didn’t seem to be a whole lot of resolution at the story’s finale.

For instance, I would have loved to find out how Cam got on about six months down the road. I also would have loved to see how Cam’s future relationship with Ruth, her Grandma, or even Coley developed. I think a nice little Epilogue of 20 pages or so would have been lovely, maybe with a little glimpse into Cam’s future. I admit that I’m somewhat of a closure junkie so a little more resolution would have been nice.

I should also mention that though this is classified as a Young Adult novel, there is drinking, drug use, shoplifting, and blatant sexual situations, elements which some people might not like to see in their YA books.

FINAL VERDICT

This book was quite an emotional roller coaster ride and there are some dark moments in the story that are challenging to get through.

Your heart can’t help but break for Cam as she struggled to make the best out of a bad situation — and then there’s Mark’s story, which is also quite disturbing and heart-wrenching.

That being said, this isn’t a fluffy YA book at all; rather, it deals with some serious topics such as betrayal, love, loss, self-acceptance, religion and sexual confusion. I don’t mean to imply that this is a grim story because it’s not — it definitely has its fun, light and humorous elements as well.

In summary, I absolutely loved this story, and while it was heartbreaking in places, it was also a beautiful coming-of-age story with a riveting plot, a strong narrative and compelling, well-fleshed out characters, especially Cameron, whom I bonded with right from the get-go. I found the courage and adaptability Cam shows throughout the novel to be praiseworthy and impressive.

The Miseducation of Cameron Post was an amazing book, and I’m so glad that it crossed my path, though it did leave me wanting more at the end of it all. I ended up giving this novel 4 stars.

You can check out the book here at Amazon or at The Book Depository.

Review of The Wicker King by Kayla Ancrum

April 14, 2018 by Roger Hyttinen Leave a Comment

The Story

The Wicker King follows two boys, August and Jack who have been friends since they were little and are like brothers. They also both come from neglectful, dysfunctional family. August has to sell drugs for money because his sole caretaker, his mother, has pretty much given up on life and August needs the money he earns to take care of her. And Jacks parents, who travel extensively for work, leave him alone for weeks at a time.

When younger, they often created games where Jack played the role of the benevolent king with August being the faithful knight or champion.

So as the novel progresses, we learn that Jack begins experiencing hallucinations from an alternate reality – similar to the games they used to play – that is blending in with everyday life. August knows that Jack needs some sort of help but feeling that he owes a life debt to Jack, decides instead to stick by Jack’s side, keep the hallucinations a secret, and accept the visions as reality.

Jack is confident that once he fulfills a sort of a quest, the hallucinations he’s experiencing will disappear for good. So August plays along, even putting his life in danger as Jack draws him more and more into his fantasy world, straddling the world between reality and madness. August willingly follows Jack, though he himself sees no otherworldly elements himself. As the novel progresses, Jack and August alienate themselves from everyone around them: parents, friends, and teachers as Jack’s visions become the primary focus of their existence.

Now as a reader, we can’t help but wonder whether Jack is actually, in fact, experiencing an alternate reality of some kind, as his instance that what he’s seeing is real become increasingly convincing. So as I read along, I began to wonder whether this book is going to turn into a YA fantasy novel. I liked the fact that I knew nothing going into this book, so it was a fun journey as I didn’t know where this novel was going to take me.

Now I don’t want to get too spoilery here, but I will say that things get a whole hell of a lot worse for our heroes before they get better, and this book does deal with a lot of intense, hard-hitting subjects such as child neglect, toxic codependent relationships, and mental illness.

What I Liked

I’m glad that I got the physical copy of this book as it’s cool how the pages are initially white but has Jack descends further and further into is fantasy – or perhaps madness — the splotches of black intrude more and more on the page until finally, the pages are completely back with white print which I thought was a brilliant device and an excellent metaphor for the direction in which the novel was heading.

Additionally, there are numerous drawings, doodles, photocopies of arrest records, copies of detention slips, newspaper clippings, school suspension forms, medical records and still frame photographs which really add to the story.

I’m not sure how all this would translate to an ebook, as that format doesn’t always work with a lot of different multimedia and images in a book.

There aren’t any full-on chapters; instead, we get a page or a page and a half of snippets for which we piece together with the story. Now I don’t mean to say that the format is confusing. It’s not. In fact, not only do the snippets and multimedia do a great job of portraying the events in Jack and August’s lives, but they also succeed in setting the tone of the novel, and I really enjoyed this type of storytelling. Taking together the short vignettes along with the multimedia, we can easily figure out what’s going it as the story unfolds. If I’m not mistaken, I think this format is called “Micro Fiction.”

Oh, it’s worth mentioning that the entire story is told from August’s point of view because no doubt of the two, he’s a more reliable narrator. However, the extra multimedia snippets gave the reader a separate point of view for the various events we read about, which helped to fill in the gaps.

Another thing that I liked about this story was that it wasn’t just the difficult subjects, the complicated relationships, and the intricately woven narrative that made this book great – it’s the characters. Jack and August are vivid and wonderfully rendered — and these people really came to life for me – in all their complexity, cluelessness, willful blindness, and, ultimately, human realism. Oh, so many terrible decisions were made — but that’s what rendered them all the more human and all the more real.

What I also liked about this novel is the lack of a clad-tight, simple, happy ending. With the way these two characters were developed, it would have not only been unreal for them to skip off into the sunset, it would have been a disservice to all Jack and August had been through, dealt with, and accomplished. That being said, the story did end with a satisfying conclusion that felt perfect to me.

What I Didn’t Like

There’s not too much I didn’t like about this book except for the fact that it will hurt your heart in places — but that’s the purpose of this book, I think. I don’t think it was intended to evoke positive emotions of unbridled joy, so the dark subject matter may not be for everyone. There are plenty of triggers in this book so sensitive readers be warned. This is the kind of book that will break you in places.

Initially, the short snippets and the sometimes non-linear storytelling felt a bit disjointed to me, and it took a bit of getting used to. But once I got the hang of it, it was fine and had no problems immersing myself in the story.

Also, though the character of Jack and August were extremely and meticulously well-developed, we are only given bits and pieces about the other characters in the book. I wouldn’t have minded knowing a bit more about the Roger and Peter, the twins who repeatedly offered their assistance (though it was never accepted), Gordie and Rina.

Final Verdict

Though this was an eerie and haunting read that was at times disturbing and cringe-worthy, it is also poignant and beautiful, and is very much also about friendship and unconditional love. It was one of those addicting reads that I just couldn’t put down. It was dark, weird, looming, heart-wrenching and utterly bewitching — I loved every single moment of it. I’m so happy that I came across The Wicker King and I ended up giving it book 5 stars.

By the way, there’s an accompanying novella to this story entitled “The Legend of the Golden Raven: A Novella of the Wicker King” which I just picked up but haven’t had the opportunity to read yet. I’m looking forward to it. Just to let you know.

You can buy the book here at Amazon or at The Book Depository

This review was transcribed from the video review on my YouTube channel “Roger’s Reads”

Review of We Now Return To Regular Life by Martin Wilson

April 9, 2018 by Roger Hyttinen Leave a Comment

“We Now Return to Regular Life” by Martin Wilson is another book that made the Lambda Literary Award’s list of finalists in the Young Adult category and that has been on my wishlist, which I finally got around to reading.

The blurb is as follows:

Sam Walsh had been missing for three years. His older sister, Beth, thought he was dead. His childhood friend Josh thought it was all his fault. They were the last two people to see him alive.

Until now. Because Sam has been found, and he’s coming home. Beth desperately wants to understand what happened to her brother, but her family refuses to talk about it—even though Sam is clearly still affected by the abuse he faced at the hands of his captor.

And as Sam starts to confide in Josh about his past, Josh can’t admit the truths he’s hidden deep within himself: that he’s gay, and developing feelings for Sam. And, even bigger: that he never told the police everything he saw the day Sam disappeared.

?As Beth and Josh struggle with their own issues, their friends and neighbors slowly turn on Sam, until one night when everything explodes. Beth can’t live in silence. Josh can’t live with his secrets. And Sam can’t continue on until the whole truth of what happened to him is out in the open.

For fans of thought-provoking stories like The Face on the Milk Carton, this is a book about learning to be an ally—even when the community around you doesn’t want you to be.

The Story

The book “We Now Return to Regular Life” revolved around one evil act: the abduction of 11-year-old Sam Walsh. So when the story begins, Sam has been missing for three years and assumed by most people to be dead. His childhood friend Josh, with whom Sam had earlier been bicycling that day, was the last person to see him. His older sister Beth, who assumed Sam was dead, is dealing with some heavy, heaving guilt from the day of his disappearance.

But now Sam has been found and he’s come home. Beth wants to know what happened to Sam but her family refuses to allow anyone to discuss the topic. All we know is that he was kidnapped and held captive for three years by a man named Russell, who did unspeakable things to the boy.

Unable to speak with his family, Sam rekindles his friendship with Josh and begins to confide in him about what he went through during his captivity. But Sam’s sister isn’t the only one who’s feeling guilty. Josh is holding onto a horrible secret about that day — a secret with which he should have gone to the police but didn’t and because of that, he’s been plagued with pain, confusion and haunting “what-ifs”. But since their reunion and as Josh and Sam grow closer, Josh finds himself falling in love with his childhood friend.

Of course, as a reader, we want to know where Sam was, what happened to him, and who he was with. The rest of the book alternates between Josh and Beth’s point of view as the story slowly unfolds. Through their eyes, we not only see their struggles but also experience the difficulty and the challenges Sam is facing trying to once again fit into everyday life.

What follows is a heart-wrenching depiction of what it means for the victim and the victim’s family to survive trauma and it’s not an easy journey.

Pros – What I Liked

I liked how each person’s point of view encompassed not only the present and how everyone involved is dealing with Sam’s return but also consisted of flashbacks to the day of Sam’s kidnapping and the subsequent days that followed. But not only are we privy to their emotions and perspectives on the kidnapping, we also get a glimpse of Sam’s recovery, through the points of view of Beth and Josh. In this way, I enjoyed experiencing the story all these different angles. Beth and Josh really made me feel like a part of their world as they struggled themselves with Sam’s reemergence and attempted to process their feelings and work through their emotional turmoil in the process.

I also felt that the dynamics between Sam, his sister Beth, their mother, and their stepfather Earl seem very realistic, and I could relate to each of them. There is a range of emotions experienced by each of them: guilt, anger, confusion, anxiety, uncertainty, and fear, rendering the story heartbreaking in places. So in essence, this isn’t just Sam’s story, but it’s also the story of those who are closest to him.

An even though we never experienced the story from Sam’s point of view, his desperate need to talk about what happened as evident and in opposition to those closest to him who couldn’t bear to hear it — and instead of supporting Sam, move away from him. Though Sam is hurting deeply, he isn’t willing to burden anyone with his pain, which I found heartbreaking. We really get a feeling for his struggle to find some sort of normalcy in his life after three harrowing years of abuse by his kidnapper, as he tries to get his life back.

I also really enjoyed the slow unraveling of the story. Each time we moved from one character’s perspective to the other, we learned a little bit more, like puzzle pieces slowly being snapped into place. I felt that the male/female, big sister/friend perspective also provided a nice balance to the story.

Cons – What I Didn’t Like

Though Sam was the main character and revolved around him, I didn’t get to learn or understand as much as I would have liked. I would have liked to have learned a bit more about how Sam was feeling and perhaps even know in more detail what he went through. In fact, I felt that each character has much more story to tell and some things are left unspoken.  I also found that the abrupt change in the point of view could be jarring at times — especially when the character was just beginning to open up and then we suddenly switch to the perspective of the next character — and to a different point in the story. I also found some bits of Beth’s narrative a tad boring, especially in regards to high school dynamics.

There was also a minor non-graphic sex scene that was a bit disturbing and mind you, I’m no prude. I felt that this story may have been better with this scene being left out.

Final Verdict

This is a powerful story packed with emotion and I really loved this book. I read a lot, and this year alone, I’ve have read some phenomenal books and without a doubt, We Now Return to Regular Life is one of those. It was a fast-moving, page-turning read and I felt the pacing of the story to be spot on.  But this is a dark and heavy story in places, the nature of which can make it disturbing for the more sensitive reader. It’s always difficult reading about the abuse of children whether it be fiction or nonfiction and this book is no exception. Thus, sensitive readers should be forewarned about child abuse, sexual abuse, and kidnapping triggers. However, I felt that the subject matter has handled in the most delicate way possible and the author didn’t give us any horrifyingly graphic scenes. That being said, though the book does handle Sam’s situation with sensitivity, it also does it with a sense of realism.  Still, this isn’t an easy topic to read about and was definitely an intense, gut-wrenching story and in my opinion, will be unforgettable.

Mr. Wilson has written a very realistic, fast-paced and beautiful story about survival, family, friendship, and love that will touch anyone’s heart. This sucker punch of a book was most certainly an experience and well worth the read, in my opinion. I can understand why it’s a finalist for Lambda Literary awards. This is the kind of book that will seep into your soul.

There’s so much more I could say about this book. I could probably talk about it forever, but I’ll stop now before I get spoilery. All I can say is that I heartily recommend it and give it 4.5 stars.

You can check out the book here at Amazon or at The Book Depository

This review was transcribed from a video review on my “Roger’s Reads” YouTube channel

Review of The Sidekicks by Will Kostakis

April 5, 2018 by Roger Hyttinen Leave a Comment

“How was your afternoon?”

“No one died, so it was a big improvement on my morning.” Will Kostakis, The Sidekicks

The Blurb:

All Ryan, Harley and Miles had in common was Isaac. They lived different lives, had different interests and kept different secrets. But they shared the same best friend. They were sidekicks. And now that Isaac’s gone, what does that make them?

Will Kostakis, award-winning author of The First Third, perfectly depicts the pain and pleasure of this teenage world, piecing together three points of view with intricate splendour.

The Story:

The Sidekicks is set in Northern Sydney and revolves around three friends, Ryan, Harley and Miles whose good friend Isaac just died. The thing with these three is that they are not friends with each other – but they were each close friends with Isaac. In fact, they really don’t like each other at all, and the couldn’t be more different from one another. The only thing they have in common is their grief over Isaac’s death.

So the book is broken down into three sections, each told from a different boy’s perspective. The three sections are named “The Swimmer” which is told from Ryan’s point of view, “The Rebel” which is told from Harley’s point of view, and “The Nerd” which is told from Miles’s point of view.

Each section starts out with the boy being called to the school deputy’s office — Miss Evan’s where they are told the news: Their friend Isaac was killed when he dove into the water at a party and hit his head on the boat.

What follows is an exposition of each boy’s reflections and flashbacks about their relationship to Isaac and their relationship to each other.

Pros:

I enjoyed the fact that each section built upon the previous section, so we saw a progression as we moved from one character’s point of view to the other. Though there was some repetition of events, we were able to revisit it through the unique perspective of the new character.

I also loved how relatable the characters were. They were so human and so real, complete with flaws, self-doubt, personal struggles and personality clashes which lent a strong realism to the story. I also liked how Isaac’s death affected each one of them differently, illustrating how grief affects all of us in different ways. This was apparent in the depiction of the different emotions each of the three experienced in the days following Isaac’s passing. I also was impressed by how distinct and unique each character’s voice and personality was. Each section had a markedly different writing style based on the character’s personality.

While the book does deal with heavy subject matter, there were also plenty of humous moments in the book, many of which made me laugh out loud. It also stressed the importance of family relationships and friendships, and both were wonderfully portrayed. In so many YA book, the parents are either absent or despised by the characters, which was not the case here. The relationships between the boy and their parents are positively portrayed and were present figures in the boys’ lives.

The ending was so beautiful it brought tears to my eyes as the three boys discovered the threads that tied them together, finally realizing that with some endings come new beginnings. In this way, it wasn’t only about grief, but it was also about acceptance.

One thing that struck me was how the book moved away from stereotypes often found in gay-themed novels. I liked that fact that it wasn’t the uppity, snitty, overly-particular, sports-hating character who was gay, but rather the Olympic hopeful jock.

Cons:

Initially, I found the story a bit confusing and slow moving. To be truthful, there isn’t a lot of action in the book – it’s definitely a character driven story as we delve deep into each character’s head as they revisit their friendship with Issac.

I also found certain parts of Mile’s section challenging to get through as it consisted of bits of dialog from a film that he was revisiting – a film in which Isaac was starring. Though it was jarring at times, these sections did end up being poignant and relevant to Miles’s growth as a character.

At first, I found it somewhat off-putting that there were no chapters in the book. As I mentioned, it’s divided into three sections. They are several sections breaks which provided stopping points which I eventually got used to.

Verdict:

This is a gem of a book, and I ended up loving it and all three characters. This novel is an excellent exploration of grief, resulting in each character’s growth by the end of the book as they reexamined the boxes into which they placed themselves and each other. I also felt that it was an excellent portrayal of teenage life.

This was a heavy-hitting book, that was both heart-wrenching yet uplifting at the same time and may make you cry throughout the story, especially during the end which in my opinion, was absolutely beautiful. It’s a bittersweet story that I’m guessing will stay with me for a long time. I’m giving it 4.5 stars. Recommended!

You can check out The Sidekicks here at Amazon or at The Book Depository

This review was transcribed my video review of this book on YouTube.