Ok, despite the title of this post, I’m not actually gonna say what the specific book I’m talking about is. Why? Because it’s not the worst book in the universe. It’s a book about generally the right kinds of things, with its heart in the right place, written by someone who’s authentically representing their experience/culture/etc. They’re better-equipped to write about this as a subject than I am, and I believe that for someone who’s going through what this book covers, it’s likely that a reader will find it a positive, uplifting experience.

It’s a YA book that we’re reading to the kids (yeah, we still read to them almost every night, which is getting maybe a little weird now that they’re 11/14, but they still don’t mind, so we’re not gonna stop). It’s about a young gay kid transferring schools, and needing to navigate adjusting to a new environment and a fairly aggressive bully. There’s a single magical element thrown into the mix – almost a literal deus ex machina, and … yeah – that’s about it.

There’s a lot I don’t like about this book. Everyone the main character encounters has a convenient identity that’s perfectly suited for the plot in the moment. It’s not that almost every character is non-binary, gay, or what have you – I have zero problems with that – it’s a story about a gay kid, the people he’s going to find to hang out with are almost certainly going to frequently also be gay or NB or whatever. But it’s that everyone’s identity has a purpose in the story. It feels like their identity is in service of the main character’s story. Sure, in most stories side characters are supporting the main story. But in this case, it feels like a paint-by-numbers “pick the stereotype, show how this stereotype’s problems illuminate the main character’s story,” and that’s it for the character.

None of the characters feel driven by any internal motivation. They don’t behave in reasonable or believable ways. The evil hall monitor is cartoonishly, absurdly evil. The bully is over-the-top absurd, and gets away with things in public that would simply never fly because there is no situation where this stuff could happen and an adult wouldn’t intervene. And I know that when I was a teenager, things felt unjust, and they felt ridiculous, and the administrators felt evil, but there’s a huge difference between writing a character that seems evil from someone’s perspective, and actually making them do things that are unquestionably, comically, over-the-top ludicrous and still getting away with it scot-free. It makes the story ludicrous.

More, the main character’s internal responses to these things make no sense. An analog would be something like: Bully dumps paint on the main character in full view of everyone in the school. Victim is sad because no one will believe him that this happened. And again, I’d get it if it was written in a way that felt like “Situation happened, emotional response to situation is outsized-but-believable.” Instead, in this book, the main character’s reactions, and the fact that everyone else responds in the way they do just feels … absurd. And it’s weird criticizing that because I think you could then argue that it’s written “how it feels”, and as an adult I no longer remember what it feels like to be a teenager who’s being bullied. Maybe? I don’t know. I feel like I fucking remember what it was like.

But the thing that bugs me more than this is that there’s actual violence in the book. And then there’s language. And yes, language can be harmful. And yes, language can leave a lasting impression. But in this book, they refer to language without ever actually using it, and that unsaid language goes off like an atom bomb. Multiple times.

Someone who’s acted as a friend to someone over a significant period of time, accidentally uses a term and thoughtlessly causes offense. They are literally supernaturally teleported away because the magic thing is protecting the victim in this offense, and the main characters wonder if this unforgivable offense may ever be rectified. And look – yes, I remember what it’s like to be called slurs. I was called them as a kid. In college, even.

But if a friend inadvertently uses an offensive word, the idea that they’ve done something potentially irredeemably harmful is so fucking stupid that I find it incredibly hard to digest. There’s no consideration that “Hey, here’s a term you didn’t consider was hurtful, please don’t use it again.” It was immediately, “Fuck, I don’t know if I can trust them! I can’t believe they think this way,” when again, they’ve been acting as a friend and doing things considerate friends do for the entire duration of the book to that point, and are a marginalized identity themselves. The idea that they wouldn’t understand the impact of language, or that they made a mistake, or again, were somehow irredeemable at this point is absurd.

And in the book, the offender apologizes, says they’ll do better, and that apology is accepted. Great.

I used to really hate Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood. Here’s a show that does a lot right – but every single time Daniel Tiger was faced with any kind of obstacle, his response was to completely crumble in the face of it. His parents would then teach him some sing-songy parable that he’d use to then overcome some repeated instance of this difficulty, and he would. Other parents I know appreciated that, and would use those parables IRL with their kids. But the thing I couldn’t get over was that Daniel, the character, constantly modeled a kind of total lack of resilience or ability to even diagnose a situation by himself that he was a completely helpless character who was totally overwhelmed by literally everything.

In this book, later, the main character is called a slur by his bully. This is a character that’s been out, and comfortable being out, for quite some time. The slur is never named. And in a YA book, that’s sort of sensible? Since I think if you wrote f****t in a YA book about a gay kid there’d be a huge uproar. But again, he’s called this, the slur is never named, and again, it goes off like an atom bomb. And it’s a slur that’s used in anger, by a bully, specifically as an attack. But again, the main character utterly crumples instantly. There’s no pushback by anyone else in the book. There’s no argument from the main character. A word is used, and it utterly destroys this kid. More, the word is like Voldemort. Not even named in the book.

It’s such a weird experience – it’s like the spectre of language destroys him, with the book unwilling to even name the slur. And yeah – maybe that’s because at this point the word is unprintable. And maybe my response is colored by the fact that you really can’t call me anything similar. Even racist taunts were never exactly right, since any anti-Asian slur… well, it only covers half of me. Or being called a f*****t because I lived at a gay frat in college, or went to a party in a dress – those things never really hit me the way they might if they were attacking my actual identity. I don’t know. But it’s really weird reading a book to the kids that is like, “An awful bully, who has no redeeming qualities in the context of this book, used an anti-gay slur – which we won’t name in any way – but it’s so awful and so deeply impactful, and coming from this person who’s been tormenting the main character in myriad ways, daily, for months… this is the atom bomb that nukes their self-confidence?

I don’t believe it. And the character’s response isn’t even illuminating. It’s unclear what the word even means to them. “Is this who I am? Is this what I am? Who could love me if I’m what they say I am?” is kind of their response, but it’s never explained in any way what that actually means to the character. Which means particularly reading it to the kids, I have no idea what they’re supposed to take away from this.

But it’s also weird – it’s the idea that language has this power to knife your soul directly. And that it’s the language, not the context. A reaction to the bully? Yes. To his actions? Yes. To his language as a part of his actions? Yes. But the way the book presents it is that the bully has done everything in his power, for months, to antagonize the character – physically chasing them, assaulting them, wielding their power against him in a huge variety of ways. For months. And then uses a word, and the character then suddenly goes into a complete and total crisis, questioning their self-worth (this could have been believable to me if there was any explanation for how), and all of their friendships (this less so), and there’s not even a moment’s thought that “Hey, a shitty person said a really shitty thing, but he’s been so consistently and irredeemably shitty that this is just another thing.”

This is where I think there’s some chance “I’m not the audience” is a real thing. Maybe so. But it’s really frustrating to read.

In any case, we’re not done with the book, but I said to the kids, “If it turns out this bully’s been antagonizing the gay kid the whole time because they themselves are gay, and in the end they’re redeemed because of their identity I’m throwing this book in the trash.” We’re a few chapters from the end, and I think the chances of this are >90%. One of his sidekicks has already gone through this arc, and were immediately accepted once they revealed they were a bully because they were themselves bullied. Ok, whatever – all the terrible shit you did is no problem, I guess.

Again, I don’t want to name the book, because I think this book probably is for someone, and it’s definitely not for me. But I think my problems with it aren’t just that I’m not the target audience. I hate how much power is given to language with no pushback from anyone, and that slurs are somehow exponentially worse than the physical violence and oppression and torture that this kid’s already gone through for months. But that’s really just one element in a whole litany of things I hate about this book. Bleh. Sorry for making you read this shit, it didn’t go anywhere or lead to any kind of actual insight.. 😀