Review: 
I received a copy from Netgalley.
The description on this book got my attention immediately. Though looking at some of the reviews I must admit I did wonder if I had made a mistake requesting this. I am always looking for new reads with transgender characters. I thought this was a high school aged YA coming of age novel. Not so much, if it had been high school aged kids, it would have most likely got a much higher rating from me.
Initially the coarseness of the writing, the language, the frank chatty talk about sex and drugs didn't bother me. Until I found out the characters in this book were middle school aged kids who hadn't even reached high school yet. I just can't get my head wrapped around kids who are (I'm not entirely sure of the age of middle school kids in their last years - 12/13/14?) so openly at such a young age so bluntly exploring sex and drugs. Smoking some weed, maybe but it's much more than just scoring some pot. If it was kids who were 16/17+ experimenting - wouldn't have bothered me in the slightest. The best friend character, Angela (I'm probably going to sound like I'm slut shaming here so forgive me for that as usually I wouldn't care) but this girl is openly described as very sexually active and she's not even a freshman in high school! I don't get it. If she was a high school junior - fair enough - it'd be a you go girl - do what you want don't care what anyone thinks. But again, kids who are 13/14? Struggling to understand that, really. (I'm sort of feeling really old right now!)
Putting all that a side, it's actually a pretty fantastic book. Jude was an amazing character. He liked make up, dresses, boys. He knew exactly who he was and simply did not give a fuck what anyone thought of him. He was blunt, crude and snarky and full of attitude. Again, sexually active, stole his mom's money when he needed it. He had a dream of running off to Hollywood and being a big star, imagining his life as told through the eyes of star telling his memoirs after he'd made it big. It was an interesting method of story telling.
The writing itself was dark and gritty, Jude suffers from a lot of bullying both physical and verbal but some people openly show their support. Like Bff Angela and one wonderful teacher who was very enthusiastic in encouraging Jude to explore his dreams and be exactly who he wanted to be. Fair bit of violence in the novel. Jude does come from a rather crappy home situation. His mom's a stripper, his had has left and mom is living with an asshole of a boyfriend who comes and goes. He does have a younger half brother who he cares about deeply. Mom understands Jude but the boyfriend doesn't, the younger brother is a sweet kid who's trying to understand but his father doesn't want him to.
A lot of party scenes, all involving sex drink and drugs and some fights. Plenty of drama as well. Jude has a crush on the school star, Luke, who keeps claiming he wants nothing to do with him, as well as a weird flingy thing with Angela's older brother Abel. Touching on some themes of bisexuality as well which was interesting to see included as well. A rather explosive very surprising ending.
The age of the kids is never actually mentioned, but I think it's implied somewhere. Like I said, if you can get past how young they are, it's a very gripping read if you like contemporaries with an edge.
Thank you to Netgalley and Little, Brown Book Group UK for approving my request to view the title
Original post: sunsetxcocktail.booklikes.com/post/1365938/review-when-everything-feels-like-the-movies
No comments:
Post a Comment