Another NetGalley read and one I won back last year – not the oldest one on the pile but I have been trying to pull out the books I have that are a bit more diverse as I work my way through my curiously non-diverse 20 Books of Summer list. This one couldn’t be more diverse, as you’ll see in the review – you can pretty well always trust YA books to be delving into today’s issues and they’ve been doing that since they became a named genre, and this one is no exception.
Camryn Garrett – “Full Disclosure”
(14 August 2019, NetGalley)
First of all, this is the second book I’ve read this year that opens with a Black woman at a gynaecology appointment (the other being “Queenie“. One for Bookish Beck’s coincidences, although I didn’t read them at the same time.
Simone is just your average 17 year old American high school student, obsessed with musicals and busy directing the school play. But she moved to this school when her HIV+ status was disclosed at her last one (via the girl she was seeing who she thought she could trust); now should she tell her two new best friends and the boy she fancies (these two sets of people are given equal status at this point, although one is prioritised over the other later)? Can she trust them? Meanwhile, the only people she knows who really understand are in a pretty cringeworthy group she has been attending at hospital for years (there’s good satire of the well-meaning group leader in these sections). And her two dads are a bit over-protective and have their own issues with family, too, one having split off from his family and the other having a son from his marriage to a woman who pushes against the family narrative of that marriage being a mistake. Their overprotectiveness does however mean that when Simone starts getting anonymous notes threatening to “out” her as positive, she doesn’t tell them.
I really liked the way characters were naturally described rather than labouring over their skin tone or ethnicity (I think I read about that on someone else’s blog or in an article and I’m struggling to think where now – if you recognise that, please let me know). For example, Simon’s friend Lydia is introduced as having a bag featuring “I love Taiwan pins from her trip to visit family last summer”. Lydia also identifies as asexual (or “ace”, which I love), which is not something I’ve encountered in work of fiction before. Certainly although there’s a trope that YA books are known for looking at issues and identity politics, it’s lovely to read something in which so many different people will see themselves reflected (as the three girls attend an LGBTQIA and allies meeting weekly at school, there’s even room for a quick mention of nonbinary identity, which does complete a sort of set of diversity but is acceptable as part of the intent of the book to be inclusive, just like Dr Khan the HIV specialist and her revolving collection of child-friendly hijabs with elephants and other patterns).
Racism and white privilege are addressed naturally: the love interest, Miles, is part of a lacrosse team which is mainly white apart from one Japanese American boy and Miles, and Simone experiences outright harassment when she meets them, although she models a good response to their unsavoury remarks about always having wanted to date a Black woman:
“I’m not a cultural experience for some random white boy,” I say, folding my arms. “And, before you go looking for one, I don’t know any black girl who wants the position”.
Simone seems more used to a more diverse background to her life than Miles does, keener to be among different sorts of people but more nervous when in a majority white environment, definitely not wanting to pretend she’s who she’s not, and I think this aspect could have been developed more in a longer book.
The thing I didn’t like is that Simone basically dumps her friends for her boyfriend, and although they call her out on it very firmly, the issue is somehow magically resolved (after she’s accused them of sending her the notes, which is also pretty bad) because she starts talking about coming out as bisexual. While her friends accept that as a difficult thing, they do seem to forgive her a bit quickly. The denouement of who sent the notes also seems a bit rushed and not foreshadowed in the earlier text, but then this is a fairly short novel with a lot of plot and characters, so it probably isn’t in truth.
The book, alongside its diversity, is very sex-positive, and that’s a great thing for teenagers to be reading about, validating their experiences and desires. So it’s not one to read if you’re not keen on detailed descriptions of teenagers’ sex lives and experimentation, but it’s important for this aspect to be talked about to the actual audience for the book. I would have learned a lot about sexualities, families and race and the experience of people different to me in those aspects if I’d read it aged 17, although 17 year olds are probably a bit more knowledgeable about the world in general these days than 30 years ago!
Thank you to Penguin Random House for selecting me to read this book via NetGalley in return for an honest review.
Jun 27, 2020 @ 09:34:19
I’m a grandfather and am expected to give books as presents. The times, too many to count, when I get the subject matter/reader age level wrong keep the children amused, but that doesn’t mean I can stop buying. So do I buy this for Ms 16? At least she is open about her life (in ways that horrify me) but do kids look to YA fiction for answers? 17 year olds in books didn’t have sex when I was 17 (leaving aside The Fringe Dwellers), perhaps I might have made fewer and less disastrous mistakes if they had.
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Jun 27, 2020 @ 16:01:45
Well I did in the limited range that was there at that age. I’d say it’s more sexual activity than sex, and it’s sex-positive which means it’s a good thing to experiment (safely – lots of talk of condoms and dental dams etc) and not for punishment. Could you proffer it before buying to see if she’d like it? Obviously not sharing with her horrific review here by ancient woman!
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Jun 27, 2020 @ 12:19:48
LOL. It was a very different world when I was 17, but I owuld have liked to read books as diverse as this.
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Jun 27, 2020 @ 16:02:09
Yes, indeed. KM Peyton and Judith Krantz got to do my educating!
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Jun 27, 2020 @ 17:53:40
I don’t tend to like YA books now, however I am sure I would have appreciated more diverse books when I was in my teens and early twenties. I am sure they woukd have helped me make sense of the world. I sometimes feel I went from Enid Blyton to Agatha Christie and various historical fiction writers. Something meaningful in between would probably have been better.
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Jun 28, 2020 @ 16:23:32
It was so much less diverse when we were that age, wasn’t it, and I could have done with something between those two sets apart from the rather shocking bits in large airport novels!
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Jun 28, 2020 @ 00:30:00
In my day it was Enid Blyton adventure stories – ballet and horse stories – careers : secretary, nurse, nun/nurse, librarian – I went with the latter. The only real YA I read was The L-Shaped Room (single pregnant woman considering abortion, shock, horror!), before I moved on to Waugh and Wodehouse, Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers. The YA section was unbelievably small at the start of the 1980s in provincial Kent. Scandal was a boy who wore eyeliner!
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Jun 28, 2020 @ 16:25:02
Ha – yes, I read the L-shaped room quite early, too (she had a Black friend, too, didn’t she) and also found Go Well, Stay Well, an Apartheid novel by Toecki Jones and a book I’ve never found again about Dutch experiences in WWII, but apart from that it was the airport novels and KM Peyton!
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Jun 28, 2020 @ 12:36:56
I’m glad you enjoyed this one, I enjoyed it too. I love how diverse and open it was – I wish there had been more books like this when I was young too. I did have Judy Blume’s Forever but that was the only YA book I knew of, the rest of the time I was reading the same books as you. I remember my Grandma being scandalised that I was reading Lace at age 13! Ha!
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Jun 28, 2020 @ 16:26:00
I was slightly too old so missed Judy Blume; I would have loved reading books like this and I’m glad you enjoyed this one, too (have I missed your review; I know I’m behind). I see she has another book due out next year and I will certainly snap that up.
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Jun 29, 2020 @ 14:33:51
This sounds like such an interesting read. There weren’t many diverse books when I was growing up. When I was younger I read the Babysitter’s Club books – definitely very different than this type of book!
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Jun 29, 2020 @ 14:36:43
It was a really interesting one indeed! I don’t think I saw Babysitter’s Club – we had Sweet Valley High around but I think a bit after I’d have been the right age. No idea how diverse those were! I’m so glad different people can see themselves reflected in books now: it’s so important.
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Book review – Kate Weston – “Diary of a Confused Feminist” #DiaryofaConfusedFeminist #NetGalley @teambkmrk | Adventures in reading, running and working from home
Jul 22, 2020 @ 08:02:54