It's hard not to read anything without coming to it with your own point of view. That's why most of my reviews come from a personal angle. Nobody is a blank slate. That said, I think my own perspective really colored my reading of this novel.

HTBS is a scathing takedown of gun culture and the current political climate and toxic masculinity. The book opens with a chapter from the POV of a teenager preparing to enter his high school with guns. It set my hair on end, and brought back memories of teen me sitting watching the news after school with my friends, watching students stream out of a school in Littleton, CO. And the flood of all the shootings since then, as well. It's not pleasant, and I don't think it's meant to be.

The story shifts to teacher Anna Crawford, and we are with her the rest of the time. She had been suspended and then named as a suspect in the shooting under sever media scrutiny until the teenage shooter is confirmed. My personal bias entered here: this book as a feminist screed (or, as the synopsis details, "a piercing feminist howl"), made me shift uncomfortably as the author photo of a white man stared back at me. Men writing from women's points of view always gets me a bit agitated. I am, skeptical... especially in the last two years. Especially in ways that the author elucidates within this book! So, it was a weird feeling throughout, though he manages well and addresses everything 'right,' so to say. I laughed at times, I enjoyed the misanthropic Anna Crawford, and her distrust of society was a lot like my distrust of this book. It was meta, kind of, and it's hard for me to explain it.

I think it's a good book, a solid and topical piece of writing that takes all the news and opinions we hear everyday and packages it into an absurdist and yet not absurdist story. It's not the book, it's me.