Thank you @legendpress for sending me a copy of The Life of a Banana to read and review! Although I am quite a bit older than the intended audience for this book (I imagine), I still got a lot from it and think it’s a really good book to be promoting to a YA audience - if you have kids aged 11-15 then I think they could learn a lot from it (there is obviously bad language and racial slurs used but it’s important!)
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Xing Li has been struggling with her identity since her mother died, leaving her and her brother to live with their eclectic bunch of relatives and attend new schools. Her new school is full of rich white kids, and as the bullying escalates, Xing finds herself in increasing danger because of who she is, her only solace her best friend Jay, a Chinese-Jamaican kid with a passion for music.
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I wasn’t expecting the dark turn this book took - like many YA lit these days, Wong doesn’t shy away from tackling intense themes including racism, classism, and even the right to die movement. It was also unexpectedly moving towards the end. It’s littered with teen speak and slang throughout so I was finding it hard to connect emotionally, but I was almost moved to tears towards the end, so that’s definitely worth mentioning! It opened up discussion about the importance of representation, as Xing Li talks about how she never sees anyone who looks like her on British TV, and occasionally there would be a truly profound paragraph with a young girl confused about her identity.
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The teen speak did put me off initially (and I don’t know if that’s actually how 12/13 year olds talk these days) but like most books that use an unusual dialect or style, you quickly get used to it! I also thought that maybe she was a bit heavy handed with the racial slurs BUT at the same time, bullying in school is intense and awful and sadly it’s probably an accurate reflection of what second generation immigrants experience.