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citrus_seasalt
guys I lied about not creating a review oopsies (jk. I just changed my mind.) However, bc my brain turned into a soup with all the different opinions I read on this book, I give up on trying to give it a star rating. (Also because I feel this was comparatively weaker, in regards to AJW’s published works.) (P.S., I raised my TSBIT rating up by .25 stars.)
I’ll be doing my review in a list format, a la my I Feed Her To The Beast review.
Things I liked:
I’ll be doing my review in a list format, a la my I Feed Her To The Beast review.
Things I liked:
- As per usual, AJW’s autism rep hits, and the gore is fantastic.
- It’s incredibly rare to see alloaro rep in YA fiction and I liked how the questioning arc was handled.
- Lady!! Not only was she a dog that stayed alive, but she was also an active character, and I rarely see or read that in thrillers/horror. I’ll admit I could tell when she was included for narrative convenience, but at her core she was very much just a dog, and existed outside of being a last-minute option for help.
- Miles’s moral dilemma regarding the murder was very interesting, even though it
didn’t appear much in the plot after Cooper’s death. - The family relationships were all interesting! They all felt like pretty realistic dynamics, too, and I especially liked how the adults were brought into the final act. And on the topic of characters, I also enjoyed Miles and Dallas’s friendship. Dallas was a lovable character and I loved how while they offered some support for Miles(even though they had very little information, too!), they still had moments of visible vulnerability.
- Despite how difficult the story was for me to read (I’m in a pretty stressed and terrible emotional state right now), I couldn’t put the book down! There’s so much lore embedded into the Abernathy history and the entire plot, too.
- The bits of text speak were realistic for teenagers, actually.
- The tension, in the first quarter especially, was splendid. I loved how the story threw you into the action without a warning, and how Davies remained not just menacing, but a genuine threat to the cast.
- I listened along to the audiobook for the last 15 or so chapters (it sounds like a lot, but some of them are very short), and holy shit the narrator was fantastic!! They absolutely nailed each character’s emotions and personalities. Now I wish I’d listened to the entire book, too.
Things I didn’t like:
- While I have no issue with important characters that aren’t meant to be good people, I could predict where Cooper’s arc would go from the moment the haircut scene happened.
Him turning out to be a transphobic shitheel and betraying Miles’s trust reminded me too much of Theo from HFWU, and I found the deadnaming from him specifically to be unnecessary. I think I’m just starting to notice a trend in AJW’s books though where the guy the MC trusts most to affirm or support him ends up completely turning against and misgendering him. - While I appreciate that YA with radical politics (and bits of strike history) like this one can exist, a lot of the concepts and philosophy felt repeated. (I also feel like the ending was a too optimistic when it came to the overwhelmingly conservative population statistics… surprisingly, a lot of Miles and his family’s actions went unchallenged?)
- Re: politics, socialism and communism were talked about interchangeably…
- The tension was slightly lessened by the pacing. Miles had a lot of shit to figure out, between his family’s safety, coming out, figuring out his sexuality, and figuring out he’s autistic, but it buffered the plot. I was expecting more carnage from the intense beginning, and very little of the book after that was actual murder.
- While the story is technically paranormal, the ghost elements are sparse. Not in a way that makes them ambiguous, though, so it just becomes a little frustrating to see how little they affect the events of the plot?
The reviews across StoryGraph and Goodreads seem to still be overwhelmingly positive, but I’m very curious to see everyone’s thoughts because I can definitely see this becoming the most divisive of Andrew Joseph White’s books.
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standard action comic storytelling with some kickass art and canon gay rep… what more could you want??
Gonna be like one of those annoying comp title things and say this is perfect for fans of those late-2010’s Dreamworks reboots like She-Ra and Voltron
Gonna be like one of those annoying comp title things and say this is perfect for fans of those late-2010’s Dreamworks reboots like She-Ra and Voltron
I am here, in part, because of Murray from Murray Out Of Water! However, I am also here because I read half of this in the library in 2020 and would like to finish it. (It left a lasting impact on my art style.)
This was phenomenal!! (And I might up my rating to 5 stars! I almost teared up reading a couple parts and I never do that with comics.) I haven’t seen a graphic novel mix textual and visual storytelling so well in a long time. The art was stunning, and I loved the change in fairytale aesthetics depending on the cultural upbringings of the characters!! (I spotted a small amount of that on my own, but most of that I only found out because of the author’s notes.) Tying different retellings into immigrant stories and self-identity is such a creative premise.
Ending was a little more abrupt than I expected it to be, though? And I also wanted to see more on Tiên, the story was mostly in his mother’s perspective and I wasn’t expecting that from the summary. However, overlapping his story with Tâm Cám’s made it extra emotional, and goodness… I just love all the parallels drawn throughout.
This was so charming, though. I’ll definitely recommend this to a lot of people.
This was phenomenal!! (And I might up my rating to 5 stars! I almost teared up reading a couple parts and I never do that with comics.) I haven’t seen a graphic novel mix textual and visual storytelling so well in a long time. The art was stunning, and I loved the change in fairytale aesthetics depending on the cultural upbringings of the characters!! (I spotted a small amount of that on my own, but most of that I only found out because of the author’s notes.) Tying different retellings into immigrant stories and self-identity is such a creative premise.
Ending was a little more abrupt than I expected it to be, though? And I also wanted to see more on Tiên, the story was mostly in his mother’s perspective and I wasn’t expecting that from the summary. However, overlapping his story with Tâm Cám’s made it extra emotional, and goodness… I just love all the parallels drawn throughout.
This was so charming, though. I’ll definitely recommend this to a lot of people.
While I had a couple issues with the pacing, and the kind of tropey Mulan-esque feminist warrior story in the beginning, I enjoyed the consistent twists, exploration of trauma, blood splatter, and the ever-expanding story. (Kai’s story continued at points when I thought it would end, and I don’t mean that in a negative way.) I also liked how Gumiho was characterized as both a monster and a savior, and the different ways Kai lived within her identity as a fox spirit, especially while coping with her own grief. I also liked that we got to see Kai’s lover throughout different points of the story, she had a tense side plot and I liked eventually seeing her and Kai’s stories converge. Points added for the rainbow colored on the pages when Kai saved/resurrected her lmfaoo
The integration of different Korean terminology was casual(although it was kind of jarring to look from the words to their explanations at the bottom of the page), and contributed to the setting! (I would’ve liked to see the prayers written in their actual characters though, and not just incredibly simplified.) The definitions throughout and their placing definitely reminded me of the translator notes given in various manga. The characters were also pretty grounded in the setting, from the historical clothing in their designs, to their motivations within a deeply patriarchal and classist society.
This story is so cruel to its main characters that it genuinely surprised me??? But as someone who grew up reading YA fantasy comic series like Bone, the darkness and the emotions—but the definitively teenage audience(I think it shows sometimes in the writing style)—was strangely nostalgic. Perhaps that’s also why I didn’t mind the simplistic art style. (I thought the chapter title cards were beautiful, but not many other pages stuck out to me aside from the panels of murder or landscapes.)
I think my middle school self would’ve loved this to pieces. A grittier story with depth, and sapphic romance sprinkled throughout—but only brought to fruition in a dramatic ending? Absolutely.
The integration of different Korean terminology was casual(although it was kind of jarring to look from the words to their explanations at the bottom of the page), and contributed to the setting! (I would’ve liked to see the prayers written in their actual characters though, and not just incredibly simplified.) The definitions throughout and their placing definitely reminded me of the translator notes given in various manga. The characters were also pretty grounded in the setting, from the historical clothing in their designs, to their motivations within a deeply patriarchal and classist society.
This story is so cruel to its main characters that it genuinely surprised me??? But as someone who grew up reading YA fantasy comic series like Bone, the darkness and the emotions—but the definitively teenage audience(I think it shows sometimes in the writing style)—was strangely nostalgic. Perhaps that’s also why I didn’t mind the simplistic art style. (I thought the chapter title cards were beautiful, but not many other pages stuck out to me aside from the panels of murder or landscapes.)
I think my middle school self would’ve loved this to pieces. A grittier story with depth, and sapphic romance sprinkled throughout—but only brought to fruition in a dramatic ending? Absolutely.
Oh, this was so cute!! Artie And The Wolf Moon had the kind of tight-knit found family I’m happy to see in a werewolf story for the first time (okay, maybe not the first time, but this was more convincing), but there was also a nice overlap of the communities biologically related to Artie(the pack in Pinewood), and outside of it(the pack in Willow Ridge). In general, the pack community was refreshing to read about, and I liked the new mythos incorporated into these werewolves. I was indifferent about the vampires, though, mostly because there wasn’t as much time spent on them.
Cat wasn’t really a convincing friend to Artie, either? I know there’s a plot reason for her toxicity, but I just couldn’t wrap my mind around how Artie grew so attached to her. However, I had my fair share of toxic friendships in middle school, and I could appreciate how Artie’s all-consuming relationship with Cat was shown through the panels.
The inclusion of the photographs was so cool, too! Not only can you see them be brought together like pieces of a puzzle in the chapter title cards, but when they're in the story itself, there’s a kind of uncanniness in how the different vampires or werewolves are rendered in them. It’s such a cool contrast to the rest of the art—which is simpler in shading/lighting, and more “cozy”—and is also a creative way to show the film photographs as a different medium!
The final fight against the vampires was also a blast to read about. And the emotions shown through Loretta’s wolf form… some of those panels crushed me!! I’ll admit, though, that her wolf form was the only one I could really distinguish. I wish the other wolves were more unique in their designs.
The pacing was a little fast, but there was still enough history given on the characters (the wolves, at least), action, and characterization to make this an engaging read. I think the target demographic(middle schoolers with a taste for monster/creature-focused stories that aren’t totally creepy) will absolutely love this.
Cat wasn’t really a convincing friend to Artie, either? I know there’s a plot reason for her toxicity, but I just couldn’t wrap my mind around how Artie grew so attached to her. However, I had my fair share of toxic friendships in middle school, and I could appreciate how Artie’s all-consuming relationship with Cat was shown through the panels.
The inclusion of the photographs was so cool, too! Not only can you see them be brought together like pieces of a puzzle in the chapter title cards, but when they're in the story itself, there’s a kind of uncanniness in how the different vampires or werewolves are rendered in them. It’s such a cool contrast to the rest of the art—which is simpler in shading/lighting, and more “cozy”—and is also a creative way to show the film photographs as a different medium!
The final fight against the vampires was also a blast to read about. And the emotions shown through Loretta’s wolf form… some of those panels crushed me!! I’ll admit, though, that her wolf form was the only one I could really distinguish. I wish the other wolves were more unique in their designs.
The pacing was a little fast, but there was still enough history given on the characters (the wolves, at least), action, and characterization to make this an engaging read. I think the target demographic(middle schoolers with a taste for monster/creature-focused stories that aren’t totally creepy) will absolutely love this.
“But this isn’t how love works, M.
It’s tailored to each of us. It can’t just be transferred to someone else.”
I liked the bit of added nuance to the Frankenstein story, and the stunning blue-greens and blacks color scheme(it added some genre-appropriate dreariness) but not much else. The continued dishonesty of almost all of the cast was nerve-wracking to read about, and besides that, the characters weren’t really memorable to me…? Especially with the acceptance of M’s identity towards the end, that felt rushed, and didn’t have as much emotional pull or depth as I was hoping it would.
There were some other visuals that I enjoyed, though, such as Maura’s wisps and overlap on the panels showing her influence. It took too long for
Although the story is marketed/written as queer because of its cast (Frances has a nonbinary partner, and the neighbors probably have the vibes of wives??), in my personal over-analysis opinion, I think the most queer part of it was M’s arc. While I know that Frances’s expectations she shoved onto M were because of her grief, sometimes it read like the cishetnormative expectations a parent has for their queer kid? I don’t say that to call the book problematic, I thought that was interesting and I wonder if that was a purposeful sort-of-allegory.
Visually this was cool and there were some parts that stuck with me, but even after reading this twice (back-to-back, I sped through it the first time), I still thought this wasn’t my kind of novel.
Tied between whether to give this a 4.5 or 5 stars— Noor Hindi’s voice will stick with me for a long time, the writing was searing, but there were still some poems that I preferred over others. I think I’ll also have to revisit this at some point: I had to read over different passages or poems a couple of times in order to properly dissect them, since there are moments when Noor focuses more on the emotions she’s expressing rather the language she’s using to convey them. (Which is the point of a lot of this collection! There’s quite literally a poem called “Fuck Your Lecture On Craft, My People Are Dying”.) (Unsurprisingly, that is one of the most powerful poems in “Dear God, Dear Bones, Dear Yellow”. But I think I also remember seeing when the poem was first created/posted in 2021?!)
This was a spectacular collection, though, and I hope that anyone reading it won’t try to do so in one sitting. Noor’s language, rawness, and numbness is visceral, but her poetry still has the structure and depth of a writer who has honed her skills long before publication.
Favorite poems: “In Which The White Woman On My Thesis Defense Asks Me about Witness”, “Fuck Your Lecture On Craft, My People Are Dying”, “All My Plants Are Dead”, “I Call My Mother From The Moon”.
Parts I Highlighted:
This was a spectacular collection, though, and I hope that anyone reading it won’t try to do so in one sitting. Noor’s language, rawness, and numbness is visceral, but her poetry still has the structure and depth of a writer who has honed her skills long before publication.
Favorite poems: “In Which The White Woman On My Thesis Defense Asks Me about Witness”, “Fuck Your Lecture On Craft, My People Are Dying”, “All My Plants Are Dead”, “I Call My Mother From The Moon”.
Parts I Highlighted:
Colonizers write about flowers.
I tell you about children throwing rocks at Israeli tanks
seconds before becoming daisies.
I know I’m American because when I walk into a room something dies.
Metaphors about death are for poets who think ghosts care about sound.
When I die, I promise to haunt you forever.
One day, I’ll write about the flowers like we own them.
I become a machine. A transfer of information. The stories—a plea for empathy—an over
saturation of feelings we’ll fail at transforming into action.
What’s lost is incalculable.
And at the end of summer, the swimming pools will be gutted of water.
And it’ll be impossible to swim.
… How tear gas
forms clouds above
the dead. How a land—
force-fed bullets and blood—
ruptures its stomach and swings it at a flag.
I want to apologize on behalf of all children
of refugees. We leave our shoes on the doors of America
and come back to find them bleeding.
I’m not a poet anymore—
I’ve interviewed too many politicians.
All they care for is ghosts.
The homeland is stuck in our teeth. It’s filling our cavities. It rests on our
tongues. My God. How we yearn for its olive trees. How it haunts our dreams.
I’m so glad one of my indie bookstores had copies of this!! 🇵🇸
Content Warnings
Graphic: Genocide, Misogyny, Racism, Grief, Colonisation
A solid collection of stories! Without even checking out the author’s site or the reviews, I could tell she had a Tumblr: the stories were written with the kind of casual queerness and fulfillment of different archetypes that seem to be in-line with writers on that site. While the short stories felt a little cut short, I was pleasantly surprised by the showcase of different kinds of sapphic love, and how cute these romances were. My other main criticism besides the stories not feeling as contained or complete as they could’ve, though, is that “The Flower Crown” was too long IMO and I just wasn’t invested in the protagonist. (Perhaps if there were more fairytale tropes to play with, and the pairing in that one had more of the Buttercup x Wesley dynamic I was starting to see the vibes of…or maybe my ears perked up reading “As you wish” idk.)
My favorites were “We Deserve A Soft Landing, Love”(the beginning was slow, but the ending was a gut punch!), and The Bog Witch(although I enjoyed the story more than the fantasy world itself).
I checked this out on Queer Liberation Library once I saw it was added to the collection, and I’m overall satisfied!
My favorites were “We Deserve A Soft Landing, Love”(the beginning was slow, but the ending was a gut punch!), and The Bog Witch(although I enjoyed the story more than the fantasy world itself).
I checked this out on Queer Liberation Library once I saw it was added to the collection, and I’m overall satisfied!
DNF at 44%. Nothing against the author: I think the story has a lot of heart, and shows middle school insecurities well. But the secondhand embarrassment was excruciating, the bullying (and some internalized homophobia) was more graphic than I expected it to be, and within 2 examples of Rahul testing out things to see if he was good at them and failing, I was starting to sense a formula/repetition for the book. It was difficult to get through, even with the lighthearted tone and the humor. (To Maulik Pancholy’s credit, though, some of the jokes made me laugh.)
Also, it was surprising to see OCD rep in this book! But from what I read, most of it was shown through compulsions and while the thought process behind those was on-page, I wonder if it was revealed to have bled into Rahul’s other anxieties as well. (For instance, his entire “I have to be the best at something” mindset.) I kinda hope it did for accuracy’s sake, well-done OCD rep is so rare, especially in kidlit.
Maybe I’ll pick this up at another time. The ending might make me cry, and I wonder how Rahul’s story and crisis will be resolved. But for now, I’m just not in the headspace for it.
Also, it was surprising to see OCD rep in this book! But from what I read, most of it was shown through compulsions and while the thought process behind those was on-page, I wonder if it was revealed to have bled into Rahul’s other anxieties as well. (For instance, his entire “I have to be the best at something” mindset.) I kinda hope it did for accuracy’s sake, well-done OCD rep is so rare, especially in kidlit.
Maybe I’ll pick this up at another time. The ending might make me cry, and I wonder how Rahul’s story and crisis will be resolved. But for now, I’m just not in the headspace for it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Homophobia, Racism
Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders
dark
emotional
tense
While Logan-Ashley Kisner’s knowledge and nerdiness of horror movies is prevalent in the pages of Old Wounds, it doesn’t show in references or spoofs: rather, it shows in the atmosphere cultivated in the first half, developed characters with angst that radiates from the pages, and a somewhat unpredictable monster that’s given some truly horrifying imagery—even if that’s mostly because of the cover art. (I haven’t seen a truly creepy cover in a while, and I expect nothing less from the cover artist for Camp Damascus! I’ll have to check out more of Zoë van Djik’s stuff.) There was also a good mix of social and monster horror that had me on edge as I was reading, although the social horror was definitely scarier.
I kind of want to know how the original screenplay format/idea of this book would’ve turned out! I could picture so many of the scenes vividly, the imagery throughout was delicious and definitely a big part of why I liked the atmosphere so much. And…it would be awesome to have a badass transgender final girl like Erin on the silver screen. (I didn’t hate Max, unlike the other reviewers—I actually liked him: even through some of his decisions, I understood his dysphoria and his resentment deep in my soul, and I appreciated him becoming less selfish as the book went on. But Erin was still my favorite.)
I also liked that whilethere was a hopeful ending , there were still enough unanswered questions about the town and the Beast to keep it menacing. In trademark horror movie fashion, lol. (Also, that the characters were still dealing with the aftermath. Because of course they were, that kind of night would fuck anyone up.)
The second half was satisfying and violent, but I wish there was more of a balance between the interpersonal and physical conflicts. That’s one of the things that kept my star rating below a five, besides the tension and stakes losing their steam around the 3/4ths mark(idc that it was established that anyone could be killed, it absolutely didn’t read that way) , and some of the 80’s references that, while typical for horror media, can’t really be picked up on as easily by the teenage demographic…? (But that’s not as big of an issue imo because all the references have some thematic importance.)
An absolute banger of a debut! I’ll keep a lookout on what Logan-Ashley Kisner writes next.
I kind of want to know how the original screenplay format/idea of this book would’ve turned out! I could picture so many of the scenes vividly, the imagery throughout was delicious and definitely a big part of why I liked the atmosphere so much. And…it would be awesome to have a badass transgender final girl like Erin on the silver screen. (I didn’t hate Max, unlike the other reviewers—I actually liked him: even through some of his decisions, I understood his dysphoria and his resentment deep in my soul, and I appreciated him becoming less selfish as the book went on. But Erin was still my favorite.)
I also liked that while
The second half was satisfying and violent, but I wish there was more of a balance between the interpersonal and physical conflicts. That’s one of the things that kept my star rating below a five, besides the tension and stakes losing their steam around the 3/4ths mark
An absolute banger of a debut! I’ll keep a lookout on what Logan-Ashley Kisner writes next.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Hate crime, Homophobia, Misogyny, Transphobia, Violence, Kidnapping
Moderate: Deadnaming, Suicidal thoughts, Vomit, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Outing