enobong's Reviews (492)

All book reviews are subjective. This is a good thing to remember while scrolling through Bookstagram, or Goodreads, or wherever you get your book recommendations. I know that personally I can't help but be drawn to the books featuring characters that either remind me of who I was, who I am, or make me think about who I want to be. Ashley reminds me of who I was and sometimes still am to an uncomfortable degree.

As a Black person who has lived in majority white spaces for most of life, I can attest that, if you're not careful, you begin to believe the things the people around you say about Black people. You begin to distance yourself from the other Black folk. You begin to believe the lies that if you behave a certain way, dress a certain way, embrace certain things, you will be accepted. But the truth is that you can never stop being Black. And instead of seeing the myriad of different ways to be Black and concluding that Black people are not a monolith, the white folks will see you and decide that you are the exception. All other Black people are the same.

I loved the unlikeability of Ashley. I love the slow journey Christina Hammonds Reed take her on through this journey. The exploration of casually racist friends and selfish boyfriends and the conflict between wanting to fit in while knowing you stand out. But it's the scenes with Ashley's family and with the other Black kids that were the most powerful for me. The Black kids who hang out with each other, not to be divisive, but because with each other they are not expected to be perfect in order to be human. And Ashley's parents who are criticised for abandoning their people and their history but whose only wish is to protect their daughters from the horrors of the world.

Christina does a fantastic job of not providing the answers and honouring the experience of the reader to form their own conclusions. If you're a fan of coming-of-age novels, then this is the next one to reach for.

As @sr.reads said, "Queenie, but make it literary." These two books are too similar to avoid comparison. They both follow a young Black woman working for an unnamed publishing house, navigating the politics of being either the only or one of a few Black people who are hired for their talent and insight but then not allowed to actually use that talent or insight to influence the company and the culture. Both women also have very complicated, and often harmful, sex lives. Now that we've gotten that out of our system, let's let Queenie be Queenie and Luster be Luster. Each powerful debuts in their own right.

LUSTER is the kind of character-driven novel that I love. The plot is full of action, highs, lows and the mundane that lies in between but the focus is all on Edie. Edie's past, future, and how she's coping (or failing to cope) with the present. Rebecca is also a multifaceted character. In Rebecca, Raven Leilani has painted a realistic portrayed of a progressive liberal white woman who means well but who will not hesitate to throw any perceived ideas of power she feels she has because of her race and class into the face of anyone who dares challenge her. 

And then there's Akila whose story or feelings towards her story do not follow the track the reader would expect and brings yet another layer in the complexities of humans.

At times, I read this novel and it felt like I was reading passages from my own diary. That is, if was able to convey concepts and feeling into words with the talent Raven Leilani has. Several of these moments occurred in the scenes depicted Edie's relationship with the one other Black woman in the company. The adoration that I feel for any Black woman on the come up mixed with (I'm ashamed to say) the worry that I will be replaced with someone who plays the games a lot better than I do. Because here's the thing, nobody says there's only room for one Black person, when you see companies and shows and advertising campaigns that only make room for one Black person, that's the intrinsic takeaway.

Filled with humour and some brutal truths, Raven Leilani's LUSTER is a brilliant debut about being young, Black, and female right now.