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Tag: Politics

Review: Indivisible

Published by Simeon on April 28, 2021

It feels like every year I get one perfect contemporary gay YA debut novel that just absolutely captures my heart. Last summer that was Adam Sass’ Surrender Your Sons, which I still rave about to whoever will listen to me. And in 2021, it is Daniel Aleman’s Indivisible. Before I start this review however, I must warn you that this is not an easy book. There is a lot of darkness there, and no easy answers.

16-year old Mateo Garcia is a New Yorker living the Manhattan working class life. He helps in his dad’s bodega. He has college aspirations and Broadway dreams. As well as the fervent hope that he will not, in fact, graduate high school having never kissed another boy. He is also the child of undocumented immigrants. Unlike him and his kid sister Sophie, his parents were born in Mexico, and crossed the border decades ago in search of a better life. And though they are both pillars of their community, not a day goes by without the underlying fear of ICE.

Then the worst happens, and Mateo’s life crumbles. Overnight, he finds himself having to become his sister’s guardian, learn to run his father’s bodega, and figure out what future he can have with his parents gone back to Mexico. And meanwhile, the feeling that he does not belong in any world drives him away from his closest friends.

Indivisible is not only a heart-rending story of hardship and perseverance, but also a meta-commentary on contemporary YA. The opening chapters show us all the trappings we know and love. An off-Broadway audition. A hurtful racial remark. A sensitive queer boy trying to find himself in a world that sometimes feels too large to comprehend. Then Daniel Aleman suddenly pulls the rug from under us, and gives us a story that is almost brutal in its earnest tragedy. And Mateo has to deal with truly adult issues before he has even had a chance to figure out being a teen.

At the beginning, I used the word “perfect”. Of course, no story is ever perfect, and Indivisible has its issues. I do wish that the pacing in the second half was a bit faster. While I fully understand the need for the catastrophic reality of Mateo’s life to have space to breathe, for me it did get to a point where I was ready for the book to move along. Another issue is the fairly contrived reason why he refuses to confide in his friends. While it does pay off emotionally in the end, I felt that in the actual moments when he could tell them, his reasoning wasn’t terribly convincing.

But the reason why I used the word “perfect”, is that Indivisible is greater than the sum of its parts. Any issues I might have with pacing or foreshadowing are irrelevant. Because the book was earnest, and powerful in a way that I have not experienced YA being in a very long time. Daniel Aleman comes out the gate swinging with this explosive debut, and I am thrilled to see what he does next.

P.S. As an aside, while reading I made a startling discovering. Aleman not only subverted the tropes of the typical contemporary queer YA. He also had a side character — Mateo’s gay friend Adam — actually have an entire traditional YA arc almost entirely off-screen. I truly hope that was intentional, because it made me smile during what was otherwise a very serious read.

Reading Update 07/15/20 – Too Much, and Just Enough

Published by Simeon on July 15, 2020

Sorry for the topical pun, which will cease to make sense within a week. But as I am halfway through Mary Trump’s unflattering and devastatingly empathetic portrait of her uncle, the title has been percolating in my head. This post is about something else however.

I have been reading a lot lately. My life is in the middle of some significant changes. For good and for bad, alas, but both aspects amount to more reading time. It’s a borderline feverish state of ingesting books, and it feels amazing! Reading has always been therapeutic for me, and working at a bookstore, it also makes me feel connected to my job.

On that note, apparently I am good at hyping up things and making people buy them. Who knew!

A bit of housekeeping. Last week I mentioned reading Sam Lansky’s Broken People. I ended up absolutely loving the book, but the reasons for that are a tad too personal to really talk about in a coherent review format. His story resonated with my own current circumstances, underlying mental health issues, and overall life experience in a way that never really matched, but at the same time informed them. I don’t even know if I could recommend it to people, because the experience was so personal.

Anyway, here’s to reading, and having complicated experiences with books!

Wear a Mask

Published by Simeon on June 19, 2020

There is really nothing literary, or punny about this post.

AMC Theaters and assorted other chains have publicly announced that they won’t be enforcing masks when they reopen, because they don’t want to be “mired in politics”. Well, I won’t be going to their theaters, because I don’t want to be mired in COVID-19. With their businesses already flailing, this is the worst possible decision they could have made.

As more and more businesses take our mobster toddler of a president’s cue, wearing a mask has apparently become a POLITICAL issue. It’s not. Protecting yourself and — far more importantly — others, is NOT politics. It’s healthcare. It’s a public health issue.

Again, for all three of you reading this: wear a mask.

That’s it. That’s the post.

Reading Update 06/17/20 – Racism

Published by Simeon on June 17, 2020

Unlike many of my attempts at puns, this time the title is plain and simple. I realized it was way past time I put my reading where my online mouth was. Protests about police brutality and racism are shaking the foundations (I hope) of this country. As a liberal progressive gay dude, I always considered myself sufficiently “woke”. I assumed that if I could not always avoid racist behavior, at least I was fully aware of it.

Spoiler alert: I wasn’t.

The first book I read on the subject was Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility. And it was certainly an eye-opener. I think that, coming from a predominantly white Eastern European country, I had an easier time with the premise. It has been literal decades since I thought of racism as “actively hating others for the color of their skin”. I know it’s far more pernicious, and that it has metastasized into society’s structures in ways that many people would struggle to recognize.

What I did not expect to learn, was that most white people refuse to recognize them. And how much the recognition feels like a powerful assault to their sense of self. I am excluding myself from this statement, but I likely shouldn’t. Even if I am partially an outsider to this culture, I am also a part of it. And I have no doubt that I share many of its failings. Suffice to say, I learned a lot.

Currently powering through Ibram X. Kendi’s How to be an Antiracist, and following that, I will get to Ijeoma Oluo’s So You Want to Talk About Race. Will report on progress next week.

Reading Update 04/08/20 – Staying on Course

Published by Simeon on April 8, 2020

If self-quarantine is good for one thing, it is curbing my “squirrel!” instinct of going to bookstores, allowing random books to catch my eye, and deciding I MUST read them IMMEDIATELY. Staying home and only making the occasional online purchase, I have been able to keep up with my reading goals. I am nearly done with “political non-fiction book 1/3” (as per my previously stated plan): Un-Trumping America by Dan Pfeiffer of Pod Save America (and, yunno, the Obama Administration) fame. It is giving me exactly what I need in these grueling times when we have malicious mobster toddlers at the helm — a systematic analysis of our current political reality, with proposed pathways to get out of it and stay out. It’s mostly things I am already aware of, as an avid PSA listener, but it is weirdly calming just the same.

Meanwhile, my pile of ARCs (the only ones I am likely to ever get, since apparently the outside world has been abolished) is slowly melting. I have arranged them by release date, and I plan on reviewing most of them when they are about to come out. I am, of course, open to requests and recommendations.

And in the mean time, happy reading, and stay home!

Reading Update: 01/29/20 – New Year’s Resolutions

Published by Simeon on January 29, 2020

Not much to report since last time (except, stay tuned for a review of Seanan McGuire’s Come Tumbling Down soon) , so instead, I wanted to talk about my New Year’s resolutions in terms of reading. And yes, I recognize that the very notion of “New Year’s resolutions” smells of giving up at the gym around January 20th, but I promise this is slightly less sad!

First of all, last year I decided to set myself the goal of 52 books. It was a nice number, a book a week, except I didn’t set it until about September. The unexpected result of that was my falling in love with the novella, but I digress. My first resolution is to repeat this number, and if possible — to surpass it. Goodreads says I am 5 books ahead of my goal, but with a wedding coming up in the summer, and a potential move to another state, things might grow dicey in the second half of the year.

Goal #1: Read at least 52 books (no cheating with comic TPBs!).

Next goal: short stories. I have always struggled with those. It’s embarrassing for an aspiring writer of speculative fiction, considering not only the origins of these genres, but also what used to be the traditional path to publishing in the era of print magazines. With that said, I just can’t make myself read short form. Some silly mental block prevents me from starting a story, and when I do finish one, I’m thoroughly unmotivated to begin another. Which sucks, because there are a ton of authors I want to read, many of whom thrive in this medium. So:

Goal #2: Read at least 3 short story collections, be they by one author, or anthologies.

Last, and certainly not least, it is 2020 (yeah, hi. I have mastered the calendar!). I am a foreigner on a path to citizenship. The world is on fire. American political structures are on fire. The US constitution is on fire. Even if I wanted to stay away, I know too much about current politics to do so. Which brings me to my third goal. Political non-fiction to me has always been like Yoga, in that I have never done Yoga, but I like to think of myself as someone who would do Yoga. Well, that might not be in the cards for this year, but I want to finally read some of the books by the people who I listen to on podcasts.

Goal #3: Read at least 3 non-fiction books on current politics.

It is all doable, I am already on it, and I am using this platform to keep myself accountable. Hopefully, you stick around for it all!