(Buy this book here)
This is a polite comedy of manners set in modern-day queer New York, about 6 women(5 of whom are trans), written entirely in rhyming verse, formatted like an old school LiveJournal blog.
That’s a lot of concept for a 168-page book, and to its credit, it mostly works. Once you get a handle on the character names and the cheeky “look at me I’m LIT-ra-ture!” tone, this is a very clever, readable book.
The title refers to the way we handle moral transgression in community, and the book lampoons the self-righteousness that has become the calling card of call-out culture. One of the characters does something very awkward, thoughtless, uncomfortable, and badly executed–but is it a shunning transgression, or just a stupid misunderstanding? The fallout–and the callout–ruin friendships and fracture community, but also expose the ugliest and most annoying parts of people who see themselves as righteous helpers or objective observers.
Unfortunately, that’s where it loses me a bit. I hesitate to call the characters unlikable –after all, that’s kind of the point–but these women are all really childish and sloppy and unkind. Nobody in this book is good company. It makes for good drama and sometimes good humor, but bad moral fabling. There needs to be at least ONE decent person here, and we don’t get that. Also, one of the problems with call-out culture is its tedium, and that doesn’t change as much as I hoped when fictionalized.
Between this and a few other books I’ve read by trans women set in New York (most notably Detransition, Baby), I’ve come to realize that maybe there’s something really distinctly liminal and volatile and fragile about transgender women’s culture(at least the white girl version) that I’m really not capable of understanding entirely. I still enjoy reading about it, because I appreciate any depiction of #ownnormal life. However, I’m noticing that in these white trans books the tradeoff for full, self-referenced depictions of transness is…very weirdly built women of color. There are two Asian women in this book, and the way they’re depicted had me rolling my eyes a bit, especially the passivity of the Japanese-American woman. I need to read some trans women of color, because this book definitely did them a disservice.
I can’t say I loved this but I did appreciate its cleverness and viewpoint.
Maturity and real honesty to The Call-Out.
(Beautiful people, fellow readers! This is one of the books I like sharing because even though it wasn’t my favorite, it may very well be one of yours. If you want to read more books by trans women, check out my (diverse) booklist. If you’re looking for diverse books in general, check out the Equal Opportunity Bookshop, but remember–any books you purchase there from a link you find here will result in a commission being paid and me buying more books and maintaining this site. It’s capitalism, but…the useful kind, I guess? Before I get myself into some sort of trouble continuing the previous thought, I’d like to say thanks for visiting, and peace! Now go read something good!)
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