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A review by goosemixtapes
Jess, Chunk, and the Road Trip to Infinity by Kristin Elizabeth Clark
3.0
well, it's a better trans road trip novel than And She Was, that's for fuckin' sure. (will i ever get over my grudge against that book? remains to be seen.)
i was both nervous and hopeful about the trans rep going in, both of which were feelings exacerbated by clark's author's note. as in her note to her other book, Freakboy, she mentions that her own daughter is trans and, while not the inspiration/basis for her writing, has had an influence on how and why she writes trans characters; she notes that she wants to help people understand what it's like to be trans. implicit there is that she wants to help CIS people--and i'm not saying that's a bad thing, because god knows cis people need to figure out how to empathize with trans people, but books about trans people that are clearly meant to educate the cis tend to leave a bad taste in my mouth.
luckily, this wasn't that at all! the trans rep here felt very genuine and easy, not like a story constructed to teach. i feel like a lot of the trans stuff i've read features characters who are either questioning or who have been out forever, and so i enjoyed seeing a portrayal of a trans girl in the first steps of transitioning--jess is on hormones, but she hasn't come out to everyone in her life yet; she still has to shave; she's going through second puberty and her emotions are all up in the air. she worries about her safety when trying to pass in red states and rural areas. she's caught between the thrill of finally being herself and the terror that other people won't see her. and i think it's great! especially for 2016; obviously there's been a spate of trans YA in recent years, but i think it's easy to take for granted how few books about trans teens don't end in tragedy or involve gratuitous violence. and this really isn't a tragic story, or even a particularly angsty one; jess's transness affects her, of course, but a lot of the emotional narrative is about her parents' separation and her relationship with chuck. (i also don't mind the use of jess's deadname in flashback sections; different trans people are gonna have different takes on that, but i kind of despise the way "sympathetic characters and/or the narrative deadnaming your MC is bad" has grown into "a deadname can never be used on page ever or it's bad trans rep" & i think this book does it tastefully.)
there are lots of people in the reviews knocking this book because jess is SOOOOO selfish. i think this is a poor critique, because that's the point. of course jess is selfish. she's just starting her transition; she's just starting the rest of her life as her proper self! her hormones and emotions and thoughts are all going haywire! of course she's a little bit self-absorbed! i love that she gets to be self-centered; i also love that chuck rightly calls her out on it. i think the major problem isn't jess's selfishness but the lack of buildup to the ending, and, relatedly, the. imo there's very little emotional buildup to the big ending confrontation, which means jess and chuck don't get to hash out stuff like jess's fatphobia in enough detail to make the conclusion feel earned.
i have less to say about the fat rep, because i know less about fat rep. i think the attempt at paralleling fatness and transness is interesting but misses the mark in a lot of ways (oof, that title). in a lot of places, it felt like this book WANTED to deal with fatphobia but was frightened to do so head-on--we get some discussion of chuck's discontent with his body, his attempts at crash dieting, his belief that no one could be attracted to him, etc, but it's all background noise, more so than i think works for the story. tbh this book honestly could have just used another 50-100 pages to flesh out the relationships more. 3.5 stars for good trans rep and for being fun to tear through, but it didn't leave much of an impact on me.
i was both nervous and hopeful about the trans rep going in, both of which were feelings exacerbated by clark's author's note. as in her note to her other book, Freakboy, she mentions that her own daughter is trans and, while not the inspiration/basis for her writing, has had an influence on how and why she writes trans characters; she notes that she wants to help people understand what it's like to be trans. implicit there is that she wants to help CIS people--and i'm not saying that's a bad thing, because god knows cis people need to figure out how to empathize with trans people, but books about trans people that are clearly meant to educate the cis tend to leave a bad taste in my mouth.
luckily, this wasn't that at all! the trans rep here felt very genuine and easy, not like a story constructed to teach. i feel like a lot of the trans stuff i've read features characters who are either questioning or who have been out forever, and so i enjoyed seeing a portrayal of a trans girl in the first steps of transitioning--jess is on hormones, but she hasn't come out to everyone in her life yet; she still has to shave; she's going through second puberty and her emotions are all up in the air. she worries about her safety when trying to pass in red states and rural areas. she's caught between the thrill of finally being herself and the terror that other people won't see her. and i think it's great! especially for 2016; obviously there's been a spate of trans YA in recent years, but i think it's easy to take for granted how few books about trans teens don't end in tragedy or involve gratuitous violence. and this really isn't a tragic story, or even a particularly angsty one; jess's transness affects her, of course, but a lot of the emotional narrative is about her parents' separation and her relationship with chuck. (i also don't mind the use of jess's deadname in flashback sections; different trans people are gonna have different takes on that, but i kind of despise the way "sympathetic characters and/or the narrative deadnaming your MC is bad" has grown into "a deadname can never be used on page ever or it's bad trans rep" & i think this book does it tastefully.)
there are lots of people in the reviews knocking this book because jess is SOOOOO selfish. i think this is a poor critique, because that's the point. of course jess is selfish. she's just starting her transition; she's just starting the rest of her life as her proper self! her hormones and emotions and thoughts are all going haywire! of course she's a little bit self-absorbed! i love that she gets to be self-centered; i also love that chuck rightly calls her out on it. i think the major problem isn't jess's selfishness but the lack of buildup to the ending, and, relatedly, the
Spoiler
total lack of romantic chemistry between jess and chuck. seriously, WHAT romantic chemistry did these two have? all we see is jess getting jealous whenever chunk talks to girls, but, girl, what do you LIKE about him? wax about his attractiveness a little bit or something!i have less to say about the fat rep, because i know less about fat rep. i think the attempt at paralleling fatness and transness is interesting but misses the mark in a lot of ways (oof, that title). in a lot of places, it felt like this book WANTED to deal with fatphobia but was frightened to do so head-on--we get some discussion of chuck's discontent with his body, his attempts at crash dieting, his belief that no one could be attracted to him, etc, but it's all background noise, more so than i think works for the story. tbh this book honestly could have just used another 50-100 pages to flesh out the relationships more. 3.5 stars for good trans rep and for being fun to tear through, but it didn't leave much of an impact on me.