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A review by goosemixtapes
Alex As Well by Alyssa Brugman
2.0
(2022 monthly goals: whichever book has been on my TBR longest)
i mean, it's... fine? it's a book. i'm not sure i'll remember it in a month. some thoughts:
>this is one of those books with a very promising premise and opening (fourteen-year-old alex has been raised as a boy and identifies as a girl; she doesn't know she's intersex & that the pills her parents make her take are testosterone supplements) that then... doesn't really do much with that premise and opening. this book isn't REALLY about alex learning she's intersex and what that means. it's about alex buying clothes and reinventing herself as a girl and having fights with her parents, who are horrible. and there's nothing WRONG with those things happening, but the book doesn't really have a... how you say... plot. also, this book could have been longer than 200 pages. the ending in particular wraps up way too fast.
>i can't speak to the intersex rep, but some of this Did hit from a trans perspective (i would consider alex trans as well as intersex since she doesn't identify with her assigned gender). some people in the reviews have expressed frustration with the idea of Girl Alex and Boy Alex as two minds in one body, but i actually liked that narrative device; i didn't see it as a literal thing but a way for alex to process her experience and the feeling of being in-between. (i'm biased because during my questioning era i had a similar framing device in my brain, but hey, that proves it happens.)
>that said. some of it did Not hit. hey, what the fuck is up with that first chapter where Girl Alex tries on clothes and then Boy Alex jacks off in them? why are we furthering the idea that trans women are trans because they're sexually attracted to themselves in feminine clothing? and what about that scene where alex makes moves on her friend, who has claimed to be straight, including trapping her in place to lick her ear? i mean, yeah, it's done jokingly, but it's also kind of creepy, and while i think trans characters should be flawed just like anyone else, writing a lesbian trans girl who keeps pushily hitting on her straight cis friends is. um. it's bad, man! i'm not gonna pretend it's not bad! there seems to be a drive on brugman's part to draw a line between Girl Alex, who is normal, and Boy Alex, who is a boy and therefore gross, and it feels weirdly bioessentialist (in terms of "boys are impulsive and always thinking about sex and hitting on people") for a book that literally purports to be about a character who doesn't fit into essentialist gender roles. (more reviews that touch on this here, here, and here)
>there are some off-color comments that made me wince. calling the brazilian and black girls alex meets "exotic," for one thing, or saying that clapping her hands very quickly to calm down makes her "look autistic." also lots of referring to her mother as insane/a psychopath, which, okay, alex's mother is a monster, but i don't love the idea of pathologizing that. sometimes people are abusive and transphobic without being mentally ill.
>alex's narrative voice often feels pretty young for fourteen. sometimes that makes it more effective, because it reminds you that this is a kid who has to deal with emotional and sometimes physical abuse from her parents along with ostracization at her former school. but also, she keeps calling her penis her "noodle," which . come on
i enjoyed this book while reading it, but stepping back to look at it from a more critical angle makes it just sort of fall apart. there isn't much substance to it; again, i'm not sure how well i'll remember it in a month.
i mean, it's... fine? it's a book. i'm not sure i'll remember it in a month. some thoughts:
>this is one of those books with a very promising premise and opening (fourteen-year-old alex has been raised as a boy and identifies as a girl; she doesn't know she's intersex & that the pills her parents make her take are testosterone supplements) that then... doesn't really do much with that premise and opening. this book isn't REALLY about alex learning she's intersex and what that means. it's about alex buying clothes and reinventing herself as a girl and having fights with her parents, who are horrible. and there's nothing WRONG with those things happening, but the book doesn't really have a... how you say... plot. also, this book could have been longer than 200 pages. the ending in particular wraps up way too fast.
>i can't speak to the intersex rep, but some of this Did hit from a trans perspective (i would consider alex trans as well as intersex since she doesn't identify with her assigned gender). some people in the reviews have expressed frustration with the idea of Girl Alex and Boy Alex as two minds in one body, but i actually liked that narrative device; i didn't see it as a literal thing but a way for alex to process her experience and the feeling of being in-between. (i'm biased because during my questioning era i had a similar framing device in my brain, but hey, that proves it happens.)
>that said. some of it did Not hit. hey, what the fuck is up with that first chapter where Girl Alex tries on clothes and then Boy Alex jacks off in them? why are we furthering the idea that trans women are trans because they're sexually attracted to themselves in feminine clothing? and what about that scene where alex makes moves on her friend, who has claimed to be straight, including trapping her in place to lick her ear? i mean, yeah, it's done jokingly, but it's also kind of creepy, and while i think trans characters should be flawed just like anyone else, writing a lesbian trans girl who keeps pushily hitting on her straight cis friends is. um. it's bad, man! i'm not gonna pretend it's not bad! there seems to be a drive on brugman's part to draw a line between Girl Alex, who is normal, and Boy Alex, who is a boy and therefore gross, and it feels weirdly bioessentialist (in terms of "boys are impulsive and always thinking about sex and hitting on people") for a book that literally purports to be about a character who doesn't fit into essentialist gender roles. (more reviews that touch on this here, here, and here)
>there are some off-color comments that made me wince. calling the brazilian and black girls alex meets "exotic," for one thing, or saying that clapping her hands very quickly to calm down makes her "look autistic." also lots of referring to her mother as insane/a psychopath, which, okay, alex's mother is a monster, but i don't love the idea of pathologizing that. sometimes people are abusive and transphobic without being mentally ill.
>alex's narrative voice often feels pretty young for fourteen. sometimes that makes it more effective, because it reminds you that this is a kid who has to deal with emotional and sometimes physical abuse from her parents along with ostracization at her former school. but also, she keeps calling her penis her "noodle," which . come on
i enjoyed this book while reading it, but stepping back to look at it from a more critical angle makes it just sort of fall apart. there isn't much substance to it; again, i'm not sure how well i'll remember it in a month.