Pet

Whew. No surprise but this is a stunner staight out of the gate for Christopher Myers' new imprint, Make Me a World. His introduction alone will give teens & teachers ideas to chew on and discuss. Though a short book, I read this so slowly because it was beautifully written (the kennings they created, the impact and heft of their word choices) and emotional and powerful and I wanted to savor it. They created a world after social justice movements like BLM have been successful, but the adults have become complacent in their safety, so it takes teens to see through the lens of magical realism and confront the monster in their midst to force their community to remember their shared promises to one another. I can't wait to share this with teachers and students, as this would be an ideal book to discuss and analyze together.

Black, trans girl lead who is selectively verbal and uses sign language frequently. Jam's best friend has three parents (they are in a polyamorous relationship and one of the parents uses they/them pronouns). And the  Entirely black cast. I enjoyed the writing so much and the magical realism aspects. 

really enjoyed this! the commentary was obviously spectacular as well as the representation. i enjoyed the writing so much and the magical realism aspects. at some points, i felt slightly confused because of lack of explanation which normally doesn't bother me but since this is a middle grade, i feel like if i'm confused then kids definitely will be.

This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader.

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Also, the problem is, when you think you’ve been without monsters for so long, sometimes you forget what they look like, what they sound like, no matter how much remembering your education urges you to do. It’s not the same when the monsters are gone. You’re only remembering shadows of them, stories that seem to be limited to the pages or screens you read them from. Flat and dull things. So, yes, people forget. But forgetting is dangerous.

Forgetting is how the monsters come back.

What’s Pet About?

Jam and her best friend, Redemption, live in the city of Lucille—a city that’s evolved beyond things like bigotry, crime, inequality, and more. Just ask anyone who lives there—that’s what they’re told, that’s what they believe.

But then Jam is visited by a creature from another world. This creature is there to hunt—not everything is as good and pure as the people of Lucille believe, and this creature is here to hunt someone hurting someone. And the creature (Pet) wants Jam to help with the hunt. Pet can’t tell Jam what the issue is, their prey is at Redemption’s home.

Redemption tries to tell his family about the problem, but no one believes him—that kind of thing doesn’t happen anymore. Everyone knows that.

The World

Lucille is in many ways a dream city—some sort of revolution occurred (it wasn’t entirely peaceful, but we don’t get details). And a Progressive utopia has been established for a generation or so. No sexism, no bigotry, full equality for all, no ableism, no crime, no want. And everyone (as far as the reader can see) buys into the vision for the city.

Am pretty sure those who aren’t that interested in this vision for life aren’t in Lucille anymore, whether voluntarily or not.

It feels oppressive, honestly. A benevolent oppression, it seems, but I’m not sure that’s really that much better.

One danger of this thorough monoculture, complete with everyone buying into the belief, is that humans aren’t good. There will be problems, criminals, broken people, and those who will find ways to get pleasure from hurting others (in various ways)—in short, sinners (however you want to define sinners). If the cultural orthodoxy is that this has been fixed, no one will look for the outlier. No one will look out for the victim, either. As mentioned in the opening quote—that’s a danger.

Harry Harrison painted a similar picture in his Stainless Steel Rat novels (although his outliers were frequently the heroes of the story as often as the villains—and the government was on the look for them).

Pet

I really liked Pet—particularly as he is in the last third or so of the book. I’m not entirely convinced by all his actions and what he tells Jam about himself at the beginning—it’s not that I think he was lying, I just wonder how consistent he is from beginning to the end.

I figure if I re-read the book a time or two, I’d end up being convinced, though. He’s probably the same being throughout, and I just understood him better at the end. Either way, he’s definitely someone you don’t want hunting you.

So, what did I think about Pet?

I bounced all over when it came to what to say about this novel.

It’s too short, really. Problems arise and are solved too quickly. And some of the rich, deep, thoughts weren’t given enough time and space to breathe—really, everything seemed like it was given short shrift.

But.

Oh man, this was just so wonderfully composed. Not a wasted word. Such a rich amount of world-building went into this—all the characters were so fully realized. And Emezi doesn’t need 3-4 paragraphs to do something like most writers—a sentence or two will do. Lovely and efficient prose.

This makes me think I’m wrong, and the book isn’t too short and everything is given enough space and time. But I’m not.

The worldbuilding alone is fantastic—no matter what I might think of the world. The story is haunting and disturbing in all the right ways. I can easily see why someone would become a big fan of Emezi based on this work, and I’m intrigued by the sequel/companion novel. If this wasn’t so abbreviated, I’d imagine that I’d be a giant fan (or a massive naysayer, come to think of it).

Either way, I’m glad I read this and do recommend it—there’s a lot to chew on here, and I’m looking forward to discussing it with Nisha, who recommended it to me for this Challenge. (I expect a lot of “you just don’t understand, Uncle H.” And I probably don’t)

I read Bitter before reading this and I feel like that is part of why I found Pet so compelling. Knowing Lucille's backstory and the history of the angels made this an incredible sequel. I'm not sure I would have rated it so highly if it was a standalone as it does feel a little lacking in context without Bitter.

Oh how I ended up loving this short book and could write so much more about it. It took me a little bit of time to really become interested, but when the fantasy elements where revealed I was hooked and then I fell in love with the protagonist and side characters. I mean, I want to know more about the librarian for example. The [heavy] themes and the way they're handled are *chef's kiss IMO. I'm unclear if this is technically YA/teen, but something about the construction of the book felt more adult - so if you're anti-YA I wouldn't let that put you off to it. The prequel has a release date in 2022 and it's going to be one of my most anticipated releases in the New Year.

slow at first but once the pace started to quicken it was a really easy read. I like how Emezi built Lucille as this place in which they intended to be some sort of utopia, and also how Jam's identity as a trans autistic girl is just a part of her and not a main focal point of her character as she is accepted in Lucille

We start with an almost unbearably diverse and accepting world. The kind
of checks-every-box utopia that strains credulity in 2020. I almost
closed the book because it felt a little contrived. The world is a bad
hard place and it is kind of a struggle to read otherwise right now. But in the end, the cynicism of the present was the perfect lens for taking in this little book!

I was primed to look for cracks in the
facade of this seemingly perfectly safe and perfectly diverse world,
just as Jam, the main character, resists seeing them herself. It's a
great juxtaposition. Jam's optimism and resilience played against the
brutal realism of Pet's quest left me, by the end, hoping to one day
have a future worth protecting-one that's imperfect but still full of
love and care, as Lucille is. All the characters were richly drawn and a joy to read about.

As an aside, Ube is a babe and I'd totally read a book about a what a revolutionary librarian gets up to after the revolution.

4/5, great writing, going to seek out Emezi's novels for adults.