Chloe Daley Daley থেকে Rantue, Kareliya Republits, রাশিয়া, 186790
*Note: There are some tiny spoilers below.* This was my first Libba Bray novel, and I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. The premise is straightforward: a plane full of beauty queens crashes on a remote island. Throughout the book, we watch them surprise themselves at their capability, learn to have some confidence in their young womanhood, and of course, save the day. I think, by far, my favorite character is the oh-so-Texan Taylor Rene Krystal Hawkins. She starts off the book as the leader (duh) of the beauty queens. How could you not love the girl who starts off rallying her fellow pageant girls after a horrific plane crash by saying, "Okay, Miss Teen Dreamers, I know we're all real flustered and everything. But we're alive. And I think before anything else we need to pray to the one we love...I'm talkin' about my own personal copilot, Jesus Christ" (p.7). It's lines that like that had me busting out laughing often throughout the book. Taylor goes a little bat shit crazy, which lost me a bit, but she was so fascinating in all her gun-toting, survivor glory. Here's my personal favorite line: After describing a hilarious product called "Breast in Show" (use your imagination there), Bray writes, "Breast in Show. Because 'You're perfect just the way you are' is what your guidance counselor says. And she's an alcoholic" (p. 212). Priceless. The book is pretty sexy (hello boat full of hot pirates), which is fine by me, but I could see some overly-conservative parents having a problem with it, so my fellow librarians be aware. I thought the sex was handled well and was honest and real. Kudos to Bray there. That said, this is definitely a high school book. The book is dotted with footnotes explaining culturally significant products and people pertinent to the world in which the beauty queens live. Sometimes, I thought they were hilarious, sometimes they annoyed me. It's all so satirical (which is great), but oftentimes a little heavy-handed. Perhaps the most annoying part, to me, was MoMo B. ChaCha. We're supposed to laugh at the absurdity of his character (and his likeness to a foreign leader we know), but he just annoyed me. Ladybird Hope was much more fitting and could have been the villain all by her lonesome. Overall, I really enjoyed this one. I liked that Bray was trying to say, "Hey, girls, it's ok to be girls and have feelings and be tough and feel sexy and not want to apologize for any of it." It just felt too obvious sometimes. The beauty queens were hilarious, as was much of the dialogue and many of the footnotes. It's nice to have some well-written girl power lit to hand to my teen patrons. Rock on, Libba Bray.
You know, as well-earned as a lot of Irving criticism is - and man, some of it really is merited - I just won't hear anything against him when we talk about books like this. It's got bears! prostitutes! vienna! lesbians! Seriously, what more do you need?