I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself
Ratings26
Average rating3.7
This was beautiful and devastating and I both wanted it never to end and also needed it to end immediately.
DNF'ed it, should start with that.
For some reason I like genre fiction, and for some reason when I go to the library to find new books to read, either on the new shelves or searching the stacks for authors I recognize, 90% of what I read, 9 out of 10 books, are queer-related. Maybe that is just how sci-fi/fantasy is being written these days, and always how horror has been. But it is not a problem for me because I like to read queer stories. I am a queer woman and I can relate to the experiences of people in these stories. Even if the stories are about messy people (because I am also a messy person).
I could not read more than half of I Keep My Exoskelletons to Myself. It hurt to read, and not in a way that feels cathartic. The world in this book is a tragedy that feels impossible to escape, and the protagonist just can't move herself out of her personal tragedy and the barriers in the world on marginalized people, who are criminalized, the shadows that she has to have on her. Like, yeah, life feels like that in our reality, sometimes. But I don't want to brood in it.
I think the author is writing her own story into this, and that is good. People should write their own stories. But the protagonist, she is just caught in that forever cycle of despair that the realized metaphor of the shadows lock her in, in that tragedy of her wife's death and her child already having an extra shadow from birth. She speaks all her snicking sarcasm to try to cope, making things worse for herself, not really being a good parent. I hated her a little. But maybe that is just some sh*tty respectability politics I am feeling. And if that is so, and I know it, it is shining a mirror on my own internalized marginal-phobia. Cringe is cringe at yourself.
I read halfway and then I skipped to the end to see if something shines through. There is maybe something at the end about young people breaking through intergenerational trauma by owning it. But I could not tie it all together and finish it, and I do not think it would have been good. So that is why it is two stars, because it did not reach me personally, because I read genre fiction for fun and this was not fun, not at all.
The first I want to say 50% of this book were 5 stars, beautifully written and emotionally powerful. Then it became mostly about tedious stuff the kid did and I was just bored with it. Great setting but ultimately nothing was really done with it and given the lack of plot and the fact that so much of the book was focused on the “actions” of the kid that seemed to be a cross between Sheldon Cooper and the edgy my little pony character but without any of the charm I wish I had stopped reading halfway through and stayed with how amazing the first part was.
Netural 2.5 rounded up.
What if The Sneetches was queer adult speculative fiction?
I love a bleary-eyed quiet dystopia. In this one, Kris is recovering from the loss of her wife Beau during childbirth. On top of navigating single motherhood, her United States has implemented drastic changes to the criminal justice system.
Those who have committed infractions (or, at least, are accused of doing so) have an extra shadow attached to them. Further wrongdoing results in a third, fourth, and fifth (etc.) shadow. Shadows are impossible to detach or hide. “Shadesters” have restricted access to healthcare, groceries, and any sort of legal recourse. Discrimination and stigma abound.
Kris has an extra shadow, and policy dictates that her child receive an extra shadow at birth. So now she must raise a child set up to fail, as a broken person in a broken world. She struggles to distance her child from the shame she cannot shake, instilling resolve and pride to offset how everyone else sees and treats them.
This is a story about persistence, the slow journey of grief, and how parenthood can make you feel trapped and inadequate, while also being the primary (if not sole) reason to keep going. I'd recommend this for fans of The Double,[b:We Are Okay|28243032|We Are Okay|Nina LaCour|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1471899036l/28243032.SY75.jpg|48277368],[b:My Year of Rest and Relaxation|44279110|My Year of Rest and Relaxation|Ottessa Moshfegh|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1597676656l/44279110.SY75.jpg|55508660], and, funnily enough, [b:We Cast a Shadow|40163362|We Cast a Shadow|Maurice Carlos Ruffin|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1533657073l/40163362.SY75.jpg|62303738].