We Love You, Charlie Freeman

Holy hell, this was perfect.

I hate monkeys. Rats and mice? Adorable! Snakes? Hello there, beautiful. But monkeys? They make my skin crawl. There is nothing creepier to me than a monkey dressed up like a person. Which is a long winded way of saying I should have known better than to pick up this book. Some of the scenes in this book are so, so disturbing that I'm worried they will haunt me for the rest of my life.

Beyond that, this book does have some interesting things to say about race, sexuality, and personhood, but even setting the monkey aside, it all felt a bit disjointed? I kept expecting something to happen that would tie the threads together but it never came. There's a really beautiful scene involving a teacher in a classroom getting through to his students that I loved, but overall this book was not. for. me.

3.5. I love the dark twist.

I wanted to like this book because it sounded like such an interesting premise but the multiple points of view (two 1st person narrators and 3rd person recounts of myriad other characters) ruined any sense of cohesion this tale might have had. At the end, I was left feeling like I had missed something because the resolution felt disjointed and abrupt, which is a shame as I found the book very readable.

Many thanks to Thomas Allen & Son for providing me with a free review copy.