Thank you, Smackdown Deities, for a great start this year! Overall, we enjoyed both of these books, and appreciated their many strengths. Both have compelling female protagonists, both feature authentically-represented diversity (#ownvoices) and explorations of identity, and both deal sensitively with lots of relevant contemporary issues - namely, mental illness in The Astonishing Color of After, and sexual assault in Saints and Misfits.
We were unanimous in voting Saints and Misfits to go forward, though. We found the ideas around internet shaming and how teens interact with their internet identities especially intriguing. How the main character moves through choices involving "sexting" and communications felt very applicable to the experiences that some our own students go through. Another strength was the way that the novel handled romance, and that it wasn’t a dominant feature or driving force. It also does a wonderful job of depicting various elements and tensions of Muslim life in Canada, and adding nuance to the representations we’re typically presented with.
The Astonishing Color of After, on the other hand, was a bit too heavy-handed with the romance, and tried to juggle too many storylines. The story of the protagonist's mother's suicide, and the journey to Taiwan to uncover the secrets of the past, would have been better, we thought, if not bogged down by the inclusion of the romantic confusion with the best friend. We really liked the magic realism, though, and the ample, mouth-watering depictions of Taiwanese street food, so this one is definitely still worth a read!Saints and Misfits for the win!
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