spam, poetry, and a book review

I bought some Spam at the grocery store yesterday and for those of you who are aghast at the thought of anyone intentionally purchasing this product, you may be happy to know that somehow it didn't make it home with me. I have no idea what happened to it, honestly. It probably didn't get bagged or something. Which actually makes me a little sad because guys, the Spam cans have the cutest little knight on them!

see?!

And now he's lost somewhere when I'm sure he was so excited to finally be chosen. I let him down.

Last week I went to a poetry slam for the first time in my little life and it was an experience. We were first...exposed...to a short story written by one of the regular attendees and it was disturbing to say the least. The author started her reading by saying she wouldn't be offended if people left - always a good sign. I won't go into details - to spare you and my own memory - suffice to say it was incredibly graphic and I'm grateful the friend I went with was willing to share her headphones with me. The rest of the slam went more to the norm and there was a pretty good variety of topics and styles, many of which I enjoyed. They had a guy there who was working on a composite poem that he would then read at the end of the night as a summary of the evening. We didn't stay that late but I thought it was a cool idea. They hold these slams every Thursday night and next week they're doing a short story slam that I'm looking forward to checking out.

This week I've got a book review! I actually read this book a few weeks ago but it was for a book group I've become a part of and we just met last night and I liked a lot of the comments that were made. I wasn't going to review this book originally but our conversation last night pulled forward some themes and ideas I thought were worth sharing.

The book in question is Remake by Ilima Todd:

It's a dystopian book set in a world where the population has been crippled by a disease that surfaced years ago. Nine lives in one of the Freedom Provinces where humans are born in "batches" consisting of ten males and ten females [for population control] that are raised androgynously in a special facility largely isolated from the rest of the province. At the age of 17 they are taken to the Remake Facility where they are able to choose whatever and whoever they want to be for the rest of their lives. These make-overs includes all physical aspects from hair, height, skin tone, teeth color, to gender. These "batches" are raised solely in the sense that they take certain lessons. Family units do not exist in the province where the emphasis is on doing whatever you want as long as it doesn't directly infringe upon the rights of another citizen and gender is considered an accessory rather than an integral part of a person's identity.

The topic of gender and families is central to the plot and Nine's own character development. She struggles with most of the decisions she needs to make regarding her upcoming Remake [other decisions aside from appearance are required, such as occupation] but none more than gender. Nine wants to be brave like her best friend Theron who has acted as her protector since they were little but before any of them make it to the Remake Facility their transport crashes into the ocean and Nine becomes separated from the rest of her batch. Through the ensuing chapters she is introduced to a society that exists outside of the Freedom Provinces and seeks to live according to family structures where gender identity is still considered a vital part of a person.  In the end, Nine has to choose which world she'd rather live in and who she ultimately wants to be.

This is the author's first published work so there are rough patches in writing as well as story logic but I'm going to refrain from listing those here. While imperfect, the book touches on a lot of topics that are worth the read  - more so for me because they are rarely explored in fiction.

One of the women in this book club is friends with the author and she shared with us that Todd's personal catch-phrase for this book was 'brave like a girl' and I can see why. For the most part, Nine struggles with which gender to choose because her entire life she's been told that gender is arbitrary and doesn't mean anything. If someone tells you that and then makes you choose between the supposedly arbitrary things how would you make a decision? Nine ends up leaning toward changing her gender to male because she is chasing bravery and courage which she has seem evidenced most often in Theron, who is male. It's a shot in the dark for her but it reflects her impression that perhaps men are naturally more confident. A big part of her journey throughout the book is discovering that she has strength and courage within herself, as a woman. Hers may not be as confrontational or showy as Theron's but that doesn't invalidate it.

After washing up on an island after the crash, Nine meets what I call the 'comparison cast' - those that are living lives almost completely opposite of what you find in the Provinces. One of these is deaf and I love Todd's treatment of this character. So much of the time handicapped characters in fiction are 2D stereotypes that are present to create a sense of guilt or duty in the main character. The only important thing about them is their disability and their potential to be the catalyzing inspirational background character. The deaf character in Remake is refreshing because she does not exist solely to provide a point of guilt or inspiration. In fact, while her handicap is a point of interest for Nine, who has never met someone with a handicap and has a hard time understanding why this girl is fine living this way, but other than Nine's own growth around the information, the handicap is hardly mentioned. This is awesome because people who live with handicaps are so much more than their disability and Todd does a beautiful job of representing the deaf community - people that live full lives regardless of their missing sense.

Okay, this post is getting entirely too long so I'm going to wrap up by saying that I do recommend this as a read. It's not my favorite and I have a list a mile long with questions and complaints regarding structure and style but the ideas in this book are well worth looking for. The second book is scheduled to come out in October this year and it's projected to be a trilogy in all.

- small rant to follow -

Remake will never be a best seller because it broaches topics that a lot of people don't really like to talk about but I think that makes its effort all the more commendable. I've seen a lot of hate in reviews, criticizing the book for being "narrow-minded in its definition of what constitutes a family" - people claiming that it discriminates against everything from single-parent households to gay couples. Having read the book, I just want to make it clear that this is not the case. In the Freedom Provinces people don't even know what a family is, at all. Nine had literally never heard the terms of mother, father, sister, and brother before. Batches are 'raised' by a series of individuals whose job it is to feed and teach them but these kids almost never see the same person twice. The contrast that Todd is trying to emphasize here is the importance of family period compared to a complete and utter lack of family of any kind. Alright, rant over.