I’m going to start by talking about the good things in the book, the best being that the disability representation was fantastic. The premise alone—a girl with Diabetes trying to make her own insulin in a post-apocalyptic world—was great, and, although I can’t be sure, the portrayal of the disability seemed accurate. There were lots of little mentions about living with Diabetes, like how she had to meticulously plan her meals and injections to make sure her blood sugar and insulin levels stayed balanced, how she had been afraid of needles and the injections hurt but you get used to what you have to do when your life literally depends on it, how she couldn’t just dig in and enjoy the meal and dessert at a group potluck because she took a certain amount of insulin, how unknown meals were terrifying because she didn’t know how much they would raise her blood sugar, etc.
And in regards to the premise, [hidden spoiler can be found in my review on my blog or Goodreads.]
There were some other interesting things in this book too, aside from the disability, like unexpected plot happenings, unpredictable romance, some touching moments, and a unique cast of characters.
But I also had some issues. For one thing, everyone in this book was way too chill about the apocalypse. Ok, the main character was a misanthrope, she wasn’t close to anyone and therefore had no one to mourn for, but she was still too unconcerned about surviving. The whole post-apoc world was just too easy. I also found it hard to believe that everyone else in the US was just as calm, that no one panicked and raided stores, that there weren’t more bad people, etc. (I suppose the author made the world easier in order to focus on the insulin-making aspect.)
The most bothersome thing though was the prejudiced implications. Everything was portrayed as great in the US, aside from one bad person, but in Brazil there were a bunch of rapists. There were also bits of sexism throughout the book. Like how Sugar assumed she was the only woman left who didn’t want to have kids and kept mentioning things about every woman’s biological impulses. And how everyone who said they didn’t want kids seemed to change their mind by the end, even if it was just to adopt. And how Sugar “never understood the power that desire held over men” until she dated one. Oh, and did you know that “the nakedness of a man to a woman is completely different than a woman’s to a man”? And that “men were at their weakest when desire took over”? Apparently men are savages who can’t control their desires. Except, this was the ironic part, when she and John (someone she was not in a relationship with) would bathe in the river, he would turn away while she got in and out, but she wouldn’t turn away for him. And she noticed that he sometimes got turned on. Which means she was looking. She also kept one of his dirty shirts just so she could smell it. So basically, if anyone was the sexual predator in that situation, it was her. It’s tricky though because these were the character’s thoughts, not necessarily ideas being condoned. For example, Sugar also believed that, “men want their women smooth under their touch” because she was worried about her scars, but the scars clearly weren’t an issue to her love interest. But I still felt that some of these things were problematic.
Speaking of Sugar, I had mixed feelings about her. She was super determined to keep trying until her dying day if that’s what it took rather than to just accept her death. And I admired and agreed with her decision to not let that one particular person back into her life. Plus she was generally a good person and did what she thought was right in tough situations, despite having a kind of surly, cold personality. But she also made weird assumptions about people. And she was incredibly naive for someone who grew up in foster care. Or just for anyone who grew up anywhere.
I also had lots of nitpicky problems (mostly minor things, not reasons to not read the book, so I'm not even going to bother listing them here).
Honestly it’s really a shame that someone didn’t point out these problems during editing because they could’ve been so easily fixed. And then I probably could’ve given the book 4 stars because I really did like the general story and the disability rep. I wouldn’t tell someone not to read this—I’m glad that I did because I feel like I learned a lot about what it’s like to have Type 1 Diabetes and there were things I liked about this book—but just know going into it that it has some problems.
Rating: 2.5 Stars
Original Review @ Metaphors and Moonlight (link in profile)
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Robinl15
A fresh take on a post apocalyptic story
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on March 21, 2017
