(no subject)

A couple of times, because I was already there in church and it seemed like I should at least be attempting to save myself, even if it was halfhearted, I tried to imagine Lindsey as the pervert who had corrupted the otherwise innocent me. But even though it did make me feel less guilty, for just a moment, not entirely to blame, I knew that I wasn't hiding anything from God, if there was one. How could I pretend to be a victim when I was so willing to sin?

- Emily M. Danforth, The Miseducation of Cameron Post

Please, let this novel be as promising as the first 100 pages have turned out. I've spent the last like twenty minutes trying to explain to iacus why this novel doesn't feel like a YA lesbian novel--and I'm glad it doesn't. So far I get the sense of greater depth, of more scope (thematically and temporally), of less pathos regarding sexual identity (with less focus on solidifying a sexual identity and more grappling with figuring that identity's place in society), and lots and lots of nostalgia: Cameron is a 90s kid. (I think the setting--and the gratuitous music and movie references that Danforth throws out--really reinforce a feeling of Danforth aiming this novel at an older reading crowd than the current generation of teens. R.E.M.? Desert Hearts? AC/DC? Cranberries? Oh man.)

It feels like a slower, more thoughtful read (partly because the sentence constructions are more complex than, say, what I was reading in The Difference between You and Me, partl because there's a lot working beneath the surface that isn't being explicitly touched upon but lurks in a way that make the issues known) and this constant questioning in the back of my mind about it fitting into YA lit has really made me wonder what "YA" lit should be, if it should be anything. (iacus and I keep getting into this conversation re: YA lit and lit categories. A marketing device, mostly, but its marketability has shaped a genre that has a certain shape and narrative style, I'd say. I.e. not A.S. Byatt's The Children's Book.)

Maybe more thoughts on that later. After I finish this novel.

The Miseducation of Cameron Post by Emily M. Danforth

The Miseducation of Cameron Post by Emily M. Danforth made me think of two other works that aren't necessarily related (or relateable) to it aside from having (adolescent) lesbian protagonists: The Silk Road by Jane Summer and But I'm a Cheerleader.

The former comparison is more an impressionistic one. The Silk Road isn't categorized as a YA novel, but Miseducation doesn't necessarily feel like a YA novel either. The sort of bigger scope of the narrative, the more fleshed out adult figures and extended cast remind me of The Silk Road, where Paige Bergman is navigating her illicit relationship with an older woman in a small-town 1970s setting, with all the risks, homophobia, and secrecy that augments the thrill of getting away with it (while the protagonist manages to get away with it anyway).

Other than that, though, Miseducation stands out from the pack on the merit of a few elements that I think all tie into how YA lesbian lit seems to focus on and circle around a central "coming out" story.

I don't think Miseducation is a coming out story, not in the usual sense. ( Again, not a real review. Spoilers spoilers spoilers spoilers. )

There's so much about this novel I really liked (and so many quoteable quotes that I will not be quoting) but that I can't really convey. A lot of that has to do with liking Cameron as a protagonist, about it being nice to have a frankly lesbian character who isn't necessarily worrying about the right-ness or wrong-ness of her desires but is more focused on pursuing the exploration of the dimensions of those desires and not getting heavily bogged down in the angst of it (or even the label of it; I like this awareness that Cameron has, this curiosity about the shape of her desires, about whether or not that includes men, about how it's different or not, about how it varies from experience to experience--and also that she knows she sends terrible signals all over place. Poor Cam).

When I read the first few pages of Miseducation of Cameron Post, I got this really good feeling, like, Oh yeah, I'm going to like this. And I did. I would recommend it in a heartbeat and will have to add it to my own library, to sit as a bridge between the YA and the rest of the lesbian lit on my shelf.