March 28th 2017 | HarperTeen
Source: Library
Frances Janvier spends most of her time studying.Alice Oseman doesn’t know how to write people of color as actual individuals who aren’t around for the benefit of their white counterparts. I can’t remember the last time a book genuinely infuriated me as much as this one did. I don’t even know if I have the right words to talk about how much I dislike this book. But I’m gonna try because why not.
Everyone knows Aled Last as that quiet boy who gets straight As.
You probably think that they are going to fall in love or something. Since he is a boy and she is a girl.
They don’t. They make a podcast.
In a world determined to shut them up, knock them down, and set them on a cookie cutter life path, Frances and Aled struggle to find their voices over the course of one life-changing year. Will they have the courage to show everyone who they really are? Or will they be met with radio silence?
—I want to know why the author thought it was okay to out one character to another? In what situation would that be okay? Even more so, why would you make one of the few men of color in the book be the one to out the white queer one? There’s already such an in balance in that relationship and we’re already made to sympathize more with the white queer character anyway. This was incredibly frustrating and I don’t understand why more people aren’t talking about it.
—WHY ARE WE TREATING A CHARACTER’S SEXUALITY AS A SURPRISE!!!
—Why is the story about Frances, Jamaican British girl but not really? Why is this woman of color’s story “made better” after the introduction of the white gay character? Why do literally all of the characters of color exist only for the benefit of the white characters in the story? I really wanted to love this friendship but I really didn’t think it was done well. Aled made zero effort to do much for Frances. In so many ways, she is the one that is always stepping up for him. She is the one that went out of her way to find him after he essentially ghosted her. He never apologized and never really took ownership for his actions. In someways I also felt like he blamed Frances for a lot of what was happening in the fandom. It was incredibly unfair and not well done. Women of color, and especially black women, are not there to make you a better person. Our existence is not there to challenge you to do better and to grow.
—Radio Silence works a lot at fandom and fandom culture. I really wanted this aspect of the story to be done well but it ended up leaving me more frustrated than anything. At the end of the day, I felt like Aled essentially blamed Frances for everything that went down in this book. Fandoms and people in fandoms can be toxic and that is very true. But to fault Frances for how other people violated your privacy? That’s uncalled for. It’s one thing for you to be upset and take that anger out on someone else. It’s a completely other situation if you take that anger out on someone else but never apologize to the person you were angry at. I hated that Frances was made to look like the bad person by every person in Aled’s life. Even more so, Aled left Daniel, one of his oldest friends in the dust for no reason. And even when all was said and done, there was no apology.
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