The Summer of Bitter and Sweet

 

My Thoughts:

This book about Lou, a Métis young woman living in Canada, is lots of bitter. Readers need to be warned that this may be triggering. There is radical racial violence, sexual violence, and emotional violence.  The author has a trigger warning at the beginning that warns us about the trauma coming, including traumas faced by Indigenous women, girls, and two-spirit people. The author does this because according to Ferguson, "Your health, happiness, safety, and well-being matter more than reading this book." She even says that if readers are not ready, it is ok to stop reading or even never read this book. As a teacher, I appreciate that last part. Young adults, even middle level readers need to understand that books can be too much of a mirror, a window, even a sliding glass door (Rudine Sims Bishop). Reading, at its best, should be a visceral experience. So if a book just does not grab you, or if a book grabs you too much and starts to push you into dark spaces that you do not want to go into, then abandon the book. According to the author, that is fine, even encouraged. For teachers, it should be ok for our own students to abandon books too. When we force people to read, that is when we lose them. I am just writing this because I know the research. I know the best practices for raising lifelong readers. I appreciate that Ferguson starts the book off in that way.

The problem is, once I started reading, I forgot her advice completely. The voice of Lou, her observations and descriptions, her family, the situation of getting the Ice Cream Shack ready on this, her final summer before college, even Homer, her old dog that surfs on top of the picnic table in the back of her F-150 pulled me in. The niggling warning beep Lou's complex attitude toward her boyfriend does not give me enough warning for the four-alarm fires that are coming in this book. It is graphic and complex. It is a visceral explosion. The bitterness is deep and rotten, but I was already too far in and I forgot to breathe.

Yes, there is sweet. Eventually. And there is an understanding of one's self, eventually. Lou comes to some realizations much later than the reader, but it did make me look up the Ace Umbrella spectrum again. I read all kinds of stories because love is love, however, this one gave me pause. I am rethinking that mantra. I did not understand the difficulty Lou has, however, it was good to read about it. Someone that passes into your own classrooms will need this book.

From the Publisher:

Lou has enough confusion in front of her this summer. She’ll be working in her family’s ice-cream shack with her newly ex-boyfriend—whose kisses never made her feel desire, only discomfort—and her former best friend, King, who is back in their Canadian prairie town after disappearing three years ago without a word.

But when she gets a letter from her biological father—a man she hoped would stay behind bars for the rest of his life—Lou immediately knows that she cannot meet him, no matter how much he insists.

While King’s friendship makes Lou feel safer and warmer than she would have thought possible, when her family’s business comes under threat, she soon realizes that she can’t ignore her father forever.

The Heartdrum imprint centers a wide range of intertribal voices, visions, and stories while welcoming all young readers, with an emphasis on the present and future of Indian Country and on the strength of young Native heroes. In partnership with We Need Diverse Books.

Publication Information:

Author: Jen Ferguson (Métis and White)

Publisher: Heartdrum (May 10, 2022)

Hardcover: 384 pages