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A review by amaldae
Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden
3.0
Obviously a lot has happened in YA since this was published and attitudes toward gay people have changed for the better (especially in bigger cities - this one's set in NYC) but not many of today's offerings portray teenage desire, sex or even love, regardless of the gender of the people involved, as positively as this one does. A lot of them are also commercialized to obscenity and presuppose an audience more than passingly familiar with American culture and settings. I'm pleased to report that this is a book pretty much anyone can fully comprehend without assistance from Google.
I'm less enthused about Annie, who is something of a manic pixie to Liza, or about the poor girl/rich girl dynamic between them, or about the prose itself. But, compared to what Garden gets right - the romance, the importance of positive role models and representation, the effects of social class, even - those are fleeting complaints, and the book still holds its own in the queer/lesbian/young adult canon. I just hope sometime in the future, there will be a generation of queer people to whom the reactions to her sexuality Liza (and the poor misses Stevenson and Widmer!) encounters at Foster will seem alien as well as absurd.
I'm less enthused about Annie, who is something of a manic pixie to Liza, or about the poor girl/rich girl dynamic between them, or about the prose itself. But, compared to what Garden gets right - the romance, the importance of positive role models and representation, the effects of social class, even - those are fleeting complaints, and the book still holds its own in the queer/lesbian/young adult canon. I just hope sometime in the future, there will be a generation of queer people to whom the reactions to her sexuality Liza (and the poor misses Stevenson and Widmer!) encounters at Foster will seem alien as well as absurd.