Reviews with content warning for Homophobia - Nevada

disclaimer: I don’t really give starred reviews. I hope my reviews provide enough information to let you know if a book is for you or not. Find me here: https://linktr.ee/bookishmillennial

Okay, so half of this book felt as if it was second-person because often during the narration, the narrator would say “you know” etc. so I think that made me enjoy it even more — I love a tangential stream of consciousness hahaha!

I loved that we leave Maria in the first part and then move to James, who meets her a month after the events of the first part take place. It was a funny time jump and I didn’t expect that level of spontaneity hahaha.

I also thought it was so fascinating how short Maria & James’ intersecting parts were after they met; the complete lack of closure could ring anticlimactic to some readers but whenever this happens, I just think it’s a fantastic parallel to real life. We don’t always get closure, sometimes we have to make peace with that and just keep it moving!

I’m also glad I read this with the updated author’s note at the end, because Imogen provided helpful context and perspective of why she wrote that ending for both Maria & James.

I am loving finding new authors (to me, not to the world) this week & I’m so grateful for the #TransRightsReadathon for providing that impetus.

Content Warnings

jmckeough's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional funny reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

Content Warnings

james1star's review against another edition

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emotional informative reflective fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

For a quick plot summary, Nevada is split into two parts, the first focusing on the “post transition” life of Maria who has been experiencing years of personal and professional inadequacies in her life in New York so embarks on a trip. The second mainly follow the “pre transition” narrative of confused stoner James in Star City, Nevada and the chance meeting with Maria. Other then that there is rather minimal plot, it’s for sure more about the characters and discussions on gender identity, sexuality and the role of women (misogyny, patriarchy and the like). These parts were my favourite I’d say, Binnie clearly has a lot of knowledge surrounding these topics and put a lot of it into her debut work. There is a lot said and I thoroughly enjoyed being educated in the experience of two trans people, with it being personal to each of them and not a generalised representation of ‘the trans experience’ but from reviews and the acclaim the book’s gotten it’s clearly resonated with many people and this is amazing. Whilst I did like Maria’s monologuing at the start it definitely become quite repetitive and a little unrealistic as the book went on. This is the same for quite a lot of what’s rehashed multiple times and I did find myself losing interest. I think it would have been better if more of what Binnie wanted to put forward was via ‘showing’ and not ‘telling’ with a focus on plot and character advancement, not the monologues.

From the paragraph above, I used the terms “post” and “pre transition” in quotation marks because this is how Binnie herself chose to describe the experiences in the 2022 afterword in the copy I read. This inclusion was a very interesting read and she listed lots of authors who write about the queer experience I’d also like to check out. In it, she says how she chose to create these characters at these specific stages to show how a trans person is trans throughout their journey and to disregard the “in between” stage. Other parts are discussed surrounding the path to getting Nevada published and reasonings for certain plot points.

Something I particularly disliked about Nevada was the excessive and continuous depictions of drug taking and the central role weed has in James’s life. I really don’t like reading about drug use/abuse and for me it was far too often mentioned. It also became more prevalent as the book went along which together with the rather unrealistic monologuing and my last point made me lose interest. I’d also say there’s a lot of unnecessary swearing. This final thing was Binnie’s use of the term ‘like’ which I found different at first and quite informal which allowed me to get to know the characters better. It then became a little annoying and as the book went on it’s use became so excessive - I counted one relatively small paragraph using it nine times - and therefore very very jarring. I just feel about 80% of the times it was used could’ve been omitted as it broke up the reading experience too much for me and whilst it may seem like something small, it was enough for me to personally knock off a half star from my rating.

I would still definitely recommend this book and it’s impact in the literary scene has done as lot for trans literature which is great. There is a lot to learn from Binnie with relatability and the discourse on the lives of transgender people. Overall I did enjoy it but as stated I have my issues too, it started out amazingly but did dwindle as I carried on reading.

Content Warnings

skudiklier's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

This is really engaging and reflective! I'd definitely recommend it to people who liked Detransition, Baby. I wasn't ready for it to end, especially because my copy had an afterword, so it felt very sudden. But I really appreciated the afterword as well for some context from the author after some time had passed since she wrote it.

Content Warnings

alecrigdon's review against another edition

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reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Content Warnings

mayan03's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Content Warnings

boy_topics's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

I hated this book. The characters are intensely unlikeable, every single one of them. I was hoping that the second half would bring some kind of redemption but the ending makes no sense. I don't get it. 2 stars for being kind of on the nose with some trans stuff. I think a lot of trans girls might find parts of this book really relatable. Other than that, I wouldn't recommend it.

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