i have zero innate problem with the presence of gore or fascism in a novel, with bluntness in symbolism or with subversive themes. my problem with this book lay in deep craft issues that made it just rough to get through. the tone was what i found the biggest struggle to get over as it's really inconsistent and sadly serves to undermine the author's points often. the sociopolitical critique was framed for an audience much too mature for the actual statements presented, which were fucking irritatingly surface level. the shallowness there bounced back and made the framing look cheap and tryhard edgy.

something i found sort of disgusting is that, while rumfitt does parallel alice's racism and antisemitism towards harry with harry's transphobia and terf bullshit, and is clear in making it known that both people hold fascist beliefs about the other, at the end of the novel

Spoiler

harry 'can't believe' he was ever transphobic and here he is marching proudly with his beautiful girlfriend he loves so much, whereas the last thought towards his identity alice has is when she says that his skin being white and his nose being small was how he was 'meant to be' and it was his 'perfect self' in the house. i know rumfitt is white but with her attention to social justice politics it's an insane statement to include in her 'they get together and are happy despite being bombed by a 4chan user randomly years after the story wraps up!!' ending.

i wanted rumfitt to put her money where her mouth was and like... not make the enduring love that survived fascism on multiple levels be a brown person and a white girl who never addressed her racist beliefs. rumfitt's position is the opposite of intersectional. her narrative prioritization of the queer identity as more marginalized and important than racial marginalization might not have ruined the book if she really focused on the white character's experience, except she also felt entitled to speak on nonwhite issues and discrimination against people of colour throughout the book in a way that, even with the shield of character voice removed, is racist. many such cases in white gay lit