magical realism based on keen observations of the social dynamics of adolescents – The Irish Times

“She is very fine. Just a veil of herself. Freckles like the beginning of rain on dry ground, a small scar above the eyebrow, a shiny, wet sheen of the teeth. When I blink, his features drip and smear like dripping paint. There are drag marks on its right side, pure tarmac. A tear in her dress, right down to the bones. The bruise on his temple is black and shaded where a piece of his skull has collapsed. She turns and smiles at me, a mouthful of yellowing smoke. My beautiful friend.”

We get the above splendor on a single page from Jenny Valentine's latest novel, Us in the before and after (Simon & Schuster, £8.99), the story of two friends having an unusual summer, due to the death of one of them. The quirkiness and immediately appealing voice will be familiar to fans of the British author, who has won awards and acclaim for his youth-oriented work since 2007's Finding Violet Park; new devotees will be eager to delve into its list of references.

Narrator Elk and her best friend Mab are like “tangled particles” (a physical metaphor used lightly throughout), but something happened just before summer that changed everything. Elk was keeping a secret, and the consequences of that decision are what – it seems – led to the current state of affairs. Magical realism is based on keen observations of the social dynamics of adolescents; at one point, Elk emphasizes the gift of being “left alone” at school: “I learned pretty quickly that I could be myself and get by.” I'm not sure anything inside a school building is worth more than that.

This hauntingly honest (and even hauntingly haunting) book can make you cry, between appreciating beautiful sentences and clever ideas. It's worth it. I loved this novel in its own right, but also as a reminder of how YA, as a label, encompasses such a wide range of writing, from the highly commercial, page-turning variety to the more literary, often quietly devastating ending.

The commercial and literary spectrum is also reflected in Charlie Castelletti's anthology Him, She, Them, Us: Queer Poems (Macmillan, £18.99), with a mix of what we might call 'internet famous' and canonical poets (hello, Whitman, Auden, Marlowe). It would, however, be naive and reductive to insist that any poem popular on social media must be simplistic (or to attribute depth to an older text simply because the language seems more formal and closer to something studied for an exam), and some of the best poems here have gone viral: Jay Hulme's Jesus at the Gay Bar, for example, is an extremely welcome inclusion, and the always excellent Nikita Gill is also present.

But there are weaker notes, including some of Castelletti's own works, and some poems that regurgitate but don't do much else with activist slogans, which seem to think that repeating slogans and adding jumps line is synonymous with depth. It also doesn't always make sense to include performance elements on the page; not all of them will work if they are deprived of what their player brings to the stage.

Then you come across a bit of Frank O'Hara or Ocean Vuong and you'd forgive everything.

It's also refreshing to have a collection like this that does not come – despite the geniuses mentioned above – only from the United States, which knows that other countries exist. The younger generation of queer Irish poets is particularly well represented here, with Micheál McCann, Rosamund Taylor, Eva Griffin and William Keohane all coming to make the country proud. However imperfect this anthology is – and all are, for reasons as much to do with copyright and permissions as with personal taste – it is worth keeping on the shelf, both for comfort and celebration .

This magical power of poetry is explored in Ashley Hickson-Lovence's verse novel The Wild East (Penguin, £8.99), the poet and speaker's third book but his first aimed at teenagers. I'm always skeptical about how writers, drawing on their own experiences in schools, handle the guest poet workshop from the students' point of view, but when we see “this curious poet has / spied on my words over my shoulder,” leaving the narrator feeling like “he had broken into my house/was sitting on the toilet or something,” won me over.

It takes time for Ronny, 14, a newcomer to school who never really felt that literature was “for” him, a certain amount of time to get used to this “game with poetry” and to familiarize yourself with this form of sharing. his feelings about injustice, identity and the horrible death of his best friend. This book deserves its hopeful ending.

For deliciously sarcastic comments alongside hope, please see this one from Josh Silver. happy death (Rock the Boat, £8.99), picking up where his near-dystopian Happy Head left off. Five seemingly perfect couples endure a series of strange challenges on a remote island, led by a charismatic couple with a fondness for grandiose language. (“Container? It's a bowl of fruit, Artemis. I saw them at Ikea.”) Narrator Seb gives us an engaging mix of banter and vulnerability as he tries to find a way out and figure out what's going on. happened to her boyfriend. ; his fake girlfriend's redemption arc is particularly enjoyable.

The power of community and solidarity is beautifully explored in two titles this month. Anna Zoe Quirke's debut Something to be proud of (Little Tiger, £8.99) introduces us to Imogen, “a chaotic, left-wing, autistic bisexual who wants to become a stand-up comedian”, following her throughout a year between Pride events. The first reminds her that she lives in “a world that was built neither by nor for people like me”; the second is its hard-won response, a more inclusive and thoughtful pride that allows “all queer people to celebrate who they are, all that they are.” Even though it's a little clunky in places, it's also comforting.

Bestselling authors Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé and Adiba Jaigirdar team up to Four Eids and a funeral (Usborne, £8.99), which uses the romantic comedy formula as an accessible entry into a story about New England's Muslim communities. Said and Tiwa, former best friends, are forced to team up when they have joint custody of a cat, then choose to pool forces when the local Islamic center burns.

The mayor doesn't think it's worth rebuilding the place, insisting that existing public spaces should meet everyone's needs. “There will be no more gatherings,” Tiwa thinks, “to break the fast together for the last time during Eid al-Fitr. No more Arabic sessions. More community. » Tiwa's campaign is complicated by the fact that it is not always “interpreted” as Muslim by foreigners; as Said says: “I know that if [her family] If I were Arab or South Asian or any race and ethnicity other than black, everyone here would have been shouting to praise Tiwa for her hard work on my behalf.

Such concerns do not stand in the way of this sweet romance between enemies and lovers, as befits the genre; However, the original lynchpin for the pair is less fully realized, and as much as we know these two will get together — and root for each other — it would be nice to have a more solid reason for their initial distance. .

However, as in Quirke's novel, the impulse here is admirable: to demonstrate to teenagers that they can – and how – to bring about change in their communities.