i have.. a few issues with this book.

esme. wonderful, accepting esme, who is supposed to be smart. throughout the story we’re constantly told she’s brilliant, but none of that is ever shown. we see that she passes her GED with flying colors, before she even knew she could get a student visa. if she’s that smart why the /fuck/ did she not research autism when khai tells her he’s autistic. it pisses me the ever-loving fuck off. and the fact that no one gets upset about that is /astounding/. she is also a big fat liar, but i feel she makes up for by actually knowing and being guilty because of the way she acted (i still hate liars though).

another thing, with khai’s family: they should’ve sent him to therapy. now, if there are negative cultural connotations, that’s different - in this book it was never even explored as an /option/. khai appears to have alexithymia (the inability to feel, understand, and/or name emotions) and one of the better ways to work through that is therapy. noticing as they so regularly do that khai has such an obvious struggle with emotions, i feel this should’ve at least been suggested by a relative or even intermediate family member. then again, i’m a very white person, so if that’s not how Asian immigrant or even Asian families in general work, that’s completely on me for not knowing and understanding - if that’s the case than i obviously need to learn more about different cultural norms.

i could’ve done without the sex in this book honestly - it didn’t feel like it added anything at all and it was pretty mediocre imo. i also could’ve done without the missing dad plotline… it felt very thrown in at the last minute and unnecessary.

on the other hand,

i really, really enjoyed them autism rep in this book though. i thought khai was portrayed really well - i related to him a lot - without any of his autism being “removed” (for lack of a better word) from his identity.

i also thought esme and jade were a very cute mother + daughter pair.