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Brooklyn, Burning by Steve Brezenoff
Kid is 16, a drummer and painter, and spends summers on the streets of Brooklyn.
Kid's gender is never revealed, nor is the gender of the object of Kid's affection, Scout, a musician.
It's a world of street kids, punk rock, and life beyond labels.
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4 comments:
I adored this book! I wrote my review here:
http://www.maggiesbookshelf.blogspot.com/2011/08/review-brooklyn-burning.html
I haven't read the book, but the concept is amazing. How best to challenge our assumptions? Don't reveal crucial information. Then we have to form our opinions on character and action. It reminds me of a study they did with an orchestra where all the auditions were "blind" using a screen so that all the judges heard was the music. They were shocked in their choice of musicians.
I thought this book was very original and well-written. It also took place in my old neighborhood and I thought the description of Greenpoint, Brooklyn was very accurate. The warehouse fire that happened in this book is just like one that really happened.
I went and bought this book based on this post (so thanks!).
I'm going to pull my thoughts together into a book review at my blog, but I absolutely LOVED it.
I thought the characters were strong and distinct. I LOVED the gender ambiguity (though I think Kid's father's statement puts Kid in the genderqueer "category" versus simply not knowing Kid's gender or sex) and more importantly, I loved that it was a facet of the story and characters, but at no point did it overtake the characters or the story.
It reminded me in a way of Recitatif by Toni Morrison.
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