Ramona Blue
by
Julie Murphy
Publication
Date: May 9th 2017
Publisher:
HarperTeen
Source: Publisher
Source: Publisher
Find
This Book: Ramona Blue
Rating:
3.5/5
This book's review is a bit scary for me, as I feel a bit vulnerable when I compare it to my own experiences. I think it's so important that conversations like this have been allowed by the doors this book has opened, but it's sensitive to all. Be aware and be kind.
I was provided a copy of this book by the publisher in
exchange for honest review.
The
first half of this book was absolutely great for me. The spaghetti-o’s were
cute, Grace was cute, the summer fling was cute. Ramona’s problems with Grace’s
confusion and reservations was emotional and powerful. Ramona’s mother was
disheartening, but real. Even Hattie’s struggle, which is not relatable to me in
the slightest, still felt relatable. It was when the self-declared lesbian kissed
a guy that I became super scared about the rest of the novel. I’d heard so many
good things about this book, I was really looking forward to it. How could
people not warn me about a lesbian finding the guy to “turn her straight”?
As
a confused sexuality-fluid female myself, I was super worried about where this
twist was going. Is the author going to make this one boy invalidate all of
Ramona’s past relationships with girls? I didn’t think I’d make it through a
book about that. Maybe Ramona was Bi? Fortunately for me, Julie Murphy emphasized Ramona’s love for
this person because of the person and everything they mean to her, not really
taking gender into account. This then left me wondering if Ramona was Pansexual or Demisexual. What was super powerful for me was Ramona’s internal struggle with
sexuality. Did her love for this guy mean that she liked guys? Or was it just
this specific guy? And every time she kissed him, she said she felt like she
was betraying her old identity. Death by a thousand cuts to the Ramona who thought she had it all figured out in high school being a lesbian in Mississippi. I can’t count how many times the same thoughts
have gone through my head. I’m a cis female, dating a cis male, that is
probably seen as a heterosexual relationship to everyone. If it’s not visible does it even count? Does this mean I am
queer enough for LGBTQ+ clubs, safe spaces, pride marches etc.? It can feel like people feel like I’m an intruder,
which of course makes everything even more confusing. This is what saved the
book for me. Ramona doesn’t label her sexuality by the end of the book. She
hasn’t figured herself out yet and maybe she never will, but the point is that
the pressure to have a label has been removed. And maybe it will help fellow
confused queers not feel pressured to label themselves as well.
What
brought this book down the stars is how long it took Ramona to be her own
person. The whole book is spent following her sister Hattie around, picking up
the pieces and trying to keep things together. While I can respect that, every
single person in her life tells her that that’s not the destiny that’s set in
stone for her. The future is still up to her and she could go to college after
graduation if she really worked for it. While money is obviously an issue, it
saddened me to watch Ramona counter everyone supporting her, and shut down
any possible future that wasn’t staying in Eulogy, working 3 jobs, and living with her sister in the trailer park.
In life, you really only need one person supporting you: yourself. Ramona didn’t
even have that which made the book really hard to get through for me. I could
only end up reading a couple chapters at a time because of this mental block
Ramona has.
I
thought this book was going to disappoint me, but it ended up pulling through. The
ending was comfortingly bittersweet. I can appreciate how Ramona is going to
figure out her sexuality, her career, her relationships etc. as she goes along.
She’s finally come to accept that the future isn’t set in stone and that she
has a life to live- a super important message. Honestly, if Ramona wasn’t her
own worst enemy, and if the writing didn’t originally indicate that this guy
was going to ‘turn Ramona straight’ as her mother had hoped, it definitely would’ve
gotten a better rating. While the payoff was worth it, the author put me
through a lot to get there.
