The Neurospicy Bean

  I am OBSESSED give me all of the trans romance and joy. Thank you so much to Katy Nishimoto from Dial Press for the advance copy of this beautiful book. I really loved so many different aspects of this book, so it’s going to be a bit tricky to parse through them all, but I shall try. First, and this is probably one of the things that has stuck most in my head about it, it was really amazing to see such a sex-positive trans romance. I do think this trend is changing, in the last couple of years in particular, but so often it seems like the reality of sex as a trans person gets completely glossed over. By that I don’t mean that sex is some kind of horrible ordeal, or that all trans people are uncomfortable with it; in fact, anyone who has read this book will know that’s not how it’s treated here at all. It’s more that a lot of authors – cis authors in particular – have seemed deeply uncomfortable committing to the reality of their trans characters’ bodies, whatever that may be. So ...

It takes a bit to get going, but once it does, this book is absolutely gorgeous. I should say – although this book is labeled as mystery/thriller, those genres are relatively small, subtle aspects of the story. The emphasis is much more on the main character, Jess, her relationship with her older sister, Liz, and the two of them navigating grief. There’s also a healthy dose of exploring small town prejudice. None of this is to say that there isn’t a mystery – there is, and the main characters work to solve it – but the mystery is for the sake of the characters’ growth, not the other way around. So I wouldn’t recommend going into the book with a mind towards a traditional mystery, because I don’t think that will get the best experience out of it. As far as what I really liked, I thought the depiction of grief was beautifully done – all the small things that bring it back, the way that it colors a person’s whole experience of life. I actually enjoyed Liz as a character more than Jess, be...

  So I’ve seen a lot of stuff pitching this as lesbian Ted Lasso, and alas, it simply is not. The side characters are charming enough, but they lack the brilliance of the Ted Lasso ensemble and aren’t given much attention throughout the book. Grace and Phoebe are very much the primary focus, and almost every scene revolves around them. And yeah, it is a romance, but those of you who follow my reviews will know that I firmly believe that the best romances have excellent side characters and spend time developing other relationships – not to mention, other aspects of the characters. This book is trying to touch on some of those things, but the proportions weren’t quite right for me.  For instance, one plot element is Phoebe and Grace exploring their potential neurodivergence. I didn’t realize that would be a plot point going in, and I was excited when it was, but it wasn’t explored as much as it could have been. Grace in particular is really reduced to a throwaway line about mayb...

  Okay, so first and foremost I would really like to see some reviews by people with bipolar disorder, because I do not feel qualified to dissect that element of the representation. In a few ways the way mental health in general was treated and discussed in the world rubbed me the wrong way – especially the way Adrien talked about Gennady on occasion – but again, I don’t think I have the right perspective to understand or talk about it in a nuanced way. With that out of the way, this book was a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand, I found the pacing frustrating – it didn’t really feel like anything happened for the first hundred pages. There was nothing terribly special about the writing either; I didn’t feel overly interested in the characters or the world. And the worldbuilding was a bit off. A lot of terms were thrown around with no real context or explanation, and there didn’t seem to be very consistent rules for where a lot of it was coming from. Similarly, the magic system wa...