Soo… remember that book I was yelling about the other day? I finished it by now, and although I’m slightly more coherent (well, I made that other post at like four in the morning so what do you expect?), but I’m still angry. Not surprised “I didn’t know this happens” angry, but hurt “I used to love this author’s books and this is so unneccessary” angry.
I still thought it was kind of funny when I read the description on the back and it fit perfectly with this post about playing “bisexual book detective”:
But at that point I hadn’t realized yet that throughout the whole book, the word “bisexual” wouldn’t appear ONCE in connection to any particular person. In case you didn’t think that’s strange after the blurb above, here’s what the Jodi Picoult has to say about the book on her website:
“Zoe Baxter has spent ten years trying to get pregnant, and after multiple miscarriages and infertility issues, it looks like her dream is about to come true – she is seven months pregnant. But a
terrible turn of events leads to a nightmare – one that takes away the
baby she has already fallen for; and breaks apart her marriage to Max.
In the aftermath, she throws herself into her career as a music
therapist – using music clinically to soothe burn victims in a hospital;
to help Alzheimer’s patients connect with the present; to provide
solace for hospice patients. When Vanessa – a guidance counselor – asks
her to work with a suicidal teen, their relationship moves from
business to friendship and then, to Zoe’s surprise, blossoms into love.
When Zoe allows herself to start thinking of having a family, again, she
remembers that there are still frozen embryos that were never used by
herself and Max.
Meanwhile, Max has found peace at the bottom of a bottle – until he
is redeemed by an evangelical church, whose charismatic pastor – Clive
Lincoln – has vowed to fight the “homosexual agenda” that has threatened
traditional family values in America. But this mission becomes personal
for Max, when Zoe and her same-sex partner say they want permission to
raise his unborn child.”
Sounds like bi (or pan!) would be a logical label for Zoe, right? All the book ever calls her, though, is “gay” and “lesbian” (mostly in phrases like “newly gay” or “now a lesbian”). Just to be clear, though, I’m not upset that this book has a character that was married to a man for a while and then finds herself falling for a woman and starts identifying as lesbian. I know that that happens in real life (in fact, I have a friend whose mother has pretty much the same backstory) - BUT. You know what also happens in real life? Bisexuals. Pansexuals. Other nonmonosexual people. And people wondering what to call themselves when they find out a new thing about their sexuality. So from a book that spends a lot of time exploring relationships, and in a FIRST PERSON VOICE, no less, I would at least expect some reflection on Zoe’s reasons for identifying as lesbian once she is in a relationship with Vanessa. Doesn’t have to be an elaborate list that goes through all the available possibilities. I’d be happy with someone asking her what her new relationship means for her identity, or her toying with a term in her head and then deciding that it’s not for her, or ANYTHING that doesn’t just imply that all of us who DONT identify as either straight or gay just simply don’t exist. The closest thing to this that we get is Zoe saying she doesn’t “need labels for everything”. Yes, that is often a cheap way of avoiding the b-word, but I feel like it would have been far more interesting than the actual inconsistency of the narrative in which she is called “gay” a few pages after that sentence without any explanation about how we are supposed to arrive at this conclusion.
It’s not just Zoe, by the way - her partner spends some time talking about the students she works with and how some of them are out as gay or lesbian, some of them “don’t realize it yet” - but, you know, those are apparently the only sexualities people have to be “in the closet” for. In fact, the only time the word “bisexual” even appears is when Zoe’s and Vanessa’s lawyer says she has a lot of experience representing people who are “lesbian, gay, transgender, bisexual or questioning”. But even at that organization? Noone is ever mentioned as really BEING bisexual - the lawyer herself is straight, which I guess is supposed to show what a great person she is for fighting for other people’s rights, or whatever. Maybe I’m just bitter, but it does seem like having another major queer character in a book that is about QUEER RIGHTS after all wouldn’t have been such a far-fetched idea.
Even without having any bi characters, though, the book manages to include a huge amount of biphobia:
(narrated from the point of view of Vanessa, Zoe’s partner:) “‘The point is,’ I say, ‘You spent forty years straight. Why wouldn’t you return to the path of least resistance?’” (p. 171) - I can’t even tell what I find more insulting about this, the idea that people who were in a different-gender-relationship once can just “return” to being straight (and that is coming from a character who spends a significant amount of time explaining how her being gay is not a choice, by the way), or the idea that this is actually the “path of least resistance”. Sound familiar? Yeah, that might as well read “straight-passing privilege”. Because we all know that having a huge part of your identity ignored and ridiculed by others and fearing to be outed to people who wouldn’t accept that part of you is so much fun, right?
This theme is touched on several times in the book, and it’s not like I mind people saying hurtful shit in a fictional book - the novel is also full of evangelical Christians calling Zoe and Vanessa “deviant” and “perverted”, and if someone said that to me in real life, I wouldn’t be thrilled, either. The difference is that with those homophobic comments, there is always another character protesting or arguing against it - the biphobia just kind of sits there and noone really responds to it.
Finally, as if the book hadn’t fulfilled it’s quota of harmful shit to say or whatever, there is also a scene where Vanessa tells Zoe that there is nothing she could tell her about her past that would change Vanessa’s love for her.
“'I used to be a guy,’ I say, straight-faced. ‘Deal breaker.’ Vanessa laughs, and she leans forward and kisses me.” (p. 421)
First of all, really? I’m cis, so I wouldn’t pretend to be the one who gets to decide how you describe a trans person’s gender assignment, but I’ve heard several trans people say that “used to be x” is something they don’t feel comfortable with because it implies that there was a point in their life where someone else’s assignment had more authority over who they are than their own identity. And second of all, what the hell? The only way this “deal breaker” thing makes sense is if you think trans women aren’t “woman enough” to be in a relationship with a lesbian. Just don’t.
So yeah. I still love Jodi Picoult’s style of writing, and found the book incredibly fascinating to read, but it also made me feel sick with every other page.
[image description: the back cover of Sing You Home by Jodi Picoult. It reads “After Zoe Baxter loses her baby, the only way she can find of coping is to try again. But her husband Max disagrees–more than that, he wants a divorce. When they separate, there is not mention of the unborn children they created together, still waiting at the clinic. / Then Zoe falls in love again, out of the blue, and finds herself with an unexpected second chance to have a family. / But Max has found a new life too–one with no place in it for people like Zoe. And he will stand up in courst to say that her new choice of partner makes her an unfit mother. / Jodi Picoult’s most powerful novel yet asks who has the right to decide what makes an ideal family?”]
