Ultraviolet

My son, Adam, who just earned his MBA and started a new managerial job, was once a thoughtful, intuitive middle schooler dealing with peers who seemed to be anything but. If there is one book I wish had been published back then it's Aida Salazar's Ultraviolet. Like Judy Blume's Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, it tackles the child to teen transition with candor and sensitivity.
Becoming a man has probably never been easy. Last night Eugene was watching a rather gruesome documentary about a time in which becoming a man required killing an enemy in battle. Today it's less gory, but probably much more confusing.
"Why does my voice sound like
gravel and glass being run over
by a street sweeper?
Why does my heart pound like
a punching bag being
hit over and over
whenever I'm with Camelia?"
Elio, Salazar's protagonist, is dealing with all the physical and psychological changes of puberty and the challenges of peer social dynamics. He gains and then heartbreakingly loses his first girlfriend and has no idea how to deal with the loss. Even at home things are confusing. His mother is raising him to be aware of the privileges society gives him for being a boy and fight for equality for girls and women. His father feels that he should toughen up to be a Solis man.
The inspiration for the book is a fascinating story in itself. Salazar had just published a book, The Moon Within about a Latina girl coming of age. Her son and his friend asked her to write a similar story with a male protagonist. Doing research, she realized that there were too few stories that could help boys, especially boys of color navigate the emotional terrain of the boy to man transition.
"Ultraviolet explores one boy's journey through the complicated landscape of falling in love and being heartbroken, through puberty and early adolescence as he tries to define his place in the world. But it is also about bigger topics like toxic masculinity, consent, and how we unconsciously or intentionally push patriarchal behavior. Because those in-between years (ages eleven to thirteen) are about exploration, it's important to have stories that help boys sort out complicated emotions and learn to respond in positive, loving, life affirming, and healing ways."
If there's a boy in your life embarking on this transition it would make such a wonderful gift!
On a purrrsonal note, you may see fewer reviews on this blog in the near future. I get most of the books I review through interlibrary loan. That's how I have access to what's hot off the press. ILL is temporarily shut down here in Maine while the truck company that does the actual deliveries is in some of negotiations. It's been a week so far. I'll do my best, but no guarantees.
A great shout goes out to you, my readers, for whom I will do my best to track down eminently reviewable books.
Jules Hathaway