I'm part of the Inkyard Press blogger/influencer team, so today I'm featuring We Didn't Ask for This by Adi Alsaid, for my stop on the blog tour! I've got a review and exclusive Q&A about the book down below. Q&A SessionQ: What's your favorite thing about Marisa Cuevas? A: Her willingness to fight for what she believes in. Q: I love the juxtaposition of a lock-in against a political protest. What was the most challenging part of threading those two very different pieces together? A: Honestly, it was the logistics of actually keeping the students locked in. The political protest wouldn’t work without it, nor would the plot. So I had to find a whole lot of justifications that felt reasonable within the story. Other than that, one of my goals was to show, embodied in different characters, all the ways people react to political protests, and to make them feel like actual people, not just symbols. Q: What do you most hope that readers take away from the story? A: Getting others to care about what you care about is hard, but you’re allowed to try, and it’s possible to succeed. Q: What inspired you to write this book? A: I’ve been wanting to write a book that felt like my favorite book, Bel Canto, for a while now. So the very initial inspiration was a group of characters all stuck in the same place for an extended period of time. Then, to make it feel more YA, I thought of The Breakfast Club, but instead of cliques, just bring people with different passions together. Then, because of my increasing awareness over the last few years about environmental issues, combined with the fact that I was traveling and seeing those issues play out around the world, I brought in the fight for climate change. Q: Is there a character that you found challenging to write? Why? A: All my characters come easily to me. The challenge is working to get them right in revisions. Jordi Marcos, a sort of villain in the story, was one that was hard to get right, in order to make his actions feel justified. I also have a queer Muslim character in Amira, and I had to work—and had the fortune of being guided by a great sensitivity reader—to not make her representation be harmful. Q: How does a typical writing day look like for you? A: Assuming this means not in the time of COVID-19. I wake up and go straight to a coffee shop, where I work/avoid looking at my phone for about 3 hours or so. Then I usually have lunch, take a break by watching a movie, running errands, or something in that vein. Then another work session in the afternoon or late evening at another coffee shop or perhaps a bar, followed by cooking dinner. During deadline times there’s also usually a late night session at home. Q: What are your current reading? A: I’m about to finish The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy, listening to The Art of Logic in an Illogical World by Eugenia Chang, and my next read will probably be Incendiary by Zoraida Cordova. Q: Is there something secret you can share with us about anything in the book or your experience writing it? A: I don’t know about secret, but I’ll say that I had the unique experience of traveling the world while writing it. So, many of its words were written in the communal areas of hostels, on airplanes, trains, on an island in Fiji, and in many, many coffee shops. About the BookCentral International School’s annual lock-in is legendary. Bonds are made. Contests are fought. Stories are forged that will be passed down from student to student for years to come. This year’s lock-in begins normally enough. Then a group of students led by Marisa Cuevas stage an ecoprotest and chain themselves to the doors, vowing to keep everyone trapped inside until their list of demands is met. Some students rally to their cause…but others are aggrieved to watch their own plans fall apart. Amira has trained all year to compete in the school decathlon on her own terms. Peejay intended to honor his brother by throwing the greatest party CIS has ever seen. Kenji was looking forward to making a splash at his improv showcase. Omar wanted to spend a little time with the boy he’s been crushing on. Celeste, adrift in a new country, was hoping to connect with someone--anyone. And Marisa, once so certain of her goals, must now decide how far she’ll go to attain them. Every year, lock-in night changes lives. This year, it might just change the world. ReviewThank you to Inkyard Press for sharing a copy of We Didn’t Ask for This in exchange for my honest review.
I’m shocked by some readers' negative responses to this novel. Many people are saying it sensationalizes climate change and trivializes the work of Gen Z to fight for proper legislature and environmental protections, but I think the book is a topical commentary on the nature of these protests and does no harm to the cause. Alsaid shifts perspective fluidly from one character to another, which I loved. Subtle connections between each moment in the story allowed me to travel around the school and understand the events from multiple points of view. This way, I got to know the whole cast, and how Marisa’s actions catalyzed their own stories. This novel is as much about the environment as it is about the bond the lock-in forges between the kids. Alsaid emphasizes the transience of the school, but I liked that the chemistry was still there. Part of the Breakfast-Club-like charm of this story is its main four-some, who have little in common, yet find a way to connect. Part of the fun of my reading experience came from the fact that this story was, very obviously, a story. It had serious tones and reflected on real world issues, but for the most part the novel was light and funny. The theoretical lock-in had humor itself because of how unrealistic the activities were. Cooking competitions? Sanctioned food fights? Spray-painting? A decathlon? It was great to get out of my own head and live in a world where students could run around and have fun for a weekend, even if that weekend was interrupted in the manner shown here. We Didn’t Ask for This is for anyone who also needs to imagine another life, one with this type of unrelenting fun. I would recommend this novel to any environmentalist, as well as those looking for a bit of escapism. 4/5 stars!
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The BaronessHey, I'm Shreya! I love to read, write, travel, and drink tea. Disclosure: I am an affiliate of bookshop.org and I will earn a small commission if you click the above link and make a purchase.
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