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Tomboyland
A fiercely personal and startlingly universal essay collection about the mysteries of gender and desire, of identity and class, of the stories we tell and the places we call home.
Flyover country, the middle of nowhere, the space between the coasts. The American Midwest is a place beyond definition, whose very boundaries are a question. It’s a place of rolling prairies and towering pines, where guns in bars and trucks on blocks are as much a part of the landscape as rivers and lakes and farms. Where girls are girls and boys are boys, where women are mothers and wives, where one is taught to work hard and live between the lines. But what happens when those lines become increasingly unclear? When a girl, like the land that raised her, finds herself neither here nor there?
In this intrepid collection of essays, Melissa Faliveno traverses the liminal spaces of her childhood in working-class Wisconsin and the paths she’s traveled since, compelled by questions of girlhood and womanhood, queerness and class, and how the lands of our upbringing both define and complicate us even long after we’ve left. Part personal narrative, part cultural reportage, Tomboyland navigates midwestern traditions, mythologies, landscapes, and lives to explore the intersections of identity and place. From F5 tornadoes and fast-pitch softball to gun culture, strange glacial terrains, kink party potlucks, and the question of motherhood, Faliveno asks curious, honest, and often darkly funny questions about belonging and the body, isolation and community, and what we mean when we use words like woman, family, and home.
Flyover country, the middle of nowhere, the space between the coasts. The American Midwest is a place beyond definition, whose very boundaries are a question. It’s a place of rolling prairies and towering pines, where guns in bars and trucks on blocks are as much a part of the landscape as rivers and lakes and farms. Where girls are girls and boys are boys, where women are mothers and wives, where one is taught to work hard and live between the lines. But what happens when those lines become increasingly unclear? When a girl, like the land that raised her, finds herself neither here nor there?
In this intrepid collection of essays, Melissa Faliveno traverses the liminal spaces of her childhood in working-class Wisconsin and the paths she’s traveled since, compelled by questions of girlhood and womanhood, queerness and class, and how the lands of our upbringing both define and complicate us even long after we’ve left. Part personal narrative, part cultural reportage, Tomboyland navigates midwestern traditions, mythologies, landscapes, and lives to explore the intersections of identity and place. From F5 tornadoes and fast-pitch softball to gun culture, strange glacial terrains, kink party potlucks, and the question of motherhood, Faliveno asks curious, honest, and often darkly funny questions about belonging and the body, isolation and community, and what we mean when we use words like woman, family, and home.
249 pages, Hardcover
First published August 4, 2020
1592 people are currently reading
6782 people want to read
About the author
Melissa Faliveno
3 books147 followersAuthor of TOMBOYLAND: ESSAYS and the debut novel HEMLOCK, forthcoming January 20, 2026 from Little, Brown.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 351 reviews
August 18, 2020
At first, I resisted the word: I knew when people called me tomboy it was meant to call out my difference, that it set me apart from the other girls in my small Midwestern town. And back then, I didn't want to be different.
Melissa Faliveno grew up in a place where to be different is suspect. Rural Wisconsin is not a great place to stand out from the crowd unless it's for winning the most ribbons at the 4-H fair. But sometimes being different is a good thing, such as when one is forced to look inside oneself for meaning, and then lets it all pour out onto a page.
There are essays here about gender identity, guns, BDSM, roller derby, parenting choice, and tornadoes. And, Faliveno writes skillfully about each and every topic. Though some of these issues may seem like rough going, the author keeps her sense of humor.
"I played softball," I said.
"So you bat for the other team?"
"I'm a switch-hitter," I said. "But I'm not swinging for you."
Once, when I was in graduate school in suburban New York, a car full of young men drove by as I walked home. They yelled "Fag!" and threw an entire uneaten taco at me through the window. (Imagine the level of hate it would take to waste a taco.)
I was surprised by how much I loved this book. Faliveno seems ripe for a long, and brilliant career. Some people are born writers, and the rest of us . . . well, we just try not to resent 'em for it.
Melissa Faliveno grew up in a place where to be different is suspect. Rural Wisconsin is not a great place to stand out from the crowd unless it's for winning the most ribbons at the 4-H fair. But sometimes being different is a good thing, such as when one is forced to look inside oneself for meaning, and then lets it all pour out onto a page.
There are essays here about gender identity, guns, BDSM, roller derby, parenting choice, and tornadoes. And, Faliveno writes skillfully about each and every topic. Though some of these issues may seem like rough going, the author keeps her sense of humor.
"I played softball," I said.
"So you bat for the other team?"
"I'm a switch-hitter," I said. "But I'm not swinging for you."
Once, when I was in graduate school in suburban New York, a car full of young men drove by as I walked home. They yelled "Fag!" and threw an entire uneaten taco at me through the window. (Imagine the level of hate it would take to waste a taco.)
I was surprised by how much I loved this book. Faliveno seems ripe for a long, and brilliant career. Some people are born writers, and the rest of us . . . well, we just try not to resent 'em for it.
December 19, 2020
Really mixed for me, i had high expectations. Definitely recurring fatphobia, and also this strange (read: transphobic) omission around trans/nonbinary folks when discussing dating/the author's relationship to the queer community and especially in conversations around biphobia - felt really odd. Also a lot of LONG essays striving towards a journalist/reporter-y voice that felt forced.
July 7, 2020
I picture Melissa Faliveno, author of this Amazon First Read title "Tomboyland," one day sitting in front of her computer reading these words.
I picture her laughing, perhaps wondering aloud "Who is this lunatic?"
It's a fair question.
It's a question I ask myself often and it's a question I asked myself often while reading this unexpectedly immersive, engaging collection of intimate yet universal essays exploring the mysteries of gender and desire, identity and class, and what it means when we call someplace, or someone, home.
The truth is that "Tomboyland" isn't what I expected, though I must plead guilty when I acknowledge that my expectations were influenced by my own preconceived notions of what it means to explore the intersection of identity and place and to confront achingly vulnerable questions about gender identity, queerness, sexuality, and commitment.
I expected something. I expected something else. My expectations weren't better or worse. They were simply different than what unfolds within these pages.
The truth is that the reason I picture Faliveno laughing as she reads these words is that, above all else, "Tomboyland" is a love story to me.
I'm not talking about a Hallmark Channel kind of love story. I'm not talking about a white picket fence or even a family, though perhaps I am talking about a family of choice. I'm not talking about marriage or parenting or postcard perfect journeys or even necessarily happy endings.
I'm talking about a different kind of love. It's a kind of love that fills the pages of "Tomboyland," a tender beast of a book about the kind of love that is hard-earned and hard-fought and maybe even hard to believe in. It's a kind of love that finds connection in strange places, says "I love you" in strange ways, and learns that sometimes the unpredictable imperfect is more than sublime.
"Tomboyland" kicks off with Faliveno's childhood in rural Wisconsin, a place of rolling prairies and towering pines where girls are girls, boys are boys, women become mothers and wives, and where life fits nicely and neatly between established boundaries and expectations.
It's just the way it is. Unless it isn't.
It would be reasonable for you to expect Faliveno to disparage this almost paint-by-numbers childhood, yet it's an expectation that would never be met.
Instead, she does the unthinkable. She loves it. She loves it in the way that she knows it's helped to make her who she is and she's learning how to love that person day by day. Sometimes, minute by minute. She loves it because of the imperfect family and the imperfect friends and the imperfect relationships she's had along the way. She's left it, sure, but she still love it.
She loves Madison, Wisconsin, where she went to college and discovered more questions than answers and explored what it means to be Melissa Faliveno. She explored her relationship with her name and her gender and her sexuality and her feminist views and her submissive body.
She explored what it means to love, at times painfully and at times imperfectly. She did the best she could until she knew better. Then, she did better.
Yeah, I kind of quoted Maya Angelou. Deal with it.
"Tomboyland" is filled with essays you don't quite expect, from essays about Wisconsin to essays about kink and guns and gender and queerness and college and home and love and parenting and, well, about life and all the questions we ask as we're growing up and growing into who we believe ourselves to be and who we want ourselves to be.
At times, "Tomboyland" is brutal. At times, "Tomboyland" is almost stunning in its tenderness.
"Tomboyland" is both culturally aware and intimately insightful, an exploration of Midwestern values, traditions, mythologies, landscapes, and unspoken truths that all somehow mold those of us who've ever called the Midwest home. Despite being a lifelong urban dweller in Indiana, Faliveno's truths still feel true and they feel honest and, perhaps most importantly, they feel true to who she was and who she's become.
There's an essay on tornadoes, particularly a June 1984 F5 tornado that leveled her nearby village of Barneveld, that is simply riveting and easily one of my favorite essays from anything I've read yet this year.
Faliveno beautifully weaves together a human tapestry, occasionally light humor creeps its way through discussions of kink party potlucks and gun ownership and what it means to not want children of her own. Faliveno seems almost bewildered by her current relationship status, while she writes so warmly and affectionately about playing softball that you'll practically want to join her out on the diamond.
"Tomboyland" seems an almost odd choice for an Amazon First Read, yet it's easily the favorite amongst those I've experienced thus far. It's not quite a "love it" or "hate it" title, though Faliveno's ability to blend together both difficult to discuss subjects with stark beauty and remarkable beauty may very well leave even a good number of experimental readers feeling a bit askew.
So be it. "Tomboyland" is, most likely, not a book for everyone but for those who embrace it there will be a strong emotional connection and what can only be described as a kinship with Faliveno's literary voice. As someone whose body was disabled at birth by spina bifida and paraplegic and eventually by double amputation and more, I resonated deeply with Faliveno's exploration of body image and self-identity and what it all means.
As someone who was further physically damaged by sexual assault, Faliveno's writing on gender identity and sexuality exploration feels like a green light to put words to experiences and beliefs and ideas that have mostly existed in the foggy corners of my mind.
Yet, I also connected with her sense of connection and the fluid way it plays out in her daily life. I connected with the tenderness, there's that word again, that somehow finds its way into nearly every chapter as if it's something that manages to find Faliveno even when she tries to hide from it or leave it behind.
This debut collection of essays is a work of emotional, physical, and universal wonder. Unapologetically honest and uncommonly wise, "Tomboyland" marks the debut title from an author whose work I look forward to reading again and again and again.
"Tomboyland" arrives on August 1st from TOPPLE Books & Little A.
I picture her laughing, perhaps wondering aloud "Who is this lunatic?"
It's a fair question.
It's a question I ask myself often and it's a question I asked myself often while reading this unexpectedly immersive, engaging collection of intimate yet universal essays exploring the mysteries of gender and desire, identity and class, and what it means when we call someplace, or someone, home.
The truth is that "Tomboyland" isn't what I expected, though I must plead guilty when I acknowledge that my expectations were influenced by my own preconceived notions of what it means to explore the intersection of identity and place and to confront achingly vulnerable questions about gender identity, queerness, sexuality, and commitment.
I expected something. I expected something else. My expectations weren't better or worse. They were simply different than what unfolds within these pages.
The truth is that the reason I picture Faliveno laughing as she reads these words is that, above all else, "Tomboyland" is a love story to me.
I'm not talking about a Hallmark Channel kind of love story. I'm not talking about a white picket fence or even a family, though perhaps I am talking about a family of choice. I'm not talking about marriage or parenting or postcard perfect journeys or even necessarily happy endings.
I'm talking about a different kind of love. It's a kind of love that fills the pages of "Tomboyland," a tender beast of a book about the kind of love that is hard-earned and hard-fought and maybe even hard to believe in. It's a kind of love that finds connection in strange places, says "I love you" in strange ways, and learns that sometimes the unpredictable imperfect is more than sublime.
"Tomboyland" kicks off with Faliveno's childhood in rural Wisconsin, a place of rolling prairies and towering pines where girls are girls, boys are boys, women become mothers and wives, and where life fits nicely and neatly between established boundaries and expectations.
It's just the way it is. Unless it isn't.
It would be reasonable for you to expect Faliveno to disparage this almost paint-by-numbers childhood, yet it's an expectation that would never be met.
Instead, she does the unthinkable. She loves it. She loves it in the way that she knows it's helped to make her who she is and she's learning how to love that person day by day. Sometimes, minute by minute. She loves it because of the imperfect family and the imperfect friends and the imperfect relationships she's had along the way. She's left it, sure, but she still love it.
She loves Madison, Wisconsin, where she went to college and discovered more questions than answers and explored what it means to be Melissa Faliveno. She explored her relationship with her name and her gender and her sexuality and her feminist views and her submissive body.
She explored what it means to love, at times painfully and at times imperfectly. She did the best she could until she knew better. Then, she did better.
Yeah, I kind of quoted Maya Angelou. Deal with it.
"Tomboyland" is filled with essays you don't quite expect, from essays about Wisconsin to essays about kink and guns and gender and queerness and college and home and love and parenting and, well, about life and all the questions we ask as we're growing up and growing into who we believe ourselves to be and who we want ourselves to be.
At times, "Tomboyland" is brutal. At times, "Tomboyland" is almost stunning in its tenderness.
"Tomboyland" is both culturally aware and intimately insightful, an exploration of Midwestern values, traditions, mythologies, landscapes, and unspoken truths that all somehow mold those of us who've ever called the Midwest home. Despite being a lifelong urban dweller in Indiana, Faliveno's truths still feel true and they feel honest and, perhaps most importantly, they feel true to who she was and who she's become.
There's an essay on tornadoes, particularly a June 1984 F5 tornado that leveled her nearby village of Barneveld, that is simply riveting and easily one of my favorite essays from anything I've read yet this year.
Faliveno beautifully weaves together a human tapestry, occasionally light humor creeps its way through discussions of kink party potlucks and gun ownership and what it means to not want children of her own. Faliveno seems almost bewildered by her current relationship status, while she writes so warmly and affectionately about playing softball that you'll practically want to join her out on the diamond.
"Tomboyland" seems an almost odd choice for an Amazon First Read, yet it's easily the favorite amongst those I've experienced thus far. It's not quite a "love it" or "hate it" title, though Faliveno's ability to blend together both difficult to discuss subjects with stark beauty and remarkable beauty may very well leave even a good number of experimental readers feeling a bit askew.
So be it. "Tomboyland" is, most likely, not a book for everyone but for those who embrace it there will be a strong emotional connection and what can only be described as a kinship with Faliveno's literary voice. As someone whose body was disabled at birth by spina bifida and paraplegic and eventually by double amputation and more, I resonated deeply with Faliveno's exploration of body image and self-identity and what it all means.
As someone who was further physically damaged by sexual assault, Faliveno's writing on gender identity and sexuality exploration feels like a green light to put words to experiences and beliefs and ideas that have mostly existed in the foggy corners of my mind.
Yet, I also connected with her sense of connection and the fluid way it plays out in her daily life. I connected with the tenderness, there's that word again, that somehow finds its way into nearly every chapter as if it's something that manages to find Faliveno even when she tries to hide from it or leave it behind.
This debut collection of essays is a work of emotional, physical, and universal wonder. Unapologetically honest and uncommonly wise, "Tomboyland" marks the debut title from an author whose work I look forward to reading again and again and again.
"Tomboyland" arrives on August 1st from TOPPLE Books & Little A.
August 24, 2020
The missing man.
Usually, when Amazon offers two Kindle First books, I only take one. But this month, there were two non-fiction selections. So I took them both and read one and reviewed it. Then I read this one and I've spent most of a month trying to figure out what to say about it. The only thing I can say for sure is this - the author writes beautifully. I just didn't always care for what she was writing about.
If I'd read only the first and last chapters of this book, I would have given it five stars and raved about the author's skill as an investigative reporter. I would have talked about the satisfaction of reading a fine writer writing about a land and people she loves dearly and deeply. Both the first and last "essays" are about her native land - southwestern Wisconsin and how growing up there shaped her as a human. She writes about fierce prairie weather and how quickly it can change lives. About the toughness of the people who can live in such a place. About the danger of the land and all it holds being destroyed by developers who care only for the bottom line. They grab the money and run, leaving others to deal with the problems.
But I also read the essays in between and I found myself swinging from pity to annoyance to horror. At one point in her life, the author was a "cutter" and it seems to me that she approaches telling her life story in the way I've read cutters approach inflicting pain on themselves. First she makes a shallow slice, then a deeper one. Soon you're looking at things you never wanted to see. It's impossible not to sympathize with her pain, but I'm not sure she's gotten a handle on its source.
Sometimes she sounds like a petulant teen, claiming that NO ONE understands her. She's bi-sexual, which she says makes her despised by both straights and gays. She's female, but looks male. Fine with me, but she seems insulted to be taken for either gender. I agree with her that we are far too obsessed with genders, but it's a bit unrealistic to simply expect them to disappear. She hates her girly name, but hasn't found a male counterpart that suits her. "Mel" seems obvious to me, but isn't mentioned.
Her current partner is male and she's upset when they're taken for a couple of gay males. Why? She fled the confines of a conservative mid-western community for the anonymity of the big city, but complains that she's an outcast there, too. She doesn't like the pronouns "she" and "her" but offers no alternatives. I don't mind saying "ze/zir" (sounds like a Swiss breakfast food) but new words take time to find acceptance.
Perhaps this is a generational thing. I've lived long enough to know the futility of expecting the world to "validate" you. Life is harsh and other people have their own problems. If you have a few people in your corner, count yourself lucky. And perhaps (having grown up in the fifties, when women had so few choices) I'm needlessly impatient with young women who agonize over what they see as society's expectations of them. I understand that parents might put pressure on a daughter to marry and have children. Might even favor a daughter who follows that conventional pattern over a different one. But she says that her parents never objected to her life choices.
I don't see that society as a whole punishes the childless. Would the birthrate be as low as it is if that were true? She's angry when she attends a Catholic wedding and the priest assumes that the bride will bear children. What did she expect him to say? If the woman wanted a less conventional wedding, she would have chosen one. It really isn't the author's business to appoint herself the Defender of All Women. Maybe some don't want to be defended.
She blames her anger on society's disapproval of her adult choices, but then tells us that she was famous for her tantrums in pre-school. She paints herself as the ultimate tomboy - a little girl who wanted to be tough and macho. But a conversation with a childhood friend reveals that she was the girliest girl in town. She seems to have forgotten or rewritten larges portions of her growing up years to suit her present story.
What puzzles me more than anything else is the shadowy nature of her father in her stories. She writes in loving detail about her mother and the other women in her family. She never says anything negative about her father or indicates that he was abusive, but he's largely ignored. How did a East Coast boy from a big Italian family end up married to a mid-western girl and living in her homeland? What kind of man was he and what was his relationship with his daughter and only child? What was missing that led her to such extreme measures to seduce older men and to please them once the relationship was in place?
There are a lot of pieces missing in this puzzle. It can't be discounted because the author's writing is so far above average. A book whose subject matter leaves one reader cold might mean a great deal to another reader. But does reading the anguish of such an angry young woman really HELP, even if the reader sees herself in the author's pain? If there are any answers, any solutions, even any light at the end of the tunnel in this book, I missed them. Anger is a necessary human emotion, but it accomplishes nothing by itself.
I don't regret reading the book. I've thought about it many times since finishing it, which is a compliment to the author. I hope she finds peace. I hope her skill as a writer helps her reach people who feel like perpetual outsiders. On the other hand, I think it's important to keep one's personal problems in perspective. No one group has exclusive rights to pain and dissatisfaction. Everyone must find a way to live in the world and get the most out of life. It's just part of being human.
Usually, when Amazon offers two Kindle First books, I only take one. But this month, there were two non-fiction selections. So I took them both and read one and reviewed it. Then I read this one and I've spent most of a month trying to figure out what to say about it. The only thing I can say for sure is this - the author writes beautifully. I just didn't always care for what she was writing about.
If I'd read only the first and last chapters of this book, I would have given it five stars and raved about the author's skill as an investigative reporter. I would have talked about the satisfaction of reading a fine writer writing about a land and people she loves dearly and deeply. Both the first and last "essays" are about her native land - southwestern Wisconsin and how growing up there shaped her as a human. She writes about fierce prairie weather and how quickly it can change lives. About the toughness of the people who can live in such a place. About the danger of the land and all it holds being destroyed by developers who care only for the bottom line. They grab the money and run, leaving others to deal with the problems.
But I also read the essays in between and I found myself swinging from pity to annoyance to horror. At one point in her life, the author was a "cutter" and it seems to me that she approaches telling her life story in the way I've read cutters approach inflicting pain on themselves. First she makes a shallow slice, then a deeper one. Soon you're looking at things you never wanted to see. It's impossible not to sympathize with her pain, but I'm not sure she's gotten a handle on its source.
Sometimes she sounds like a petulant teen, claiming that NO ONE understands her. She's bi-sexual, which she says makes her despised by both straights and gays. She's female, but looks male. Fine with me, but she seems insulted to be taken for either gender. I agree with her that we are far too obsessed with genders, but it's a bit unrealistic to simply expect them to disappear. She hates her girly name, but hasn't found a male counterpart that suits her. "Mel" seems obvious to me, but isn't mentioned.
Her current partner is male and she's upset when they're taken for a couple of gay males. Why? She fled the confines of a conservative mid-western community for the anonymity of the big city, but complains that she's an outcast there, too. She doesn't like the pronouns "she" and "her" but offers no alternatives. I don't mind saying "ze/zir" (sounds like a Swiss breakfast food) but new words take time to find acceptance.
Perhaps this is a generational thing. I've lived long enough to know the futility of expecting the world to "validate" you. Life is harsh and other people have their own problems. If you have a few people in your corner, count yourself lucky. And perhaps (having grown up in the fifties, when women had so few choices) I'm needlessly impatient with young women who agonize over what they see as society's expectations of them. I understand that parents might put pressure on a daughter to marry and have children. Might even favor a daughter who follows that conventional pattern over a different one. But she says that her parents never objected to her life choices.
I don't see that society as a whole punishes the childless. Would the birthrate be as low as it is if that were true? She's angry when she attends a Catholic wedding and the priest assumes that the bride will bear children. What did she expect him to say? If the woman wanted a less conventional wedding, she would have chosen one. It really isn't the author's business to appoint herself the Defender of All Women. Maybe some don't want to be defended.
She blames her anger on society's disapproval of her adult choices, but then tells us that she was famous for her tantrums in pre-school. She paints herself as the ultimate tomboy - a little girl who wanted to be tough and macho. But a conversation with a childhood friend reveals that she was the girliest girl in town. She seems to have forgotten or rewritten larges portions of her growing up years to suit her present story.
What puzzles me more than anything else is the shadowy nature of her father in her stories. She writes in loving detail about her mother and the other women in her family. She never says anything negative about her father or indicates that he was abusive, but he's largely ignored. How did a East Coast boy from a big Italian family end up married to a mid-western girl and living in her homeland? What kind of man was he and what was his relationship with his daughter and only child? What was missing that led her to such extreme measures to seduce older men and to please them once the relationship was in place?
There are a lot of pieces missing in this puzzle. It can't be discounted because the author's writing is so far above average. A book whose subject matter leaves one reader cold might mean a great deal to another reader. But does reading the anguish of such an angry young woman really HELP, even if the reader sees herself in the author's pain? If there are any answers, any solutions, even any light at the end of the tunnel in this book, I missed them. Anger is a necessary human emotion, but it accomplishes nothing by itself.
I don't regret reading the book. I've thought about it many times since finishing it, which is a compliment to the author. I hope she finds peace. I hope her skill as a writer helps her reach people who feel like perpetual outsiders. On the other hand, I think it's important to keep one's personal problems in perspective. No one group has exclusive rights to pain and dissatisfaction. Everyone must find a way to live in the world and get the most out of life. It's just part of being human.
July 15, 2020
Eight essays: The Finger of God. Tomboy. Of a Moth. Switch-Hitter. Meat and Potatoes. Gun Country. Motherland. Driftless.
These are the compositions that make up Melissa Faliveno’s collection of essays called Tomboyland: Essays. From The Finger of God, in which she writes of tornadoes, Faliveno takes us on a very personal, sometimes stormy expression of her own self-discovery and self-expression. The F5 tornado that ravaged the small Wisconsin town near her own town of Mount Horeb is a metaphor for her own painful teen and young adult years. The Moths essay made me chuckle because my wife and I struggled with “mealy moths” for at least a whole summer until we finally rid our home of them. Unlike Melissa, we did not learn to love them. I found Meat and Potatoes to be sort of all over the place. It starts out being the way someone described her – “what you see is what you get.” And about food. But then it wanders into acknowledgement of having engaged in self-destructive behaviors – excessive drinking and drugs, self-mutilation, BDSM. It felt sort of all over the place, this spiral that eventually returns to food and back to sexual expression. This particular essay is brutally honest and may not be for everyone. But with Melissa Faliveno, what you see is what you get.
In Switch-Hitter, she naturally writes about her love of softball, to which I could totally relate, including bonding with teammates. This also includes questioning her sexuality and gender identity, swinging both ways. She makes no apologies. She has always been willing to try something new, whether it’s roller derby, Japanese food, or kink. She admits to loving women; however, it seems that many, perhaps most, of her significant love relationships have been with men. Still, she seems open to anything and anyone – including just being alone.
Gun Country, Motherland, and Driftless explore the culture of her Wisconsin upbringing, her family, and friends. She says “the Midwest,” although I think there are some significant differences in geography and culture even between Northern Minnesota, where I grew up, and central Wisconsin. But Minnesotans are hunters, so I found her essay on guns quite interesting. There is a part of her that understands the gun culture, the hunting environment that she grew up in; there is another part that rejects the need to carry a weapon for protection. Motherhood, too. I get what she’s saying about babies. But what I thought was ironic was her statement that she feels that carrying a child and giving birth would be, “an act of violence against my body.” (p. 65) What?! This is a person who has engaged in S & M, who used to cut herself, who abused alcohol. I don’t quite understand that statement. But I do not judge her at all for not wanting children. As a now senior woman whose only children are all furry four-legged creatures, I used to feel very uncomfortable at baby showers and weddings. So I get it. She writes about her spider plant having babies and about gardening and nurturing the earth with her mother. She cherishes her mother and grandmother and what she has learned from them, and I love that!
"Driftless" refers to areas in Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, and Illinois that were bypassed by the glacier. It’s a word, she says, the “suggests stagnancy, stillness, something that remains, but at the same time feels like something moving. A simultaneous leaving and staying.” (p. 236) To me, this suggests the flow of her life to this point, her 36 years of ebbing and flowing between Mount Horeb, Madison, Ohio, and New York. Trying new places and lifestyles, always returning home to find it changed, yet familiar and comforting. I found this last piece to be quiet and poetic, a fitting end for a sometimes tumultuous body of work.
Tomboyland: Essays is a thought-provoking anthology of highly personal writings about one woman’s journey to find a home, both inside and out of her physical being. In her search for identity, belonging, unique experiences, companionship, meaning, and depth in her life, she has felt the raging power of a twister inside herself as well as the thrill of hitting a home run that takes her to the highest of heights. That is the human experience, and whether or not those exact events are like what you or I have been through, we are all on a journey for understanding of ourselves and our world. Thank you, “Lou,” for sharing part of your story with us.
I received this book through Amazon’s First Reads. My opinion is my own.
4.5 rounded to 5 stars
These are the compositions that make up Melissa Faliveno’s collection of essays called Tomboyland: Essays. From The Finger of God, in which she writes of tornadoes, Faliveno takes us on a very personal, sometimes stormy expression of her own self-discovery and self-expression. The F5 tornado that ravaged the small Wisconsin town near her own town of Mount Horeb is a metaphor for her own painful teen and young adult years. The Moths essay made me chuckle because my wife and I struggled with “mealy moths” for at least a whole summer until we finally rid our home of them. Unlike Melissa, we did not learn to love them. I found Meat and Potatoes to be sort of all over the place. It starts out being the way someone described her – “what you see is what you get.” And about food. But then it wanders into acknowledgement of having engaged in self-destructive behaviors – excessive drinking and drugs, self-mutilation, BDSM. It felt sort of all over the place, this spiral that eventually returns to food and back to sexual expression. This particular essay is brutally honest and may not be for everyone. But with Melissa Faliveno, what you see is what you get.
In Switch-Hitter, she naturally writes about her love of softball, to which I could totally relate, including bonding with teammates. This also includes questioning her sexuality and gender identity, swinging both ways. She makes no apologies. She has always been willing to try something new, whether it’s roller derby, Japanese food, or kink. She admits to loving women; however, it seems that many, perhaps most, of her significant love relationships have been with men. Still, she seems open to anything and anyone – including just being alone.
Gun Country, Motherland, and Driftless explore the culture of her Wisconsin upbringing, her family, and friends. She says “the Midwest,” although I think there are some significant differences in geography and culture even between Northern Minnesota, where I grew up, and central Wisconsin. But Minnesotans are hunters, so I found her essay on guns quite interesting. There is a part of her that understands the gun culture, the hunting environment that she grew up in; there is another part that rejects the need to carry a weapon for protection. Motherhood, too. I get what she’s saying about babies. But what I thought was ironic was her statement that she feels that carrying a child and giving birth would be, “an act of violence against my body.” (p. 65) What?! This is a person who has engaged in S & M, who used to cut herself, who abused alcohol. I don’t quite understand that statement. But I do not judge her at all for not wanting children. As a now senior woman whose only children are all furry four-legged creatures, I used to feel very uncomfortable at baby showers and weddings. So I get it. She writes about her spider plant having babies and about gardening and nurturing the earth with her mother. She cherishes her mother and grandmother and what she has learned from them, and I love that!
"Driftless" refers to areas in Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, and Illinois that were bypassed by the glacier. It’s a word, she says, the “suggests stagnancy, stillness, something that remains, but at the same time feels like something moving. A simultaneous leaving and staying.” (p. 236) To me, this suggests the flow of her life to this point, her 36 years of ebbing and flowing between Mount Horeb, Madison, Ohio, and New York. Trying new places and lifestyles, always returning home to find it changed, yet familiar and comforting. I found this last piece to be quiet and poetic, a fitting end for a sometimes tumultuous body of work.
Tomboyland: Essays is a thought-provoking anthology of highly personal writings about one woman’s journey to find a home, both inside and out of her physical being. In her search for identity, belonging, unique experiences, companionship, meaning, and depth in her life, she has felt the raging power of a twister inside herself as well as the thrill of hitting a home run that takes her to the highest of heights. That is the human experience, and whether or not those exact events are like what you or I have been through, we are all on a journey for understanding of ourselves and our world. Thank you, “Lou,” for sharing part of your story with us.
I received this book through Amazon’s First Reads. My opinion is my own.
4.5 rounded to 5 stars
July 1, 2020
Makes Me Happy to Be a Lifelong Left Coast Citizen
I love reading books that get you thinking, and this one certainly did. This collection of essays explores several complex and arguably controversial topics from both a profoundly personal standpoint and a broader cultural perspective. As someone who grew up on the left coast of the US, I appreciated how the author made the Midwest of her youth—a culture vastly different from the one I was raised in—come alive so vividly. Being a square peg in a land of round holes is not easy. As the world is becoming more accepting of sexual, gender, and desire fluidity, the essays feel particularly timely. I found this to be a compelling and fascinating read that looks at both the author’s interior landscape as well as her cultural milieu—which weren't often congruent early on. Our roots can be somewhat tangled, and the concepts of home and belonging are not simple ones.
I received a free copy of this book, but that did not affect my review.
I love reading books that get you thinking, and this one certainly did. This collection of essays explores several complex and arguably controversial topics from both a profoundly personal standpoint and a broader cultural perspective. As someone who grew up on the left coast of the US, I appreciated how the author made the Midwest of her youth—a culture vastly different from the one I was raised in—come alive so vividly. Being a square peg in a land of round holes is not easy. As the world is becoming more accepting of sexual, gender, and desire fluidity, the essays feel particularly timely. I found this to be a compelling and fascinating read that looks at both the author’s interior landscape as well as her cultural milieu—which weren't often congruent early on. Our roots can be somewhat tangled, and the concepts of home and belonging are not simple ones.
I received a free copy of this book, but that did not affect my review.
July 9, 2020
This was an interesting collection of essays. I loved the two 'bookend' essays--"The Finger of God" and "Driftless," especially having grown up 30 miles or so west of the author's hometown. In fact, I was deeply moved while reading "The Finger of God" in particular.
However, in some of the middle works, I felt there were a few awkward juxtapositions within the essays that didn't necessarily allow for smooth transitions (maybe just for me as the reader), but I still found beauty in Faliveno's prose nonetheless. The only other aspect I took charge with, of course, is the generalizations about the Midwest. When the author speaks with her friends about motherhood and women, a friend suggests there is no one definition; I agree---but I would also argue "there is no one thing" that means Midwestern.
4 stars - Faliveno moves her readers, presents a diverse range of topics, and makes her readers think!
However, in some of the middle works, I felt there were a few awkward juxtapositions within the essays that didn't necessarily allow for smooth transitions (maybe just for me as the reader), but I still found beauty in Faliveno's prose nonetheless. The only other aspect I took charge with, of course, is the generalizations about the Midwest. When the author speaks with her friends about motherhood and women, a friend suggests there is no one definition; I agree---but I would also argue "there is no one thing" that means Midwestern.
4 stars - Faliveno moves her readers, presents a diverse range of topics, and makes her readers think!
July 20, 2020
I have a lot to say about this collection of wonderfully written essays, but I’ll try to keep it short.
Telling you I didn’t tear up multiple times while reading this would be a lie. It might be the empath in me, but you could also blame it on feeling so heard, so validated, and so understood. So much of what Faliveno writes about - her memories, her experiences - are so similar to my own life and experiences growing up. From family and what defines it, to the intersection of gender identity and sexual identity and navigating what defines being queer. How our bodies and femininity (or lack thereof), can be confusing and hard to find a community in which you feel you belong. Self harm and bdsm, a connection of inflicting pain and pleasure I’ve never made before. The tornadoes and the god-fearing Midwest, not wanting to be a mother and the manipulative and invasive conversations that go along with that choice. A new understanding of what feeling grief actually means to us, and how, for example, you can love the feeling of power shooting a gun and hitting a target gives you, but also hate guns all at the same time. How, for those of us who have a lot of anger, rage is a scary and confusing emotion to navigate. So much of her life, and mine, is covered in here.
This was such a nourishing read for me. I’ve never highlighted so many passages in a book before I read this. Please, even if none of what I’ve mentioned above resonates with you, read this anyway.
Side note: I’ve also heard Dan Savage deny bisexuality on a few occasions. I hope he’s come around since then. Eye roll.
Telling you I didn’t tear up multiple times while reading this would be a lie. It might be the empath in me, but you could also blame it on feeling so heard, so validated, and so understood. So much of what Faliveno writes about - her memories, her experiences - are so similar to my own life and experiences growing up. From family and what defines it, to the intersection of gender identity and sexual identity and navigating what defines being queer. How our bodies and femininity (or lack thereof), can be confusing and hard to find a community in which you feel you belong. Self harm and bdsm, a connection of inflicting pain and pleasure I’ve never made before. The tornadoes and the god-fearing Midwest, not wanting to be a mother and the manipulative and invasive conversations that go along with that choice. A new understanding of what feeling grief actually means to us, and how, for example, you can love the feeling of power shooting a gun and hitting a target gives you, but also hate guns all at the same time. How, for those of us who have a lot of anger, rage is a scary and confusing emotion to navigate. So much of her life, and mine, is covered in here.
This was such a nourishing read for me. I’ve never highlighted so many passages in a book before I read this. Please, even if none of what I’ve mentioned above resonates with you, read this anyway.
Side note: I’ve also heard Dan Savage deny bisexuality on a few occasions. I hope he’s come around since then. Eye roll.
July 17, 2020
I could not finish this book. The author reminds me of Charlie Brown who has a rain cloud over his head but I get the deep self-examination of her self but the essays felt like deadweights and seemingly never ended. I finally was exhausted by the minutiae of her remembrances with nary a space for breath. The absence of even a glimmer of humor was deadly. The other unforgivable thing is, it crescendoed in boredom. So, I stopped reading it. The end.
July 19, 2020
Another choice from the Amazon First Reads program...I'm off to a great start with those. Two in a row that I've really enjoyed.
While this book is ostensibly a collection of essays, it really doesn't read as such. It doesn't have the ebbs and flows that you usually find in a book of essays. It flows consistently with each essay showing her characteristic style and helping to paint an overall portrait. This portrait is as much of the soul of the land the author comes from as it is of the soul of the author herself.
It's a tale of contrasts, best exemplified by the essay that tackled the oh-so-related concepts of midwestern potlucks and BDSM. Gardening and breeding and gender and relationships and guns and vegetarianism...the topics covered are about as broad as you would expect from a Wisconsonite New Yorker.
Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Her style is blunt and straightforward, while being thoughtful and complex. She doesn't purport to have answers on how to live life, but offers an honest and often occasionally uncomfortable look at her own path. She has an interesting mind and I will probably seek out more of her work.
While this book is ostensibly a collection of essays, it really doesn't read as such. It doesn't have the ebbs and flows that you usually find in a book of essays. It flows consistently with each essay showing her characteristic style and helping to paint an overall portrait. This portrait is as much of the soul of the land the author comes from as it is of the soul of the author herself.
It's a tale of contrasts, best exemplified by the essay that tackled the oh-so-related concepts of midwestern potlucks and BDSM. Gardening and breeding and gender and relationships and guns and vegetarianism...the topics covered are about as broad as you would expect from a Wisconsonite New Yorker.
Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Her style is blunt and straightforward, while being thoughtful and complex. She doesn't purport to have answers on how to live life, but offers an honest and often occasionally uncomfortable look at her own path. She has an interesting mind and I will probably seek out more of her work.
August 1, 2021
I loved this book. I loved it in a way that makes me terribly nervous to write this review for fear of not articulating well enough to give it justice. It's not a perfect book (I'd throw out half an essay), but it's striking and will stay with me. It's swathed in stories and analysis and feelings of home. The author grew up 22 miles west of Madison; so many of her experiences are my experiences, while so many of them are not. It was living through the eyes of someone seemingly entirely unlike me and yet very much like me.
I appreciated her ability to write truthfully about herself and her motivations, not afraid to illustrate how we are human and are sometimes unable to offer to others what we want to receive ourselves. Near the end of the book, she speaks of a feeling in herself and others and is able to identify it as grief- not in the way the word is typically used and yet, so clearly correct, a bit stunning. The entire novel is about being in conflict and trying to find who you are, but perhaps realizing that this is a moving target with reflection being the best weapon we have to look at the pieces in all of their varying lights as we leave and grow and change.
I appreciated her ability to write truthfully about herself and her motivations, not afraid to illustrate how we are human and are sometimes unable to offer to others what we want to receive ourselves. Near the end of the book, she speaks of a feeling in herself and others and is able to identify it as grief- not in the way the word is typically used and yet, so clearly correct, a bit stunning. The entire novel is about being in conflict and trying to find who you are, but perhaps realizing that this is a moving target with reflection being the best weapon we have to look at the pieces in all of their varying lights as we leave and grow and change.
December 24, 2020
As a queer person born and raised in the rural Midwest, Melissa Faliveno's "Tomboyland," a collection of essays that reflects on her queerness and Midwestern roots, served as a reminder that even those places we leave remain a part of who we become.
Melissa lives in New York City with her (male) partner of ten years. A queer woman who has wrestled with her gender and sexual identities for years, uses the essays in this collection to confront her longing for the Midwest and the ways of life that she left behind but longs for as she lives on the coast. From tales about being a tomboy to tales about the meat and potatoes that constitute a majority of the Midwestern diet, Faliveno has a remarkable ability to interweave social criticism with self reflection in a way that makes each essay resonate and help readers reflect on their own upbringings and where they come from.
At times Faliveno gets a bit defensive about her views and beliefs and identities and a little more pushing on her own end could have allowed her to confront these defenses and interrogate why it is they persist. And she includes numerous conversations with friends throughout her essays but also fails to really interrogate the thoughts and views of these third parties - taking them at face value. Despite this single flaw, this collection is otherwise the perfect book to read when your nostalgia pops up and makes you long for your childhood and the places that made you who you are today.
Melissa lives in New York City with her (male) partner of ten years. A queer woman who has wrestled with her gender and sexual identities for years, uses the essays in this collection to confront her longing for the Midwest and the ways of life that she left behind but longs for as she lives on the coast. From tales about being a tomboy to tales about the meat and potatoes that constitute a majority of the Midwestern diet, Faliveno has a remarkable ability to interweave social criticism with self reflection in a way that makes each essay resonate and help readers reflect on their own upbringings and where they come from.
At times Faliveno gets a bit defensive about her views and beliefs and identities and a little more pushing on her own end could have allowed her to confront these defenses and interrogate why it is they persist. And she includes numerous conversations with friends throughout her essays but also fails to really interrogate the thoughts and views of these third parties - taking them at face value. Despite this single flaw, this collection is otherwise the perfect book to read when your nostalgia pops up and makes you long for your childhood and the places that made you who you are today.
July 9, 2020
The author has that quality that a superior essayist needs, the ability to keep being interesting as she spins her tale. From the descriptions of tornados to the trolls in Mt. Horeb, Wisconsin (you can find said trolls on Google Earth if you got to E Main Street and N Third Street in Mt. Horeb and head east) the writing is smooth and flowing. And I love the self-deprecating humor. For example, as a leader in a religious group she says of the rules she quoted to others, '--even as I, like so many kids in that group, was enthusiastically partaking in them.'
I have seen my only tornados in Wisconsin, but never thought to describe them as beautifully;
'And then my mother saw them: fast, bright sparks of green, a second or two apart--like flashbulbs in the distance against the dark.'
Melissa as a voice comes across as likeable and entertaining. She manages to put her tornados out there--dark and threatening, close enough that the reader can feel them. The trick with an essay is to say just enough, not more or less than what will capture the readers' imagination and sync with their life experience. Like being left outside in the wilderness during a church group outing with only a bible and a flashlight and having the flashlight go out.
I looked for a sample before I got the book, but did not find one. I got the book anyway and am glad I did.
I have seen my only tornados in Wisconsin, but never thought to describe them as beautifully;
'And then my mother saw them: fast, bright sparks of green, a second or two apart--like flashbulbs in the distance against the dark.'
Melissa as a voice comes across as likeable and entertaining. She manages to put her tornados out there--dark and threatening, close enough that the reader can feel them. The trick with an essay is to say just enough, not more or less than what will capture the readers' imagination and sync with their life experience. Like being left outside in the wilderness during a church group outing with only a bible and a flashlight and having the flashlight go out.
I looked for a sample before I got the book, but did not find one. I got the book anyway and am glad I did.
July 8, 2020
The midwestern town Monica Faliveno grew up in might well fit the popular image of the Midwest: "rural, mostly white, working-class Christian" as she herself describes it. Yet, Faliveno is not quite the "meat and potatoes" fare one might expect from such a description. Being, as I am, unfamiliar with the Midwest, cisgender, male, and heterosexual, one of the chief appeals of Faliveno's essays is the array of unfamiliar experiences and challenges they reveal to the reader (or at least to this reader). Her writing brings Faliveno's world to life (I could feel the moths crawling over my skin and may never see tornadoes the same) as she scrutinizes the tensions between identity and community: gender expression and sexuality at odds with a traditional Christian upbringing; perceptions of guns in the city versus the country; being a woman with no clear desire to have children; the family one's born into and the families one makes. Her prose flows such that one is swept along in the stream of her thoughts, unsure of what will come next, but never lost or bored. Faliveno's explorations of where she comes from and how she found her people are not easily put down.
September 14, 2020
First, this book ideally should come with trigger warnings: bullying and harassment, suicide, self-harm, guns and gun violence, discussion of hunting and some discussion about slaughter (as a vegan I found these parts the hardest to get through!), and kink/BDSM come to mind as things readers may want to be warned of before they read this book.
The book, a collection of essays and personal introspection, is candid - at times shockingly so (for some people). There were times when I teetered on the edge of wondering at how mercurial the author was in understanding herself and also admiring her honesty to admit that she didn't always know herself.
I once read/heard someone say "we read to know we're not alone" and parts of this book fit that maxim for me. There were some parts of the book that I found very relatable, considering I am also a Midwesterner. I also fall along the gender spectrum and took time to feel comfortable with it and grew up androgynous and non-binary so that some of the experiences of being "misgendered" were so in tune with my own. Then other parts were so far from anything I have ever experienced myself and have only experienced in others minimally that it was like a glimpse into worlds I will never visit and have little desire to visit either!
I also think that people who write and share essays and content that is their own narrative are looking for a way to understand themselves better and to help others understand them better. I wonder if this book served that purpose as well! Either way, I think it took integrity and grit for the author to share everything they did, and for that and the relatable parts that really resonated with me, I am very grateful.
The book, a collection of essays and personal introspection, is candid - at times shockingly so (for some people). There were times when I teetered on the edge of wondering at how mercurial the author was in understanding herself and also admiring her honesty to admit that she didn't always know herself.
I once read/heard someone say "we read to know we're not alone" and parts of this book fit that maxim for me. There were some parts of the book that I found very relatable, considering I am also a Midwesterner. I also fall along the gender spectrum and took time to feel comfortable with it and grew up androgynous and non-binary so that some of the experiences of being "misgendered" were so in tune with my own. Then other parts were so far from anything I have ever experienced myself and have only experienced in others minimally that it was like a glimpse into worlds I will never visit and have little desire to visit either!
I also think that people who write and share essays and content that is their own narrative are looking for a way to understand themselves better and to help others understand them better. I wonder if this book served that purpose as well! Either way, I think it took integrity and grit for the author to share everything they did, and for that and the relatable parts that really resonated with me, I am very grateful.
July 28, 2021
I live in the area she's writing about, so it was neat to hear reflections on local people and places, our culture, and what it's like to be queer in this area. She's thoughtful and non-judgmental. I loved how she discusses embodiment, though as a disabled person I couldn't exactly relate to her depictions of strength and athleticism. I loved the positive and loving discussion of kink, polyamory, and various queer relationships and identities. (I listened to the audio version, performed by the author).
Content notes: self-harm, alcohol abuse, sexual assault and harassment, domestic violence, death of a child.
Content notes: self-harm, alcohol abuse, sexual assault and harassment, domestic violence, death of a child.
July 30, 2020
I was so blown away by this essay collection. Melissa Faliveno is a natural storyteller and an extraordinarily gifted writer. So whether she's talking about tornados or gender identity or growing up in the Driftless Area of Wisconsin, she writes with a sense of wonder and curiousity about the world and the people she's talking with and about her self and her own struggles with a body that doesn't always comply with expectations. She gives you access to her thinking in a way that makes you feel special for having read it, for being allowed to know what she knows. I came away from this collection absolutely in awe. What a generous, funny, thoughtful, and thought-provoking collection. Can't recommend this highly enough.
July 13, 2020
Thoughts~
I enjoyed this one! A beautifully written, timely collection of essays exploring a diverse range of topics.
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Faliveno is an excellent essayist. Born in the Midwest she uses her own upbringing and personal opinions and experiences to bring to life these essays. Topics of gender expression and sexuality, Christian upbringing, feminism, rage, identity, home, belonging and more. Tom Boy Land made me think a lot. Faliveno made interesting points about where we grow up, the landscape and community's effect on our identities.
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Thank You to the publisher for sending me this book opinions are my own.
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For more of my book content check out instagram.com/bookalong
I enjoyed this one! A beautifully written, timely collection of essays exploring a diverse range of topics.
•
Faliveno is an excellent essayist. Born in the Midwest she uses her own upbringing and personal opinions and experiences to bring to life these essays. Topics of gender expression and sexuality, Christian upbringing, feminism, rage, identity, home, belonging and more. Tom Boy Land made me think a lot. Faliveno made interesting points about where we grow up, the landscape and community's effect on our identities.
•
Thank You to the publisher for sending me this book opinions are my own.
•
For more of my book content check out instagram.com/bookalong
July 8, 2020
Brave New Voice
Melissa Faliveno brings the midwest to life with her stunning debut book Tomboyland. Beautifully written and achingly honest, she courageously examines all aspects of growing up and discovering her true self. It will make you cry. It will make you laugh. It will leave you wanting more.
Melissa Faliveno brings the midwest to life with her stunning debut book Tomboyland. Beautifully written and achingly honest, she courageously examines all aspects of growing up and discovering her true self. It will make you cry. It will make you laugh. It will leave you wanting more.
January 8, 2025
It's possible my low score is disproportionate, but this book felt personal in its badness. I too am from a small town just outside Madison, Wisconsin who lived in NYC, who never felt quite like she belonged but is also weirdly defensive of the Midwest to outsiders, but this book is not that.
The author plainly states she wrote this book in the wake of 2016, that the cool Brooklynites were lamenting about the morons in flyover country who voted for Trump and she wanted to paint a more "complex" picture. This book provides nothing to that discourse, despite being the apparent purpose of the book. It's as shallow as Hillbilly Elegy in this area, or an Atlantic article about Trump supporters in an Ohio diner left behind or some such nonsense. Coastal intellectuals reading this trying to get a sense of Midwestern complexity and stoicism will learn nothing useful and insightful.
And this is something that irritated me but is probably irrelevant - she describes her hometown Mt. Horeb as this rural town, real folks of the land. For those who don't know Wisconsin, it's practically a suburb of Madison that is represented by Democrats in the US House and the state legislature, it's hardly Trump country. Visiting her Northwoods cabin does not give her special insight to the rural Wisconsinite (okay, maybe it does, but she sure doesn't convince me of that in this book).
Another thing that irritated me, the shallow liberal posturing. An example, I do not believe for a second the author constantly thinks of the Ho Chunk and the stolen land Wisconsin rests on (she literally says "I think about them [the Ho Chunk] now, every time I go home and every time I leave"). She does not meaningfully engage in indigenous communities or issues, just provides a Wikipedia history of an indigenous tribe and, you know, ruminating on it (did you know lots of place names are indigenous? Yes, literally everyone does, there was a Wayne's World joke about it). Wisconsin has 11 tribal nations, a complex and rich history, who are very much a part of our state today. They are more than just a lesson to learn about white supremacy, one she barely skims. The author just needed to make sure we knew that she knew indigenous people exist. Good job, you did it.
What it comes down to, this essays (which don't mesh well together and are overwritten at times) represent a very personal journey of the author, trying to use Wisconsin as a clumsy metaphor/backdrop/explainer for her life. I even found some possible interesting themes, like exploring gender identify through a farm girl lens where gender is already obscure, could have been good, but fell flat. Again, she made it clear more than once that the purpose of the book was to explain and understand the place she came from. The two stars are mostly because this book has no strong thesis to me, and fails spectacularly at the thesis it proposes to have. The politics of it have the depth of a term paper. If you need a book to tell you that things like gun issues are more complicated than a Twitter fight, maybe you need this, but otherwise, skip it.
The author plainly states she wrote this book in the wake of 2016, that the cool Brooklynites were lamenting about the morons in flyover country who voted for Trump and she wanted to paint a more "complex" picture. This book provides nothing to that discourse, despite being the apparent purpose of the book. It's as shallow as Hillbilly Elegy in this area, or an Atlantic article about Trump supporters in an Ohio diner left behind or some such nonsense. Coastal intellectuals reading this trying to get a sense of Midwestern complexity and stoicism will learn nothing useful and insightful.
And this is something that irritated me but is probably irrelevant - she describes her hometown Mt. Horeb as this rural town, real folks of the land. For those who don't know Wisconsin, it's practically a suburb of Madison that is represented by Democrats in the US House and the state legislature, it's hardly Trump country. Visiting her Northwoods cabin does not give her special insight to the rural Wisconsinite (okay, maybe it does, but she sure doesn't convince me of that in this book).
Another thing that irritated me, the shallow liberal posturing. An example, I do not believe for a second the author constantly thinks of the Ho Chunk and the stolen land Wisconsin rests on (she literally says "I think about them [the Ho Chunk] now, every time I go home and every time I leave"). She does not meaningfully engage in indigenous communities or issues, just provides a Wikipedia history of an indigenous tribe and, you know, ruminating on it (did you know lots of place names are indigenous? Yes, literally everyone does, there was a Wayne's World joke about it). Wisconsin has 11 tribal nations, a complex and rich history, who are very much a part of our state today. They are more than just a lesson to learn about white supremacy, one she barely skims. The author just needed to make sure we knew that she knew indigenous people exist. Good job, you did it.
What it comes down to, this essays (which don't mesh well together and are overwritten at times) represent a very personal journey of the author, trying to use Wisconsin as a clumsy metaphor/backdrop/explainer for her life. I even found some possible interesting themes, like exploring gender identify through a farm girl lens where gender is already obscure, could have been good, but fell flat. Again, she made it clear more than once that the purpose of the book was to explain and understand the place she came from. The two stars are mostly because this book has no strong thesis to me, and fails spectacularly at the thesis it proposes to have. The politics of it have the depth of a term paper. If you need a book to tell you that things like gun issues are more complicated than a Twitter fight, maybe you need this, but otherwise, skip it.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 20, 2020
This book tries to tackle a wide array of topics, ranging from gender identity, sexual orientation, motherhood (and not being a mother), guns, and others. The author writes from the perspective of someone who is originally from the Midwest, bisexual, and has lived in New York for over a decade. As I'm also a Midwest transplant in New York, I had thought this book would resonate with me more, but it often fell flat. The author certainly presents some thoughtful discourses on the above-mentioned topics, including the erasure she has felt as a bisexual women in a relationship with a man, but she also goes on very detailed tangents about the nature of tornadoes, softball, and even minute descriptions of particular species of moths. The chapters are divided by theme rather than chronologically, so the book ends up revisiting the same periods in the author's life with different lenses. At the end of the book, I wasn't sure what the author's goal was. She certainly makes a number of thoughtful observations about herself and the culture she grew up in, but I think the book would have benefited from a much more rigorous editor. In fairness, however, I have also thought the same of all the other Amazon Prime First Reads books that I've read so far.
August 21, 2020
Eventually, I would like to sit down and really dig into this book and how much I loved it. For now, I'll just say that I was not expecting to be tearing up over a book I picked up on a whim as a Prime First Read. I love essay collections. Often, I find myself reading them for technical reasons—for lessons in essay writing, rather than an experience of the form on a more emotional or intellectual level. I thought this is what I would be doing with these essays. But right away Faliveno punched me in the gut with her incisive look at gender identity and sexuality, two things I have been grappling with over the last few years, particularly in terms of being bisexual or queer within a longterm "heterosexual" relationship. Her meditations on home, on finding family, on whether or not to become a parent, on how to be part of a community where you aren't sure you belong are all things I've been carrying heavily in my heart and to see them on the page, in such clear and deeply felt language, is nothing short of amazing.
July 12, 2020
This was once of the free choices sent to me by Amazon for my kindle. Because it is essays, I picked it over love stories and fiction that looked rather inane.
Faliveno is a good essayist and has a style that takes two seemingly unrelated topics and weaves them together or at least wanders back and forth between them and mostly it works.
My biggest problem with the book is that it doesn't come with a warning on triggers. When I read an essay titled Meat and Potatoes I do not expect to run into explicit descriptions of S&M. Fair warning.
She tackles tough issues: gender identity (a gay woman who seems to have spent all of her longer relationships with men), gun ownership, childlessness. I come away thinking she looked at both sides of all of these topics and still hasn't quite made a decision where she stands.
An interesting read.
Faliveno is a good essayist and has a style that takes two seemingly unrelated topics and weaves them together or at least wanders back and forth between them and mostly it works.
My biggest problem with the book is that it doesn't come with a warning on triggers. When I read an essay titled Meat and Potatoes I do not expect to run into explicit descriptions of S&M. Fair warning.
She tackles tough issues: gender identity (a gay woman who seems to have spent all of her longer relationships with men), gun ownership, childlessness. I come away thinking she looked at both sides of all of these topics and still hasn't quite made a decision where she stands.
An interesting read.
August 11, 2020
I loved this book. I am the same age as the author so I could relate to so many minor, relatively unimportant aspects of her life thus far, from childhood into high school and young adulthood. She covers so many topics, seamlessly weaving many together that seem unrelated (for example sexuality and diet—as in what one eats, not an endeavor to lose weight—) she just touched on so many subjects, and more than once she articulated something I had never attempted to put words to. She is a brilliant writer.
July 22, 2020
This series of essays picks you up like a tornado, whirls you through softball practice and Wisconsin's Driftless Area and gender expression, and drops you in New York City feeling homesick. Having grown up in Iowa, in the heart of "tomboyland," I am fascinated by how aptly the author describes aspects of Midwest life that are not often pointed out. Everyone else jokes about Ranch dressing, and "Midwest nice," but she points out the highs and pitfalls of small-town communities with equal reverence.
I see some of my childhood friends in Melissa. I see some of myself in her too. I see her pain and her peace in turn as she shifts between topics. This is not for the weak-hearted; she pulls no punches. Every essay has at least one gut-punch line that I highlighted to dig deeper into later. She says it best herself: "But what of a woman who wears her tragedy aloud? Who doesn't hide it, like she's taught to, and bury it in the rubble she's meant to rebuild? Who, instead, holds the pain she's supposed to carry alone out in the open - like an offering, like a stone she can't cast off into the abyss - and asks for someone to take it?"
The author doesn't answer this question. She doesn't answer many of her own questions; she poses them thoughtfully and expects you as the reader - and a human being - to think for yourself, question for yourself, learn for yourself. She readily admits that she is still learning, which is something we all should strive to be. Tomboyland will stay on my shelf for a long time, reminding me that conversations are continuous, that chosen family is family, and that "tomboyland" is home.
I see some of my childhood friends in Melissa. I see some of myself in her too. I see her pain and her peace in turn as she shifts between topics. This is not for the weak-hearted; she pulls no punches. Every essay has at least one gut-punch line that I highlighted to dig deeper into later. She says it best herself: "But what of a woman who wears her tragedy aloud? Who doesn't hide it, like she's taught to, and bury it in the rubble she's meant to rebuild? Who, instead, holds the pain she's supposed to carry alone out in the open - like an offering, like a stone she can't cast off into the abyss - and asks for someone to take it?"
The author doesn't answer this question. She doesn't answer many of her own questions; she poses them thoughtfully and expects you as the reader - and a human being - to think for yourself, question for yourself, learn for yourself. She readily admits that she is still learning, which is something we all should strive to be. Tomboyland will stay on my shelf for a long time, reminding me that conversations are continuous, that chosen family is family, and that "tomboyland" is home.
July 27, 2020
This book blew me away. Maybe it's because Faliveno writes about so many things that are so close to my own experience (though in very different ways). The writing is so clearsighted and intimate. What Faliveno has to say about place, queerness, parenthood, desire, gender-it's all just so good and interconnected. And her writing about the Midwest is the kind of place-based writing I love. I don't have a connection to Wisconsin, and yet I felt so immersed in her experience of it, and her Midwestern identity, by the end of the book. There's so much detail, vulnerabitly, and also invitation: to sit with her in the contradictions and challenges of loving and leaving and coming back to and wrestling with a particular place.
I think about the essay about her choice not to have kids, and the grief of the choice not chosen, and the ways that the world refuses to make space for that grief--every day. There's just so much to chew on here. And there's such an expansive queerness to this book. In writing about all her varied experiences, Faliveno opens up queerness in the best way. It's a book that felt like home to me in the way it engages with the messy reality of queerness and queer family. We need more books like this, books that turn the expected and stereotypical and normative narratives about queerness on their heads.
I think about the essay about her choice not to have kids, and the grief of the choice not chosen, and the ways that the world refuses to make space for that grief--every day. There's just so much to chew on here. And there's such an expansive queerness to this book. In writing about all her varied experiences, Faliveno opens up queerness in the best way. It's a book that felt like home to me in the way it engages with the messy reality of queerness and queer family. We need more books like this, books that turn the expected and stereotypical and normative narratives about queerness on their heads.
June 3, 2024
Maybe more like 4.5.
Well after 2.5 years of this being on my shelf I finally read it and I think I'm glad I waited. I love books that make me think, and this one made me think a lot. I think that I enjoyed this a little extra because of how much of it talks about Wisconsin. I have some complex feelings about the state--- the place I was born in but barely remember, but still hold a strangely strong affinity for. Yet again this had themes of talking about motherhood ( I literally cannot avoid them) but this time a lot of it actually really resonated with me. Also the way the book talks about gender-- I'm not spiraling but I'm having lots of thoughts.
Well after 2.5 years of this being on my shelf I finally read it and I think I'm glad I waited. I love books that make me think, and this one made me think a lot. I think that I enjoyed this a little extra because of how much of it talks about Wisconsin. I have some complex feelings about the state--- the place I was born in but barely remember, but still hold a strangely strong affinity for. Yet again this had themes of talking about motherhood ( I literally cannot avoid them) but this time a lot of it actually really resonated with me. Also the way the book talks about gender-- I'm not spiraling but I'm having lots of thoughts.
April 20, 2021
Honest and thought provoking: a look at identity, at culture, at what family can mean, at gender and labels. I listened on audio as it was narrated by the author and also considerably cheaper than the book!
July 14, 2020
I'll be honest - I picked this book up because it was one of the freebie Kindle First Read books, and looked sort of interesting. I've read other First Reads before, and while a lot of them are entertaining, in general I feel like you're getting what you're paying for.
This one, however, blew me away. Faliveno is brutally honest about her feelings and emotions, and she does not shy away from difficult or "taboo" subjects. She hits on heavy drinking, sexual abuse, fetishes and kinks, roller derby, fast-pitch softball, love, gender, family, and place, and weaves them all together in a collection of essays that are interesting and moving. Even better, she is not afraid of tickling out the nuances in people; herself as well as others. There are no simple essays in this book, because the subjects she writes about aren't simple subjects. They are complex, nuanced, and multi-faceted, and Faliveno embraces that. In this time where it feels like we're all just screaming into echo chambers of our own opinions, it's nice to see someone say, "Hey, this is tough. i don't have the answers, but here's what I think about."
So, if you can deal with a world of grey areas, where life is not as simple or binary as it's sometimes made out to be, give these essays a try.
This one, however, blew me away. Faliveno is brutally honest about her feelings and emotions, and she does not shy away from difficult or "taboo" subjects. She hits on heavy drinking, sexual abuse, fetishes and kinks, roller derby, fast-pitch softball, love, gender, family, and place, and weaves them all together in a collection of essays that are interesting and moving. Even better, she is not afraid of tickling out the nuances in people; herself as well as others. There are no simple essays in this book, because the subjects she writes about aren't simple subjects. They are complex, nuanced, and multi-faceted, and Faliveno embraces that. In this time where it feels like we're all just screaming into echo chambers of our own opinions, it's nice to see someone say, "Hey, this is tough. i don't have the answers, but here's what I think about."
So, if you can deal with a world of grey areas, where life is not as simple or binary as it's sometimes made out to be, give these essays a try.
July 13, 2020
An essay book that reads like the best fiction
This month's firts reads selection did not appeal to my taste in fiction. So I took a chance with this non fiction essays book. It was a lucky chance. Probably in the top 5 of the many books I have read in the past year, maybe more.
Non fiction that absorbed me to the point that I read late at night must be very good.
I came to feel identified with the writer at many points, because I grew up in a small town where my views on life were not mainstream. Contrary to her I felt I wanted to have children but not neccesarily get married. In the 60s and 70s that was taboo. So many things expressed here were in my head while growing up but I never had the precise words. The author does, and wonderfully.
This book is a must read for any woman.
This month's firts reads selection did not appeal to my taste in fiction. So I took a chance with this non fiction essays book. It was a lucky chance. Probably in the top 5 of the many books I have read in the past year, maybe more.
Non fiction that absorbed me to the point that I read late at night must be very good.
I came to feel identified with the writer at many points, because I grew up in a small town where my views on life were not mainstream. Contrary to her I felt I wanted to have children but not neccesarily get married. In the 60s and 70s that was taboo. So many things expressed here were in my head while growing up but I never had the precise words. The author does, and wonderfully.
This book is a must read for any woman.
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