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We Deserve Monuments
Goodreads Choice Award
Nominee for Readers' Favorite Young Adult Fiction (2023)Family secrets, a swoon-worthy romance, and a slow-burn mystery collide in We Deserve Monuments, a YA debut from Jas Hammonds that explores how racial violence can ripple down through generations.
What’s more important: Knowing the truth or keeping the peace?
Seventeen-year-old Avery Anderson is convinced her senior year is ruined when she's uprooted from her life in DC and forced into the hostile home of her terminally ill grandmother, Mama Letty. The tension between Avery’s mom and Mama Letty makes for a frosty arrival and unearths past drama they refuse to talk about. Every time Avery tries to look deeper, she’s turned away, leaving her desperate to learn the secrets that split her family in two.
While tempers flare in her avoidant family, Avery finds friendship in unexpected places: in Simone Cole, her captivating next-door neighbor, and Jade Oliver, daughter of the town’s most prominent family—whose mother’s murder remains unsolved.
As the three girls grow closer—Avery and Simone’s friendship blossoming into romance—the sharp-edged opinions of their small southern town begin to hint at something insidious underneath. The racist history of Bardell, Georgia is rooted in Avery’s family in ways she can’t even imagine. With Mama Letty's health dwindling every day, Avery must decide if digging for the truth is worth toppling the delicate relationships she's built in Bardell—or if some things are better left buried.
What’s more important: Knowing the truth or keeping the peace?
Seventeen-year-old Avery Anderson is convinced her senior year is ruined when she's uprooted from her life in DC and forced into the hostile home of her terminally ill grandmother, Mama Letty. The tension between Avery’s mom and Mama Letty makes for a frosty arrival and unearths past drama they refuse to talk about. Every time Avery tries to look deeper, she’s turned away, leaving her desperate to learn the secrets that split her family in two.
While tempers flare in her avoidant family, Avery finds friendship in unexpected places: in Simone Cole, her captivating next-door neighbor, and Jade Oliver, daughter of the town’s most prominent family—whose mother’s murder remains unsolved.
As the three girls grow closer—Avery and Simone’s friendship blossoming into romance—the sharp-edged opinions of their small southern town begin to hint at something insidious underneath. The racist history of Bardell, Georgia is rooted in Avery’s family in ways she can’t even imagine. With Mama Letty's health dwindling every day, Avery must decide if digging for the truth is worth toppling the delicate relationships she's built in Bardell—or if some things are better left buried.
10 pages, Audible Audio
First published November 29, 2022
351 people are currently reading
38166 people want to read
About the author
Jas Hammonds
2 books624 followersJas Hammonds (they/she) was raised in many cities and between the pages of many books. They have received support for their writing from the Highlights Foundation, Baldwin for the Arts and more. They are also a grateful recipient of the MacDowell James Baldwin Fellowship. Their debut novel, We Deserve Monuments, won the 2023 Coretta Scott King - John Steptoe Award for New Talent. She lives in New Jersey.
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November 18, 2023
When your 12 year old tells you they love a book and it is a must-read, you stop whatever you are doing and read that book. And, as with We Deserve Monuments, the debut novel from Jas Hammonds, you often find a book you now love too. Here is what they had to say about it:
We Deserve Monuments follows Avery, a queer, biracial teen, and her family returning to a small, Southern town when they learn the grandmother has cancer. It is a story about a family amidst racism and generational trauma, but it is also a love story and perhaps the most impressive aspect of the novel is that Hammonds manages to balance both and portray them with equal excellence. Yet, this is also a story about friendships, with Avery bonding with her Black neighbor Simone and Jade, the daughter of a wealthy white family with an unsolved murder in its recent history, and navigating her blossoming love with Simone in a deeply conservative town where being both Black and queer puts your life in jeopardy. This is a YA debut that will touch the hearts of readers of any age, being a multigenerational tale that elegantly addresses each family member in a way that, as Jas Hammonds says in an interview with NPR, is ‘like, "Gilmore Girls," but make it Black and gay.’
Setting is a key part of We Deserve Monuments, as spilled blood and the echoes of trauma never seem to dissipate a sense of place. The small town of Bardell, where ‘every corner [holds] a story,’ is a well crafted setting that rural readers will find to be rather authentic and quite lovingly portrayed. It is a troubled city where racism is as deep and numerous as the potholes and MAGA bumper stickers, yet there is a sense of irony that Avery finds more acceptance here as a queer, biracial teen, than she did amongst her peers back in DC. The choice of DC as Avery’s “home” is key, making a strong argument that the spectacle of politics that has become the sitcom of social media is not an authentic representation of the livelihoods of people actually living in the communities being argued over. Hammonds is deliberate in wanting to ‘showcase that queer people exist everywhere. We exist, and we not only exist, we thrive everywhere. And that includes small rural towns, especially down in the Deep South.’ Avery and Simone have a date in a secret underground club, showing safe spaces for communities of queer and Black people exist everywhere, which is quite lovely. Especially as spaces like this are often threatened.
‘ I cried because I felt guilty. And helpless. And lonely and frustrated and angry. I cried because I couldn’t tell if everything was changing or nothing was.’
There are several mysteries at the heart of this novel—a major one being the unsolved murder of Jade’s mother—that serve as an excellent catalyst for the events to unfold and for the trio of friends to go digging into the past. What they find is horrifying and plays into themes of generational trauma and the terrors of racism, all of which begins to slowly unravel the looming mysteries about Avery’s family. Her mother and grandmother are on poor terms, to put it gently, and the absence of her grandfather as well as the decades-longs frustrations between the mom and Mama Letty are an enormous elephant in the room for much of the book. Mama Letty is rather caustic, and Avery’s initial attempts to approach her are met with mocking and disdain, but Avery know that if her family is to every come to a sense of healing these are secrets that must be uncovered and confronted.
Hammonds works wonders juggling the multiple characters and addressing both past and present, with the fallout between Avery’s mother with her Mama Letty as well as her former best-friend neighbor (also Simone’s mother) telling as much of a story as anything else. Something I enjoyed immensely here is the way this is less plot-driven and more a character study of women coping with trauma, familial struggles, and young love in a world that is far more apt to inflict harm than offer space to heal. The interracial tensions that linger across the decades show how much racism has left a festering wound across society and that we must become the sutures to stave off further bloodloss and begin the difficult process of healing. But Hammonds offers excellent role models, such as the mother who managed to stop the cycle of trauma and abuse (though her struggles show this is not an easy task despite being a necessary one), Avery who aims to uncover and assuage the pain while blossoming into a world of queer love, Simone who is discovering her sexuality and finding space to do so productively, or even Jade who bridges racial divides and stands up for her friends for their sake instead of as a weapon against the racism of her family legacy.
Beyond just enjoying reading a book recommended to me by my own kid, I liked reading about people of their generation experiencing a lot of things that in ways my kid sees them. Such as the mentions of Covid and how frustrating and, well, rather traumatic the back-and-forth from in-person to slapdash online learning was while also having to navigate a global problem bewildered that the adults who are supposed to be in charge and protect them couldn’t even decide if they wanted to try and be productive or pretend it wasn’t real for edgy clout. It was a perspective from that year that I can’t have experience not having been a teenager in school and it was a good way to think about what they were going through from their own perspective and help them see how to cope with it all and remember there are people who care, who help, and even when they feel like an outsider to know they can find a community for them. As Hammonds says in the NPR interview:
I’m glad we could share this book and have good heart to heart conversations about it.
Ours is a complex world full of past and present hurts that bruise and bewilder us all. We Deserve Monuments is a gorgeous and intricate narrative about reaching out across divides, seeking towards empathy, understanding and healing. It can be a bit slow for a YA, which I enjoyed, but the many twists and revelations will keep you turning pages, even if just to bask in Jas Hammonds lovely prose. This is a marvelous book full of heart.
5/5
‘We had everything we needed now to become a whole, complete family—time, proximity, bodies hugging the dinner table every night.’
‘We Deserve Monuments by Jas Hammonds is a must read for anyone young and queer, following the love story of two girls and the buried history of racism in the small town of Bardell. My dad even liked it. I couldn’t stop reading it and when I had to for school or whatever I was still thinking about it the whole time. It is really good!’
We Deserve Monuments follows Avery, a queer, biracial teen, and her family returning to a small, Southern town when they learn the grandmother has cancer. It is a story about a family amidst racism and generational trauma, but it is also a love story and perhaps the most impressive aspect of the novel is that Hammonds manages to balance both and portray them with equal excellence. Yet, this is also a story about friendships, with Avery bonding with her Black neighbor Simone and Jade, the daughter of a wealthy white family with an unsolved murder in its recent history, and navigating her blossoming love with Simone in a deeply conservative town where being both Black and queer puts your life in jeopardy. This is a YA debut that will touch the hearts of readers of any age, being a multigenerational tale that elegantly addresses each family member in a way that, as Jas Hammonds says in an interview with NPR, is ‘like, "Gilmore Girls," but make it Black and gay.’
Setting is a key part of We Deserve Monuments, as spilled blood and the echoes of trauma never seem to dissipate a sense of place. The small town of Bardell, where ‘every corner [holds] a story,’ is a well crafted setting that rural readers will find to be rather authentic and quite lovingly portrayed. It is a troubled city where racism is as deep and numerous as the potholes and MAGA bumper stickers, yet there is a sense of irony that Avery finds more acceptance here as a queer, biracial teen, than she did amongst her peers back in DC. The choice of DC as Avery’s “home” is key, making a strong argument that the spectacle of politics that has become the sitcom of social media is not an authentic representation of the livelihoods of people actually living in the communities being argued over. Hammonds is deliberate in wanting to ‘showcase that queer people exist everywhere. We exist, and we not only exist, we thrive everywhere. And that includes small rural towns, especially down in the Deep South.’ Avery and Simone have a date in a secret underground club, showing safe spaces for communities of queer and Black people exist everywhere, which is quite lovely. Especially as spaces like this are often threatened.
‘ I cried because I felt guilty. And helpless. And lonely and frustrated and angry. I cried because I couldn’t tell if everything was changing or nothing was.’
There are several mysteries at the heart of this novel—a major one being the unsolved murder of Jade’s mother—that serve as an excellent catalyst for the events to unfold and for the trio of friends to go digging into the past. What they find is horrifying and plays into themes of generational trauma and the terrors of racism, all of which begins to slowly unravel the looming mysteries about Avery’s family. Her mother and grandmother are on poor terms, to put it gently, and the absence of her grandfather as well as the decades-longs frustrations between the mom and Mama Letty are an enormous elephant in the room for much of the book. Mama Letty is rather caustic, and Avery’s initial attempts to approach her are met with mocking and disdain, but Avery know that if her family is to every come to a sense of healing these are secrets that must be uncovered and confronted.
‘If I was going to get to know Mama Letty, I was going to have to be the one to crack through her prickly exterior. She had to shed her loneliness, one layer at a time. Maybe I would be perfect for the job since I was dealing with my own version of loneliness after my breakup.’
Hammonds works wonders juggling the multiple characters and addressing both past and present, with the fallout between Avery’s mother with her Mama Letty as well as her former best-friend neighbor (also Simone’s mother) telling as much of a story as anything else. Something I enjoyed immensely here is the way this is less plot-driven and more a character study of women coping with trauma, familial struggles, and young love in a world that is far more apt to inflict harm than offer space to heal. The interracial tensions that linger across the decades show how much racism has left a festering wound across society and that we must become the sutures to stave off further bloodloss and begin the difficult process of healing. But Hammonds offers excellent role models, such as the mother who managed to stop the cycle of trauma and abuse (though her struggles show this is not an easy task despite being a necessary one), Avery who aims to uncover and assuage the pain while blossoming into a world of queer love, Simone who is discovering her sexuality and finding space to do so productively, or even Jade who bridges racial divides and stands up for her friends for their sake instead of as a weapon against the racism of her family legacy.
Beyond just enjoying reading a book recommended to me by my own kid, I liked reading about people of their generation experiencing a lot of things that in ways my kid sees them. Such as the mentions of Covid and how frustrating and, well, rather traumatic the back-and-forth from in-person to slapdash online learning was while also having to navigate a global problem bewildered that the adults who are supposed to be in charge and protect them couldn’t even decide if they wanted to try and be productive or pretend it wasn’t real for edgy clout. It was a perspective from that year that I can’t have experience not having been a teenager in school and it was a good way to think about what they were going through from their own perspective and help them see how to cope with it all and remember there are people who care, who help, and even when they feel like an outsider to know they can find a community for them. As Hammonds says in the NPR interview:
‘There's an ongoing theme about giving yourself grace. If teens read this book and if they take anything away, I hope it's that. I hope that it's, you know, there's a power in community and asking for help and, you know, asking to be seen and being witnessed and just really knowing that you don't have to go through this world alone. And that people - there are people out there who will love you and uplift your whole self. That was just really important to me for - especially for young people.’
I’m glad we could share this book and have good heart to heart conversations about it.
Ours is a complex world full of past and present hurts that bruise and bewilder us all. We Deserve Monuments is a gorgeous and intricate narrative about reaching out across divides, seeking towards empathy, understanding and healing. It can be a bit slow for a YA, which I enjoyed, but the many twists and revelations will keep you turning pages, even if just to bask in Jas Hammonds lovely prose. This is a marvelous book full of heart.
5/5
‘We had everything we needed now to become a whole, complete family—time, proximity, bodies hugging the dinner table every night.’
January 14, 2023
Sometimes there are books that are written that seem to capture our hearts and souls. Every year, I usually find a handful books that do that to me; however, I've never read one so early in the year. This book has so much meaning to me. It's beautiful, gut-wrenching filled with happiness, sadness, pain, relief, compassion, anger, hatred, and more. Jas Hammonds wrote their ass off in this one and I can't wait to see what they produce in the future.
We Deserve Momuments is so many things at once, but at it's core it is a story that follows 17-year old Avery as she travels back to Bardell, Georgia with her mother and father to help take care of her terminally ill grandmother. While there, Avery learns so much about her family, it's highs and lows and most of all its secrets. She also meets two other characters, Jade and Simone, who create an even more complex meaning behind the words friendship and love. It is in Bardell that Avery learns about love, loss, heartbreak, and finding peace and closure.
What Worked: EVERY FUCKING THING. Nothing about this book was a miss. And it is quite rare that I say that. From Hammond's beautiful and poetic writing, to the intricacy of the plot development, to the robust character development, everything was crafted in way that made me want more and more of the story. Coming from a family that has had it's own fair share of secrets as well as generational abuse, I connected to Avery's need to fix her family. Unfortunately, for a good portion of the book she doesn't understand that there are some things in life that one just can't "get over." The relationship between her mother and grandmother was more complex than she could have ever expected and both needed to find their own way to both healing and forgiving. Black women are often characterized with a certain amount of strength that doesn't allow them to be vulnerable. We are so strong that we can "take anything." Hammonds broke that narrative. Avery saw her mother as this successful, powerful, Black woman and didn't understand how much pain and suffering she carried. It took this meeting between the three generations to comprehend how much of shield she'd held up her entire life. Avery has potential to ruffle a few feathers for readers because as a teenager she believes she understands it all, that she knows it all (didn't we all think like this at some point haha). But Hammonds takes their time with Avery, molding her into a place of understanding, compassion, and sensitivity. By the end of the book, I loved Avery and her family like they were my own.
There were also some interesting and thorough points about Blackness and it's intersection with queerness. While I can't discuss all of it in detail due to spoilers, it was amazing to see the varied generational and cultural perspectives on what it meant not only to be Black, but also queer in a small town that was readily known for it's bigotry. Avery's experiences in being out while living in DC vary greatly from her counterparts in this book and it's something that she has to reckon with and grow to understand.
One of my favorite parts of this book outside of the writing was the ever evolving relationships. I LOVED that Avery met Jade and Simone and they formed this tight knit friendship. The closeness that begins to exist between Simone and Avery does change the dynamic, but I'm glad that it did. There is something to be said about accurate portrayal of teen relationships in books and this one does it right. I've seen people criticize the relationships between Avery and Simone to the relationships that Avery has with her family and I disagree with all of those thoughts. AVERY IS A TEENAGER. SIMONE IS A TEENAGER. JADE IS A TEENAGER. THIS IS A BOOK FOR TEENAGERS. As an adult reader, it must be clear that we have a life of experience that teenagers do not. They fall in love quick, make decisions without much thought, and think that the universe revolves around them. THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO. That's what teenagers do and my goodness do we get to see that beauty in this book. These characters and their relationships grow. They begin to understand each other. They begin to forgive each other. And most of all, they begin to truly love each other.
If I could personally write a thank you letter and give it to Jas Hammonds myself, I would. At the time of writing this review, my own grandmother is dying of a terminal illness and my family isn't exactly in the best place. The feeling of being seen in a book that wasn't even written for me both breaks and mends my aching heart. With writing that flows so smoothly and feels like pure poetry, I'm not sure I've come across a book as beautiful as this. It's quotable, it's memorable, it's everything that I needed in this moment of my life. So, thank you Jas for giving me a book that I didn't even realize I needed. That is the power of good book and a damn good writer. If you haven't considered checking out this book, you're missing out. It is easily going to be one of my favorites of 2023.
We Deserve Momuments is so many things at once, but at it's core it is a story that follows 17-year old Avery as she travels back to Bardell, Georgia with her mother and father to help take care of her terminally ill grandmother. While there, Avery learns so much about her family, it's highs and lows and most of all its secrets. She also meets two other characters, Jade and Simone, who create an even more complex meaning behind the words friendship and love. It is in Bardell that Avery learns about love, loss, heartbreak, and finding peace and closure.
What Worked: EVERY FUCKING THING. Nothing about this book was a miss. And it is quite rare that I say that. From Hammond's beautiful and poetic writing, to the intricacy of the plot development, to the robust character development, everything was crafted in way that made me want more and more of the story. Coming from a family that has had it's own fair share of secrets as well as generational abuse, I connected to Avery's need to fix her family. Unfortunately, for a good portion of the book she doesn't understand that there are some things in life that one just can't "get over." The relationship between her mother and grandmother was more complex than she could have ever expected and both needed to find their own way to both healing and forgiving. Black women are often characterized with a certain amount of strength that doesn't allow them to be vulnerable. We are so strong that we can "take anything." Hammonds broke that narrative. Avery saw her mother as this successful, powerful, Black woman and didn't understand how much pain and suffering she carried. It took this meeting between the three generations to comprehend how much of shield she'd held up her entire life. Avery has potential to ruffle a few feathers for readers because as a teenager she believes she understands it all, that she knows it all (didn't we all think like this at some point haha). But Hammonds takes their time with Avery, molding her into a place of understanding, compassion, and sensitivity. By the end of the book, I loved Avery and her family like they were my own.
There were also some interesting and thorough points about Blackness and it's intersection with queerness. While I can't discuss all of it in detail due to spoilers, it was amazing to see the varied generational and cultural perspectives on what it meant not only to be Black, but also queer in a small town that was readily known for it's bigotry. Avery's experiences in being out while living in DC vary greatly from her counterparts in this book and it's something that she has to reckon with and grow to understand.
One of my favorite parts of this book outside of the writing was the ever evolving relationships. I LOVED that Avery met Jade and Simone and they formed this tight knit friendship. The closeness that begins to exist between Simone and Avery does change the dynamic, but I'm glad that it did. There is something to be said about accurate portrayal of teen relationships in books and this one does it right. I've seen people criticize the relationships between Avery and Simone to the relationships that Avery has with her family and I disagree with all of those thoughts. AVERY IS A TEENAGER. SIMONE IS A TEENAGER. JADE IS A TEENAGER. THIS IS A BOOK FOR TEENAGERS. As an adult reader, it must be clear that we have a life of experience that teenagers do not. They fall in love quick, make decisions without much thought, and think that the universe revolves around them. THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO. That's what teenagers do and my goodness do we get to see that beauty in this book. These characters and their relationships grow. They begin to understand each other. They begin to forgive each other. And most of all, they begin to truly love each other.
If I could personally write a thank you letter and give it to Jas Hammonds myself, I would. At the time of writing this review, my own grandmother is dying of a terminal illness and my family isn't exactly in the best place. The feeling of being seen in a book that wasn't even written for me both breaks and mends my aching heart. With writing that flows so smoothly and feels like pure poetry, I'm not sure I've come across a book as beautiful as this. It's quotable, it's memorable, it's everything that I needed in this moment of my life. So, thank you Jas for giving me a book that I didn't even realize I needed. That is the power of good book and a damn good writer. If you haven't considered checking out this book, you're missing out. It is easily going to be one of my favorites of 2023.
May 22, 2024
returning to my first love (ya contemporaries)
this book is A LOT. these poor teens are going through it all: coming out, mourning, coming of age, rumors about hired hitmen, racism, homophobia, so much death.
they are also putting themselves and each other and their parents through even more. the fringe characters here are a little over the top, and so are a lot of the actions themselves, but i'm also adjusting this for the being-a-grownup-reading-about-teenagers tax. when you're 17, leaving your dying grandmother alone at home until the wee hours maybe is nbd.
even if right now it's like...oh my god. can you guys please be nice to each other and maybe send your mom a text?!
bottom line: reading YA as an adult is equal parts fun, nostalgic, and nightmarishly frightening.
3.5
this book is A LOT. these poor teens are going through it all: coming out, mourning, coming of age, rumors about hired hitmen, racism, homophobia, so much death.
they are also putting themselves and each other and their parents through even more. the fringe characters here are a little over the top, and so are a lot of the actions themselves, but i'm also adjusting this for the being-a-grownup-reading-about-teenagers tax. when you're 17, leaving your dying grandmother alone at home until the wee hours maybe is nbd.
even if right now it's like...oh my god. can you guys please be nice to each other and maybe send your mom a text?!
bottom line: reading YA as an adult is equal parts fun, nostalgic, and nightmarishly frightening.
3.5
February 14, 2023
In a Nutshell: I can see why the YA audience will go gaga over this. I can also see why some adults will love this. But mine, yet again, is an outlier review. Sigh.
Story Synopsis:
Where the book worked for me:
😍 Such a gorgeous cover! And it fits the book perfectly!
😍 There are some third-person interludes throughout the book depicting incidents from the past and concerning other characters. These are written well and add a nice balance to Avery’s first-person perspective.
😍 There are some interesting themes such as dysfunctional families, the value of friendships, and acceptance of sexual identity. The dark past of the American South is blended well with contemporary reality. Avery’s mixed race background also adds some nuances to the story (though this particular factor could have been handled much better.)
😍 As an OwnVoices work, it’s no surprise to see that the book is inclusive in its representation. There are many LGBTQ+ characters who are out and proud of it. There are also some closet queers whose emotions over coming out are written well. But… (continued below)
Where the book could have worked better for me:
😒 (continued from above)… but some of the representation exists just for the sake of it. For instance, Avery is supposedly pansexual, yet throughout the book, her feelings are more lesbian than pansexual. The rep felt like it was included because it was a cool thing to declare.
😒 If I have to describe the plot at its simplest, it is just about a bunch of women (of varied ages) who come together and bitch about the other women in their lives, either to their faces or behind their backs, and who consider themselves right and everyone else wrong. Basically, each one of them thinks that they ‘deserve a monument’. This gets tiresome after a while. I didn’t like a single main character in this book as all were self-absorbed.
😒 I can stand only *so* much of whiny, judgemental, egocentric teens who consider themselves smarter than all the adults in their lives. Imagine a seventeen-year-old being out of the house all evening (without permission while being grounded), not returning till 5am, and yet arguing with her mother for overreacting about the incident that was ‘not a big deal’. As an adult, it’s irritating to read about such teenagers!
😒 Almost all of the contemporary white characters are villainous. The only one who isn’t, has a minimal stock role to play. This makes the writing somewhat predictable. Moreover, there are too many disparaging comments, and some really odd accusations that are tough to digest. I don’t want to go into spoilers, so I will give a similar but unrelated example. Would you point fingers at Hitler’s relatives who are alive today, for what he did during WWII? The drama was much over the top.
😒 There is a supposed mystery in the book, but it was much half-baked and not even worth the time.
😒 There is a sapphic romance in the book but I wasn’t a fan of the way it was written. Typical teen love, full of physical attraction and hardly any other connect.
😒 I am not a fan of YA books that have the main characters indulging in drugs (weed) and alcohol (whisky) without guilt. I also don’t appreciate the presence of risqué scenes or cuss words in this genre.
The audiobook experience:
The audiobook, clocking at 10 hrs 22 min, is narrated by an experienced narrator whose works I have enjoyed in the past. Not this time though. While I was initially impressed with her attempt to voice characters distinctly, it soon became irritating. Her dramatization was exaggerated and her stress on individual voices for the characters ended up making them sound caricatured. The audio version will work for those who don’t mind hyperbolic performances.
Some YA books work for all age groups. Some work only for their target age range. To me, this fell in the second category (though the GR rating and friends’ reviews prove me very wrong!) Basically, I can see the appeal of this book to the YA crowd. But I was the wrong audience for it, not because I am not a YA, but because it was too YA for me. (I should have gotten a clue from that very self-absorbed title.) I go in mentally prepared for a lot of anatomical references and shallow characters in YA reads, but the prep didn’t help this time.
At the same time, I am very much an outlier on this. So feel free to ignore my opinion and give it a go. It’s by a debut author, and they would certainly appreciate your support.
2 stars.
My thanks to Recorded Books and NetGalley for the ALC of “We Deserve Monuments”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the audiobook.
———————————————
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Story Synopsis:
Seventeen-year-old Avery is moving with her parents from Washington to Bardell, Georgia, in order to take care of her terminally ill maternal grandmother, Mama Letty. She isn’t happy about the sudden move, especially when her mother doesn’t even have a good relationship with Letty. Moreover, there is some past secret that they refuse to talk about. As Avery settles into her new school and makes new friends, more secrets come tumbling out, and Avery is left wondering if resolving past issues is more important than maintaining present relationships.
The book comes to us in the first person perspective of Avery.
Where the book worked for me:
😍 Such a gorgeous cover! And it fits the book perfectly!
😍 There are some third-person interludes throughout the book depicting incidents from the past and concerning other characters. These are written well and add a nice balance to Avery’s first-person perspective.
😍 There are some interesting themes such as dysfunctional families, the value of friendships, and acceptance of sexual identity. The dark past of the American South is blended well with contemporary reality. Avery’s mixed race background also adds some nuances to the story (though this particular factor could have been handled much better.)
😍 As an OwnVoices work, it’s no surprise to see that the book is inclusive in its representation. There are many LGBTQ+ characters who are out and proud of it. There are also some closet queers whose emotions over coming out are written well. But… (continued below)
Where the book could have worked better for me:
😒 (continued from above)… but some of the representation exists just for the sake of it. For instance, Avery is supposedly pansexual, yet throughout the book, her feelings are more lesbian than pansexual. The rep felt like it was included because it was a cool thing to declare.
😒 If I have to describe the plot at its simplest, it is just about a bunch of women (of varied ages) who come together and bitch about the other women in their lives, either to their faces or behind their backs, and who consider themselves right and everyone else wrong. Basically, each one of them thinks that they ‘deserve a monument’. This gets tiresome after a while. I didn’t like a single main character in this book as all were self-absorbed.
😒 I can stand only *so* much of whiny, judgemental, egocentric teens who consider themselves smarter than all the adults in their lives. Imagine a seventeen-year-old being out of the house all evening (without permission while being grounded), not returning till 5am, and yet arguing with her mother for overreacting about the incident that was ‘not a big deal’. As an adult, it’s irritating to read about such teenagers!
😒 Almost all of the contemporary white characters are villainous. The only one who isn’t, has a minimal stock role to play. This makes the writing somewhat predictable. Moreover, there are too many disparaging comments, and some really odd accusations that are tough to digest. I don’t want to go into spoilers, so I will give a similar but unrelated example. Would you point fingers at Hitler’s relatives who are alive today, for what he did during WWII? The drama was much over the top.
😒 There is a supposed mystery in the book, but it was much half-baked and not even worth the time.
😒 There is a sapphic romance in the book but I wasn’t a fan of the way it was written. Typical teen love, full of physical attraction and hardly any other connect.
😒 I am not a fan of YA books that have the main characters indulging in drugs (weed) and alcohol (whisky) without guilt. I also don’t appreciate the presence of risqué scenes or cuss words in this genre.
The audiobook experience:
The audiobook, clocking at 10 hrs 22 min, is narrated by an experienced narrator whose works I have enjoyed in the past. Not this time though. While I was initially impressed with her attempt to voice characters distinctly, it soon became irritating. Her dramatization was exaggerated and her stress on individual voices for the characters ended up making them sound caricatured. The audio version will work for those who don’t mind hyperbolic performances.
Some YA books work for all age groups. Some work only for their target age range. To me, this fell in the second category (though the GR rating and friends’ reviews prove me very wrong!) Basically, I can see the appeal of this book to the YA crowd. But I was the wrong audience for it, not because I am not a YA, but because it was too YA for me. (I should have gotten a clue from that very self-absorbed title.) I go in mentally prepared for a lot of anatomical references and shallow characters in YA reads, but the prep didn’t help this time.
At the same time, I am very much an outlier on this. So feel free to ignore my opinion and give it a go. It’s by a debut author, and they would certainly appreciate your support.
2 stars.
My thanks to Recorded Books and NetGalley for the ALC of “We Deserve Monuments”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the audiobook.
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December 4, 2022
4.50 Stars. An excellent YA novel with all the feels. As a huge YA fan this was one of my most anticipated books of the year. I had a feeling this book would be a tough read, but I had no idea I would be ugly crying for half of the book. If you are going to read this book, then I highly recommend keeping a box of tissues next to you. There are a lot of TWs for the book including racism, homophobia, murder, cancer and that is not a full list. As tough as this book was to read at times, and as much trauma it deals with, underneath it was these stories of love and life that made you feel, and it gave you hope that these characters could get past some of their pain in time. And it kept you reading and reading because you just had to find out.
I really enjoyed almost everything in the whole book, I think my only complaint, and why I didn’t give this a full 5 stars, is that I felt the book started a little slow. I kept picking the book up and putting it down, over and over. It really took me a while to find my reading groove. Once the book picks up, about a quarter in, the story changes and I could not put the book back down. It had its hooks in me and I had the tissues in my hand for the rest of the night.
There is a very light sapphic romance. What is there romance-wise is very sweet and cute, but one character is just deciding her sexuality, so it is really light. There is also a light mystery in the book, but I would say that the mystery is a little bigger than the romance was, but it is not the biggest part of the book yet still a very interesting part. My mystery loving brain was proud to have figured it out before it was revealed because it was not easy to guess, and I really enjoyed the twists and turns.
In the end I would absolutely recommend this queer contemporary YA, especially if you enjoy more emotional stories. The fact that this is Hammonds’, debut book and their writing is this good already makes me really excited to imagine what they could have instore for us next.
An ARC was given to me for an honest review.
I really enjoyed almost everything in the whole book, I think my only complaint, and why I didn’t give this a full 5 stars, is that I felt the book started a little slow. I kept picking the book up and putting it down, over and over. It really took me a while to find my reading groove. Once the book picks up, about a quarter in, the story changes and I could not put the book back down. It had its hooks in me and I had the tissues in my hand for the rest of the night.
There is a very light sapphic romance. What is there romance-wise is very sweet and cute, but one character is just deciding her sexuality, so it is really light. There is also a light mystery in the book, but I would say that the mystery is a little bigger than the romance was, but it is not the biggest part of the book yet still a very interesting part. My mystery loving brain was proud to have figured it out before it was revealed because it was not easy to guess, and I really enjoyed the twists and turns.
In the end I would absolutely recommend this queer contemporary YA, especially if you enjoy more emotional stories. The fact that this is Hammonds’, debut book and their writing is this good already makes me really excited to imagine what they could have instore for us next.
An ARC was given to me for an honest review.
January 23, 2023
queer black girl unpacking intergenerational trauma with her family... it's like this book was made for me!!
January 7, 2022
Full disclosure, Jas is my friend and I read many early drafts of this book. This review is of the final manuscript, and while you might say OK, you're biased, why should we take you seriously as a reviewer? Well: Like I said, I've read the book before, so you'd think I'd be a little jaded. You'd think I'd skip over words or scenes I'd read before. No. No. No. I hung on every single word, and it was more moving and more beautiful than I even remembered.
WE DESERVE MONUMENTS is a pull-your-heart-out-with-its-teeth novel, and I mean that in the best way possible. Jas *goes there* in every sense; their characters feel like real people, and so their big love, aches, and humor feel real too. I got chills multiple times reading this book. I cried more than once (and at really inconvenient times too, tearing up on a treadmill, sobbing 2 minutes before a work Zoom call). I laughed a whole hell of a lot, and I swooned like crazy. Like, damn, Jas can WRITE.
Though the prose, plot, themes, and characters are all tight and expertly executed, Avery, the protagonist, carries the voice. She is one of the most relatable characters I've ever read; queer kids, Black kids, biracial kids--and everyone else--will find so much of themselves in her. She's loyal, funny, adventurous, calming, kind. She wants the world to be better and for people to heal. She wants to love sincerely and wants to let her every wall down; she just doesn't always know how. Her friendship with Jade and Simone, and then ultimately her romance with Simone, is genuine and warm. The romance is hot and tender, thrilling and complicated. It's really, really something. This is a literary couple for the ages. (If you make fan art please send it to me. A pony could probably draw better than I can or I'd do it myself).
Beyond her school social life, though, Avery has other stars in her life: her parents, especially her mother, Zora, who escaped her hometown, Bardell, after a childhood filled with her mother's abuse. But her mom, Avery's Grandmother Letty, was neglectful because of how deeply she was hurting after unthinkable tragedy. Mama Letty becomes a star, too, for Avery, for Zora, and for everyone around her. This novel allows everyone to be fully human and flawed but then takes the time to break that cycle of abuse. It meticulously heals, and wonders how everyone can keep on healing even after love is gone. Mama Letty is a complicated character, but oh my GOD will you love her. I did. She's snappy and honest. She's curmudgeonly and perpetually over it. She's everything.
If you liked HONEY GIRL, if you liked "San Junipero," if you like books that make you FEEL SOMETHING, if you like books that reckon with real life and important history and the messy, all-you-can-do-is-cry fallout of generations of racism, this book is for you. If you like queer romance that takes your breath away, found family, generations of queer Black characters, or hidden spots where you can be yourself and find yourself, this book is for you.
In the novel, the Renaissance is a local bar, tucked away in an old man's house, treasured by generations of people who are just looking for somewhere to *be.* Arnie serves hot food, stiff drinks, and songs that have folks dancing their way into the night, into the next day. It's more magic than the moon, better than Jupiter. WE DESERVE MONUMENTS feels just like that.
Jas, if you're reading this, you've really done it. Thank you for writing a story I will keep in my heart forever, for making me cry at work, for being such a magical, thoughtful, special person and writer and friend. You deserve monuments.
WE DESERVE MONUMENTS is a pull-your-heart-out-with-its-teeth novel, and I mean that in the best way possible. Jas *goes there* in every sense; their characters feel like real people, and so their big love, aches, and humor feel real too. I got chills multiple times reading this book. I cried more than once (and at really inconvenient times too, tearing up on a treadmill, sobbing 2 minutes before a work Zoom call). I laughed a whole hell of a lot, and I swooned like crazy. Like, damn, Jas can WRITE.
Though the prose, plot, themes, and characters are all tight and expertly executed, Avery, the protagonist, carries the voice. She is one of the most relatable characters I've ever read; queer kids, Black kids, biracial kids--and everyone else--will find so much of themselves in her. She's loyal, funny, adventurous, calming, kind. She wants the world to be better and for people to heal. She wants to love sincerely and wants to let her every wall down; she just doesn't always know how. Her friendship with Jade and Simone, and then ultimately her romance with Simone, is genuine and warm. The romance is hot and tender, thrilling and complicated. It's really, really something. This is a literary couple for the ages. (If you make fan art please send it to me. A pony could probably draw better than I can or I'd do it myself).
Beyond her school social life, though, Avery has other stars in her life: her parents, especially her mother, Zora, who escaped her hometown, Bardell, after a childhood filled with her mother's abuse. But her mom, Avery's Grandmother Letty, was neglectful because of how deeply she was hurting after unthinkable tragedy. Mama Letty becomes a star, too, for Avery, for Zora, and for everyone around her. This novel allows everyone to be fully human and flawed but then takes the time to break that cycle of abuse. It meticulously heals, and wonders how everyone can keep on healing even after love is gone. Mama Letty is a complicated character, but oh my GOD will you love her. I did. She's snappy and honest. She's curmudgeonly and perpetually over it. She's everything.
If you liked HONEY GIRL, if you liked "San Junipero," if you like books that make you FEEL SOMETHING, if you like books that reckon with real life and important history and the messy, all-you-can-do-is-cry fallout of generations of racism, this book is for you. If you like queer romance that takes your breath away, found family, generations of queer Black characters, or hidden spots where you can be yourself and find yourself, this book is for you.
In the novel, the Renaissance is a local bar, tucked away in an old man's house, treasured by generations of people who are just looking for somewhere to *be.* Arnie serves hot food, stiff drinks, and songs that have folks dancing their way into the night, into the next day. It's more magic than the moon, better than Jupiter. WE DESERVE MONUMENTS feels just like that.
Jas, if you're reading this, you've really done it. Thank you for writing a story I will keep in my heart forever, for making me cry at work, for being such a magical, thoughtful, special person and writer and friend. You deserve monuments.
November 11, 2022
I read the audiobook of this one and I thought the narrator did a great job bringing the characters to life, and I mean all of the characters not just the main character telling the story. This is a slow paced but beautiful and heartbreaking story. A story about family and trauma and love. This story shows how trauma haunts us through generations impacting far beyond. Avery’s parents have moved her back to her mother’s home town, a tiny place in Georgia, because her maternal grandmother is dying. Avery has a plan to go to school and get out without drama. But as she learns more about this grandmother she only ever met once before and makes friends she finds get out without making connections will be impossible. Avery learns a lot about her family’s history and as a biracial (black and white) she learns a lot that is hard to swollen about her southern roots. Reconciling what happened versus present day is difficult for her. This story was beautiful and poetic. It was heartbreaking and definitely made me shed a tear or two. Definitely worth a read.
December 4, 2022
"There are things I didn't want you to know," she said, "because they are painful. Do you understand that?"
"I think I should be able to decide that for myself."
She smiled unkindly. "Oh, because you're grown now?"
"No, because this is my family, too." pg. 146
This is a kind of layered book that has a lot of depth. Avery moves to Georgia (where her mother grew up) because her grandmother whom she barely knows (Mama Letty) is dying of cancer. Avery is mixed (dad is white, mom is Black), lesbian, and seventeen. Leaving DC for small-town Georgia is quite a change.
When she gets to Georgia she finds a very grumpy grandma, a very stressed-out mother obviously hiding a lot of secrets about her family and her past, and an attractive Black girl next door her own age who she prays is gay. Simone (the next-door neighbor) comes with a built-in friend, her bestie Jade who is a white girl with a complicated, tragic family past.
...
That's the bare bones explanation. The actual book has a LOT of facets, a LOT to unpack.
FRIENDSHIP
This book delves into teenage friendships and their intensity. Simone (Black, , Jade (white, has a murdered mother, from a very rich family), and Avery (new-girl-in-town, mixed, fiery temper when agitated, lesbian) seem like a rather bizarre trio, but Avery fits right in with this girl-group. It's extra-special for her considering she was having a lot of trouble with her friends back home.
She was in a group of three there, too, dated one (which ended messily when her girlfriend said some racially charged stuff and also told Avery she "wasn't even Black," or something along those lines) and was platonic friends with the other. They were go-getters, studiers, all planning to go to ritzy Ivy League or Hidden Ivy colleges. They never did anything like drink or smoke pot or fuck (even Avery and her girlfriend never fucked). Avery was beginning to feel claustrophobic. She was losing interest in keeping her grades up and touring Georgetown every weekend. She was having urges like shaving her head and going to Black history museums. This caused her DC friends to be uncomfortable and mock her.
When she lands in GA, she meets Simone and Jade, and they couldn't be more different than her friends at home. They drink alcohol and smoke pot. They are into crystals and astrology. They are conscious of and critical of racism and homophobia. They seize on Avery almost immediately and welcome her into their cozy embrace. Avery starts experiencing happiness with friendship and being herself for the first time. She slowly releases her friends in DC and they fade into her past as GA swallows her whole in more ways than one.
The girls also get into huge fights. Reminds me a bit of why I avoid YA, it's always so dramatic.
FAMILY
The book is also hugely about family, family secrets and what is now referred to as 'intergenerational trauma.' Avery's family is honestly all kinds of fucked up. Her mom goes back home to care for her mother, but it's obvious her relationship with Mama Letty is very strained, full of resentment, and that she might have actually . Her father (Mama Letty's husband) was
Mom was still crying under Mama Letty's cruel gaze, and I was torn. Again. I didn't know how to fix something that stretched past decades I'd been alive. My mind was reeling. pg. 288
Avery is kind of shocked to be plunged into this icy, dagger-filled relationship between her mom and grandma which is filled with resentment, anger, deep pain, and bad acts. She really wants to get to know her surly, insulting grandmother before she passes and has a hunger for learning about her family history. This is in no small way influenced by her two brand-new best friends who have each painfully lost a family member.
"You have to." Simone's tone hardened. "Avery, you have to. None of that trivial stuff matters when someone dies. If your mom doesn't want to talk about it, then fine. You'll find your own way. Just don't give up. Promise?" pg. 102
And does Avery ever have a doozy of a family past to plunge into. Things just keep getting more and more twisted.
PLOT TWISTS
Despite the many twists and turns of the story, I was only once surprised: at the end, when there is a pretty big shock. Other than that, Hammonds telegraphs her twists. I wouldn't read this expecting shock after shock. She doesn't allow you to be shocked (except for the ending) because she lets you know beforehand what to suspect.
DRAMA
Only read this if you like Big Drama. The book is very dramatic. For someone trying to... or at least who mildly feels like she should hide her sexuality if not only for her own sake Avery does some really stupid shit. She also gets in huge fights she shouldn't get in. And she also airs a lot of dirty laundry that she knows should be kept hush-hush in these huge, screaming, public fights.
And that brings me to why I don't read YA very often. I'm an adult and it's hard to watch these teenagers making horrible decisions (often knowing full well they are horrible decisions) and barrel forward. As an adult, I'm often cringing and begging the characters not to do that. I only read (as a general rule) YA that is based in reality in order to avoid the really stupid shit, but there's still a pretty considerable gap between an adult mind and a teenaged one. Most times I feel like the mom or auntie, instead of someone who relates to the teenaged main characters as if they were myself.
If you have a low tolerance for drama, and many, many, many screaming fights between characters, avoid this one.
Alarm bells went off. I had been nothing but a respectful daughter for seventeen years. Now, there was only anger. I felt nothing like the well-behaved girl who used to quietly spend my Saturday mornings reading next to her. She had been treating me like a child. I was going to act like one. pg. 173
RACISM
Self-explanatory. The book discusses racism frequently. This might upset some readers.
HOMOPHOBIA
A lot of homophobia dealt with in here. Avery is pretty lucky because her family accepts her when she comes out at 14. Others aren't as lucky, and outside the home Avery faces homophobia herself.
SIDE NOTE
Avery is pretty well-off, her parents drive a BMW and they eat take-out every single night. Classism isn't much addressed, Jade's family is Old Southern wealthy, but Avery isn't poor or lower middle class. Simone is poor. While racism is addressed extensively, classism is not really touched on outside of the context of evil rich white people preying on poor Black people.
TL;DR
A good book, I'd recommend it. Sometimes I do read YA, and this was pretty decent. Along the lines of something like With the Fire on High or The People We Choose. It didn't absolutely blow me away, make me recommend it to all my friends, but I would suggest it to anyone who enjoys contemporary YA.
Hammonds writing is plush and soft. I enjoyed her writing style.
If I was a ship and Mama Letty was the iceberg, then Mom was the rocky, unforgiving ocean. pg. 106
Read this if you want a good complex plot with a lot of layers. Read it if you enjoy books about friendships, messy families, f/f romance, generational trauma, mysteries, and teenagers struggling with finding their identity and their place in the world. Read it if the idea of a granddaughter solving the mysteries of her family's tormented past appeals to you. Read it if you thrive on drama. DO NOT read it if you are upset by racism, homophobia, murder, or descriptions of teenagers smoking, drinking alcohol, sneaking around, and lying to parents. There's no sex, if you are a parent worried that there is *gasp* lesbian teenage sex in here, there isn't.
...I thought, I might be in love with you. I always thought falling in love would feel like an endless summer. Warm and whimsical, sugar-sweet sherbet and sparklers lighting the sky. But it was autumn now, and the world was still beautiful, and it all reminded me of her. I rested my hand on her back and thought yes, hearing her laugh felt like jumping into a lake on the first day of summer vacation. But it also felt like this, like being wrapped in the navy glow of a fall evening with golden leaves beneath our feet. It felt like an angel in a fresh layer of snow and a text message saying all schools were closed. Being around her felt like the opening of a tree bud after a long winter's sleep, and I wondered if that was what love REALLY ways. A four-season delight. pg. 276
NAMES IN THIS BOOK
"I think I should be able to decide that for myself."
She smiled unkindly. "Oh, because you're grown now?"
"No, because this is my family, too." pg. 146
This is a kind of layered book that has a lot of depth. Avery moves to Georgia (where her mother grew up) because her grandmother whom she barely knows (Mama Letty) is dying of cancer. Avery is mixed (dad is white, mom is Black), lesbian, and seventeen. Leaving DC for small-town Georgia is quite a change.
When she gets to Georgia she finds a very grumpy grandma, a very stressed-out mother obviously hiding a lot of secrets about her family and her past, and an attractive Black girl next door her own age who she prays is gay. Simone (the next-door neighbor) comes with a built-in friend, her bestie Jade who is a white girl with a complicated, tragic family past.
...
That's the bare bones explanation. The actual book has a LOT of facets, a LOT to unpack.
FRIENDSHIP
This book delves into teenage friendships and their intensity. Simone (Black, , Jade (white, has a murdered mother, from a very rich family), and Avery (new-girl-in-town, mixed, fiery temper when agitated, lesbian) seem like a rather bizarre trio, but Avery fits right in with this girl-group. It's extra-special for her considering she was having a lot of trouble with her friends back home.
She was in a group of three there, too, dated one (which ended messily when her girlfriend said some racially charged stuff and also told Avery she "wasn't even Black," or something along those lines) and was platonic friends with the other. They were go-getters, studiers, all planning to go to ritzy Ivy League or Hidden Ivy colleges. They never did anything like drink or smoke pot or fuck (even Avery and her girlfriend never fucked). Avery was beginning to feel claustrophobic. She was losing interest in keeping her grades up and touring Georgetown every weekend. She was having urges like shaving her head and going to Black history museums. This caused her DC friends to be uncomfortable and mock her.
When she lands in GA, she meets Simone and Jade, and they couldn't be more different than her friends at home. They drink alcohol and smoke pot. They are into crystals and astrology. They are conscious of and critical of racism and homophobia. They seize on Avery almost immediately and welcome her into their cozy embrace. Avery starts experiencing happiness with friendship and being herself for the first time. She slowly releases her friends in DC and they fade into her past as GA swallows her whole in more ways than one.
The girls also get into huge fights. Reminds me a bit of why I avoid YA, it's always so dramatic.
FAMILY
The book is also hugely about family, family secrets and what is now referred to as 'intergenerational trauma.' Avery's family is honestly all kinds of fucked up. Her mom goes back home to care for her mother, but it's obvious her relationship with Mama Letty is very strained, full of resentment, and that she might have actually . Her father (Mama Letty's husband) was
Mom was still crying under Mama Letty's cruel gaze, and I was torn. Again. I didn't know how to fix something that stretched past decades I'd been alive. My mind was reeling. pg. 288
Avery is kind of shocked to be plunged into this icy, dagger-filled relationship between her mom and grandma which is filled with resentment, anger, deep pain, and bad acts. She really wants to get to know her surly, insulting grandmother before she passes and has a hunger for learning about her family history. This is in no small way influenced by her two brand-new best friends who have each painfully lost a family member.
"You have to." Simone's tone hardened. "Avery, you have to. None of that trivial stuff matters when someone dies. If your mom doesn't want to talk about it, then fine. You'll find your own way. Just don't give up. Promise?" pg. 102
And does Avery ever have a doozy of a family past to plunge into. Things just keep getting more and more twisted.
PLOT TWISTS
Despite the many twists and turns of the story, I was only once surprised: at the end, when there is a pretty big shock. Other than that, Hammonds telegraphs her twists. I wouldn't read this expecting shock after shock. She doesn't allow you to be shocked (except for the ending) because she lets you know beforehand what to suspect.
DRAMA
Only read this if you like Big Drama. The book is very dramatic. For someone trying to... or at least who mildly feels like she should hide her sexuality if not only for her own sake Avery does some really stupid shit. She also gets in huge fights she shouldn't get in. And she also airs a lot of dirty laundry that she knows should be kept hush-hush in these huge, screaming, public fights.
And that brings me to why I don't read YA very often. I'm an adult and it's hard to watch these teenagers making horrible decisions (often knowing full well they are horrible decisions) and barrel forward. As an adult, I'm often cringing and begging the characters not to do that. I only read (as a general rule) YA that is based in reality in order to avoid the really stupid shit, but there's still a pretty considerable gap between an adult mind and a teenaged one. Most times I feel like the mom or auntie, instead of someone who relates to the teenaged main characters as if they were myself.
If you have a low tolerance for drama, and many, many, many screaming fights between characters, avoid this one.
Alarm bells went off. I had been nothing but a respectful daughter for seventeen years. Now, there was only anger. I felt nothing like the well-behaved girl who used to quietly spend my Saturday mornings reading next to her. She had been treating me like a child. I was going to act like one. pg. 173
RACISM
Self-explanatory. The book discusses racism frequently. This might upset some readers.
HOMOPHOBIA
A lot of homophobia dealt with in here. Avery is pretty lucky because her family accepts her when she comes out at 14. Others aren't as lucky, and outside the home Avery faces homophobia herself.
SIDE NOTE
Avery is pretty well-off, her parents drive a BMW and they eat take-out every single night. Classism isn't much addressed, Jade's family is Old Southern wealthy, but Avery isn't poor or lower middle class. Simone is poor. While racism is addressed extensively, classism is not really touched on outside of the context of evil rich white people preying on poor Black people.
TL;DR
A good book, I'd recommend it. Sometimes I do read YA, and this was pretty decent. Along the lines of something like With the Fire on High or The People We Choose. It didn't absolutely blow me away, make me recommend it to all my friends, but I would suggest it to anyone who enjoys contemporary YA.
Hammonds writing is plush and soft. I enjoyed her writing style.
If I was a ship and Mama Letty was the iceberg, then Mom was the rocky, unforgiving ocean. pg. 106
Read this if you want a good complex plot with a lot of layers. Read it if you enjoy books about friendships, messy families, f/f romance, generational trauma, mysteries, and teenagers struggling with finding their identity and their place in the world. Read it if the idea of a granddaughter solving the mysteries of her family's tormented past appeals to you. Read it if you thrive on drama. DO NOT read it if you are upset by racism, homophobia, murder, or descriptions of teenagers smoking, drinking alcohol, sneaking around, and lying to parents. There's no sex, if you are a parent worried that there is *gasp* lesbian teenage sex in here, there isn't.
...I thought, I might be in love with you. I always thought falling in love would feel like an endless summer. Warm and whimsical, sugar-sweet sherbet and sparklers lighting the sky. But it was autumn now, and the world was still beautiful, and it all reminded me of her. I rested my hand on her back and thought yes, hearing her laugh felt like jumping into a lake on the first day of summer vacation. But it also felt like this, like being wrapped in the navy glow of a fall evening with golden leaves beneath our feet. It felt like an angel in a fresh layer of snow and a text message saying all schools were closed. Being around her felt like the opening of a tree bud after a long winter's sleep, and I wondered if that was what love REALLY ways. A four-season delight. pg. 276
NAMES IN THIS BOOK
January 9, 2024
brb staring at a wall for the foreseeable future to think about how good this was
December 31, 2022
The reasons I didn't rate this book higher all have to do with spoilers...
The ending to me felt very tacked on. While it answered some things, others went unaddressed. Really, Mama Letty killed the wife of the man who killed her husband? He was having an affair...why would he care? Does shooting an innocent (as far as we know) woman somehow redress the wrong? Did Jade ever find out, and what happened with her friendship with Simone and Avery? Whatever happened to Avery?
The murder (and also Avery's trajectory) were the crux of the book, and deserved more than a quick chapter resolution at the end.
The ending to me felt very tacked on. While it answered some things, others went unaddressed. Really, Mama Letty killed the wife of the man who killed her husband? He was having an affair...why would he care? Does shooting an innocent (as far as we know) woman somehow redress the wrong? Did Jade ever find out, and what happened with her friendship with Simone and Avery? Whatever happened to Avery?
The murder (and also Avery's trajectory) were the crux of the book, and deserved more than a quick chapter resolution at the end.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 21, 2023
Some friendships just happen. One day they don’t exist, the next it’s like you’ve known each other forever. One of these self-evident friendships surprises Avery, who was ready to grit her teeth through her senior year of high school and get it over with. The hard part wasn’t so much leaving DC and her friends as moving in with her dying and very grumpy grandmother and navigating a brand new school in Bardell, Georgia as one of very few non-white students. Then she meets Simone and her best friend Jade and suddenly, everything gets a lot more interesting.
This audiobook made me go through so many different emotions I’m not sure where to start. First of all, I loved the narration, despite a couple of misplaced pauses. All the voices are perfect, I never had any doubt about who was talking, even when I had to take a break and came back in the middle of the dialogue. The teenagers, the moms, the grandmother, all have their specific timbre and tone.
There’s so much in this story. First love, growth, awareness of evil big and small. Racism plays a huge part, and its repercussions in the moment and on following generations both of victims and perpetrators, the intergenerational trauma. Parental abuse and bigotry as well. Atonement, forgiveness, love all combine in a messy, complex, beautiful journey. The romance arc is very sweet and heartbreaking and hopeful, but what will stay with me is the family dynamics. Especially Avery’s, with the relationship between her and her mother Zora (also her and her father to a lesser extent), between her mother and her mother’s mother, Mama Letty, between Avery and her grandma. But also Simone and her mom Carol, Simone and Mama Letty, Carol and Mama Letty, Jade and her murdered mother, Jade and her stepmother…
I’d lie if I said that despite the tough and gut-wrenching topics, this book doesn’t feel heavy. It does. It absolutely does. And yet I’d relisten in a second. It’s a beautifully-written debut with realistic characters – teens and adults – and fundamental questions about how we treat ourselves and others. 4.5⭐️
I received a copy from the publisher and I am voluntarily leaving a review.
Read all my reviews on my blog (and please buy from the affiliation links!): Jude in the Stars
December 13, 2022
5 stars, but... 3.5-4 for the ending.
For most of this book, I was sure that it would end up as 5 stars, but the ending was a bit rushed, and more than a little confusing, not to also mention disappointing. And if I DID understand the ending to some degree, then I'm even more disappointed. But overall, I quite enjoyed this book, and would recommend it.
For most of this book, I was sure that it would end up as 5 stars, but the ending was a bit rushed, and more than a little confusing, not to also mention disappointing. And if I DID understand the ending to some degree, then I'm even more disappointed. But overall, I quite enjoyed this book, and would recommend it.
Want to read
January 22, 2021⭐Queer girl next door romance
🌟Black biracial lead
⭐ Family secrets in SMALL TOWN!!!
(If all of these enrapture you add this book to your tbr and go listen to unwell podcast cz it has everything above except MC is an adult)
🌟Black biracial lead
⭐ Family secrets in SMALL TOWN!!!
(If all of these enrapture you add this book to your tbr and go listen to unwell podcast cz it has everything above except MC is an adult)
May 12, 2024
I needed this book. Perfect pacing, beautiful writing about generational trauma. Truly inspiring.
September 27, 2022
We Deserve Monuments is a poignant and gripping coming of age story that follows Avery, a queer biracial (Black & white) teen who moves to a small Southern town with her parents to help her dying grandmother, Mama Letty.
This is a slow burn, character driven novel where the reader watches Avery navigate the complexities of familial trauma, anti-Blackness & homophobia in the south, intersectional identity, love, small town secrets, and family secrets.
I immediately fell in love with Avery. So many of her struggles were ones that I’ve also faced growing up, which was pretty difficult to read.
When it came to Mama Letty, her story was by far the most heartbreaking. Her story really highlights the cruel history of America’s past.
While this story is incredibly sad at times, there are moments of joy. We get to see Avery find her place in this new community and even fall in love with the girl next door!
Overall, this is an incredible debut, but get those tissues ready! This one will definitely have you in your feelings.
Thank you Macmillan Children’s Pub for providing a review copy. This did not influence my review. All opinions are my own.
This is a slow burn, character driven novel where the reader watches Avery navigate the complexities of familial trauma, anti-Blackness & homophobia in the south, intersectional identity, love, small town secrets, and family secrets.
I immediately fell in love with Avery. So many of her struggles were ones that I’ve also faced growing up, which was pretty difficult to read.
When it came to Mama Letty, her story was by far the most heartbreaking. Her story really highlights the cruel history of America’s past.
While this story is incredibly sad at times, there are moments of joy. We get to see Avery find her place in this new community and even fall in love with the girl next door!
Overall, this is an incredible debut, but get those tissues ready! This one will definitely have you in your feelings.
Thank you Macmillan Children’s Pub for providing a review copy. This did not influence my review. All opinions are my own.
December 4, 2022
I wanted to love this book and I thought it would except it shied away from some interesting complexity in race relations when it should have embraced it. I enjoyed all the main cast: complex, rich relationships full of trauma and worries about living in a small town as people of color and additional queer people on top of that, white girls very aware and embarrassed by their rich families owning and operating plantation hotels, and a lot of coming of age and getting to know your family and wrestling with generational trauma.
What I did not enjoy was that two important plot points are just left out to dry at the end of the book:
What I did not enjoy was that two important plot points are just left out to dry at the end of the book:
February 20, 2023
You open a book like We Deserve Monuments and it demands you pay attention. The author came in with such a sure and strong voice, I reveled in the words.
Avery and her parents head down to small town Georgia to spend time with her grandmother who is dying of cancer. There are old family wounds and the book shares the pain of three generations of women who cannot find a way to communicate let alone heal. Avery is torn between her mother and grandmother but too many secrets and lies keep them all apart. Mother/daughter relationships are of course complex and here are two sets which makes things even more complicated. The author props up the dynamics carefully like a precarious house of cards, the tension building because it is decades in the making. At times, it is a difficult read because so many unspoken truths lie just below the surface, ugliness waiting to be confronted. Ultimately, the author breaks down everything to build up. There are also more characters who fill the small town with joy and/or fury. Avery is queer and out in case anyone is wondering and there is a small romance. Monuments is a powerful story with memorable characters that I recommend highly.
The narrator, Tamika Katon-Donegal, is surreal in how many distinct voices she gives life.
Avery and her parents head down to small town Georgia to spend time with her grandmother who is dying of cancer. There are old family wounds and the book shares the pain of three generations of women who cannot find a way to communicate let alone heal. Avery is torn between her mother and grandmother but too many secrets and lies keep them all apart. Mother/daughter relationships are of course complex and here are two sets which makes things even more complicated. The author props up the dynamics carefully like a precarious house of cards, the tension building because it is decades in the making. At times, it is a difficult read because so many unspoken truths lie just below the surface, ugliness waiting to be confronted. Ultimately, the author breaks down everything to build up. There are also more characters who fill the small town with joy and/or fury. Avery is queer and out in case anyone is wondering and there is a small romance. Monuments is a powerful story with memorable characters that I recommend highly.
The narrator, Tamika Katon-Donegal, is surreal in how many distinct voices she gives life.
February 22, 2022
This book crawled inside my heart and now lives there permanently. I adored Avery, a teenager who is trying to find her place in a lot of ways: in the small town she's just moved to, full of rumors and watchful eyes; in her own body, as she feels self-conscious about her new lip ring and wants to gather the courage to shave her head; in her family, as she attempts to form a connection with her dying grandmother; among her friends, as she makes friends in a new town and starts falling for Simone, the girl next door. This felt like such a real, slice-of-life book with all of life's ups and downs--sometimes sad, sometimes funny, sometimes hopeful. And at all times, it was beautifully written and so hard to put down.
January 26, 2022
Incredible.
February 13, 2023
4.5
we, as a society, don't talk about this book enough
we, as a society, don't talk about this book enough
March 28, 2024
Content warnings: lesbophobia, homophobia, racism, systemic racism, references to murder, death of a loved one, references to abusive parent, alcohol consumption, drug usage, terminal illness (cancer), hospital visit, police brutality, anti-Black hate crime, references to alcoholism, trauma, gun violence, vomit, medical content, classism, parental abandonment, fatphobia, gaslighting.
Rep: Avery (MC) is cis, biracial-Black, and pansexual. Simone (SC/LI) is cis, Black, plus sized, and lesbian. Avery's mum is cis, Black and bisexual. Side Black characters. Side Black queer characters.
This was fantastic.
I love books in which family dynamics play into the story so much. This was really well done - the stories wove together really well, and was an all around powerful read.
Rep: Avery (MC) is cis, biracial-Black, and pansexual. Simone (SC/LI) is cis, Black, plus sized, and lesbian. Avery's mum is cis, Black and bisexual. Side Black characters. Side Black queer characters.
This was fantastic.
I love books in which family dynamics play into the story so much. This was really well done - the stories wove together really well, and was an all around powerful read.
June 1, 2024
this was an unexpected ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ read for me — i got the audiobook as an influencer ARC from @librofm and then bought the physical book because i loved it so much. truly, a beautiful YA story with so much depth and heart and diversity, tackling so many layered topics and themes with a masterful hand and telling a really engaging slow burn love story all the while. i loved the main characters and was so invested in the friendships, the family dynamics, and the small town controversies and complexities and mysteries. it got me in feels and was surprising more than once and i can’t recommend this one enough!
December 18, 2022
This is about a mother who moves her family back to her hometown to take care of her mother who is sick. This is about family secrets and building relationships. I felt like this book would have been better if we would have focus on relationships as family and friends and not relationships as falling in love. I think it was to insta and took out what a heartfelt book this could have been.
December 19, 2022
"A diamond in the rough" is how Avery's mom has defined Barbell ever since the family decided to move there. It's not like the family had any other choice. The town's biggest claim to fame is that it has the richest soil on earth which makes it a great place to grow. However, with the history of the South, this claim seems insidious to the family.
Matters aren't helped by the fact that Avery has been uprooted from her life in D.C and been forced to move there because of her terminally ill grandmother, Mama Letty. To aggravate matters further, the family is mixed, Avery's dad is white and her mother black, and Barbell is in the south, where there is animosity between the races, problems, issues and, possibly, extreme danger for Avery and her family. Just for being different. Avery’s grandmother is not an easy person to live with (and this is stating the problem the woman has with everyone and everything lightly). If only Avery’s grandmother didn’t complain about everything her mother has ever done (and does) and insult’s her father about his color.
Will Avery’s new friends and a budding romance help her overcome the history of Barbell and the stains it left behind? Or, will she be able to overcome the town and be able to blossom into a woman in her new home? We Deserve Monuments, by Jas Hammonds, is a coming of age tale in a town you want to miss (but, not the book), if only to see what the past has done to the future of the South. Especially from the eyes of a young northern girl who never understood what the South was like. The book left me with the question, “Would ignorance of this knowledge be better than having to know it?” After reading the book, you will be able to answer that question for yourself.
Happy Reading!
Matters aren't helped by the fact that Avery has been uprooted from her life in D.C and been forced to move there because of her terminally ill grandmother, Mama Letty. To aggravate matters further, the family is mixed, Avery's dad is white and her mother black, and Barbell is in the south, where there is animosity between the races, problems, issues and, possibly, extreme danger for Avery and her family. Just for being different. Avery’s grandmother is not an easy person to live with (and this is stating the problem the woman has with everyone and everything lightly). If only Avery’s grandmother didn’t complain about everything her mother has ever done (and does) and insult’s her father about his color.
Will Avery’s new friends and a budding romance help her overcome the history of Barbell and the stains it left behind? Or, will she be able to overcome the town and be able to blossom into a woman in her new home? We Deserve Monuments, by Jas Hammonds, is a coming of age tale in a town you want to miss (but, not the book), if only to see what the past has done to the future of the South. Especially from the eyes of a young northern girl who never understood what the South was like. The book left me with the question, “Would ignorance of this knowledge be better than having to know it?” After reading the book, you will be able to answer that question for yourself.
Happy Reading!
October 25, 2022
Disclaimer: I received a complimentary ALC in exchange for an honest review. This did not affect my rating.
Content warnings: Terminal illness (cancer), grief, death, murders, homophobia, anti-Black hate crime, police brutality, alcoholism, trauma
Avery is entering her senior year away from DC, which she’s always called home, to be with her dying grandmother she doesn’t know in a small Georgia town where she feels very out of place. Avery’s mom and grandma won’t stop fighting, and Avery’s determined to get to the bottom of it to help them heal. But healing might be harder than Avery originally thought, as she finds out more and more about her new town’s racist past that’s deeply rooted in her family history.
I love how deeply complex this story was. There are certain characters you root for/feel bad for in the beginning that, by the end, you’re not so sure you like anymore. I think this really showed that if you only have one side of the story—especially if that side belongs to the guilty party—there’s a good chance you’re not actually on the right side. I’d love to talk about this more, but alas, spoilers. (Feel free to message me about it if you’ve read this, though!)
With that said, I loved Avery all throughout this story. I can’t even imagine moving schools my senior year, yet that was the least of Avery’s concerns, especially once she started to learn more about her family’s past. She didn’t always make the best choices (readers at home, please don’t be out past curfew for an entire six hours without so much as a text), but she was so caring and I loved that about her.
I highly recommend this book!
Content warnings: Terminal illness (cancer), grief, death, murders, homophobia, anti-Black hate crime, police brutality, alcoholism, trauma
Avery is entering her senior year away from DC, which she’s always called home, to be with her dying grandmother she doesn’t know in a small Georgia town where she feels very out of place. Avery’s mom and grandma won’t stop fighting, and Avery’s determined to get to the bottom of it to help them heal. But healing might be harder than Avery originally thought, as she finds out more and more about her new town’s racist past that’s deeply rooted in her family history.
I love how deeply complex this story was. There are certain characters you root for/feel bad for in the beginning that, by the end, you’re not so sure you like anymore. I think this really showed that if you only have one side of the story—especially if that side belongs to the guilty party—there’s a good chance you’re not actually on the right side. I’d love to talk about this more, but alas, spoilers. (Feel free to message me about it if you’ve read this, though!)
With that said, I loved Avery all throughout this story. I can’t even imagine moving schools my senior year, yet that was the least of Avery’s concerns, especially once she started to learn more about her family’s past. She didn’t always make the best choices (readers at home, please don’t be out past curfew for an entire six hours without so much as a text), but she was so caring and I loved that about her.
I highly recommend this book!
February 4, 2023
I picked this debut YA contemporary up because of the gorgeous cover - and the sapphic romance subplot - without really registering that it has a strong grief storyline. For various reasons, this wasn’t the best emotional choice for me right now. But once I’d started, I couldn’t stop reading, so here we are with me typing this review from my daybed, with a tear-wet pillow and a hot water bottle.
This is the story of Avery, uprooted from her life in DC in the final year of high school and transplanted to Bardell, Georgia. Why? Because her estranged maternal grandmother, Letty, is dying of cancer. After years without contact, Avery’s mother Zora wants one last chance to reconcile with her own mom. As Avery adjusts to her new life living with Letty - starts to break through her grandmother’s hard exterior; makes friends; falls for Simone, the gorgeous girl next door; and uncovers the racist murder of her grandfather - she navigates what it means to love people and lose them in the space of a few short months.
This is a story about anti-Blackness and violence, both physical and structural; it’s also a story about death and grief, and the way people hurt and abuse each other. The exploration of generational trauma, and the way the book - while hyper contemporary to the pandemic - puts us in proximity to the Jim Crow South, is unflinching. That makes it hard reading at times. But Jas Hammond also has an unerring gift for creating moments of joy and connection in the midst of the most difficult stuff. What I loved most about the book were the perfect scenes of friendship and freedom and Black community that Avery experiences.
I highly recommend this one.
Character notes: Avery is a Black, 17 year old, pansexual woman and a high school senior; her mum Zora is a Black bisexual woman and an astronomy professor; her dad is white and a musician. Simone is a Black, 17 year old, lesbian woman; Jade is a white 17 year old woman and Simone’s best friend.
CWs: grandmother dying of cancer (on page throughout); grandfather was murdered by police (off-page, described); secondary character’s mother was shot and murdered (unsolved); descriptions of past child abuse; alcoholism; recreational drinking and drug taking; forced outing; homophobic slurs and familial rejection because of sexuality.
This is the story of Avery, uprooted from her life in DC in the final year of high school and transplanted to Bardell, Georgia. Why? Because her estranged maternal grandmother, Letty, is dying of cancer. After years without contact, Avery’s mother Zora wants one last chance to reconcile with her own mom. As Avery adjusts to her new life living with Letty - starts to break through her grandmother’s hard exterior; makes friends; falls for Simone, the gorgeous girl next door; and uncovers the racist murder of her grandfather - she navigates what it means to love people and lose them in the space of a few short months.
This is a story about anti-Blackness and violence, both physical and structural; it’s also a story about death and grief, and the way people hurt and abuse each other. The exploration of generational trauma, and the way the book - while hyper contemporary to the pandemic - puts us in proximity to the Jim Crow South, is unflinching. That makes it hard reading at times. But Jas Hammond also has an unerring gift for creating moments of joy and connection in the midst of the most difficult stuff. What I loved most about the book were the perfect scenes of friendship and freedom and Black community that Avery experiences.
I highly recommend this one.
Character notes: Avery is a Black, 17 year old, pansexual woman and a high school senior; her mum Zora is a Black bisexual woman and an astronomy professor; her dad is white and a musician. Simone is a Black, 17 year old, lesbian woman; Jade is a white 17 year old woman and Simone’s best friend.
CWs: grandmother dying of cancer (on page throughout); grandfather was murdered by police (off-page, described); secondary character’s mother was shot and murdered (unsolved); descriptions of past child abuse; alcoholism; recreational drinking and drug taking; forced outing; homophobic slurs and familial rejection because of sexuality.
October 20, 2022
Holy wow. This was so so good. It is a story about a girl who ends up going back to her mom's hometown when her grandma is dying of cancer. She doesn't really know her grandma at all because her mom has some pretty big trauma related to her childhood but as she gets to know her grandma and this little town that she's landed in, she starts to uncover a lot of secrets.
So this book has a queer biracial main character and loads of discussions about queerness which was awesome. There is a next door neighbor's romance happening. There is a lot of discussions on generational trauma and healing and grief. There are a lot of conversations about racism and homophobia and systemic discrimination that is prevalent everywhere but especially rampant in small towns.
This book comes out at the end of November and it is a really perfect book for fall spooky season. It's a crossover between YA romance and mystery. It's a heavy book but also a cozy read if that makes any sense at all.
The writing is really atmospheric and you can easily envision the environment and all the characters. It really felt like Avery, the MC, and Mama Letty were right there in front of me bickering and joking and laughing and crying. I honestly just love this so much and can't recommend it enough.
(Side note: I fucking love when queer characters have queer parents. It's such a joy)
Also there's a Black fat love interest!!!
So this book has a queer biracial main character and loads of discussions about queerness which was awesome. There is a next door neighbor's romance happening. There is a lot of discussions on generational trauma and healing and grief. There are a lot of conversations about racism and homophobia and systemic discrimination that is prevalent everywhere but especially rampant in small towns.
This book comes out at the end of November and it is a really perfect book for fall spooky season. It's a crossover between YA romance and mystery. It's a heavy book but also a cozy read if that makes any sense at all.
The writing is really atmospheric and you can easily envision the environment and all the characters. It really felt like Avery, the MC, and Mama Letty were right there in front of me bickering and joking and laughing and crying. I honestly just love this so much and can't recommend it enough.
(Side note: I fucking love when queer characters have queer parents. It's such a joy)
Also there's a Black fat love interest!!!
April 20, 2022
I wish I could give this book six stars.
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