Pet: A Unique and Important Reading Experience [YA Review]

There are no more monsters anymore, or so the children in the city of Lucille are taught. With doting parents and a best friend named Redemption, Jam has grown up with this lesson all her life. But when she meets Pet, a creature made of horns and colours and claws, who emerges from one of her mother’s paintings and a drop of Jam’s blood, she must reconsider what she’s been told. Pet has come to hunt a monster, and the shadow of something grim lurks in Redemption’s house. Jam must fight not only to protect her best friend, but also to uncover the truth, and the answer to the question – How do you save the world from monsters if no one will admit they exist?

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Review ✍🏻

Instead, they put up other monuments. Some were statues of the dead, mostly the children whose hashtags had been turned into battle cries during the revolution.

Pet, 5%

I requested a number of ebooks when the libraries closed in mid-March, including Pet. It became available to me at the end of May; I read it over 31 May and 1 June. I did not anticipate it being so keenly relevant to the Black Lives Matter protests that expanded at that time. Pet is a work of speculative fiction, but it’s deeply rooted in reality. It offers a look at a utopic world in which protest achieved revolution. The monsters in this book aren’t fantasy. They’re human monsters, of the sort that you could encounter any time without realizing it. Pet, then, reads as a not-quite-allegorical parable on the themes of recognizing harm, enacting justice, and transforming society.

What does a monster look like? Jam asked. Her mother focused on her, cupping her cheek in a chalky hand. “Monsters don’t look like anything, doux-doux. That’s the whole point. That’s the whole problem.”

Pet, 9%

A Realistic Parable

Although Pet comes in at about 200 pages, it offers plenty to reflect and comment on in a review. This reviews focuses on just a few points. The story has distinct parable vibes. But it’s not didactic, really, in the way that I might describe George or even parts of Felix Ever After (where the characters engage in discussion that directly educates the reader). Pet tells a story that forces you to confront your experiences, as it takes place in a fantasy world, a world of speculative fiction in the truest sense – “Let’s speculate what it would look like in the future if Black folks achieved the society they’ve been fighting for”. Emezi’s style contributes to the dreamy atmosphere. While the story may have seem allegorical, it’s a cuttingly real story about real people.

Worldbuilding

They briefly mentioned other angels, those who weren’t human, but only to say that Lucille’s angels had been named after these other ones.

Pet, 6%

That being said…an excellent element of fantasy world building runs through Pet. Throughout the book, the terms monster and angel are used for humans, but there also seems to be an understanding of angels as terrific (in the old sense of the word) supernatural beings. If I was still a student, I might write a paper analyzing the use of the terms and representation of monsters and angels throughout this book. The character Pet, of course, as a creature who comes alive from Jam’s mother’s painting, is the most ‘fantasy’ feature of the story. Pet wants to destroy a monster. Pet makes a intriguing guardian – caring yet seemingly unpredictable. I had to keep reading to see how Jam and Pet’s differing desires would play out.

Protagonist Jam

I can’t wrap up this review without highlighting the book’s protagonist, Jam. Jam is a Black trans girl who appears to have selective mutism (not named in text). Her society does not disadvantage her because of her identity. Jam has never known monsters in her community, so she grapples with the idea that a monster is hurting someone she knows. I also have to applaud Jam’s friendship with Redemption. I love to see non-romanticized/sexualized relationships between girls and guys normalized.

When Jam was a toddler, she’d refused to speak, which was why they’d taught her to sign instead. She used her hands and body and face for her words but saved her voice for the most important one – screamed out during her first and only temper tantrum, when she was three, when someone had complimented her for the thousandth time by calling her “such a handsome little boy” and Jam had flung herself on the floor under her parents’ shocked gazes, screaming her first word with explosive sureness.

“Girl! Girl! Girl!”

Pet, 11%

The Bottom Line 💭

It took me a long time to write this review because there’s so much that could be said about Pet, but I don’t want to rob anyone of the opportunity to experience it for themselves so really all I should say is: a must read.

Further Reading 📰

🍂 Read an excerpt
🍂 Author website
🍂 Interview @ The New York Times
🍂 Reviews: Seji @ The Artisan Geek (video), Tasha @ Amasyn Reads, Nicky @ The Bibliophian, Jess @ Spooky Reads, Acquadimore
🍂 Related: For more speculative fiction featuring Black protagonists, check out my list of 18 middle grade titles.