Ask the Passengers
by A.S. King
LGBT
Realistic Fiction
* * * * * Stars (Amazing!)
Astrid is struggling to figure out who she is in a small town that’s full of small-minded people and she’s keeping her innermost thoughts a secret from everyone she knows except the passengers in the airplanes that pass over her. She spends hours lying on her back on the picnic table she and her father built, watching the planes overhead and sending her love to the passengers. Maybe one day she will have a place for all of that love, maybe one day she will need it for herself, but for now, it is the safest place for it, the best thing to do with it. A painful and beautiful coming of age story, Astrid is thoughtful, philosophical (not in a small part due to the humanities course she’s taking), lonely, and uncertain. This raises excellent questions about what it means to be in love, and pushes us to examine all the little boxes and categories into which we (conveniently?) force others. Note: I am absolutely loving everything I read by A.S. King. (See also “Reality Boy,” and “Please Ignore Vera Dietz”)
Reviewed by YA Librarian
