Jennifer Finney Boylan

When the body of a college friend is discovered twenty years after her disappearance, Judith, the only witness who can testify to the innocence of the chief suspect, is forced to confront dark secrets from her past that compromise the healthy life she has built for her family.

A Novel

Long Black Veil

Ryan Mateyk

POPSUGAR 2020: A book written by a trans or non-binary author

This book was strange. The main plot was honestly really interesting and original. A group of college friends are exploring an old abandoned prison, and one of them goes missing. 35 years later, the missing girl's body turns up in the same prison they explored back in the day and her husband from the time is immediately targeted as the suspect. His best friend, who the friends all presumed had died, and who can prove his innocence is now living as a trans woman, and nobody, not even her husband and son, know of her past. 

If the book was just this premise, I would've rated it higher, despite the awkward dialogue between most of the characters (especially Casey... who talks like that!?). But interspersed throughout, there were lengthy meditations on gender and identity that felt more like the author's personal thoughts, rather than her character's. And the last ~40 pages - absolutely deranged! I don't even know what was happening and it made for a poor ending to an otherwise decent book.

it was fine? i really liked the beginning but it set up an atmosphere that it did not carry through, the ending was rushed, some of the prose was really gorgeous but it didn't make the rushed story better. 

Clara Gauthier

Geoffrey Froggatt

** spoiler alert **
           “You carry the past with you. Even if there's a before, and an after, in your life. It's still the same life. The trick is to build a bridge between that and what comes later.”

I loved this little dark piece of the dark academia genre. Long Black Veil is the story of Judith Carrigan, whose past is dredged up when the body of her college friend Wailer is discovered 20 years after her disappearance in Philadelphia's notorious and abandoned Eastern State Penitentiary. On a warm August night in 1980, six college students sneak into the dilapidated ruins of Philadelphia's Eastern State Penitentiary, looking for a thrill. With a pianist, a painter and a teacher among them, the friends are full of potential. But it's not long before they realize they are locked in, and not alone. Immediately the atmosphere is drenched in the typical dark academia trappings, only with the weight of a mystery from the past looming over the story. I loved the trans protagonist and how their story was told, and I especially loved how the author used The Ship of Theseus thought experiment to convey how human beings shift and change throughout their lives, much like how Judith changed throughout her transition. I loved the theme of identity and the idea that every version of yourself you’ve ever been or will ever be are all you on a foundational level and yet are all simultaneously different people. There was a consistent theme of the characters feeling distant from their old friends from their college days and yet still feeling forever connected to them and I really resonated with that. I liked the complex feelings felt towards these old connections, it felt like the quote “I hope you get everything you have ever wanted and I hope I never hear a word about it.” personified.

“For a long time, I'd searched the world, thinking I could start up new friendships like the ones I'd had before. But I never met people like that again. I know people will think that's what everyone believes about their college friends, but it's true. Maybe we're like flowers that open up at that brief moment in our lives, and after that, we close up again, one by one.”

There were moments where it felt like the book was treading water or when I felt like the plot was meandering, but I think the mundane day to day stories were vital to the ideas being explored here. This book reminds me of The Secret History, and not just because the genre and plot are similar. The format of this book beginning with a dark act and then slowly following the characters in the aftermath made this book and The Secret History feel like companion books. The quiet parts of the novel were carried by the book’s atmosphere and the unique narrative voice, and I felt like this book did it better than The Secret History in the sense that it didn’t drag or slow down the pace of the book. I didn’t feel so attached to any of the other characters other than Judith, but I still felt the weight and the impact of their relationships and history. I liked the relationship dynamics between the characters and their individual histories with each other. I liked that the book doesn’t handhold the reader when it comes to Judith’s trans identity. She doesn’t owe her old classmates an explanation and she didn’t owe the reader one either. I thought that was an interesting approach as non-trans authors typically use trans characters as a sounding board for the trans experience, and sometimes relegate those characters to acting as a stand in for an entire community which is so much pressure to put on a single character and takes away from who they are individually. I loved the final theme of reconciling the mistakes of your past selves while still taking accountability and moving forward. I like how this story was a vehicle for the author to take the reader by the hand and say, “we’re all just fucked up people trying to make things work, and maybe that’s enough.” and I love her for it. This novel was not what I expected but it was exactly what I needed.

“Maybe we should just love one another, even if we don't completely understand the things that people bear in their dark, strange hearts, even if the stars that other men and women are following seem invisible to us. If we make ourselves open to the humanity of others first, maybe understanding will follow. An incomprehensible theory of the universal isn't necessary if your only ambition is to embrace another soul. What you need, maybe all you need, in fact, is the willingness to love.”

Long Black Veil A Novel

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