Garvey’s Choice

  Writ­ten in poignant­ly poet­ic tan­ka verse, Grimes’ newest fol­lows a young black boy search­ing for his own unique voice, lost among his father’s wish­es and soci­ety’s mis­char­ac­ter­i­za­tions. This com­pas­sion­ate, coura­geous, and hope­ful nov­el explores the con­straints placed on black male iden­ti­ty and the cor­re­spond­ing pains and strug­gles that fol­low when a young black boy must con­front these real­i­ties both at home and in school. Gar­vey has a com­pli­cat­ed yet car­ing rela­tion­ship with his fam­i­ly: “Mom’s got a tal­ent / for origa­mi, but she / can’t fold me into / the jock Dad wants me to be.” Gar­vey copes with his father’s dis­ap­point­ment by binge eat­ing and, more pos­i­tive­ly, escap­ing into sci­ence fic­tion. Read­ers see the deep, lov­ing friend­ship Gar­vey shares with class­mate Joe, the only one with whom he can share his secrets. Through his father’s lament that Gar­vey isn’t “nor­mal” and oth­er clues, Grimes leaves the pos­si­bil­i­ty open for read­ers to see Gar­vey as a young gay boy, which rein­forces the con­nec­tion the nov­el estab­lish­es between him and Luther Van­dross, who strug­gled with both body image and being clos­et­ed. Gar­vey even­tu­al­ly finds him­self in the school cho­rus. “I feel unwrit­ten / like that song says … / I can’t wait to sing my song, / croon my own untold sto­ry.” This grace­ful nov­el risks stretch­ing beyond easy, reduc­tive con­struc­tions of black male com­ing-of-age sto­ries and deliv­ers a sin­cere, authen­tic sto­ry of resilience and find­ing one’s voice. (Kirkus Reviews, starred review)