Pulp- R. Talley

After reading multiple books that were not really my style (Expect a hate filled review of Catcher in the Rye soon!) I read a book just for me because I wanted to, and it was maybe only 40% not very good! Considering I enjoy hating things, that pretty impressive. This is super spoilery, but I don't want any of you to read it anyways, so we're good.

I pushed myself with more historical fiction because I figured I should find a book in that genre to have a positive experience with? I don't know. Anyway, I read Pulp by R. Talley. It was told from two perspectives, Abby, a lesbian teen living in 2018, and Janet, a lesbian teen from the 1950's. Although Abby was a character more like myself and very similar to other YA characters I love, I found myself a lot more interested and happier with Janet and her story. I think enjoying that older part of the story was an good experience for me to have, because I'm not a history kid. Are the 1950's even far back enough to be history? Y'all know I'm awful with historical things... I feel like Elizabeth is either rolling her eyes or loudly sighing or both. Anyway, back to the plot!

Abby (2018) is in her senior year. While searching for a topic to do her senior project on, she stumbles upon some 1950's lesbian pulp fiction, and becomes the biggest fangirl ever about this book, Women of the Twilight Realm by Marian Love (that's a pen name). Abby begins writing her own, more modern, lesbian fic in that style, influenced by Marian Love and her previous relationship- Abby's also getting over a breakup with her ex-girlfriend. They continue to be friends, which drives Abby kind of absolutely crazy. Abby is super activisty and has a really diverse friend group- In the group of 5, only two are white, and none are both cis & het. This felt a little bit like it was trying too hard, but I appreciated the effort and maybe this is actually realistic? Not in VT, I guess. One thing that really bugged me about Abby was that she deals with a lot of stuff in this book, particularly with her family (parents are divorcing, she's trying to take care of younger brother), and also is struggling a lot with the breakup. Abby continuously made bad decisions in both of those areas, choosing to make reckless decisions and avoid confrontation, despite her English teacher making an effort to reach out and see if there's anything going on, and her parents being willing to talk about it.

Meanwhile, Janet (1950) is 18 and has just found one of these lesbian books. It's called A Love So Strange by Dolores Wood (also a pen name!) and is the starting point for Janet discovering her own sexuality. Janet begins a tough relationship with her best friend, Marie, which they have to keep super secret because of the time period. Janet struggles with the consequences to being gay (although she isn't out) and has a hard time with not knowing any other lesbians other than the fictional ones from her book. It should be mentioned that most 1950's lesbian pulp fiction books were pretty focused on sex, especially the ones written by men (so, the majority of them) and also had to end with the girls either turning straight or dying. Janet is so impacted by this book that she begins writing her own, heavily influenced by her relationship with Marie, and A Love So Strange. Sounding familiar?

At this point, I was a little bit puzzled by the plot, because between Janet's chapters, Abby's chapters, and chapters consisting mostly of excerpts of the books (mostly Women of the Twilight Realm and A Love So Strange) I wasn't entirely sure which of these pulp fics were written and belonged to which girl. 

Sometime, it becomes super clear that the book Abby loves, Women of the Twilight Realm, is written by Janet. As well as learning more about the books and authors, there was a lot of information about being gay in the 1950's wrapped up in Janet's story. I actually really appreciated this part, because LGBTQ+ history is often not talked about, and I was not aware of almost any of the things this book showed. Marie (Janet's secret girlfriend?) struggles with working in the government, being with a girl who's father is a large part of the government, and how much she could lose by liking women. Janet and Marie end up ending things because the fear is too much- Marie gets interrogated at one point, and is afraid she is being tracked. Back then, being a lesbian meant you would lose your job, and likely go to jail. Janet's grandmother ends up finding out about Janet's sexuality, and relationship with Marie, and says some pretty hurtful things to Janet. After her grandmother threatens to tell her parents, Janet runs off to NYC to hang out at a gay bar with the author that wrote the book that Janet's obsessed with.

In 2018, Abby's trying to figure out how to find Marian Love (Janet), partly because of the school project, and partly because uhhh fangirling? Unfortunately, Abby gets told that she is dead. Big oof. Abby doesn't give up though, and continues searching for more. Abby is also making some bad decisions and kind of failing 3 classes and also hasn't thought about college. Her English teacher is all "uh so somethings up so uh you can tell me if you want but also You Need To Do Things Because You Are Failing so let's set some deadlines and I'm gonna help you get your life back on track, let's make A Plan" and eventually Abby is like "mm yeah my family's falling apart and also I kissed my ex??" except then there's no hugging because English teacher is too logical and orderly for that even though she cares so much about Abby, which is okay I guess.

Abby eventually receives a call from Janet who is NOT DEAD because she faked her death to get out of a bad legal situation for being a big old lesbian, which is actually kinda badass? Abby is all "bRO WhAt yOUr'E ALivE ? i LoVe yoU"

They meet up in real life and have a nice chat to wrap everything up nicely which actually kind of bugged me? The ending was a little rough and hard to get? But like I did kinda enjoy it?

Anyway, there's kinda the plot. Things I liked:

-Learning more lgbtq+ history! 

-Lesbian relationships that are not pretending to be fairy tales

-Janet? Her story? Old gay angsty stuff?

-Having a modern connection through Abby's story!

-Lots going on, which kept me from getting bored with the slower start

Things I didn't like:

-Slurs were used occasionally in places I felt they shouldn't have been

-Abby's relationship with her ex

-How Abby handled most things

-Wasn't terribly fond of how many of these lesbian pulp fics were incorporated- made it confusing

-A lot of the book was about these 1950's lesbian books, which meant reading through a lot of sex scenes

-I'm not a fan of meet-cutes (trope basically like "love at first sight") and this book had a lot of that.

Overall, very educational and taught me that I can enjoy stories from earlier than right now! Maybe 6/10 stars.