Wednesday, April 26, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Harvest House by Cynthia Leitich Smith

 


Harvest House is the latest YA novel by acclaimed Muscogee Nation author Cynthia Leitich Smith. The novel is actually a stand-alone follow up to an earlier apparently acclaimed YA novel, Hearts Unbroken, but this novel is entirely stand-alone (I haven't read that earlier novel and didn't even known of its existence prior to reading this book and was totally fine reading this book). Also, unlike that book, this book is a genre book, with it featuring a ghost story at its core, as our protagonists deal with not just a made-up haunted house, but also a potential real haunting at a cross-roads of an Indigenous girl who supposedly died at the scene years ago.

The result is a really effective and strong short novel, which features a teen indigenous protagonist Hughie Wolfe as he tries to deal with a number of issues faced by indigenous teens these days: such as a white woman who doesn't understand and refuses to listen when she's dealing with harmful tropes (an Indian Burial Ground), showing solidarity and helping fellow indigneous youth and others dealing with prejudice, and (to a much lesser extent in this book) straight up racist conservative people. Hughie also has to deal with typical teen issues, like trying to get into and have a relationship with a girl he likes, dealing with friends, not selling out on who he is, and the loss of his beloved fall school play. Then of course there's the fantasy horror elements: a supposed ghost story - promoted with some harmful anti-indigneous tropes - that might contain a grain of truth, stemming from the disappearance of a native girl years in the past. Smith weaves this all together really well into a novel with an enjoyable story, characters, and message that's well worth reading for YA and even perhaps some non YA audiences.

----------------------------------------Plot Summary----------------------------------------------
Hughie Wolfe enters sophomore year hoping for simple things. First, to land another big role in his Fall and Spring School Plays - ones which hopefully won't require him to back out and take a stand again like he did when the year before he backed out of the Wizard of Oz due to its author's genocidal articles about native peoples. Second, to be in solidarity and show support to the few other indigenous teens in town and in school, and of course to have a good school year with perhaps a new friend or two. Finally, he hopes to finally get the courage to ask his crush, Marie Headbird, out.

But some things start to go awry pretty quickly for Hughie, starting with the fall school play being canceled, and him feeling the pressure to write a new play for the students to perform in the Spring. Lacking something to do, Hughie follows his new friend Sam into helping at what's planned to be a local haunted house exhibit - the Harvest House...only to discover that its proprieter thinks things like an Indian Burial Ground is harmless fun in this day and age. And then there's the fact that the local pub across the street from the house keeps having teen girl waitresses quit, with several of them reporting hearing a sketchy male, possibly haunted voice, chasing after them on their way home. It isn't helped by that haunted voice being connected by some to a stupid superstitious story about a murderous "Indian Maiden"

Hughie isn't one to take all this and just hope it passes, especially when Marie starts working herself at the pub and might be in danger. And so Hughie and his friends will have to deal not only with the not-so-harmless prejudice in the area, but the real story behind the haunted crossroads....before it claims Marie or someone else innocent as its next victim....
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Unlike some novels of this sort, Harvest House doesn't exactly hide the fact that something supernatural and ghost-related is actually going on here, even if its characters have doubts for large portions of the book. The book begins with a chapter taking place from the perspective of Celeste, a spirit seemingly haunting the crossroads and trying to save young indigneous women from someone she refers to as the "Bad Man", and Celeste has other chapters interspersed throughout the novel. At the same time, the story of who Celeste is, what she means by the "Bad Man", and what is really behind what's happening at the Crossroads is only revealed as its main character Hughie, and his own chapters that make up the majority of this book, discovers it for himself.

Which is not to say that Hughie is some detective or supernatural ghost hunter. Far from it, Hughie is just an indigneous teen in a small town who is trying to live his own high school life, dealing with normal high school teen issues (a crush on an indigneous girl he's met through his cousin, a new friendship with a boy named Sam, teen Bullies who are just kinda jerks, the school play for the fall being canceled) along with prejudice towards who he is as an indigenous teen. And for Hughie and his fellow indigenous youth (and some of the older indigenous characters we see), dealing with prejudice does not just mean putting his head down and gritting his teeth while it goes on. It means trying to support a freshman girl who he's met through tribal events, even if she's not a friend of his, when she's suffering from dumbass bullies; it means having previously refused to be in a performance of the Wizard of Oz when he found out L. Frank Baum wrote columns advocating for Native genocide; and it means saying something and refusing to be a part of future events and promotions and things that promote harmful ideas. Hughie is a principled good kid which makes him incredibly easy to root for, even as he finds himself boxed in by things like his trying to fulfill his promises, a newfound friendship with Sam, a Mexican-American kid (with some indigneous Mexican heritage), and his relationship with his crush Marie and his family members.

And the plot works really well to put Hughie into conflict between his principles, the prejudices around him, and his attempts to get through a high school life. He has to deal with things like the local pub owner trying to capitalize on a racist myth involving an "Indian Maiden" killing people at the Crossroads or the Haunted House he's promised Sam he'd help work on being run by a White Lady who doesn't understand that an Indian Burial Ground is a hurtful prejudiced trope...and refuses to listen when he objects or comes up with alternate ideas. Add in the fact that there really does seem to be something going on at the crossroads that's threatening indigneous teen girls - something that is covered up by the "Indian Maiden" legend - and well, it's only natural that Hughie gets involved trying to investigate what goes down. This plot and the characters who act it out, from Hughie to his friends, is really well written, such that you always feel for Hughie and care about them all and want to see him succeed despite it all.

And the book's conclusion uses this plot, and the supernatural elements to shine lights on prejudice and other issues faced by Indigenous peoples in the past and in the present today, such as the disappearance of native girls without much attention from the cops - even when there are clear people to talk to to investigate foul play (unlike the case with white girls). The book excellently - as explained in the author's note - uses some spins on the usual tropes to really hammer home these messages, such that it avoids feeling generic or preachy, even as it is in fact conveying the importance of its message. There's a lot of harm out there still faced by indigneous youth and adults today, and there isn't some easy one way for them to deal with it, and this book shines a light on that even as it tells a story. The result is a very solid YA novel, which I can easily recommend.

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