Jordan Lombard's Reviews > The Reckless Kind

Title/Author: The Reckless Kind by Carly Heath
Series/Standalone: Standalone
Genre/Sub-Genre: Teen Historical Fiction
Book Format: Print
Length: 336 pages
LGBTQ+ Orientation: Asexual & gay
Content Warnings: This is a quote directly from the author’s note at the start of the novel: “As a writer and reader, I firmly believe in the importance of content warnings. Look away now if this is information you don’t wish to know. This book features a character who copes with his trauma by making glib remarks that allude to child abuse, alcoholism, suicide, and self-harm. There is a depiction of physical violence and bodily injury. The existence of sexism, homophobia, and xenophobia is briefly mentioned. Something I often want to know as a sensitive person entering a fictional world is does it end okay? Meaning: Will the book end in tragedy and death? I assure you, it doesn’t. No tragic ending here. No death for the main three. In this story, their supportive love prevails.” – Carly Heath
Well-Written/Editor Needed: Well-written except that most everything could have been solved with one conversation at the start of the book. When Asta determines that she can find a way to save Gunner’s family farm, she has no idea how she’ll do it, but never once does it occur to her to ask their mutual friend, Erlend, for help or ideas. Instead, Erlend, who has the means to buy property, spends it elsewhere and they must find another way to save the farm.
Would I Recommend?: The LGBTQ+ representation in this was good, as was the disability rep. If you can get over the one plot issue mentioned above, and if none of the content warnings are triggering, then yes, go for it!
Personal thoughts: As I said, the representation here was good! Here is a rundown of the disability representation: Asta is deaf in one ear with Waardenburg Syndrome (as is the author, Carly Heath). Following a riding accident, Fred has Post-Concussion Syndrome (his symptoms were inspired by Heath’s own experiences with PCS). Also following that same riding accident, Gunnar suffers from Brown-Sequard Syndrome where a lesion in the spinal cord results in weakness or paralysis on one side of the body and a loss of sensation on the other. Heath drew on her experience with lumbar spine trauma when writing about Gunnar. None of these maladies are named as this is a historical novel and the characters wouldn’t have had the modern terminology for them in 1904, but Heath has a section at the end that briefly talks about each one and why they made the decisions they did when writing it.

I liked the three main characters: Gunnar, Erlend, and Asta. Each stood out from the others, but they also worked well together as a group, both complimenting each other’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as annoying the heck out of each other, as good friends do at times. That said there were some things about their relationships that bothered me. First, the romance between Erlend and Gunnar needed more time and space on the page to grow, or should have been established prior to the start of the book. Second, Gunnar’s depression hits hard, especially when he believes that he’s taken Erlend from his loving parents and decides he doesn’t want to be with Erlend anymore, even as Erlend pushes to stay together. Toward the end, I began to wonder, at what point should you take a step back and respect a friend’s decisions, even if you think it’s wrong?

Plot-wise, this is a very slow moving story with most of the action happening near the end. The slow plot didn’t bother me too much. What did bother me was that many large decisions were made in a rush where everything either worked out perfectly or there were more injuries heaped on top of the injuries or disabilities they already had. There’s a lot of misery piled on these characters before everything can get better. Perhaps a bit too much.

I didn’t get a strong sense of Norway from this, but I was also distracted by all the injuries and the depression and anxiety that filled the book so I didn’t notice the lack of Norway until I’d finished the book.

In short, I loved the disability and LGBTQ+ representation a lot and even though the execution of the plot could have used some help, the writing itself was enjoyable and easy to follow.