Review: "The Redemption of Daya Keane" by Gia Gordon

The Redemption of Daya Keane by Gia Gordon
Published May 2024 via HarperTeen
★★★★

Daya knows who she is—and she knows that her small Arizona town will never be fully on board. This is not a town where queer kids thrive; it's a town where conservative Bible culture is thriving and the safest thing to do is keep your head down and submit. To not be a girl crushing on other girls—and in particular, to not be a girl crushing on the girl who is the poster child for the local megachurch.

I'm drawn to stories of queerness and also stories of religion, and I like intersections in my reading—and, better, I like it when it's not all fire and brimstone, and even the...let's call them 'less sympathetic'...characters are allowed some complexity. Here, although Beckett's parents stay pretty one-note, Daya's mother is interesting—she reminds me a bit of Aunt Ruth in The Miseducation of Cameron Post: trying to do the right thing, but not always able to see that not everybody falls under the same 'right thing'. Or maybe Jeanette Winterson's mother in Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? (who asked the titular question, which...tells you something about her, no?)...in any case, she's trying, but not in a way that is helpful to Daya.

The thing that interests me most about the book is the end, and...well, to avoid spoilers I can't say too much about it. But I'm always glad when a book takes the expected ending and turns it on its head. (This is even more true for YA books, which—partly because of the common emphasis on romance—can start to feel predictable.) The Redemption of Daya Keane did not go where I was expecting it to, and although I wouldn't mind a clearer tying up of certain threads (let's call this 3.5 stars), a bit more mess and a bit less predictability than usual makes me a happy reader.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.