The Language of Seabirds is the first middle grade book I think I've read

 

Today I’m talking about The Language of Seabirds by Will Taylor, which I believe I got the same time I got the last two books I read. Also, I’m fairly certain that this is a middle grade book, so I’m definitely not the target audience, or have at least grown out of the target audience. That’s definitely something I kept in mind while reading.

The blurb is a pretty short one, but it says that Jeremy is not excited about the prospect of spending the summer in Oregon. But then he bumps into the intriguing and irresistible Evan. Just like that, his summer changes. Soon Jeremy and Evan are hanging out whenever they can, going on adventures and conjuring their own secret language. What starts out as friendship blooms into something neither boy is expecting, but something they have both been hoping for.

So in the first chapter Jeremy has his 12^th birthday and gets a card from his uncle with a sexy woman on the front and homeboy (emphasis on boy) is embarrassed by it, but obviously his dad loves it, and you kind of get a vibe of what they’re both like. His mum obviously doesn’t like it. You also see that Jeremy has this stack of hidden fashion magazines in his room. Then by the end of the chapter you see that he’s gone on a trip with his dad to stay with that same uncle for two weeks because his parents have gotten a divorce. The context is that they’re going on a trip while his mum moves out after secretly applying for and getting this dream job she never shared with either of them. In another early chapter, he then ends up in this knickknack shop that Evan works in. He looks at a stack of vintage fashion magazines but gets embarrassed, thinking that people can see him looking at them and that he probably shouldn’t be.

This is very much just a things just happen book. It’s literally at its core a book of just what happens to Jeremy while he’s on this two-week trip. You do end up seeing Jeremy getting Evan’s number at one point, but that he also doesn’t want his dad or uncle finding out about Evan as he wants to keep him for himself and doesn’t want to explain Evan.

You get to see the discovery in parts of who Jeremy is. There are bits where the narrator is saying that all Jeremy wants to do is be with Evan. There are bits where you see how Jeremy is feeling internally about what he wants to be doing, and about how he feels about his dad. There’s a bit where Evan brings Jeremy a pile of magazines from his shop because he saw Jeremy staring at them, and Jeremy had no idea. You see how happy that it makes Jeremy that he was being paid attention to like that, and that he then got to explain what it was about the fashion magazines that he likes to Evan.

I will say, reading this as someone who definitely isn’t the target demographic for this book, it at least let me understand the actions of the adults in this book. And when I say adults, I mean more so Jeremy’s dad and uncle. When I say understand, that doesn’t mean I specifically agree with everything they did or the way they went about handling certain things, but it at least meant I could understand their point of view. There’s a bit where Jeremy’s dad and uncle are throwing a fourth of July party, and Jeremy ends up going on a run with Evan just before and the two end up getting stranded on a cliff because the tide comes in, so they miss the party. So, obviously, or you’d hope, Jeremy’s dad ends up leaving a note for Jeremy, since he left his phone in the house. It’s that case of, I get why his dad acts like that, but since Jeremy is the main character, I’m also on Jeremy’s side.

To talk about Jeremy’s dad, I did appreciate that there was a point where, while it wasn’t under the best circumstances, where everything starts to come out – is there a pun in there? Perhaps – and I really did appreciate the way the two of them spoke to each other, even if the way that Jeremy’s dad spoke to Jeremy sometimes was a bit questionable. He would say things and it almost felt very pick me vibes, and I was thinking, this is a whole-ass forty-odd-year-old man, why is he saying these sorts of things? And although I criticise him as a person, he still was a man going through a divorce he didn’t want, trying to now to be a single parent, so at the same time, I do get why he’s a bit crusty.

I will say, there was one bit in particular that made me stop for a moment. And this may just be me being in the wrong generation, but I don’t know how smart twelve-year-olds are, especially since my last experience with a twelve-year old was hearing them threaten to stab someone I work with. But Jeremy is looking around a house that his uncle is considering buying and some of the thoughts that Jeremy was having, to me, didn’t read like something a twelve-year-old would think. Granted, his uncle did tell him to give him his thoughts, but it was serious architectural thoughts that I didn’t know that someone who was twelve would think all that hard about.

This book was really sweet. I know me saying that might be a little odd, since I believe it is a middle-grade book, definitely not aimed at me. Like I said, I’m well aware of the fact that I wasn’t the target audience, but I still really appreciated it. The relationship portrayed between Jeremy and Evan was just honestly really wholesome, and very indicative of a first love. I think it would be a first love, since the characters were twelve. Do I know whether you can be in love at twelve? Not a clue. But I really liked their relationship, and the book as a whole. I think it did a good job of capturing the innocence of people that are twelve, little kids, let’s be real.

I feel like I could complain about the fact that not many of the characters had a lot of depth to them besides the main characters, however, I’m not going to, because I feel like that comes with the territory of the book, had it been a YA book, I would have liked more depth, but since it wasn’t YA, and was for a younger audience, I think the book hit a really good level of depth for the characters. You got to know who you needed to. There’s a part of the book where Jeremy’s father clearly hooks up with this woman, Sandy, and being twelve, Jeremy doesn’t realise they’ve slept together and just thinks that she literally just stayed over and slept in his dad’s bedroom. I think had this book been aimed at an older audience, that would have been explored more, but since it wasn’t aimed at an older audience, I think it was one of those things that is someone like me were to read it, they’d understand, but someone younger (like Jeremy) would have just thought she stayed over – like Jeremy did.

To close out, I really liked this book. I don’t think I’ve really read much middle grade stuff, but honestly, if there are others that are as good as this one, I’m happy to read more. It’s just that kind of book where I need to remember that I’m not the audience for it.

Okay, bye!