Book review: Honey Girl by Morgan Rogers

Honey Girl

by Morgan Rogers

Finished reading: 30/3/21

My rating: 3.5/5 stars

"Lonely creatures, what makes us so different from the stories we tell in the dark?"

Honey Girl follows Grace Porter, a hard-working queer, Black woman who recently completed her PhD in astronomy and is sprung into the struggles of adulthood. Grace has always had a plan and has always been taught to settle for nothing less than the best. But after one crazy night in Las Vegas, Grace begins to come to terms with her high expectations and feelings of burnout. Grace’s plan seems further and further away and the girl she met in Las Vegas cannot seem to get out of her head.

I came across this book on BookTok and it was sold to me as a beautifully deep, lyrical piece of writing exploring mental health and adulthood. I would say this is a fairly accurate description, however, I cannot say that it fully met my expectations.

Firstly, the things I liked. I really enjoyed the quality of Rogers’ writing. The descriptions felt very poetic, like the sort of thing you might hear in a spoken word performance. In particular, I really liked how Rogers used smell to describe her characters. It made me realise how difficult it is to place our sense of smell in words, but Rogers does it so well. I thought this was really interesting considering that our noses are one of our primary senses when it comes to evoking memory. Each smell-descriptor told me something about each character without having to over explain it. I did not need to know what they looked like, but through their smell I understood their presence beyond what they said and did. I think this is something I would love to play with in my own writing in terms of characterisation.

I also really liked Yuki’s radio show about mythology and folklore. The stories were so lyrical and beautiful. I would love to hear someone recreate this as a podcast because I really wanted to hear more of them audibly. I loved the comparisons between lost, lonely souls and imaginary monsters. I am sure a lot of people would find comfort in reading or listening to these metaphors late at night when you’re feeling low.

I thought the depiction of mental health and burnout were incredibly relevant. Watching Grace, a super talented, organised, over-achiever, come to terms with her anxiety and depression is a story that so many can relate to. It seems to be a trait of over-achievers to bottle up their feelings and keep pushing through because on the outside they seem to be doing ok. I liked that this story was told and I hope that it might encourage readers in a similar position to Grace to open up more and seek help.

Not only this, but the added challenge of being queer, Black and female in an incredibly straight, white, male industry was explored so well. We are given a snippet of what it is to live in Grace’s shoes as a professional. Again, this is something that deserves to be discussed more in the world we live in. Many of us experience different forms of injustice, but it is important that we try to understand and appreciate what it is like to live in a body that experiences multiple injustices all at once despite how hard you work. We all deserve to be recognised for our efforts rather than our demographic. But sadly, particularly in the workplace, this does not always happen. Many people will be able to relate to Grace’s struggles and it is so important to have stories that make us feel seen.

Now onto the things I didn’t enjoy so much. Strangely, for a book marketed as a romance novel, I found the romance pretty under-whelming. I liked that it was not entirely focused on the romance because I think the other themes were important. However, I wanted to feel more invested in the romance. There was hardly any chemistry between the main characters which made it fall a little flat. This may be due to the fact that there were not many chapters featuring only these two without a load of other characters affecting the dynamic. I really appreciated the diverse range of characters throughout the book, but I didn’t think they all added much to the story. I would have liked either a nice family dynamic where they all have a purpose, or significantly less characters in total.

As for the plot, it was very much a book of three acts: Portland, New York City, Florida. These were successful in splitting up the different parts of Grace’s life as well as shifting the plot forwards. However, I do not feel that they all necessarily worked well together. It felt a bit like reading three separate books in one and I was never quite sure what direction the story was going. I accept that this was reflecting Grace’s emotional journey, but I would have liked much more closure to bring all the strands together. It is extremely difficult when plot is focused more on a mental journey because, realistically, you are never going to reach a satisfying end. Life is full of ups and downs and it keeps going. Mental health specifically is not a linear journey of recovery. Therefore, I admire how Rogers dealt with this considering how challenging a task they were faced with. However, I was not utterly sold on how the plot was delivered.

Overall, I would not recommend Honey Girl to those looking for a cute romance novel, but I would definitely recommend to any fellow lonely creatures still searching for their place in the world.