I’ll say it — this book broke me ... The Prettiest Star outdoes what has already been a stellar literary career ... one of the most heart-wrenching novels I’ve read in a long time ... There’s something for everyone in this novel ... Sickels weaves a rewarding but complicated web ... The choices each character makes are rendered not just through Sickels’ gifted prose, but also in the often telling, time-stamped sections Brian records in his childhood room ... The stream-of-consciousness style lends itself to the feel of the novel — the unpredictability Brian is facing, not from the virus, but from the community where he has chosen to live his last days ... Brian was real to me. He still is.
Heartbreaking levels of bigotry and loss are conveyed through fluid, poignant prose. Amid the tragedy, threads of loyalty, strength, and pride result in a glimmer of hope—not for a happy ending, but for human beings’ capacity to love one another through the worst crises. Devastating and impactful, The Prettiest Star captures the profound effects of the AIDS crisis, and the lies and bigotry that contributed to it
While The Prettiest Star could have easily tipped into sentimental melodrama, Sickels manages to keep the story grounded and empathetic. Slurs are thrown casually, hateful glares are exchanged in public, and ignorance runs rampant while being upheld by those in power. But rather than wallow in it, the main characters in this novel look to live through it. While the story is primarily about a gay man dying of AIDS, the disease and his final months of life are used to examine exactly how microcosms like Chester can show the best and worst of humanity ... The reader is given a widescreen view of the protagonists that lifts these characters beyond clichés ... a sensitive, unashamed look at how much has and hasn’t changed since the beginning of the AIDS epidemic. While at times heartbreaking, the novel is infused with a deep, hopeful humanity. It shows how difficult is it to live in a world that sees one as different but it also reflects how it’s possible to wade through that sea of ignorance, as long as you have enough to keep you afloat.
The Prettiest Star was written with great depth and emotion. Chapters are told from various family members’ first-person narratives that reveal poignant details such as Jess’ love of killer whales and the pain Brian’s mother feels on behalf of her son ... Brian’s storyline is conveyed through deeply intimate personal video diary entries ... The effect is powerful ... we’re privy to [Brian's] poignant end-of-life reflections.
A brutally fresh kind of homecoming novel, The Prettiest Star weaves between resentment and redemption in its unvarnished portrait of ignorance and cruelty ... But Carter Sickels, often writing in the voices of Brian's tormented mother and sister, searches for a softer story, too, and a kind of dignity in death that's not pretty, maybe, but is surely human.
Sickels does an excellent job showing the mix of panic, homophobia and bullying that AIDS once engendered. He also evokes the mid-1980s and rural small-town life with the right amount of period and place detail. Brian’s narration occasionally feels too composed and lyrical for a 24-year-old man talking into a camera, but that’s a small quibble ... While the story is bleak, it moves along at a clip, offering some surprises and a couple of unlikely, brave heroes. The Prettiest Star is a sensitive portrayal of a difficult time in our recent history.
The most arresting aspects of the novel are the sections narrated by the mother, Sharon. Sickels does a wonderful job of portraying the impact of the AIDS epidemic on families, particularly the mothers and fathers who struggled to accept their children’s sexuality ... ickels is an expert at rendering the lush comfortability of everyday small-town life and the ways that these small comforts become the markers of our passing lives. How, when we realize the fragility of our own bodies, we all cling to the small things. There is of course the boredom and small-mindedness we associate with small-town life, but Sickels also envelopes his very prose with a deep respect for the pleasures of rural America ... Brian’s father, Travis, is in many ways a representation of small-town life incarnate...This depiction of the quiet, hardworking man who nearly disappears into the background, is in many ways quite accurate, but the inclusion of his voice and his perspective throughout more of the novel would have benefited the book immensely. The one chapter where his voice is featured is wonderfully wrought and only made me wish there was more of him ... Additionally, Sickels relies on a device to relay much of Brian’sthoughts and emotions. The conceit is that Brian is videotaping himself, a kind of spoken diary. While interesting at first, this device eventually only served to distance the reader from Brian. We never get his thoughts and feelings as the events play out, we only ever see them in reflection and so they quickly become summary instead of scenes ... a beautifully quiet book, even with all the big subjects that it tackles. What it is most interested in is the pulse of a son, the pulse of a mother, the pulse of a town ... an extended examination of vulnerability and loyalty on both a large and small scale.
The multiple perspectives create a mosaic of experiences that are sometimes funny, though more often heartbreaking, adding layers of psychological texture as readers witness the same events filtered through different eyes ... this novel deserves a place in the canon of AIDS literature alongside the likes of Larry Kramer and, more recently, Rebecca Makkai ... a novel by a queer author about queer lives, and thus may be overlooked by a wider audience and critics. However, the book is also about more universal themes of family, reconciliation, and survival. It serves as a reminder to the world that our stories matter — that despite all odds, we are still here. It gave me a sense of comfort, of familiarity, of knowing that there’s a place for queer stories like mine. With this novel, Sickels has offered readers the queer homecoming we never had — homecoming as arrival rather than return.
... heart-wrenching ... The alternating narrators of Brian, Sharon, and Jess are fleshed out in all of their complexities and contradictions. This immersive, tragic book will stay with readers.
Sickels captures the atmosphere of the times in scenes that are painfully realistic ... pays homage to the victims of that horrible time and offers a measure of solace to the survivors.
The story is told in alternating chapters by Brian, Sharon, and Jess, but unfortunately all three voices are strikingly similar, and at times Sickels explains the characters’ motivations and feelings rather than letting the characters speak for themselves. In addition, the community is portrayed as universally intolerant, and while it’s true that the disease was hard to fathom, this depiction seems to distill the gay and straight characters to a simplistic dichotomy of good and bad ... A touching, sad, and important book, but sturdier editing would have helped to take it to another level. Libraries with large LGBTQ collections will want, but novels such as Rebecca Makkai’s The Great Believers and Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty delve into the subject with more success.
This unvarnished portrait of what people are capable of when gripped by ignorance and fear is relieved slightly by a few cracks in the facade of the town’s intolerance, some moments of kindness or at least faint regret ... Sickels’ characters are painfully flawed and wholly, believably human in their failings. This unflinching honesty, conveyed in finely crafted prose, makes for a memorable and unsettling novel. Powerfully affecting and disturbing.
... heartfelt ... Sickels is at his best in his characters’ most painful moments, poignantly revealing Lettie’s regret of offering Brian too little, too late. This tragic story of AIDS and violent homophobia stands out by showing the transcendent power of queer communities to make their voices endure through art.
