Book Review: Vengeance Road by Erin Bowman

In her novel, Vengeance Road, Erin Bowman takes readers on a journey through rough, dangerous 1870s Arizona, in a story told with the voice of Kate Thompson, an 18-year-old who has just come home to find her father brutally murdered. It is, of course, a story with a lot of grit and blood and shooting and revenge—these are things that come with the territory. Kate is an angry girl with a cause, and Bowman doesn’t pretend otherwise. And for much of the story, the concept works well. There were some moments of soul-baring and sentimentality that felt off with the rest of the text, but by and large I believed in Vengeance Road and Kate’s story.

That is, until the book derailed quite suddenly in the second half and became…well, “a fucking mess” is about the most accurate descriptor.

MAGICAL NOBLE PIXIE SAVAGE DREAM GIRL

The first big problem is the way Bowman approached the introduction and characterization of Liluye, an Apache whom Kate rescues from a burning building and then engages as a “scout” while searching for a mythical gold mine. Prior to Liluye’s appearance, much of Vengeance Road is colored with anti-native sentiment, which I absolutely grant is on par for White settler in this timeframe, so while that made me uncomfortable as a 21st century reader, I was able to recognize the authenticity.

However, there is racism coming from historical characters’ mindsets, and then there is a narrative that internally condones racism and harmful stereotypes, which is what happens in this book.

Liluye is a walking trope, who exists only to further along the White protagonist’s own character arc. Liluye’s personality, such as it’s been outlined for readers, is the epitome of the stereotypical Magical Native and Noble Savage stereotypes, with a good measure of Manic Pixie Dream Girl thrown in for good measure. I was extremely put off by everything that came out of Liluye’s mouth, her slightly odd syntax and constant references to Mother Earth and “White Eyes” and Spirit Guides, etc. And while I think there might be some root of truth in this representation of Apache culture, it felt very forced and shallow on Bowman’s part.

Liluye’s character never had any depth beyond her “mystical” speech and the help she was able to provide in getting Kate closer to her goal. If you replace her character with an all-knowing book or treasure map or whatever, there could hardly be a difference. If a character can be replaced with an inanimate object and not make much of a difference to the story, that’s a definite sign of a problem. The fact that this character was also steeped in racial stereotypes only makes matters worse.

MY MOTHER, “LA LOCA”

So, at the beginning of the book, I was excited because protagonist Kate is biracial. Her mother was Mexican and her father was White. (Obviously, from what I’ve written above, Vengeance Road does not handle racial issues sensitively at all, but I hadn’t known that yet.) So the excitement was there. Yay for more girls like me in mainstream fiction…except…uh…never mind.

Long story short, it turns out that Kate’s mother is actually a terrible person. She’s “evil” in the way a supervillain is evil, i.e. without dimension or believability. Which is a whole issue unto itself, however it is not the one I’m speaking to at the moment. Needless to say, Kate is understandably upset to find that her mother is just a tad “loca” and renounces her. Which seems fitting, except I take great exception to the way in which Kate did so.

Her response was to say something along the lines of “I’m glad I look like my father and not like you!” Which basically translates as “I’m glad I look White!”. I get it, your mom’s an evil villain. Be happy you take after your dad and not her! By all means. But why bring physical appearance into it? A more fitting response would be “I’m glad I’m a good person, unlike you!” or “I’m glad my father was a good enough man to raise me to be better than you!” or something.

But Kate denounced her mother’s race, as if that was the reason she turned out so evil. Everyone knows we brown-skinned folks are just one step away from ruining the world as White people know it, right?

That’s a whole level of fuckery I can’t even get into.

Why, Erin Bowman? Why?

HE LOVES ME, HE LOVES ME NOT

And my third and final point of contention was the romance in this book. It kind of pales in comparison next to the above issues, but it bears mentioning, as it was just a long stream of “WTF is this?!” from my end. I don’t even understand how I was supposed to believe in the Kate + Love Interest scenario in the first place. There was no chemistry, no connection, no meaningful human interaction.

And then Love Interest starts behaving like an asshole by abandoning Kate to search for mythical gold, and then he abandons her again at the end because…? Why? He couldn’t handle his own feelings? Give me a break.

Why did she take him back? I don’t know. He was a jackhole, and while it was big of her to forgive him, I’m not sure what behavior on his part really established him as a trustworthy or dependable life partner.

But, in the long scheme of things, that is the least of Vengeance Road‘s problems.

BASICALLY: NOPE

I find this book endlessly problematic and troublesome. Aside from the glaring issues of race representation, there’s just the fact that it’s not particularly well-written, and tries to be Very Gritty to the point where Bowman’s insertions of actual feelings feel off-key and jarring. Characterization was weak, the plot got overly theatric and downright strange, the romance was pretty gross. Also racial stereotyping is just not okay, which bears repeating.