Jam lives in a future USA, in a town called Lucille that is proud to have banished any monsters years before. These monsters are the perpetrators of any crimes, bigotry, greed, hurt or anguish on Lucille citizens. Life now is simple and good where everyone looks out for one another. Jam is a trans black girl, the only child of Bitter, a talented and successful artist, and Aloe, her loving and hard working dad. She has grown up on the mantra that there are no more monsters. Until she inadvertently releases one…

One night, and even though she knows she mustn’t touch her mother’s paintings before they are completely dry, she visits the latest work in her mum’s studio. Something arrives in her house. It tells her to call it Pet. It’s something her parents have seen before, and is here to hunt a real monster.

Jam is confused, unbelieving and in denial. There are no monsters. They are all gone. There was a revolution years before, cleansing their world of terrible people. Jam wants IT gone, back to where it came from. Pet refuses, saying it will only leave when the hunt is over. It is here to make her see the unseen. To see what is happening right in front of them. When Jam learns it involves her best friend Redemption’s family, she is horrified. But if she does nothing, the results could be even worse.

Pet is something utterly unique in its setting and story, dealing with the ‘monsters’ among us. The diversity of the characters and the loving and supportive family structures were heartening, making the possibility of a monster among them even more menacing.

This new future held no bigotry for Jam with her estrogen implant under her skin, or her best friend’s parents in a polyamorous (three parents) relationship, one of who is non-binary.

Pet is deemed YA but is a great read for young teens, with beautiful language, poetic simile and metaphor, and a strong trans protagonist. Intriguing read. Loved it.

Author – Akwaeke Emezi

Age – 13+

Read an excerpt here

(Diversity, Polyamorous relationship, Trans, Non-Binary, LGBTQ+, Monster, Fantasy, Violence, Abuse, Courage)