24. We Ride Upon Sticks

Quan Barry. 2020.

There was a lot that was fun about this book. It is about a high girls field hockey team in the late 1980's who collectively get it into their head that they can influence their ability to win by engaging in witchcraft.  Having been on girls teams in the 80's, so much of this story was reminiscent of those experiences.  The details were exquisite, reminding me of so much 80's pop culture that I had forgotten about.  From the California Raisins to all sorts of one-hit-wonders, it is amazing how many things were so popular for a bit and then just faded out of my mind.  The hair, clothes, phones, and news headlines descriptions brought a rich backdrop to the story. And the nicknames! They just do not have offensive nicknames now the way we did then.  It isn't a bad things that we don't have them, but kids today just do not appreciate how subtly ruthless girls were back then. 
The story is written in an unusual style in which the narrator will jump forward in time from the story to put things in context, like rape, casual racism, and transphobia.  This is an interesting way of being able to present may of the things we thought and didn't think in the 80's that would be just so offensive now. 
In many ways, the writing, both the style and the detail, was a distraction from the story itself and I sometimes forgot the storyline, being so lost in the era and social commentary, leaving me to delve not only into to my own memories, but also to thoughts of how much things have changed.  This might also be because I know exactly zero about field hockey and things like the "rotating rhombus" and the other hockey lingo left time for my mind to wonder. 

I also really loved the collective delusion that the kids on the team work themselves into.  How they fed off each other while using a Ouija board, doing "light as a feather, stiff as a board," and other "witchcraft" was realistic and, again, so rich with contextually accurate details.

​Recommend.

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