The Bus 57

Book: The Bus 57; 

My Goodreads Rating: 3*

First Thoughts

Ok, so back in the summer of 2020, around the time I went to the Black Lives Matter March where I live, I googled books by black authors, about racism, I wanted books that were both fiction and non fiction books. For Christmas I asked for some books, I had a whole long list, books by my favourite author (who is Dorothy Koomson and is black) a d books by black authors and white authors, books that covered racism within them.  The Bus 57, was a book I asked for and received.  

While Reading

• Wow.  When I asked for this book I had read the synopsis that Amazon gave and saved it for later.  Now that I’ve started the book it’s different than what I imagined it to be. 
• I like how the author put in meanings of different LQBTQ+, sexual orientation and gender phrases.  I had no idea just how many there were. 

Sasha

• “Why are you wearing a skirt?  Your not a girl” was said to Sasha by an older person. Sasha’s response is normal for them.  
• The whole bathroom thing, what’s the right bathroom for someone who is gender fluid, and while at home and school it’s easy to use what ever bathroom you want, in the ‘outside’ world it’s not so easy. 

Richard

• While reading Sasha’s first part of the book, I felt that when I got to Richard’s history that they were going to make him out to be this really bad kid, who grew up without any structure.  But he was a little different than I imagined. He did have structure, though the area of Oakland he lives in isn’t great, he has a family that want the best for him. He did wrong in his past but he was trying to do better. 

• I already have the feeling that how Sasha and Richard are treated is completely different by others because of their backgrounds.  
• The right vs wrong aspect that came into play annoyed me to no end. Yes, Richard is 16 year old and should know better but can anyone say they did things at 16 that they would one day look on and think that wasn’t right.  What I did was wrong.  
• Something else that annoyed me was that I’m not finished it yet but why is Richard the only one getting any sort of punishment. The other two people he was with that day were also involved, not with setting the fire, but were there. 

Conclusion 

Ok so my review on the book, it’s an ok book, I don’t love it but I don’t hate it.  There are areas that I love, areas’s that I don’t. 

I would’ve loved longer chapters.  I am someone who like actual chapters.  Sometimes in this book it was a page or less. 

I wanted to love this book, and I did at first, but I felt that it dipped.  I felt that people brought down Richard because of his actions and that he’d never learn from his mistakes, and that he should’ve known better.