Elaine White's Life in Books

Book – Finding His Feet
Author – Sandra Bard
Star rating - ★★★☆☆
No. of Pages – 306

Cover – Nice.
POV – 3rd person, 1 character POV
Would I read it again – Probably Not

Genre – LGBT, Science-Fiction, MM, Romance, Alternative Future, Military, Disability


** I WAS GIVEN THIS BOOK, BY THE AUTHOR, IN RETURN FOR AN HONEST REVIEW **
Reviewed for Divine Magazine


*WARNING: There will be spoilers ahead. It's impossible not to include them.*


*Trigger Warnings: child by rape, disability, ableism amputation, military situations, suicidal thoughts and attempts.*


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I was of two minds about this book. One part of me said to give it 2 stars, for the prevalence of certain aspects, but another said that was too harsh and I should give it a 4, thanks to other aspects. I decided to go with my gut and settle in the middle, with a 3. This is neither good nor bad, but in that limbo place in between. Deciding how to explain the why is the tough part.

Hmm, let's first talk about that title, shall we? I get that it's a play on words, but it just feels really insensitive, as do quite a few other things in the story. Namely, being a disabled person in a wheelchair myself, with limited mobility, I thought I would really connect with Kaden. And, at times, I did. But I also found it quite insulting the way he acted.

So – warning – I'm going to admit that I know that often what the author thinks and what a character says aren't the same thing. I'm going to choose to believe that's the case here and the flagrant Ableism and trans-phobia displayed by the main character, Kaden, is all his own. Because, yes, those are real issues.

But, let's go back to the beginning. In an unexpected Author's Note (unlabelled, surprisingly but following the Dedication, which is also unlabelled as such) the author tells us of their travels and a life growing up in a warzone. Now, they don't mention having a disability – due to the warzone or any other reason – so I'm going to take a guess that they don't have one. I say that, because they write about Kaden's disability with the same mentality that I've seen on TV shows and other books, where writers try to explain the thought process and the physical reality of a disability they haven't experienced. Their first reaction is that the person should be angry, furious, not want to live, thinks their life is over and worse.

All those things apply here, except that, as someone who has a disability, I'll say from personal experience that it's not true. There are plenty of military personal, as well as civilians, who end up disabled or impaired in some way, only to suck it up and get on with life, without ever once feeling suicidal. Yes, there are those who do consider suicide, feel that their life is over and can't accept it, but they're actually fewer than you'd think.

For once, I would have liked to see this attitude displayed, by a competent, still physically able soldier (thanks to his suit). However, Kaden is aggressive, dismissive and rude to anyone who attempts to help him with his disability or offer advice about it. He ignores all the medical help and advice, choosing to wallow in self-pity and believe that he can't live without his armour, which makes him feel “normal” again. See that? Yep, that's what I meant earlier, when I said it was insulting.

Whether the author intended it or not, the degree of total ignorance that Kaden displays towards his own disability is staggering. He is rude, obnoxious and ableist towards his own disability. He sees himself as somehow less than and useless to the world and his friends, because of his disability, instead of gritting his teeth, facing reality and moving on to a happy life. Unfortunately, even by the end of the novel, Kaden sees no hope in medical care, proper hygienic care, prosthetics or any other things that could help him on his way to recovery and a full, happy life. The only hope he sees comes from more tech, more machinery enabling him to walk about like he used to. Even when he encounters others with disabilities – since it is a warzone – he's rude, ignorant of their pain and self-centered, as though he's the only one to have ever suffered. He even can't bear to look at another man, who has prosthetics, because he finds them abhorrent.

A small saving grace to this increasingly frustrating and disgusting attitude is Shun. A surprise package from the moment he enters the picture, he supports Kaden and doesn't shy away from accepting or learning about his amputations or limitations, constantly offering support and encouragement for Kaden to wake up. However, due to the intensity of Kaden's hatred for himself and his disability, Shun is only a very small light in that darkness and that side of him isn't shown anywhere near equally to the hatred Kaden harbours for his amputated legs.

“In armor, he was a fully functional person, but out of it, he was as good as dead.”

I began reading Kaden's POV thinking that I was going to sympathize with him, suspecting what his big secret was and knowing how hard that was to deal with, emotionally as well as physically. I enjoyed the early scenes, where we didn't know what his secret was and then the reveal. I enjoyed the detail and honesty of the thoughts about how unfair it had been, how hard it was to adjust and the embarrassment and shame that came with being looked after. But that was where my sympathy and compassion for him ended. After that, I wanted to slap him and tell him how good he had it, because his suit allowed him to function like the “normal” human being he wanted to be, while there are those with disabilities who don't get that privilege.

There are perfectly happy disabled people in the world, living productive lives, working hard and doing the things they love, with a positive attitude. The perpetuation of disability being depressive and causing suicidal tendencies is infuriating and sends the wrong message! I can't imagine how many people will read this and might, one day, end up in a situation where their mind will jump back to this book and think “right, now that I'm disabled myself, my life must be over”. It's NOT!

“He wasn't going to subject himself to that, of walking awkwardly on things that resembled badly formed stilts. To settle for that was admitting his armor days were over, that he was resigned to the life of a disabled soldier, only good for living off charity.”

It quite honestly made me angry, after a while. To see this guy with the tech that made his life easier, like any other able-bodied person and let him pretend things were still fine; it made me furious that he still wasn't happy. He still complained. He still wanted more. Yet, he had more than I can ever have. I really hoped that the end would have Shun talking sense into him, having him accepting his disability and how lucky he was to be alive, healthy and with people he loved. Instead, he was even more obsessed about getting the kind of prosthetic that meant he had the benefits of his suit all the time. It wasn't a solution, but replacing one crutch with another and allowing him to ignore the issue even more. Never once did Kaden or anyone else try to get him psychological help to deal with the emotional side of his disability.

To make it worse, there was even a time in the book where he had the conscious and clear thought that if people lost a few limbs, they'd be lighter and more capable of working the tech-suits, as well as more capable of bonding mentally with the suits. Don't even get me started on how that made me feel. I might not have an amputation, but I have loss of sensation and an inability to walk more than a few feet. This kind of thing made me feel pretty sick, to be honest. It wasn't much better to suffer through the humiliation, with Kaden, of having him dragged around in a kiddy's cart. Which, yes, actually happened. But I'm getting all riled up about it, so...moving on.

Sadly, there was also an instant – very briefly – of trans-phobia. At first, I thought (1) was about to give us a positive trans character, who had done this amazing thing for the world and the Army. However, by the time (2) came about, that began to feel more and more dismissive and put a whole new light on (1). Not only is everything in bold, or really just everything, in (2) horrifyingly trans-phobic, but it's also anti-female, in a strange way. Very odd, considering the author is female.

In fact, it made (1) read much more like a trans character had been thrown in, for no rhyme or reason, just for the sake of it, as well as implying that, despite all of the great things he did, he was even more incredible for having been born a woman. As though women are somehow secondary or unintelligent. While (2) very clearly implies that a mercenary or gang member shouldn't be female, or is somehow less female than other women. While also throwing in those horribly discriminating phrases, that imply anyone not clearly male or female is somehow abhorrent.

(1) He had been well received by most. At universities he gave speeches, which many attended but few really understood. He also worked part-time at the local university, where his courses were only popular with those who wanted to develop neural networks and understood complex five-dimensional mathematics. No one mentioned he had been born a woman.

(2) They were all of them young, all of them male, and something about the way they looked at him said they weren't going to walk away.
[…] “Where's the friend?” one of the group spoke, and Kaden reassessed their genders. At least one of them was female – or something thereof.
[…] Next, he systematically took out the former owner of the chain and the knife-wielding woman-man-person by breaking their knees and tossing her aside.

One last downside? The editing. It was an ARC, so I'm hoping that maybe my insight might help the author. There were a lot of mistakes – missing words (realized it was last skirmish), a sentence cut in half (as he t. He), words melted together when one should be cut (Bradley reiteratedretorted in an), repeats (giving Kaden a smooth portion of the outer hull to Kaden), continuity (MacCrave, become McCrave and Shun becoming Sun) and misplaced punctuation (“. How's).

~

I think it's time we looked at some positives, right?

Okay, so I really liked Shun. I think he was, by far, the best character of the book, though we didn't get to see nearly enough of him. Kaden was secondary, for all those moments he wasn't thinking about his legs or himself.

To be honest, Bradley and Wayland were surplus for me. Neither were likeable or all that interesting, though they served their purpose throughout the story. Vorani was very similar, that way. She served a purpose, but wasn't exactly someone I thought about a lot, while reading or after it.

The bones of the story – the mission and the relationship blossoming between Shun and Kaden – was the real star, that made me enjoy this book as I was reading it. And, I did. I know it doesn't sound like it so far, but I enjoyed the story as it progressed, even though things became increasingly frustrating in other departments. I liked the attention to detail, the fight scenes, the science behind the advancements and how they were possible. I even loved the slow progress of the relationship and how Kaden and Shun weren't loved up right form the start and didn't always agree with each other. They fought, Kaden took care of business even if that meant knocking Shun out and Shun did what he could to get what he wanted/needed. None of that was shiny-bright insta-love.

The story was exciting. There was always something going on, always something around the next corner and always a new revelation on the horizon.

~

Overall, you can probably see what I thought. One half of me was thrilled by the adventure, science-fiction story and the romance weaved within it. The other half was furious and riled up to screaming point by the disability issue.

While the bones of this story were great and very much deserved a 4 star from me, I couldn't in good conscious let the disability issue slide. Even if I took the trans-phobia as me reading the situation wrong (though I doubt it, with the use of those terms) I can't forgive the flagrant use of a disability being used to make Kaden the sourest, most confusing MC I've read in a while. He had everything going for him, but he just wasn't a positive disabled character for anyone to look up to and it actually pained me to be inside his head at times, because even in the darkest times I have never known a disabled person to hate themselves this much.