Mahogany L. Browne‘s Chlorine Sky is a necessary addition to YA fiction

Mahogany L. Browne’s YA debut, Chlorine Sky, is a must-read novel about not making yourself small for the people you love.

Coming-of-age novels are the bread and butter of YA. They are stepping stones helping guide teenagers through the difficulties of adolescence by way of fiction and its many resonating tones. But to call poet Mahogany L. Browne‘s Chlorine Sky, her debut YA novel-in-verse, a coming-of-age story seems too small a categorization. Her work in the novel is more aptly a coming-into-one’s-own story.

The main character (who I will be referring to as MC because the reveal of her name is a part of the book) is a fiercely loyal young Black girl who is suddenly estranged from her best friend. It’s a fate that the reader may see coming, but she certainly doesn’t. See, it has been some time since her friend, Lay Li, has acted like the girl who defended her from the mean-spirited teasing that the boys at the pool would splash her way.

Now Lay Li lets boys like Curtis talk about MC’s skin color and how dark she is in comparison. She laughs when he tells her to drop MC because he’s light skinned and Lay Li’s light skinned but MC isn’t. Lay Li laughs as if that’s not her best friend as if she agrees as if MC is there for her amusement and nothing else. It’s not a tale as old as time, but it’s familiar.

Whether personally, or through fiction, we are all familiar with stories about girls who grow apart when they hit puberty. On the surface, it’s about boys. It’s nearly always about boys, but it’s also much deeper than male attention and that is what Browne is digging for in Chlorine Sky–the root. The rot that had already set into the soil of MC and Lay Li’s friendship that prevented them from growing.

There’s the superficial with Lay Li being concerned with fashion and always looking nice while MC prefers basketball shorts and hoodies. There’s the social where MC is quieter and quick to hold her tongue unless she’s on the court talking smack or defending Lay Li from someone else. And then there’s the personal, where MC is Lay Li’s secret holder and her confidante while Lay Li grows distant.

Browne’s narrative poetry beautifully conveys the fragility of this relationship, its cracks, its shattering, and the pieces of it that MCs hold up to the light and inspects with a clear and distinct voice.

For some readers, MC will sound like girls they go to school with or grew up with talking at their side or in their ears. She may even sound like them and their observations of the world. Girls with slick words and a quick wit that they may or may not have shared with others besides themselves and their thoughts.

The kind of girl that thinks or says, “You think you cute,” when their friend is doing the most or being unkind. An admonishment for showing off in front of others without fear of recompense, censor, or shame. The kind of girl that likens their best friend to the sun. Bright and glorious with a shine that can warm and burn.

What makes Chlorine Sky special is Browne’s attention to duality. You can both love someone and be unloving to them. You can have so much to say in one area of your life and be silent in the other. You can believe someone about being assaulted, help them confront the person who did it, and still walk away without expecting it to change your relationship with them.

It’s not that MC doesn’t already know the world is filled with more grey than stark lines of black and white that clearly delineate what’s right and what’s not. It’s that Browne’s journey with her is focused on allowing herself to be more than what other people say she should be.

With encouragement and support from her cousin Inga, MC stops making herself small for the benefit of others. She stops fitting herself into the shadows to make space for other people, and she does so knowing that it will come with having to defend herself.

There will be boys who can’t handle her beating them at every turn in sports and coaches who pretend they don’t see her getting harassed. There will be girls like her sister, Essa, who deem everything about her wrong and feel the need to comment on it incessantly. But through it all MC must not let other people stop her from being and loving herself without comparisons and denigration. She is who she has at the end of the day no matter who is or who isn’t in her corner.

Chlorine Sky‘s message of not only self-acceptance but also the acceptance of other people’s faults not being a reflection of your own value is a necessary addition to YA. Though this is not to say other YA novels have not tackled similar themes but Browne’s story is unique in its handling and its position. It’s not often that narratives about Black girls, their friendships, their families, and their personal struggles take center stage in a story that is akin to a slice of life.

There are girls in California right now on basketball courts doing lay-ups with their hair thrown in a bun and sweat glistening on their foreheads. Girls wondering about their best friend who isn’t talking to them or mourning the loss of a friendship. Girls catching the eyes of boys and feeling the flutter of excitement over the attention and stealing glances at ex-friends hoping they notice.

Chlorine Sky is an everyday story. A universal one colored by the life experiences of its lead that are informed by race, gender, class, and family structure because universal doesn’t mean every aspect has to match up to what the reader has personally experienced. It means I see you in me because you’ve walked the road I’ve walked, and I want to see where else you go. It means you don’t have to look like me to know me or to see me or to see yourself in me.

Browne’s debut is an extraordinary first YA outing that feels timeless even with pop culture references that will inevitably date it as time goes on. That’s a testament to her writing and the ageless story of growing into yourself and letting go of the people who hold you back.

Chlorine Sky is available now in print, audio, and e-book format.