And the Trees Stare Back

<i>And the Trees Stare Back</i> is a YA horror set in Soviet Estonia of the 1980s, that deals with themes of family, identity and trauma. With its setting, it talks quite a bit about the trauma of living under an authoritarian government, with specific attention on what it means to be 'not-normal' - particularly queer and/or disabled - in a state that demands uniformity. The protagonist is confirmed to have OCD by the author, who also suffers from the disorder herself. While I do not have OCD myself, I nonetheless found the depiction very refreshing, as it shows the reality of the disorder and the thought-spirals behind it that will have you believing that your whole family <i>will</i> die if you do not press the light-switch next to the front door exactly ten times. It also discusses the frustration, that will be intimately familiar to anyone with an anxiety disorder, of knowing that your fears <i>are not rational</i>, while also not being able to do anything about it. As a Finnish person who grew up loving Finnish folklore and its many creatures, it also made me realise how embarrassingly little I know about Estonian folklore, which I shall strive to remedy immediately. So, long story short, I really loved this book.