Name: Invasive Species
ISBN: 9781937658939

Marwa Helal

A vernacular debut that uncompromisingly journeys towards its sole destination: the decolonization of the imagination

Invasive Species

I feel bad about giving a bad review for memoirs because this is literally someone's life I'm talking about. Who am I to rate experiences? But that honestly goes both ways, I guess. Saying I like this or that memoir is less about the experiences, and more about the form, the narrative, and lots of other aspects in which the writing interacts with the reader. So to say, Invasive species is an awkward mix of poetry and memoir. The memoir part was.. informative. I might have sympathized with her when I read those parts. Unfortunately, a lot of time has passed between reading the book and writing this review so I can't really remember. What I could remember was how I couldn't fully understand her struggles and desires, especially to be properly American, which was completely on me and my privileges of never having had to feel such strong citizenship(?) dysphoria, I guess. Well, that's that, and it's still the better part of the book. 

My problem is, whatever good can be achieved with a full-length memoir was interrupted by subpar poetry and montages of things that might not be arranged in the best composition to evoke deep enough feelings. I also had a problem with the abstract insert of common carp as invasive species here. Invasive used in this context vs immigrants being 'invasive' is wholly different in terms of power balance. Common carps are akin to colonisers if anything. I waited to see if she was ever going to use this analogue ironically. It could've been a jab for the opposing people on their WRONG use of 'invasive species', because how immigrant is ever seen as invasive is a problem of unfairly tall borders between us humans. It could've been a jab for the system that is so rigid it breaks people. But she barely even elaborated further? Without any clarification, her 'invasive' jargon was not very purposeful and rather felt like a misinformed effort to express an internalized inferiority complex. The anger and desperation at least came through, i guess, but only through a thick muddy water of stylistic interferences.

It's a piece of a slightly experimental cross-genre book, maybe. Other than that appeal (if it's enough to be one) it's honestly just.. okay.