Crosshairs: 04/25/22

Crosshairs by Catherine Hernandez is a near future dystopian novel set in Ontario, Canada. The events are narrated by Queen Kay, a drag queen who has been in hiding, separated from a lover named Evan.

Told in alternating timelines from the present to the various events in Kay's life, it's up to the reader to piece together everything into the bigger picture. A business man promising to fix Toronto's economy and solve the problems of homelessness and unemployment ends up turning the city and then the province into a police state.

Anyone who isn't white and straight is labeled an Other. They are systematically targeted, rounded up, and forced into his "work program" which to anyone not immediately benefiting from these moves will readily admit they're modern day concentration camps. The fact that the term "Other" is the one chosen, though, shows the author's experience as a screenwriter. It's a term that comes up in film theory, used exactly as it is Crosshairs.

Like so many of these dystopian stories, the focus is extremely narrow. While the program is described as being spread out to other provinces, there isn't much else in the way of a birds' eye view. The United States is mentioned briefly when the president dies, but that's it for the rest of the world.

Crosshairs, though is written as a very personal account, a surviver's tale. It's short, focused, and emotionally brutal.

Five stars

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