Editor and author extraordinaire Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore (Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?) returns to memoir after her acclaimed 2018 novel Sketchtasy, but The Freezer Door acts less as documentation and more as rumination.
After moving from San Francisco to Seattle, Sycamore continues to grapple with themes of desire and belonging. These have become more elusive with the onslaught of gentrification. "One problem with gentrification is that it always gets worse," she begins, leaving that single statement to its own page. Having taken up residence in Seattle's contemporary gay neighborhood, Capitol Hill, she seeks out activist spaces, pops into bars (even though she's sober), cruises for sex and exchanges phone numbers, in hopes of establishing intimate connections in a modern era of superficial connectivity.
"I used to live in a neighborhood where no one belonged and so we all belonged," she writes, remembering a time when oppression fostered solidarity, and tracing an arc of queer identity that becomes popular at the same rate it becomes commodified. The entwined forces of nostalgia and gentrification reverberate, then, in feeble social interactions that leave her exhausted--for asking her to tone down her politics, intellect, gender or sexuality in favor of more desired elements of her self. "People say it's the Seattle freeze... but really it's just the gentrified gaze."
Expanding on her dazzling stream-of-consciousness style, Sycamore has crafted a true marvel in The Freezer Door. Every page teems with aphoristic gems, and the result is an invaluable meditation on holistic belonging. --Dave Wheeler, associate editor, Shelf Awareness