An unapologetic story of trans joy and an invitation to take up space. While it did get a bit cyclical/repetitive in the middle for me, the push and pull between the hell and alien storylines was at least enough to keep my attention. I do wish we got to hear more of Katrina’s voice outside of her self-doubt, since the story is ostensibly about her finding the confidence to put her two feet forward. Nevertheless, it’s about as cosy as you can get from a story about escaping transphobia while still confronting the transphobia. So many dreamy descriptions of food…

This story did at least speak to me as a trans artist, particularly the part of me that is constantly wondering exactly how much of myself I want to put out there before it becomes less about my writing and more about me. I don’t want my books (if they happen) to get written off or acknowledged purely because they are on a queer shelf. We deserve to be on the fantasy shelf with everybody else. Katrina deserves to be recognized for her talent and not labeled an icon or activist merely for existing publicly while trans. Recognizing our humanity also means letting us simply be human.

The woman looked into Girl's eyes. As she did, tears welled up in her own. She pressed the skin of her hand against Girl's larger hand. The same blood flowed under their skin. Their hearts beat at the same time. They shared a single thought: We are not alone.

This is an ambitious project. Before the story starts, it provides a glossary indicating the characters in the prehistoric timeline have a limited vocabulary. Doing a historical fiction in this way (needing to explain the larger concepts of the world without the characters being able to communicate as such) places The Last Neanderthal in a position to dance the line of what I would call David Attenborough-fication. Essentially, some of the Neanderthal sections read more like a documentary account. I believe it comes from a place of good intentions, of not wanting to anthropomorphize too much, but this is already a work of fiction, and when one of your major themes is our species were more alike than different, I think leaning into the emotion a little bit more would have been more than okay. As such, I do kind of feel like there is an emotional core missing between the two timelines/MCs to pull them together. But nevertheless, I am impressed by the form. If nothing else, it is proof that speculative fiction doesn’t always have to be fantastical to be interesting.