User Profile

All Fired Up is the first book I've read by MK England & it definitely put them on my authors-to-watch list. England writes fantastic fiction for queer nerds & I am absolutely that demographic. And if you're also a queer nerd who loves reading about friends to lovers, messy sapphics, and found family then All Fired Up is the book for you.

Kira, the firefighter, is not here for your stereotypes or misogyny. She's strong, capable, & committed to the people in her life. 

Nic, the pyro scientist, is in love with her best friend & struggling to find her place within her friend group after coming home from grad school. 

The two make a duo of self-appointed saviors for a friend they are both certain is about to make a horrible decision with her life. I'd be more frustrated with the characters determination to avoid an honest conversation on …

On Her Terms is Amy Spalding's third installment of her Out in Hollywood series & once again, Amy has hit it out of the park.

This one was the most relatable for me as I felt like I had a LOT in common with Clem as someone who always identified as bisexual but didn't fully step into my queerness until my mid-30s. Worrying whether you are queer enough to exist in your own queer identity especially when surrounded by other queer people is such a common experience for a lot of us.

This one is a slow burn but in the best way. I love Clem & Chloe doing this sort of delusional dance around each other. It feels so authentic to the Sapphic experience, honestly. The meta-ness of the MC hating fake-dating tropes in fiction while agreeing to fake-date someone in real life had me chuckling.

And yes, once …

I've been looking forward to this book & when I finally got it in my hot little hands, I absolutely devoured it.

Call it the need for instant gratification but I loved the intense spice right out of the gate. sWitch is no one-and-done either, it was hot all the way through. Generally, the fuckboi personality doesn't appeal to me but Remy hits just the right note. Especially paired with Fauna's sweetness. The two are electric together.

While the spice is on point, the backstory had me seriously guessing for so long. Finding books that keep me on my toes like that are few & far between. Let's hear it for multifaceted relationships that change and grow through the book.

Altogether, sWitch was easily some of the most fun I've had reading in a while. It gets released tomorrow so make sure to grab your copy. I am buying a …

This last year, I found a rekindled love for historical fiction in a new form for me - queer storytelling. Given who I am as a person, it's surprising that I've reached my big age before stumbling on this love for queer historical fiction. Nonetheless, I am thoroughly enjoying my new finds.

I've been looking forward to All The Painted Stars by Emma Denny since I saw it on Netgalley. Knowing I've too much on my plate, I didn't elect to be an ARC reader & am thoroughly pleased with having purchased the book. It's just so good.

We have an unputdownable late Middle Ages tale of the duty to family, friends, and oneself. Lily shines in the role of a Sapphic woman disguising herself as a man in order to save her secret love from the societal expectation of heteronormative oppression- sorry, marriage. Jo is an amalgamation of the …

Gabrielle Korn has crafted an incredible duology of queer speculative fiction. Because every great work of SpecFic builds on reality and asks "what if?", the effect in Your For the Taking and The Shutouts is often chilling. The reader is reminded that the very near future could be well reflected in this work of fiction. I feel that is what makes a strong piece of SpecFic - not the fabulous outlandishness of the future, but the plausible reality of a fictional outcome. 

Each character these two books follows is a masterpiece. At once a hero and villain, showing that humanity lives within the shades of gray. On one page, you love Ava and another you hate her. You understand Jacqueline's motivations in one chapter and in another find her methods abhorrent. In the first book, we empathize with Ava in her struggle with her relationship with Orchid and in the …

This book had such mixed reviews, I knew that I had to read it for myself. 

On the one hand, I get it - it's a meandering kind of story with the kind of strange narration that puts a lot of folks off. Especially those accustomed to more straightforward narratives. Personally, I really enjoyed Robin's interjection in storytelling but I'm partial to the impish nature of fae creatures. 

Yes, the story is slow moving, the language is decidedly archaic, & the antagonist during the whodunit portion of the book is pretty predictable but the world is immersive & the book is so well-written that I hardly noticed. The wry humor, subtle salaciousness, & blend of historical fiction & fantasy was a lot of fun. I'd love more sapphic stories like this. 

I think if I had one critique that I didn't wave away, it'd be that I wish there was …

Having never had a sleep away camp experience or any direct experience with religious homophobia, I went into this read with a pretty open mind. Written in first person & in YA format, this story was a really good time with great pacing & development.

Although the resolution of the primary issue (the horrible pastor who treats anyone who doesn't bow & scrape to his religious perspective) leaves me wishing I could march into the pages & throw some punches, I think it's actually a more realistic ending.

Those years of late adolescence are rough for anyone, throw in some sexuality grappling & religious intolerance & it becomes a powderkeg. The struggles & triumphs are really well captured here by Jenna Voris. Recommended!

Thanks to Penguin Group for this ARC!

Full disclosure: I very nearly DNF'd this book about halfway through. Decided to keep at it and by the end I kind of wish I'd stopped when I initially wanted to.

The slow build of this one is mindnumbingly slow. For all of the otherworldly weirdness the characters experience, the story itself is dull. 

It's meant to be a reimagining of the Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde. The author examines society's abhorence of women's anger and the measures taken to supress and villify it. This premise is so appealing. I was looking forward to this commentary in the setting of dark academia. 

Not only did it fall flat, every interesting plot piece was handled so hamfistedly that I was left with the sense of wasted time.

What a bummer. 

My thoughts contain spoilers so if you're dead set on avoiding them, scroll away. But I'm not hiding this behind a spoiler button because I think at least one review of this book should be out there with the information that people want to know.

I got over 80% through this alleged romance before there was an intentional kiss between the main characters. Until more than halfway into the book, this was just an employer/employee plot. Not even terribly friendly. And the one & only spicy scene isn't worth the wait.

Is the writing good? Sure, I guess. No real complaints there.

But the story? No one needs this story. Easily the most boring romance novel I've ever read & I used to read cishet romance once upon a time.

Save yourself the frustration & skip this one.

A story like The Last Witch in Edinburgh could have fallen flat, losing it's punch to the shallowness of White Feminism. But Thompson manages to stay true to a universal experience & brings very real history into a story of modern speculative fiction. 

Reading Nellie's character is frustrating but rewarding through her journey. She learns & grows, eventually becoming honest with herself about her own motivations.

I think that's the part that I most appreciate, the hubris the characters have or grow to have. It would be easy for a writer to give their main character a sense of infallibility but Thompson allows each character to be human, flaws & all.

Beyond that, the message that carries through this story from the nineteenth to twenty-first centuries is one that pulled at me. We're not alone.

When I was a teenager, we read Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak. Over the decades since then, Speak has become a widely read and celebrated novel detailing an all-too-common experience for girls and young women. I think it still deserves a place among literature that provides representation for an under-represented perspective. But I do feel Speak is beginning to show its years, despite recent attempts to contemporize it.

I just read a different novel that I feel takes the path left by Speak and blazes ahead of it. Dear Medusa, written by Olivia A. Cole, is a story written in breathtakingly beautiful verse that weaves itself in and out of your bones. Where Speak stops short of exploring the darkest corners of trauma, Dear Medusa brings the reader along as it plumbs the depths of the traumatized soul. This novel tells its story unflinchingly, daring to stare down the patriarchy in …

Copious Harry Potter references in the positive.