And finally we’re here, day 3 of my ode to tropes. Today we’re featuring two brilliant tropes. First up, is monster romance (which rather got out of hand as it turns out I love quite a few). Secondly, we’ve got a trope hugely important to all of us in the queer community: found family.
Monster romance
I am a sucker for monster romance. Give me dark monsters falling in love with soft, cinnamon rolls everyday.
Let’s start with a book I’m pretty sure might be THE sapphic book of the year. Releasing in July, Girl, Serpent, Thorn is about a princess who is poisonous to touch. When she tries to rid herself of her curse with the help of a demon, she unleashes unimaginable consequences and must question everything about herself. Girl, Serpent, Thorn is a book with a monster girlfriend, a morally grey princess, a descent to villainy, and wings!
So whilst Blood Countess doesn’t have a typical ‘monster girlfriend’, you can’t get more monsterous than the most prolific female serial killer of all time. Hence I think this book deserves to be included in this trope! This is a dark, horror retelling of Countess Elizabeth Báthory, the inspiration for Countess Dracula from the POV of Anna, a servant in Elizabeth’s castle. Check out my full review here.
In Missing, Presumed Dead we have a ghost, Jane, who’s out for revenge on the person who killed her. Lexi, a woman who can see how a person dies, sees Jane’s death but doesn’t do anything to stop it. So when Jane sticks around to destroy her murderer, she enlists Lexi’s help. And monster romance begin. Check out my full review here.
In Beyond the Black Door, not only do we get a gorgeous asexual biromantic heroine, we also get a monster romance! This is a dark and lush YA fantasy with people who can walk through the souls of others, and I’m not going to say anything else about the monster romance because spoilers!
In Sawkill Girls, there’s a dark and spooky island setting, where girls keep going missing and there’s lots of talk about a monster hiding in the woods. This books has a horrory-mythical vibe, a focus on female friendship and monsters to fall in love with.
Does a gothic horror tale about murder and monsters and a man who loves himself some of both sound interesting? Then this is the novella for you! The night is dark and full of corpses. The town of Elendhaven was left to die thanks to a plague outbreak and then stripped of all its industry. But the people in Elendhaven are going to have their revenge. Enter evil, murderering magicians and monsters.
A dark sapphic Asian retelling of Beauty and the Beast inspired by Vietnamese mythology beats all other Beauty and the Beast retellings, I said it. Even more so when the Beast is a motherfucking dragon.
And we’re ending with another ghost romance, one that is already one of the most talked about books of the year! Not much gets better than a gay, trans, Latinx brujo accidentally summoning the wrong ghost then falling in love with him.
Found Family
Found family is quite possibly the most important and queerest of all these tropes I’ve talked about, which is why I’m leaving it to last. It’s a trope that resonates with those of us who can’t trust the family we’re born into, and instead must find our own in life to keep us going. It’s such a powerful, hopeful trope and I think these books really emphasise that positivity.
This is one of the most gorgeous, wholesome, joyful, queerest books in the whole world, I love it! Featuring found family at it’s very best, The House in the Cerulean Sea follows Linus, a caseworker who goes to investigate an orphanage with some very special magical children (of whomst one is the Antichrist). This book is warm and cosy and utterly delightful. Check out my full review here.
K.Ancrum is an absolute genius and one of my auto-buy authors, no matter what she writes. Her debut The Wicker King was incredible, as is her second novel, The Weight of the Stars. This features a group of rough kids who’ve found each other thanks to Ryann, a girl who dreams of going to space. It has a soft sapphic relationship, Ancrum’s usual lyrical writing, and a beautiful page design!
I’ll take your found family and raise you a found family made up of queer, librarian spies fighting fascists in a Western-style dystopian future. Yes that does sound as incredible as you think it is. This story is told from the POV of Esther, a stowaway who catches a ride when the librarians come to town and then realise she’s in the place she’s always needed to be.
This is an absolutely weird and wild Sherlock Holmes retelling where Holmes is a pansexual female sorceress and Watson is a trans man who just can’t catch a break as he’s beset by vampires, pirates and sharks during his efforts to help out his fellow lodger. Full of fun and friendship and acceptance, everything the found family trope is known for.
And that’s a wrap on my trope posts! What’s your favourite trope? Are there any you love that I’ve missed?
So after yesterday’s dive into queer enemies to lovers, the trope to rule all other tropes, I also want to talk about several other tropes that I just adore. And midway through writing this post, I realised it was going to be SO LONG because there are SO MANY books that I love with these tropes. So I had to once again split it up. Today, we’re going to get three tropes: disaster queers, slowburn romance, and everyone’s favourite ‘there’s only one bed!’
Disaster queers
Disaster queers, aka the trope where a group of queer people or an individual is a complete and utter disaster/mess/loveable idiot who just cannot catch a break and no matter how much they plan, shit gets fucked up. I LOVE THEM. Such messy angels.
First off, a group of French Revolution queer disasters to rule all queer disasters forevermore. These idiots are trying to rescue innocent people from the guillotine, but their rescue keeps going wrong (and like, really wrong.) The opening action sequence of this book is quite possibly the most hilarious, fun disaster rescue in the whole world, and all these characters know it and accept it with such resignation and snark, I love them all so much. You can read my full review here.
How about two queer disasters who just broke up but now have to travel the multiverse in search of a lost customer because their corporate overlords tell them they have to? Enter disasters such as almost getting eaten by a plant chair and paying in blood at a parallel universe Ikea with creepy clones all around you.
The main character of The Ruin of Kings has been called the literal definition of a bisexual disaster by so many people I follow on Twitter so the fact that I still have not read this book is really letting down the team, I’m sorry. This book sounds like it puts the epic in epic fantasy, with gods, demons, dragons, prophecies, war and a long lost prince.
In Beyond the Ruby Veil we have the brand of disaster queer known as ‘chaos lesbian’. This beautiful foolish idiot kills the only person in her city capable of creating water and now her whole city might die of thirst and so she has to try and figure out how the fuck to get water back. What a disaster.
Slowburn
Not much is better than a long, drawn out romance where they don’t kiss until pretty much the last chapter. Slowburn romance + speculative fiction is pretty much my favourite genre of all time, I read so much of it so here’s four of my favs!
This has been one of my favourite books of the year so far! The Unspoken Name is a portal fantasy with an absolutely huge, expansive world with magic, necromancy and powerful gods. And it also has a brilliant slowburn romance that’s one of my favourite relationships of all fantasies ever because it has: one idiot lesbian orc who doesn’t think before acting (yes she probably could also appear in the previous trope), one extremely powerful mage who might be a gateaway to a fallen, evil god so must always remain in total control, and said aforementioned completely-in-control mage TOTALLY FUCKING LOSING IT over the idiot lesbian orc, I love it. You can read my full review here.
This book is one of my favourite YA fantasies and as it’s a genre I’ve been struggling with recently, that means it is extra, extra special!! This is such a relevant and uncomfortabley familiar book about illegal immigrants crossing walls into Medio, an island city. Dani illegally crossed the border with her parents but is now at the Medio School for Girls where, hiding her past, she is top of her class. At the school women are trained to be wives for important men, Primera’s and Segunda’s. Each man chooses two girls to be his wives – and in We Set the Dark on Fire, two wives fall in love with each other instead of their husband. It’s slowburn sapphic fire, a book full of revolution and courage, a must read for YA dystopian readers. You can read my full review here.
Possibly the most unique book I’ve read recently, this is a science fiction unlike any other: it combines massive space empires with poetry and murder mystery. And obviously a very (and I mean very) slowburn f/f romance. It’s a twisty turny political-technological-sci-fi-ode-to-poetry-murder-mystery-romance! It sounds complicated (and it totally is), but it’s absolutely amazing and full of humour as well, which brings a much needed lightness to this complex book. You can read my full review here.
I’m terrible at sequels so whilst I still haven’t read the sequel to this brilliant debut fantasy, I have read (and loved) Girls of Paper and Fire. This book was the kind of fantasy I read the first page in bed and then had to put the book down to start the next day because I immediately knew I was not going to be able to stop reading. There is an incredible world with different castes of people, human, demons, and Steel (a mix of both). It’s a very dark book (the entire premise is basically a King choosing 8 girls to be consorts – regardless of whether they want to be or not), but the relationship that develops between our two lead girls is beautiful, and Ngan writes in an empowering manner, putting focus on the strength and recovery of these girls than on the acts themselves. You can read my full review here.
There’s only one bed….
I feel like this is one of the most popular tropes, and that’s because it’s just so tense and awkward, I love it. There’s only one bed aka ‘here are two people who may not really like each other (or perhaps do like each other but it’s a secret and the other doesn’t know) and now they have to sleep really close together because there is but one bed’.
Yes this book appeared in yesterday’s enemies to lovers trope list, and yes it is appearing here too. But that’s because it does both these tropes so well! This is ‘there’s only one bed’ at it’s most classic and excellent: with two characters who kind of hate each other.
Queer novellas are winning right now (in fact so much so I have a separate post this month all about them!) and Silver in the Wood is one of these, a lyrical, mythical folklore romance about a man who lives on the edge of the woods. And of course a ‘oh! look! we have but one bed, where shall I sleep!’ scene.
Okay there’s really something about enemies to lovers and there’s only bed going together because this is another that is on both lists. And that’s because THIS is the moment when feelings often change, when people who used to hate suddenly consider other feelings that change everything. And it’s pretty awesome when we’re on a pirate ship with a pirate and a monster trainer too.
Dark academia is one of my newest loves so when we take dark academia + nostalgic theatre gays + murder + there’s only one bed, it becomes something even more extraordinary.
That’s it for today’s list of tropes! Join us tomorrow for my last two favourite tropes: monster romances (and hot damn did this list get rather long, I clearly have A Type), and a trope I think particularly personal and important to us queers: found family.
Enemies (and rivals) to lovers is most definitely my favourite trope. There’s just something about hate to love which just SOARS above the rest: the intensity, the passion, I just love it!! I did plan to do one post featuring all of my favourite tropes. But there were so many enemies to lovers favourites that I decided to split the post. So today you get my favourite enemies to lovers, and tomorrow you get all my other favourite tropes! (And a further update at the time of scheduling: I actually ended up having to break these down even further because I have too many books and too many favourite tropes so prepare for three days of tropey fun!)
What could I start with but the epic sapphic enemies-to-lovers fantasy that is Crier’s War?! (With the additional trope of ‘there’s only one bed’ to really make this the best book it can be!) Blending science fiction and fantasy in a Made versus Human post-war world, where Made rule over the human population, and the heir to the Made empire falls in love with a human servant. This is full of action and drama and tension which is everything we want in an enemies-to-lovers ship.
Pretty much my favourite book ever, it’s no surprise The Fever King has my favourite trope ever. On one side, Noam, son to immigrant parents who wakes up with magic after a virus outbreak. On the other side, Dara, the adopted son to the most powerful man in Carolinia, Calix Leher. Noam and Dara are full of mistrust and anger at each other, their positions and just how exactly they want to overthrow the government, but that results in such an intense and powerful romance that it literally breaks my heart every time I read.
I think I hear much less noise about this book than I do Crier’s War, which makes me rather upset because this is just as amazing a sapphic enemies-to-lovers (in fact I think I prefer We Set the Dark on Fire). In We Set the Dark on Fire, two wives fall in lover with each other instead of the husband they’re supposed to serve. There’s also lots of discussion about immigration, it’s a very relevant book that compares to situations on the US-Mexico border today which makes it so poweful a book and one I really wish I heard more people scream about.
If The Fever King is my favourite enemies-to-lovers then this is a close second! This is an absolutely terrifying, claustraphoic read about a caver who gets trapped in a caving system. She’s trying to find a way to escape, with only the help of the woman on the other end of her headset who’s monitoring her caving suit. It’s so tense and panic-inducing with just two characters and one, very tight setting, with a character who begins to lose control of reality, no longer sure what is real and what isn’t.
We all know Gideon the Ninth is one of the highlights of the enemies-to-lovers trope. In Gideon, we have pretty much mortal enemies: Gideon, a cavalier, and Harrowhark, bone witch necromancer who wears a corset of bones and skull facepaint. The two must work together to help Harrowhark be chosen as the Emperor’s necromancer with a series of challenges and mysteries that require a mastermind to solve. Enter Harrowhark’s clever brilliance and Gideon’s brash ‘charge into battle without a thought’ness.
Not much could get more enemies to lovers than ‘human and the robot alien who’s overtaken Earth’. But that’s what we get in The Sound of Stars! This is a YA science fiction dystopia about an alien race called the Ilori who overtake Earth and outlaw any form of human expression (including books and music). When Ellie is caught with a private library, she and her captor must work together to save Earth.
Beyond the Black Door is a lush and gorgeous fantasy with a villain romance and asexual heroine. It’s a beautiful world where Soulwalkers exist, people who can travel into people’s souls whilst they sleep. Kamai is a soulwalker, but in everyone’s soul she walks, a black door follows her. And Kamai wants to know what’s behind the black door.
Amelia Westlake is such a funny, feminist, and sapphic Aussie YA about rivals Will, the school bad girl, and Harriet, the golden girl and prefect of Rosemead Grammar. The two join forces to try expose the blatantly misogynistic practices at the school. And obv, fall in love, because this is a list about enemies (or in this case, rivals) to lovers.
Another excellent sapphic rivals to lovers YA contemporary! This one features a budding film director and the school’s cheerleader captain (YESSS QUEER CHEERLEADERS) who are forced to work together to create a film even though they hate each other.
If you want epic time travel + spies + sapphic enemies to lovers, then this is the book for you. Blue and Red are spies on opposite sides of a war across time. The two write letters to each other growing from battlefield taunts to a love that will cross time and space itself to survive. (God that was cheesy. But it’s so true).
I don’t think you can get much more enemies-to-lovers than a Captain Hook x Peter Pan romance. In Peter Darling, Peter Pan is returning to Neverland years later, now all grown up. But when he gets back, things have changes, the Lost Boys have grown up too and now their tricks are more like war, and Peter’s old rival is suddenly like super hot?!
Pirates and monsters and boats oh my. This enemies-to-lovers sapphic adventure follows Cassandra, who has spent her whole life breeding and training monsters to protect ships. But then she’s kidnapped and forced to raise a monster pup for a pirate ship, and kinda-also-sorta has feelings for one of the pirates.
With a book that opens with the two main characters having a fight and knocking over a very expensive cake at a wedding, you know it’s going to be a brilliant rivals to lovers book. Especially when the two characters are the Prince of England and the son of the President of the United States.
A recent 2020 release, The Henna Wars published in May this year. It’s a YA contemporary with two girls who set up rival henna businesses for a school project, but one is appropriating the others culture. But when the competition is sabataged, the two’s lives are further entwined and one just can’t quite get over her crush. I’m planning on reading this one this and am so excited as it’s one of my most anticipated releases of the year!
Yes this list is heavily sapphic and I do not apologise for it, especially when they all sound this fucking good. The Dark Tide is a soon to be released (already released in Australia, August 4 US release!) sapphic enemies-to-lovers featuring a Witch Queen who must kill one innocent life every year to stop her island from sinking, and the girl who sacrifices herself to the Witch Queen in exchange for her friend’s life. As the two fall for each other and the dark tide floods the streets of the island, the two must decide whether to save each other, themselves, or the island residents.
Do you love this trope as much as me? What’s your favourite enemies to lovers book?
Goodreads blurb: A magical island. A dangerous task. A burning secret.
Linus Baker leads a quiet, solitary life. At forty, he lives in a tiny house with a devious cat and his old records. As a Case Worker at the Department in Charge Of Magical Youth, he spends his days overseeing the well-being of children in government-sanctioned orphanages.
When Linus is unexpectedly summoned by Extremely Upper Management he’s given a curious and highly classified assignment: travel to Marsyas Island Orphanage, where six dangerous children reside: a gnome, a sprite, a wyvern, an unidentifiable green blob, a were-Pomeranian, and the Antichrist. Linus must set aside his fears and determine whether or not they’re likely to bring about the end of days.
But the children aren’t the only secret the island keeps. Their caretaker is the charming and enigmatic Arthur Parnassus, who will do anything to keep his wards safe. As Arthur and Linus grow closer, long-held secrets are exposed, and Linus must make a choice: destroy a home or watch the world burn.
An enchanting story, masterfully told, The House in the Cerulean Sea is about the profound experience of discovering an unlikely family in an unexpected place—and realizing that family is yours.
Well my heart has melted into a puddle of rainbows, this is ghost Rachel speaking. I come to you from beyond the grave with the gift of a book review for the happiest, most joyful, so fucking queer, loveliest, sweetest, glorious book I’ve read all year. This was magnificent. I read this book a month or two ago near the start of the coronavirus stress and isolation here in Australia, and I’m so glad I could escape into this world with these beautiful characters during that lonely time.
Linus is a caseworker for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth (DICOMY). He is assigned a new, highly classified case whereby he must go to a secret orphanage on an island where six special magical children live, to investigate if the orphanage is up to DICOMY standard. There, he is changed and renewed by this children and their caretakers, Arthur and Zoe, as he comes to know their lives and see underneath the monster society has labelled them as.
These six children are the life blood of this book, giving it the hope and joy which made this book so special. Each of these children are special, more powerful than other magical children which is why they have come to be placed in this particular orphanage. We have:
Talia: a female gnome (the being female makes her unique as this has never before been heard of). She is such a fierce character, full of threats and bluster and grump, and yet at a moment’s notice can be touchingly sweet.
Sal: a teen who can turn into a Pomeranian, though one who can also pass this magic on if he bites you. He has had an awful, terrible childhood, passing through 12 orphanages until he was placed on the island. He is terrified of adults and constantly startled and frightened, but grows into his confidence as he learns to have faith that this home is permanent.
Theodore: a highly intelligent wyvern, clumsy as he hasn’t quite grown into his wings yet, who has a secret hoard of treasure and a particular fondness for buttons, who looks at the world with such beauty, even the smallest things imaginable.
Pree: a traumatised young forest sprite, who saw her mother die in front of her, who is dealing with powers she struggles to control, full of teenage flounce.
Chauncey: the adorable and sweet Chauncey, a creature no one knows quite what is, with a see-through body and tentacles, who’s only dream in the world is to help people by being a bellhop, and yet has only ever been told he is a monster.
Lucy: and then we have the enigmatic and morbid Lucy, the Antichrist himself, but still just a six year old child who is overwhelmed with nightmares of spiders and destruction, but who has a brilliant love for music and cooking.
I cannot express the beauty of these characters in words. They are so perfectly whole and wonderful, Klune has created a cast of characters who make this story feel like home. You feel as much at home with these children as Linus does, as they drag him from his dreary office job into a world of colour. And dear old Linus. What can I say about a man who sees himself as below ordinary, as the most unspecial, unimportant person on the planet, but who does what he can with what he’s got. I would say his hate for himself when he such a wonderful person is utterly destroying, but that would be wrong, because Linus doesn’t hate himself, somehow it’s much worse than that: he thinks he is invisible, devoid of any use, and his indifference and acceptance of what he sees as uselessness is so much worse to see. Because he is a beautiful person, so able to see hope and love in the world and yet unable to accept it as something he could have. But these children, Arthur and Zoe, provide an opportunity for his life to gain colour.
Arthur himself is an enigma for much of the book, standing on the edge of the story but always looking and seeing Linus for who he is. He helps Linus to see his worth, much like he helps the children to see theirs.
In addition to the beauty of these characters, Klune makes subtle (and sometimes decidedly unsubtle) jabs at our capitalist, surveillance state, from the robotic blank slate that is the DICOMY offices, to the obscene 250 page Rules and Regulations manuel, to the posters decorated everywhere – Say Something, See Something. This integration of satire adds to the humour of the children to create this funny and inviting novel, set in a world so much like our own in so many ways.
Klune’s writing is full of humour and smiles. I felt so happy to see this world and be around these characters and I long to see more of them. I didn’t want this world to end, but it did, and I was so full of happy tears and joy at this delightful book which brightened up a very dark and lonely time in isolation.
I feel like 2020 publishing is a pretty major year for retellings, whether that be retellings of fairytales, historical events, classics, or mythology. Now I’m a pretty big fan of retellings, but you know what make them reach new heights of epicness? Making them gay! There’s just something about taking an old, boring, cishet book and making it sparkle with queerness instead. So here’s some of my favourites as well as some of the ones I’m most excited to read!
The Mercies has been one of my favourite reads of the year so far. This is a retelling of the year 1617 Vardø storm, a storm which wiped out the men in a small fishing village in Norway. The village of newly independent women must come together to survive in the cold and harsh climate. But then a commissioner is sent to the village to help lead them, a witch hunter from Scotland. What follows is a story focused on the destruction of this village, as the witch hunter riles up suspicion and hatred amongst the group of women as he tries to control them with his Godly, just ways. This book is so fantastic. There is a soft, sapphic relationship (one of my favourite couples!!), a dark descent to villainy and evil, strong friendships, and an absolutely enthalling and enchanting gothic setting. Highly recommend! You can check out my full reivew here.
Okay I know we’ve all read it. But like. It’s so bloody good. I couldn’t leave it off this list! The Song of Achilles reimagines the myth of Achilles and Patroclus, their life growing up together, the journey which takes them to Troy and the long Trojan War, and their era-defining love (yes I said it, this book is ERA-DEFINING). If you were a fool like me, you might not have realised the ending of this myth before you read this book the first time, and holy fuck, what a mess that resulted in. This book is a beautiful, poetic and HIGHLY EMOTIONAL (I’M NOT FUCKING KIDDING) retelling that will no doubt break you heart but also make you fall in love with Madeline Miller and her Greek retellings.
I was lucky enough to get an ARC of this, and everyone is in for a treat when this releases next month!! Girl, Serpent, Thorn is a Persian mythology inspired fairytale about a princess who is poisonous to the touch and her journey to discover the power in her gift. This book has so many of my favourite tropes: enemies to lovers, morally grey MC, descent to villainy, a bisexual mc, soft sapphic romance, monster girlfriends, and wings!!!! Yes I have a thing for characters with wings, I blame it on a fanfic I read as an impressionable teen. I loved exploring all the Persian mythology, and the journey Soruya, the main character, goes on. A girl terrified of hurting someone with her poison, to someone who embraces her differences and learns to see their power, is sapphic goddess win.
Okay so I admit I’ve only read half this book, because I ran out of time and had to return it the library. Once libraries reopen I will be re-borrowing it to finish it off! This is an Alice in Wonderland retelling where Alice fights monsters with massive knives and doesn’t that just sound fantastic?! Add to that a lesbian romance and this book is killer. Alice almost dies when she is attacked by a Nightmare, a creature from Wonderland, a kind of dream realm. So of course she decides to train up and fight them. But when her mentor is poisoned by one of the Nightmares, she needs to travel far into Wonderland to find a cure, fighting monsters all the way.
This beauty released in January this year, and has an absolutely killer cover!! This is a retelling of The Counte of Monte Cristo, which whilst I’ve never read, I have seen it discussed in the film V for Vendetta every Guy Fawkes night for the last 10 years. So. That counts. This is a book full of revenge, with Amaya looking to bring down the man who ruined her family and stole her life. I hope she stabs him. Surely that’s what that knife on the cover represents?!
This is the Captian Hook x Peter Pan fanfic you always wanted. I literally described this book to my partner and all he could say was ‘wow that sounds like your cup of tea’. And it so bloody is!! With a trans mc, a Peter who left Neverland to live as Wendy Darling but has come to accept his identity as a man and is now returning to Neverland as an adult. And now he has the hots for his old enemy, Captain Hook. I literally want to sob at how perfect this is.
Cinderella is Dead is one of the books releasing later this year which have caused me to dub 2020 Publishing as The Year of the Retelling. This time, of Cinderella (obviously). This is set 200 years after the story of Cinderella, in a world where girls are now required to appear at a ball once a year, where the men of the kingdom make their choices for brides based on the beauty and finery of the girls. If you aren’t picked, you’re never heard from again… Sophia, who would rather marry her best friend Erin instead of any man, runs away and hides in Cinderella’s mausoleum where she meets the last descendent of Cinderella and together they plan to take down the king for good.
This retelling sounds so brilliant and I can’t wait to see the cover when it gets revealed!! It’s a historical fantasy retelling of a Portugese miracle about a girl who turns all food she touches into flowers, following an actual Portugese saint Yzabel of Aragon. Plu! It’s sapphic! There’s an f/f relationship between Yzabel and (I assume) the enchanter she goes to to try reverse her miracle (or curse…)
Of all the retellings coming this year, I think this might be my favourite. I am such a big gothic fan. I’m currently taking my partner through all my old gothic films after watching the stage version of Phantom of the Opera on Andrew Lloyd Webber’s weekly Youtube musical release. I adore Phantom. Book, film, and show! So when I heard there was going to be an f/f Phantom of the Opera I think I might have died a little. In a world with music magic, Cadence has been forced to sing to torture the queendom’s disgraced nobility at the queen’s bidding. But when reuinted with a childhood friend, she needs to decide whether to free their country or become a monster herself. Is it bad that I….kinda want her to be the monster?! This sounds so brilliant, morally grey characters, possible descent to villainy, music magic and sapphic relationships, I cannot wait till November!
A King Arthur retelling that’s queer as fuck?! Hell fucking yes. At a local university program for talented high school students, there are demons, a secret society of Legendborn students who fight down the demons and a mage called Merlin who wants to wipe Bree’s memory when she sees one of these demons attack on her very first day on campus. The attack unlocks Bree’s own magic and memories of the death of her mother. Bree vows to become a Legendborn initiate to find out how her mother died. But the Legendborn reveal themselves as descendants of King Arthur and his knights and claim a magical war is coming. Bree must decide whether to take them down, or help them fight.
I hope you enjoyed reading about these super queer retellings and found some new books to add to your TBR! Are there any I’ve missed which you love?? I struggled narrowing down this list so they might be appearing on my blog another day this month…
If you haven’t thought about what you can do today to support Black Lives Matter, here’s a link to a Twitter thread of petitions which still haven’t reached their goal! There’s so many there, and even spending just 10 minutes of your time would get a TON of these signed. (And if you spent just 10 minutes a day signing, I bet you’d get all of these petitions signed before the weekend is over).
Today we’re going to look at books with bi rep! We have contemporaries, fantasy, horror, adult and YA so hopefully you can find something that suits all your bisexual desires in this post.
I wanted to do a pan rep post as well (especially since I tend to prefer the term pansexual over bi for myself, though I do go by both depending on the situation) but I’ve only read one book with pan rep. This seriously needs to be remedied, so if you have any recs, please do let me know! And in case you’re wondering what that one book is, it’s The Library of the Unwritten which featured in yesterday’s science fiction and fantasy post and it’s one of my favourite books so you should definitely pick it up!
Deposing Nathan is one of my alltime favourite books. It’s a very important book, very close to my heart, AND this year was nominated for a LAMBDA for Bisexual Fiction! Deposing Nathan is part courtroom drama, part YA coming of age. We open in a courtroom, where Nate is giving evidence against his former best friend, Cam, who stabbed him. We cut between this courtroom and the past, where we see Nate and Cam’s relationship develop as they go from BFFs to Stab City. This book also very personally and honestly deals with religion and sexuality, as well as the validity of bisexuality and it’s pretty much one of the most important books to me because of this. Smedley also manages to have some of the most realistic, dramatic writing I’ve seen, I felt so connected to Nate and his very moving story. This isn’t a happy story. But it’s a very important one. You can read my full review here.
I won a copy of Missing, Presumed Dead in a Twitter giveaway (pretty much one of the only things I’ve ever won in a giveaway or raffle situation). And it also had the honour of being my first ever SIGNED book, so it has a rather special place in my heart. And that’s on top of it being an incredible f/f ghost romance murder thriller. Whenever Lexi touches someone, she sees their death in vivid detail. When she forsees Jane’s death, she does nothing to try stop it. So, when Jane comes back to haunt her, Lexi agrees to help her hunt down the killer. This is a very dark and gritty book, but with a very realistic take on what it would actually be like to have this magic power. Lexi is deeply depressed and lonely, and I love that this book really talked about the shitty sides of having magic. Check out my full review here.
Full Disclosure has one of the funniest scenes in YA, an epic heroine, nerds for musical theatre, and a sweet, lovely romance. Simone has lived with HIV since she was a baby. Having moved schools after she was bullied for her HIV status at her previous school, Simone plans to stay away from boys and avoid another reaction like at her past school. But as director of the school musical, she begins to fall for Miles, a sweet, adorable guy who she vows to teach all about her favourite musicals. But then she starts getting threats warning her that if she doesn’t break up with Miles, her secret will be revealed. Simone is such a brilliant character, so funny and strong and I loved all her musical references. I also really appreciated the different discussions of sexuality that showcased the spectrum of bisexuality and queerness, including those questioning and unsure of their sexuality. There is some internalised (and external) biphobia but it’s questioned and addressed within the narrative. Check out my full review here for more details.
Necromancy is one of my favourite magic systems to explore so I was so excited to read this bisexual necromancer book! Our main character, Sparrow, is a necromancer. Whenever a noble dies, she walks into the Deadlands to retrieve their soul and brings them back to their body. But once raised, the Dead must stay shrouded in life. If they are ever seen by the living, they became Shades, deadly monsters. When a necromancer is murdered, Sparrow realises someone is purposely making Shades to bring down the empire and must hunt down the murderer. Reign of the Fallen had such a cool magic system. Everyone is born with eye colour which determines their magic, blue eyes for necromancers, green for beast masters, brown eyes for inventors, and lots of other interesting magics. There is a big fight between Living and Dead in the empire, with the Dead ruling nobles outlawing inventors as they want to stay in the past and not progress. It was a really interesting world, with normalised queerness and lots of creepy dead people.
Bisexuals with dragons! Bisexuals with dragons! Bisexuals with dragons! Shatter the Sky is the first in a duology which concludes later this year, about a bisexual (obviously) who goes to rescue her girlfriend by stealing a dragon. The magic system around the dragons is so interesting and unique – aromatherapy magic anyone?! There are different scented oils which can work the dragons up into different states (such as put them to sleep, make them angry etc). There’s a very dark undertone to this fantasy, with the enslavement of these dragons who can think and have minds as clever as humans but are reduced to nothing by use of these drugs. Plus, we have a bisexual m/f/f love triangle which I love to see. Check out my full review here.
Onto one of my favourite ever books, Into the Drowning Deep is the novel which all horror will always be held up to in comparison. This book is chilling and terrifying and so, so, so damn good. In this book, mermaids are real. But they aren’t the lovely ladies of the sea everyone thinks them to be, instead they’re ferocious face eating monsters from the deep who will hunt you down if you enter their realm. So of course, the only thing to do is send a research ship to them to investigate. What follows is a gore covered mess of chaos and terror as the ship fights against the monsters. And it’s so. fucking. good. Check out my full review here!
This book is iconic in sapphic Twitter and I read it so long ago I am never going to be able to sell it better that pretty much all other people I follow on Twitter. But I shall try! The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo is the story of a retired film star, Evelyn Hugo, who has hired someone to write her biography. The story is told as Evelyn recites her life story to this writer, of her seven husbands, and of the great love affair of her life. It is beautiful, tear-enducing, historical fiction at its best. Anyway Evelyn Hugo is a bicon (that’s a word right?) and hence has to be included in this list.
Steel Crow Saga is on my TBR for this month but I couldn’t resist adding to this list because we needed some adult fantasy bisexuals on this list. Steel Crow Saga is a chonky, standalone fantasy novel with MAGICAL ANIMAL COMPANIONS that fight alongside you in battle. I feel like I need to highlight that part. A soldier, a thief, a detective and a prince unite together to defeat an enemy with unstoppable power; five different nations, all coded after different Asian countries (this sounds amazing?!?!); and POVs from the colonised and the colonisers to create a political fantasy of epic proportions. And lots of magical companions uniting together too?? Hopefully? I just love magical animal companions, I used to have a cat that followed me around in Elder Scrolls and it was truly magical.
If you’re into superheros, then this is the book for you! A Vietnamese-Chinese American bi teen, Jess, lives in a town where superheros are common. She’s looking to beef up her college application and lands a great internship. There’s just one problem: it’s with the heinous supervillain in town and her superhero parents are going to kill her. But a bonus? She gets to work with her longtime crush. What could go wrong?
It’s very rare to get any sort of questioning rep in YA, so it is really great to get this bisexual questioning religious girl, who also suffers from extreme anxiety. Though, it’s probably definitely not the book to read whilst the world is as Fucked Up as it is right now. It’s about two girls who meet in their therapists waiting room, one who is terrified the world is going to end, and one who knows when it will end, because she had a premonition.
Do you have any other bisexual favourites to add to this list?
I’d like to start again by directing you to the Black Lives matter carrd to continue efforts to sign petitions and donate money to support protestors. If you’re Australian, we have a number of protests this weekend in state capitals across the country, to lend our voices and support to Bla(c)k Australians, so please check out if you have any near you! For fellow Melbournians, event info can be found here.
Today’s post is pretty much just a list of my favourite books. Science fiction, fantasy, horror and all that comes under the SFF heading are by far my favourite genres and I read so much of it, so today’s list of ‘queer speculative fiction’ ended up basically just being a list of all my favourite books. I hope you find a few books at least to add to your TBR!
The Priory of the Orange Tree is the only book on today’s list that I haven’t read yet (although at time of posting, I’m 300 pages in!), and that’s because I couldn’t talk about queer speculative fiction without mentioning the powerhouse that is Priory. Priory is a hefty, high fantasy involving dragons, assassins and queens. As word of the Nameless One’s return takes root, Queen Sabran the Ninth, unwed and with no heir, must birth a daughter. Assassins circle around her whilst her lady-in-waiting, Ead, works to protect the queen by using forbidden magic. Not only that, the world has zero homophobia AND has an f/f relationship. A slow burn, epic fantasy at its best, The Priory of the Orange Tree is not to be missed.
A surprise to none to see this title on my favourite queer speculative fiction, as The Fever King is my favourite book. Alongside the sequel, The Electric Heir, this series blew me away unlike any other. Set in a dystopian universe where the world has been ravaged by a virus, those who survive have magic. In Carolinia, Noam, a technopath, is trained by none other than Calix Leher, ex-King of Carolinia. Alongside a group of trainees, Noam vows to take down the current regime who terrorise the refugee and immigrant population in Carolinia. This is a series about trauma, how to survive, and finding the strength to fight back against abuse by the powerful. You can read my full reviews here for The Fever King and The Electric Heir.
The Fifth Season is the first book in one of my favourite fantasy trilogies. If you haven’t heard of N.K Jemisin, firstly, maybe think about correcting that, because her work is outstanding. The worldbuilding, the plot, the sheer geological magnitude of it all, makes The Fifth Season the powerhouse of SFF that it is. I’m very close to rereading this whole trilogy so maybe at some point this month I’m going to end up saying ‘fuck it’ to all my other books and reread this trilogy. This is a story with several POVs, set in a world with dangerous and regular seismac events. It follows several Orogenes, individuals who can control thermal energy and help with the aforementioned terrible seismic events. We have: Essun, told in second person POV, a woman who’s trying to track down her daughter and husband (who just killed her son). Demaya, a young girl who grew up in an abusive household and has been given to the Fulcrum, to train her Orogene powers. And Syenite, who is an adult in the Fulcrum and has been asked to have a child with one of the most powerful Orogene. This book is just full of twists and turns and is one of the most clever and wellcrafted novels I’ve ever read.
The Library of the Unwritten is one of the most fun fantasy novels I’ve ever read. Hell’s Library is the place where all unwritten manuscripts are housed. But sometimes the books come alive. When a character goes missing from one of the books, Claire, the Head Librarian, must track down the character on Earth but somehow ends up in the midst of a battle between Heaven and Hell as each searches for the Devil’s Bible. This book is an absolute riot of fun, full of snark and sass and with the first on-page pansexual rep I’ve ever read! You can read a full review here.
One of my more recent favourites, I read The Unspoken Name earlier this year. This is an expansive and detailed slow burn portal fantasy about an orc named Csorwe. She is destined to be sacrificied to her god on her fourteenth birthday. Instead, on the day of her death, she runs away with a wizard who trains her up to be his sword. She must then embark on a quest to find an ancient artifact holding powerful knowledge. This has a huge number of my favourite things in fantasies: necromancers, powerful god magic, wizards, all powerful women losing complete control, different worlds and peoples. It’s a huge story, and I absolutely loved it. You can read my full review here.
Witchmark is one of the most magical books I’ve ever read! Set in a world similar to Edwardian England, Miles is a doctor, using his healing magic to treat soldiers with PTSD after a world war. But his past is bound to catch up with him: Miles ran away to war to escape his noble family, where he would be enslaved to provide his sister with a source of power for her magic. When a fatally poisoned patient reveals Miles magic to a handsome stranger, Miles must investigate the murder, with the help of a handsome stranger, all while trying to stay free from his family’s influence. There is a really sweet romance in this, as well as lots of action, and a fascinating world that reimagines an Edwardian England with magic.
Now onto The Scary One on this post. The Luminous Dead is a terrifying horror sci-fi about being trapped in a caving system and trying to make it out alive. Told in only one setting, and with just two characters, The Luminous Dead is absolutely remarkable for such a small cast and setting. I thought it might get a little repetitive given the small setting, but it really doesn’t. It is a terrifying descent to madness, psychological horror at its best, as you never know if the main character is experiencing reality or hallucination. You can check out my full review here.
I absolutely adored this YA fantasy when I read it last year, and I really need to read the sequel! This is a book set in Medio, an island world where women are trained to be Primera (wives to help running the household) or Segunda (wives to have the kids). Dani and Carmen are rivals at the prestigious school and have been chosen to marry the same man. So of course they go and fall in love with each other instead of their husband. But Dani has a secret. When she was young, her parents forged papers and snuck her across the border wall into Medio. When she is asked to spy on her husband for a resistance group, Dani needs to decide whether to keep the privilege her parents sacrifice gave her, or to fight for a free Medio for all. It’s such a relevant book, the similarity to the US/Mexico border is undeniable. This is a book about resistance and fighting for what’s right, and is definitely one I wish more people were reading because it is fantastic. You can read my full review here.
Erin Morgenstern is well known for her beautiful, artistic, poetic style of writing. The Starless Sea is no different to her debut, The Night Circus, in this regard. The Starless Sea follows Zachary, after he picks up a library book and finds himself in the story. Except the book has missing pages so he doesn’t know how his story is going to finish. As he tries to track down the origins of the book, he crosses paths with Dorian, a storyteller Zachary is immediately drawn to, and Mirabel, a door maker. And if you believe enough, if you long enough for something, then Mirabel’s doors might just lead somewhere. (The somewhere being a magical library). At it’s heart, The Starless Sea is a book about readers and their longing to escape reality. You can read my full review here.
A Memory Called Empire is one of the most unique books I’ve ever read, and certainly the most unique science-fiction novel I’ve read. It’s a genre-blending novel crossing hard sci-fi, murder mystery, political thriller and a English Literature thesis on poetry. A Memory Called Empire follows Mahit, an ambassador to a small mining station. She is called to the Texicalaan Empire when her predecessor is murdered. As she tries to discover who killed her predecessor, she is embrolied in complex political battlefield. The writing style of this novel could be difficult to get into – as I mentioned above, it’s almost like a thesis on poetry as in Texicalaan, the language is poetry. Alongside the memory melding technology (whereby Mahit’s predecesor’s memories and voice are embedded in her mind), this makes for a complex, unique book, but one that is absolutely outstanding. You cna read my full review here.
I read Jade City, and it’s sequel Jade War, at the start of the year and adored them! I cannot wait for the finale. These are huge, epic political fantasies, set on an Asian inspired island nation called Kekon, where jade is mined and can give individuals magic abilities. It follows the Kaul family, who are one of two major clans in the capital city. This follows their battles with the opposing Ayt clan to win control of the city, and is an epic tale of politics, family and honour.
The only YA on this list, and it’s a good one! Wilder Girls was the first horror novel I’ve read (I used to be a real horror wimp), and this book really pushed me to expand my reading and I’m so glad I did, because some of my favourite books in the past year have been horror. Wilder Girls opens in the midst of a virus outbreak, at a quarantined school. The virus has mutated in the girls, causing deformations in the girls and death in the teachers. When Hetty’s best friend goes missing, she ventures outside the quarantine into the dark and haunting woods, where creatures and reality is twisted from the virus, to find her. A disturbing start to my journey into horror! You can read my full review here.
If The Library of the Unwritten is the most fun fantasy novel I’ve read, then The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet is the most fun sci-fi I’ve ever read. This book follows the spaceship Wayfarer, a tunnelling ship which travels space and ‘punches’ holes to create tunnels for other ships to travel along. It’s set in the future, after humans have had to leave Earth and take to the skies. As they travelled across the universe to find a place to live, they met other species living in the universe, joining the Galactic Commons. The Wayfarer crew is therefore filled with different, unique alien species, similar to TV series like Star Trek. The characters really shine in this book, from Ashby, the human captain, to Rosemary, the young, inexperienced clerk escaping from her past on Mars, to Corbin, the grumpy and kind-of-a-jerk human who ended up being one of my favourites, to Sissix, an Aandrisk, a reptilian-like species with different social language compared to the humans. This book is just an absolute joy to read! You can read my full review here.
I only finished this book on Sunday so hastily added it to the list before posting because it is a masterpiece. The City We Became is Jemisin’s newest book, released earlier this year. In this world, cities can become alive when they develop a particualrly unique culture and reach a great size. But the act of their awakening is destructive and dangerous to other parallel worlds around them. New York has just awakened, but because of the size and uniqueness of each of the boroughs, six people (five for each of the boroughts, and one for New York itself) have awoken and been tasked with fighting of The Enemy who is trying to kill the city. It’s a complex book and idea to get your head around (which is probably why I’ve done such a terrible job at explaining it). Just know this book is incredible, it is so alive and real, I feel like I know New York even though I’ve only ever spent 5 days there. It also doesn’t shy away from talking about race, racism, and expertly entwines discussions of racism and microaggressions into a powerful fight to save the city. I’ll be posting a full review of this book tomorrow so check back in to find out more about it.
Have you read any of these? What’s your favourite queer SFF book? I am always looking for new ones to add to my TBR!
If you’ve yet to move your arse in support of Black Lives Matter, first of all, why the hell not? Please use your voices and platforms to sign and share petitions, share a Tweet, talk to your family, give money, educate yourself by reading books, articles, podcasts, protest if you’re able to. We should be doing this all year round: let’s keep this passion and fire going!
One way we can do this is to support Black books and authors. There are so many brilliant books and I want to see everyone reading and supporting their voices. As it’s Pride too, here are a few of my favourites (or most anticipated) books by Black, queer authors if you’re looking for authors to support. I’ve also added a few of my favourite non-queer books at the end of this post as well, we need to be supporting all Black authors and there’s some really brilliant books that aren’t getting the love they deserve.
If you haven’t already been won over by that stunning cover, this is a “memoir manifesto” essay collection from activist George M. Johnson about his childhood and college years, covering topics from gender to toxic masculinity to family and consent.
If you missed my review of this book yesterday, you missed me pretty much screaming in awe at this book because it is STUNNING. What if cities have souls? And they can come alive? Well New York can, and there’s a soul for each borough. This book is so creative, so unique, and expertly entwines New York fantasy with an examination of the societal structures upholding white supremacy.
Kacen Callender is an absolute genius, they can write so well in so many different genres (shout out to Felix Ever After in particular which is on my TBR for this month!) King and the Dragonflies is a middle grade magical realism novel about a boy who’s brother died, and now his best friend, Sandy, is missing. But when Kingston finds his best friend hiding in a tent at the bottom of his garden, the two boys begin an adventure to help Sandy escape his abusive family.
K. Ancrum is one of my auto-buy authors, and whilst she only has two books published so far, the books she has in the pipeline sound amazing! The Wicker King is her debut, about a teen with degenerative hallucinatory disorder with visions that take the form of a fantasy world, and his best friend who will do anything to help him.
The Stars and the Blackness Between Them is a beautiful and poetic f/f contemporary novel, about Trinidadian Audre, who is sent to America when her mother catches her with her secret girlfriend, the pastor’s daughter; and Mabel, who takes Audre under her wing and helps her navigate a US high school.
This book is on my TBR for this month, and I can’t wait to read it – it’s on so many ‘most anticipated books of the year’ lists. Real Life is a literary fiction novel about Wallace, a queer, Black, Southern biochemistry student and his experiences studying at a very white Midwestern university.
Akwaeke Emezi is such a diversely talented author, bringing us both adult literary fiction as in The Death of Vivek Oji, alongside middle grade fantasy (which you can read a bit more about later in this list!) The Death of Vivek Oji releases in August, and it’s one of my most anticipated books of the year. It promises a book about family and friendship and how the loss of Vivek affected them, in Emezi’s usual powerful prose.
Full Disclosure is a fun and sex-positive YA contemporary, following Simone, a Black teen with HIV as she moves to a new school after being bullied at her old one over her HIV status. But at her new school, when she grows close to Miles, she starts receiving threats that if she doesn’t stop hanging out with Miles, her HIV status will be revealed. This book has one of the funniest scenes in YA and tons of musical theatre references! Which makes this book rock even more.
Another of my most anticipated books of the year, Cinderella is Dead releases on July 7! Set 200 years after Cinderella, every year there is a ball where girls are paraded around so men can choose a wife. The girls dissappear if they aren’t chosen. So Sophia decides to run away, and hides in Cinderella’s masoleum where she meets a descendant of Cinderella herself, and the two fight to take down the kingdom.
The Black Flamingo is an absolutely gorgeous YA coming-of-age story in verse. It follows Michael, a biracical, gay teen, from his childhood to his time at university as he finds himself through drag, and his journey to come to term with his identity.
The Sounds of Stars is a YA science fiction novel about an alien invasion. Aliens, called the Illori, invaded Earth to save the planet from human destruction, killing one third of the population in the process. Now, music, books and other forms of human expression are banned. When Ellie is caught with her secret library by an Illori called Morris, the two must team up to save Earth.
This brilliant book just realised yesterday so help out this debut in its first week by buying a copy! You Should See Me In A Crown is about Liz, a Black, poor teen who wants to escape Campbell, Indiana. When her financial aid falls through, she joins in the race for prom queen in order to win a scholarship but then finds herself falling in love with the competition.
Akwaeke Emezi is the only author with two books on this list, and that’s because they are both brilliant but also these books are so different I wanted to feature them both. Pet is a middle grade fantasy, set in a town that doesn’t have monsters anymore, at least that’s what Jam’s always been taught. But then one of her mother’s paintings come to live, with a creature called Pet walking out of it. He says monsters still exist and he’s here to hunt them down. But he also says the monster is at her best friend Redemption’s house, and Jam must reconsider everything she’s been taught, including if she can even trust the adults anymore. This book is just spectacular, so relevant and full of prose that gave me chills the whole way through.
This is another of my favourite covers because the yellow is amazing. Also this is about a bee farm which is so cool! By Any Means Necessary follows Torrey, who on the day he becomes a college freshman, gets a call that might need him to drop out before he’s even started: the bee farm left to him by his uncle has been foreclosed on. He is torn in two between getting his degree and leaving the neighbourhood, with fighting to stop his uncle’s legacy from being destroyed.
Elizabeth Acevedo is known for her lyrical and poetic prose and verse novels. I’ve so far only read her second novel, With the Fire on High, but Clap When You Land just released last month and I’m sure it will be just as good! This book is a verse novel following two sisters who only find out about each other after the death of their father.
I also wanted to celebrate some of my favourite non-queer books by Black authors too. We should be celebrating all Black voices all year around, so here’s a few books I wanted to highlight which I think are amazing!!
This UKYA novel is one I’m very sad to see not getting more hype, it has less than 250 ratings on Goodreads which is an outrage because it is an incredibly beautiful, poignant and personal exploration of grief and suicide. And The Stars Were Burning Brightly follows Nathan as he tries to understand why his brother committed suicide.
Another book with shockingly low adds on Goodreads, come on people! This is a book exploring and confronting toxic masculinity in teens, and follows Del as he tries to get his dream girl, who he’s had a crush on since kindergarten.
Black Girl Unlimited is unlike other books: part memoir, part magical realism, it follows Echo’s lifestory from her childhood to adulthood. It’s a confronting book, exploring Echo’s trauma and survival, and dealing with the intersections of racism and sexism.
This is a book for all the gamers out there! Slay follows 17-year old Keira who secretly developed a game to provide a safe space for Black gamers. But when a gamer is killed over a dispute in the game, Slay is suddenly all over the news, being described as an exclusionist, racist place for criminals, and someone threatens to sue Kiera over it. Kiera needs to find a way to both protect her game and her identity and fight off the online trolls.
Parker describes this book as a fictionalised memoir about her teenage years. Morgan is in therapy, and she knows why: she’s often being the only Black girl in a room, she’s bullied for her “weird” clothing, and she’s been crying all summer. This is a book about Morgan exploring what being Black means to her, full of honest and authentic discussions of depression and anxiety.
If you’ve reached the end of this post, you have to buy a book by a Black author. Go do it now! It’s so exciting to see so many of these books sold out at book retailers here in Australia! Let’s keep this up the whole year round.
And if you haven’t yet donated, maybe think about doing that as well? You can find lots of places to donate to, as well as other resources and information, at the following link: https://blacklivesmatters.carrd.co/
Goodreads blurb: Five New Yorkers must come together in order to defend their city in the first book of a stunning new series by Hugo award-winning and NYT bestselling author N. K. Jemisin.
Every city has a soul. Some are as ancient as myths, and others are as new and destructive as children. New York City? She’s got five.
But every city also has a dark side. A roiling, ancient evil stirs beneath the earth, threatening to destroy the city and her five protectors unless they can come together and stop it once and for all.
The City We Became is another masterpiece from speculative ficiton legend N.K Jemisin. As a non-American who has only spent five days in New York, I marvelled at the character and essence Jemisin evoked of this city. I expected great things from this book, because Jemisin is the author of my favourite adult fantasy series (The Broken Earth trilogy), and all my expectations were thoroughly met! This book entwines a brilliantly unique and imaginative a premise and the harsh and confronting realities of racism in the US, in a way that manages to bring New York to life and makes me feel like I know the city in a way I never imagined I’d be able to.
The City We Became is about what happens when the city of New York becomes alive. Sometimes, when a city grows large and develops a unique enough culture, that city’s soul can become alive. But the birth process of the city is dangerous and destructive, and smashes through other parallel universes in the process. When New York comes alive, the process is a bit different. There is such distinctive culture in each of the boroughs, that each borough awakens – and they choose one person (an avatar) to protect them, one person who personifies the culture of that city. So at the start of The City We Became, six people, one for each borough and one for the city of New York, suddenly realise they are a city. And the city needs protecting because during the birthing process, the avator of New York was injured. The Enemy is trying to kill the City whilst it’s weak, and it’s up to the five boroughs to find each other and protect the city from an attack that would kill millions.
I am in awe of Jemisin. I have never been to New York, and yet Jemisin has made me feel like I know the city. The way the culture of the boroughs is embedded in the characters is so well done, from the way they dress, to the way they act, to the the tensions between each of the characters, these characters fully embody the spirit of their home. Obviously, I’ve only spent 5 days in New York, so I feel like Americans and New Yorkers will be way more able to actually speak about how realistic and well this characterisation does actually represent the boroughs. But as an international outsider, I thought it was done fabulously, and I feel like I really get who and what each of the boroughs is. There were all so different and even though we switched between lots of POVs, every one felt so different. We have:
Manny: the newby to New York, who literally stepped off a train platform and the city immediately took him over and made him forget his past, New York giving him the new start he moved here for. He seems to have a very dark side, a memory of a coldness and cruelty to his past to represent the coldness and cruelty of Manhattan’s business class.
Bronca: if I had to choose a favourite, I’d choose Bronca. She’s the oldest of the team, Native American, queer, director of the Bronx Arts Centre. She’s fought all her life with AIM (the American Indian Movement), and she’s tired and doesn’t want to fight again. But she is so fierce and tough and her close relationship with daughter-figure Veneza, another employee at the Arts Centre, is sweet and so protective.
Brooklyn: points to the best fucking entrance goes to Brooklyn, who managed to fight off an alien with a music beat and goddamn stilleto heels, she is an icon! Black, rich, councilwoman, mother, Brooklyn is as stylish as they come. She has a past as a rapper, and uses her music to give her power.
Padmini: the woman from Queens, incredibly clever, but who’s bored out of her mind putting her mathematical brain to use in finance because that’s where they money is, which she needs to support her family.
Aislyn: Staten Island, white, racist, doesn’t feel like part of New York, scared of change, scared of foreigners, someone who just wants to be left alone.
And then there’s New York themselves, the homeless, skinny young man who would die for the city – but he isn’t going to let The Enemy win that fucking easily.
The diversity and uniqueness of each of these individuals, and of the boroughs they represent, was so vivid. I feel like I know New York even though I’m not a New Yorker, and not even American.
What’s just as special and as important as this incredible characterisation, is the way Jemisin entwines this hugely creative concept with the confronting insidiousness of racism and otherness. The Enemy, this creature from another world, is able to manipulate people in New York who are susceptible to bigotry – it makes them easier to manipulate into attacking the avatars of New York. From police turning into monsters, to the white women calling the cops, Jemisin showcases the way societal structures can be twisted to uphold white supremacy. What I found most haunting, most insidious and most terrifying, was the way The Enemy interacted with Aislyn, Staten Island. This is a woman who’s had a pretty shit upbringing, she lives in an abusive household, she isn’t a loud and vocal racist like her dad though she prefers if foreigners stay away from her, she’s there as the silent, complicit white person. And the way The Enemy hooks its claws into Staten Island slowly, the way it uses friendship and niceness as a weapon, the way Staten Island is willing to give it the benefit of the doubt because of how it looks, is terrifying because Jemisin made it so easy to see how white supremacy is upheld – not by the white supremacists, but by the people like Aislyn who don’t say anything, who choose to believe what’s easy and not what’s right. I want to recommend this book to every white person I know.
So suffice to say: I fucking loved this book. N.K Jemisin remains one of my favourite authors. Her books are so unique, so well researched, and she combines these huge creative powerhouse concepts with vicious take downs of societal structures and the racism they uphold. I cannot recommend enough!
Well, Pride month is here. I’d like to preface the first of my posts by saying that this isn’t a year for celebration. It doesn’t feel right to celebrate our freedom and identity when others are fighting right now to have the right to the same freedom. I hope this year everyone is challenging themselves to look back at our history and discover how we got here. That you look back and thank god for Marsha P. Johnson and the other Black trans women who rioted for our rights at Stonewall, that you look back at the violence that got us where we are today, and you reflect on why that means we now need to stand up for the Black people who are suffering today and support their actions. Change doesn’t come easily, and it doesn’t come if we just sit around waiting for the right time. There is never an easier time.
To the white queer people who follow me, when celebrating this month, I want to ask all of us to use our platforms to support Black people and lift their voices. This is a month when our platforms get more views, when those outside our community try to support us: so use that focus to amplify the voices of Black people in your communities. We need to help fight their cause, because we owe them for how far LGBTQIA+ rights have come since Stonewall.
Racism is a problem everywhere. I’m seen too many people on my timeline saying “thank god we’re not as bad as the US”. You are wrong. So look to your local community and find out what you can do to help. We all need to do better. Be prepared to get shit wrong, be prepared to feel guilty, be prepared to be uncomfortable. It won’t even be close to the pain and trauma millions of people have lived with.
So this month, use your platform to speak out about racism. Support Black authors. Support Black content creators. Give money if you can. Raise their voices on Twitter. Spread information. But most of all, don’t forget about this in a few weeks time.
How can you continue your support and activism in future? I am considering this question too and will be trying to find ways in my local community here in Australia to help support and fight racism in a country that was founded on it.
Over Pride, I’ll be posting every day on both here and my Instagram account. Every book featured will (obviously) be queer – and currently there’s almost 200 books that I’ll be talking about across the month so I hope your TBRs are ready. There will be lots of recommendation posts and I’ve tried to keep different titles in every single post so there will be new books every day to avoid being repetitive, which is how we ended up with almost 200 books and many hours spent working on these posts for the month.
Last year during Pride, I read the most books I’ve ever managed for one month (15), so today, here’s my ambitious TBR for the month. However, I’m very doubtful I’ll manage to finish all these because there are a couple of pretty massive fantasies in here (yes, I’m finally vowing to read Priory). This Pride, I’m also really trying to expand my reading outside of my usual genres, so we’ve got memoirs, literary fiction, contemporary, fantasy, historical, science fiction, and mystery! And thank you to my library of reopening on June 1 so I can collect all the books I had reserved and read them this month.
This will be the very first memoir I’ve ever read and I am absolutely thrilled it’s by Carmen Maria Machado. I’ve heard incredible things about her writing so I’m sure this memoir about the author’s experiences in an abusive same-sex relationship will be so so powerful.
Real Life is on many ‘most anticipated books of the year’ lists and I predict it’ll be one of my favourites of the month. This is a book about a Black queer biochemistry student from Alabama who studies at a very white Midwestern university and his dealings with both overt racism and the more subtle microaggressions in his friendship group.
In my efforts to read more widely, I’m trying to read more queer literature classics (or more like books not released in the last five years), and this 2002 sapphic Victorian murder mystery sounds very up my street.
Goldilocks is set in a future where the Earth is close to environmental collapse and there’s lots of restrictions on the freedoms of women, so a group of women steal a spaceship which is going to explore a potentially habitable planet.
And now for my second memoir, this one by cofounder of the Black Lives Matter movement, Patrisse Khan-Cullors. When They Call You a Terrorist is a memoir about being a Black woman in America and what led her to cofound the movement aiming to transform the US.
I’ve been meaning to read this book since it was released and finally picked up a copy last month. This is written as a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read about the son’s life as a Vietnamese-American growing up in the US.
Is this one of my monst anticipated books of the year, YES IT IS!! This is a contemporary YA about two girls who set up rival henna businesses for a school project, but one of them is appropriating the other’s culture.
And another of my most anticipated books of the year on this months reading! I’m also pretty sure this is my favouritve cover of the year (although more on gorgeous queer covers later this month!) Felix Ever After is about a trans teen who decides to catfish his bully and ends up in a quasi-love triangle.
The Gods of Tango is set in Argentina, and follows Leda, a genderfluid/trans man (it isn’t clear from the blurb) who moves to Argentina to be married but finds their husband dead. So they dress up as a man called Dante and join a a group of tango musicians, but find the lines between Leda and Dante begin to blur and feelings they have supressed begin to reveal themselves.
If you want a dark sapphic book about poisons this is for you. This is about an expelled phD candidate who studies poisons and antidotes and the obsessive relationship she has with her mentor.
This is the sapphic book everyone is talking about and I’m very excited to read it this month! I haven’t read The Winner’s Trilogy so very new to the world and universe of The Midnight Lie but everyone seems to love this book so fingers crossed I do too.
Here there be dragons. I still can’t believe I haven’t read this book. But it’s finally the month, because since we’re all isolating I don’t need to carry this chonky book about on public transport to read.
Pretty sure this will end up being one of my favourite ever books because it sounds brilliant: diverse fantasy discussing colonialism from the perspective of both colonised and coloniser, five nations all inspired by different Asian nations, talking animal companions?!! This is going to be incredible.
This sounds like the sprawing, decades long, heavily political epic historical fantasy that I love. This is a steampunky, alternate history set in the Belgian Congo if native populations had learned about steam technology earlier.
Scavenge the Stars is another of my favourite covers of the year! This is a retelling of The Count of Monte Cristo, which I haven’t read, so going into this totally new! All I really know is that one of the main characters is bi, and that that’s a pretty badass dagger, so this book already rocks.
Anxious Nachos 