'Nathan Burgoine's Blog, page 8

Queer the Shelves Pride!

Hey all! I’ve been writing these posts for Pride Month ahead of time because as of Wednesday, I was flying over the ocean for Queer the Shelves, which will be later today (or, well, has already begun, given time zones)!

Queer the Shelves is happening at the Nottingham Library, and while the event itself is sold out, as of when I wrote this, it was still possible to get tickets to the after-party (that’s the link to see if that’s till true). I’ve been to Nottingham once before, when the same two wonderful people who organized Queer the Shelves organized another event I took part in (and loved) six years ago—back when Of Echoes Born had just released, in fact—and when I saw I had the opportunity to return to Nottingham and see these wonderful queer authors again?

Well. I jumped at it. Because when you get the opportunity to hang out with these two? You take the opportunity to hang out with these two. I spoke about the joy of queer events on the blog over at Queer the Shelves, and if you’d like to know more about that, it’s here.

But they’re not just organizers of amazing queer literary events, oh no. That’d be too easy right? They’re also writers and editors of queer books and they’re both skilled and talented, so y’know, while they’re usually the ones shining lights at other people, I thought today I’d shine a light on them.

Wordsmiths both…

First up, let’s talk Robyn Nyx’s Stolen Ambitions. Now, Nyx is prolific, and picking one title is difficult, but the most recent title I’ve read of Nyx’s was awesome, so here we are. I don’t even know how to begin to tell you the ride this book was, but if I can attempt a short-and-teasing version, it’s this: someone on the edge of breaking out with a public success story has their identity not only stolen, but their whole life taken by someone else, who steps in and replaces them—while tossing them into servitude in a criminal drug enterprise.

Yeah.

Now, when I say this story—this grim, twisty, thrilling story—also has a romance? Like, a really good sapphic romance with flawed people who have made not only terrible but horrific choices? Well. Now you’re starting to get it. This one blew me away.

Luca Romero’s dream has finally come true. Writing is going to get her out of the slums and into the life she’s worked so hard for. But when she trusts the wrong person with her golden ambitions, her world takes a dark, deadly turn. Waking to find herself imprisoned on a marijuana farm while another woman takes her place in the limelight, Luca doesn’t know where to turn.

Marissa Vargas has secrets. As daughter of a drug cartel boss in Mexico, she knows what will happen to her if those secrets come out before she can escape to a better life. But when sweet Luca shows up on her father’s compound, Marissa’s plans take an unexpected turn. Can she leave to live her own life, knowing she’s left Luca behind to face a world of destruction and despair?

When hearts get involved in a world of double-dealings and deception, only the strongest find a way out.

Next, time for Brey Willows and Spinning Tales, and while picking a single title from her vast (and multi-pen-named) backlist is also difficult (seriously, so many good books), I’m gonna go with the one with the talking grumpy cat because it has a talking grumpy cat and the talking grumpy cat made me laugh out loud so many times. (The want-ads alone…)

You can’t quite call this one a portal fantasy, but it has a similar vibe, with a fish-out-of-water—Maggie McShay—learning the world isn’t what she thought it was (it’s actually magic, in a fairy-tale way) and that she’s (accidentally?) signed on to, y’know, deal with a whole lot of fairy tale awfulness.

And, of course, romance is part and parcel of fairy tales, no? Just generally that kind of love has a whole lot of trouble reaching the happy-ever-after…

Maggie McShay wants a little magic in her life. Something more than the drab existence of going to work and coming home to a cat that barely tolerates her.

When she spontaneously replies to a want ad asking for someone to take care of a fairy tale cottage, it turns out magic wasn’t as far away as she thought. Maggie discovers she wasn’t who she thought she was either. Recalcitrant fairy tale shepherd and ladies’ woman Kody Wilk shows Maggie a world she knew nothing about…a world they need to save before the villains of the world’s fairy tales take over New York City.

It’s up to Maggie, her grumpy, shape-shifting cat, a dwarf hell-bent on finding romance, and Kody to set the fairy tale world to rights. The big bad wolf has nothing on Maggie McShay.

Since I’m at an queer literary event right now (or time-shifted, anyway) hit me with your favourite queer events!

Retelling Pride!

Okay, so for most of these introductions, I’ve made an aside about something I’ve written before discussing two awesome titles you should check out with a similar theme. This time, I’m not quite doing that because the thing I want to talk about today for Pride Month is taking something old and making it queer.

I mean, I do that every December, with a queer retelling of a Christmas story, and that’s where the “not quite” comes from. I don’t have a link. I don’t have a cover to tease. But I do have a working title: Upon the Midnight Queer. That’s right. If all goes well, this year I’ll be releasing a collection of queer holiday retellings in print and e-format, which means those stories, including “Dolph” and “Frost” and all the others here already will be out there in one volume. Plus more! I’m going to be including “Folly,” a queer romance story set in the Village that riffs on “Jolly Old Saint Nicholas,” and hopefully another story as well, but this all falls under the category of “if all goes well…” Either way? Fingers crossed.

I suppose that’s an announcement, isn’t it?

Now, let’s talk telling old stories…

Retell Me A Story…

In the case of this first book, it’s not even “retell me a story” because it’s actually “retell me three stories.” Anne Shade’s Femme Tales takes three fairy tales and retells them with sapphic sizzle, and does a nice job of also weaving all three into a greater whole for those who like their love stories with some easter eggs and crossover appeal.

Beast, Awaken, and Stiletto make up the three novellas (those links go to my Short Stories 365 project review of each) and Beauty and the Beast, Sleeping Beauty, and Cinderella get a fabulous update here, with a stunning cast of women who had me rooting for them from step one.

And who doesn’t love a fairy tale?

Beast: Former hip-hop artist Ebony “The Beast” Trent has wrapped her persona around herself like a protective wall of bitterness. Belinda Jansen is confident, intelligent, sexy, and—to Ebony’s fascination—not the least bit intimidated by Ebony’s beastly demeanor. Can Beauty truly tame The Beast?

Awaken: Local celebrity chef Chayse Carmichael has achieved a level of success she’d only imagined while learning to cook. But when free-spirited Georgia peach Serena Frasier walks into her restaurant, Chayse realizes that success doesn’t always bring happiness if you don’t have someone special to share it with. Does love at first sight truly exist?

Stiletto: Music mogul Cass Phillips barely has a moment to sleep, let alone build a relationship. But an unexpected encounter with shoe designer Faith Shaw leads her to believe that maybe fairy tales do come true. Can true love really conquer all?

Six women find themselves in their own real-life fairy tales when true love finds them in the most unexpected ways.

Actually, I can think of one person who doesn’t like Fairy Tales, come to think of it. Or at least, one who probably would prefer not to be living the Fairy Tale she’s in, and that’s Lily, the protagonist of Michael Thomas Ford’s awesome Baba Yaga story, Lily. You see, Lily has discovered she has a… well, I suppose we should call it a gift, but it’s landing more like a curse for her: when she touches people? She sees how they’ll die.

Yeah, not really the sort of gift you want, right? Like, maybe the person who gave it to her kept the receipt? But when you’re on a quest given you by Baba Yaga and you’re trying to avoid having your soul snatched—sorry, “healed”—by the revivalist running a carnival, life can get confusing. And creepy as all heck.

I freaking loved this story, is what I’m saying, in all the best shivery ways.

Oh! And if you still can (I think you still can?) splurge on the hardcover with the incredible illustrations. Trust me.

Lily is a girl who discovers she has the ability to see how others will die simply by touching them. Only she doesn’t want this gift, and takes extreme measure to protect herself from it.

When her mother—because every fairy tale has to have a wicked (step)mother—sells Lily’s services to an evangelical preacher and his wildly popular travelling tent revival, Lily is torn away from the idyllic place she’s always known as home and thrust into a world of greed and manipulation that threatens to destroy her unless she can find a way back….if she survives the quest the old witch Baba Yaga has given her…or the attention of the tent revivalist who promises to save her soul.

Do you have a favourite re-telling? Hit me with stories that have been told in a new and queer way!

Collection Pride!

Okay, I’m cheating. I admit it. I’m in England when this goes live—in fact, all the rest of my Pride Month posts will go live while I’m in England thanks to the magic of scheduled posts—but listen, I’m in another country, I have no idea what will happen re: wi-fi, and at this point in time I’ll have lost most of an evening flying overnight between Ottawa and London. And there are still multiple train-rides ahead of me before I get to Nottingham.

It occurred to me I could write about journeys today, or I could write about the people I’ll be seeing in Nottingham—I’m heading there for a queer literary event, after all—but then I thought why not do both?

So, let’s talk furry little capybara pirates on journeys made of squeaky queer joy—but also I shall mention the darkest noir take of the Wind in the Willows ever written.

Look, at this point I’m surely jet-lagged, okay? Roll with it.

Sorry, did you say Capybara Pirate and dark noir Wind in the Willows?

I did! But they’re not the same book, don’t worry. The Lesbian Capybara Pirate is Cinrak the Dapper, and her adventure with her stalwart crew of various adorable critters is one of my favourite collections of linked short fiction, ever. Truly, The Voyages of Cinrak the Dapper is freaking adorable.

A.J. Fitzwater puts together a series of linked tales that tell a grand adventure on the high seas (or, as high as they can be when you’re talking capybaras and ferrets and the like) and it’s just full of wonderful queerness. Wee transboy chincilla characters seeking magical plants that will help them grow their beards, a kraken named Agnes, and so much love and magic and adventure I cannot even begin to tell you. This is what I wish all the kids tales I’d had to read were like when I was a wee queerling, but that doesn’t mean these tales are kid-like, just joyful.

Dapper. Lesbian. Capybara. Pirate.

Cinrak the Dapper is a keeper of secrets, a righter of wrongs, the saltiest capybara on the sea and a rider of both falling stars and a great glass whale. Join her, her beloveds, the rat Queen Orvilia and the marmot diva Loquolchi, lead soprano of the Theatre Rat-oyal, her loyal cabin kit, Benj the chinchilla, and Agnes, last of the great krakens, as they hunt for treasures of all kinds and find adventures beyond their wildest dreams. Let Sir Julius Vogel Award-winning storyteller A.J. Fitzwater take you on a glorious journey about finding yourself, discovering true love and exploring the greatest secrets of the deep. Also, dapperness.

The Voyages of Cinrak the Dapper includes seven stories about Cinrak and her crew.

So, when I say the last collection is joyful and bright and magical and queer, this collection is… well, it’s queer, and the author’s name is Bright, but the rest of it tends to fall on the darker, moodier, grimmer side of things—and did I mention there’s a grimy noir thriller retelling of the freaking Wind in the Willows?

Stories to Sing in the Dark is Matthew Bright’s brilliant collection, and I can’t wait to sit with him again in Nottingham later today (soon? then? now? scheduling and jet-lag are weird) in part because it’s always such a delight to learn about what new weird tale he’s working on. And Stories to Sing in the Dark is weird—I mean that in the most complimentary way possible.

Just trust me. (Oh, and also? He designed the cover, because Matthew Bright is also Inkspiral, who does such brilliant covers and has done so many of mine.)

The speculative shines bright in the dark with these stories by Matthew Bright: a boy with a secret begins work at a strange library housing all the books never written; Dorian Gray’s love of beauty struggles in the face of AIDs-era San Francisco and the Castro; the tomb of the Empress is adrift in space and hungry for the concubines aboard her; two men in an old film finally realize that they are trapped but still they seek the means for finally declaring their love for each other.

These and other tales of the queer fantastic should be the perfect bedtime read.

Have you got any great stories about meeting authors? Tell me your tales… (Weird or otherwise…)

New Orleans Pride!

I know I just talked about mysteries a couple of days ago, but it occurred to me as I did so that two of my favourite mystery series both took place in New Orleans, and so why not get specific today on my trek through Pride Month recommendations, and head to the Crescent City?

I love New Orleans, and I loved every trip I’ve taken there—and specifically, my visits to the Saints & Sinners Literary Festival—and I’ve always thought that the best stories that take place in New Orleans seem to understand the location is as much a character as the individuals in the narrative itself.

These two authors did that so well with their mystery series I re-read them whenever I need a hit of that wonderful city.

Queer New Orleans of then and now…

Let’s start with Micky Knight. Now, if you haven’t heard of J.M. Redmann’s Death by the Riverside, ohmigosh do you have a journey ahead of you. Micky Knight is freaking phenomenal, and a hard-boiled queer detective in Louisiana, and doing so with smarts, edge, and passion in equal parts. She’s flawed, understand me. Micky Knight is by no means perfect, and honestly she’s all the more alluring for it.

This was her first adventure, and while when I re-read this one, I have to paused here and there to chuckle to myself (Micky hunting for a payphone, using paper maps to try and locate people, etc.), other than the technology the book holds up so well it could still be now—including the elements working against Knight.

It’s one of my deeply fervent wishes to someday see an adaption of Micky Knight on the small (or large!) screen, but until then, I’ve got eleven books to love…

Among the moss-covered trees and wrought-iron balustrades of southern Louisiana, Detective Michele Knight (Micky to her friends) takes on the seemingly simple job of shooting a few photos for a client, but the going gets rough as Micky finds herself slugging through thugs and slogging through swamps in an attempt to expose a dangerous drug ring. The trail leads to the Hundred Oaks Plantation, a transvestite named Eddie, a beautiful doctor named Cordelia, and memories Micky thought she had buried twenty years ago.

Hard-hitting prose in the style of Sam Spade and Mike Hammer with a lesbian twist.

The first time I read the next book I’m going to talk about I gobbled it down in a day, which used to make me feel guilty because authors take months to write books and there was me, boom, done in a day. Now I know that for the compliment it is, of course. Greg Herren’s Murder in the Rue Dauphine starts off his Chanse MacLeod mystery series, with said PI trying to figure out a blackmail case, and having it all go very wrong, very quickly.

Just like the Micky Knight series, location is character-level important in the Chanse books, and New Orleans has rarely been captured as well as it has here. Also, the cast of characters around Chanse are fascinating, and you get to see them grow and shift throughout the series as well (did I mention this is also a series of seven books?)

For gay New Orleans private eye Chanse MacLeod, it seemed like a simple case: find out who was blackmailing his pretty-boy client’s rich, closeted boyfriend, collect a nice check, and take some time off. But then the pretty boy turns up dead in what looks like a hate crime and the gay community of New Orleans is up in arms, demanding justice.

In the stifling heat of a New Orleans summer, Chanse searches for an extremely clever killer on a trail leading to a gay rights organization, boys for hire, and New Orleans society, knowing he has to find the killer before the entire city explodes.

How about you? Ever been to New Orleans? Or do you have a location that you love to visit in a literary way whenever can?

Tabletop Tuesday — Gaming Group Pride (Part Three)!

It’s Tuesday again, which means I’m back to being a nerdy about tabletop gaming, and as such today I’ll be discussing two more queer authors from my Star Trek Adventures gaming group—I really meant it when I said my gaming groups are basically made up of authors.

So, allow me to beam another two books directly to your Pride Month reading lists…

Engineering and Science Teams, Checking In

In my USS Bellerophon campaign group, the crew of the Intrepid-class starship are exploring the Shackleton Expanse (part of an official campaign setting available from Modiphius) and in said campaign, the crew discovered multiple times that what they needed was an expert in ancient technology, as it’s clear an ancient species capable of powerful advanced feats of engineering used to thrive in the area.

And so, Claudie Arseneault’s Ammalia joined the crew. Ammalia is a Denobulan civilian specialist in ancient technology—and especially focused on the interplays of mass and gravity modification—and her growing understanding of how the ancient technology of this long-lost race might actually function has come into play more than once.

What’s also come into play more than once is her status as a civilian who doesn’t much care for Starfleet rules, which the first officer of the Bellerophon—routinely and unironically referred to as “By the Book Bob”—doesn’t always love. Still, there’s no stopping determination when it’s paired with skill.

Speaking of skill and determination, though, allow me to point you in the direction of Arseneault’s Baker Thief, where you’ll find character equally skilled and determined (and just as “free” when it comes to the rules and laws). I freaking loved this story, and the sheer joy and playfulness with tropes to be found in this aromantic-centred relationship story (including bread puns) is phenomenally good.

“I love you” would never be right for them, but they had their own words—Je crois en toi—better and more tailored to him. They fit him, and he hoped they’d fit her too.

Adèle has only one goal: catch the purple-haired thief who broke into her home and stole her exocore, thus proving herself to her new police team. Little does she know, her thief is also the local baker.

Claire owns the Croissant-toi, but while her days are filled with pastries and customers, her nights are dedicated to stealing exocores. These new red gems are heralded as the energy of the future, but she knows the truth: they are made of witches’ souls.

When her twin—a powerful witch and prime exocore material—disappears, Claire redoubles in her efforts to investigate. She keeps running into Adèle, however, and whether or not she can save her sister might depend on their conflicted, unstable, but deepening relationship.

BAKER THIEF is the first in a fantasy series meant to reframe romance tropes within non-romantic relationship and centering aromantic characters. Those who love enemies-to-lovers and superheroes should enjoy the story!

Next up from our crew in the USS Bellerophon is the ship’s science officer, Lt. Commander Timor Eku, a Joined Trill who’s got more experience than most of the rest of the crew even before you take into account his previous hosts. An older scientist, Timor is also the first host of the Eku symbiont to be male, and the influence of Eku has led to Timor having some interesting takes on the subject of gender.

I believe he was also the first character of the group to utter the now almost team-wide rallying cry of “It’s more of a Prime Suggestion, really…” when the Bellerophon encountered an inhabited planet facing down imminent destruction and realized their survival would depend on the actions of the crew—despite the civilization in question not yet having achieved warp drive.

Lt. Commander Eku is played by Jerry L. Wheeler, and if we’re going to talk about characters with long histories, then I have to take the opportunity to discuss his novel, Pangs. Wheeler takes the notion of Vampires and turns them slightly sideways—instead of blood, these vampires feed on talent.

Finding uniquely talented individuals that might feed them for a long time, if properly “cared for” (which isn’t quite the right turn of phrase) rather than tearing through their ability and dooming them to burnout and an early grave, is something of a moral core for Wheeler’s Warner, whereas Seth—with whom Warner has clashed often over the decades—is more willing to burn it all down. But the two end up having no choice but to work together when someone new and talented crosses their awareness, and then something much worse than either of them arrives on the scene as well.

The turning of mythology, the otherworld portal fantasy vibes of the book, and the ongoing tension between Warner and Seth keeps this book humming all the way through. I would cheerfully read an entire series with the characters, but Pangs satisfies as a single bite, too.

Unlike their blood brethren, Warner and Seth are vampires who subsist on talent.

They have been enemies for centuries, competing to feed on artists with the most prodigious musical gifts, and country blues singer Wade Dixon is no exception.

But the pursuit and capture of Dixon unleashes unexpected forces that carry these combatants from the earthly realm to a dangerous land of eternal night where they must work together or die alone.

Got any queer and skilled favourites who don’t particularly respect the law much? Or how about a long-lived queer character with a fascinating view? Tell me all about them.

Mysterious Pride!

I’ve only ever kinda-sorta dabbled in writing mystery or thrillers, and only in short fiction. I wrote “Keeping the Faith,” in Men of the Mean Streets (though even that was kind of cheating and sliding into fantasy, because it was about someone stealing a priest’s faith), and for Saints and Sinners short story contests, I did end up with two tales that kinda/sorta count as well: my out-of-print “Hometown Boy” (where an author goes back to his hometown to learn his childhood tormentors all had an “accident”), and “Sweet William” (where a drag queen gives her final confession with her priest before heading to her lethal injection).

Safe to say I’m an enjoyer of mysteries and thrillers, but I don’t think I have the writing chops to pull off a full-length novel with the skill others do. And that’s fine! Because I love sinking into a mystery or a thriller, and it’s Pride Month and I’m recommending books I loved, so…

How about two thrills?

Two different types of taking fire…

So, to start with, I’m going to talk about a thriller that also took the slightly-speculative route. Jessica L. Webb’s phenomenal Trigger is a medical thriller narrative given an ever-so-slight sci-fi twist. We meet our heroine, Dr. Kate Morrison, in a Vancouver ER, where fate puts her in the right place at the wrong time: a man stumbles in off the street and collapses, and while Kate tries to save him, police arrive and demand she not touch him at all. When she does—and when nothing bad happens and she manages to save the man’s life—instead of praise, Kate finds herself in the harsh criticism of RCMP officer Sergeant Andy Wyles, the woman who ordered Kate to keep her hands off the patient.

Confused, and despite Sergeant Wyles’s desire to keep Kate out of it, the doctor is soon caught up in something far darker than she could have imagined. Someone has turned human beings into bombs. Triggered by touch, people like this man have been exploding, and Kate is the first human being who seems somehow immune to triggering the effect. Suddenly very important to both the investigators who want to uncover who is behind this potential act of terrorism and also a danger to those who have created these human weapons, Sergeant Wyles has little choice but to draw Kate further into the investigation, working with her joint task force that crosses the Canadian-American border.

That’s right. A mystery centred around spontaneous human combustion. (Oh, and also there’s a lovely romantic sub-plot that blooms between the two heroines as the series continues, of course.)

Dr. Kate Morrison doesn’t know how or why someone would create human bombs that are triggered by touch. But when Sergeant Andy Wyles blocks Kate from touching the patient who collapses in her Vancouver ER, Kate joins the investigation to demand answers, regardless of the danger.

As the two women work together to find those responsible for creating an army of human weapons, Kate finds it increasingly difficult to ignore her feelings for the fiercely protective and unrelentingly perceptive cop. The investigation escalates, and Kate gradually begins to trust Andy, not only with her safety but also with the difficult details of her past.

With lives at risk and her heart on the line, Kate must search for a way to defuse the bombs and save her patients, even as she questions the intensifying connection between herself and Andy.

Next up, a book I read while on vacation about a vacation that goes very wrong, 24/7 by Yolanda Wallace set a pretty hectic pace from step one and didn’t let up on the throttle thereafter. As choices for “relaxing read while soaking in the sun” went, I ended up more-or-less gobbling it down instead, but I regretted nothing!

Finn, a travel writer who isn’t so good at making long-term connections, and Luisa, an officer with the Mexican Federal Police have a very quick—and fiery—connection that they both enjoy, never really thinking they’ll encounter each other again, but when the all-woman resort adventure Finn is enjoying for work turns out to be an opportunity for them to maybe get to know each other since it’s within range of Luisa’s life, things get a bit more complicated. And then, when the criminal element Luisa is trying to defeat also gets involved? Things go from complicated to deadly. 

Wallace has a real knack for turning up the tension and for heart-stopping thriller moments. Also? I rooted for those ladies something fierce.

Finn Chamberlain is a travel writer with more passport stamps than friends. Her career keeps her constantly on the go, leaving her precious little time for relationships. And that’s just the way she likes it—until a charged encounter with a beautiful stranger causes her to call her unsettled life into question.

Luisa Moreno is an officer with the Mexican Federal Police. Her chance meeting with Finn Chamberlain was supposed to be a one-time thing, but it leaves her wanting more. When Finn’s life is threatened, it’s up to Luisa to save her. Will Luisa’s rescue attempt be successful, or will she lose much more than her heart in the process?

Hit me up with your favourite queer thrillers and mysteries!

Nonfiction Pride!

I’ve mentioned earlier this month how I’m not Mr. Nonfiction, and how apart from biographies, I don’t often end up delving a lot into nonfiction, and usually only do when I’ve got audio options available. That said, I do try to pick up queer history at least now and then, given I was raised in the same queer-erasing culture as everyone else in my immediate vicinity.

I also try to find people who can focus down onto one specific slice at a time. I don’t know why I prefer reading about history or biography this way, but I always prefer a kind of narrow specificity. If a book tells me it’s going to talk about one broad topic, I often find myself struggling to generate interest. But if a book narrows this down to some piece of the whole?

I’m so much more likely to be on board.

So, let’s talk about two pieces of history today on my journey through Pride Month recommendations: sitcoms, and growing up queer in the Southern US—both of which were far, far out of my own wheelhouse.

Queer History in Glimpses

I bumped into Matt Baume via a random encounter with a YouTube video about the film Victim. That led me down a rabbit-hole of his videos and then I learned about Hi Honey, I’m Homo!: Sitcoms, Specials, and the Queering of American Culture and I was off and running. I decided to read a chapter every day or so, since the book is broken up by particular sitcoms, starting with Bewitched and heading closer to modernity with every entry—I mean that literally, given we get to Modern Family eventually.

What was fascinating for me was the ebb-and-flow, which parallels my experiences over the decades as an out queer person (and oh my God, I’m at the point in my life where I can say “decades as an out queer person”): the pattern of “forward-backward, progress-pushback, representation-villification” can be just as exhausting when you look at only one facet of it—such as this book does, by focusing on sitcoms—as when you live it as a whole.

Also? almost every piece of representation discussed in the book could be summed up with “It was progress—if you know the context.”

But the context is worth knowing.

There’s a secret storyline hidden across some of the most popular sitcoms of the 20th century.

For decades, amidst the bright lights, studio-audience laughs, and absurdly large apartment sets, the real-life story of American LGBTQ+ liberation unfolded in plain sight in front of millions of viewers, most of whom were laughing too hard to mind.

From flamboyant relatives on Bewitched to network-censor fights over Barney Miller, from military secrets on M*A*S*H to a little-known man behind The Muppet Show to a primetime power-kiss on Roseanne, TV, Hi Honey, I’m Homo! is not only the story of how subversive queer comedy transformed the American sitcom, from its inception through today, but how our favorite sitcoms transformed, and continue to transform, America.

Accessible, entertaining, and informative, the book is filled with exclusive commentary and interviews from celebrities, behind-the-scenes creators, and more.

My other preferred format for reading about history does a similar “focus down narrowly” thing, only instead does so by bringing me multiple voices exploring the same topic. This was my experience reading Crooked Letter i: Coming Out in the South, which I’ll admit only crossed my path because I’d gone to Saints and Sinners Literary Festival and met a few of the contributing authors.

As a Canuck, it’s safe to say I was surprised by this collection. Some of it was less startling: I imagined going in that I would be reading a lot about how religion has shaped the experiences of these queer people, but what I had not expected was to be shown a few times how religion was a caring and loving start (and sometimes even continued to be so). For many of those writing these essays, faith formed a solid foundation. Often they parted ways, and I don’t want to downplay the very real damage many suffered at the hand of their religious families or communities, but it wasn’t the total acrimony I expected.

The personal essays also touch upon living under the shadow of potential homophobia (how every slight makes you second-guess yourself for the cause), family acceptances, Sororities, AIDS, racism, gender, McCarthyism and integration, motherhood, the evolution of our language and self-descriptors… The 50’s, the 60’s, the 70’s and beyond are explored; There’s a wide range of personal experiences here, and I was enthralled.

In most LGBT writings I’ve read that touch the subject, I’ve seen The South described as a place survived, or as a place escaped from, but rarely have I seen it given any due as a positive experience by LGBT folk—at least, that’s been my experience. Reading this book, however, I found a series of new voices I’d never heard before. Ultimately, I think what I took from Crooked Letter i was how The South itself was such a source of strength and comfort for so many LGBT people—even for those who did choose to leave, but especially for those who remain or who came back.

Crooked Letter i offers a collection of first-person nonfiction narratives that reflect the distinct ‘coming out’ experiences of a complex cross-section of gay, lesbian, and transgendered Southerners from all walks of life and at different stages in their lives.

There is the Appalachian widower who, following the death of his wife, decides it’s time to tell his church community. There is the young man who left his hometown as a girl, returning hesitant but hopeful for his grandmother’s love. There is the adolescent girl who refuses to surrender her soul to Jesus because she is not yet certain of her own beliefs. There is the well-mannered Southern gentleman who hopes his blueberries and biscuits will help ease the awkwardness of coming out to his elderly neighbor. There are the ones who survived the frequent bar raids, arrests, and beatings. But, there is also the first kiss, and the first love.

The experiences represented here pivot around a central theme—finally finding language to understand one’s identity, and then discovering we were never the only ones. Revealing a vibrant cross-section of Southerners, the writers of these narratives have in common the experience of being Southern and different, but determined against all odds.

What are your favourite glimpses into queer history you’ve read?

Three-in-One Pride!

Okay, if you’ve been around here for any length of time, you know how much I love me a novella, and how much I love a shared world, too. When I had the opportunity to take part in a shared world trio of novellas, I was super excited at the opportunity, and the result was “Hope Echoes,” which you can find in Three Left Turns to Nowhere, alongside two other novellas by Jeffrey Ricker and J. Marshall Freeman.

One of the reasons I was so excited to take part in these is how often I’ve enjoyed them in the past. Novellas are a funny thing: they’re not exactly cost-effective to print, so unless they’re bundled up, they tend to exist in an e-format only (though there are exceptions, of course).

I love me a good bundle. I love me a good novella. So, today, for Pride Month, let’s talk about two three-in-ones I’ve read and loved…

Once, Twice, Three times…

Okay, so, I know it’s June, but we all now how I feel about queer holiday romance novellas, so I’m guessing you can imagine how I feel about three sapphic holiday romance novellas in a bundle? Did you guess “eee!”? If you did, you are correct.

When I first read All I Want for Christmas a couple of years ago, I was in a reading slump, and these three were one hundred percent what I needed at the time. Basically? All three are low-angst, HEA, queer holiday joy. Even better? We’ve got a fauxmance, a meet-cute, and a forced proximity. It’s like a holiday trifecta!

In Triple Dog Dare by Georgia Beers, Sasha Wolfe has been talking up her new girlfriend to her overbearing mother for months, and when her skeptical sister dares her to invite this new squeeze over for family Christmas, Sasha accepts the challenge. After all, how hard can it be to bring your nonexistent girlfriend home for the holidays?

In Hustle & Bustle by Maggie Cummings, Hannah Monroe is ready to dazzle customers with her pop-up shop at NYC’s winter holiday market. NYPD beat cop Toby Beckett, who just wants to protect and serve, barely notices the spirit of the season until events keep pushing her into Hannah’s path.

In A Christmas Miracle by Fiona Riley, Mira Donahue’s bar, Mirage, is the hottest Christmas party venue in Boston, despite Mira’s secret: she hates Christmas. When self-described Queen of Carols Courtney Rivers books Mirage for her company’s holiday party, she clashes with Mira over the plans. Then a freak storm strands them in the bar, and more than miracles abound.

If you’ve hung out around here, you know I love me an Aurora Rey romance, and I’ll admit the sole reason I nabbed this collection was to get to Aurora Rey’s “Lead Counsel” into my eyeballs, but that’s another bit of joy we get from three-in-one novella collections: we get to read new-to-us authors!

While Office Romance isn’t always a theme I go for, the three different takes on this—professional encounters between former flings now co-workers, second-chance romance intersecting a big case, and an ice-queen thawing for her assistant makes for three different takes, and I appreciated how well all of them navigated the realities of the power dynamics in play (which is often my “eek” point with romances set in professional settings).

Going to work never felt so good. Three office romance novellas from talented writers Julie Cannon, Aurora Rey, and M. Ullrich. 

In For Your Eyes Only by Julie Cannon: Dress for success takes on a very different meaning. CFO Riley Stephenson finds herself in a particularly difficult position when the stripper she’s fallen for shows up at her office – as her new employee.

In Lead Counsel by Aurora Rey: Attorney Elisa Gonzalez is happy working behind the scenes while still having time for a life. All that changes when her firm takes on a major case and Parker Jones, powerhouse litigator and her law school crush, is named lead counsel.

In Opportunity of a Lifetime by M. Ullrich: Luca Garner is eager and hardworking but her new boss is a total nightmare: snarky and uncooperative, not to mention an ice queen. VP Stephanie Austin doesn’t mean to be unkind but the last thing she wants is an assistant getting under her skin, especially one who is as attractive as she is kind.

Have you bumped into any bundles you’ve adored? Picked up an anthology for one author and found a new favourite? Tell me all about it.

Magic Pride!

On this trip through recommendations for Pride Month, I’ve made quick stops with my the first two Triad books, so today I figured I’d round out the journey with Triad Magic, which closes the trilogy and focuses mainly on Curtis, my queer wizard whose plan to bond with a vampire and a demon—rather than sticking to a group of his own kind, wizards—and sets everything in motion from the beginning of the first short story featuring the characters.

Magic is queer. You can try to change my mind, but I doubt you’ll succeed. It bends the rules (or breaks them), changes the world, and is—very often—at best feared or misunderstood and at worst vilified. In fiction, I freaking love all things magic (or psychic, or other) and so today, I thought I’d conjure up some favourites where the magic is very queer indeed.

Join me for a spell?

It’s a Kind of Magic

Okay, so Craig Laurance Gidney’s Skin Deep Magic does so many things I cannot put into words well enough, but I’ll do my best. First: it’s a collection of short fiction that is truly among the best of all collections out there I’ve ever read. Second: the varied tones of the story still manage to tell a thematic whole in a way I would be jealous of if I weren’t instead so in awe. Third: the style of stories on display are just as varied, and I just loved that shift from the tale to tale, from a mosaic piece to a more linear narrative, from something romantic to something borderline horrific…

Gah. Just trust me on this one. This was my favourite book the year I read it. It could be yours this year.

Magic is more than skin-deep. It hides in the folds of a haunted quilt and illuminates the secret histories of Negro memorabilia.

Magic reveals the destiny of a great storyteller and emanates from a sculpture by an obscure Harlem Renaissance artist.

Magic lurks in the basement of an inner-city apartment building and flourishes in a city park.

Magic is more than skin-deep; it shimmers in the ten stories in this collection.

You’ve likely heard of David R. Slayton, but on the off chance you haven’t, there’s a whole freaking journey ahead of you (and multiple places to start) but I’m going to suggest you start your ride at White Trash Warlock.

Adam Binder is a character of a type I’ve rarely seen—a queer dude, yeah, but one with magic who comes from a part of the US rarely afforded more than a “I came from here and escaped” paragraph or two, but while Adam did indeed escape, it’s not so simple, and the past is coming calling on multiple fronts. Also, his family history is tangled and awful—not new—but his approach to them struck me as quite novel. I never really got the feeling he felt he owed them anything, but rather that his own direction in life was taking him somewhere aligning with a mission he’s already put himself on.

We all know how I feel about “because they’re family” garbage, so I was nervous while I listened to this one (which is a solid audiobook production, by the way), but the narrative never strays particularly closely to the clichés of forgiveness-no-matter-what.

I mean, Adam’s also a little busy dealing with demons and possessions and keeping people alive with his own life force (accidentally binding himself to someone do to so) to really put that on his plate anyway…

Not all magicians go to schools of magic.

Adam Binder has the Sight. It’s a power that runs in his bloodline: the ability to see beyond this world and into another, a realm of magic populated by elves, gnomes, and spirits of every kind. But for much of Adam’s life, that power has been a curse, hindering friendships, worrying his backwoods family, and fueling his abusive father’s rage.

Years after his brother, Bobby, had him committed to a psych ward, Adam is ready to come to grips with who he is, to live his life on his terms, to find love, and maybe even use his magic to do some good. Hoping to track down his missing father, Adam follows a trail of cursed artifacts to Denver, only to discover that an ancient and horrifying spirit has taken possession of Bobby’s wife.

It isn’t long before Adam becomes the spirit’s next target. To survive the confrontation, save his sister-in-law, and learn the truth about his father, Adam will have to risk bargaining with very dangerous beings … including his first love.

Hit me with your best and most loved tales of magic!

Graphic Novel Pride!

I’m not a prolific reader of graphic novels, but I delve in and out. I was, at one time, a huge fan of all things X-Men. Shortly after the time of the Age of Apocalypse, though, I petered out. Mostly it came down to being unable to afford (or find!) all the various issues and lines of cross-overs to keep up with the storylines. I loved Generation Next and the New Mutants and was always a fan of Iceman—yes, that’s right, when he came out my reaction was more I knew it! than surprise—though Jean Grey has a place in my heart (it’s the telekinesis/telepathy thing).

These days, I tend to wait for collections, but I also try to keep an eye on YA and Middle-Grade graphic novels, as they’re honestly incredible. And over the last few years, I’ve bumped into more than a few I’ve loved.

So, here’s two of ’em for my wander through recommendations for Pride Month.

Trauma makes for bad choices, you say?

First up, I’m going to talk New Mutants, because as I said, I was long a fan, way back to when Sam Guthrie was a gangly, awkward fella instead of a blond hunk. The New Mutants were a group of scared, different teens back when I was a scared different teen, so really, we were made for each other.

My most recent interaction with the New Mutants came from Charlie Jane Anders’ run with the group during New Mutants: Lethal Legion, and holy heck did I love it. First off, in the interim from when I first read my various X-titles, there have been so many characters coming out, queer characters joining up, and queer stories being told. It’s flipping awesome. Now we get allegory and text! There’s a newer queer trans mutant, Escapade, and she can swap places/qualities/powers with those she’s near, and she’s totally got a crush on a teammate, and she’s making… choices.

Second—and this part truly had me from hello—there’s a part of this graphic novel that just summed up the whole that I loved. I felt the thematic core of this collection and story arc is best summed up by Wolfsbane saying, “Traumatized people make terrible decisions,” which is then repeated by Karma as “‘Traumatized people make terrible decisions,’ should be the New Mutants motto,” which Moonstar answers with, “I want those words embroidered on a throw pillow.”

Because, yes.

Bestselling writer Charlie Jane Anders launches the New Mutants into a new era!

Bestselling writer Charlie Jane Anders launches the New Mutants into a new era — before it all comes crashing down in “Fall of X”! When Escapade and her new friends decide to try their hand at robin hooding, they stumble onto a conspiracy that could level New York City. Can the OG New Mutants save their young charges, or will they set the world on fire together? The team has faced some of the most cunning minds in the Marvel Universe — and survived. But when someone starts building a new Lethal Legion, will Krakoa’s youngest class finally be outmatched?

It occurs to me as I’m writing this that both my recommendations today are graphic novels focused around trans women, and I’m kind of chuffed to be able to do that (in fact, I’m sure I could do an entire month highlighting two awesome trans books a day, and that makes me so freaking happy).

Crystal Frasier’s Cheer up! Love and Pompoms was a re-read for me this year, and I’d forgotten how joyful this was, but it’s also joyful without dodging the realities/rough patches of existing-while-queer, which is one heck of a balance to accomplish.

Parents, first crushes, growing up, cliques, fitting in, planning a college future, being true to yourself, fighting for independence… and on top of all that, being queer? Ooof. But when you’ve got the right people in your corner? Well. That’s always worth cheering.

A sweet, queer teen romance perfect for fans of Heartstopper and Check, Please!

Annie is a smart, antisocial lesbian starting her senior year of high school who’s under pressure to join the cheerleader squad to make friends and round out her college applications. Her former friend Bebe is a people-pleaser—a trans girl who must keep her parents happy with her grades and social life to keep their support of her transition. Through the rigors of squad training and amped up social pressures (not to mention micro aggressions and other queer youth problems), the two girls rekindle a friendship they thought they’d lost and discover there may be other, sweeter feelings springing up between them.

I’ve already talked about a couple of graphic novels already this month, but how about you? Any other queer graphic novels you’ve loved?