Lilah Suzanne's Blog, page 27

Redefining Super

diversityinya:

By C. B. Lee

I’ve lived with depression and suicidal ideation since I was a teenager, much of it stemming from an overwhelming need to live up to my parents and my own expectations, along with never feeling I was good enough, and never feeling like I fit in. I was ashamed of myself, ashamed that I was a burden on my family, ashamed that I had failed in every way: school, career, relationships, and more.

It was a long road to recovery with my depression, and it’s still a work in progress. There’s a huge stigma surrounding mental health, especially in the Asian American community where we were raised to “save face.” Learning the patience to work out what I needed emotionally from my family and friends and being able to voice it has been a long journey.

I escaped into books, devouring anything and everything, disappearing into endless possibilities of worlds, delighted in travelling alongside my favorite heroes as they saved the universe.

And yet at the same time I was always a spectator; I felt wrong and broken for being attracted to more than one gender, because I hardly ever saw it portrayed in novels, especially in speculative fiction. I wasn’t white or straight like the heroes of renown, and I had internalized that adventures and saving the world and falling in love and happy-ever-afters were not for people like me.

I started writing because I wanted to write the books I wish I could have read as a teenager. I want romance and adventure and fantasy and science fiction and horror and every genre imaginable.

My novel Not Your Sidekick began as a project that was born out of frustration. I was tired. I was tired of characters of color being sidelined in supporting roles, I was tired of stories where girls who fell in love with other girls were met with tragedy at every front.

I’ve always loved the superhero genre because there are so many ways you can talk about identity, super or otherwise. One of the things Jess struggles with in Not Your Sidekick is living up to expectations. Since she doesn’t think she’s going to get superpowers, she’s struggling to prove herself. Her parents are immigrants, and she and her siblings are the first born in this new country— similar to my own experience growing up, albeit Jess lives in the year 2132. This theme of redefining success really hits close to home for me, and I wanted to show how first-generation children really feel that pressure.

Not Your Sidekick is lighthearted and and often skirts the line of ridiculous. I don’t take myself too seriously, and the novel doesn’t either; I poke lots of fun at superhero tropes and secret identity shenanigans. While I touch on issues that are important to me, like the theme of expectations and defining your own success— I want most of all to bring joy and laughter and silliness and light. I want readers to have fun.  

I hope readers will find joy in the novel, as I have bringing it to the world.

C.B. Lee is a bisexual writer, rock climber and hiking enthusiast based in California. She is a first-generation Asian American and has a BA in Sociology and Environmental Science, which occasionally comes in handy in her chosen career, but not usually. Lee enjoys reading, hiking and other outdoor pursuits. Her first novel, Seven Tears at High Tide, was published by Duet Books (Interlude Press) in 2015 and named a finalist for two Bisexual Book of the Year Awards. Ms. Lee is also a Lambda Literary Emerging LGBTQ Voices Fellow.

Not Your Sidekick is available for purchase.

interludepress:interludepress:THIS WEEKEND ONLY! 20% off...

interludepress:

interludepress:

THIS WEEKEND ONLY! 

20% off all books, eBooks, and pre-orders in the IP Web Store with discount code: FLASH

store.interludepress.com   Sale 9/17-18

And better still, with our new Priority Mail shipping option, the more print editions you buy, the more you save on shipping. Save time, save money. (And enjoy some great books!)

Book Review: BURNING TRACKS by Lilah Suzanne

alysia-constantine:

Burning Tracks by Lilah Suzanne (August 11, 2016); 224 pages. Available from Interlude Press here.

This is the second book in the Spotlight series (the first is Broken Records), which follows the lives of a quartet of people: Nico, the stylist to the stars, his business partner-stylist Gwen, Gwen’s wife Flora, and Nico’s love Grady, who just happens to be a big country music star.

While Broken Records focused mainly on Nico and his courtship with Grady, Burning Tracks is centered around Gwen and Flora’s lives. Nico and Grady are still around, and they get important story developments, but this is not their novel. The primary story—and the reader’s heart—belongs to Flora and Gwen as they navigate their new lives in a new town, pull apart and pull together and pull other folks into their circle.

When Nico and Gwen become business partners and take their star-styling business from LA to Nashville, Gwen and Flora need to make a new life for themselves in a new place. While Nico navigates a new and coltish relationship with Grady, Gwen and Flora are doing the hard work of staying together, weathering the long haul—it’s lovely balance: both couples are unsteadily trying to figure out how to live in new conditions, both literally (Nashville) and figuratively (new stages of lives and relationships, new pressures and possibilities). While Nico and Grady are stumblingly trying to figure out how to be in love, Gwen and Flora are trying to figure out how to stay in love—I don’t mean that they’re in constant danger of falling out of love, but that they’re trying to understand how to maintain their lives, keep beauty alive for each other, simply be in love without all the bang and fuss and glory that newness brings.
There’s heartache and drinking, of course (I mean, there are country music stars in this, so it would disappoint if it didn’t happen), but there is also contentment and joy… and some kittens at one point, too. I admit I’m not a big country music aficionado, but I can’t think of a single country song about the joys of living with kittens—this novel goes well beyond the clichés, in other words, to give a real picture of real lives happening.

They’re great characters, all four of them: loving, but not saccharine; interesting, but believable; complex, but still relatable; just stupid enough to make them real (I hate the sexism of “Mary Sue” labels, but because most people understand that term, I’ll use it: there are none here).

In this second novel, the group grows a little bigger to include Clementine (another country music star/Nico client), a couple kittens, and an endearing little guy named Cayo—but I won’t talk about how he figures into the story, because I don’t want to give anything away. Instead, I’ll say that Clementine is a fun and interesting character: she’s a shining penny of a woman, with the sleek sheen that money and fame seem to give, and she comes across as a bit vain, a bit too big for her britches, and yet still very endearing and well-meaning. She’s the kind of girl who gets her hair colored and calls people “Sugar,” but she isn’t one-dimensional—she gets a moment of awkward redemption, plus she hides a kitten in her coat like a crazy lady, so I think she’s tops.

The book’s paced just right—one is pulled along without any dragging, and the prose is efficient but loving (if you can say that about prose; I mean it feels neither self-indulgent nor too airy and speedy). It’s one of those books I could have easily (had I the time and no other stupid life obligations) read in one sitting, though knowing it was waiting for me to pick it back up again each evening was a good motivation to get through the daily mire.

While Broken Records never felt unresolved to me, Burning Tracks feels like it resolves some of what got knotted up in Broken Records, and leaves off at the top of a cliff—all the characters are just starting big new life adventures (I won’t say what, and you can’t make me). It felt quite nicely resolved, but still leaves room for more to happen in a future third book. Which I’m hoping Suzanne has in the works.  

If there isn’t a country music song about kittens, someone should really get on that. Thank you so much for this! 

interludepress:Certainly, Possibly, You—the second book in...

interludepress:

Certainly, Possibly, You—the second book in Lissa Reed’s Sucre Coeur series—will be out October 6th, and we have two specials to help celebrate it!

All caught up on Sucre Coeur? Get a two-fer of Certainly, Possibly, You so you can enjoy a print edition and take the eBook on the road for free. Use the discount code CERTAINLY with the purchase of the print edition from the IP Web Store and receive a free multi-format eBook of Certainly, Possibly, You until its October 6th release. The eBook must be in your cart for the discount code to be valid.

Need to catch up on Sucre Coeur? Get 30 percent off Definitely, Maybe, Yours from the IP Web Store now through September 21 with the discount code DMY.  Sorry, but we can’t combine discounts in one order.

alysia-constantine:I am utterly enjoying Lilah Suzanne’s new...

alysia-constantine:

I am utterly enjoying Lilah Suzanne’s new novel BURNING TRACKS, and then I came to a part in which one of the characters gets a tattoo of swallows. I have tattoos of swallows, one on each shoulder. And the character explains his reason:

“’The artist said sailors used to get them at the end of a long journey to show they had survived. That they could survive anything. And it means—’ He pauses, letting sadness pass over his features without pushing it down and away. ‘I wanted something that means loyalty. Swallows always return to the same place. The same person.’“

That’s pretty much the same research I did before getting mine. They’re supposed to carry the souls of the dead to heaven. I am forever getting lost and needing someone to navigate, so… precautions.

Anyway, loving the novel, it is SO much fun!

That’s so awesome! I love the symbolism of swallows, seemed tailor-made for Grady (and Gwen, really.) Also very happy to hear you’re enjoying the book!

interludepress:rtbookreviews:Which do you think is the Best...

interludepress:

rtbookreviews:

Which do you think is the Best Book Cover of September? Check out Not Your Sidekick by CB Lee. Cast your vote on the RT site!         

Consider our vote cast!

countryff4171:Ain’t it funny how an ole songCan take you...

countryff4171:

Ain’t it funny how an ole song

Can take you back in time

Bring back the memories

You thought you left behind

We’ve Nearly Closed the Book on Summer...

interludepress:

…but we haven’t finished our summer fundraising campaign on behalf of  @thetrevorproject and public libraries. A contribution to The Thousand Book Challenge will donate funds to The Trevor Project’s life-saving efforts for LGBTQ teens and young adults, as well as place copies of Killian B. Brewer’s The Rules of Ever After into public libraries across the US. 

Each $15 donation sponsors the shipment of a book and contributes $10 to The Trevor Project—a tax deductible twofer. We pay for the books, and your donation will help ship them to libraries that requested them at the American Library Association convention in June as well as on our web site. 

For the past two years, librarians at the ALA conference have told us about their need for more life-affirming titles for their LGBTQ teen readers. We’re printing a special run of Rules to help them out. But we still need your support to help us meet this goal. Before we say goodbye to summer, please help us bring a successful end to this campaign.

For more information or to make a tax-deductible donation, please visit http://store.interludepress.com/products/the-thousand-book-challenge.

Now Available: “Not Your Sidekick” by C.B. Lee

interludepress:

Jess grits her teeth,
going for a running start. The gravel on the trail crunches under her feet, the
wind rushes through her hair, and she can taste success. This time. This time,
she’s gonna make it.

The canyon is streaked
with color, warm in the afternoon light; golden striations race across the
signature rusty reds of the landscape. The sky is a gorgeous, impossible blue,
and clouds flutter down the endless horizon, a perfect backdrop for a first
flight.

Every step resounds in
her body, and her heart races. Blood pounds in her ears.

Flight.

One of the rarest of
abilities. Jess’ dad can fly, and her older sister inherited the gene. Why not
Jess?

Why not me? I could be
a hero, Jess
thinks as she picks up speed.

Summary

Welcome to Andover, where superpowers are common, but internships are complicated. Just ask high school nobody, Jessica Tran. Despite her heroic lineage, Jess is resigned to a life without superpowers and is merely looking to beef up her college applications when she stumbles upon the perfect (paid!) internship—only it turns out to be for the town’s most heinous supervillain. On the upside, she gets to work with her longtime secret crush, Abby, whom Jess thinks may have a secret of her own. Then there’s the budding attraction to her fellow intern, the mysterious “M,” who never seems to be in the same place as Abby. But what starts as a fun way to spite her superhero parents takes a sudden and dangerous turn when she uncovers a plot larger than heroes and villains altogether.

Price: $16.99 US print / $6.99 multi-format eBook
Length: 296 pages/ 75,870 words
ISBN: 978-1-945053-03-0 print / 978-1-945053-04-7 eBook
Details: Trade paperback, 5.25"x8"

Not Your Sidekick is available from the IP Web Store and your favorite book retailers, including: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple iBookstore, All Romance eBooks, Smashwords, Kobo, Book Depository, and Indiebound.   

International Special:  Order the print edition by November 8, 2016 from your favorite book retailer and receive free multi-format eBook by submitting a copy of your receipt to contact@interludepress.com.

About the Author

C.B. Lee is a bisexual writer, rock climber, and hiking enthusiast from Southern California. A first-generation Asian American, she is passionate about working in communities of color and empowering youth to be inspired to write characters and stories of their own. Lee’s debut novel Seven Tears at High Tide was published by Duet Books in 2015 and named a finalist in the Bisexual Books Awards. Get to know C.B. at cb-lee.com, on Twitter @author_cblee, and on Facebook at facebook.com/authorcblee.

Cover art and design by C.B. Messer

Coming in January:“Lunch With the Do Nothings at the Tammy Dinette” by Killian B. Brewer

interludepress:

COMING IN JANUARY:
Lunch With the Do Nothings at the Tammy Dinette
by Killian B. Brewer

When Marcus Sumter, a short order cook with dreams of being a chef, inherits a house in small town Marathon, Georgia, he leaves his big city life behind. Marcus intends to sell the house to finance his dreams, but a group of lovable busybodies known as the Do Nothings, a new job at a local diner called the Tammy Dinette, and a handsome mechanic named Hank cause Marcus to rethink his plans. Will he return to the life he knew, or will he finally put down roots?

About the author:

Killian B. Brewer grew up in a family where the best way to be heard was to tell a good story, therefore he developed an early love of storytelling, puns, and wordplay. He began writing poetry and short fiction at 15 and continued in college where he earned a BA in English. He does not use this degree in his job in the banking industry. He currently lives in Georgia with his partner of 10 years and their dog. Growing up in the South gave him a funny accent and a love of grits. His first novel, The Rules of Ever After, was published by Duet Books for Young Adult fiction in 2015.

Get to know Killian at killianbbrewer.com and on Twitter at @killianbbrewer

Cover art and design by C.B. Messer.