Magic & Mayhem: Fiction and Essays Celebrating LGBTQA Romance

by Nicole Kimberling (Editor), Amanda Jean, Samantha Derr

Everyone deserves to see themselves in stories, to see themselves get a happy ending. For the past few years, GRNW has helped to see those stories reach more of the LGBTQ community, and gain traction in libraries and beyond.

Furthering that goal is this collection of fiction and essays, including information on how to get books in libraries, letters from authors, why positive and happy queer books are so important, and short stories about tattooists, soldiers, mages, and cyborgs that span the LGBTQ spectrum.

Genres: Anthologies, Romance, Fantasy, M M Romance, Short Stories, LGBT, Contemporary

314 pages, ebook

First published August 3, 2016

Reviews

[ttg]

Magic & Mayhem Anthology Contents

STORIES:

“Broken Art,” by Dev Bentham
“Caroline’s Heart,” by Austin Chant
“Demonica,” by Megan Derr
“The Hollow History of Professor Perfectus,” by Ginn Hale
“Fade to Black,” by Josh Lanyon
“Charmed By Chance,” by Alex Powell
“Sun, Moon, and Stars,” by E.J. Russell
“Slack Tide,” by Karelia Stetz-Waters

ESSAYS:

“Romance for the Rest of Us,” by Jessica Blat
“Sad Queer Characters and the Revolution of Joy,” by Austin Chant
“Dear Rose,” by Rose Christo
“How to Get LGBT Romance Books Into Libraries” by Marlene Harris
“So What is “Character-Type Love Match” Anyway?” by Nicole Kimberling
“My Road to Romance,” by Susan Lee
“To My Future Self,” by EE Ottoman
“What I’ve Learned,” by Jordan Castillo Price
“Dear Len,” by Radclyffe
“A Letter to My Former Self,” by Rick R. Reed
“Five Things We Learned Running A Queer Romance Event (and the One Thing We Still Need to Do)” by Tracy Timmons-Gray (That's me.)

So excited! This is the anthology that will include A) stories contributed by authors based on the "couples" that were voted on by attendees at the 2014 and 2015 Gay Romance Northwest Meet-Up conferences. (2014's couple was "Tattoo Artist x Soldier" and 2015's couple was "Mage x Cyborg".) Can't wait to read them! And B) The anthology will also include keynotes from the conferences, including pieces by Jordan Castillo Price, Radclyffe, Rick R. Reed, EE Ottoman, Rose Christo, and Austin Chant. (I have a piece in here as well...Let me know what you think!) :-)

Thanks to the wonderful editors Samantha Derr, Amanda Jean, and Nicole Kimberling for making this anthology a reality!!! :D

Proceeds raised from anthology sales will go to fund programming and activities for Gay Romance Northwest, a nonprofit, volunteer-run initiative of the Seattle writing nonprofit Old Growth Northwest. GRNW's mission is to celebrate the awesomeness of LGBTQIA genre fiction by creating spaces to celebrate queer genre stories as well as build capacity in public and community libraries to have more LGBTQIA books in circulation. Since the initiative launched in 2013, we've had the chance to host three annual conferences with hundreds of attendees from around the US, 20+ free reading events in Seattle and Portland, and through the generous donations from the author and reader community, gathered over 1,000 LGBTQIA books for Seattle community LGBT libraries. :-) The Seattle Public Library, through their work with GRNW, has also increased their library collection by over 400 new LGBTQIA romance titles in three years.

We'll be celebrating our fourth conference at the Seattle Public Library this September 24, 2016. Come join us! (It's free!)

[Tamara · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are two parts to this book - fiction and essays.
The fiction I've rated bellow. The pairings are either mage and cyborg or soldier and tattoo artist.
The essays are in a letter-to-self form, mostly about how writers felt about writing and reading romance.

Slack Tide by Karelia Stetz-Waters - 3 stars
Too short to be higher rating. The writing is flowery and not really my thing most of the time.
Two girls - one is a tattoo artist, the other just finished a tour in the military. Sweet reunion :)

Charmed by Chance by Alex Powell - 3 stars
Cute, with some wtf moments.
The MC whose POV we're in is kind of flaky, but at at least he warns people :D
But his priorities are kind of out there - he ranks getting beaten up and mugged the same as missing a date and getting his favorite shirt ripped. So yeah.

Broken Art by Dev Bentham - 4 stars
Oooh, I loved this one!
A soldier in the Navy goes to a tattoo artist to get his tramp-stamp "fixed". The author managed to give the characters depth despite the story being short. It's practically begging for a sequel.

Caroline’s Heart by Austin Chant - 4 stars
I really liked it. It was interesting and the writing flowed nicely. I liked the world building!

Sun, Moon, and Stars by E.J. Russel - 3 stars
This needs to be even longer to develop the world more. There's so much potential.
I had a few niggles but I liked it.

The Hollow History of Professor Perfectus by Ginn Hale - 4 stars
The world building is very interesting - a steampunk/magical alternate universe set sometime at the turn of 2oth century USA. Magic is prosecuted and our MC is a wind mage. She and her girlfriend get pulled into solving a crime.

Fade to Black by Josh Lanyon - 4 stars
Similar setting as the first story in this anthology - a retired soldier reunites with a tattoo artist. The story is just as short but the writing is more articulate. Loved!

Demonica by Megan Derr - 3 stars
Classic Mean Derr - short and sweet, interesting world building.

In all, I really enjoyed this anthology.

[Vi]

Broken Art by Dev Bentham
Fade to Black by Josh Lanyon

[Antonella · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great mix of stories and essays including some of my favourite authors. Thank you for putting them together!

[Janeylou · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great collection of stories and essays by both favourite authors and writers I was not familiar with. I quite enjoyed it.

[Haldis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Don't know how to rate this one. A mix of good and bad, unfortunately a really bad one had me putting this aside before I got to the good stories. Finally picked it back up to finish.

[ItsAboutTheBook · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review can be read at It's About The Book

4.5 stars

The new Magic & Mayhem anthology from GRNW Press is not pure fantasy. It includes several non-fiction essays in addition to the short stories. One of the big things that stands out in these essays is that LGBTQ fiction has come a long way. LGBTQ fiction has become an industry. Another thing that stands out is the industry still has a long way to go. Gay romance is the biggest part of the LGBTQ fiction industry. If you’re not a white, able bodied, gay male there is a fairly strong likelihood you’re not going to see yourself represented accurately all that often. We need to do better than that. We know we can increase representation as we’ve done it before. And ask your local library to stock your favorite titles! Please!

Charmed by Chance: Merritt has a type. He falls for Mech mages. It ends poorly. Even as he’s having his hand fixed because his last mage girlfriend messed with it as she left he’s attracted to the mage fixing him. They’re just so attractive and mysterious. Their nametag says Verity. Merritt knows he wants to date Verity. Despite some attempts by his ex to sabotage the budding relationship, Merritt and Verity are going out on a date. Merritt is attacked and loses his prosthetic arm. Verity does their best to help Merritt.

Even if we have a type people are not a type. Verity was certainly a Mech mage, but they were not the same as the people Merritt had dated in the past. Merritt found out it wasn’t so much that he had dated mech mages in the past that was the problem, but he had dated people that were not very nice.

Broken Art: Jim has spent his life in the military. Now he’/ preparing to re-enter civilian life, but before he embarks on his last tour he has some unfinished business to fix. Jim can’t bear the thought of beginning his life outside the military with the tattoo he has carried since the early years of his service, a tattoo he is too ashamed of to show anyone. Now he has come to Broken Art Tattoos to have it covered with something that has meaning. Over ten hours spent with Andy, the tattoo artist, creates a bond between the two men. Maybe one that runs deeper than either of them could have expected.

Even as short as it was, I really loved this story. I was drawn into Jim’s tale from the first line and I absolutely believed in the connection that built between these two men in those hours. The beautiful, succinct writing created that almost magical, dreamlike intimacy you often get with late night conversations. I became completely invested in both of the characters very quickly and was left wanting more in the best possible way.

Fade to Black: Ghost is leaving his tattoo shop when he encounters an odd man waiting for him in the shadows. He soon learns that they have met before as the man, Gene, reveals an early example of Ghost’s work tattooed on his chest from twenty years ago. After Gene’s good-natured refusal to allow Ghost to fix the old tattoo, they part ways. It turns out to be a brief parting, as Ghost runs into Gene once again when he stops in for dinner at Luau Louie’s.

Fade To Black is a nice little story about fate and second chances. While for Ghost, the memory of his and Gene’s original encounter had long since faded, for Gene it had been something special with the right person in the wrong time and place. The chance sighting of Ghost in his shop felt like fate for Gene, how could he not take the opportunity to see if maybe now was the right time and right place with the person he had always felt was the one for him? I enjoyed the exploration of the idea of random chance being fate providing possibilities. It’s up to the players if they choose to take the possibility provided and turn it into a future together.

Demonica: This was an excellent short story I would be thrilled if the author chose to continue as a series but at the same time felt really good about the story as a whole. There’s history between the MC, and the family of the man he’s hired to rescue. Life changing history. Even though it’s a short I felt the weight of that history without the author burdening the story with it overtly. There are princes to save! Demonica was action packed with fantastically vivid characters that I loved. The world building was great. I’m totally intrigued. Monks. Magic. Forbidden magic. Kings and Queens. Demons and mercenaries. A sweet love story without sex. I didn’t miss it at all. Physical intimacy isn’t just sex and I think this story if continued could prove that well. It is kind of insta love but it worked given the length of the story and the characters round about history together. I thought this story was really good. I was drawn in from the first page. There’s quite a few laughs thrown in there too. An excellent short story. I would love to read more. I loved this one!

The Hollow History of Professor Perfectus: This was an amazingly rich tale about two women who have found respite hiding out in a magic show. They’re in a relationship but it’s new and their past means they’ve kept certain aspects secret form each other. Those secrets don’t stay hidden when Guela the magician assistant and love interest takes a job from 3 powerful women looking for a missing woman. It leads Abril our MC who has great skills in magic right back into the nightmare man from her past. If they want to escape their pasts for the life and freedom they’ve been dreaming of they have to face the man Abril has been running from.

This was am amazing magic filled steampunk short story. The world building was fantastic just like I’ve come to expect from Ginn Hale. The romance between the women was sweet and tenuous. I loved how I felt a very real fear and complete disgust about what the bad guys were trying to do to women. This story is told on the cusp of women gaining right’s and how fragile that time was. I understand that but I loved how our MCs who are the outlaws in the this story are ultimately the woman who handle the tough situation they find themselves in. They save the day! This one is fantastic and is a must read. Don’t let the love story being about two women keep you away. You’ll be missing out on a great story. Must read IMO.

Slack Tide: This story is about a woman coming back from 4 years of service. She’s coming back to a woman she discovered wanted her the night before she left. Her sister’s best friend no less. It was sweet and you could tell the MCs cared for each other. They’d held out hope they’d be together again. The problem for me was it felt like a short. I can’t say it’s memorable or that I was at all engaged in the outcome of their story together. It wasn’t bad. Sweet but nothing to rave about.

[Danis ❤️ MM · Rating 3 out of 5]

Meh. Granted, this review is only based on the short stories I read. I'm not a fan of F/F, just not my thing. So I skipped those. Read all the others, including the essays (which were fine, but felt like fillers). By far IMO the best stories were:

Fade to Black by Josh Lanyon (this author rocks, always eloquent, never disappoints, I'd love to read a full length version of this story about a career military man rediscovering a potential love in the tattoo artist who helped him with a cover up years ago).

Demonica by Megan Derr (nice world building, I'd like to read more, saved this author for future reads)

Broken Art by Dev Bentham (story in essence about reclaiming life and a sense of self worth, saved author for future reads).

As for the essays, there were a couple of authors I added to my to read list from the list after looking up their work. I was a bit disappointed in the EJ Russell story, as I really like her work and am actually in the middle of reading the a series of hers now. But this story fell short, perhaps because their wasn't enough time to really flesh out the world building?

[⚣Michaelle⚣ · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

Maybe it was the combination of such differing protagonists as Cyborg and Mage - but I didn't much like the fantasy-based stories. But I did love reading the essays and those letters the authors wrote to themselves - very enlightening!

[Erica · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really loved all the Cyborg/Mage stories. It's fantastic how much variety you can get out of the same premise. (The Tattoo Artist/Soldier stories were less my cup of tea, but that's because I'm a big old fantasy/sci-fi nerd.) The essays were heartwarming.

[Marge · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read Josh Lanyon's Fade to Black, available separately from this collection. Lovely short story about a tattoo artist and soldier reconnecting after many years.

[Teamama · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delightful!

[Shannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

KSKS

[Cally73 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this primarily for a favourite author's story, but thought the premise sounded interesting. There was more diversity in the stories than I was expecting, but it was good to get out of my usual reading comfort zone. There was only one I didn't enjoy - Slack Tide. This was because I found the characters flat and the story boring. The others I liked or really enjoyed. Some authors were first time reads for me. I would have liked to have had a table of contents, because I'm not likely to read this through again. I would potentially re-read some of the stories, but not having a clickable table of contents doesn't make that easy. Poor formatting.

I was disappointed in the essays. I guess it was because I was expecting something with a little more depth. Some of them were interesting and heartfelt, but there were a couple that seemed to be there to fill in space.

[Tigress62 · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just finished the book and I am jumping with joy! It took me only a little over three days, and that is besides my 10 hours per day job! Why? Because I simply could not put this book down :-) So I read on the commute (do you also hate it when you arrive at your destination when a story is just too fascinating to put the book back in your bag? Well, that's the reason I have occasionally been spotted sitting in railway stations for hours - reading! - while trains come and go!), on break (my breaks may have been slightly too long this week!), while my hairdresser worked on me (she has never seen me so quiet!), and the second I came home in the evenings I flopped down on my bed to continue reading. I haven't done any household chores since Tuesday - God bless my dishwasher and a daughter who has to atone for a stupid thing she did ;-) Sleep is also vastly overrated when you've got a book like this one in your hands :-) I have to admit: I really do read A LOT - and I read a lot of anthologies too. Mostly, they are mixed bags, with some awesome and some not so awesome stories. But this one? It was a knock out!!! I very much liked every single story, and some were so lovely they made me cry ... The essays were touching and heartfelt, and I will re-read and cherish them from time to time. I will also follow every single one of the authors :-D With short stories, there is no way I can go into details without spoilers, so I won't even try. Just listen to me and start reading - and believe me: you will wish that this book was much longer or that there were a volume 2, 3 and 4 already!!

[Curtis · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is one of those cases where one tries to do too much within the same project. This anthology attempts to throw together short stories, essays, and letters, all of which initiated in different contexts and not as part of a cohesive project. The result is an anthology that seems to lack a common thread or purpose; it doesn't feel like there's a curated collection here. And I found myself surprised at the stories that were included because they didn't seem quite up to the expected caliber of their authors, but that might also be attributable to what I recall was a relatively short timing for the call for submissions.

I absolutely want to support GRNW, as it's a project I believe in, but I have to give an honest rating to this particular work. I hope the next project is conceived and developed in a more intentional, purposeful, and cohesive way...

[Lily · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.9 stars rounded up. I enjoyed this anthology for several reasons and the rating reflects my liking for the entire package. I particularly appreciated the combination of essays and story telling, the diversity of the characters and the presence of asexual protagonists. Short stories tend to leave me with a feeling of incompleteness, but in this case I was pleased.

[Didi · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting insight and (short) stories from some of long time and well-known authors in LGBTQ romance.

[Cerulean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Broken Art - 5 stars
Fade To Black - 4 stars

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

4* for the stories I liked: Broken Art by Dev Bentham, Fade to Black by Josh Lanyon, Demonica by Megan Derr, and Sun, Moon, and Stars by E.J. Russell.