Over the Rainbow Challenge

[Becky]

4/7

L: Rulebreaker 6/16
G: The Student Prince 7/6
B: Who's Your Daddy? 9/6
T: Luna 9/12
LGBT YA:
LGBT Classic:
LGBT Award Winner:

I just finished my trans* book, Luna, and I boo hoo hooed all over my tshirt. Not because the ending was tragic, but it was very bittersweet.

[Becky]

Helloooo.... is anyone else still working on this challenge?

I've been terrible about fitting in these categories with the rest of my challenges. I've read plenty more Gs and Bs, and at least one more L, I haven't gotten to the YA, Classic, or Award Winner yet. Although I've got my Award Winner picked out! I was browsing through a list of Lambda winners and nominees, when I came across Sheepish: Two Women, Fifty Sheep, and Enough Wool to Save the Planet. As a knitter, I just couldn't resist. :) And my library had the ebook, so I'll probably settle in to read a few pages before bed tonight.

Has anyone read anything they really liked? Hated? Anyone have a good rec for us?

I read a trans* romance a while back that I thought was kind of interesting: Man Enough. It definitely showed some of the struggles that trans* people can sometimes face within the LGBT community.

[Jane (PS), Moderator]

Hey Becky! I'm still going

[Elizabeth]

I've updated my post but I haven'r read anything since July for this challenge. There are a couple of book I'd like to read for the letter L and the YA and classics category and I'll try to get to them till the end of the month.

[Becky]

5/7

L: Rulebreaker 6/16
G: The Student Prince 7/6
B: Who's Your Daddy? 9/6
T: Luna 9/12
LGBT YA:
LGBT Classic:
LGBT Award Winner: Sheepish: Two Women, Fifty Sheep, and Enough Wool to Save the Planet 11/20

I enjoyed Sheepish quite a bit. (Although the same sheep sex joke over and over again got tiresome.) It was a Lambda nominee in the LGBT memoir category, but the lovely thing about it was that being a lesbian is pretty much the least interesting thing about the author, and she treated it that way. She talked about her wife a lot- she refers to herself as the "backup farmer", so as the main farmer, her wife was front and center in many of the farming stories- but she talked about her the same way any straight person would talk about their spouse. Other than one short chapter about them going to California to get married, there was no particular emphasis on LGBT issues at all. It was about a city girl who learns to love all the wonders of wool, and oh, by the way, she's a lesbian.

Now I've started Secret by Brigid Kemmerer. It's the fourth book in a paranormal YA series about a group of brothers, and some of their friends, who have supernatural abilities. The first three books were about m/f couples, and now book four is about one of the brothers who is gay. He's afraid to come out, so it's not exactly "post gay". (Stories where the fact of a character's homosexuality is treated as being unremarkable.) But a gay character getting his own book within a mainstream series, just like his straight brothers, is pretty cool.

[Jane (PS), Moderator]

My comment above was actually a few paragraphs long but iphone ate it up!

I've done most of my list I think... Classic will probably be the hardest for me since none of them particularly appeal :(

I'll update my list and come back with comments :)

[Jane (PS), Moderator]

Over the Rainbow
6 June - 31 December 2014

Level: Over The Rainbow
Completed: 6/7

L - Battle Scars √ 12 Nov
G - Seven √ 3 Jul
B - Three to Tango √ 17 Aug
T - Perfect √ 23 Oct
YA - Turning 16 √ 17 Nov
Classic - Brokeback Mountain
Awards - First You Fall √ 6 Oct


I've rated all the books at least 3 stars but I'm not sure I'll do anymore L books. The plot was pretty good, but I wasn't too interested in the 'loving' part. This happens with a lot of stories (me not being very interested in the smexing) - but the body parts do seem to make a difference to my overall enjoyment ;)

[Becky]

6/7

L: Rulebreaker 6/16
G: The Student Prince 7/6
B: Who's Your Daddy? 9/6
T: Luna 9/12
LGBT YA: Secret 11/22
LGBT Classic:
LGBT Award Winner: Sheepish: Two Women, Fifty Sheep, and Enough Wool to Save the Planet 11/20

I want to try to knock out a couple more Meet-n-Greet books before the month ends, so I'm going to take a little bit of a break before getting to my last book here. I've heard excellent things about The Charioteer, so I'm going to try to read that for my LGBT Classic sometime in December.

[Becky]

We're almost to the end of the year, and believe it or not, there are only 10 days left to this challenge! How is everyone doing? Are you hooked on LGBT rom? Did you enjoy one "flavor" more than the others? Find any new authors you plan to read more of?

The only category I haven't checked off my list yet- LGBT Classic. I've been wanting to read The Charioteer- I've heard excellent things about it from people whose opinions I respect. But I just can't get excited about it right now. So I think I'm going to have a last minute poke through the lists and see if I can find another classic that will catch my end-of-the-year, it's-almost-Christmas! scattered attention.

[Jane (PS), Moderator]

Hey Becky - I'm stuck on the same final category for the same reason! I just can't get interested in it :(

Thanks for hosting this challenge Becky! I've really enjoyed some of the books I read, but I was a solid MM convert before :)

[Becky]

For Jane and anyone else stuck on the Classic category (including me!), I'm poking around, looking for more lists to choose from. Maybe something on one of these will jump out at you. For the classics in particular, don't forget to check your library's website for availability! Mine has recently acquired Rubyfruit Jungle, which would definitely qualify as an LGBT Classic, but there's a waiting list, so it's very unlikely I'll get it in time to read it before the end of the challenge.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacke...
http://www.rainbowsauce.com/glbtfic/g...
http://jclarkmedia.com/gaybooks/recom...
http://www.autostraddle.com/top-ten-l...
https://read.rifflebooks.com/list/85973
http://www.publishingtriangle.org/100...