reviews, releases and recommendations of LGBT media
This month’s book of the month is one you have (hopefully) heard of, but there’s never any harm in just making sure, is there? Anyway, if you’re looking for a sweet summery romance, then Meet Cute Diary will be the book for you, trust me! It’s the fake-dating romcom you’ve always been craving, only it’s even better because it’s overflowing with trans joy.
So sit yourself down in a comfy chair, and check out why we think you should be excited about this one!
If you follow either of us on twitter (and were following us back in December), you probably already know how much we love The Sky Blues. Personally I would have probably chosen it as my most anticipated April release, of it wasn’t for the fact that I’ve read it last year… (But I did sneak it onto our list of fav reads of 2020!) It’s a one that will make you laugh and cry, and feel absolutely loved.
But let’s not get into details now, when you can just read our reviews below. And listen to the mix we made for the book!
Also follow Robbie Couch on twitter! He has more exciting things for us in the store!
Sky’s small town turns absolutely claustrophobic when his secret promposal plans get leaked to the entire school in this witty, heartfelt, and ultimately hopeful debut novel for fans of What if it’s Us? and I Wish You All the Best.
Sky Baker may be openly gay, but in his small, insular town, making sure he was invisible has always been easier than being himself. Determined not to let anything ruin his senior year, Sky decides to make a splash at his high school’s annual beach bum party by asking his crush, Ali, to prom—and he has thirty days to do it.
What better way to start living loud and proud than by pulling off the gayest promposal Rock Ledge, Michigan, has ever seen?
Then, Sky’s plans are leaked by an anonymous hacker in a deeply homophobic e-blast that quickly goes viral. He’s fully prepared to drop out and skip town altogether—until his classmates give him a reason to fight back by turning his thirty-day promposal countdown into a school-wide hunt to expose the e-blast perpetrator.
But what happens at the end of the thirty days? Will Sky get to keep his hard-won visibility? Or will his small-town blues stop him from being his true self?
Robbie Couch
Rep: gay mc, mlm li, trans & gay characters
TWs: homophobia, racism, f-slur, past car accident, past death of a parent, vomiting
Release: 6th April 2021
Let’s be honest, we all know that there is no trope better than found family. And actually, as long as we’re being honest with each other, found family as a concept is inherently gay. There’s just something about choosing your own family, that rings true to all LGBT people.
So yeah, here I am with ten LGBT stories featuring the found family trope. Only the best for you guys!
And hey, a lot of those titles are available on Scribd, so if you want to check out that service but don’t have an account yet, use my invite code to get 2 months for free! (This also gives me one free month.)
This post being a day late (work has made a mess of my timing skills), I figured I would go with something easier. That is, part three of my list of books with less than 400 ratings on Goodreads.
Okay, it’s a mouthful. We’re working on it.
In the meantime, you can find the first post here and the second one here.
Sounds weird to use terms associated more with literature, but really, when I say “new adult characters” what I mean is characters in their early or mid 20s. Young people trying to figure adult life out.
I ended up with 11 titles, and because I cheated and am claiming the last one only half fits the theme & that’s why it can stay. I was also tempted to put And Then We Danced and God’s Own Country on here, but eventually figured you all must know about them already.
It’s been a while since I did my first high fantasy rec list on here, and I’ve read a lot more of it since so, it being Friday and I cannot come up with a more interesting theme for this list, I decided that it’s the perfect time for a sequel.
In the interests of making this list a little more, I don’t know, readable, I suppose, I’m going to only include books that are already out. So, yes, there are several upcoming I’ve read and loved, but they won’t be on here. Plenty of motivation to make a part three then though…
Waaaay back when this blog was just a baby blog, I did a rec list of enemies to lovers (or otherwise hate to love) and that rec list has been probably one of the most viewed of all time. But then I went back and looked at it the other day, and was like… this is quite basic.
And hence the idea for a second part was born.
Before we begin, however, I would like to say yes I am aware that enemies to lovers and hate to love are not synonymous. No, I don’t really care, but if you want to be specific, this is more of a hate to love list.
As requested by Lena on Twitter, here are ten books with “characters in college/university or that general age range”. A few are straight up taking place at uni, a few are just with protags roughly that age.
I really wanted to include two more books, but I just featured them on my last rec list (Warm Hug LGBT Books), so I figured y’all need some more variety. Please know, though, Abroad by Liz Jacobs & Weak Heart by Ban Gilmartin also fit this theme perfectly.
Today’s rec list is one which was requested sometime in December on Twitter (and yes, we’re just getting round to it. We are a slow-moving operation). But we’re finally here! In this post you will find 10 books, each featuring a BIPOC bi mc. So get yourself a cuppa and have a look see!
I don’t know if you guys are aware, but the LGBT History Month is celebrated at different times in different countries. And in the UK it’s in February. Which I figured is a perfect reason for me to recommend you some documentaries. It’s actually always a good time to learn something about our history.
Like Larry Kramer said, “we are entitled to our history. We are entitled to know who these people were. I don’t think you can be a people until you have a history”.
There will most definitely be a part two to this rec list, since it’s in no way comprehensive, but still: below you will find ten titles I have seen (or found) recently. Enjoy, and happy learning! (And of course, sadly, a general tw of homophobia, transphobia, violence for almost all of those titles.)
If you’ve followed our blog for a while, you know we like to make these releases posts and you also know that last year I’ve made two for books with bi and/or pan protagonists. So of course, here I am again, this year.
Like before, I want to make clear that I tried my hardest to only include books where it’s very clear a character actually is bisexual (or pansexual), so that y’all get real rep. I also included books with bi and pan love interests, since those are usually rather big roles too. If I missed any books, because I only knew they feature a sapphic or achillean main character, please let me know!
And like always, the rainbow emoji means the author is LGBT. Happy reading!
So, you’ve opened up Scribd. The choices are overwhelming. You’ve read everything Anna suggested on their previous post. But where do you go from here?
Not to worry because today it’s my turn to provide you with 50* books that you can read on Scribd! I’ve done the digging so you don’t have to! So whether you’re looking for YA or adult, classics or poetry, sapphic, achillean or trans/nonbinary rep, hopefully there’s something here for you.
A little disclaimer first though: I myself haven’t read all of these books (some of what I initially included has been taken off since, thanks for that Scribd!), but they are all, if not read, then ones I want to read sometime soon.
*You may not actually have access to all 50 of these books, since Scribd can vary in availability depending on country.
In desperation, two days ago, I asked for a rec list theme. The response I got was the theme of pirates, or the sea in general. Now, I’ve not read that many pirate books (not that I would feel able to rec, at least), so I went with the latter.
So, if you’ve been listening to sea shanties non-stop for however long, in this list you’ll be able to find yourself a book that they’re the perfect soundtrack to.
We asked what rec lists you guys would like to see & got this gorgeous request that maybe, possibly we have almost fought over. Just maybe.
So anyway, the request was: “wholesome books full of queer characters if possible, essentially just books that feel like a big queer warm hug because I cannot handle reading anything else”. You would fight to recommend people books like that, too, wouldn’t you? Enjoy then!
Today’s post is our, slightly delayed, book of the month announcement! This time, we’ve chosen Me, My Dad and the End of the Rainbow, a children’s-slash-middle-grade book about a kid who just wants to make his dad happy, so he sets off to Pride in order to do that. If you want a book that will make you feel happy and full of love, this is the book for you.
You can also check out my (Charlotte’s) review of it here!
