• All Reviews,  Book Club,  Literature

    Book Club: Orientation

    10 October, 2019

    September saw us read a mystery book for the book club! We selected Orientation by Gregory Ashe, an ownvoices m/m novel. For once, though, we didn’t have mixed reactions over this book. In fact, we had remarkably similar views (bets on how that lasts for the next book?). Part of that was because, yeah, there are quite a few content warnings for this (we’ve tried to list them all, but please let us know if we’ve missed any!) and they felt almost gratuitous at times.

    So, did we like it? You’ll have to read on to find out!

    One last thing first: you can find our October read here, and look out for the twitter chat we’re planning at the end of the month!

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  • Book Club,  Literature

    Book Club: October Read

    30 September, 2019

    This month, we asked something different in choosing our read. Instead of genre, we wanted to know a trope you wanted to read. (And also because Anna wanted to read contemporary because they’re picky about genre like that.)

    And the trope you picked was found family. At which point, me and Anna realised we don’t actually know any contemporary found family books that we haven’t yet read, so we ended up instead going for sci fi.

    But this is all just an incredibly rambly way of saying, we have picked our October book, and are very excited for you to join in!

    Also, don’t forget to take part in our Orientation twitter chat happening tomorrow at 4pm GMT if you read the book!

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  • All Reviews,  Literature

    Blog Tour: Crier’s War

    28 September, 2019

    This is a second blog tour I’m a part of hosted by the lovely Karina @ Afire Pages and honestly, what a joy! And like before, not only do I have for you a review of one of my most anticipated books of the year, but a giveaway as well. Check out the link at the end to win a copy!

    There’s also another little surprise, and by surprise I mean a playlist for Crier’s War by yours truly.

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    After the War of Kinds ravaged the kingdom of Rabu, the Automae, designed to be the playthings of royals, usurped their owners’ estates and bent the human race to their will.

    Now Ayla, a human servant rising in the ranks at the House of the Sovereign, dreams of avenging her family’s death…by killing the sovereign’s daughter, Lady Crier.

    Crier was Made to be beautiful, flawless, and to carry on her father’s legacy. But that was before her betrothal to the enigmatic Scyre Kinok, before she discovered her father isn’t the benevolent king she once admired, and most importantly, before she met Ayla.

    Now, with growing human unrest across the land, pressures from a foreign queen, and an evil new leader on the rise, Crier and Ayla find there may be only one path to love: war.

    Crier’s War

    Nina Varela

    Rating: 5/5 ðŸŒˆ
    Published: 1st October 2019
    Goodreads
    Rep: lesbian poc mc, bi poc mc, poc cast, numerous side mlm & wlw couples

    Inside her chest, in the core of her, Ayla felt her heart stretch and swell and take root.

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  • All Reviews,  Book Club,  Literature

    Book Club: Sing the Four Quarters

    14 September, 2019

    Our first official Book Club review post! Yes, we originally said we will be putting those up at the end of the month, but then realised people can take the whole month to read! So it only makes sense to talk about the book after said month is finished. Which is why we’re here in the middle of September.

    As a reminder, our September Book is Orientation by Gregory Ashe & you can find the TWs for it on our twitter (there are a few, yeah). We also want to hold a little chat on twitter close to the end of September or maybe in the first days of October. Just some questions about the book, so we can all actually talk. Hopefully you guys will want to participate!

    But anyway, here’s our reviews of last month’s book!

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  • Book Club,  Literature

    Book Club: September Read

    30 August, 2019

    I know what you’re thinking. It’s not even the end of August yet, and that’s true, there’s still a few days left on our last book club read (which was Sing the Four Quarters), but we wanted to let you know what’s up next anyway.

    Again, we asked on twitter what genre you wanted to read, and this month you came  up with mystery! Because we read an f/f book last month, this month we’re reading an (ownvoices) m/m one (also because, shamefully, neither of us know any mystery novels with trans or nb mcs, which was our first thought. Next time definitely though).

    Before I let you know what book we’re reading, just a reminder that we are on twitter for this and we have a hashtag too (#readarainbow). And also, watch out for our review of the last month’s read!

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  • All Reviews,  Literature

    ARC Review: The Songbird’s Refrain

    24 August, 2019
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    When a mysterious show arrives in town, seventeen-year-old Elizabeth Brighton is both intrigued and unsettled. But none of the acts capture her attention quite like the blue-eyed woman. Locked in a birdcage and covered in feathers, the anguish in her voice sounds just a little too real to be an act—because it isn’t. The show’s owner, a sadistic witch known only as the Mistress, is holding her captive.

    And she’s chosen Elizabeth as her next victim.

    After watching the blue-eyed woman die, Elizabeth is placed under the same curse. She clings to what little hope she can find in the words of a fortune teller and in her own strange dreams. The more she learns, the more she suspects that the Mistress isn’t as invulnerable as she appears. But time is against her, and every feather that sprouts brings her closer to meeting the blue-eyed woman’s fate. Can Elizabeth unlock the secret to flying free, or will the Mistress’s curse kill her and cage its next victim?

    The Songbird’s Refrain

    Jillian Maria

    Published: 3rd September 2019
    Goodreads
    Rep: lesbian mc, bi li

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  • All Recommended,  Book Recs,  Literature

    Book Recs: Sapphic Mystery/Thrillers (I)

    19 August, 2019

    I’m back with the second part of this series (the previous parts can all be found here)! This time, I’m reccing mystery/thriller books (because they are my favourite genre when done well). Good mysteries keep you on your toes the entire time, with plot twists you don’t see coming until they’ve happened (you know when you get a good one, and then you think back to what’s come before and you’re like oh this was coming. That’s just *chef’s kiss*). So with these recs I hope you will find some of that.

    P. S. Some of the books I recced in the previous post may also apply here as mysteries, but I haven’t included them here so as not to duplicate too much.

    P. P. S. Once again, I haven’t read all of these, so as such, I think some don’t have an f/f romance but do have a wlw mc, but I don’t necessarily know which those are.

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  • All Recommended,  Book Recs,  Literature

    Book Recs: LGBT Retellings (Myths)

    6 August, 2019

    Part two of my retellings rec lists, as promised! Don’t forget to check out the rest of the series: LGBT fairy tales retellings & LGBT retellings of classic books.

    Now, when it comes to mythologies… I actually had a bit of a problem. I wasn’t sure if I should include retellings of The Odyssey, for example. Sure, we have mythology there, but also part three of this series is going to be Classic Texts & wouldn’t it be more of a fit there? I even ran a poll on twitter and y’all were who decided in the end. :>>

    Also obviously my first thought for this theme was The Song of Achilles, because I am gay and love to suffer, but I figured there’s no point in reccing a book we have all read multiple times.

    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.)

    See also: LGBT retellings of folklore, fairy tales, classic books & books about historical figures
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  • All Recommended,  Book Recs,  Literature

    Book Recs: Sapphic Historical Fiction (I)

    30 July, 2019

    Approximately once a month, twitter throws up a certain argument along the lines of there is no f/f, or where is all the f/f, or where is all the hyped f/f. And while I think there is a genuine case to be made for f/f books getting less attention, that doesn’t mean there is none (and also to say there is barely any/none blatantly ignores the authors who are producing f/f and the publishers who are backing it (did you know there are several publishing houses who only publish f/f), which is not cool). Basically, it’s there if you look.

    But this will become too much of a rant unless I shut up now.

    What I’m aiming to do with this series is provide you with a bunch of rec lists so that, next time someone says there’s no f/f, you can point them in this direction. Because yes. There is f/f.

    Quickly, and finally, before I start I want to point you towards Mahana @ Sapphic Library who not only posts a lot of sapphic rec lists, but also has a twitter dedicated to it all.

    So, on with the historical f/f recs! (There is some overlap in some cases with fantasy and mystery, just fyi.)

    P. S. in the interests of full disclosure: I haven’t read all of these. This is less a rec list in the sense that these are ones I’ve read and enjoyed, more these are 20 f/f historical books as proof they do exist.

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  • Book Club,  Literature

    Book Club: August Read

    23 July, 2019

    It’s time to make this official on our blog!! The choice did take us a while, because honestly, we had a lot of good candidates… But guys, we know what book our book club will be reading in August!!

    As per the poll on twitter, which you guys voted in for days, we chose a fantasy book. And as per our preferences & also a belief that a hype our books doesn’t just appear out of this air, it has to be created by readers – we chose to read an F/F book.

    First, though, let me remind you guys how we plan on doing this. We have a twitter account that we encourage you all to follow – Reads Rainbow Book Club. We’ll be using that to chat about the book, adding the hashtag #readarainbow. (Get it? Because it’s gay? Yeah, you get it.) At the end of August, we will post our reviews of the book & tell you what we plan on reading in September.

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  • All Recommended,  Book Recs,  Literature

    Book Recs: Neurodiverse Characters

    20 July, 2019

    This rec list comes from a request I got on twitter for LGBT books with neurodiverse characters. Obviously, neurodiversity covers an enormous spectrum, so I’m in no way attempting to cover all that (and if you look at the list, you can probably see where there are gaps, i.e. rep that isn’t anxiety, depression, PTSD, because sure those are the most common disorders but there’s a lot more out there).

    What I’m attempting to give you here is a handful of recs (ownvoices where possible, elsewise covered respectfully) to start you off. And, as ever, I would happily take recs from you in return. (Also I have extended the rec list to feature 12 books instead of the usual 10 just so I can broaden the variety here.)

    P.S. I’m only giving the rep for the neurodiverse LGBT character(s) in the book, even if there are more LGBT or neurodiverse characters in all. If that makes sense.

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  • All Reviews,  Literature

    Blog Tour: This is How You Lose the Time War

    18 July, 2019

    We’re so excited to be part of a blog tour for This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal el-Mohtar and Max Gladstone! This beautiful little epistolary novel is out today, and is definitely one you’re going to want to pick up (like, now, please pick it up right now). If you’ve been looking for an f/f book with that kind of intense and all-consuming romance you only ever see with m/m or m/f couples? Well, how can you say no to this?

    So, scroll down, read my review, and then head on over to the other blogs to see how they felt.

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    Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading.

    And thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more.

    Except discovery of their bond would be death for each of them. There’s still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war. That’s how war works. Right?

    This is How You Lose the Time War

    Amal el-Mohtar & Max Gladstone

    Rating: 5/5 ðŸŒˆ
    Published: 18th July 2019
    Goodreads
    Rep: wlw mcs

    But hunger is a many-splendoured thing: it needn’t be conceived in limbic terms, in biology. Hunger, Red – to sate a hunger or to stoke it, to feel hunger as a furnace, to trace its edges like teeth – is this a thing you, singly, know? Have you ever had a hunger that whetted itself on what you fed it, sharpened so keen and bright that it might split you open, break a new thing out?

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  • All Recommended,  Book Recs,  Literature

    Book Recs: LGBT Retellings (Fairy Tales)

    11 July, 2019

    I mentioned on twitter the other day that I was thinking of making a post like this and everyone was very into the idea. I mean, what’s better than taking a classic story we all know & putting a gay spin on it, right?

    I put a parenthesis in the title of this rec list and there’s a very simple reason for it: there are going to be two more in the “series”! One for classic books (think Peter Pan or Sherlock Holmes) and one for mythologies (in a very broad meaning of the word). So look out for those!

    Before we start, let me make an honorary mention of Ash by Malinda Lo, the lesbian retelling of Cinderella. It’s not on the list itself because I can’t rec you a book you all already know, can I? But just in case you forgot for a second…

    And now, let’s go boldly into the world of LGBT fairy tales!

    See also: LGBT retellings of folklore, fairy tales, classic books & books about historical figures
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  • All Reviews,  Book Club,  Literature

    Buddy Read: Girl Made of Stars

    22 June, 2019

    Week three of our little, proud project is upon us and this time we were reading a book with a bisexual protagonist. Cool fact about this book is that the MC actually uses the label, it shows up multiple times and there’s actual on page representation. Feels good, feels organic. (It’s also another book by Ashley Herring Blake where that happens!)

    That being said, if you count me and Anna individually, we’re currently going 1 in 4 for how good our buddy reads are. So, to say we’re really hoping the last book improves on that is an understatement…

    Read on to find out which one of us actually enjoyed this week’s book!

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