Tag: queer literature

sapphicliterature:

Huntress by Malinda Lo

Nature is out of balance in the human world. The sun hasn’t shone in years, and crops are failing. Worse yet, strange and hostile creatures have begun to appear. The people’s survival hangs in the balance.

To solve the crisis, the oracle stones are cast, and Kaede and Taisin, two seventeen-year-old girls, are picked to go on a dangerous and unheard-of journey to Tanlili, the city of the Fairy Queen. Taisin is a sage, thrumming with magic, and Kaede is of the earth, without a speck of the otherworldly. And yet the two girls’ destinies are drawn together during the mission. As members of their party succumb to unearthly attacks and fairy tricks, the two come to rely on each other and even begin to fall in love. But the Kingdom needs only one huntress to save it, and what it takes could tear Kaede and Taisin apart forever.

Genres: fantasy, adventure, romance

Get the book from The Book Depository here and follow the author on tumblr @malindalo

So glad this book is mentioned here – if you love women warriors, magic, fairy tales, the supernatural – and women who love women – you’ll love this.  

Follow up by reading ‘Ash’ – set a few hundred years after ‘Huntress’ – Ash is a retelling of the Cinderella story, a rich fairytale and slow burn romance between the King’s Huntress and a young girl who has lost her mother and become ensnared by the fae.  

Hi! Do you know any lesbian romance novels with a fat or chubby protagonist?

shiraglassman:

biandlesbianliterature:

Unfortunately, I’m not super well read in the romance genre, so I don’t have one that immediately comes to mind… Definitely check out Casey the Canadian Lesbrarian’s post about Fat-Positive LGBT Books. Also, Princess Princess Ever After is a fantasy comic, but it has a chubby protagonist.

@lessthanthreepress @riptidepublishing​ @shiraglassman Any suggestions?

the love interest in Rebekah Weatherspoon’s contemporary erotic romance At Her Feet is a chubby Latina (review)

one of the two girls in @kayla-bird‘s teens-with-powers SFF Screaming Down Splitsville is a nurturing, chubby butch girl (review)

& I also offer you Aviva, the chubby, bi love interest to the MC in all my Mangoverse books (but she hardly has any screen time at all in the first one.) @timewarnercable

I’m a bit reluctant to add this as the reader wants ‘romance novel,’ but Emma Donoghue’s ‘Hood’ features a self-described overweight protagonist (I think there’s a line where she says she gets ‘bigger and bitchier over time.’). Pen is a fantastic character, but the story itself is awfully angsty (she relives memories of a recently deceased but much loved partner).   It is set in Ireland in the 90s so being ‘out’ was simply not possible and it is one of the themes of their relationship.  In spite of the angst, there is an overall hopeful tone (for Pen to go on) and, along with her novel Stir Fry, and the collection Kissing the Witch, I think are excellent ‘romantically-minded’ novels for YA.  Donoghue is a masterful writer.  

bookriot:

Everyone has a superpower. It can be just about anything—making
complex spreadsheets, frying an egg perfectly, or understanding
calculus. For me, it’s spotting Asians in media.

I can scan a 100+ book list and find the three written by Asian
authors. When I’m watching movies, I always catch the lone Asian face in
the crowd. And given a cast of illustrated characters, I can
immediately suss out the one Asian. By the way, “but they don’t REALLY
look Asian, so that doesn’t count” is bullshit and erasure.

All this to say that when I’m reading, I naturally gravitate toward
the ‘mirrors’ in YA lit: the books that reflect who I am. I’m always on
the lookout for LGBTQIA young adult books. Only a tiny percentage of
them are by or about PoC, much less Asians.

Nevertheless, I gift you with five* YA books starring queer Asian characters.

http://bookriot.com/2016/10/11/ncod-5-queer-asian-ya-books/

Just a note here: Lo’s ‘Ash’ is set in the same universe as Huntress, only a few hundred years later.  

10 Should Reads

lesbiansubtextempire:

for Ladies into Ladies into Sci-fi/Fantasy

[You like Buffy, contemporary urban fantasy, witches, sisterhood, Young Adult]

[You like classic fantasy, epic fantasy, quests, magic, sole survivors]

[You like military fantasy, matriarchal societies, female warriors, slow-burn bow chicka-wow-wow]

[You like shapeshifters, secret societies, romance, star crossed lovers]

[You like super powered mutants, near future dystopias, underdogs, and orphans who like to box]

[You like Zombies, pop culture references, innuendos and sass]

[You like Norse mythology, urban fantasy, blacksmiths, dragons and Portland]

[You like classic Science Fiction, parallel universes, poetry and philosphy]

[You like gothic ghost stories, mind-fucks, atmospheric autumn novels in a New England setting]

[You like robots, space, science fiction, wit, scathing satire]

You really should read more lesbian books, so you’re perfectly free to see this as the kick in the ass that you need to do just that. Pick one and read it. Pick two, read both. Pick all. Just read more lesbian books.

Thanks for sharing this!

Can I add Malinda Lo’s ‘Ash’ and ‘Huntress’ – the first a take on the Cinderella story and the second is a classic fantasy adventure in the same universe as Ash, but set several hundred years earlier.   Her science fiction thrillers Adaptation and its sequel, Inheritance are excellent, also.  

If you like a different take on fairytales, Emma Donoghue’s Kissing the Witch is absolutely a must-read. Lyrical, challenging – totally reinvents classic fairy tales for modern readers.