Hello, everyone! It’s Wednesday Links time and this edition is brought to you by readers like you! Seriously, most of today’s links came in by submission from the community. Keep ’em coming!
It’s mid-May and my allergies have made an appearance. So far, they aren’t as bad as previous years, but dry eyes are a new symptom and while my meds are working, I hate that stuffy head feeling.
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Ellen sent this one – thanks, Ellen! The New York Times has the “top books” from 2000-2023. Ellen notes there are over 3,000 titles and she only counted eight romances among them. Do you have thoughts on the list?
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Heather S. let us know that another romance bookstore opened up, this time in Panama, Florida! Heather said:
Half of the store is used books, mostly fiction of various types, and the other half is mostly romance – contemporary, dark, fantasy, etc. Lots of indie authors.
I love a used book section; it feels like such a scavenger hunt. Heather also sent in a photo:
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In Cosmopolitan, Meaghan Wray writes about the treatment of fat people on reality TV. Obviously, trigger warnings here for discussion of weight, weight shaming, and weight loss.
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EC Spurlock sent us this OwlCam! The two owls are named Barney Rubble and Betty White. There are also some that are due to hatch; they may have already started.
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Don’t forget to share what cool or interesting things you’ve seen, read, or listened to this week! And if you have anything you think we’d like to post on a future Wednesday Links, send it my way!
This article on “anti-sex beds” for Olympic athletes amused me and also has me wondering how many of these cardboard (?!?!) beds will end up trashed due to vigorous bonking. Let the hot, young athletes do what they do best! Or, er, second best, after their chosen sport. Also has there been a rec league for Olympic romances? I think I’ve read a few, though usually the Olympics are at the end of the book. An Olympic ONS could be a great start to a book! Here’s hoping we see a few Olympics-inspired romances after the summer games in France, maybe even featuring these goofy beds!
https://sports.yahoo.com/anti-sex-beds-arrived-paris-163026041.html
I’ve had a slightly sticky couple of weeks (nothing too bad, but I started a new job, and have lots of other things going on at the same time), but had a nice moment among the chaos scrolling through the 2024 Comedy Pet Photo Awards. I think the dog in the snow was my favourite.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2024/may/10/2024-comedy-pet-photo-awards-in-pictures
Cats and model railways.
@squee me: Elyse Springer’s HEAD OVER HEELS addresses what happens when hot, young, incredibly fit athletes are together in close proximity for competition (including, iirc, the Olympics). There’s a funny moment when someone mistakenly knocks on one of the MC’s door and, not seeing the expected person, doesn’t miss a beat before asking the MC if he’s DTF.
Honestly, I live for the bird cams. I watch one eagle duo, Jackie and Shadow, in Big Bear Valley, California, just about every day. Seeing them going about their eagle business is so soothing.
@squee me After the Gold (which I think I learned of here on SBTB a while back!) has a pairs figure-skating duo as the leads and is interesting because winning the Olympic gold happens really early on in the story instead of being the culmination— the story is really mostly about navigating life and identity post-Olympics and exploring what that means outside of the sport that they’ve been training for from a really young age. But it’s also partly set during a couple of different (fictional) Olympics, through flashbacks.
Kiss and Cry by Keira Andrews is an m/m about rival men’s Olympic figure skaters.
Elizabeth Harmon’s Red Hot Russians series is all figure skaters…
Layla Reyne’s Changing Lanes series is m/m Olympic swimmers.
And I thought the Snow & Ice Games series was Olympics, but it’s a different competition, LOL.
I feel pretty confident that a horde of young, incredibly fit people don’t need beds to show each other a good time.
Reactor magazine has an article about the Sunfire imprint titled Chaos under the Corset by Leah Blaine about the subversive messages hidden behind very traditional covers.
(Sorry I’m html impaired.)
BTW, I loved Harmon’s Red Hot Russians series, especially the one with featuring the reality tv show and no actual skating.
@PamG: I read the same article. We should applaud subversion in all its forms:
https://reactormag.com/chaos-under-the-corset-when-romance-covers-hide-revolution/?utm_medium=email&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8OsEQN_arp4MSpBTH9axCs20PUMxr9G7XMNatri0Ss0VhdPCDCM18kkMVefkAydlHk5WM4cY3Qp_DeQ_lSYo9zTBHhaA&_hsmi=307379690&utm_content=307379690&utm_source=hs_email