This book moves very quickly, and while a lot happens, the plot doesn’t venture too deeply in any one direction: not into the history, not into the setting, not into the characters’ motivations. I dove into this book because it was about a Dutch widow in 1654 who travels from her very small hometown to Delft and becomes a pottery painter. Obviously, that’s exactly like Regency England and every other historical I’ve read. (Ha. Not.) … Continue reading Midnight Blue by Simone van der Vlugt →
Wanna Bet by Talia Hibbert is a friends-to-lovers romance and it features–get this!–adults who have to do actual adulting in order to be together! Holy shit! Emotional accountability FTW! I am personally so sick of books that feature “all my emotional hangups are resolved because I want to put my dick in you!” as the solution to any internal conflict. In Wanna Bet? the hero and heroine had to do actual work on themselves in order to … Continue reading Wanna Bet? by Talia Hibbert →
We’re so happy to have this guest squee of Set It Up, a new romantic comedy on Netflix! This squee is from Darbi Bradley and you can find her on Twitter (@darbibradley). Darbi is a romance reader from Toronto, Canada currently living in Washington, DC. She hasn’t thought about moving home since November 2016. Not once… … I am supposed to be studying for my Business Law final (I like to stay very #onbrand as a member … Continue reading Guest Squee: Set It Up →
Long have we bemoaned the fall of the Romantic Comedy genre, and we aren’t the only ones. Chrissy Teigen feels our pain. Netflix felt that pain and seems to be willing the entire genre back into our hearts. Thank god, I know I need a bit of wacky hijinks and perhaps more screwball in my life right now. Set It Up is a Netflix original starring Zoey Deutch and Glen Powell as Harper and Charlie, … Continue reading Movie Review: Set It Up →
Killing Eve is feminist, ethnically diverse, and LGBTQIA friendly. It features incredible clothes. It also, in the very first episode, includes the extremely violent and horrifying use of a hairpin. It is simultaneously glamorous (those clothes!) and gritty (Russian prison! Dour cubicles!). I watched six of the eight episodes in a single day (I watched the other two the day before). The series killed off my productivity with even more efficiency than it killed off … Continue reading Summer TV Binge: Killing Eve →
Startup Fiancé by Shilpa Mudiganti is a short contemporary romance that features an arranged marriage, corporate rivals, and an enemies-to-lovers storyline. It’s a quick read, but the length inhibited all of the emotional development I craved. Arav Shetty and Nisha Jain are rivals; both are founders of successful app start-ups, Tech Notes and Note Nirvana, respectively. Reading about characters who developed note-taking apps made me realize how much my loves-planners-and-lists brain wants a good note-taking … Continue reading Startup Fiance by Shilpa Mudiganti →
His Very Own Girl is a historical romance set in England during WWII. The protagonists are an American medic (Joe) and an English pilot (Lulu). Lulu flies for the Air Transport Auxiliary (ATS), ferrying planes from one airstrip to another. I could not stop picturing Lulu as Peggy Carter, but with a pilot’s license, which means of course that I adored her. Joe is a less sympathetic hero in the sense that he is quite … Continue reading His Very Own Girl by Carrie Lofty →
Persephone is a graphic novel that re-imagines the Persephone story from Greek mythology as a fantasy about science, magic, mothers, and daughters. It’s not a romance. Instead, it’s a coming-of-age story about a girl who has to emerge from her mother’s shadow and find her own identity. In this version, the world above (Eleusis) and the world below (Hades) existed in peace until Hades, Lord of the Underworld, became paranoid and launched war on Eleusis. Hades … Continue reading Persephone by Loic Locatelli-Kournwsky →
Betty’s Boob is a graphic novel about a woman’s emotional and physical recovery from a mastectomy. It’s joyous and body-positive. However, it doesn’t pull any punches with depicting the physical and emotional pain that Betty goes through along the way. Because of this, some people may find this book to be triggering rather than empowering – it depends on the individual reader. The book is almost completely wordless. Betty wakes up from a mastectomy and demands … Continue reading About Betty’s Boob by Vero Cazot and Julie Rocheleau →
Bright Star (2009) is a historical romance between poet John Keats (played here by Ben Whishaw) and Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish). It’s not a spoiler to say that Keats died young, so it’s not a happy movie. However, if you are in the mood for sexual tension, historical costuming, and some astonishingly beautiful cinematography, then this is the movie for you. It was written and directed by Jane Campion, who adapted Andrew Motion’s Keats: A … Continue reading Movie Review: Bright Star →
The Lotus Palace is a historical romance/mystery set in Tang Dynasty China. It is the first in the short but fantastic Pingkang Li Mysteries Series. I adore the setting, the characters, and the delicate way that the issue of consent is handled given the many forms of inequality within the society in which our characters live. This is a slow-paced book, but one that allows a relationship to mature over time in a believable way … Continue reading The Lotus Palace by Jeannie Lin →
