I love made-for-tv Christmas rom-coms, and I’ve been soothing myself with them since Halloween. My expectations for these movies aren’t high, but every once and a while I come across one worth a rewatch. One of my faves this year is Christmas Ever After because of its catnippy premise—a romance novelist who falls for her cover model. It’s pretty much tailor-made for romance fans who like lighthearted holiday movies. Izzi is a successful author whose … Continue reading Movie Review: Christmas Ever After→
All you need to know about this book is two things: It has zero percent angst and one hundred percent love, making it a perfect balm for any bad day. It’s inspired by Anne of Green Gables! Anne and Diana falling in love? I was living for it from the first page to the last. Tessa O’Connell and Montgomery “Monty” Ford are best friends. Always have been, always will be. Tessa is a loud, loveable … Continue reading Who We Could Be by Chelsea M. Cameron→
Sometimes a book is just exactly what you need right when you need it, and The Lord of Stariel was that book for me. I had been saving it up for a while because the blurb sounded wonderful, but I was nervous about whether it would live up to my expectations. One night in the weeks leading up to the US presidential election, I was in desperate need of a distraction and I finally started … Continue reading The Lord of Stariel by AJ Lancaster→
Because of its Christmas “meet cute” and other pivotal scenes that take place at Christmas, I consider the groundbreaking classic The Price of Salt (also published as Carol) to be a holiday book, although much of it takes place at other times in the year. With that in mind, December is the perfect time to read this short novel about two women who meet during the Christmas season in New York City and who find … Continue reading The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith→
I adored this book because of the heroine but I also had some serious problems with it. It pains me to say that although this book was fun, funny, sexy, entertaining, and has a heroine whom I adore, it was also problematic in its Gay Best Friend stereotype and the ending was rushed. The heroine of this book is a 46-year-old divorcee named Greer, a superheroine who has hot flashes due to early-onset menopause and … Continue reading Caped and Dangerous by Isabel Jordan→
Her Pretend Christmas Date is a novella comprised almost entirely of Catherine catnip. I am an absolute sucker for White Christmas settings, I love me a Fake Relationship (especially when they come with Only One Bed), I adore a buttoned-up hero who gets completely unravelled by a messy heroine but do you know what I really love? A Christmas gathering that devolves into a gingerbread house making competition that is run, commentated on and judged … Continue reading Her Pretend Christmas Date by Jackie Lau→
Her Magical Pet is a collection of SFF short stories featuring women in love and their magical pets. It was put together as a fundraiser for OutRight Action International, an organisation that fights for the rights of LGBTIQA people worldwide. It is a collection of gentle, low-tension stories about women in love with women, or women falling in love with women, featuring cute magical pets and happy ever afters. About half the stories are traditional … Continue reading Her Magical Pet, edited by Rachel Manija Brown→
I have so many feelings about this book, which hit on more than one of my nerdy passions, most notably the fate of the Lost Franklin Expedition. I expected historical fiction and got a mystery that kept me reading late into the night. Lady Franklin is the wife of Captain Sir John Franklin, an Arctic explorer who disappeared along with his crew. After many attempts have been made by men to find him have failed, … Continue reading The Arctic Fury by Greer Macallister→
CW/TW: abortion consideration, biphobia from parent Finn is out of prison, building a new life for herself far away in Austin. When she visits a low-income clinic to get a prescription for migraine meds, Finn runs into the one person she least expects to see: Vivi, the nurse Finn worked alongside for two years at the prison’s pharmacy. Finn was devastated eight months ago when Vivi stopped showing up for work one day with no … Continue reading Get It Right by Skye Kilaen→
Ten Things I Hate About You is one of my favourite films and a truly great reimagining of a classic play. It takes Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew and strips out the misogyny, the violence, and the straight up gaslighting and abuse, while keeping the banter and the chemistry between Kate and Petrucchio. Ten Things I Hate About the Duke takes Shrew in one hand and Ten Things in the other, stirs them together, adds … Continue reading Ten Things I Hate About The Duke by Loretta Chase→
About a quarter of the way into When a Rogue Meets His Match, I realized the book was probably not going to be a particularly successful villain redemption or enemies-to-lovers romance. About three-quarters of the way in, I started to wonder what, exactly, the intended message of this book was, because it was verging in a startlingly uncomfortable way on emotional abuse apologia. Everything after that felt like too little, too late in terms of … Continue reading When a Rogue Meets his Match by Elizabeth Hoyt→
CW: gruesome violence, discussion of rape and slavery I DEVOURED The Blacksmith Queen, the first book in this series. I’ve read it and reread it and will probably read it again. So it was with VERY grabby hands that I reached for this sequel. I present for your edification and delight (hopefully!) 5 Steps to Loving The Princess Knight. Step 1: Get Ready for Some Violence This book is brutal in its portrayal of violence. … Continue reading The Princess Knight by G. A. Aiken→
