“People who say change is impossible are usually pretty happy with things just as they are.”
In today’s world, amidst the ongoing tensions caused by the fight for racial equality, isolation from the Coronavirus, and political dissent in the aftermath of a negligent administration, it seems that humanity is more divided than ever. N.K. Jemisin’s The City We Becameerases those arbitrary borders,…

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Posted 8 months ago reblog 16 notes

Danika reviews Zami: A New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde

Images of women flaming like torches adorn and define the borders of my journey, stand like dykes between me and the chaos. It is the images of women, kind and cruel, that lead me home.
Audre Lorde is a name that looms large in lesbian literature, in Black history, and in her legacy in poetry. I have read some of her essays and poems, but I hadn’t before read a long-form work by her. Zami

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Once we talked about how Black women had been committed without choice to waging our campaigns in the enemies’ strongholds, too much and too often, and how our psychic landscapes had been plundered and wearied by those repeated battles and campaigns.

Zami by Audre Lorde

Posted 9 months ago reblog 20 notes

Maggie reviews Treasure by Rebekah Weatherspoon

In these trying times, the romance stories I am drawn to most right now involve two characters taking one look at each other and going “Oh.” Enemies to lovers or any variation thereof has its place, and is a trope I do enjoy, but right now what I want is two characters just being into each other. Treasure by Rebekah Weatherspoonfulfills that need. It’s a cute rich girl/working girl novella…

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felinepurrrstory:

Amruta Patil’s Kari (2008) was perhaps the first widely published and circulated Indian graphic novel with a lesbian character. Kari is a short-haired, androgynous woman who mourns the end of her relationship with another woman in crowded-yet-lonely Mumbai.

[image description: the cover of Kari by Amruta Patil, a photo of Amruta Patil, and several pages and panels from the graphic novel]

Posted 9 months ago reblog 694 notes

Anonymous:

Hi! I tried looking through the tags so I have some ideas but what would you rec for YA or New Adult that has a (explicitly) black lesbian MC?

lgbtqreads:

This is What it Feels Like by Rebecca Barrow (one of the 3 MCs)
Cinderella is Dead by Kalynn Bayron
The Stars and the Blackness Between Them by Junauda Petrus
Treasure by Rebekah Weatherspoon (NA)
Once Ghosted, Twice Shy by Alyssa Cole (passably NA)
Also, I’ll mention The Weight of the Stars by K. Ancrum, in which the LI, not the MC, is Black, but both are lesbians and the author is Black

Posted 9 months ago reblog 65 notes

“ Fairytale retelling? Check. Descent to villainy? Check. Sapphic slowburn romance? Check. Monster girlfriend? Double check. Girl, Serpent, Thorn was every bit as magical as I wanted it to be. It has such a wonderful fairytale vibe to it, with...

Fairytale retelling? Check. Descent to villainy? Check. Sapphic slowburn romance? Check. Monster girlfriend? Double check. Girl, Serpent, Thorn was every bit as magical as I wanted it to be. It has such a wonderful fairytale vibe to it, with picturesque forests and carved out mountains, and I want nothing more than to read f/f villain monster romances forever.

Girl, Serpent, Thorn by Melissa Bashardoust was reviewed at Anxious Nachos

Posted 9 months ago reblog 77 notes

“ Melissa Bashardoust’s Girl, Serpent, Thorn has the lushness of a fairy tale and the boldness of the best contemporary YA fantasy. This opulent novel, inspired by traditional Persian stories, combines all the romance and intrigue of high fantasy...

Melissa Bashardoust’s Girl, Serpent, Thorn has the lushness of a fairy tale and the boldness of the best contemporary YA fantasy. This opulent novel, inspired by traditional Persian stories, combines all the romance and intrigue of high fantasy with a deep exploration of the main character’s emotional world and relationship to her own strength.
The story is sexy, bloody, and luxurious, but perhaps the most interesting part is the way Soraya slowly begins to see the things that have always made her different as not a weakness, but a strength.

Girl, Serpent, Thorn by Melissa Bashardoust was reviewed at Lambda Literary

Posted 9 months ago reblog 76 notes

“ I couldn’t believe that this novel, The Stars and the Blackness Between Them, was a debut work! It was so poetic and lyrically written, and Petrus painted such a vibrant picture into the lives of Audre and Mabel.
This is a young adult romance that...

I couldn’t believe that this novel, The Stars and the Blackness Between Them, was a debut work! It was so poetic and lyrically written, and Petrus painted such a vibrant picture into the lives of Audre and Mabel.
This is a young adult romance that is written in a way that acknowledges the complexity and emotional depth that people in their teens have. It can be seen as a beautiful time to be experiencing all of the intricacies of love and dating, and this book is a beautiful experience to read. There are other elements of racial justice that fit in very well to the current political climate.