Skip to main content

Featured

The Empress of All Seasons by Emiko Jean

Each generation, a competition is held to find the next empress of Honoku. The rules are simple. Survive the palace's enchanted seasonal rooms. Conquer Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. Marry the prince. All are eligible to compete--all except yokai, supernatural monsters and spirits whom the human emperor is determined to enslave and destroy. Mari has spent a lifetime training to become empress. Winning should be easy. And it would be, if she weren't hiding a dangerous secret. Mari is a yokai with the ability to transform into a terrifying monster. If discovered, her life will be forfeit. As she struggles to keep her true identity hidden, Mari's fate collides with that of Taro, the prince who has no desire to inherit the imperial throne, and Akira, a half-human, half-yokai outcast. Torn between duty and love, loyalty and betrayal, vengeance and forgiveness, the choices of Mari, Taro, and Akira will decide the fate of Honoku in this beautifully written, edge-of-your-seat YA...
Post a Comment
Read more
Labels

These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart by Izzy Wasserstein

In mid-21st century-Kansas City, Dora hasn't been back to her old commune in years. But when Dora's ex-girlfriend Kay is killed, and everyone at the commune is a potential suspect, Dora knows she's the only person who can solve the murder.

As Dora is dragged back into her old community and begins her investigations, she discovers that Kay's death is only one of several terrible incidents. A strange new drug is circulating. People are disappearing. And Dora is being attacked by assailants from her pre-transition past.

Meanwhile, It seems like a war between two nefarious corporations is looming, and Dora's old neighborhood is their battleground. Now she must uncover a twisted conspiracy, all while navigating a deeply meaningful new relationship.

PUBLISHER: Tachyon Publications
YEAR: 2024
LENGTH: 81 pages 
AGE: Adult
GENRE: Dystopian, Science Fiction, Thriller
RECOMMENDED: Highly

Queer Rep Summary: Lesbian/Sapphic Main Character(s), Genderqueer/Nonbinary Secondary Character(s), Trans Main Character(s).

*I received a free review copy in exchange for an honest review of this book. 

THESE FRAGILE GRACES, THIS FUGITIVE HEART is a queer thriller about a trans woman who returns to her former anarchist compound and ends up investigating her ex's murder. It intimacy, autonomy, and connection, as well as the timeless question of "if you fuck your own clone, is it incest or masturbation?"

THESE FRAGILE GRACES strange and vibrant, set in a dystopia with governmental and corporate neglect inversely proportional to the wealth of the residents, when any remain at all. The worldbuilding is drawn in broad strokes, only explaining as much as is relevant to Dora's thoughts at any one moment. What is explained is about the result, not the path to get there, as much of the collapse happened before her lifetime. 

Even as the mystery part of the story takes a bit of a backseat to Dora's identity crisis when confronted with her clones, it never loses the tense thread which began with her ex-girlfriend's murder and sudden return to a place she left under stressful circumstances. 

If you like queer dystopian thrillers, don't miss THESE FRAGILE GRACES, THIS FUGITIVE HEART.

Graphic/Explicit CW for blood, violence, gun violence, death.

Moderate CW for transphobia, deadnaming, grief, sexual content, incest, injury detail, medical content, medical trauma, murder, parental death.

Minor CW for drug use, drug abuse, vomit.

Bookshop Affiliate Buy Link

Add this on TheStoryGraph

A glitchy magenta face, with most of the features obscured by distortion or darkness


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular Posts