The Southern Bookclub’s Guide to Slaying Vampires | Review

It’s been a good few years since I’ve endeavoured to read any horror. I read Shirley Jackson and sort of figured it wouldn’t get much better so why bother? But I’ve been writing a story that involves vampires and as much as I adore Shirley Jackson she has very little to offer in the way of vampires and having read all the vampire books I own I thought I’d pick up something new. I picked up Fangs by Sarah Anderson, a cute little graphic story about a vampire and a werewolf dating, and then I found the complete opposite of that in Grady Hendrix’s The Southern Bookclub’s Guide to Slaying Vampires.

The Southern Bookclub is a lot like what the title sounds like; a group of housewives in the south come together over their love of true crime fiction (which we can all relate to) but when a new neighbour arrives in town with an aversion to sunlight, a Ted Bundy feel and a trail of missing children behind him Patricia tries to spur the bookclub into action.

This is the first of Grady Hendrix’s work I’ve ever read and holy crap did it revive my faith in horror fiction; the bitter cocktail of suspense, frustration, and beautiful writing that Hendrix mixes makes a work of art that to me at least is better than anything Stephen King has ever even dreamed of.

The horror was hardly in the vampire at all, this was an exploration of the inherent horror of womanhood in a patriarchal society. The lack of agency and lack of protection these women and their children are offered is at the centre of the novels terror, because their lack of agency endangers everyone. These women are knowledgeable and fiercely protective of what they have, but they cannot move freely through their community outside of what is acceptable, despite this they are the communities last line of true defence as they try to protect their families. This is a harsh critique of gender roles and racism and oppressive communities all wrapped up in the most textbook perfect (though no less brilliant for it) example of southern gothic horror.

I’m usually quite wary of women’s stories written by white men, and thankfully I only bought this book based on the title or I might not have considered it. Hendrix writes womanhood better than any cis white man I’ve ever read, no one is boobing boobily down the stairs in this novel. The race side of things wasn’t explored too much, but when it was it was painfully realistic and our protagonist, Patricia, fell short a lot in this regard and became a painfully realistic example of passive racism that Hendrix did so well with a subtlety in Patricia’s own thoughts that only make her shortcomings more horrid to the reader.

Hendrix offers us a new and original kind of vampire, laced with the same classic concerns of sexuality and corruption of community that Dracula brought with him when he docked at Whitby, but his critiques of American values makes it a brilliant and fresh addition to the vampire genre. I’m almost scared to read anything else by him in case it doesn’t match up to this masterpiece.

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue | Review

I read The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue toward the end of 2020. Addie and Piranesi were the only two books I’d been really excited for last year and thankfully neither of them let me down. VE Schwab gives us a fresh take on the Faustian bargain and makes it so somber and sweet and gentle that it was a balm for a troubled soul, ironically. It took me a solid week to finish it though, simply because I knew I’d never be prepared for the book hangover that inevitably came afterwards.

In case you avoided everything online in 2020, which is understandable, here’s a quick outline. Addie LaRue is a girl, born into a French village in the 1600s. Even as a child she knows she doesn’t want what her mother wants for her; marriage, husband, domestic life (cue some real Belle vibes), she prefers running wild and hanging out with the village wise woman learning about the old gods. So when her mother tries to force her into marriage she calls on the old gods, and a dark one answers, she wishes for escape to live forever to be entirely free, and she is granted all of it with a cruel twist: every person she meets immediately forgets her, and once she is fed of up this existence she can give her soul to the darkness. Addie is a survivor though, and centuries later she finds the one thing she never thought she would; someone who remembers her.

If you happen to be a big VE Schwab fan (and you should be if you’re not) this isn’t like her other books, or at least not like the ones I’ve read. It’s a gentler, more folkloric sort of fantasy, that tackles morality and personhood and memory other wonderfully deep things without a whole lot of world building. This surprised me because Schwab’s world building is kind of what I loved most about her other works, but I was pleasantly surprised by the lack of it in Addie, as the reader we just have to accept what we see and sink into the story she offers us and let it soothe us. And while it definitely does soothe it also hypes you up to possibilities, to enjoying little things like walks in the park, old films, paint stains and good books.

What really intrigued me about this narrative was the jumping through time. Obviously Addie’s story is epic, it spans centuries, centuries filled with mostly the same things over and over; Addie stealing, Addie learning, Addie being forgotten. Schwab keeps it exciting by playing with Addie’s memories, we slip through her consciousness in a way, things she sees spark the narrative back a few hundred years, pieces of art, books, sculptures, memories all weave together to create a tapestry of Addie’s life and stitch it seamlessly to how she exists in our modern world.

Honestly, I wouldn’t even be mad if Schwab dropped her more typical fantasy for this sort of narrative entirely. Next time I need a comfort read I’ll definitely be turning to The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue.

The Secret Commonwealth | Review

I’ve been looking forward to reading The Secret Commonwealth for aaaaaaaaaages. La Belle Sauvage was incredible and I loved returning to Lyra’s world, but this time I wasn’t so impressed. This might be because of a few personal hang ups but hey, this is a personal review and I like what I like so here goes.

Let’s start with what I enjoyed because I like to start positive; I loved, loved, LOVED how the daemons were explored in this book. They are treated in the other books like a complete unquestionable certainty; your daemon settles you get some Dust, you’re an adult. Of course now that Lyra is older, is studying at university, and has lived through some shit it becomes clear that daemons aren’t as black and white as Mrs Coulter once implied. We see many different stories through Lyra’s travels of different people in different and strange circumstances with their daemons whilst Lyra suffers a strange new relationship with her own Pan.

As well as the daemons I loved that we get to see more of Lyra’s world and how it functions. Pullman showed us the East of Lyra’s world, how those cultures reflect our own, he showed us the complexity of the Magesterium and the way that trade and religion and war all interconnect. This was essentially a sort of magical, fictional look at history. Anyone who didn’t particularly enjoy history in school might not enjoy this book, there’s not too much action, it’s all history, trade, philosophy, basically a big ol’ nerdy way of worldbuilding and I loved it.

But, as with any books that aren’t written by Becky Chambers, I had a few issues with it. And these few issues made me question if I even want to keep reading the series. As I’ve said already this is a personal issue, but there was a rather disturbing and unnecessary scene where a group of soldiers attempt to rape Lyra. This did nothing to further the plot, it only seemed to satisfy the theory of Chekov’s gun (or Lyra’s stick in this case) and giving her a chance to use a weapon she’d been given earlier in the book. I understand that Lyra is no longer a little girl, but if the only way Pullman can show a girl has become a woman is with her sexuality then I’m gonna have a few problems with his efforts.

This also cropped up in Malcolm’s attraction to Lyra, there is only a ten year age difference between them but he cared for her whens she was a baby and taught her when she was a child, all of this screams red flag to me, though he feels uncomfortable with it himself it doesn’t stop him chasing Lyra all around the world to get a piece of her. I think we’re supposed to think her vaguely predatory tutor is preferable to a train full of soldiers raping her, but either way I’m disappointed in a writer I’d always trusted to write women well. I might just be more jaded now than the nine year old that loved His Dark Materials but who knows.

I’m the first to admit I had a complicated relationship with this book. The worldbuilding was wonderful, as it always is in Lyra’s world. But where Pullman seemed to thrive writing a little girl he seemed to stumble into the same pitfalls most men do when writing a grown woman.

The Time of Contempt | Review

I was missing my favourite genre so I thought I’d dive back into the Witcher books and read The Time of Contempt because sometimes you have a hankering for a bit of high fantasy. But, if you have to keep reminding yourself as you’re reading that it was written in the 90s (a year before I even existed) and that back then writing feminist characters maybe had different goalposts it might be best to just put the book down.

There are going to be some SPOILERS AHEAD so beware.

So this installment followed Ciri being taken to Aretuza to learn some good witchin’ by Yennefer. There was a bit of Geralt mixed in but he really doesn’t seem to be the main concern despite being the titular character (or maybe the title of the saga is referring to Ciri and her witcher training? Who knows) and Dandelion, arguably the best character, turns up a little. Of course, Ciri doesn’t make it to Aretuza and once again everything and everyone is blown off course because of some distant kings and queens and wizards fucking about, but we do learn a bit more about Ciri’s prophecy and Yennefer’s education and such.

Let me start off by saying that Ciri’s chapters were brilliant. There were a few hiccups, mostly due to the fact that Sapkowski thinks all women are temptresses by nature who only want the attentions of men and14 year old Ciri is his way of mapping that out I guess? But mostly seeing her grow and fight and genuinely be a spirited and petulant child whilst changing daily at the whims of her experience is actually well done.

Another scene I liked in particular was Dandelion explaining a recent battle to Geralt who had missed the action. As he spoke the narrative took us to certain individuals who had gone through the battle and the parts they played in it no matter how small and it was so well done and cinematic that I was finally able to get lost in the story for a little bit.

Buuuuut this is fantasy from the 90s written by a white man and I suppose I couldn’t expect the enjoyment to last. The absolute most uncomfortable scene was the party at Aretuza that, inexplicably, lasted for almost a whole chapter. And mostly it consisted of info dumps and the sorceresses flaunting their nipples and vying for Geralt’s attention as self-described “nymphomaniacs”… I am not kidding. These long-lived intelligent magic wielding women live their lives, Sapkowski tells us, in a world of sexual competition, where nothing matters more to them then one-upping one of their co-workers by sleeping her her homeless, grimy boyfriend who frankly is a bit dumb?

Honestly, the way women are written in this book are painful. I’ve seen a lot of people defending Yennefer’s characters as being amazing and well written (she genuinely said “oh heavens” because Geralt was so good in bed though so I don’t know) but why does every background female character exist to reinforce to the reader how great Yennefer is? It’s some real “you’re not like other girls” bullshit and I’m not here for it.

I will probably spend the rest of my life baffled as to how the Netflix series turned out so great. But saying that the series so far is based mostly on the short story collections that begin the saga which were incredible, though even then Yennefer ended up tied to a carriage wheel with her breasts hanging out using her “dainty” foot to wield magic so maybe I should have seen this coming.

The whole thing not only made me uncomfortable but the plot did not need a whole book! It could have been a chapter or two at most, I just… I am disappointed, but I am also invested enough in Ciri’s character to want to read on, the question is should I bother?

Why Men Want to Fuck Seals | thoughts on mermaids, men, and marriage

So this week I was listening to the Breaking the Glass Slipper Podcast (one of my absolute favourites I recommend everyone listen to it) and the episode on mermaids with Beth Cartwright, author of Feathertide, and it’s sent me into a spiral of thinking about mermaids so I thought I’d get it all out here since Covid-19 has me miles and miles away from anyone who would be willing to listen to this.

We all know what mermaids are, sexy fish-tailed ladies with flowing locks and lovely voices who tempt sailors to their doom. They aren’t the only ones who do this in folklore, there’s sirens, rusalkas, huldras, selkies, and about a million other terrible women who are completely at fault for the men chasing them. A mermaid, like a selkie, usually has a kind of love story to go along with their tales (ha); they either pursue a human man and either succeed and gain a soul or die and turn to sea foam, or they are stolen like Selkies with magical objects like combs, pearls, dinglehoppers you get it.

First of all, in the BTGS episode they discussed why these stories are framed like this, why have a woman who is half beast and the discussion on the meeting of a human mind with animal instinct was very interesting but it got me thinking about the more literal purpose of telling fairy tales. Beauty and the Beast is famously considered to warn women about their new husbands; they will be surly and strange and other at first but with time and patience the beast facade will disappear and you won’t feel so trapped. And I think possibly in the same vein mermaids serve the same purpose for men the beast serves for women.

• Your wife wants to go home to her family = your selkie bride longs for the sea
• Wife suffers postpartum and leaves/kills herself = she returned to the sea
• You get a big fancy dowry for marrying a women = magical items that bind her to you
• Your wife is having an affair = she’s simply going to stare longingly at the waves
• You can’t for the life of you understand your children = it’s just their watery merblood

Of course, unlike beauty, the bride stealing fisherman has control until he doesn’t. This isn’t “put up with your husband until you love him” this is “it’s not your fault you’re an awful husband who’s made no effort to understand his new bride, it’s the sea.” And why should a man feel bad about this anyway? He’s married her, given her children, given her a home, and most importantly given her a soul.

This idea that the mermaids should be grateful for what they’ve gotten from this intrusion practically screams out my next idea; the mermaid/selkie/crane wife myth is one of colonisation. Offering a soul in return for conformity is a pretty basic colonising tactic dressed up as missionary work and Christian concern. It’s almost a reversal of the Garden of Eden mythos; a woman is living perfectly in innocence beneath the waves before some interfering old fucker turns up and gives her knowledge damning her and telling her to be grateful.

These white men turn up in a strange land and promise everything good; new ways of living, new food, love, security, a thriving partnership, and a chance at a shiny new afterlife, only to use their stolen wives to temper storms at sea and take her land (well, sea) refuse to give it back. The colonised either have to make do or rebel. The greatest rebellion a mermaid can make is to leave and return to her native ocean home, a place where, though he’s tried, her husband cannot colonise or utilise without her. In this case what exactly is the mermaid myth saying? Is it for the colonisers, saying “keep those you colonise happy”? Or is it for the colonised, a sort of “this too shall pass and you can return to the sea” kind of thing?

Maybe it’s none of these things. Maybe it’s just a bunch of horny dudes at sea suffering from scurvy and debating how they’d fuck a fish. Either way I think about mermaids too much so I will probably come back and write a more coherent post soon.

A Blade So Black | Review

I picked up A Blade So Black because I LOVE LL McKinney’s twitter presence, I figured if I love her tweets this much a whole novel of her words is gonna be a treat, and folks it was.

A Blade So Black is primarily an Alice in Wonderland retelling. It follows Alice, a young black girl living in Atlanta with her mom who, after the death of her father, becomes a Dreamwalker, humans destined to slay the Nightmares fuelled by human fears that come from Wonderland a place fed by humans dreaming. It’s marketed as the Alice books meet Buffy and boy is that marketing on point.

There will be some SPOILERS AHEAD but there are three main things I wanna talk about; the Nightmares, the love interests, and the Black Knight. The most spoilery bits will be about the boys so I’ll do that bit last. Here we go.

Firstly, the Nightmares. This concept completely blew me away but it was the execution of concept that really brought it together. The Nightmares are born from bad dreams and ill feeling from the humans, and can be fought by Dreamwalkers with the power of their Muchness. There is one in particular that Alice struggles to fight and extinguish due to her own fear of it; the Nightmare born from the fatal shooting of a young black girl Brionne. Her failure to truly defeat this Nightmare sets the narrative in motion. The real question it poses is how can any individual black person have enough Muchness or enough stamina to really fight off institutional racism, especially when after every fight the fucker keeps coming back? It’s such a powerful metaphor that I found myself fuming on Alice’s behalf, on my behalf, on the behalf of every black girl out there, McKinney really knows how to get under your skin. And so does the Black Knight…

The Black Knight is a figure who wields a Vorpal blade and can make Fiends, a particularly horrible Nightmare. The Black Knight turns up and attacks Alice seemingly out of the blue. He is described as wearing “some sort of high impact body armor” (ch. 7) and unleashes a Fiend on Alice demanding he pass on a message for her. Now the Black Knight as a character is incredible to me. He is literally a cop; his identity is hidden by riot gear and he has safety in anonymity, he attacks a young black girl in the dark when he could have just used his big boy words, he he wields a weapon of insane power and runs pretty much unchecked with it, he creates pure fear, and his both infantilising and sexual nicknames he gives Alice make him all the more sinister. Basically, the Black Knight scares the shit out of me. But as with all cops he’s not the first and he, sadly, will not be the last. But more about that in a moment onto the love interests.

SOME MORE BIGGER SPOILERS AHEAD!

There are two main love interests in the book; Hatta, from Wonderland, and Chess, who is human. Both of them come to represent fear in some way for Alice. It is revealed that Hatta was the original Black Knight, basically making him a reformed cop, throughout the story he withholds information and is fairly physically affectionate with Alice which, him being her mentor and much older (being immortal), I found a little dodgy. Chess starts off in a stronger place; they go to school together, he doesn’t put Alice in situations of danger, but Alice puts him in danger and Chess ends the book being turned into a Fiend – other things happen to him but they’re not relevant to my analysis so I won’t spoil for no reason. When fighting off Fiend-Chess Alice’s fears from Brionne’s murder resurface, she is essentially being attacked by a white man she trusted and is close to death, horrifically, in the same place Brionne was shot.

McKinney uses a truly brilliant reimagining of a classic to remind us that being black and facing racism is a truly surreal and nonsense experience. Being a black woman is being down the rabbit hole trying to make sense of the racist bullshit around you, but unlike the original Alice black women need to be armed and ready to face it, there are no caterpillars or rabbits to help them only their own Muchness.

Heiress for Hire|Review

I picked this book up for its absolutely gorgeous cover! We all love a strong colour palette. But I wasn’t really sure what I was getting into. I picked it up expecting a straight romance, but was kind of surprised to find that there was a whole mystery going on too!

Heiress for Hire by Madeline Hunter, follows Minerva Hepplewhite, a young widow who has been left a massive portion of a Duke’s riches unexpectedly. Unexpectedly because she never once met the man. Enter Chase Randor (Chase is such a top notch romance hero name) the nephew of the Duke with a long standing career in solving mysteries. Both Minverva and Chase pursue the same goal; finding out what lead to the Duke’s death, and start to get in each others way.

The plot was about 50% romance and 50% murder mystery and strangely I actually enjoyed the mystery more! Piecing together what had happened as I read, realising what little hints means gave me a greater appreciation of the mystery genre and made the whole read more fun. Which is good because the romance side of the book was not entirely fun.

Minerva struggles to get past the abuse she suffered from her late husband, and given that this is a romance and must have a HEA she does. But I felt like more time could have been given over to the romance and the struggle in general because it just wasn’t there? Half the fun of romance is the ups and downs, the will they won’t they, the ridiculous misunderstandings that need to be rectified before they finally settle down. This had none of that really, even the two main characters suspecting the other of murder didn’t stop them being entirely devoted. It was a breath of fresh air, but maybe I like my air a little polluted okay, I’m a city gal, I wanted a bit more FIRE in the romance. But it was also really inspiring to see a woman take charge of her own sexuality and recover a part of herself that she though an abuser had taken away entirely.

All in all this was definitely a cosy read. Despite the romance, the abuse, the possible murder, the stakes didn’t feel too high. It was actually a perfect quarantine read because I wasn’t stressed at all! I just got to have a read and relax and enjoy getting to know these snarky fun characters.

Thank you to NetGalley and Kensington Books for the free eArc of this book!

Romance Wasn’t Built in a Day | 2020 Romance Reads (so far)

So, I’ve read a few romance books now in my newfound love of all things lovey dovey, but I don’t feel like I’ve read enough of them to do really big chunky reviews like I do for SFFH, I know nothing about the genre yet and no one wants to read another “it’s a bit like Pride and Prejudice” take so I’ve decided to do a sort of listicle review of the few I’ve read so far this year. So here we go, my romance reads of 2020 so far:

Adult Romance

Bringing Down the Duke by Evie Dunmore – ♥♥♥♥

This first one follows Annabelle, an Oxford student whose way is paid by the suffragists as long as she campaigns for them, and she seems to keep running into the same very sexy duke during her campaigning who just happens to be their political enemy! This book is the first adult romance book I’ve ever read and it was an incredible experience so it’ll probably stay a favourite for me. It has literally everything; suffragists, castles, the fucking queen, dramatic horseback rides, amazing sex scenes, brilliant characters, and, my fave, realistically harsh feedback from a university tutor. I feel like it didn’t sweep me up that much, but as I was new to the genre when I read it I might return to it and see what I think.

My Darling Duke by Stacy Reid – ♥♥♥♥♥

The second of my adult romance reads I think my love for the genre really started with this book. It’s about Kitty Danvers, a woman who needs to make sure her sisters find good matches and are comfortably married, and she decides to ruin her own reputation to do it. She pretends to be engaged to a reclusive duke to bring her sisters up in society and marry them off, but then her duke (scarred and disabled in an accident) reenters society and sparks start flying. This is a loose beauty and the beast retelling and the series (Sinful Wallflowers) focuses on women who have been put on the shelf by society getting into all sorts of scandals so they basically don’t end up alone and bored forever. It’s pretty amazing, and though I know there’s nothing terribly out of the ordinary for romance I started to really appreciate the tropes and feelings and just really fell into it. I love this book.

Surrender to Sin by Nicola Davidson – ♥♥♥

Surrender to Sin is about Grace, a young woman about to be forced into an unwanted marriage who decides to ruin her reputation by creating a public scandal with a renowned brothel owner Sebastian AKA Sin. This book was more erotica than romance, but I thought I’d give it a go and although I LOVED the sex scenes (Nicola Davidson really has a gift) I didn’t feel like the romance was based on much else other than mutual kinks. Which would have been fine had it not been a little less marriage plot-y but I didn’t believe the true love too much. Still, a pro sex work erotic novella with actual plot (I’ve only read plotless porno erotica before now) and a high speed carriage chase! Yes please, I’ve already bought the second book in the series!

Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston – ♥♥♥♥♥

The first contemporary romance and the first MM romance on the list, RW&RB is about the son of the president, Alex, and a prince of England, Henry, falling in love. It’s pretty much beautiful, and it’s the first political novel I’ve ever been interested in without any dragons in it. This book really surprised me, I had been clinging to my comfy historical romance blankie (and I still am) but this was just lovely. My favourite thing about it was these two characters who are literature and history nerds writing each other love letters through email and signing off with excerpts from famous love letters it completely melted my heart.

YA Romance

To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han – ♥♥♥♥

This one, as we all know (and if you don’t watch the Netflix films because they’re amazing) is about Lara Jean, writer of secret love letters, whose love letters get sent out to all her various crushes. In order to make one recipient jealous she fake dates even hotter love letter recipient, Peter Kavinsky, and sweet jesus is this adorable. I read it in like a day. It didn’t entirely blow my mind, I’ve read this sort of YA before but I really enjoyed it.

 

PS. I Still Love You by Jenny Han – ♥♥♥♥♥

This was my favourite book in the trilogy. This never happens, I never love the middles of trilogies, except for High School Musical 2. In this one a much better, much more handsome letter recipient, John Ambrose McClaren, turns up just as Lara Jean is getting super jealous of Peter’s ex-girlfriend. This book was incredible. It rekindled my love triangle obsession. I have no notes, good job Jenny Han, keep it up.

Always and Forever, Lara Jean by Jenny Han – ♥♥♥

Okay, final book here. This one is a little bittersweet, young high school loves are preparing to go off to college and they don’t get into the same schools, shocker. I didn’t feel the same enjoyment with this one, I really dug the college narrative and the growth of the characters, but the romance felt a bit dead to me, hence the bittersweet. I still enjoyed it, but anything would be a let down after the incredible PS I Still Love You.

Heartstopper Vol. 3 by Alice Oseman – ♥♥♥♥♥

The first graphic novel and the second MM romance on this list, I read the first two last year and I’d give them both 5 hearts too FYI. This installment is all about Nick and Charlie going on a school trip to France together. It’s honestly the purest, fluffiest, happiest read of my life. Of course I’ve read the novellas in this series and I know this is sort of where it starts to get a little dark for Charlie and that began towards the end but Oseman spared me the heartache this time and didn’t shine too harsh of a light on it. Probably the most diverse romance books I’ve ever read. Everyone needs these comics.

There were a couple other romantic reads this year, but they were related to Gail Carriger’s Parasol Protectorate series which is a sort of romantic paranormal steampunk alt history saga of whimsical brilliance that deserves its own novel length post so I will definitely come back to Gail Carriger when I have about a year free to rant about how much I love her.

To All the Books I’ve Loved Before

Recently, in my own writing, I’ve hit quite a few walls plot wise. These were not small garden walls that can be stepped over or rested on like a spare seat, it was a little more Fort Knox than that, and I recently figured out why; I’m trying to write fantasy romance without the romance. I was trying to push the elves and magic to the forefront and ignore the human element, so to speak but why?

I’ve had a problem with romance my whole life – in books at least in reality it’s all a little easier and less dramatic. But when I started using, or rather misusing, romantic tropes in my writing I decided to ask why I disliked romance so much. The answer is I don’t. I love romance. (Please picture me declaring that I love love in the rain or something for dramatic effect.)

To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han; Loved this trilogy so much

Almost all the books I love have romantic elements. I’ve adored Uprooted and Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik, A Long Way to a Small Angry Planet was the perfect mix of sci-fi and tenderness, even my favourite part of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell was Jonathan Strange driven to insane magics in the search for his faery-led wife. Cassandra Clare, Sarah J Maas, Gail Carriger, Maggie Stiefvater, every book I’ve truly loved and found comfort in and returned to over and over has had a strong romantic subplot. Some of them are just plot, in a lot of them the fantasy falls into the background. And let’s be honest, as much as I love vampires they weren’t why I was reading Twilight.

My Darling Duke by Stacy Reid; I devoured this book, Stacy Reid is the answer to my prayers

All these books are things I’ve called my “guilty pleasures” a phrase I’ve come to despise over the past few weeks. What I have been a little happier declaring I enjoy is romantic films and shows, which is why when I was stuck indoors with a cold-ridden baby and no desire to read I decided to watch To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before on Netflix, and let me tell you Lara Jean’s completely unembarrassed love of romance novels got me. So I went on Goodreads to have a look for some romance books and lo and behold it was Romance Week!

So since then I’ve read a few romance novels. I’ve read the To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before books (PS I Still Love You is easily the best in the trilogy, but that’s another post) and I’ve read a couple historical romances and devoured them way quicker than anything else I’ve read recently. It’s a brave new romantic world, so why didn’t I visit it before? Why do I feel guilty for reading a genre with diversity, drama, brilliant writing, and maximum entertainment factor? The answer is simple; internalised misogyny.

Bringing Down the Duke by Evie Dunmore; Suffragists and romance! The perfect book!

After just some small research into the genre (which for me basically means listening to podcasts and browsing for new books online) romance seems to be one of the few genres dominated by women and read predominantly by women too, which seems to be one of the only reasons I can see for why I didn’t like it. There are so many romantic genres it’s impossible not to find one you like, there’s fantasy romance, sci-fi romance, historical romance, time travel romance, western romance, LGBT romance, interracial romance. Even just within historical there’s Victorian, regency, Scottish (?? I assume because of Outlander the romance world thinks Scotland is a thing of the past), American civil war, and even underground railroad romance.

What I’m saying is this is a vast and intense genre and despite the fact that I’m just scratching the surface I’d call it insta-love. Or more likely enemies-to-lovers given my previous aversions. Basically if anyone is actually reading this and I’m not just talking to myself (which I’m very okay with believe me) there will be a lot more romance on this blog in the future.

The Deathless Girls|Review

The days are shorter, nights are darker, and I’ve got vampires on the brain. So when Kiran Millwood Hargrave advertised a giveaway for her new vampiric YA novel The Deathless Girls on Twitter I decided to enter. I won! (I’ve got to brag because I never win these things I was PUMPED) So about a week or two later when the book arrived in the post I devoured it.

The Deathless Girls follows two young Traveller women Kizzy and Lil, twins, who have a run in with the great vampyre himself, Dracula. The book is basically an explanation of sorts of the origin of Dracula’s brides, at least the two dark haired brides, and it is thrilling. Despite knowing the outcome I became so attached to the characters I convinced myself that it might change, they might be saved, it all might turn out right. It didn’t.

This dark ending was so refreshing, not a lot of stand-alone YA books have bleak endings. There’s always a comfortable feeling that there will be a happy ever after (even The Hunger Games did this and that was pretty bleak) but this book really leant into the tragedy.

What struck me in reading this book was that Dracula’s brides are never really confirmed to be his actual brides. It is the easiest and most sexist reasoning for their being in the castle but as always banishing assumptions makes for a much more interesting and diverse story, which is an interesting thing to consider in retellings. Most retellings I’ve read are just the same story in a different time or in space or with magic or zombies etc, but this is the first I’ve sought out that looks at a minor character and tells a story much more interesting behind the scenes, barring Jane Eyre probably.

As well as taking a slightly more feminist view of Dracula’s alleged brides Hargrave places them in a racial minority, being dark-skinned travellers, and the one twin Lil is also LGBTQ and has a strangely satisfying romantic tragedy that has nothing to do with coming out or being rejected, only with the frustration of star crossed lovers and annoyingly Shakespearean fuck ups.

Anyone who likes Dracula should read this book. Even if you’re not into YA or retellings or any of it Hargrave really examines the political climate around the history of the famous Vlad Tepes that lead to the Dracula tale. She has also written the first positive and even loving example of travellers in a book I have ever read. I love this book so much I’ve gone on a vampire reading spree to satisfy my need for more, so expect some more vampiric reviews coming up.

The days are shorter, nights are darker, and I’ve got vampires on the brain. So when Kiran Millwood Hargrave advertised a giveaway for her new vampiric YA novel The Deathless Girls on Twitter I decided to enter. I won! (I’ve got to brag because I never win these things I was PUMPED) So about a week or two later when the book arrived in the post I devoured it.

The Deathless Girls follows two young Traveller women Kizzy and Lil, twins, who have a run in with the great vampyre himself, Dracula. The book is basically an explanation of sorts of the origin of Dracula’s brides, at least the two dark haired brides, and it is thrilling. Despite knowing the outcome I became so attached to the characters I convinced myself that it might change, they might be saved, it all might turn out right. It didn’t.

This dark ending was so refreshing, not a lot of stand-alone YA books have bleak endings. There’s always a comfortable feeling that there will be a happy ever after (even The Hunger Games did this and that was pretty bleak) but this book really leant into the tragedy.

What struck me in reading this book was that Dracula’s brides are never really confirmed to be his actual brides. It is the easiest and most sexist reasoning for their being in the castle but as always banishing assumptions makes for a much more interesting and diverse story, which is an interesting thing to consider in retellings. Most retellings I’ve read are just the same story in a different time or in space or with magic or zombies etc, but this is the first I’ve sought out that looks at a minor character and tells a story much more interesting behind the scenes, barring Jane Eyre probably.

As well as taking a slightly more feminist view of Dracula’s alleged brides Hargrave places them in a racial minority, being dark-skinned travellers, and the one twin Lil is also LGBTQ and has a strangely satisfying romantic tragedy that has nothing to do with coming out or being rejected, only with the frustration of star crossed lovers and annoyingly Shakespearean fuck ups.

Anyone who likes Dracula should read this book. Even if you’re not into YA or retellings or any of it Hargrave really examines the political climate around the history of the famous Vlad Tepes that lead to the Dracula tale. She has also written the first positive and even loving example of travellers in a book I have ever read. I love this book so much I’ve gone on a vampire reading spree to satisfy my need for more, so expect some more vampiric reviews coming up.