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harrietj's reviews
426 reviews
Asumi-chan Is Interested In Lesbian Brothels Vol.1 by Kuro Itsuki
4.0
This was hot. Very light on plot. I liked the different scenarios. Some of course hit better than others, but all were hot.
I wish the characters had looked a bit more different from each other. Often I wasn't sure who I was looking at. There was very little variation in terms of body type or even appearance generally. It pretty much always looked like two near-identical women having sex. Good news if that's your type, I guess!
I wish the characters had looked a bit more different from each other. Often I wasn't sure who I was looking at. There was very little variation in terms of body type or even appearance generally. It pretty much always looked like two near-identical women having sex. Good news if that's your type, I guess!
Belle of the Ball by Mari Costa
4.0
I mean it's probably not really a four star read - it's quite a simple and predictable story, and while the art is really competent, and I loved the all-pink colour scheme, it does look quite like a lot of other YA graphic novels.
But the BUTCH LOVE. I cannot and will not ever rate a book that centres a butch as a romantic lead, that says she is desirable, that treats her as beautiful, anything less than four stars. I love this and the fourteen year old baby butch in me needed it.
But the BUTCH LOVE. I cannot and will not ever rate a book that centres a butch as a romantic lead, that says she is desirable, that treats her as beautiful, anything less than four stars. I love this and the fourteen year old baby butch in me needed it.
My Cute Little Kitten Vol. 1 by Milk Morinaga
2.75
Cute lesbian manga centred around a cute cat. You'll know from that description alone if this is for you.
The art is good enough; I'm not well-versed enough in manga to know if it's especially good. It looks much like most manga I've read to me. Certainly perfectly good and not in any way bad. The sex is a bit chaste - I wasn't here for porn, but I wanted more, honestly. It was all a bit cutesy and ambiguous.
It is nice that this is a one-off, standalone volume, so reading it won't set you down a time and money consuming spiral like some manga series do.
The art is good enough; I'm not well-versed enough in manga to know if it's especially good. It looks much like most manga I've read to me. Certainly perfectly good and not in any way bad. The sex is a bit chaste - I wasn't here for porn, but I wanted more, honestly. It was all a bit cutesy and ambiguous.
It is nice that this is a one-off, standalone volume, so reading it won't set you down a time and money consuming spiral like some manga series do.
The Amityville Horror by Jay Anson
2.5
I think basically I was expecting there to be... more? To this?
Having watched so many films, that get so utterly ridiculous, and knowing what an iconic horror location the Amityville house is, I think it's maybe really easy to forget what an impact this story had when it first came out. And maybe it's impossible to recapture that. But overall, what I felt reading this allegedly true account of the Amityville haunting was, frankly, boredom.
I almost wish I could have read it with fresh eyes, to really get the impact of it.
Having watched so many films, that get so utterly ridiculous, and knowing what an iconic horror location the Amityville house is, I think it's maybe really easy to forget what an impact this story had when it first came out. And maybe it's impossible to recapture that. But overall, what I felt reading this allegedly true account of the Amityville haunting was, frankly, boredom.
I almost wish I could have read it with fresh eyes, to really get the impact of it.
Isabella & Blodwen by Rachel Smith
4.0
I love it that this strange book exists. I honestly feel that one of the reasons I most adore graphic novels is that there still seems to be a willingness to tell uncategorisable stories that don't fit neatly into saleable genres. I feel like mass market prose publishing is still struggling to really get books like that visibly on the shelves, although perhaps that's more to do with what gets publicity that what's actually being written or printed. Anyway, that's a side note.
This book has a foundation in feminism so solid that it almost isn't even the point. Isabella, a fairly uptight sixteen year old (early) university student, accidentally unleashes Blodwen, a medieval (I think?) witch, into her life, and through her learns to be a little more confident in herself and a little less desperate to do the right thing. Blodwen is so utterly unapologetically herself that Isabella cannot help but learn from her, and I really truly hope that any young readers enjoying this book also do. Blodwen is not palatable, and she doesn't try to be. She is big, and ugly, and funny, and weird, and 'fixing' any of those things is absolutely the anti-point. I love stories that aren't about making your weirdness acceptable, but about utterly just being weird, and not minding too much if other people don't really get it. Great stuff.
Oh, it's also really funny, but what else would you expect from Rachael Smith? I've loved her naturalistic and hilarious writing style since I bought House Party at a convention, and she's never disappointed.
This book has a foundation in feminism so solid that it almost isn't even the point. Isabella, a fairly uptight sixteen year old (early) university student, accidentally unleashes Blodwen, a medieval (I think?) witch, into her life, and through her learns to be a little more confident in herself and a little less desperate to do the right thing. Blodwen is so utterly unapologetically herself that Isabella cannot help but learn from her, and I really truly hope that any young readers enjoying this book also do. Blodwen is not palatable, and she doesn't try to be. She is big, and ugly, and funny, and weird, and 'fixing' any of those things is absolutely the anti-point. I love stories that aren't about making your weirdness acceptable, but about utterly just being weird, and not minding too much if other people don't really get it. Great stuff.
Oh, it's also really funny, but what else would you expect from Rachael Smith? I've loved her naturalistic and hilarious writing style since I bought House Party at a convention, and she's never disappointed.
My Boyfriend Is a Bear by Pamela Ribon
4.0
This was so cute and ridiculous. The boyfriend is an actual bear. He's not a big hairy guy, or a person drawn as a bear, or a werebear, or anything like that - our protagonist's boyfriend is literally a bear. He does have a job and he doesn't, like, maul her or anything, so I guess he's not a totally realistic bear, but he hibernates and wants to eat her tampons so he's definitely a bear. And people do not approve.
If that doesn't put you off, you'll probably love this book. I did. It was funny and touching and cute. I had a whale of a time with it, start to finish.
If that doesn't put you off, you'll probably love this book. I did. It was funny and touching and cute. I had a whale of a time with it, start to finish.
Friends Forever by Shannon Hale
3.5
This graphic memoir about friendship in the turbulent time that is eighth grade, with all the confusion and betrayal that dating, changing friendship groups, and mounting academic pressure bring, is charming, cute, and funny. It's low stakes that feel so, so high at the time. If I have a criticism, really it's that this book is almost too gentle. What I remember of being this age is mostly a viciously painful sense of not quite knowing what's going on, the sharp hurt of the friendships that form our practice relationships, and the incredible joy and comfort of belonging to a group of friends as close as anything I've ever known. If anything, this book is a little too safe, compared with my own memories of being twelve or thirteen.
I almost don't feel I can rate this book accurately, being so far away from that time in my life, but as an adult choosing books for the kids in my life to read I can confidently say I'd pick this up.
I almost don't feel I can rate this book accurately, being so far away from that time in my life, but as an adult choosing books for the kids in my life to read I can confidently say I'd pick this up.
Mimosa by Archie Bongiovanni
3.5
Four friends, all somewhere on the sapphic spectrum, navigate their changing relationships as they grow up.
I liked this. I'm not sure how unbiased I can be, though, when I am so kindly predisposed towards any media with lesbians at its centre (we get so little!). Certainly, the art is pleasing, and the writing is clever enough, and fresh, but would I enjoy this if it was a story about straight people, or men? Almost certainly not. I suppose the more interesting question is, could this be a story about straight people or men? Or is it telling a uniquely lesbian story? I'm not sure. I think that, with minor tweaks, this group of friends could be any group of youngish queerish people. Perhaps that's what holds it back, for me, from being a more highly-rated book.
As a simple story about how friendship changes as we age, especially in a cool, vibrant city setting, this definitely succeeds. I'm just not sure there's enough here to entice me to return to it again.
I liked this. I'm not sure how unbiased I can be, though, when I am so kindly predisposed towards any media with lesbians at its centre (we get so little!). Certainly, the art is pleasing, and the writing is clever enough, and fresh, but would I enjoy this if it was a story about straight people, or men? Almost certainly not. I suppose the more interesting question is, could this be a story about straight people or men? Or is it telling a uniquely lesbian story? I'm not sure. I think that, with minor tweaks, this group of friends could be any group of youngish queerish people. Perhaps that's what holds it back, for me, from being a more highly-rated book.
As a simple story about how friendship changes as we age, especially in a cool, vibrant city setting, this definitely succeeds. I'm just not sure there's enough here to entice me to return to it again.
The Horror Zine Magazine Spring 2021 by Jeani Rector
3.5
As always with surprise collections like this, which I went into entirely blind, knowing nothing other than what the cover suggested, the joy really isn't in the work as a whole, but in the individual stories and the discovery of entirely new-to-me authors. For that reason, it's very hard to rate.
All that it's ever really possible to say about a collection like this is that some stories are good, some are better, and some are worse. But for anyone who, like me, enjoys reading new work by new authors in the hopes of finding someone new to enjoy, collections like this are a dream. Often, I've picked up a very low print run collection of stories just like this one and discovered an author whose work I've immediately had to seek out and add to my shelves, and the pleasure is often in that one story by that one author that really excites me. But can I review an entire book based on that one story? And thus: very hard to rate.
All that it's ever really possible to say about a collection like this is that some stories are good, some are better, and some are worse. But for anyone who, like me, enjoys reading new work by new authors in the hopes of finding someone new to enjoy, collections like this are a dream. Often, I've picked up a very low print run collection of stories just like this one and discovered an author whose work I've immediately had to seek out and add to my shelves, and the pleasure is often in that one story by that one author that really excites me. But can I review an entire book based on that one story? And thus: very hard to rate.