jaelynx's reviews
255 reviews

The Vanishing Futurist by Charlotte Hobson

3.0

An English governess throws herself into the Russian Revolution in living in a commune with Nikita Slavkin, who in attempting to build a time travel device to view the utopian communist future ahead of them, vanishes.

Weather War by Paul Posnick, Leonard Leokum

2.75

In ’78, a sexy weatherman unwinds conspiracy that freak weather events bringing disaster are actually weapons of war! If you like a slightly dated thriller sci-fi that presumes we might destroy our planet through extreme weather strategically rather than as a by-product of greed and ignorance, then this might be for you!

Carmilla '86 by Avery Morstan

dark emotional lighthearted mysterious tense fast-paced

3.25

A short story retelling Sheridan Le Fanu’s classic lesbian vampire story as a romance in 1980s small town America.

Laura has a quiet life looking after her conservative dad who wants her to date his dull farmhand. But one night at a club she is entranced by Carmilla, an electric encounter with her lips that is interrupted by the discovery of the body of her (supposedly) dead college roommate.

This perhaps fails a bit on any horror aspect, mostly being about their whirlwind romance with a strong queer and feminist underpinning (I did appreciate a vigorous calling out on men fetishizing beautiful young female murder victims). It's very short, and might be served by something more fleshed out but it does well at telling the story it sets out to. The only gripe I have is the number of times Laura addresses her diary - I'm never a fan of that cliché). But if you want a modern day body positive lesbian vampire short story, this is a good shout. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood

Sterling Karat Gold by Isabel Waidner

3.75

Kafka’s The Trial, if Kafka was having an acid trip at the time. Sterling is arrested despite their innocence and their world increasingly becomes more surreal and unhinged with bullfighters, spaceships and time travel via google streetview. Underpinning it, however, is a commentary on state-sanctioned violence against migrants, minorities and queer working-class people. I’d love to write more but, every time I try, my recollections seem even more unhinged than the book. It’s certainly a mood. 

Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe by John Boswell

5.0

So many timelines of Queer History start with Stonewall & Oscar Wilde. This book sheds light on a long history of queer unions of love, but personal and church-sanctioned. With so much of our history erased or painfully reinterpreted to be as hetero as possible, this is an essential record of our forebearers’ hearts & legacy.

Tales from the Colony Room: Soho's Lost Bohemia by Darren Coffield

3.75

An oral biography of the Soho private members club that was the centre of London’s elite artistic community since the 1940s. The stories of the sordid and chaotic lives of those within are amusing and horrifying in equal measure but a wonderful capture of a bohemian queer moment in the city’s life.

Homintern: How Gay Culture Liberated the Modern World by Gregory Woods

4.0

While the fear of a Homintern - a Comintern-like international conspiracy of gay artists, writers and actors - was unfounded, the network of queer creatives and the art they produced has been a huge cornerstone of western culture. Woods guides us through the out and closeted creatives across the West since Wilde to show their contributions to art and culture.

Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe

5.0

Maia’s autobiographical graphic novel is a beautiful rendition of eir experience gender growing up and coming out (and thus is the target of frequent book bans). I sent this book to my family before coming out as trans in the hope that seeing a perfectly encapsulated tale of the inner turmoil and challenges would help them understand my own life.

Christopher and His Kind by Christopher Isherwood

5.0

Isherwood’s memoir covering the period around his time in the gay scene of 1930s Berlin as the country was slowly overtaken by Nazis, ending in his leaving Germany and trying to get his boyfriend Heinz immigration to the UK to avoid him being conscripted by the Nazis. Part of it was fictionalised in his Berlin Novels (and adapted into the musical Cabaret).

It's this which really got me into the history of Weimar Berlin and the early gay rights movement there, but also writing that focuses on the calm day to day lives of unimportant but fascinating characters swept up in changes far above them. 

The Christmas Swap by Talia Samuels

funny lighthearted medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

(I missed posting the review last year- putting it here a year late!)
 

Next on my queer Christmas romcom list, it’s fake dating a guy at his countryside mansion to please his parents but then falling for his sister. Which is an identical set-up to Make You Mine This Christmas by Lizzie Huxley-Jones which I read last year. But thankfully beyond that set up they’re fairly different.

Margot has just come out of an abusive relationship and any friend she had that wasn’t through her girlfriend she neglected long ago. So when a business connection Ben asks her to pretend to be his girlfriend so he doesn’t show up his parents’ perfect Christmas, she goes for that rather than be alone.

But while they orchestrate the perfect fake relationship to fool his family, she falls for real for his sister, Ellie. That is, after Ellie spends a few days trying to reveal Margot as a golddigger after her brother’s money. Queue midnight rendezvous by the lake as they seek romance away from prying eyes. That’s not going to go wrong, right?

There are some interesting strands throughout, such as Margot coming to terms with the emotional abuse she suffered, grandpa’s deteriorating mind, Ben’s long lost childhood love and the perils of vegan baking. It’s a sweet story for Christmas that hits some warm but meaningful notes.