Book 20: Copper Script by KJ Charles

A book that beautifully straddles the line between a murder mystery and a romance! This author writes about damaged men finding each other in post-Great War Britain so well, and this one has just a touch of the paranormal to keep it interesting. Joel can essentially see who a person is at their core from their handwriting, and this skill makes him useful for both a socialite checking up on their fiancée and a cop trying to solve a murder. The cop in question is Aaron, a detective who's living a small, closeted life and has to open himself to work with Joel to save themselves and apprehend the crook. And you know what, it just works! It's a nice book with a lovely romance at the center of it, and if the mystery isn't the most complicated one I've ever read, I still really enjoyed my time reading this. It hit the spot.

Grade: A

Reread: Children of Earth and Sky by Guy Gavriel Kay

This is, to the best of my recollection, the first book that I've reread that I read for the first time after I had started this blog. So here are my thoughts about it from 2016. 

I don't disagree with any of my thoughts or conclusions, although it took me longer this time around to vibe with the ensemble cast nature of the story. I have also actually been to some of the places that inspired this book now, namely Venice and Ravenna and Dubrovnik, as well as Greece, and that along with other books I've read about the region have deepened my appreciation of many of the themes of the book. I still cried, again mostly from relief, but also from recognition and the feeling of being home in this book. I don't think it will ever be my favorite GGK novel, but it's in conversation with so many of them that it exists within those books now, too. It enriches all that came before, and I expect it will do the same for those that come after. 

Grade: A

Book 17: Provoked by Joanna Chambers

Sometimes you just need a classic gay regency romance to get through the day, and boy did this do the trick. We've got an upstanding lawyer who desperately wants to resist his desires, and a lord who is desperate to convince him not to. Add in some early 1820s political radicalism and social tensions and you've got a great first book in a trilogy. It's closer in length to a novella than to a novel, and for me that was perfect for the amount of plot and tension and longing. Also, the sex is extremely good regency gay sex. Looking forward to reading the next two!

Grade: A

Reread: The Last Light of the Sun by Guy Gavriel Kay

Sometimes there's a book that does something intentionally and you know why it did it conceptually and you're still like yes but please give this to me???? And that is how I feel about this book and the lack of a map at the front. 

Every other book that GGK has written has a map at the start. It grounds you in this shared universe that he's created, which is essentially a fictional Europe and Middle East and North Africa that he can play with freely. And this book is about the version of Britain and the Vikings in 9th century or so, and I understand why the lack of a map reflects the mists and unknown glens and so on and so forth, but I would like to have my narrative bearing!!! 

Anyway. I love this book very much; many of Kay's books are about fathers and sons, and legacy, and above all else how chance encounters and timing changes the course of history, but this one has some of the most affecting scenes and develops those themes in ways that continue to stay with me. It's a book I reread hoping that I've misremembered some things about, so I don't have to experience that pain again, but by the end I'm so happy with where the story goes that I've accepted going through that pain. And there's a lot of hope in that. 

Grade: A 

Reread: Lord of Emperors by Guy Gavriel Kay

I got stalled in this reread about 75% of the way through - I got to the point when it all begins to fall apart in the way that it simply has to fall apart, and weirdly I found it tough to experience this time around!! But I finally did, and it was as devastating and ultimately satisfying as it ever is. 

This book was the reason I specifically traveled to Ravenna to see some mosaics in person, which was one of the greatest experiences of my life. It gave me some of the language to explain why art and storytelling matter so much, even when (especially when) the world around us feels like it's imploding. And I find it comforting to know that humans have always just been trying to live our ordinary lives while greater machinations happen around us, and that there's still joy to be found in moments even during so much cruelty and terror. 

Grade: A 

Book 20: You Should Be So Lucky by Cat Sebastian

The second book in her series about mid-century gays living in New York City, this one unfortunately suffers a bit from comparison with the first one, which I enjoyed so so much. But this is still delightful, just slightly less my speed.

The love story here is between a journalist who is still privately grieving the death of his boyfriend a year and a half prior, which of course is something very few people know he's going through, and a slumping baseball player who's been traded to a team that sounds suspiciously like the Mets but of course isn't. Mark gets assigned to write a series of articles about Eddie's slump, and in the process they strike up a friendship that very very slowly becomes more. It's an interesting narrative in part because both of them are out to themselves, so it's less about coming out and more about creating a community. But I found the resolutions of some of the conflicts to be more expedient than I wanted. I don't need or want historical accuracy in the form of tragedy or the threat of outing from my gay historical romance novels, but this one went a little too far in the other direction, for me. Mark also felt like a character who made more sense as a 40 year old than a 28 year old, and while that may have been intentional from the standpoint of him aging as a result of losing his partner, I kept bumping up against it. So not quite the home run of her prior book, but still a solid double. 

Grade: B

Book 18: The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo

A book club book! Which was also already on my list of things I needed to read, but this gave me the nudge I needed to actually read it. Unusually for this author, it's a standalone novel and also one that I think is probably New Adult rather than YA. It takes place in Spain post-Ferdinand and Isabella and focuses on a young servant named Luzia who is hiding both her family's Jewish faith in an era when anything other than public Catholicism was outlawed and her magical abilities. Her magic is discovered by the mistress of the household she works for, and a powerful noble who has a mysterious assistant wants to train her and present her in court for his own gains. 

The story unfolds more slowly than I was expecting, and then suddenly it opens up completely and takes a lot of turns. It's the third historical book about the Iberian peninsula that deals with religious identity and persecution and magic that I've read, so I was very much in the bag for the overall themes of the story, and when the narrative pace picks up it's pretty thrilling and ends up taking turns with various characters that I didn't expect and found extremely gratifying. It also made me want to pick up her adult fiction series again, which I bounced off of a bit the first time I tried it. But now I think I'm ready for the particular kind of edge she approaches stories with. 

Grade: A   

Book 39: A Nobleman's Guide to Seducing a Scoundrel by KJ Charles

The sequel to The Secret Lives of Country Gentlemen, this book is just as delightful and captivating as the first one. The focus of this book is on Joss's nephew Luke, who becomes the secretary for Rufus d'Aumesty, a new Earl. They develop a relationship, but Luke has secrets and Rufus has his own problems attempting to fend off his uncle's attempts to strip him of his title and property. Will it all work out???? Indeed. 

Grade: A 

Book 38: The Secret Lives of Country Gentlemen by KJ Charles

Man, I loved this book. Two men who have been sleeping together but don't know each other's real names at a pub in London part on bad terms, only to encounter each other again when one of them moves to Kent after the death of his estranged titled father. Sir Gareth is completely unfamiliar with the smuggling families that control the Kentish Moors, but is introduced to all aspects of it when he discovers that his former bed partner is Joss Doomsday of the Doomsday clan. Hijinks and misunderstandings ensue, and it's just a delightful story from start to finish, with real conflicts that are resolved in satisfying ways. My favorite book by this author in quite some time. 

Grade: A 

Book 30: The Betrayals by Bridget Collins

As soon as I heard that there was another book written for adults by the author of The Binding, one of my favorite books that I read in 2020, I knew I had to read it. I think I went into it expecting it to feel more similar to that book than it actually is, but what definitely is similar is the way it drops you into a world that feels familiar but has distinct differences from our world and history. It is set primarily at a remote academy where young men are taught the art (and science) of the grand jeu, while the larger society around them begins to crumble. The story is told from three alternating points of view, as well as a journal belonging to Leo Martin describing his experience at the academy ten years prior as a student. 

Part of the thrill of The Binding is discovering how incomplete a version of reality you're initially shown, in wild swings of revelation. The Betrayals is more gradual; it draws you through the current day and the past, all while ruminating on the role of art and creation when basic freedoms are being sanded away. It has made me want to read Hermann Hesse, who is a noted inspiration for this novel, and it made me think a lot about the desire for the remove of an ivory tower, a place that doesn't need to concern itself with something as dirty as politics, until suddenly it does. 

Grade: A 

Book 24: Lone Women by Victor LaValle

A book club book! I hadn't read anything by this author before, and I really enjoyed this book a lot. It's set in early 20th century Western U.S., and focuses on a Black woman who has left California after the suspicious circumstances of her parents' deaths and makes her way to Montana, because unmarried women (including Black women) are allowed to claim homesteads in their own name. She's traveled light aside from a locked steamer trunk, which attracts a lot of attention. 

I don't want to say much more because I went into this book pretty cold, and from the very first page it just drops you right in and lets you figure out which way is up. It's described as being horror fiction, which I understand, but for me it's more horror cut with magical realism. Adelaide is a wonderful POV character, and the history of Montana made me want to read a number of the books that initially inspired this story. It's an eerie book that doesn't shy away from how harsh living on your own as a Black woman would be on a homestead, but it's not a story that wants to spotlight those challenges for their own sake. I'll definitely be reading more works by this author in the future.  

Grade: B

Book 23: A Thief in the Night by KJ Charles

A lovely novella to read on a summer afternoon! There's not a lot of conflict in this gay regency romance, but sometimes that's just what you want. Toby is a thief who robs a man after a mutually satisfying encounter in an alleyway, only to meet him again when he goes to a manor house attempting to pose as a butler. But the man in question has his own difficulties, chief among them the fact that his father deliberately ruined his estate while he was in the navy, which he now has to resolve after his father's death. Will they learn to trust each other and find the hidden jewels that will provide for their future together??? What a question. This is the final piece of the world started with Kit and Marian's novels, and I had a very nice time reading it. 

Grade: B

Book 18: Lavender House by Lev AC Rosen

A queer mystery set at a mansion! This book is pitched as "Knives Out with a queer historical twist," which was enough to make me interested. I have to say that I went in expecting a different historical setting; rather than the turn of the 20th century Edwardian backdrop, we were in the Bay Area in the early 1950s. Our protagonist is Andy, a former San Francisco detective who was fired in disgrace when he was caught with his pants down in a gay bar raid. Before he can drink himself to death, he's hired by a mysterious and wealthy woman named Pearl who wants him to investigate whether her wife Irene died tragically or was in fact murdered. Pearl and Irene lived together on a large estate in Marin County with a whole cast of queer family members and staff, and Andy needs to figure out who might have wanted Irene dead and why. 

This was an enjoyable, fast read and certainly fits the "country house murder but gay" genre, but I think I may have gone in with slightly too high expectations, or possibly just hopes for a slightly different book. One of the themes of the story is how the closet acts as a cage, and we see the impact that had on Andy while he was a closeted and then exposed cop. But we also see how living in a house where everyone knows who you are can make it difficult to survive outside of that house, no matter how beautiful it is. I think I was hoping for a lighter gay mystery novel, but once I realized what kind of story it was, I really enjoyed it. I'm already adding the sequel coming out this fall to my reading list, sigh (one step forward, two steps back, as always). 

Grade: B 

Book 17: The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes by Cat Sebastian

I kept reading the first book in this series because I had a feeling I would like the sequel better, and I was correct! 

This book overlaps with various parts of The Queer Principles of Kit Webb and benefits because it has much less setup to spend pages and pages on. Rob is blackmailing Marian because her rich duke husband was already married when he married her, which Rob knows because his mother is in fact his actual wife. For some reason (can't imagine what!) the two of them continue to exchange letters even while they should be enemies, and when she needs help after she kills her husband during what was supposed to be a robbery, the two of them escape from London together. 

If that setup sounds a bit convoluted: it is! It's an odd series, but the two of them have great chemistry together, and while the novels can't really decide whether they want to be about a couple of 18th century aristocrats completely throwing away their wealth or if it's something in the middle, it ends in a way that feels less half-baked than the first one. I don't know if the first one is worth getting through to make it to this one, but I felt satisfied by this conclusion. 

Grade: B   

Book 16: Masters in This Hall by KJ Charles

Well, it took me until February 7, but I finally read a great Christmas romance novel this season! 

Honestly, I expected this to be great; it's a novella set in a universe I had enjoyed, and the setting is also delightful. John Garland has been dismissed from his job as a hotel detective after a robbery occurred while he was, uh, distracted by Barnaby Littimer. He retreats to his rich uncle's home on Christmas Eve for the Christmas season, and discovers that Littimer is there as a master of festivities during the the week leading up to his cousin's wedding. He is of course immediately suspicious that Littimer is there to rob his uncle, but is there more to the story? Who can say! 

The pairing is very fun, and so are the holiday traditions Littimer is in charge of leading, including a mummers play. It's a classic mystery set at a great house over the holidays, and I had a great time reading it. 

Grade: A 

Book 7: Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

First book club book of the year! I was very happy when this book got chosen, because I've been meaning to read something by this author and this was a great excuse for it. This book club focuses on novels that exist within the speculative fiction umbrella, and I would say that this one qualifies but is closer to literary fiction than the standard scifi genre novel. The story spans four or five centuries, starting with a remittance man in Canada just prior to WWI, then stopping off in New York right before Covid hits, and then a worldwide book tour two centuries after that. How are they all linked? Well that's what everyone is trying to figure out. 

I hadn't read anything else by this author, but I've seen the first two episodes of the miniseries based on Station Eleven, so I wasn't surprised at how much of the story is about a possible future and also pandemics and what they do to civilization. I was surprised by the writing; for some reason I went into this expecting it to be a challenging read in some way, and instead I found it delightfully crisp and engaging. I think I went in fearing that it would be all of the things I like least about literary fiction as a genre, and instead it was what I like best. It also has a ton of incidental queerness, which is something I always appreciate. I really enjoyed reading it, and individual images and characters from the story are going to stick with me for a long time. Looking forward to going back and reading her earlier novels now! 

Grade: A 

Book 4: The Wrong Rake by Eliot Grayson

Whenever I do my annual kindle unlimited read of various m/m Christmas romance novels, I also end up downloading a couple of non-Christmas romances to see if there are any new authors I need to add to my mental list of options. I'm not entirely sure this will be a permanent entry for me, but I did enjoy this enough to download the other historical romances this author has written. 

The setup for this one is pretty straightforward: Major Henry Standish has come to London from Bath to find the rake who trifled with his sister. He goes to a club called Perdition, which Simon Beaumont, the alleged rake in question, owns along with two friends. But it is a case of mistaken identity, because in reality it was Simon's brother, who often poses as Simon and runs up debts and generally gets himself into trouble. However, before they can go find Simon's brother and resolve the issue of Harry's sister, Simon allows Harry to "demand satisfaction" from him, in predictable (yet delightful!) ways. 

The resolution of the story isn't quite as, well, satisfying as the rest of it, but I did enjoy both the setup and the overall dynamic of the story, and I'm looking forward to discovering whether this continues in the author's other books as well. 

Grade: B 

Book 3: Peter Cabot Gets Lost by Cat Sebastian

The second entry in the Cabot books, this story is set a few years later than the first and focuses on Tommy's nephew Peter, who has just graduated from Harvard and doesn't know what to do with his life. His family (a very very very thinly veiled fictional version of the Kennedys) expects him to join his father on his presidential campaign before he heads to law school, but when Caleb Murphy, a classmate who has always avoided Peter, discovers he doesn't have enough money to get to LA from Boston, Peter offers to drive him there. And then the rest of the book is a pretty delightful roadtrip romance that blossoms between two frenemies who begin to reveal their true selves to each other over the course of nine days. It's a beautiful early 1960s travelogue as well as a romance, and it was just a real pleasure to read - a great summer romance to read while under a blanket or two in the middle of winter. 

Grade: A 

Book 2: Tommy Cabot Was Here by Cat Sebastian

After a bit of a break, I'm catching up with this author, and this first novella made me very happy I am! It's a 1950s prep school second chance romance between the school's former golden boy Tommy Cabot and his best friend (and more) Everett Sloane, who's now an instructor there. When Tommy's 12 year old son becomes a student there, they meet again after 15 years of silence. I absolutely loved the angst and tension in the first couple of chapters, and the hurt that resulted from Everett leaving for England immediately after Tommy's society wedding in order to protect his own heart. I could have actually done with more of that before the inevitable reconciliation, which felt a bit too pat when it finally happened - I wanted the pain to be ratcheted up even further first. I thought the story threaded the needle between realism about how gay culture existed in the U.S. at that time and creating a happy ending for them, and I'm very excited to read the next two books in this series!

Grade: B

Book 31: Miranda in Milan by Katharine Duckett

 Boy, this novella did not work for me. As is probably evident from the title, it's a story about Miranda from The Tempest living in Milan after the end of the play. This should really be my jam, or at least interesting to me. But both the story and the writing didn't capture me, and I felt really disappointed by it. This is just something that happens with books sometimes, and it's a bummer!

Grade: C