#really sapphic books

[youraveragekilljoy87]

I want. Sapphic films. I need. Them. It doesn’t matter if they’re basically porn as long as it’s not insanely sanitized. I prefer sexualization over sanitization any day. Also want to note sexualization isn’t the same as objectification. Because if they’re good characters then it isn’t objectification because they’re being portrayed as actual people. Also. I want to see girls kiss. Pleeeeeease

#sapphic #sapphic movie #sapphic media #wlw post #wlw film #lgbtq movies #I’d also appreciate books #really sapphic books #but not ya books #god no #like #carmilla #I need more carmilla

[kithj]

IM THE PERSON WHO WAS TALKING ABOUT THINGS HAVE GOTTEN WORSE SINCE WE LAST SPOKE A FEW DAYS AGO And i agree about how sad it is that most queer horror authors i dont vibe with. do you have any you DO like? im always on the lookout for more and from what i’ve seen of your book taste on here we have pretty similar taste in books. can be any genre of horror tbh im not picky

hehehe yes i'd love to give u some recommendations! though if i'm being honest i really haven't found that many authors in the genre that i really vibe with yet. im still on the hunt... may leitz is probably the only one i can recommend that is kinda in the same vein as the "popular" ones, but Leitz is someone who i think does well balancing the extreme aspects of it with characters that are actually interesting and sympathetic to read (as opposed to just one-dimensional cannon fodder for random violence)

i don't know if any of these authors actually refer to themselves as "queer horror" authors nor do i know with certainty if all of them are a part of the lgbt community, but um. well i like their books. these also all aren't strictly about the characters identity; some focus more on it than others so i'll just say it's horror + lgbt characters.

i'll start with extreme horror:

fluids by may leitz - this will be the most extreme book i recommend, and i've talked about it a few times before. it's about two women, named Dahlia and Lauren, who meet on tinder during the pandemic, and after only a few days of talking Lauren takes it upon herself to drive to Dahlia's hometown and try and "save" her. things escalate, and the two women's paths diverge. cw: extreme violence and gore, rape, incest (the two girls pretend to be related), emetophobia, suicide, eating disorder, murder, literally everything you can think of. this is Extreme Horror, and i wouldn't recommend this one for anyone that's not already familiar with the genre.

girl flesh by may leitz - while i didn't like this one as much as fluids, i'm just a fan of may leitz's writing in general so i'd still recommend it. this one has a bit of a pacing problem & does a lot of telling rather than showing, but i like the direction leitz takes this one in the end. i've talked about this one before too so you might remember me rambling about it. this one is about two women who are kidnapped and wake up restrained in a dirty hotel in the middle of the texas mesa. they work together to escape their captors as well as the wild mesa and maybe even fall in love a little bit on the way. cw: extreme violence, gore, transphobia/deadnaming, eating disorder, emetophobia, self-harm, rape. this one isn't as extreme as fluids but i'd still be cautious with it.

to be devoured by sara tantlinger - this one is a short novella you can read in one sitting. Andi really really really wants to know what carrion tastes like. she's fascinated by the vultures that circle the edge of her property, but her fascination soon turns to obsession, and Andi will stop at nothing to learn their secrets. cw: blood consumption, cannibalism, violence and gore, very graphic animal harm and animal death

okay now the rest are just more general horror:

house of hunger by alexis henderson - loosely based on the legend of Elizabeth of Bathory, this story takes place in a society that runs on blood. Marion travels to the House of Hunger to begin her term as a bloodmaid under Countess Lisavet, who has a mysterious ailment that renders her weak and bedbound unless she has a constant flow of blood to treat it. Marion gets to know the other bloodmaids, and in time begins to realize not all is as it seems at the House of Hunger. cw: blood consumption, violence, abusive relationships/gaslighting, death

alexis henderson has also written the year of the witching, and she just announced an academy for liars. i really like her writing so i plan to check out her other work soon-ish.

apparitions by adam pottle - again i talked about this one recently so you may have seen it already, but i NEED more people to read this book. this follows the story of a young man who was born deaf and raised in an abusive household until he was able to escape as a teenager, only to be institutionalized immediately after. there he meets another deaf teen, and for the first time in his life, he has a language that he can speak with and can finally be understood. cw: child abuse, institutionalization, homophobia, abusive relationship, ableism, violence, death, religious trauma, animal harm and animal death.

the luminous dead by caitlin starling - gyre price is a lone caver swaddled inside a hi-tech suit that allows her to dive deep underground to map mineral deposits off-planet. however, the person on the other end of the suit has other plans, and easily takes control of gyre and her suit, putting the two at odds with each other as gyre spirals into uncertainty and paranoia while also having to deal with the terrifying presence of the tunneler. cw: claustrophobia, death, forced drugging, violence, gore, abusive/toxic relationship

caitlin starling also has a few other books though i haven't gotten around to reading them yet and i honestly haven't heard much about them so i can't say how they compare, but the luminous dead is one of my favorites of all time.

the Sworn Soldier series by T. Kingfisher - i love these books, they're just short fun horror stories with a really charming main character. Alex Easton is a retired soldier from Gallacia, and has their own special pronouns in Gallacian (kan/kanself) as part of their occupation and culture, and is what we would consider nonbinary (not all soldiers identify this way, but Alex does). vicars in Gallacia use van/vanself, there are different pronouns for children and adults, etc. i think it's just really interesting and i enjoy what the author has done with the worldbuilding and language, and how seamlessly it fits into her writing. the first book is a retelling of the fall of the house of usher (and is the stronger of the two) while the second one has Alex returning home to Gallacia and facing off with an old Gallacian superstition that's haunting their family cottage.

again i don't really know how T. Kingfisher/Ursula Vernon personally identifies but i do recommend her writing regardless, she's written other horror books as well as some fantasy books & she's just incredibly skilled imo, easy and fun to read.

most of my TBR that i'm working towards is horror so maybe i'll update this post later with more.... i'm currently reading providence girls by morgan dante and into the drowning deep by mira grant.

morgan dante has a few other books that are all some flavor of gothic horror/romance and i'm very excited for their new book that just came out TODAY that's a carmilla/elizabeth of bathory reimagining. i'm planning on reading that Immediately (i preordered it) so i'll report back for it and once i finish providence girls, too.

the next few books on my TBR that are all lgbt + horror:

The Seep by Chana Porter

Thirst by Marina Yuszczuk

A Dowry of Blood & An Education in Malice, both by S.T. Gibson

Little Rot by Akwaeke Emezi (i think this one is a thriller actually and also isnt out yet but whatever. i recommend this author, they genre-hop a lot & have a decent amount of work published already)

Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon

and of course i always recommend looking up content warnings if you need to especially for the last few since i haven't read them myself and can't vouch for them just yet. but ummm hopefully you see something you like 😭 i'll stop yapping <3

#sorry i do favor f/f pairings or sapphic characters in books and thats kinda obvious here lmfao #anyways. thanks for enabling me to talk about books <3 #i really want to read the seep ive been dying to get to it. nyehilism recommend it to me mwah #into the drowning deep is beating my ass i WILL finish it today so i can move on #i'll probably post about it here once i finish i have Thots about it already #oh also i just looked and caitlin starling's newest book is under st martin's press which is being boycotted atm #so that's probably why i havent seen anything #the luminous dead is under harper voyager tho #ask #anonymous #long post

[daydream-draws]

what if we were girl best friends and i was in love with you (also i’m a mirror)

#kotlc #keeper of the lost cities #jolie ruewen #vertina kotlc #i don’t wanna reread the books I’m gonna be fr #i don’t really remember Vertina much but I got sapphic vibes from her #idk if this is an actual ship or if my brain is misremembering or if it’s actually not even there #but like I feel like Vertina was in love w jolie #day art finally !!!! #I love these two #my art

[dvasva]

Tbh? I think the radiant emperor duology deserves more critique than it gets in its tag, so after stewing it over for a couple weeks and also discussing it with my friend, I have decided to do it myself.

So. Spoilers for She Who Became the Sun and He Who Drowned The World ahead.

First off, so nobody accuses me of hating the series, I liked the series. I'd say I'd give the first book a 4.5/5, I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I like both books. I truthfully skipped the fisting scene, it triggered some dysphoria that I wasn't comfortable with personally but I don't have problem with it existing in the book, it's good where it is, no changes.

No, my critiques come mostly from the second book, hwdts. Which sucks because I absolutely loved Baoxiang in it, it's a well known fact that my ideal type is pretty, really mean, characters. ('What about Madam Zhang?!!!???!? Shes mean and pretty!!' I hear you ask. Give it a second cause i will get to my beloved madam zhang) So, my critiques are mostly organized as 'The first part I didn't like in Hwdtw that signals the thing that became my biggest issue, the bits in the middle that i did like along with the bits that I felt didn't really work well, and Act 3 which is where my issues really were exacerbated.'

By the end of book one, I had a general annoyance but acceptance that Ma Xiuying was a bit of a weak character, and not weak as in 'dang shes a woman and cant fight' or any other sexist way you may interpret that, but weak as in structurally, she didn't really have as much depth as other characters. I thought she didn't have as much time put into her character as others. And yeah you could have a million character analysis essays over Ma and her place in the story and etc, but for me, her setup for the next book as potentially having conflict with Zhu or her own morals was the most interesting part of Ma. In general I think a lot of people tend to overlook this flaw partly because Ma is a cis lesbian character and the main 'love interest' in a book that is usually marketed to people as sapphic, which yeah there is certainly a sapphic relationship in the book but I think saying it's a major part of the book is really giving the relationship a load bearing wall ot isn't strong enough to carry. The Radiant Emperor Duology is not a romance, first and foremost. To describe it as a wlw romance is gonna leave people who read ot specifically for that reason kinda dissappointed by the end of book 2.

My big critiques didn't start until book two, and a particular scene, though. Ma, at the start of book two, was generally filling the niche of 'nagging wife' to zhu, which yknow, is a fine place to start from. I was a little disappointed there was no further discussion of Ma's disapproval of the morality of Zhu's actions, and in fact the dead child was pretty much entirely forgotten by Ma in favor of being Zhu's wife. Which, yknow, sure.

The Scene I had issue with happened (Spoilers once again) after Zhu finally captures Ouyang and imprisons him at her base of operations. Ma, dressed in her empressly regalia enters his room with the intention of being the bigger person. She walks in, looks at the stripped down and humiliated general who killed her father and famously is also really a women hater, and tells him she forgives him for killing her father. And then she gets upset and cries when the prideful general who hates women gives her a dressing down and taunts her and is like 'I'm glad I killed your father'? She nearly cries because Ouyang was mean to her (notably only cause he was mean to her and didn't gracefully accept her forgiveness, not because he killed ehr father) and runs off to Zhu. And Zhu responds with 'Wow, he's just a weirdo, everyone likes you and everyone in existance immediately knows you're a good person and you change people.' Which, my friend suggested before she finished the book, was a case of Zhu placating Ma and dismissing her feelings which would be an interesting dynamic.

Really my hangups with this scene come from multiple parts.

1. Ma' few character traits including being observant and reading people really well (a thing she's praised for in book 1) and having good social intuition are completely thrown out by her thinking being alone with ouyang and forgiving him would be a good idea and then her being shocked and upset when he spat on her forgiveness. And

2. Zhu's response is never once treated by the text as her dismissing Ma and placating her, and Zhu's statement despite never being shown to be true before and that moment being the first time it's ever mentioned, ends up becoming Chekov's moral purity by the end of the book, where the plot hinges on Ma being able to magically heal a damaged character's mind enough for Zhu to win in the end. Which I will get back to. There's a lot of other stuff happening between here and the end.

So, before I get back to Ma and her role in the story, I'll address some other bits from after this scene. Both problems and things I enjoyed generally.

Madam Zhang and her parallels to Baoxiang and her being the absolute queen of dissociating really was interesting (before act 3). She was a very compelling character who I completely understood and felt positively about. She had a way more interesting relationship with gender imo than Ma did, especially in book 2. I didn't really like that she was overwhelmingly shown having sexual villence done to her, that felt weirdly like a punishment. But, I did like her a whole bunch, and I liked the look we got into her head. She was probably my second, maybe third, favorite character in the whole book until Act 3.

I really, really liked Ouyangs dynamic and relationship with Zhu. The weird sexual tension between them, their weird kinda nonsexual but also kinda very sexual S&M relationship. It was somehow the most sensual, sexual part of a book that featured Madam Zhang having sex with multiple people, and Zhu going down on Ma, and a lot of other mentions of sex or scenes involving sex. Tbh I feel like, in a way, Ma was left to the sidelines for most of the book because Ouyang became the primary 'love' interest for a hot second there and the only reason Ma could get her spot back was Ouyang and Zbu's separation. Also, from what I've seen when people talk about this book, they always kinda try to express Zhu and Ouyang's dynamic as very nonsexual and nonromantic, as platonic mostly. And there is no inherent superiority of romantic over platonic, but I think to insist that it is only platonic, and not a strange swirl of romantic, platonic, sexual, frustration and relief, and a swirl of familiarity and vulnerability all wrapped into one, is doing the dynamic a bit of a disservice. And ther is, imo, very clearly a subtle hint of romantic intent and interest on Ouyang's part before he realizes Zhu has a body he hates.

Which is also another point I didn't like. Ouyang and Zhu's relationship end felt off. The entire bit with the pirates felt off, but especially how Ouyang found out about Zbu's body, and how Zhu reacted. I think Ouyang finding out second hand, from a combination of being suspicious and from Jiang saying it, was a poor way for that to be revealed. I think there was a better way for that to happen that woyld have felt more like a betrayl to zhu than this did. The fact that Zhu and Ouyang were so in tune and could see each other perfectly, but this one thing was a blind spot for both of them because of how unaffected by gender Zhu was compared to how overaffected by gender Ouyang was is a really interesting thing to explore, an interesting disconnect between two character's whose entire basis for their relationship is 'like recognizes like'. I think Zhu seeing it as a betrayl would have been more impactful if she had presented this informatuon to Ouyang herself and been rejected than how it went down. And, I think her not realizing Ouyang would be disgusted that he felt connected and felt a sameness to someone with a body he found grotesque and that he feared would have been more interesting for zhu, who views herself outside of womanhood and didnt really think that other people would not see her outside of womanhood, if she was the one who told ouyang herself.

Also, less importantly, think going into Ouyangs annoyance that zhu kept moving his target further away was a good move but it wasn't expanded on as much for my taste. I also really liked it when (spoiler) Xu Da dies, and that entire part despite some minir bits, was extremely good in that Zhu finally has tasted loss. She had, up until that point, been riding a wave of positivity, she was the underdog who won over and over again despite all the odds and despite her own reckless choices. So I did appreciate that everything went wrong for her at least once. that would have been, imo if other things were changed, a good place to end a book two in a three book series. Which will make sense as to why I mention it im a bit.

I also didn't like how Ma was nonexistant unless the plot was like 'ok we need to remind people that Ma exists.'

And there's of course other stuff but those are the main points of acts 1 and 2 that i wasn't fond of or that i liked.

Act 3 is a wholely different behemoth which can be encapsulated with 'I wish it was longer but also different' (courtesy of the convo my friend and I had).

My friend and I both agreed that we liked this kind of courtly drama game it was playing. My friend doesn't tend to like the structure or writing style of a lot of the chinese wuxia, danmei, or courtly drama translated books i read, so it was nice to know that the genre content isn't the issue for her there.

The biggest problems I had with the ending though was 1. I think Baoxiang and Ma had an interesting dynamic despite it being really rushed and how distasteful I found the entire concept of Ma being such a good wholesome goody good good person that she could change Baoxiang, quiet his demons and fix him in some way. That was annoying in an otherwise interesting dynamic. And 2. I think Madam Zhang's character traits and cleverness and all that were wiped away to make her inexplicably jealous of Ma in a way that I don't think fit her character and just served to fit a trope of jealous empress who hates the favored concubine.

So, here's my major proposed changes.

1. Ma gets sent to Khanbaliq extremely early on. Like, act one maybe after ouyang is captured early. This serves three purposes. A. Ma has something to do and is more present in the story. this could be a good xhance to let her actually feel frustrated or upset at Zhu in some tangible way that needs to be resolved or talked thru eventually. B. she gets more time to build a relationship with Baoxiang, whose entire defeat hinges on him having a strong connection with her. and C. Her absence in the other parts of the book feel less like she's being ignored or forgotten. It makes Zhu's lack of haste more than just a way to annoy Ouyang, and turns it into an interesting moral choice. Should she rush to Khanbaliq to save Ma or trust that Ma will be ok in favor of gaining power? Her lack of haste means Ouyang leaves, depressed, and she loses Xu Da, all while she doesn't even have the assurance that Ma is ok, she is truly at her lowest point with nobody with her. If Ma is in Khanbaliq and that's explored, then Zhu and Ouyang can also explore their dynamic without Ma feeling a bit like she is battling for Zhu's attention.

2. Madam Zhang is suspicious of Ma, or feels actually tangibly threatened by Ma. In act 3, Madam Zhang's anger towards Ma feels really out of place. She got exactly what she wants, she is empress, her emperor isn't interested in removing her from her position and her position isn't threatened by anyone. Baoxiang won't get rid of her, he won't demote her, he has shown zero sign of ever even considering it. So, why is Madam Zhang jealous of Ma? Imo, especially since she very clearly has dissociated into oblivion and has no love or affection for anyone anymore, and no real desire or motivation to secure her position further aside from maybe producing an heir to make sure shes taken care of after Baoxiang dies, there's no reason for her to be inextricably jealous of Ma. It kinda just erases all of Madam Zhang's political savvy and cunning into jealous, petty woman, and that sucks. If she was suspicious of Ma's intention, or Baoxiang genuinely expressed spmething that actively threatened her position, her hatred of Ma would make sense, but instead she hates Ma cause Ma is ugly and spends every night with Baoxiang. She hated rice buckets concubine cause that concubine used a lot of funds and competition genuinely made her position less stable. She needs better motivation for hating Ma.

3. As I mentioned earlier, Zhu needs to be the one to tell Ouyang that she does not have a dick. That's just all around better, it feels more like a betrayl to bare your secrets and be rejected, etc etc.

4. The duology should have been a trilogy, with book 3 starting when Zhu is at her lowest, ouyang is dead, ma is in khanbaliq, Xu Da is dead, a new guy is the emperor. This is where a book three should have started. in a series that has so many important characters, i feel like it needs more space. she's in a 10 gallon tank when really she needs a 30 gallon tank. Lots of it, especially towards the end of book 2, felt rushed and the extra book will absolutely push that back a bit and make it less rushed.

Anyways that's my critique of The Radiant emperor duology. Once Again, I liked the series, its one of my favorites i've read all year. I don't dislike it, and having a critique or opinion about something doesnt mean I didn't like the book or understand the book (because obviously if i understood it i would understand why its flawless). I liked it, there are things I wish were different, that's it.

#radiant emperor #he who drowned the world #she who became the sun #radiant emperor spoilers #spoiler #i wrote this in like 2 hours at 4 am and i got lazy halfway thru editing it so if theres typos rip #i just needed to get it out of my brain #organized in text somewhere other than jamies discord dms #thank you jamie also #i have a lot of opinions on this duology #some i didnt even mention cause its 6:30 and i forgot #i think shelley parker chan wants to write nblm or mlm books tbh #i dont think they really wanna write sapphic books #and tbh im ok with that i think there should be more books about transmascs #the tiktok/tumblr habit of describing a book with tags really also doesnt help this book also #i think to say 'sapphic enemies to lovers' for this kind of book gives people the wrong impression #especially since once again i wouldnt really describe it as sapphic in the genre way #anyhow again so nobody kills me #i did like the books #i enjoyed them i loved them i did not hate them at all

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

Everything Under the Moon

Anthology of queer reimaginings of fairytales by mostly Australian authors

various genres, from contemporary to fantasy and sci-fi, mostly about older teens

mlm, sapphic, trans, nonbinary, demi, bi ace, and aromantic characters, some stories focusing on romance but many on familial relationships and siblings

#Everything Under the Moon #aroaessidhe 2024 reads #aromantic books #queer books #A really nice anthology of queer fairytales! definitely a mix of all sorts of stories. #Some were a bit forgettable (I mean I’m just not a short story person) but I really enjoyed others! I #I picked this up specifically because I heard there was an aromantic story (which I didn’t know much else about) and yeah it hit hard actua #it’s about being okay with loneliness and also centred around artists….so. it did make me cry a bit…. #I liked that a lot of them focused on platonic r/ships - most on sibling actually? I appreciate that there were a couple sapphic aces too #I will say while the illustrations are really high quality (I especially liked the naturey ones) I found a lot of them depicted the chars #as very.....disnefied? idk. thin and generic. lacking 'imperfect' features like freckles even #(when they’re described as having them) With a couple exceptions for sure - but a lot of them were a bit samey #I would have loved some authors notes or a list of the stories because I didn’t recognise which all were inspired by #(though they’re on the endpapers; just not specified which) - I did find this in a GR review tho

[moghedien]

if Thom is gonna be showing up with the girlies in Tanchico in the show (and I believe its more or less confirmed that he is showing up somewhere next season based on his actor filming in various locations) I would like them to actually lean in a little bit to the possibility of Thom being Elayne's biological father

like I don't want it to necessarily be true or even like a 50/50 chance but like....I want Elayne to be like "wait what" when confronted with him again

#I don't think it would be true #Elayne's gotta have the Damodred Sapphic Gene after all #but I would really really really like them to make the viewers at least question the possibility of it #and to maybe add to some reasons as to why Thom almost definitely basically 100% certainly killed Taringail Damodred #like it would also honestly add some flavor just to make it like absolutely clear that to Andor it doesn't matter who her dad is #she's Morgase's daughter and that's literally all that matters #wheel of time #wot on prime #wot book spoilers #elayne trakand #thom merrilin

[sapphosclown]

looking for book recommendations!!

would love it if there are sapphics, there doesn’t have to be but it makes me happy

shows i like for taste reference: rise of the pink ladies, stranger things, community, i am not okay with this, heartstopper, school spirits, wednesday, umbrella academy

books i’ve liked in the past: one last stop (casey mcquinston), will grayson will grayson (john green), solitaire (alice oseman), radio silence (alice oseman)

#please help #i’m not really a romance novel girlie i think… i like romance but they all feel so cringey if it’s the main plot and im not totally into it #i’m not anti sci-fi and fiction and fantasy #honestly have not read very many books in recent years so idrk what i like anymore #but i like when there’s gay people ! #book recommendations #sapphic books #queer books

[mjduncan]

En Garde (Symphony Series #4) is now available for pre-order! You can get yours here ⚔️ 🩰 🔥

#wlw romance #wlw fiction #sapphic romance #sapphic fiction #new book!!! #and it's a fucking BEAST at over 189k 😅 #i'm really beyond pleased with how this one turned out #can't wait for you all to read it #mj duncan #this indie thing is rough y'all #please reblog to help spread the word

[luxaofhesperides]

she gets the girl - rachael lippincott & alyson derrick

#yalit #yalitedit #she gets the girl #rachael lippincott #alyson derrick #lgbtq books #sapphic books #litedit #wlw books #queer books #my edit #been a while since i read a contemp romance and this one was really good!!! #i love the development of molly and alex's rship is so good!! #highly recommend it

[thoodleoo]

ok last thing i will say about this but i just. i dunno! i guess i'm just not the target audience for these myth retellings but if the entirety of how a book is pitched to me is "greek myth but make it feminist and queer!" then i just don't care. i don't!! i've read a variety of retellings/adaptations of/stories that incorporate greek myths aimed at different age-level audiences, and if all you've got to pull me in is to make it gay or whatever, that doesn't excite me. unless you're actually going to engage with the material outside of superficially making it gayer or whatever then you're not really adding much to it for me. i can make dionysus and pentheus have raging sparagmos-sex or whatever in my head on my own. give me something i haven't seen before!!!

#like for all i know this odyssey book could be really good but #all the reviews ive seen are just like 'it's so sapphic!!!' whatever #im going to reread le guin's lavinia #like i really enjoyed the first series of percy jackson books bc they were a refreshing way to look at myth for a younger audience #tsoa on the other hand.....like ok i can just go to ao3 if i want to read mediocre patrochilles fanfic

[beeesworld]

Ron’s protectiveness was unstoppable, always had been, and Harry, overall, loved that about him.

He just couldn’t explain to Ron all of the little things about Draco that made him want to sigh while he was sure little hearts exploded over his eyes.

The way he would concentrate on Harry when it was just the two of them as if nothing else existed. The look where he smiled so unguardedly, so differently than the one he gave to the rest of the world. The moments where he held onto Harry, clutching even as he fell asleep.

The moments that Harry was sure Draco wasn’t truly able to let himself accept – yet. Like the way Draco had kissed the breath from him last week when he’d returned to London and stroked his cheek so tenderly. How he’d stayed in bed five minutes later than his alarm – which he knew by now never happened – and when he had gotten up, he’d murmured to Harry that he could stay if he wanted, despite the fact that Draco had to go to work.

No, Draco wasn’t professing feelings, but . . . it was something. Something different than what it had been at first. And he was patient, very much willing to let Draco come to terms with these things on his own time.

#i did a bad thing #copy and paste #from #sapphic book #those who wait #by haley cass #replaced #sutton x charlotte #with #drarry #harry potter fanfiction #harry x draco #draco malfoy #drarry microfic #but maybe #not really #idk man #you decide

[darkacademiaarchivist]

this is how you lose the time war absolutely DESTROYED ME five stars no questions asked

#spoilers in the tags #I'M SO HAPPY THERE WAS A HAPPY ENDING I WAS REALLY STARTING TO DOUBT IT???? #AND IT WAS SO GOOD I'M SO GLAD THEY CAN BE ON THEIR OWN SIDE NOW (GOOD OMENS WHO) #AND EVEN THOUGHT THEY'LL ALWAYS BE ON THE RUN THEY'LL ALWAYS BE THREE STEPS AHED AND THEY'LL ALWAYS HAVE EACH OTHER #(this is my headcanon) #i care so much about them #if I had a nickel for every book about time traveling sapphics with hints of unbury your gays I read this month I'd have two nickels #which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice #this is how you lose the time war #my post

[visualbrainrot]

"That special stupid is stealing over me... I am dumb around beautiful women. Seen the same thing happen to men"

-The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, Meg Elison

#Meg elison #book of the unnnamed midwife #dystopia #lesbian dystopia #this novel is really good #wlw #sapphic #lebian #queer women

[marzipanandminutiae]

hello!! i’m so sorry to snoop in the tags, but i saw you mention a book you were reading where one of the women uses a spell to disguise herself as a man and the other one is into it!! may i ask what book that is? id love to read it or something like it

A Restless Truth by Freya Marske. Generally quite a good book, I thought, though it took me some time to get into it! It's a fantasy murder mystery/MacGuffin HuntTM story set on a luxury steamer in 1909.

The disguise part is very brief; the character is a generally femme bisexual cis woman, but she's played trouser roles in a music hall and used her magic powers to enhance the illusion. And she demonstrates that to her new lover (femme cis lesbian) while they're kissing at one point. It doesn't happen again after that.

I found it offputting, especially because the lesbian has just figured out whey she's never had any interest in men and now here she is briefly pretending the woman she's falling for is a man. Genderfuckery is not generally something I'm into in terms of reading romantic or steamy lit and trying to lose myself in it, but if that's something you like, that aspect of the scene will probably appeal!

(I should hardly have to say this, but it's Tumblr, so: obviously IRL I support people in whatever gender or presentation they find most authentic. You don't have to be attracted to someone to want them to have basic rights, and be happy and comfortable in their skin. I'm also perfectly content to read books that don't reflect my experience or what I personally find attractive. This specific book was very much in Comfort Food territory for me, though, so I approached it from that angle and that colored my reactions. Clear? Excellent.)

#ask #books #queer lit #sapphic lit #I also felt like it might have betrayed an imperfect understanding of why trouser roles and male impersonators were popular back then #there's not SUPPOSED to be a total illusion that the performer is a man. the appeal is in knowing that she's really a woman #some straight men even found such performances titilating because Woman In Trousers (showing off separation of legs!!!) #and for sapphic women it's like how butch women are different from men

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

The Splinter In The Sky

fast-paced standalone sci-fi

follows a scribe and tea expert from a colonised moon whose sibling is kidnapped and lover is killed, and is taken as a political prisoner into the heart of the empire

she navigates the political world of high society serving tea while spying for multiple forces, in an attempt to fight for her people’s freedom and free her sibling

sapphic

#The Splinter In The Sky #aroaessidhe 2024 reads #I enjoyed a lot about this! but I think narratively it fell apart a bit in the end? #I will say the worldbuilding in terms of the MCs culture and depiction of colonialism is very rich and detailed #(I feel like I haven’t read a ton of scifi colonialism books based around African colonialism specifically?) #But the worldbuilding of the rest of the empire is kinda vague?? like there’s details but it didn’t quite feel meshed together. #It definitely falls into the trap of ‘imperial colonialsim and systemic injustices will be fixed if we kill this one guy’ #(or 3-5 people; here) #I kind of wish it was more complex and maybe a duology in that sense? Or; I was actually kinda expecting a more tragic dramatic ending. #I did really enjoy the characters though! #I started the book being like there’s no way x will be a love interest right. there’s no way you can convince me of that #but by the end I was endeared to her as a character. though did think she was too…nice and good for who she was in the narrative #sapphic books

[rainedroptalks]

Not to um actually but did Brennan just call wolfsbane and belladonna the same thing

#ramblings #liveblogging #fhjy #raine watches fhjy #they’re NOT the same!!! #I um. I really liked poisons as a kid #cuz of a vaguely sapphic ghost book I read once #(wasn’t actually sapphic but yea it definitely was) #that had many many references to belladonna #and belladonna is very different!!!