Tag Archives: Farzana Doctor

All Eyes on Her

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I could not be more excited for today’s post. I am super thrilled to welcome back BBB contributor Jack for another incredible review. This time, Jack writes about a forthcoming LGBTQ2S+ novel, Seven, by Farzana Doctor, an author of colour in my local, Toronto. Then, I am deeply honoured to be hosting a post by another Ontario author, Laurie Elizabeth Flynn, whose new YA thriller, All Eyes On Her, comes out later this month. She addresses a super challenging topic in writing, and one that she proves herself to be a master of in her upcoming title that I couldn’t put down: multiple POV.

Before we jump in, I just want to put in a quick plug for an upcoming LGBTQ2S+ contemporary indie press book by my client, author CM Harris. Maiden Leap releases on September 1st, and you can read more about it here!

In addition, as a follow up to last week’s post on chapter books, huge congratulations to Theanne Griffith, Reggie Brown, and their whole team – there are more Magnificent Makers books on the way!

Jack’s Review of Seven, by Farzana Doctor

I have such a fondness for Farzana’s work, which I discovered years ago through our mutual connection to the social work profession. I was super glad when Jack chose this book to check out. Seven comes out later this year, and is available for pre-order now.

Farzana Doctor’s novel Seven is the kind of novel that, like the scent of baked bread wafting over from a bakery, lures you in. In her fourth novel, Seven, Doctor explores themes of personhood, motherhood, and the concept of individuality in a collective community. The novel borrows from Farzana’s Indian ancestry, specifically her Dawoodi Bohra community and carefully braids truth and fiction into a family’s intergenerational story. What begins as an insight into a familial tree takes Sharifa through past and present becoming a story of chosen family and the fortitude of relationships.

Seven, is a layered concoction which reveals itself to its reader in pieces. In the novel, Doctor questions how people define “harm”, challenging the notion of harm and family as mutually exclusive. Doctor represents social justice on the public scale we are familiar with, and through the individual experience which personalizes pain.

Photo by Jill Dimond on Unsplash

CW for this book include sexual violence and gas-lighting. I found enlightenment in the presence of both sexual violence and strategies of healing. I recommend this book to readers in their young adulthood. It is also an insight into the different types of activism and stands one can take.

Farzana Doctor is a Canadian author, activist, and psychotherapist. She is a careful writer whose embroidery of Intergenerational trauma, the politicization of women’s bodies and the human experience, is both brilliant and alluring. What happens when trauma is weaponized as a vehicle of obedience and victims become perpetrators? How can multiple truths co-exist?

During this year’s Festival of Literary Diversity (FOLD), I had the pleasure of attending the virtual What We found discussion, where she posed thoughtful questions about identity, about writing. The thoughtfulness is evident once again in the configuration of Seven, a novel full of questioning.

The novel begins with Sharifa, a woman who feels broken. Sharifa and her family decide to go to India, where Murtuza (her husband) will be working and Sharifa will be on sabbatical. Sharifa plans on researching her family, specifically Abdoolally’s role as the family’s patriarch, while homeschooling her daughter.  Her daughter, Zee becomes a focal point, reminding Sharifa of herself as a child when she would travel back to India. During her research, Sharifa begins to identify the ways in which people can inflict harm their loved ones. Even though this is a work of fiction, the character of Abdoolally was inspired by Hussonally Dholkawala, Doctor’s great-great grandfather, and the character are based on the very real Dawoodi Bohras’ community.

Photo by Yaopey Yong on Unsplash

In many ways, the novel is an account of the experiences of a cultural transplant with sexual violence, generational trauma and belonging. By showing the varying ways in which trauma shows up for the same experience, Doctor explores the complicated nature of trauma.

In Seven, the reader is given pieces of a puzzle and asked: “what happens if we believe in the wrong thing, the wrong people?” What does healing look like?

Laurie Elizabeth Flynn, Author of ALL EYES ON HER

I met Laurie through this blog, when I first wrote about one of her titles, Last Girl Lied To, which I read during the #VillainAThon last year. I could not put this book down. Since then, I’ve learned that Laurie herself is as much of a delight as her books are, as she’s peppered me with recommendations for other un-put-down-able titles over the last several months. I think that I can safely say that we share a passion for messy teenaged femme characters, and I have never been disappointed by a book that she’s suggested for me.

I am honoured to have met Laurie, and to have received an ARC of her forthcoming YA novel, All Eyes On Her to screen read for my bookshop. It was the first book I read in 2020, while I was going through a very difficult time in my life, and it was immersive and escapist and everything I’d hoped. The ending drove me bananas in the best possible way. The last chapter was absolutely delicious, and kept me guessing through the very last page. All Eyes On Her comes out on August 18th, and is available for pre-order now.

More recently, Laurie has achieved incredible success, and as a reader I could not be happier, and as one of her supporters, I am deeply proud. Her adult debut was recently acquired by Simon and Schuster, and optioned for television by AMC. I can’t wait to read this book, and I hope desperately that we’ll all get to watch it come to live as a super bingeable series.

For this post, I am so grateful that Laurie addressed multi-POV writing. As I wrote at the top of this post, she executes it perfectly in All Eyes On Her, and it’s something that takes so much technique, precision, and dedication to master. Thank you so much for this, Laurie, and congratulations for all that is to come!

As is tradition, I asked Laurie to recommend some books by Black authors that readers of this blog should check out alongside All Eyes On Her. Her choices were Some Other Now by Sarah Everett, which releases in early 2021. She also loved Allegedly, by Tiffany D. Jackson, and You Don’t Know Me But I Know You by Rebecca Barrow. 

Voices in a Crowd: Writing Multiple POV

When I started writing All Eyes On Her, I didn’t have a plot or an outline—just a vaguely drawn idea about a boy and a girl who went into the woods, and only the girl came back. The first voice that came to me was the main character Tabitha’s best friend, Elle, and the next thing I knew, Tabby’s sworn enemy needed a say too. Before I knew it, several other characters had emerged from my imagination, all of them with one thing in common: They knew, or had known, Tabitha Cousins, and thus felt qualified to weigh in on her guilt or innocence. To act as a sort of jury, convincing the reader of her true nature.

I drafted the novel in a fast and furious blur. By the time I finished, there were five main point of view characters, each with a different relationship to Tabby and her deceased boyfriend Mark, as well as several peripheral characters with their own chapters. To complicate matters, the story also involved news articles, blog posts, texts, diary entries, and police transcripts. 

I give huge credit to my editors for not balking at the idea of a novel with so many different POV characters and formats. They were fully on board and excited about the concept from the start. I knew the challenges I was facing—to successfully execute the style I wanted the novel to take, each voice had to sound unique, and each character had to provide different information that informed the narrative and moved the plot along. It was in editing and revising that I really learned what worked and what didn’t, and I came up with these tips for anyone else working on (or wanting to start) a multiple POV novel!

Photo by Nguyen Thu Hoai on Unsplash

Know Your Characters

You need to know your characters no matter how many POV characters you have, or how the story is told. But it’s especially important when you have a cast of characters whose voices each need to sound distinct. Each time I entered a new perspective, I settled into that character’s head, and that informed the voice. I often asked myself, is this something she would say? Is this a reaction she would have? I also challenged myself to memorize each person’s motivations—why he feels this way, and why he thinks the reader needs to be made aware. I aimed to know instinctively how each character would react to a situation, even if it was a situation that wasn’t happening on the page. 

The Why

Ask yourself why a certain character’s POV needs to be included. What does it bring to the story? What information or insight does this person provide that another one can’t? A few side characters with POV chapters in the first draft of All Eyes On Her were cut in revisions, because as fun as they were to write, they weren’t adding any new or crucial information to the narrative.

Photo by Christina @ wocintechchat.com on Unsplash

Try Different Formats

While most of my POV characters have first-person present-tense chapters, I wrote one entirely using a police transcript format. At the time, I wasn’t sure why his story needed to be told this way, but looking back, I can see the reason. I didn’t necessarily want the reader in his head as much as directly outside of it. I wanted to showcase his personality through dialogue and intentionally keep certain thoughts off-limits. Which brings me to the next point…

Hide and Seek

Just because you have multiple characters doesn’t mean you need to give readers their every thought. In fact, it’s more effective when you don’t (especially if you’re writing a thriller where everybody may be a suspect…). Think as much about what you choose not to share as what you do. Give your readers tantalizing little gaps to fill in. Consider why a character may not be saying something, and what that tells readers about him or her. The only thing I love more than an unreliable narrator… unreliable narrators.

The only thing I love more than an unreliable narrator… unreliable narrators.

Show, Don’t Tell

This is solid advice for writing in general, but I find it especially helpful for navigating a multi-POV book. If readers are simply told every thought in a character’s mind, they’ll get bored easily, and you run the risk of one character blending into the next. Show how the character interacts with others. How she walks and talks. What her hobbies are. How she acts at parties. How she behaves around friends versus parents. What her secrets are, and how she conceals them…

Streamline Information

Something to avoid with a large cast of POV characters is each section feeling like an info-dump, or a repetition of information another character already shared. Ideally, you want each character’s next chapter to piggyback off the one before it, ramping up to the climax of the novel. The order needs to be determined by underlying tension, and what comes next to ratchet up that tension. Every author has a different strategy, and there’s no wrong way. Some write all of one character’s chapters before moving into the head of another, and some write mostly in chronological order. For this book, I head-hopped and wrote mostly in order, which I think helped with the pacing, and ensured that every new event built on the one before it to create momentum.

Photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash

Motivation is Key

Since character arcs are so important, this is a challenge when you have several characters whose stories need to feel compelling on their own, as well as part of a whole. Make sure you always know what each character wants, and what’s standing in the way of them getting it. I also like to keep in mind what each character is hiding, or what they don’t want people to find out. Having character arcs overlap and inform each other is like putting together a (sometimes frustrating, sometimes extremely satisfying) puzzle.

Differentiate Speech and Mannerisms

A trick I employed as I edited All Eyes On Her: If I picked up the manuscript and flipped to a random chapter, would I know whose head I was in within a couple sentences? If the answer was no, I looked at why. Had I fallen into similar phrasing? Made everyone constantly push their hair back behind their ears? Did the dialogue feel familiar? Voice is everything in a book with several of them, so having consistent go-to mannerisms or expressions that feel familiar to a character helps them stand out.

I hope these tips are helpful to anyone writing multiple POV! All in all, try to think of it for what it is… a very fun experience, and a challenge that will improve your writing. If you’re someone who gets bored easily (hi, me) or something doesn’t feel right in your book from just one POV, it might be worth figuring out whose voice to potentially add to the story. Listen to what that character has to say—because it may be quite telling.

PS, if you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving me a tip! It only takes a minute, and it allows me to keep creating content just like this, buying food for my pets, and pursuing my career as a literary agent!

Chapter Books… What’s GOOD?

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New (to me) Resource

Before I get into content, I do want to throw up a new Enby Book List that I discovered on Twitter this week! Compiled by Jeanne G’Fellers, this is a new resource that I’ve now added to the BBB Links and Resources page! This is a great list, especially if you’re looking for indie or harder to discover titles featuring non-binary authors and characters.

Chapter Books… What’s GOOD?

Thanks to some inspiration from one of my clients, Marissa Ellor, I’ve decided to finally write a comprehensive list of chapter book recommendations. This is a post that I’ve been meaning to make for a while, and it’s a total bookseller post, but I hope that it will be useful to parents and kidtlit writers as well.

The bookshop where I work is in a neighbourhood with a lot of young families in it, and we also do the majority of our business with the local school boards. Our store specializes in social justice and diversity, so as curators and booksellers, we are very mindful and selective about the books that we choose. For a while now, there has been fantastic YA to choose from, and picture books are getting better and better every day. Board books are catching up, and there’s starting to be some good MG out there. When you’re looking at kids who are still learning to read independently, though, finding really good chapter books, early readers, and graphic novels for the developing (or “reluctant”) reader can be super challenging. I hope that my recommendations can make finding the gems a little bit easier for those who are overwhelmed!

There was a period of my life when I was spending a lot of time in suburban Colorado, and probably once a week I found myself at the 2nd and Charles in Aurora. This store is an oasis of used kids’ books. They have a massive selection in a clean and well-organized space, and they often do ridiculous sales. At the time, I was co-parenting, and one of my favourite things to do was to bring the kids to these sales and give them free rein to pick whatever books looked good, and then spend time sitting at one of the kids’ tables with them, discussing what we were going to bring home and why it was awesome.

A bearded person stands in front of shelves of picture books with their arms full of books. They are laughing.
Photo from the 2nd and Charles Facebook page, May 22 2019.

Part of the fun of this for me was rediscovering the books that in large part made me who I am today. I was that kid who used to bring their maximum number of library loans home every week, and had to carry a stack after the Scholastic order came into my classroom in elementary school. I was lucky enough to be allowed to read whatever I wanted, and I read a lot. Some of my favourites were chapter book series – from The Chronicles of Narnia to The Saddle Club to Goosebumps and Bunnicula… I loved these stories. The bad news is? A lot of them haven’t aged so well. The good news is? There are a LOT of new things on the market for this reading group.

Unfortunately, sometimes too many choices can be overwhelming, and because chapter books are chronically under-screened and under-reviewed compared to books in other categories, it’s hard to know what’s good. Taking a peek at Barnes and Noble’s selection, for example: there are over 27 000 titles available through their website categorized as paperback, ages 6-9, and that cost between $5 and $10 USD. The Toronto Public Library lists 5 816 results for “easy-to-read” stories. Important to note: neither of these outlets for books for kids actually categorize books AS chapter books. Where does a reader even start to look? I hope that by providing some recommendations for my favourite chapter book series, it will make the selection process a little more manageable!

A close up of a child reading a book, one eye visible, and the book large and out of focus in the foreground.
Photo by Johnny McClung on Unsplash

I’ve chosen the series listed below for a number of reasons, and diverse representation is at the top of that list. That said, probably the BIGGEST fault in chapter books right now is that you actually can’t judge books by their covers. Although so many of these titles look super inclusive, there is a serious dearth of #OwnVoices stories, and even most of the books that feature diverse casts are still written by white folks. It’s time for kidlit publishers to seek out better representation among their authors for books in this reading level.

I am also not a fan of “potty humour” in books, so there’s not a lot of that here. For each category, I’ve profiled my favourite selection briefly, and then included a list of other titles in that category underneath. You will see that the book listed is always the first book in the series (where the series are numbered), but as a rule, it is not necessary to read chapter books in the order in which they are published! They are typically stand alone stories. Where the series name isn’t obvious, I’ve included that in parentheses following the title.

A child looks at a bunch of books on a shelf.
Photo by Suad Kamardeen on Unsplash

Books with Animals as Characters

When you’re looking for a crowd-pleasing book for a group of young kids, or a great read aloud, it’s hard to go wrong with anthropomorphic animals just living their lives. The Heartwood Hotel series, written by Canadian author Kallie George and illustrated by Stephanie Graegin is a wholesome series about a super-cozy hotel for forest animals. Themes of friendship and community come through in these books accompanied by black and white illustrations.

The cover of Heartwood Hotel: A True Home, showing a tree with a small mouse sitting on a branch.
  • Eva’s Treetop Festival (Owl Diaries)
  • A True Home (Heartwood Hotel)
  • Rabbit’s Bad Habits (Rabbit and Bear)
  • A New Friend (The Adventures of Sophie Mouse)

Stories for Animal Lovers

The Jasmine Green books by Helen Peters and illustrated by Ellie Snowdon are about a young girl who lives on a family farm with her parents and siblings. Her mom is a veterinarian, and each book in this series sees Jasmine helping an animal in need. This is the perfect series for compassionate education in a classroom, or for any kid who loves animals.

The cover of A Piglet Called Truffle, featuring a pink piglet running through the grass.
  • Mercy Watson to the Rescue
  • Megabat
  • Amy and the Missing Puppy (The Critter Club)
  • A Piglet Called Trouble (Jasmine Green)

Books about Friendship

I love Megan Atwood’s books. At a more accessible level for readers, the Dear Molly, Dear Olive series features two young girls who are cross-country Email penpals. One lives in a city, and one lives in a rural area. The books follow the girls as they tell each other about their adventures, and the reader explores the ups and downs of long-distance friendship. At a more advanced level are the Orchard Novels, of which there are four, one for each season. These follow four kids who live and work together on a New England apple orchard. Like Dear Molly, Dear Olive, these lighthearted books feature a diverse cast.

  • Ivy and Bean
  • Best Friends Forever? (Ashley Tall and Ashlee Small)
  • A Fall for Friendship (An Orchard Novel)
  • Dear Molly, Dear Olive
  • The Baby-Sitters Club

Books about Making Stuff

The Magnificent Makers series is an #OwnVoices series of books about kids making stuff, written by Theanne Griffith, PhD. She is not only a children’s author, but also a neuroscientist. The illustrator for this series is Reggie Brown, who specializes in diverse representation. These books are charming, well-written, and they are a brilliant fresh perspective for a space where we are only just starting to see #OwnVoices stories come to light.

The cover of Magnificent Makers: How to Test a Friendship, showing three children of colour looking at a biodome on a table.
  • Rosie Revere and the Raucous Riveters (Questioneers)
  • Ellie, Engineer
  • The Un-Friendship Bracelet (Craftily Ever After)
  • How to Test a Friendship (The Magnificent Makers)

Mysteries

My favourite series in this whole post is the Museum Mysteries series. While I wish that the creators behind this series (Steve Brezenoff and Lisa K. Weber) were a little more diverse, the books themselves offer a fresh new take on classic whodunnits with an inclusive Scooby Squad cast of characters and beautiful covers. They’re quick reads with awesome classroom tie-ins, and if your household is playing a LOT of Animal Crossing right now (like mine is), fans of Blathers will be super into the varied museum settings of these stories.

The cover of The Case of the Haunted Mystery Museum, featuring a child looking up at a large museum with lightning in the background.
  • Ada Lace on the Case
  • The Case of the Haunted History Museum (Museum Mysteries)
  • King and Kayla and the Case of the Missing Dog Treats

Spooky Stories

Obviously, my favourites. I wish that my childhood chapter books had aged a little better, but I’m glad that there are new spooky series taking up the mantle – like Desmond Cole Ghost Patrol, by Andrés Miedoso and illustrated by Víctor Rivas. This is a classic monster-of-the-week series (appropriate for the faint of heart!) featuring the fearless Desmond Cole, and his sidekick who is afraid of everything: Andrés.

The cover of Desmond Cole Ghost Patrol, which shows two children in the foreground and some spooky houses and ghosts in the background.
  • Ghoulia
  • The Haunted House Nextdoor (Desmond Cole Ghost Patrol)
  • Sam Wu is Not Afraid of Ghosts
  • Isadora Moon Goes to School
  • Amelia Fang and the Barbaric Ball

Fantasy

There are so many good fantasy chapter books, and they range from epic to urban to friendship stories about yetis. There’s something for every reader. Left wanting for an #OwnVoices series in this category, I still love Zoey and Sassafras, by Asia Citro and illustrated by Marion Lindsay. This whimsical series is a blend of science and magic with lots of illustrations, featuring a young girl, and her cat.

The cover of Zoey and Sassafras, which shows a young girl and a cat looking at a small dragon.
  • Upside-Down Magic
  • Dragons and Marshmallows (Zoey and Sassafras)
  • Polly Diamond and the Magic Book
  • Rise of the Earth Dragon (Dragon Masters)
  • Bo’s Magical New Friend (Unicorn Diaries)
  • Sparkly New Friends (Unicorn and Yeti)
  • Willow Moss and the Lost Day (Starfell)

STEAM (Science, Math, and More)

At a slightly more advanced reading level, the Elements of Genius series is ideal for a reader transitioning to MG novels. This series is written by Jess Keating who is herself a zoologist, and illustrated by Lissy Marlin, an artist from the Dominican Republic now living in the US. Lissy has done all kinds of cool projects, including the Magic Misfits series by Neil Patrick Harris. the Elements of Genius are witty and trendy and feature a badass feminine protagonist as she navigates a new school for gifted kids.

The cover of Elements of Genius, which shows an adolescent girl in the foreground and a ferret reaching toward a laser gun in the background.
  • Nikki Tesla and the Ferret-Proof Death Ray (Elements of Genius)
  • The Friendship Code (Girls Who Code)
  • Frankie Sparks and the Class Pet
  • Super Amoeba (Squish)

Graphic Crossover (Illustrated)

I challenge anyone not to love the CatStronauts, a graphic series by Drew Brockington featuring astronaut cats in weirdly scientifically accurate NASA-type situation. They’re wonderful. I have nothing else to say about these books.

The cover of CatStronauts, which shows four astronaut cats on the moon.
  • CatStronauts: Mission Moon
  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer: New School Nightmare
  • Sparks!
  • The Way Home (Owly)
  • Narwhal: Unicorn of the Sea (Narwhal and Jelly)
  • Hildafolk (Hilda)

Heroes and Adventure

There are a lot of really good hero books out there, but none as weird and charming as Gum Girl by Rhode Montijo. These books have bubblegum-scented covers (yeah, for real), and feature a feminine protagonist who literally changes into gum and goes on adventures. With a little bit of Spanish sprinkled throughout, I love the writing in these books, and I love the bizarre concept. They’re heavily illustrated, and they’re funny.

The cover of Gum Girl, which shows a character made of gum flying through the sky.
  • Mia Mayhem Is a Superhero
  • Kitty and the Moonlight Rescue
  • Chews Your Destiny (Gumazing Gum Girl)
  • The Jolly Regina (The Unintentional Adventures of the Bland Sisters)
  • The Princess in Black
  • The Bad Guys
  • An Extra-Ordinary Girl (Ellie Ultra)

Contemporary

They’re a bit on the ridiculous side, but if the #OwnVoices Alvin Ho books aren’t relatable, I don’t know what are. They’re about a kid who’s afraid of everything, and basically just has to figure it out. Alvin Ho is written by Lenore Look, who has been creating kids’ books since she was a kid herself, and illustrated by the incredible LeUyen Pham, who also illustrates the Princess in Black series, and is co-creator of Real Friends with Shannon Hale.

The cover of Alvin Ho, which shows a scared child on the front.
  • Good Dog McTavish
  • Katie Woo Has the Flu
  • Alvin Ho Allergic to Girls, School, and other Scary Things
  • Sadiq and the Desert Star
  • Yasmin the Builder
  • Mindy Kim and the Yummy Seaweed Business
  • Stella Díaz Has Something to Say

…last but not least: Sports, Choose Your Own Adventure, and Personal Faves

There are SO MANY CHAPTER BOOKS that I couldn’t not mention just a few more. On the top of this list is a standalone chapter book level novel called Coyote Tales. It’s written by acclaimed Indigenous author Thomas King, and tells two stories about Coyote that demonstrate his skillfulness as an author, as well as his humour. This is a rad book that we sell a lot at the shop, and although it’s a bit difficult to categorize, I would be remiss not to mention it here. It’s the perfect note to close out on.

The cover of Coyote Tales, where a coyote looks up at the moon, who frowns back.
  • Coyote Tales
  • Sideways Stories from Wayside School
  • Flying Ace: Errol’s Gander Adventure
  • Little Shaq
  • The Ice Chips and the Magical Rink
  • Choose Your Own Adventure
  • Yael and the Party of the Year (Yes No Maybe So)
A small child reading on a couch.
Photo by Josh Applegate on Unsplash

PS, if you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving me a tip! It only takes a minute, and it allows me to keep creating content just like this, buying food for my pets, and pursuing my career as a literary agent!

Neglected Favourites of 2019

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Currently Reading: You’re Next, by Kylie Schachte

LGBTQ2S+ POC Authors Are #CanLit

A handful of rad authors, many of whom are LGBTQ2S+ POC, have been announced as part of the delegation representing Canada at the Frankfurt Book Fair this year! So happy to see so many authors who have been celebrated in this space before (and who will continue to be!) get the public recognition they deserve. Special congrats to Billy-Ray Belcourt, Canisia Lubrin, Catherine Hernandez, Farzana Doctor, Joshua Whitehead, Tanya Tagaq, Tanya Talaga, Téa Mutonji, and Vivek Shraya!

Looking for 2020 Reads?

I love being able to shout out other trans and/or non-binary content creators! Recently, Books Beyond Binaries has extended support to Santana Reads, a book blog by a rad content creator. Carolina is a bi, genderfluid, Puerto Rican 16-year old teen book blogger who is very passionate about diverse literature. When they’re not reading a good book, they can be found snacking on gingerbread cookies, napping, playing with their dog, and marathoning TV shows on Netflix. They are one of the co-hosts of the Latinx Book Club, and their latest post is a review of Don’t Ask Me Where I’m From, which comes out later this year. Thank you so much for this insightful review, Carolina!

If you are a non-binary content creator, and you can think of ways that this blog can support you, feel free to reach out through the contact form!

Genderqueer blogger and author Corey Alexander has put together another bang-up list of new release books with trans and/or non-binary authors for early 2020. So many rad titles on this list, but the ones I want to shout about are: Blood Sport, by the indelible Tash McAdam, which is a perfect pick for educators or those who want a more accessible reading level; Common Bonds, an anthology which has hella incredible rep across the aromantic spectrum; The Subtweet, by Vivek Shraya, who has never once disappointed me with anything she’s created; and The Thirty Names of Night, by Zeyn Joukhader, an #OV Syrian trans novel with an almost entirely QTPOC cast.

A mood board for Tundras, Travelers, and Other Travesties, featuring mostly a lot of mist and snow.

One of the other options on this list is Tundras, Travelers, and Other Travesties, by the fabulous enby author and online community builder who likely none of us could do without, Amara Lynn. It is a prescient solarpunk post-apocalyptic sci-fi short with a queer protagonist that is available now. I am thrilled to be able to share a preview of Amara’s newest offering in this space. Buckle in.

Excerpt: Tundras, Travelers, and Other Travesties

“I don’t understand. You live outside of Earth?”

“Yeah. In space. On an artificial planet, made for people to live on instead of Earth when it became too polluted and unlivable. Why don’t you know any of this?”

I shrug. I’m having trouble taking this in, confused by what it all means. I know that our outpost and greenhouse is built into the side of a hill of landfill waste, and the solar panels were built atop the highest landfill peaks to take in maximum sun exposure. All I know is this tundra, this landfill outpost. Zaza and Nana never told me anything about why there were so few people, why we never received travelers. Is it because they all live on this artificial planet Earth?

I clutch my knees to my chest, which aches along with my ribs. I don’t even realize I’m rocking until the traveler’s hands touch my shoulders.

“Hey, it’s okay. I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to shock you.”

I look up, staring at those bright pools. “Who are you?” I blurt the question without thinking about it.

“The name’s Ignis. I use he, his, and him pronouns.”

“Eis. What are pronouns?” I am unfamiliar with this concept.

Ignis seems confused that I don’t know. “They’re used to refer to a person when you’re not using their name. They vary based on a person’s gender. I’m a man and I use he, him, and his pronouns. Someone who is a woman might use she, her, and hers. There are also people who don’t have any particular gender or who fluctuate and use neutral pronouns like they and them, ze and zir, or ze and hir. Those are just a few.”

“Oh…” I have never known anyone else besides my parents. Now, thinking about it, I recall Nana used ze and zir when referring to Zaza, and Zaza had used they and them for Nana.

“Why don’t you know that?”

“I…I’m not sure. My parents did use some of those for each other, but I’ve never been asked about myself. I’m not sure I know what gender I would be.”

“That’s okay. Would you like me to use neutral pronouns for you? They and them, or ze and zir? I can list some others if you like.”

“Oh…maybe ze and zir?” That’s what Zaza used.

“Okay.” Ignis smiles. “And if you change your mind later after learning more about it, that’s totally okay, too.”

“Okay.”

If you want to read the rest of this story, it is available on B&N, Universal, Gumroad, and (if all else fails) Amazon, or it can be added on Goodreads! You can find Amara Lynn on Twitter!

Unsung Favourites of 2019

This post comes at a time when we are experiencing the fullness of a complicated world. I didn’t have a collaborator or special theme of this week, so I thought that I’d write about some of the best books that I read in 2019 that I didn’t get to talk about in this space. Hopefully, these recommendations will serve everyone who is new to social distance well! If you can, order these titles from your local indie, since many of them are suffering right now, and lots of them can take online orders and provide delivery.

There’s nothing that’s a better distraction, in my opinion, than a good thriller, and these two were page-turners. A Madness of Sunshine is the first crime book from NYT bestselling contemporary fantasy romance author Nalini Singh. This atmospheric story set in a vividly imagined small coastal town in New Zealand features a diverse cast including many Indigenous characters and a slow-burn romantic subplot. It’s a clever twist on a formulaic crime novel from a WOC that features enough predictable elements to feel recognizable, while still hinting at searing political commentary in the best of ways. Despite a few loose ends at the conclusion of the book, I would recommend this to anyone seeking a great mystery. CWs for domestic violence, substance use, murder, violence against women, some ableist language, police protagonist, violence against animals (one scene, with warning indicators before violence occurs).

I am a huge fan of UK-based author Fran Doricott, and I ate up her twisty abduction mystery thriller After the Eclipse. It’s a complex mystery with a badass femme journalist protagonist, and it’s hella queer. This one requires all the CWs, in particular for violence, child abduction, confinement, imprisonment, sexual assault, rape, pregnancy, and stalking, off the top of my head. However, I loved about this book that it had a positive, satisfying outcome, despite its grim themes.

The Collected Schizophrenias by LGBTQ2S+ author Esmé Weijun Wang, and Consent by Donna Freitas, were two of my favourite non-fiction books from last year. I bought Wang’s collection of essays at the Tattered Cover in the Denver airport, (unsuccessfully) holding back tears, in the middle of a mental health crisis. I could not have made a more perfect choice. Not only did the author respond with such generosity and care when I reached out to let her know that her book was in an airport display – a long-standing wish of hers – but the collection is moving, relatable, and insightful. It is the book about psychiatric disability that I have always needed. In contrast, Consent is a timely, chilling, and all-too-familiar story of an academic relationship gone awry for Freitas, a student at the time, who ultimately gets stalked by her mentor. Freitas’ story is an unflinching tale that every femme will be able to see themself in, and a searing social commentary.

I struggle to describe what I loved so much about the fever dream that is Gingerbread, by Helen Oyeyemi. It’s one of the few books in my life that I have finished, and then immediately felt the urge to flip back to the first page and read again. I had never read any of Oyeyemi’s work before Gingerbread, and I am delighted that she has such an extensive backlist for me to discover. This book is a strange and wonderful delight.

By contrast, Kiley Reid’s Such a Fun Age is a quick, engaging, millennial fiction, that I found instantly relatable in so many ways. You know that white girl who got rich off Instagram? Yeah, her. This book is both about her, and so not about her. With aspects of political commentary, a twisty romantic subplot, and the best-written child character I have ever read, I would recommend this one to anyone. It is a perfect book conversation starter or club pick, and it’s a great gift for the college freshman who loved The Hate U Give.

I don’t read a tonne of MG, as is probably evident from what I tend to review on this blog, but I picked up a few last year that I loved. I listened to The Lost Girl, by Anne Ursu, on audio, and it was fantastic. I love twin books to begin with, and this one was a love story to weird junk shops, featuring adolescent social awkwardness (hard relate) and an unpredictable, fairy-tale-inspired plotline. If you liked the Hazel Wood, you’ll like this, too.

I loved Jinxed so much that although its sequel hasn’t been released in Canada yet, I actually begged a UK-based friend to mail me a copy. Canadian-born Amy McCulloch’s book is set in a near future Toronto, and I picked up the ARC on a whim while I was bored between bookselling at an event. I read it in one sitting, and I loved every minute. Jinxed is about a realistic electronics tinkerer protag, in a world where smart phones have been replaced with personalized robotic animal companions, and features one of my favourite things: a school for the elite! It’s an engaging mystery, and ultimately our fair protagonist is left facing off against the corporate overlords. Jinxed has been released in North America now, and the sequel, Unleashed, is available across the pond. Also, look out for McCulloch’s forthcoming YA Gothic thriller, co-written with Zoe Sugg (aka Zoella), The Magpie Society (!!!).

I feel like there was literally no way I was going to miss these last two books. I think I’m physically incapable of passing on cheerleader intrigue or witchy 90’s throwbacks – and I stan. Squad is a short but impactful YA contemporary by non-binary author Rae (Mariah) McCarthy about a cheerleader who gets dumped by her friends, has to navigate newly-discovered mental health struggles, and figure out who she really is. All I can say about this book is that it’s charming AF, and I hard relate. It’s well-written, and it’s a story that I think any teenaged femme (or formerly teenaged femme) will see themselves in. It also has a well-crafted transgender secondary character, and a tough-to-navigate romantic subplot with aspects of “what does transition mean anyway?”… without spoiling the entire book – if you are a fan of Complicated Friendship Stories, this one’s for you.

As for The Babysitters Coven, by Kate Williams, I’m delighted to report that this book is exactly what it says on the label. 90’s throwback. Magic. Baddies. Femmes save the day. Babysitters. It’s brain candy, and it’s great. My bookshop sales rep from PRH Canada tossed me a copy of this when I told them that I basically wouldn’t be able to wait for its release date, so shout out to them for always humouring me with such good will. Especially at a time when the world feels heavy, this is a kitschy delight to spend an afternoon on.

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