#literature things

[spankerella]

[tsarinablogs]

really trying to get through The Song of Achilles… I feel like I just might be a bit too old and critical and picky with my reading to really like it, even if it has some beautifully written parts

[hungryforloveletters]

I perceive the world in a language that is unknown to the human psyche. The more I swallow the words of this language, the more it poisons me.

[timelessbian]

really rude for no one to have told me that dracula is quite possibly the funniest book ever written

[chainofclovers]

Do you have any recommendations for lesbian-centric literature? I've long admired your writing and am sorely in need of more queer stories in which to immerse myself. I sadly have no gay friends in my real life and feel the need to engage more with fictional ones haha

Hi, @elcolordeamor! This is such a lovely ask and I would love to give you some recommendations. Also, thank you so much for the kind words about my stories. 😊

Here are a few great novels featuring lesbians or otherwise queer women:

* The Ghost Network by Catie Disabato* Under the Udala Trees by Chinelo Okparanta* Light, Coming Back by Ann Wadsworth* The Hours by Michael Cunningham (my relationship to this book has changed over the years but when I was younger and just figuring stuff out it was THE formative novel about female sexuality for me, and I still love it)*  How to be both and Hotel World by Ali Smith (read anything Smith–she’s incredible)* Red Clocks by Leni Zumas (not a queer novel but it does some really interesting work with queer characters–the book has quite an ensemble cast and is absolutely amazing)* The Last Nude by Ellis Avery* Orlando by Virginia Woolf (written as a love letter to Woolf’s lover, Vita Sackville-West)

For poetry, my favorite contemporary lesbian poet is Natalie Diaz, but there are so many wonderful poets of the lesbian and queer experience. My favorite lesbian poet of the 20th century is Elizabeth Bishop. One of my favorite poetry blogs on here is @lifeinpoetry, which posts a ton of work by queer writers.

For graphic novels, I unfortunately haven’t read a lot of LGBTQ ones. I should change this! But I can recommend On a Sunbeam by Tillie Walden and Bingo Love by Tee Franklin. 

I need to think more on short stories, but the bisexual writer Katherine Mansfield wrote some of my favorite short stories. Sometimes I find that reading a work by a queer writer—no matter the topic—is as meaningful as reading work specifically about the queer experience.

A friend of mine let me know about @starship-library, which is currently on hiatus but which posts tons and tons of LGBTQ lit recs, mainly in the YA, SF&F, and feminist categories. She’s also got a prolific twitter (also on hiatus). I don’t read a lot of sci-fi or fantasy, so if that’s your jam I’d definitely check out her recs.

FINALLY, I have to say that some of my most rewarding queer reading experiences have been fanfic. In terms of a community of people, some of whom have become true friends, interested in engaging with all sorts of media and insisting that our queer narratives matter and that the world needs to make space for queer stories?! The world of femslash is just unmatched. My #fic rec tag has a lot of great recommendations. 

What type of genres do you most like to read? I can give you more extensive recs in those genres, so definitely reply here or send another ask if you want to narrow down the recommendations in any way.

Happy reading! And while I hope that you are able to experience the joy of in-person gay friends and community, I also hope you have lots of fulfilling and wonderful reading experiences. <3

[chainofclovers]

Just finished The Last Nude and really enjoyed it! Thanks for the rec! Are you planning on writing any post S6 Grace and Frankie stories?

I’m so glad to hear you enjoyed The Last Nude! That makes me really happy. :D

And YES I have at least a couple fic ideas for post-S5 Grace and Frankie. I’ve got one story in progress now and it’s somewhat slow going due to other commitments, but I’m having fun with it and hopefully it won’t be an eternity before I can share.

[chainofclovers]

hi! your rec post (thanks btw!!) made me curious: in what way did your relationship with ‘the hours‘ change?

Hey there, so glad you liked the rec post. My relationship with The Hours changed not because I stopped loving the book or appreciating everything it gave me at a time when I really needed a story about queer women, but because as I’ve gotten older and read more writing by queer women, my  perspective and ability to contextualize a story has expanded. 

When I first read The Hours as a very much not out teenager, it was absolutely thrilling: these were stories of women in pain, yes, but they were beautifully written narrative threads about women leading actual lesbian lives, and, in many ways, an argument that the pain of these choices is better than the pain of not making them. Clarissa’s story especially made me imagine a life I’d never let myself imagine before. I’m sure I’d consumed media with gay characters before, but this was the first time (I can remember, at least) I’d read something about lesbians that went beyond subtext and codes. And because as a teenager a lot of the “education” we get about sexuality is about how it’s not a choice but rather an innate part of us, and yet all queer people are saddled with the choice to come out, it was really helpful for me to read a book that’s very much about the choice to reveal oneself, the choice to live in a particular manner, and so on. 

My reading of the text has gotten a bit more complicated over the years, though, as I consider what it means that Michael Cunningham, a white gay man, wrote a story that flips Mrs. Dalloway so that his version of Clarissa, a modern-day lesbian woman, has her big defining moment of happiness when she kisses a gay man in her youth. (I love the book version of The Hours more than the film, but one thing I like better about the film version is that modern!Clarissa and modern!Sally’s kiss at the end of the movie is on the mouth instead of the novel’s forehead kiss.) 

But! Even as I’ve grown to find queer stories by queer women more resonant, I will always love The Hours and will always appreciate the sheer revelatory moment of exposure I experienced because of that gorgeous book! 

P.S. Edited to add: I read The Hours before I read Mrs. Dalloway, oops! Weird choice in hindsight, although I did have a basic sense of the plot so I wasn’t too lost. When I read Mrs. Dalloway it exploded everything I knew about the novel and when I reread The Hours after finally having read Mrs. Dalloway, The Hours both gained and lost some of its brilliance. Gained for having the added necessary context. Lost because some brilliance I’d attributed to Cunningham was actually Woolf’s, I think. <3