Wednesday Reading Meme

[kitewithfish]

What I've Read
- Omega Required - Dessa Lux (aka, fanfic writer Dira Sudis) - Werewolf Omegaverse m/m arranged marriage romance novel- I bought this in 2018, read 25% of it and then never picked it up again. I finished it this week and I found the main couple really quite charming.  Beau wants to be a werewolf doctor to humans, Rory ran away from home at 16 with an older man who promised to take good care of him and has some major trauma around sex. It's careful to show Rory's recovery, tho it's a romance novel so he's improving on a pretty brisk pace. Beau is used taking care of only himself and not asking for help so he makes some fairly stupid (but very in-character!) mistakes around his new job. The resolution is sweet and generally hits the points that think a thoughtful romance ought to. I am probably going to read other things Dira has written - this series has a couple of other books, and this is hitting a self-indulgent spot for me.

Wife to the Marines: A Military Reverse Harem Romance by Krista Wolf (reverse harem het romance, straight woman with three straight men) - Well, this book had some great elements? The sex was fun, the character dynamics were a bit spare (perfectly fine for this genre) but what was there felt engaging, the plot was brisk and both acknowledged the silly elements but made them feel emotionally true to the female lead's internal life. I finished it and at the low price of $1, I feel like I got my money's worth. I have definitely paid more for worse. 

But, oh man, I am too queer for this book. I am just too dang queer for this book. I literally picked this up because I was curious about the reverse harem romance sub-genre (aka, straight woman with multiple male partners, yay!) and wow, this is just - like, do gay people exist in this world? Do ace people? Polyamory is briefly mentioned but not actually engaged with at all, so functionally, nah. Because I just cannot imagine a world where queer people exist and these men are making the life choices they are making about committed relationships to other men, and having sex with the same woman in a committed relationship, and then like, just not talking about the fact that you are in a queer poly relationship. It's just, like, the most hetero and monogamous take possible on a very queer, very poly relationship. It's almost as if it's a het romance where the dude just happens to have three bodies? It's so fucking weird to see a book go so far out of its way to frame this as hetero brothers-in-arms who love each other? Like, the intense military friendship that is actually a romance in disguise is literally a gay cliche - this one is ours, straight people. 

Also, massive trigger warnings for eating disorders shit (the woman is a trainer and runs a youtube channel where she makes sad tasteless healthfood, constantly breaks food into good or bad categories, calorie counting, talks in detail about the weight loss plans of her clients, none of it needed) and also, uh, military kink?  using the American invasion of Afghanistan as a neutral-to-justified backdrop for a personal vendetta? (Dudes, is it gay to avenge the death of your boyfriend's brother under the cover of a legitimate Marine mission while you lie to him and keep him out of the loop, safe at home with your other shared boyfriend and girlfriend?) This was a compellingly written novel full of sympathetic depictions of people who I would not ever want to have a drink with!

 

What I'm Reading

A Taste of Gold and Iron - Alexandra Rowlan - A re-read for my book club. So sweet, so queer, so fun. 

Thrawn: Treason - Timothy Zahn - Getting fun and brisk with this one! 55% in. 

Hunting Towards Heartstill - Blackkat - Star Wars Clone Wars Cartoon au - marriage of convenience, fake marriage, Mace Windu/Cody - Slowing down because we're crash landed on an abandoned Sith planet and I'm watching Mace be annoyed at Anakin and, well, he's very annoying! I'm going to try and buckle down and get some more under my belt so that I can actually just get past this part. I got stuck here last time too.

Stay With Me, Go Places - cac0daemonia-  https://archiveofourown.org/works/39540420 - "After months of living a quiet, peaceful life on Ryloth, Waxer and Boil must don their armor again. What begins as a rescue operation in conjunction with a bounty hunter becomes a journey that the Force itself seems to have a hand in." - I am really enjoying this ongoing series, the Reconstruction Corps AU, which posits that a fairly minor change in the Clone Wars plot around the clones control chips allowed the Jedi to stop Darth Sideous and save the galaxy and allow clones like Waxer and Boil to retire to little backwaters and build themselves a community. 

What I'll Read Next

2312 - Kim Stanley Robinson - Book club pick, long one, too! Bought it since we're probably splitting it up over six weeks
 
Library books:
Our Wives Under the Sea - Julia Armfield
Maul: Lockdown - Joe Schreiber 
The Whale Rider -Witi Ihimaera 
Tiger's Daughter - K Arsenault Rivera 
Riot Baby - Rochi Onyeuchi
The Silence of the Wilting Skin - Tlotlo Tsamaase 
An Unkindness of Ghosts - Rivers Solomon

Libby: 
Truth of the Divine - Lindsay Ellis
Devil House - John Darnelle