J.S. Fields

Author & Scientist

Review: Where You Linger by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam

Genre: sci fi / horror anthology

Queer Representation: bisexual, trans, nobinary, lesbian

Warnings: none

 

 

There’s no great way to summarize this anthology so I want to start off with this: I read this book around six months ago and I am still thinking about the stories in it. Even when life ate up every last second of my free time, somehow, these short stories stuck in my brain like hardening tree sap. And I’m not a big horror fan, even gentle horror like this, which I think speaks to the absolutely superb writing from Stufflebeam (what a name!) Honestly, I don’t even remember how I got this book. It’s been on my shelf, has no publicity contact form (so it wasn’t likely mailed to me like most review material), which means someone likely handed it to me at a con.

Publicists know my taste. Random people at cons do not. So to have a book land like this, is just flat out spectacular.

My favorite story in this collection is The Lifespan of Shadows, in which a sentient house conspires to force its former occupants to remain there. The two soon-to-be victims grew up in the house, and story is filled with detailed memory that deeply resonates.

The house is flat out spooky, but in that highly-relatable way in which you can follow the progression from I’m lonely to I will trap these people here forever (relatable, not saying I’d actually DO that).

The house did not know the difference. The house wanted to be loved For a moment, it thought Beth would give it that without asking for something in return, But she would not. As for Jackie, her love for the house wouldn’t be enough to save it. That much the house knew like it knew it was made from pier-and-beam, from concrete and fluffy pink insulation, from wood and granite and carpet fibers. A terrible truth; it would never be skin. But it could witness skin. The house wanted Beth and Jackie to stay. Beth and Jackie would stay, if it was the last thing the house did.

I also really enjoyed The Damaged, so much so that I reread the whole short before writing this review. It doesn’t have much of an arc, this story, but it’s so engaging right from the start that it doesn’t really matter.

Robin Underwood is an engineer for Playmates, a line of artificial intelligence sex dolls. Due to some alluded to previous bad relationships and the contractual inability to own her own Playmate, Robin finds one of the homeless ‘damaged’ playmates, takes him home, and after some bathing and sex, decides to open him up and see where her programming went wrong. She ends up taking out his heart, which is beating far too fast, and examining it.

Night after night she brings home more damaged Playmates, each of which she sleeps with and then takes apart. All have a little box inside their heart and within each little box, a screw that’s coming loose. Eventually a Playmate catches Robin and works with her to solve the mystery, and we do get an answer in the end…but goodness the treatment of Robin’s serial killer nature is just so well done. There’s a lot of ‘this would be a crime if XYZ but it isn’t’ bits, and the absolute blasé nature of her shoving Playmate bodies into dumpsters, only being able to fall asleep to the waning light of a dying Playmate, is both macabre and brilliant.

I did this again and again, the next night and the next. It began to feel like part of a routine. Without it, without the dying embers of artificial life beside me, I found I couldn’t sleep.

With Halloween just around the corner, you owe yourself this book. Maybe a Playmate too? You can definitely buy them both here. And yes, there’s absolutely tons of sapphic content, and some nice nonbinary rep as well. Neopronouns ahoy!

Review: RUST IN THE ROOT by Justina Ireland

Genre: fantasy: alternate history / high fantasy (upper YA)

Pairings: f/f to f/nonbinary

Queer Representation: cis lesbian, pansexual/nonbinary/its complicated (gender/sex changing magical creature)

Warnings: none

 

 

Review

An absolute MUST read. This is one I did for New York Journal, so you can find the full review here. I hope this has multiple sequels because I cannot wait to get back into the world. Double extra bonus for a strong sapphic lead, a lady/sapphic nonbinary love interest, unicorns and dragons.

Review: OF DEMONS AND COAL by Thomas Gondolfi

Genre: fantasy: alternate history / low fantasy / steampunk (blends the three)

Pairings: f/f

Queer Representation: cis lesbian, cis bisexual/pansexual (not defined)

Warnings: none

Review

Demons power steam engines, occasionally get out of control, and rampage around killing humans. Witch Stella Ochoa and the Hellfighters are on the job, although a certain demon seems to have it out for Stella, personally. Stella, meanwhile, can’t quite seem to sort out her love life between her dead husband and prostitute/lover Karie. There’s a lot of dialogue and period scenery described, and that’s pretty much the book.

Okay, here’s the deal. While I didn’t dislike this book, it also failed to grab my attention. The premise is neat and there’s some great tension between Karie and Stella, but in the end I felt like the tension kept snapping every time we got an extended dialogue and/or description of the city. There’s a lot of over-description for a relatively short and plot-light book, although I will say for those who enjoy the nitty-gritty of how does it work in the magical steampunk subgenera, this may be right up your alley.

On the surface, interning a loose demon is simplicity itself–tease it back to where it doesn’t want to go and then imprison it. Two witches take turns baiting the fiend with mild damage spells, getting it to chase them. Three others block the demon’s view and access to anything but its tormenters. The last witch heals any of our team who is damaged in the process. In the end, he is also often the one that seals the beast in place. But for all of that, every hellfighter has to be on their toes as something always goes wrong.

And there are fun little nuggets of real life humor embedded between all the slice-of-life moments.

“So, how do I make this work, Henry?”

“First, we put this belt around your chest,” he says, lifting a belt from beside me.

“Excuse me?”

“My apologies again. I hadn’t considered women when I put it in. It buckles through the loop on the other side.”

I eye the leather belt. The height puts it right across my breasts. “Are you sure this is necessary?”

“Quite, Stella. It is essential if there are any sudden stops.”

Ahh, the joys of seatbelts and breasts.

Stella is an interesting protagonist, who doesn’t get to do a whole lot of protagging. She does have some excellent internal monologues every so often, however,

I oft wonder if I would have made Aaron a good wife. We’d only been married for a scant few months, and only weeks of that together. My cooking manages not to poison, but nothing better. Cleaning doesn’t come naturally. I can barely throw a stitch. And I dress only well enough not to be stoned by other Catholics. My only natural talents seem to be sarcastic, witchcraft, and sex.

The relationship between Stella and Karie may leave some sapphic readers unsatisfied, as there doesn’t seem to be resolution on Stella’s side (Karie is delightfully polyamorous).

In the end, if you love world building for world building’s sake and a lot of period-appropriate talk and and humor, you’ll like find yourself at home in OF DEMONDS AND COAL. If faster pacing and plot movement is your preferred MO, better to look elsewhere.

Trap a demon and maybe kiss a lady of the night by buying the book here.

Review: Can’t Find My Way Home by Gwynn Garfinkle

Genre: science fiction: urban paranormal

Pairings: f/f

Queer Representation: cis lesbian, cis bisexual/pansexual (not defined)

Warnings: none

 

Review

Junior soap opera actress Joanna Bergman is having a moderately decent life. She’s got a job, she’s got friends, she has reasonable coworkers. Sure, sometimes she is haunted by her past, in which she was a part of bombing of a New York draft board in 1971 and her best friend died, but that’s water under the bridge. Right?

Nope. Having finally achieved a measure of stability, Joanna becomes haunted by the ghost of her dead best friend, Cynthia Foster. Joanna was supposed to have accompanied Cynthia on that fateful day, and cancelled last minute. They both should have died. Now, Cynthia’s ghost forces Joanna to relive a million possible future in which Joanna chose a different path–until Joanna can finally come to terms with her past.

Although not my usual read, CAN’T FIND MY WAY HOME was an interesting alternate timeline paranormal adventure. It shone particularly well in the scenes where Joanna must come to terms with her attraction to Cynthia, and in the scenes that reinforce the choices Joanna has already made.

“Oh, come on. It’d be fun.” She stroked my upper arm. Her voice became a caress. “Your skin is awfully soft.”

What was this? More of Cyn’s non-monogamy line? Or perhaps just another way to know me, too well. Or maybe just so she could say she’d done it with a woman. Whatever it was, I didn’t want that kind of involvement with Cyn. We were close, and it was sometimes messy, but it would get messier and more tangled if we crossed that line.

Generally, the plot gives us an interesting period piece that ravels together the Vietnam war and budding sexuality. It’s the little moments in between the plot, however, where the book really shines. Every life sequence Joanna lives, every what if, balances heartbreak and joy. These scenes are the meat of the book, and what will keep the reader turning pages.

“Wait,” Can said. She reached up and cupped my cheek. Her hand was cool against my feverish face. Illuminated by the streetlight, her face was grave. Her gaze burned into mine. “We did it,” she whispered. She pressed her lops dryly to mine. In that moment everything seemed unreal, and everything seemed possible.

“You’ll catch the flu,” I said.

Oh, how she smiled. “No, I won’t. I’m fucking invincible.” She grabbed my hand, and we headed for her place. Halfway there we started to run. I was suddenly full of energy, the flu forgotten. We were running, her hand in mine. We were so alive.

You can join Joanna on a trip through parallel universes by buying the book here.

 

Review: Seawolf by Anna Burke

Genre: science fiction: lesbians on boats

Pairings: f/f

Queer Representation: cis lesbian

Warnings: none

Review

Second in a trilogy, SEAWOLF follows the smashing COMPASS ROSE–a dynamic and very, very hot lesbians on boats tale, complete with pirates, bondage, and power play.

In this installment, the directionally unflappable Compass Rose now resides on the pirate ship Man o’ War, with her lover/pirate captain/it’s complicated. Miranda Stillwater is everything we love in a butch pirate captain. She’s emotionally complicated. She’s a little too into substances. She likes a lot of sex and not a lot of talking. She’s clearly a lesbian train wreck. Which means she does not handle Compass Rose’s early injury and subsequent loss of her navigational superpower, very well. Not very well at all. There’s a lot of very poor decisions, crew mutinies, and Miranda Stillwater treating Compass Rose like a breakable doll. Not breakable in the bedroom, mind, just, you know, there’s only so many jellyfish stings and concussions one captain can take before she ties you to a bedpost. *cough*

The plot progresses, as it does, and we are treated to several underwater battles and jellyfish. People die, people are injured, and the crew is deeply sassy. The main villain from COMPASS ROSE returns to eventually take Miranda’s ship from her, and the crew are sassy about that, too:

“90 degrees south, Compass Rose.”

I stared at Ching’s–Amaryllis’s–mouth in order to avoid her eyes, noting the chapped skin and the determined bow of her upper lip, and had one coherent thought: What the actual fuck?”

“What the fuck?”Orca echoed my thoughts, slamming her hands on the table in what I assumed, dimly, was shock. “Nobody sails there. The water–“

“Isn’t the real danger,” said Ching. I couldn’t quite bring myself to call her Amaryllis.

“Like hell it’s not.”

“Orca,” Miranda said in warning.

I’m just very confused about why you’re suddenly insane, Captain.”

Their adventures eventually sail them into forbidden waters, where Compass Rose meets more people with eyes like hers, and gets to meet the lost side of her family tree. It is in this part of the book, the second half, that the narrative really finds its footing. The first half of the book wanders and feels mostly like an extended clean up or epilogue to COMPASS ROSE. Fresh plot and new advances occur once we finally get to meet the sea wolves and learn about their culture. Stakes raise, estranged family members reunite, and we are left on an excellent cliff hanger for book three.

I find with Burke books that the author has really mastered the novella, but struggles in long form. Her full novels would often benefit from about 100 fewer pages (200 fewer in the case of the Robin Hood retelling). SEAWOLF is no exception. The book is a slow start, as was COMPASS ROSE, but lacking the sexual tension that drove the first book in this series. Breakups are all well and good, and make sense in a second book, but without new plot details, don’t much contribute to movement.

With that said, this was still a very enjoyable book and I’m looking forward to the third. A strong opening with the sea wolves for the third book would be much appreciated, as well. (And if you’re looking for what I consider Burke’s masterpiece, check out THORN).

Let yourself be kidnapped by a butch pirate captain (but only if you bring the booze) here.

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