Hey folks,
I know a lot of people are here for the interviews, and I’m scrabbling away trying to get interviewees in the background. But for the time being, I refuse to leave you without your queer chaos!
So without further ado, I want to talk about a book! All of these reviews will be positive. I want to spread positivity in this community and if you want to find scathing critiques of queer work I’m sure you can find plenty. That’s not for me. For me, the goal is to scream loudly about queer things and help them find their audience. As a result, this review will ALSO be as spoiler-free as possible - sorry, you’ve got to go find it out yourself!
Today’s book is Kinship and Kindness, by Kara Jorgensen. The author is openly queer on social media, which makes them perfect to feature here! I picked up this book a long while ago, but due to the TBR of doom I only just got to it. And… it was exactly what I needed right now.
Theo and Bennett, wolf-shifter and fox-shifter, land in each other’s orbit while a werewolf conference, usually run by Theo’s father, is on the horizon. With a backdrop of a historical, regency-esque society in America, shifter politics, and personal confusions, they grow closer to each other and we get to watch them both gain confidence and support.
There are times in our lives when we need darkness, and there are times we need to be gently wrapped in blankets and told that even if we’re sad, things will be okay. This book delivered for me in that regard. With trans rep (trans man) and disability rep (epilepsy), I already felt pretty inclined to like this book. But then it got CUTE.
Without giving too much away, the couple in this story hit a fair few romance tropes in some truly adorable ways, and throughout the story we learn more and more endearing details about each. While there are some very strong emotional moments, I left this book feeling like if they could solve their problems, so could I!
In terms of an audience… Personally my experience of this sort of story comes from authors like Gail Carriger. If you like the idea of a historical that incorporates fantasy elements into the worldbuilding, if you want something cute that will feel many emotions and then soothe them afterwards, this sounds like a great pick. I also want people to know that my experience of reading this book as a queer person has been wonderful - so many of the tropes that authors include about identity, or tropes in which one person has to ‘learn to accept’ the other due to their queerness or disability are all gone, and I am so thankful for it.
I’d like to send a shoutout to Kara Jorgensen, and include some links below.
Links:
Kara Jorgensen LinkTree: https://linktr.ee/karajorgensen