Happy Friday, shipmates! It’s Alex, and I’ve got some more new releases for you–and some WLW fairytale retellings you should check out for Pride Month! I hope everyone has a really awesome weekend. It’s kind of exciting over here in Colorado, because this is the first year we’re going to have Juneteenth (this Sunday, June 19th) as an official state holiday! Stay safe out there, space pirates, and I’ll see you on Tuesday!
Let’s make the world a better place, together. Here’s somewhere to start: NDN Collective and Jane’s Due Process.
Galactic Gay Pin by gloriousweirdo
This lovely little enamel pin of a black spacesuit helmet says “galactic gay.” I want to add it to my “gay in space” pin collection! $10
New Releases
Note: The new release lists I have access to weren’t as diverse as I would have liked this week.
January Fifteenth by Rachel Swirsky
In the near-future, America has changed over to Universal Basic Income… and January 15th is the day that it’s paid out annually. Four women view this day very differently, each with their own context to her life, from a mother who used the UBI to escape an abusive husband to a college kid who is planning to waste it all spectacularly.
The Path of Thorns by A.G. Slatter
Morwood is a dark and evil house that eats secrets. When Asher Todd comes there to be the governess for the family, she has a revenge in mind, one that will choke the house on all the secrets she carries with her. But she’s not such a monster that she doesn’t become fond of her charges, or of the people of the Tarn, and soon she begins to doubt her plan… until the ghosts from her past become too hard to control.
For a more comprehensive list of new releases, check out our New Books newsletter.
Riot Recommendations
Here are more recommendations for Pride Month! Today, we’re going to do a couple of WLW fairytale retellings!
In the Vanishers’ Palace by Aliette de Bodard
Vu Côn is one of the last dragons to walk an Earth blasted and poisoned; Yên, a failed scholar sold to her, thinks she’s about to get eaten. Instead, Vu Côn wants Yên to tutor her children in the palace-prison she calls home. First terrified of her master and jailer, Yên soon finds herself falling for the dragon… and wondering at her dark secrets.
The Little Homo Sapiens Scientist by S.L. Huang
Two sentient species share the Earth: humans above and the artargati below in the deep abyss of the oceans. Dr. Cadence Mbella is a researcher studying these mysterious people, who have been dubbed, perhaps inappropriate, as mermaids. But when she discovers that an artargati subject has been captured and being experimented upon by her superiors, she sees no choice but to give up everything on the surface to rescue the artargati.
Ash by Malinda Lo
Ash is left to the mercy of her cruel stepmother by the death of her father. Her only solace is to reread the fairytales her mother once read to her, hoping the fairies will come take her away. When the fair Sidhean appears, she hopes that wish might come true… until she meets Kaisa, the Huntress for the King, and feels something in her heart bloom.
See you, space pirates. If you’d like to know more about my secret plans to dominate the seas and skies, you can catch me over at my personal site.