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Book 689: The Play of His Life – Amy Aislin

I honestly didn’t plan for April to be full of MM Romance novels, but that’s how the world works. Plus in this new world of coronavirus stay-at-homeness they’re the only thing I want to read. So in the words of Jonathan Van Ness, buckle up queen (YouTube video; watch the first 10-15 seconds) there are more to come after this, thanks to the library coming through on a few that have been on hold.

I read this as part of the Gay Romance Reviews publicity push for The Play of His Life‘s re-release later this month. I was intrigued when it landed in my inbox because I love second chance romances (oh hey Persuasion), and let’s face it MM romance sports stories are usually pretty hot and heavy. I did have some hesitations about accepting it because it is self-published, but it did come from a publicist rather than direct from the author so someone had to vet it at some point, so I figured why not?

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Book 686: Enter the Aardvark – Jessica Anthony

This was a weird ass novel. I should’ve known it by the title when I requested it from NetGalley, but it was even weirder than I expected.* I’m sure I requested it because the blurb mentioned the modern protagonist was in deep denial about his sexuality, but that’s all I remember the rest was a weird wonderful surprise as I read it.

This is another dual narrative novel, authors really love those lately, with one portion taking place in modern America and the other taking place in the late 19th century England, and what ties the two together is a preserved Aardvark that arrives/is created at the most inconvenient time.

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Book 681: Lab Partners – Mora Montgomery

What this books needs more than anything, is a good editor: there were continuity errors, there were issues with over description and there were issues with dialogue. And the saddest part is the story and characters were solid enough, but the editing really let it down. [Some of it may have been fixed in the final version of the book, but if it were me I would not have released this to reviewers with these types of errors.]

I requested a copy of this book from NetGalley based on the blurb and the cover.* I mean cute cover, adorable blurb about high school first romance, who wouldn’t want to read it right?

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Book 678: Blowout – Rachel Maddow

My jaw legit hurt after I was reading this because my mouth kept hanging open at the sheer audacity of the companies, politicians, and countries in this book. Seriously though, let’s just say that, this is one of those books that if I used only emoji’s to review books would just be this gif of Nick from Big Mouth‘s Head blowing up in amazement.

I stumbled across this book after seeing a review in the Washington Post (months after the book and review were published) and I reached out to the publisher for a review copy and they kindly sent one.* What I wasn’t expecting was for this thing to be like a spy/thriller novel. It. Was. Insanity. Just when you think something more ridiculous can’t possibly be done, Maddow gives her smirk and says, “but wait….there’s more.”

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Book 676: Sense of Wonder – Bill Schelley

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I said I’d take a look at this after the publisher reached out to me about a review copy.* As much as I love the MCU and the various graphic novels I read (especially LGBTQ+ ones), I haven’t read comics since the early 1990s when I read a ton of Star Wars comics at the local Borders, I was going into this blind when it came to comic fandom.

Sense of Wonder is a deep dive into comic fandom from its earliest moments to the colossal behemoth it has become today all through the lens of Schelly’s life and experiences. I had no idea that fanzines were a thing back in the 1960s (oh hey, internet generation) and thanks in part to Schelly’s wonderful writing style and the methodical yet meandering journey he takes you on in this work, I now long for the days of pre-internet community building via snail mail, rides from parents to other parts of town, and collect phone calls.

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