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Book 906: Black Cake – Charmaine Wilkerson

When someone from the publisher reached out to me about Black Cake, it wasn’t an immediate yes or an immediate no.* I honestly had no idea what I was going to do, I thought it was a beautiful cover (even if I didn’t notice the woman on it for ages) and the multi-generational story drew me in.

What ultimately decided for me was that it was a debut novel, love those most of the time, and my reading list is seriously lacking authors of color and I’ve been saying for years I’m going to expand my reading list. And holy shit y’all I’m so glad I did, this book took me for so many rides.

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Book 887: If This Gets Out – Sophie Gonzales & Cale Dietrich

My little closeted teenage heart would’ve died to read something like this in the late-90s/early-00s. So, when I saw it on NetGalley I requested it IMMEDIATELY, the publisher approved, and I have been sitting on it for months.*

I know I’ve said it before and I’ll keep on saying it—I am SO jealous of all the teens today getting to see themselves in books like this. I mean hell I enjoy them and I am WELL outside the target demographic for these.

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Book 870: Before We Disappear – Shaun David Hutchinson

Full disclosure, I only requested this one because of how adorable Wil is on the cover with that book.* I have no idea why, I was just like awwwww and then I read the premise and was sucked in and so glad I requested a copy!

Jack and Wil are magicians’ assistants and they meet at the Seattle World’s Fair in 1909. They’re both in abusive relationships with their magicians and when they find each other they slowly discover that there is so much more in the world than they ever thought and ultimately, they want to experience it together.

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Book 853: Game Changer (Game Changers #1) – Rachel Reid

Now THIS is a hockey novel. Everything the last one I read (Keeping Hope) did wrong, this one did right (especially the epilogues!). And to make it even better, this was kind of like the adult version of Ukazu’s Check, Please! series, with quite a few parallels that I thoroughly enjoyed.

Just like It Takes Two to Tumble, I found this one because Annabeth Albert (always, yes) highly recommended the newest release from Reid’s Game Changers series, Role Model, so of COURSE I was going to read it, because if Albert loves it, it is 100% worth checking out.

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Book 851: One to Watch – Kate Stayman-London

Blazed through this wonderful debut novel after stumbling across it on a list of great beach reads. It took quite a while to get it from the library, but it was 100% worth the wait. I can easily see this being turned into a film or made-for-TV-movie, but it’s better than some of the young adult gay one’s I’ve read recently.

Bea is a plus sized fashion blogger who writes a scathing take down of a reality TV show that’s suspiciously similar to The Bachelor, and the next thing she knows she’s been convinced to be the next Main Squeeze on the show and of course chaos, hilarity, and romance ensues.

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