itch.io

A short and spicy story about a blind, transfeminine escort, who has been sent to service an elusive client today. It dives deep into her sensory experiences, focussing on smell and sound and touch, which was a really intruiging perspective for this short story to explore, both during the erotic scenes, but also outside of them. I enjoy the inclusion of mythology and am excited to read more of the short stories in this series and hopefully learn more about the client as well. (As mentioned in another comment below, I just need to read 12 other short stories first :D).

 Disclaimer: I received an e-ARC from the author. Adeline has been living in the same small town all her life. Taking care of the plum orchards, dealing with annoying tourists and being in love with her best friend Theo are all deeply familiar to her by now. But when the town’s rhythm is thrown off as the orchards bloom too early, the flowers glowing in a strange red instead of the calming pink and people turn into rotting corpses, she finds herself forced to break out of her daily trot, trying to figure out how to save herself and 

I really enjoyed Adeline as a character and I liked how her gender and disability were portrayed in the story, both as just a regular part of her character, but obviously also something that influences her day-to-day life. Theo was also an interesting character and while I would have loved to know more about him in the present, I did enjoy the moments were Adeline reminisced about their friendship and how they found connection with each other as queer disabled kids. I am also always a big fan of he/him lesbians, my beloved. 

The body horror and especially the descriptions of rot and decay was really gross and fun to read but absolutely need a strong stomach. As a horror fan, I loved it. I also enjoyed the horror of ecological havoc that greedy corporations can wreak and the punishment they were dealt. Plus, two lesbians kissing after eating their way through a guy’s face is something I knew I needed and this story delivered. 

All in all, this was a very fun novella. While I think some parts could have been longer and explored in more detail, especially regarding the relationships between Adeline and the other people in town that aren’t Theo, if you’re looking for a short and dark horror story and a small town overrun by zombies and some really, really fun lesbianism, you should check this out and enjoy a quick read. 

Hi, i don't know if you've received a reply elsewhere, but I've just read this and it is trans woman/transmasc butch he/him lesbian.

In a nexus of realities, there’s a church that collects and slowly devours every version of a single woman it can find across parallel realities. When it collects Stella Carson, a woman, whose life was ruined by the brutal murder of her High School girlfriend it may have bitten off more than it can chew though. Because unlike the many other iterations of herself here, Stella is already haunted. And when her ghost appears in the church and begins taking out others while looking for her, things take an even darker turn. 

Told in a strange and twisting narrative, with very intense scenes of horror, this story hits you like the water from a broken dam and after tearing you away doesn’t let you up for air until you’ve followed the story to its haunting conclusion. It combines cosmic horror with a murder mystery featuring two toxic lesbians and the constant questioning of reality both in Stella’s internal narrative and the world surrounding them. 

I really enjoyed reading this one, if you are looking for a quick, horrifying read, definitely check it out. 

The (for now) last installment of the Winnie & Crela stories ends with them moving into a new home in which to build their relationship further. (There will be more stories to come though, which I'm very excited for!) I really liked how supportive Anders is, he’s a great friend and I enjoyed that he also gets a bit more moments to show how his own life changes. It was also really lovely to see how much better Crela’s life is now that she can move more freely and how Winnie and her are making the most of their life together.

While this was mostly about the actual work of making the crypt livable and inviting a friend over for dinner, it was all very sweet and gave us more insight into the character and so I really liked this short story. I’m very excited for any future stories about the girls (and Anders also).

In the next installment of Winnie’s and Crela’s life they are joined by Anders, a coworker of Winnie’s and a self-proclaimed specialist of the occult. The strict moral rules of the time force Winnie to spend far too many nights apart from Crela if she wants to keep her apartment and despite the fact that Crela’s crypt is exceptionally cosy and well decorated (for a crypt), Winnie is not ready to spend the rest of her life down there. But Anders claims to know a way to break the bond that keeps Crela tied to the cemetery without breaking the bond between her spirit and her flesh.

I really enjoyed that there was a new addition to the group and I liked Anders a lot (who doesn’t love a weird little guy who enjoys gore and science? Honestly peak transmasc rep, I can relate). It was also really interesting to see the way he reacted (positively) to their relationship as it provided an outsider perspective that I enjoyed. (I had really gotten used to living in the crypt but had not really thought a lot about how a tour through it would feel for somebody who hasn’t been here from the beginning. Now I definitely have a bit of a better picture of the place, which I really like.)

Finally, I also really enjoy the discussions that are being had about terminology in these books, with Winnie always making sure to refer to Crela with the terms she feels comfortable with and wants to use, it adds to their sweetness with each other.

All in all, a really sweet installment of the series and I’m excited to see this world growing.

The next book in the Winnie and Crela series, this book switches POVs and lets us find out a bit more about Winnie and how she feels about her ghoulfriend. While still very short, I really enjoyed that this story reveals more about the world Winnie and Crela live in and what Winnie's life looks like outside the cemetery. I also liked that we got to know more about Winnie's scientific background, which was fascinating. Their relationship is also slowly growing more intimate, which I enjoyed and I'm excited to read the next short in this story. As before, this is a very sweet romance, with two very sweet main characters and I enjoyed reading it a lot.

A short, but sweet, story about a ghoul and a necrologist falling in love. Meeting after Crela killed Winnie's two companions as they were trying to break into the crypt (they sucked, so it's okay!), the two set about improving Crela's unlife, figuring out what makes her function and find themselves soon drawn towards each other for reasons more than hunger or pure scientific interest.

As I said the story is very short so there isn't really a lot of romantic build up or anything, everything moves rather fast and the story is over before a lot happens between them, but this is a fun little read for the season and I'm glad I picked it up. Can't wait to continue and see where their story goes next! If you like your lesbians quite literally unburied, check this series out, it's sweet and fun.

Sammaël, an eldritch entity, the only one of its kind, has been travelling the universe forever, when its path is interrupted by a strange new sound. Interest piqued, it decides to investigate this thing called music and finds itself hovering over a blue planet, which it might have devoured whole during any other time. When an opportunity for a fresh, recently emptied vessel presents itself when Abe falls and dies in an alley, it takes the chance. At first, most of its attention is focused on the more immediate sensation of concussion, but soon other experiences crowd in, such as the fact that something feels deeply wrong with the body she has taken, the name that is being used and the pronouns applied to her. To be able to enjoy music however, she has to convince Sierra, Abe’s ex, that she is not Abe, the man who died in the alley, without driving her insane through cosmic knowledge. And if all that wasn’t enough to deal with for an eldritch entity’s first foray into human interaction, she finds herself dying over and over and over again.

Sam is a fascinating character (and not just because we have the same name, but I always find that funny too) and her learning about humanity, trans identity and how to experience happiness was a joy to read. Sierra too, was incredibly interesting and I liked that her reactions weren’t always positive, but that she was supportive when it really counted and that once she had gained the knowledge that Sam was not Abe, she really got to shine as a kind and compassionate woman. It was also fascinating to read how their relationship changed and shifted during the various time loops. (Slight spoilers) I also really loved that at some point during it all Sierra gained knowledge of the time loops, allowing their relationship to grow despite the gruesome deaths.

I enjoyed the way space and time very depicted in a very fun and approachable way and the story mentions Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy to set reader expectations and then manages to fulfill them very well. This story takes cosmic horror and manages to tell a very touching and sweet romance through it. Because even the cosmic horrors sometimes want to experience new things.

Sammaël an eldritch cosmic entity, the only one of its kind, has spent the last book experiencing music (and accidentally also gender dysphoria, gender euphoria and lesbianism), so it is now interested in experiencing different things as well. In its quest to finally experience friendship it takes over the body of the Demon Lord that has been plaguing the lands and aware of the fact that it prefers to inhabit women transitions her right in front of the intrepid hero, who thought their foe vanished. What better way to start an enemies-to-friends journey? Now if only the hero could stop running away from her for one second to listen and maybe also do some reflection on other things they have been running from for quite some time, that would make this story just perfect! 

As my summary probably already reveals this is a rather meta story about narrative. Since we last encountered Sammaël it has been consuming quite a lot of media and having embodied its avatar, Samhain, with it made for some really intriguing moments of playing with storytelling and what it means for a character to have unlimited power and yet still be trapped in the bindings of narration, fearful of The End. The nods towards various enemies-to-friends journeys in other media was fun and I loved seeing how confused the hero reacted to them. Samhain is once again her own character, growing and changing and becoming different from Sammaël, and while I liked her and found her interesting, this time the story is not really about her as much as it is about the hero and their journey across the world, the friends they made and lost as well as their mentor Darius, until they have to face that they have been living as an empty shell for too long. This egg is quite dense, but I love them anyway. 

I had a lot of fun reading this and while it is rather short and spends a lot of time running around the world, if you just want a short (but sweet) story about a hero realizing there might be more in life than fighting demons and a demon queen’s quest to make a friend, with a really sweet end you should check this novel out! 

TW: dysphoria, misgendering 

The Fleet has fallen, but humans and fabricants have rebuilt. Their society has been altered in their attempts at survival, but the more comfortable people get, the more Cora notices that things may be starting to get bad again, the same mechanisms of exploitation rearing their ugly heads. When an investigative job leads her back to the farm, she left 20 years ago after suffering a psychotic break, she manages to fight the negative voice in her head warning her long enough to return to Annalise and Sarah as well as their now adult daughter Minerva. Desperate to redeem herself, she agrees to take Minerva on a caving expedition to explore one of the fallen ships. What is supposed to be a bonding experience, a way to make up for lost time, soon turns into something much more dangerous, when Cora finds herself not just reminded of her past, but instead actually living through it.

Unlike the previous books we are now in Cora’s head, learning a lot more about how her mind functions and what drives her, which was incredibly interesting (and heartbreaking). While there had been hints in the previous book that her time working under Fleet-rules had been anything but rosy (CORA-units are described as neurotic and due to the nature of their work forced to be isolated from other fabricants since they are used as spies), actually experiencing this isolation (as well as a few more upsetting aspects) of Cora’s past was heartbreaking to read. She struggles with psychosis in the form of a consistently negative voice in her head letting her know about all the things she messed up or that could go wrong and she’s not always able to differentiate that voice from reality. I don’t want to spoiler too much, but Cora was an incredibly interesting POV-character for this story and I loved the way the narrative returned to exploring (un)reality like it did in the first book, but diving into the horrors of it even deeper, as well as exploring what to do if one of your biggest obstacles is yourself?

Slight spoilers here: In general, I really, really adored the way this story explored trauma and maladaptive coping mechanism to said trauma with a lot of understanding and care. The negative aspects that Cora’s actions have are not downplayed or ignored, but neither are they totally blamed on her and depicted as inherent to her character, which is something I wish more media did when presenting traumatized characters who mess up.

Sarah and Annalise still have a role to play in this book, but what I really enjoyed in this book was the examination of their relationship with Cora and how Cora’s trauma warped the way she viewed them. As already explored in the previous books Cora has a tendency to run away and this abandonment and her guilt about it don’t make it easier for her to connect with them on an equal level. It was also really interesting to see Cora’s view on Sarah, which due to events of the first two books is quite complicated and tense, despite also caring for each other deeply. I also really enjoyed the exploration of how Cora’s gender (and some events in her past related to it, which she has been repressing) influenced her relationship with the two other women and increased her anxieties about talking about her past.

I also really enjoyed Minerva’s character, serving as an outside perspective from someone, who didn’t grow up in the Fleet, as well as her investment in her mothers’ pasts, desperate to get to know them better. While it is implied that they are good parents and did their best raising her despite adverse conditions, it is clear that their past is not something they enjoy talking about, which leaves her feeling somewhat excluded and isolated as well. She was a fun addition to the cast and I liked her interactions with Cora very much.

And finally, my favorite part of the story, was the deep dive into psychological horror presented here. Cora deals with a lot in this book: isolation, trauma, internalized victim blaming, mental illness, psychosis, domestic abuse and transmisogyny, all while being a lot more vulnerable than Sarah was presented to be due to her position in the fleet. While the vulnerability of certain Fabricants, such as the UHAN units was something that Sarah was certainly aware of and even the fact that Cora was so much smaller and weaker was mentioned in the previous books as well, experiencing that through Cora’s eyes was a lot more impactful to me.

All in all, this was a really, really great finale to a very well written sci-fi trilogy with heavy psychological horror aspects and I loved reading it. If you like characters Going Through It and facing the horrors, then you need to check these books out so they can break (but also heal) your heart like they did mine.

An amazing collection of gay trans erotic short stories, which combines transformation, body horror, gore, erotica and trans euphoria (& dysphoria) into an incredibly horrifying and satisfying reading experience. The horror and erotica presented here is dark, really creepy and deeply innovative, exploring a wide array of scenarios that somehow still manage to flow together quite well without ever feeling repetitive. From summonings gone wrong to medical intervention that crosses all boundaries to strange ceremonies and (un)divine intervention there is something here for any fan of trans horrorotica exploring the strange and macabre. I also loved the diversity of trans male character presented here regarding wishes for their bodies and how they engaged with their partners, the various different embodiments they were granted or took for themselves as well the fact that they weren’t just the recipients of the deeds done. This, plus the various scenarios and different worlds we got to explore, made each story feel unique and special and quite interesting to read. The writing style was also incredibly well done, I adored the prose and the atmosphere that was created for each story and am very thankful that I took my time savoring each story.

My favorite short stories were Godling (incredibly horrifying pregnancy horror), Lambskin (possession horror of the finest variety), Sting (an alchemists experiment gone Oh So Right) and Mouth to Mouth to Mouth (an incredibly atmospheric trip through a horrifying and strange world).

All in all, I really enjoyed this collection and if you are a fan of dark gay and trans horrorotica this is a collection you need to check out asap.

A sad and haunting story, with a delicious end celebrating change, about being stuck in an unaccepting environment and how becoming yourself (blooming into yourself, one might say…) sometimes requires a big change of self and situation. I love fungal horror and this story explores that very well, especially the intimacy that comes with symbiosis. The body horror was also done really well and delicious. While this is only a short morsel, I really enjoyed the atmospheric writing and the exploration of stifling rural life. Very, very fun to read!

In the sequel Sarah and Annalise are struggling, trying to eke out a living in the hindfleet. Sarah’s body may need constant readjustment and replacement as she’s slowly falling apart, Annalise may need constant surgeries to remove the implants poisoning her, but at least they are together. Everything is not fine, but they are sure they can make it work, they have to. And at least they are together again. But when fabricants and humans start spewing up silver bile and attacking everything in their path, another parasite appears and spaceships are turned into ramming weapons spreading this new disease, they soon find themselves on the run again. And worst of all, Sarah finds herself separated from Annalise all over.

In a way this book functions as a repetition of the first book (on purpose), moving the reader (and the characters) through the events as if in a fun house mirror. One major difference is that Cora and Sarah now know what’s coming, fear it and love each other, allowing for more trust and communication between them, but also an additional layer of horror, both of which I loved. I in general really enjoyed the additional character development moments in this book, allowing us to see how the characters’ relationships had changed in the time between book one and two and how they dealt with their trauma and fears.

Both Sarah’s and Annalise’s and Sarah’s and Cora’s relationships are given a lot more time and development here and I especially enjoyed the development between Cora and Sarah. Their relationship had been left somewhat unresolved at the end of book one and so I was really excited, when I saw that it got such a big focus here. They were a very important part of the story for me and I really liked reading how they dealt with the events of book 1 as well as a few other questions that were left open in their relationship (and yes. It is poly! Complicated, but poly!). In general, the characters are further explored and we learn a lot more about Sarah’s past and her existence outside of her function of caring for Annalise, which was both really interesting and heartbreaking. Alongside homophobia and transphobia, this story also explores ableism as Sarah loses certain functions and Annalise is disabled from the implants, as well as the way fabricants are dehumanized and treated as disposable machines. We also get to learn a lot more about other people in the fleet (many of which suck!) and a few more world building details, which really added to my enjoyment of the story and made me even more excited to read the third installment of the series. I don’t want to spoiler too much, but if you, like me, thought well book one was good but I have so many questions… some of them are answered here! And many new ones are asked! It’s great!)

**Caution: I discuss some spoilers in this paragraph ** In general, I think this sequel avoided the second-book-in-a-trilogy-problem very well, because while it did move the plot forward (and left us in a completely different space than it started, which makes me itch to dive into the third installment immediately!) it didn’t feel as if it was just here to move us towards a grand conclusion, instead using the space it had very well for aforementioned character development as well as diving a lot more deeply into psychological horror. While the first book focused on Sarah’s fears, this book also examined Annalise’s internalized lesbophobia, which lead to some truly horrifying stuff (the blur world and its utter terror and suffocating ‘protection’ will stick with me for a while for sure!) and I utterly adored it! It wasn’t an easy read, this book really didn’t pull any punches as it explores the horror of the closet, but it made the payoff at the end so much sweeter.

All in all, another incredible installment of sci-fi psychological horror with additional lesbians and trans characters (I need more of Sunan in book three! I loved them so much!), some really tense horror as well as a great exploration of autonomy under an unjust system and how societal prejudice can force you to change and harden in ways that are damaging to yourself and your relationships. I really enjoyed it and I’m excited to dive into the next book in the series.

This sci-fi horror story follows CERHA on her mission aboard the starship Upon Silver Tides, where she is tasked with first finding and then rescuing her charge Annalise Fletcher. Upon first entering the ship she realizes that something is wrong. Not only have the other fabricants (synthetic, but sentient, beings created with one singular purpose) nearly all gone mad, assuring themselves and everybody in their vicinity that Everything Is Fine before attacking anybody that threatens their assertions, but CERHA soon realizes that whatever is going on aboard the starship is also affecting her, threatening to make her lose her path.

While this story may not be a perfect fit for people who are looking for the darkest possible sci fi horror or those looking for fluffy romances, for me, as a fan of horror and transgender romance I had a really, really good time with this book. I enjoyed the bleak horror and the depiction of unreality, that CERHA encountered in this story, having to cope with not only slowly losing her mind but also a ceaseless barrage of traumatic events. And throughout it all she wonders what exactly her relationship with Annalise was and who actually considers her a fully sentient being, deserving of love and having her voice heard?

CERHA is a fascinating main character and as I already stated her state of mind is not an easy one to be in. The book takes her apart and as a reader we watch her unravel as she scales the ship up and down and up again, solving mysteries along the way and slowly (hopefully) getting closer to fulfilling her mission. Along the way she considers her relationship with herself, with those around her and with her body. For parts of the book she is accompanied by another fabricant named CORA, who seems to be one of the last sane fabricants aboard the ship, who was one of my favorite characters. I really, really like her and enjoyed what the interactions between CERHA and CORA added to the story, in particular the way they disrupted the deeply unsettling, but sometimes a bit repetitive (still scary af though! The atmosphere is really, really great) acts of climbing through the ship. I also quite enjoyed the other characters and there are certainly a few that I am looking forward to getting to know more in the sequel!

Another really incredible aspect of this book was the atmosphere it created. Starting with fascinating lore about the moon and the space fleet, the fact that there are parasites, whose radiation causes you to lose your grasp on reality and the constant doubt of what is real and what isn’t, this book really delivers some great sci-fi horror atmosphere. As some people have already mentioned the SIGNALIS influences are certainly there, although I did not think they overshadowed the rest of the book and instead functioned as nice little easter eggs for me.

While I would have enjoyed some more world building (there are quite a few questions still to answer, but that’s where the sequels will hopefully come in!), the main focus of this story is CERHA and her doubts and fears. The book dives deep into questions of autonomy, questioning if a being which is created with a function, which they need to fulfill or otherwise go insane, can ever truly make their own decisions and explores transfeminine fears surrounding disposability and exploitability. Unlike sci-fi which only uses transfeminity and queerness as a metaphor, this story digs deep into what it means to exist in a world where your gender identity may be tolerated in so far as it allows you to function better, but is still treated as an aberration, which should at best be fixed and then go unnamed and ignored.

All in all, this sci-fi horror asks the important questions: What if the unreliable narrator slowly driven mad by cosmic radiation was powered by duty and lesbianism? And she was transgender? How cool would that be? How much would it break your heart to read? How hard would you root for her survival? The answer is very!

I really, truly adored this story and I cannot wait to dig into the sequels!

A wonderful addition to the horrorotica genre, this dark romance explores the messy, abusive and yet incredibly erotically charged relationship between a blind woman and her vampire girlfriend. Having been rescued by Carm from more than one creep during their relationship, Adrianne feels indebted to her girlfriend and does her best to steal blood from the hospital she works at. But it doesn’t always work out and when Carm gets hungry she becomes mean, feeding from Adrianne with little care for how she feels. When her coworker Petra notices that Adrianne doesn’t seem to be doing too well, she starts asking questions and offering support. And despite knowing how dangerous Carm could pose to both of them, Adrianna finds she doesn’t have the strength to keep herself isolated and alone any longer.

I really liked Adrianna as a main character, her actions were understandable and the manipulation and abuse Carm put her through were heartbreaking to read about. It was also fascinating to be put in her mind and explore the ways she justified Carm’s behavior for herself, because while an abusive relationship may look easy to parse from the outside, this just makes it very clear that it is anything but. Carm is a deeply unlikeable character, expertly manipulative and a horrible person, but despite this, I could understand why Adrianna had fallen for her at first and then felt unable to leave her. I also love fucked up women in fiction and Carm sure delivers on that front, she’s just absolutely terrible and I adored it! (Also, she’s hot…) And finally, there’s Petra who plays an important role in showing support to Adrianna that finally enables her to leave. She clearly cares for Adrianna and the romance between the two of them was super sweet. I also liked how protective she was as well as how she provided an outsider’s perspective both on the relationship and the supernatural aspects of the storyline.

If you enjoy lesbian monsterfucking, dark romance, a disabled main character, a transfem LI, an exploration of abusive relationships and how to get out and a spicy but scary story, you gotta check this one out.

A great anthology of short stories combining horror with erotica and trans identity. While some stories definitely dive deeper into the field of horror and others lean more towards erotica, most are quite good at striking an intriguing balance between the two. 

There are quite a lot of things I really, really enjoyed about this anthology, besides my favorite short stories of course. I really like that this anthology features a variety of trans identities, trans women, trans men and nonbinary, as well as a variety of transitional stages, genital configurations and character’s feelings about their bodies. In particular I enjoyed that there is a story featuring a trans man, who had gotten surgical phalloplasty, something I still rarely see in trans erotica, especially queer trans erotica, despite reading quite a lot of it. I also enjoy the wide variety of horror subgenres featured here, from witchy rituals, swamp gods, southern gothic, zombies, sentient penises and more there’s something here for everybody. 

My favorite stories were Transymbiosis, The Light Behind the Black Chrysalis, The Angel out of Space, Margaret, Juice, How to Cheat: For Dummies, The Creature and Born from Earth. 

All in all, this is certainly an anthology I’m very glad to have read and I’m especially excited that I have found some new authors to check out! 

I also have uploaded a more in depth review where I talk about the short stories as well as cws and the included representation on storygraph here.

A bittersweet novella this short story follows the trans man Eris, in a very unaccepting world finding hope in the fairytale he found his name through, when he meets the angel from the fairytale. The angel Helge believes Eris is his past lover reincarnated. Soon they are falling in love, but the short stolen moments of peace and acceptance cannot blot out the immense amounts of hatred and repression Eris faces in his day-to-day life. And worse Helge keeps disappearing for long stretches of time.

The prose in this novella was utterly gorgeous, making for a very enjoyable reading experience without ever veering even close to purple prose territories. I also loved that we were able to dive deep into Eris’ head, experiencing his joy and grief and rage intimately.
I also found the worldbuilding really interesting, especially Eris’ job of bottling people’s grief and sorrows and the burden that places on him.
The relationship between Eris and Helge was sweet and erotic and I liked that both magic gender-affirmation was possible as well as gender-affirming language during erotic scenes allowing Eris to experience both forms of euphoria.

All in all, if you are looking for a short story exploring trans love and survival in a very prejudiced world, following a very traumatized main character as he grows into his identity and become secure in himself despite it all, then you will certainly have a fun time reading this story!

Set in a flooded world, this story follows the crew of the Steadfast on their mission to capture an ancient abyssal. Sally, a very powerful demon-binder, also called a cleaver, is asked to come along on the mission. Haunted by his own ghosts (quite literally, in this world remora, the remains of the deceased, attach themselves to cleavers and exist as voices inside their mind), he agrees, hoping to be able to use the coin to soon free himself from the worst of them.

This story features a lot of very interesting world building, making use of excerpts of fictional documents in the beginnings of chapters to tell the readers a bit more about the world in increments without becoming info-dumpy. From the magical and religious systems, to the nautical lifestyle, to the way trauma and relationships are explored, the narrative weaves a beautiful tapestry that is very fun (and often heartbreaking) to follow along. Sally is the main character a traumatized trans man, who copes with his issues by drinking until the voices quiet, but the other characters are equally as interesting. Mary is a trans woman, who can summon demons, with a past and a failed summoning that haunt her. Dru is a young girl, orphaned too soon and only cared for by a man barely able to take care of himself, who suddenly finds herself wanted for her unusually strong summoning powers. Y, the ship’s captain, a former pirate turned Navy after his town was destroyed, struggling between the bonds he has caged himself in and his desire to save himself and his crew. And Weatherby, a scholar, who seems to know a lot more than they let on. Plus of course, the demons and their reasons for allow themselves to be summoned and the way they work with and against the constraints placed upon them by the summoners.

Another strong point of this narrative is the representation of platonic t4t (and as in all my favorite stories the t stands both for trans and for trauma) in the companionship between Mary and Sally. They start out not really trusting each other, then are forced to share a cabin and after discovering that Mary’s touch can help Sally quiet the remora in his head find themselves slowly growing closer and supporting each other.

If you enjoy cosmic horror, swashbuckling adventures, traumatized characters, really intriguing worldbuilding and some incredible action scenes alongside really touching emotional connections, you will want to check this book out!

TW: alcoholism, abuse (sexual and emotional against an adult, physical, emotional and neglect against a child, both are in the past), body horror, multiple character deaths, torture

This novel set in a matriarchal magical world explores the brutal realities of classism, sexism and war all while weaving a political, cultural and linguistic feast so dense it is a joy to fully immerse yourself in it. An epic fantasy novel that truly encapsulates the meaning of epic, the world building and the rotating (and relatively big) cast of characters play the most important role in this book.
I would consider myself a quite fast reader and yet this novel took me nearly a month to get through. But my, what a joy it was to immerse myself in the characters, their lives, their fears and joys, the social structures, the incredibly intriguing money system, the politics. I could have read more. At first (and probably because English is not my mother tongue, even though I have a high proficiency) I struggled a bit with the language used in this novel, but quite soon I got used to it and it certainly added to the appeal this book held for me. In fact, the author invented fictional languages that all are built on different linguistic constructions with different songs and sayings and poems for each culture that speaks those languages, Hwoamish, Illasi, Ennish and the Underroad cant, elevating this novel from an intriguing look into a matriarchal society to something so much grander and more intriguing. The novel also explores how language and the ability to speak a certain language (and to speak it accent free) can be used to segregate and harm those oppressed in a society.

Besides the linguistics what I really enjoyed about this book was its commentary on oppression and the fact that most important characters are women and thus there were women that were great and women that were horrible and women that quite frankly disgust me. Women in this story can be anything, from warriors to political leaders to revolutionaries and criminals, including those that are sexist, creepy and abusive towards the men and women under their power and even simply average, just the way men are allowed to be in epic fantasies. I also adored the way trans identity was explored in this world, although I would have personally found it really interesting how this world would react to trans men. I did enjoy the exploration of how this world reacts to trans women, where they consider it important to affirm and honor a trans woman’s identity, while still seeing her (and probably any woman who cannot get pregnant, as that is a prerequisite for higher political office) as lower status due to their inability to birth a child.

The magic system is incredible, there’s intriguing religious systems, there’s a variety of societies outside of Sforre-Yomn, the main city this takes place in, there’s the colonialist English (well the fantasy version of them anyway), there’s an intriguing concept of sex work, there’s magical and mythical creatures and lore abound. I also enjoyed that the plot varied (depending on the character in question) between more action-focused scenes and more discussion-focused scenes and that this novel really explores what makes a main character, but giving each character a focused and detailed backstory and the only reason why the characters we followed were more important than other characters is because the story focused on them.
All in all, this novel deserves its page count because of the incredible and detailed world it weaves and it deserves a place beside other epic fantasy books. I can recommend it to fans of detailed epic fantasy, anybody who enjoys reveling in linguistics (and who has a high proficiency of English or is willing to look up A Lot of words) and anybody who wants a fascinating exploration of a fantasy matriarchy.

Trigger warnings include: child abduction, child abuse, ableism, murder, gore, violence, classism, sexism, slavery, mentions of past rape/threats of rape, transmisogynist/bioessentialist language (bootless as bollocks on a bride, womanhood proven by childbearing), self-harm, suicide, murder, torture, off-page murder of girls and boys for sexual pleasure (in which societally only the murder of girls is judged as truly bad) and probably some more that I missed. It’s a big book.

This is a really interesting collections of short stories that will guide you through a strange and fascinating world. Some of the stories are set in the same universe and finding where they are interconnected made me feel a lot more invested than I would have been without. Especially the early stories tend to be very short (they get longer as you get further into the collection), and I would advise you to not let that put you off the book. It is worth it, even though some of the stories made me desperately wish there was more (especially Don’t feel guilty, which had a really cool concept, but was too short for me to enjoy in all its terror).

As it always is with short story collections I did not like all of the stories in here, some due to premise or because they were from a genre I did not really enjoy, but I liked a lot of them. The stories span from fairytales with a twist, romances with gods or AI and urban magic to gothic horror, so even if there are some genres or tropes here you normally don't enjoy, there's more than enough other interesting stories here to definitely make this a worthwhile read for many. I think if you like stories exploring fantastical worlds and supernatural characters, there will be a few gems in here for you.
(Warning for slight spoilers for some of the short stories)

My personal favorites are “the turning of claribella holte”, which is one of the short stories that I think really showcases the beauty of the writing, “my parents are spies” a short story about a young person going through some changes as they grow older and having to come to terms with the knowledge that their parents won’t accept them, “blood-drenched brothers”, a fairytale horror about loss due to other’s prejudice, “edie” a Hansel and Gretel-based revenge story, “theoretical robotics and the dynamics of love” a story about an AI experiencing something new, “koschei” about a girl who can see other people’s deaths meeting someone whose death she can’t see, “the magic number” about a trans woman nervous about telling her date she’s trans, “the hands and the mouth” a short story about escaping an oppressive regime when the way you speak can out you as somebody who needs to be hunted down, “soliloquy” following a being from an underground society befriending a human and learning to understand art and “six hours under” about a chance meeting that might just save a life.

I adored the way queerness played a role in these stories, sometimes a source of anxiety for a person worried about facing queerphobia, other times just part of the story that was being told. I also like that real life aspects of oppression where reflected in these stories somewhat. Besides the supernatural aspect of the stories another thing that connects these stories is love and connection, which plays a role in pretty much every single one of the stories. There’s a wide variety of connections from friends to lovers to family and even sometimes strangers and I really enjoyed how important community was in many of the stories. The characters also always feel different, which made them unique and interesting.

All in all, this is a really good short story collection and I can definitely recommend it to anyone who enjoys vignettes and short stories that guide you through a strange world and allow you to meet a variety of different characters. If you know and enjoy the podcast Monstrous Agonies, or enjoyed reading Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children Series you will probably enjoy this book as well.

This sweet and sometimes action-filled story follows a young woman returning home to her family in Mumbai to get married in an arranged marriage. However when she meets her dance instructor her conviction to finally acquiesce to her family's desire wavers and she will have to decide if her happiness is more important than her mother's approval.

My favorite part of this story is its cultural focus and the atmosphere it builds. Particularly the focus on food and the descriptions of it, as well as the feeling of the city really helped draw me into the story and follow Esha's story with heightened interest. I also adored the inclusion of classic Indian movies and romantic stories, as well as the many cultural references and untranslated words and phrases. Since it is not something I have a lot of experience in myself, I found myself googling quite a lot, but I also felt that it increased my immersion in the story and made the world feel incredibly rich. While some aspects of the story are a bit cliche (getting stuck together due to external circumstances, discovering they have the exact same music taste, the desparate motorcycle chase at the end - however, this is a romance after all and romance lives from cliche and with this book this felt like a movie drama in the best way), it was clearly written with love and care and worked well for me. Billu was a really interesting character, caring and very polite, but also someone that needed (and deserved) to be persued and shown that she is worthy of love and care. I would have liked to get to know a bit more about her, especially her own experiences and feelings outside of the relationship, but I still found myself caring a lot for her. I also really liked the friendgroup and the exploration of relationships between them. And furthermore I absolutely adored the dance scenes, the bonding through music and the realization how actual attraction is supposed to make you feel.

This is a quite short novella and while I was able to suspend my disbelief for the quick progression of the romance due to the external circumstances forcing deeper connection (as well as isolating the main character), I would have loved some more moments of them exploring the city and discovering their feelings for each other as I feel it would have increased my enjoyment of their relationship. I always enjoyed these scenes a lot and I mainly just wish there had been more of them, they were so cute! As I already mentioned I would also love to learn more about Billu. The end itself felt rather abrupt (especially after the very long motorcycle chase, which was cool, but a bit too long for the lenght of the novella and especially compared to the rather sudden end) and I think a longer epilogue would have increased my enjoyment of the story further. Despite this, I really enjoyed this story!

All in all this is a lovely ownvoices story by a Desi trans lesbian about deciding against an arranged marriage, recovering from getting one's heart broken, rebelling against cultural and familial norms and finding love and I am very happy I read it!

(crossposting from my storygraph, I received an ARC of this book in 2023)

Having read & loved Seraph Ex Machina, I was quite excited to read this alternative world for the characters and it is a lovely story.

Al Hess creates a beautiful somewhat futuristic world (but in other aspects much too similar especially with the religious transphobia) and asks the question how this society might react if we had the ability to upload your soul to a server if you die and grow a new body to inhabit once you’re ready to come back. Our two focal characters of this book are Sasha, a man who was resurrected recently, and Metatron, the AI tasked with watching over the souls in Limbo.

I enjoyed the characters and I especially liked hanging out with Metatron again. We get to see a somewhat different side of them, so I would absolutely advise anybody who enjoyed Seraph Ex Machina to read this book as well. They go through a lot less trauma this time (which was good, because I cried a Lot for them during SEM), but they still have to deal with the fact that aren’t sure how to express their feelings. Sasha was a really interesting character, struggling to deal with the way his past addiction still influences his life even now that he’s clean (especially since his addiction lead to his divorce and he only sees his daughter during the weekends now) while also needing to find a way to convince Metatron to stop pinning and ask their crush out before he gets a stomach ulcer. The portrayal of adhd, autism, past drug addiction, religious fear of technical advancement and divorce set in a futuristic world was really interesting. For example, Sasha has a “stim” injected in his arm which he can use to get his adhd-meds whenever he needs it (no more remembering where you sat your pills down! God, that would be really useful!), but the drugs he was addicted to are just as easily acquirable, as they simply consist out of two perfectly legal stims mixed together. I found this really interesting, especially since staying clean under such circumstances must be really tough.

I also really enjoyed Sasha’s character as well as all his friends and that fact that a huge part of his storyline was accepting that he can and should open up to his friends as they care about him and not just his romantic feeling. He’s carrying a lot of guilt around fearing he ruined everything due to his past addiction and it was just really nice to see that people loved and cared for him the entire time. Mr. C. is also a quite interesting character and I liked him as well, he and Rodrigo are both really cute love interests.

(slight spoilers for the end of the book in the next paragraph)

I would have liked some more character building for our villain Campbell as he feels quite one dimensionally EvilTM at times (why does he do what he does? Cause he’s evil, duh!) and so did not really interest me and I think it would have been more interesting if his motivations had been explored more. And while he does get his “punishment” in the end, I do think the many people he hurt would have deserved to deal with their trauma a bit more. However, the interesting world building and the other loveable characters more than make up for it and the story is a really good one.

All in all, I really enjoyed this story, it is an interesting read with multiple twists and turns and interesting plot reveals that doesn’t shy away from examining a few tough topics. Diversity plays a huge role, not just for neurodiverse people, but also regarding genders, sexualities and races and it was just great to see it done so effortlessly. Mostly I think it is a story about overcoming adversity and healing from trauma and allowing yourself to love again and I think we can always use more diverse stories like that.

A new and incredibly good short story collection by Natalie Tautou. It's dark, it's messy, it's transgender, it deals with horrifying and terrible shit, it's bleak and dark and so, so good!

I really enjoyed reading it (blasted through it in an evening, emotions going from feeling queasy at points to incredibly intruiged by the stories and feeling very sorry for the characters to just deeply grateful to get to read great and messed up horror). The writing is crisp and very to the point, its extreme horror and filled with trigger warnings, but also strangely beautiful.
If you enjoy your horror extreme and dark and messy, check out this collection.

To avoid spoilers, short reviews for each short story & trigger warnings can be found on my storygraph.

Trigger warnings for this review for discussions of gore!

This is a short story collection with a focus on the gorey, the messy, the dark things. If you like horror and gore, I don’t think you will need a lot of convincing after enjoying the gorgeous cover to pick this book up. But if you need some more convincing, let me tell you that this is an incredibly well written and very intriguing collection of horror short stories (& it features some great art inside as well!). It includes multiple genres of horror and from cosmic horror to deep sea horror to gruesome body horror, there’s something here for everybody who enjoys the macabre. Most stories feature gore or other forms of body horror, but some focus on more interpersonal horror and for that I just want to mention that I loved the way this book handled trigger warnings. They are provided at the end of the book, but mentioned in the beginning. This makes them easy to check out, without running into the risk of accidentally spoilering yourself, if you choose to skip them.

Besides the cover setting the mood for the stories included here, there’s another cool aspect that I enjoyed at the beginning of the book: It includes a word definition for the title and if you’re a gorehound like me, I think you can understand the giddy joy I felt when reading “to cut something purely for the enjoyment of cutting; generally understood to be enacted upon something living or once living”. Just lovely!

While not every short story was perfectly suited to me, I really enjoyed most of them and felt that most managed to really work with the genre of short story well. Only one story was too short for me to fully enjoy it and I still adored all the concepts presented here and found them to be explored in interesting ways and with some great detailed and gruesome imagery. There’s a roommate with a dangerous curse, deep-sea scientists, self-inflicted amputations, women with weird fixations on corpses and more. My personal favorite stories were “Eusect” (the self-amputation story), “Aurozoa Sleep” (the deep-sea scientist horror), “In Miriam’s Arms” (the corpse-obsessed woman), “We, the Water, the Stars” (a scholar of the cosmic embarks on a sea voyage, but his plans there are sinister) and “Tender Writhing” (a man wrecked by grief over the loss of his partner cannot let him go). As I already mentioned the stories tend to be intimate, exploring character’s reactions to facing the horrors or their descent into depravity or desperation. Despite being very short, these stories managed to provide great character (and world) building and I found myself deeply intrigued by most of them.

All in all, this is an incredible short story collection and if you enjoy your horror gorey, queer and with a variety of bodily fluids, check it out. For myself I definitely have found a new author whose work I will be keeping an eye on!

This short story has everything! Antipsych swag, gutwrenching body horror that made me feel sick (honorific), a sexy, seeeexy cover, a nonbinary worstie (<3), an MC that has a bad time and makes it worse, incredible intense gore described in vivid detail (again, if the gore does make me cringe and want to puke a little, then I know its great! and it did!!!) and even a dog (that does not get harmed)!

In general if the cover makes you go "Huh, interesting" please just check this book out. If you need more incentive this book is about the spiral where everything just gets worse and worse and what to do if you can't stop it. Also read this book if you've ever wondered what life would feel like when your mental health is bad already, your band is falling apart (again) because of your situationship with the singer and suddenly the little dust sprites from spirited away lived in your bathroom and did a little dance whenever you had a bad time.

Tws are provided in the back of the book, but I will also type them up here: Skin picking, skin chewing, alcoholism, medication abuse, paranoia, hypnagogic and hypnopompic type hallucinations, severe self mutilation, gratuitous gore, graphic on page body horror done to self, implied eating disorder (including struggle with food contamination), implied past suicidal ideation, choking during sex, emetophobia, character death, declining mental health, spiraling severe borderline personality disorder symptoms.

A satirical, but very honest look at the publishing industry and the various ways people betray themselves and others in an attempt to thrive in it. Pearl, a lesbian trans woman writer, creates a gay cisgender man alter ego, Paul, to sell an “authentic” gay male romance to the straight female masses. Of course, things soon spiral out of control.

Pearl is not necessarily a very likeable character (taking her butch trans girlfriend as inspiration for the masculine partner in the gay novel without acknowledging why being compared to a man might be doubly hard for a butch trans woman? Yikes!), but she is certainly fun and sarcastic and she just doesn’t stop digging once she gets going, all traits I like in my fail-woman characters. She is incredibly interesting and intruiging and I do have a soft spot for messy women, so I had a great time. If you enjoy books where you can see your darkest impulses reflected and enjoy a trainwreck you can see coming a mile away: This absolutely fits the bill!

But Pearl isn’t the only character in this story. There’s also Barbs (the butch trans woman, my favorite side character, just because she is such a quintessential butch with a big heart and bigger hurt) and Pippin (Pearl’s trans roommate, whose picture Pearl uses for her cis-sona. I love him. He finds out she took his picture without asking and only cares that the fictional guy in question is cis. So he passes :)), as well as a variety of people in fandom and publishing.

This story not only examines the cis-gaze in publishing (Pearl is pressured to remove a trans side character from her story in order not to “offend” or “confuse” the audience, *cough* cowards *cough*), but also the way cis people are just always so eager to degender a trans woman at the slightest opportunity (Beatrice is a prime example of that. 10/10 would fight!) and finally the online fujoshi community on twitter and their never-ending quarrels as well as some of the most off-putting straight fujo comments I have ever encountered. Yuck!
If you are in speculative trans lesbian lit circles however you will also get a few lovely nods and hints towards the stories Pearl would actually like to write (“Yuri futures are up!” – and a guy ends up forcefemmed!), which I found a really nice change of pace to the otherwise deeply, tragically messy reality of getting published as a marginalized author presented here.

If you are a trans writer, in online trans writing spaces, ever interacted with fujo-spaces only to find they don't fit, like transfem MCs who make mistakes or just want to read a story that critiques publishing in a very enjoyable to read way: check this book out. 5 stars. I loved it.

TW: Misgendering, prejudice against butch trans women, lots of book discourse, wrong accusations of “bad behavior” (implications of aggression and sexual assault), discussion of suicide (no attempts, but it is considered and discarded)

A very interesting (and horny & fun & dark) collection of short stories focusing on toxic lesbians. In regard to genre the stories vary (there’s mostly sci-fi and fantasy, but also some contemporary), as does the intensity and darkness of each story (some are enthusiastically consensual, others less so, others again completely blur the lines of possibilities here through some fun use of magic or sci-fi invention). The stories also vary in the level of world building as well as the ratio of story vs spicy scenes and so there is definitely something in here for everybody who enjoys toxic horny lesbian short stories.
My favorite aspects of these stories where the ones with more worldbuilding (I enjoy the kinky stuff too, but I always adore a convoluted world building to make a kink scenario make sense :D) and my favorite short stories where: “Endings”, “War’s Prize”, “Box”, “To Serve Her Rights”, “Her Monstrous Hound” and the titular “Tempting Poison”.

I also enjoy that trigger warnings are provided on the itch page where the short story collection is sold and in the book itself. That is always really nice to see.

Lastly, I really adore the many characters Jemma Topaz wrote for these stories, because they are all so different and yet it all manages to flow together quite well. Many of the characters are trans, some cis, some butch, some femme, some still have to figure it out and some do not get an identity. Some enjoy their role, some don’t, some learn to.

A transfem erotica that plays with the lines of gender through sci-fi means and depersonalization (Can you classify yourself as trans when you can’t even fully classify yourself as human?) was something I was hoping to find one of these days and I am so glad I found it here!

Very spicy, very dark, very fun, I can just recommend this collection to anybody who has 5 bucks to spare and wants to really dig into some of the cool trans erotica that is out there.

Link to short reviews of every short story on storygraph

A really interesting retelling of Greek myth, following the last living Basilisk Petra, hiding in her human form to survive as the last of her kind. After being granted surgical intervention by followers of the goddess Cybele to make her body her own, she sets out on a quest to reclaim Perseus’ armaments from his grave in Medusa’s lair. Unlike Perseus’ however, she has no interest in harming Medusa to please the Gods.

I really liked both the journey to get to Medusa’s lair and the erotic parts that happened afterwards. The writing was poetic and lush and I felt transported into the world during Petra’s journey and I found it very interesting to read about the arduous path she traversed to finally encounter Medusa. The erotica afterwards was simply delicious, and with a big focus on reclaiming your body (both from past sexual violence in Medusa’s case and from the fear of being different and othered as a trans woman and a basilisk in Petra’s case). If you like your erotica dark, yet touching, brutal, yet tender and featuring some gorey body modifications as healing and reclamation of yourself I can just recommend this short novella to you! I also really liked how incredibly detailed Petra’s character and backstory was. If the author ever decides to write more with her as a main character, I would love to read it. I also really enjoyed getting to read Medusa's story interpreted as about a traumatized lesbian reclaiming her sexuality, that was beautiful.

The ending is a bit abrupt and I think if it had been a bit longer, it could have been more satisfying still, but all in all I really enjoyed reading this story and especially loved to see some trans butch rep in lesbian erotica!

TW: body horror, body modification (both willingly and for gender euphoria and self-inflicted but viewed as mutilation as a protective measure), dysphoria, gore, injury, lesbophobia (minor), self injury, past sexual assault, past suicide and suicidality, transmisogyny (minor), trauma around fertility and infertility

This story is a beautiful example of a cyberpunk sci-fi noir with a healthy dose of romance. It follows a grieving private detective Ryoma as he is trying to get back into work after having his life derailed by a traumatic death. What starts out as a simple case of uncovering a cheating husband's affair so his wife can divorce him soon turns out to be a lot more than meets the eye and Ryoma can't stop himself from digging deeper.

This story takes some of the most intruiging aspects of its genres (synthetics, cybernetic implants and their upkeep as big corporations fuck with people's bodies for a quick buck, megacities divided between the mega-rich and the seedy underbelly of poorer people struggling to survive, traumatized private investigator and traumatized lounge singer with a troubled past) and weaves it into a beautiful tapestry filled in with incredibly interesting world building.
If I didn't know this was a debut work I would not believe it to be one either. The writing and particularly the dialogue feels fluid and natural and as I already mentioned the world building manages to feel immersive without being info-dumpy, creating a rich world with interesting characters and yet never overwhelming me with that information.

For a story that moves quite fast in the escalation of the mystery, it also has its moments to slow down and let us bask in the sweet and tender moments of romance and relationship building, which added further depth.

All in all I really enjoyed this book and if you enjoy cyberpunk noir sci-fi romances I can only advise you to check it out!

Trigger warnings for: sexual assault, dehumanisation, violence, murder, massive invasion of bodily autonomy in a non-sexual way (in addition to the sexual assault), aspects of invasive body horror and loss of autonomy.

This is a really interesting and satisfying trans revenge story. I liked how our MC figured out what had happened and decided to use it to her advantage. I especially like the ending.