soph (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sophia_sol) wrote2016-12-09 07:51 pm
sophia_sol) wrote2016-12-09 07:51 pm
Trade Me, and Hold Me, by Courtney Milan
And so we embark on the period where for approximately a month straight I read almost nothing but lots and lots of Courtney Milan and Tamora Pierce.
The following two are the first Courtney Milan books I have ever read. They are the beginning of her new contemporary romance series. I don't know why I started with these instead of her copious quantities of historical fiction, given my general preference for reading stories about the 19th c over the 21st c, but I did! And clearly it worked because it inspired me to keep reading her books. Courtney Milan writes really compelling romance novels, I must say.
Trade Me, by Courtney Milan
A very charming contemporary romance novel! It was a bit too romance-novel-y in places, but was fairly restrained about it given that it is, you know, a romance novel. I really liked Tina, the female lead, and the male lead (Blake) wasn't bad considering he's an angsty billionaire. I mean, I shouldn't phrase that so judgily, having money doesn't automatically result in people's lives being perfect, and his problems are real and worthy of respect. I think I just don't have a lot of patience for that character type in fiction. (Though I would have even less patience for an "alpha male" type billionaire. Good thing this book isn't doing that!)
I think the main characters' relationships with their families are the best part of the book - real and complicated and full of love despite the complicatedness. I also enjoyed Tina's roommate Maria, although she didn't get enough space in the book to have the same roundedness Tina's parents do. But apparently there's a sequel about Maria, so that's cool and I'll have to check it out!
Something I found frustrating is that Tina spends a lot of time doing emotional labour to help Blake and his family, and the reverse isn't really true. Which does feel accurate to their characters, and also his family needs a lot more fixing than hers does, but it's still an unfortunate following of unexamined gender roles
At any rate there is a short story sequel to this book, called Year of the Crocodile, which is about Blake's dad and Tina's parents meeting and it is BEAUTIFUL AND GLORIOUS and I giggled gleefully all the way through all the interactions between the parents. And also after finishing it I actually kind of cared about Blake's dad which I didn't do at all in Trade Me itself. Tina's parents are so much more interesting than him! But now I guess I have to admit that I kinda care about his story too.
Hold Me, by Courtney Milan
This is a romance novel starring a trans Latina woman and a bisexual Asian man. And all gender identities and sexual orientations within this book are treated really well! It even has two bit-part background characters who are nonbinary, one whose pronoun is they and one whose pronoun is zie.
But also it's just largely a really charming book. I just LOVE Maria, the female lead. (The first time around I typed that sentence as ending "the main character" and then I remembered that her love interest is also a main character, whoops, can you tell my priorities in this book because Jay isn't it)
Also also, Maria's friend Anj is great, as is Maria's friend Tina who was the star of the first book in this series (Trade Me), and also I adore Maria's grandmother, and basically I would have been into reading all about Maria hanging out with all the excellent women in her life forever. The grandmother in particular did not have nearly a large enough role in this book!
I did love the extremely nerdy math-and-science flirting that took place throughout the book between Maria and her love interest Jay. Jay himself...eh. Dude who's convinced he's way more of a feminist ally than he actually is? No thanks. At least he eventually makes the effort to get over himself when it's pointed out to him what an ass he's been.
Look I am not reading these books for the actual romances, it is becoming apparent. I am reading these because Courtney Milan does an excellent job of creating interesting female leads and giving them interesting platonic relationships in their lives. And the love interests can come along if they have to.
The following two are the first Courtney Milan books I have ever read. They are the beginning of her new contemporary romance series. I don't know why I started with these instead of her copious quantities of historical fiction, given my general preference for reading stories about the 19th c over the 21st c, but I did! And clearly it worked because it inspired me to keep reading her books. Courtney Milan writes really compelling romance novels, I must say.
Trade Me, by Courtney Milan
A very charming contemporary romance novel! It was a bit too romance-novel-y in places, but was fairly restrained about it given that it is, you know, a romance novel. I really liked Tina, the female lead, and the male lead (Blake) wasn't bad considering he's an angsty billionaire. I mean, I shouldn't phrase that so judgily, having money doesn't automatically result in people's lives being perfect, and his problems are real and worthy of respect. I think I just don't have a lot of patience for that character type in fiction. (Though I would have even less patience for an "alpha male" type billionaire. Good thing this book isn't doing that!)
I think the main characters' relationships with their families are the best part of the book - real and complicated and full of love despite the complicatedness. I also enjoyed Tina's roommate Maria, although she didn't get enough space in the book to have the same roundedness Tina's parents do. But apparently there's a sequel about Maria, so that's cool and I'll have to check it out!
Something I found frustrating is that Tina spends a lot of time doing emotional labour to help Blake and his family, and the reverse isn't really true. Which does feel accurate to their characters, and also his family needs a lot more fixing than hers does, but it's still an unfortunate following of unexamined gender roles
At any rate there is a short story sequel to this book, called Year of the Crocodile, which is about Blake's dad and Tina's parents meeting and it is BEAUTIFUL AND GLORIOUS and I giggled gleefully all the way through all the interactions between the parents. And also after finishing it I actually kind of cared about Blake's dad which I didn't do at all in Trade Me itself. Tina's parents are so much more interesting than him! But now I guess I have to admit that I kinda care about his story too.
Hold Me, by Courtney Milan
This is a romance novel starring a trans Latina woman and a bisexual Asian man. And all gender identities and sexual orientations within this book are treated really well! It even has two bit-part background characters who are nonbinary, one whose pronoun is they and one whose pronoun is zie.
But also it's just largely a really charming book. I just LOVE Maria, the female lead. (The first time around I typed that sentence as ending "the main character" and then I remembered that her love interest is also a main character, whoops, can you tell my priorities in this book because Jay isn't it)
Also also, Maria's friend Anj is great, as is Maria's friend Tina who was the star of the first book in this series (Trade Me), and also I adore Maria's grandmother, and basically I would have been into reading all about Maria hanging out with all the excellent women in her life forever. The grandmother in particular did not have nearly a large enough role in this book!
I did love the extremely nerdy math-and-science flirting that took place throughout the book between Maria and her love interest Jay. Jay himself...eh. Dude who's convinced he's way more of a feminist ally than he actually is? No thanks. At least he eventually makes the effort to get over himself when it's pointed out to him what an ass he's been.
Look I am not reading these books for the actual romances, it is becoming apparent. I am reading these because Courtney Milan does an excellent job of creating interesting female leads and giving them interesting platonic relationships in their lives. And the love interests can come along if they have to.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
I think possibly my problem with Blake is that I just do not care a lot about stories about modern technology. Future technology is great, and past technology is great, but stories about modern life are usually kind of a yawn to me, I don't know why.
But yes Tina's parents are the ACTUAL BEST I love them so much.
no subject
no subject