Thank you so much to the team at Harlequin Trade Publishing for having me on this blog tour! I love being a part of the YA seasonal blog tours because YA is my jam for sure for sure. Definitely one of my favorite age ranges for books. I can never get enough of YA.
A follow-up to the critically acclaimed All Out anthology, Out Now features seventeen new short stories from amazing queer YA authors. Vampires crash prom…aliens run from the government…a president’s daughter comes into her own…a true romantic tries to soften the heart of a cynical social media influencer…a selkie and the sea call out to a lost soul. Teapots and barbershops…skateboards and VW vans…Street Fighter and Ares’s sword: Out Now has a story for every reader and surprises with each turn of the page!
This essential and beautifully written modern-day collection features an intersectional and inclusive slate of authors and stories.
Saundra Mitchell has been a phone psychic, a car salesperson, a denture deliverer and a layout waxer. She’s dodged trains, endured basic training and hitchhiked from Montana to California. She teaches herself languages, raises children and makes paper for fun. She is the author of Shadowed Summer and The Vespertine series, the upcoming novelization of The Prom musical, and the editor of Defy the Dark. She always picks truth; dare is too easy. Visit her online at http://www.saundramitchell.com.
Disclaimer: I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. Thank you to Harlequin Trade Publishing, Netgalley, and Inkyard Press for this free copy. All quotes in this review are taken from the Advanced Reader Copy and may change in final publication.
I think this was the perfect start to Pride Month and June, and I am actually really bummed that I never heard of this book until I was asked to do this blog tour. Unless I just never followed anyone that promoted this anthology, but really, I’m wishing that I heard about this book a lot more because it would have been really great to see more people talking about this in the book community.
Anthologies can be hit or miss all around, especially depending on either the authors included in the anthology and the voice of each story. For me, I felt like I enjoyed this experience and it gave me a lot to think about in the LGBT experience and the diverse LGBT experience. It was only very recently that I was able to feel safe enough to figure out how I identified in the LGBT world, and even though I feel like maybe I’m still trying to figure that out completely and more accurately, these stories helped me learn more about myself and show me that I’m not alone in this world.
Also, with anthologies, I don’t personally like picking a “favorite” or a “least favorite” because I feel like each author put their heart and soul into their stories and just like with non-fiction stories, I feel like it’s not my place to judge what they have to say. I guess I’m just weird like that, but I was able to find something that I liked in everything. I think that everyone should be able to give this book a chance and learn more about these stories.
Sometimes Leelynn Reads 