For the majority of the twentieth century, Manhattan’s Lower East Side was an enclave of affordable housing (e.g. tenements) that housed lively immigrant cultures as well as many queer folk feeling the crunch of capitalism’s unceasing demands. Today, I’m discussing three books written by or recollecting the memories of queer Jewish women who lived andRead More
Mothers and Daughters, a Lighthouse, and a Curse: The Curse of the Cole Women by Marielle Thompson
This novel follows generations of Cole women who maintain a lighthouse on a small island off of New Hampshire. Their family line comes with a curse. There are always two Cole women on Juniper island, and every birth comes with a death: the older Cole woman will walk into the ocean, joining the ghosts ofRead More
A Novel for Mere Mortals: Woodworking by Emily St. James Review
Woodworking by Emily St. James is a novel for mere mortals. It takes place in the shadow of the 2016 presidential election, and of all the goings-on of those few months, of all the things said and seen; Woodworking is set in rural South Dakota, against a backdrop of bad community theatre and doomed local progressiveRead More
The Cost of Ambition: To the Moon and Back by Eliana Ramage Review
Since she was a child, Steph Harper has yearned to step foot on the moon. She arrived at the Cherokee Nation when she was five, after her mother fled from her abusive husband. Her mother, Hannah, and sister, Kayla, thrived there. They both take pride in their culture and history. Steph, though, never felt likeRead More
A Heartbreaking Love Letter to Hawai’i: Extinction Capital of the World: Stories by Mariah Rigg Review
This collection of short stories traces generations of characters living in Hawai’i, beginning with “Target Island”, which starts in 1948, when Harrison in his crib is covered in broken glass (but miraculously unharmed) when the window shatters from the shockwave of a bomb dropped by US government. When he’s seven years old, he proudly showsRead More
Femme Fatales, Homicidal Housewives and Errant Employees: The New Lesbian Pulp edited by Sarah Fonseca and Octavia Saenz Review
I love pulp fiction. I love reading it, reading about it and I especially love books collecting it. After all, I came to sapphic literature through Radclyffe Hall (by way of Sara Ahmed’s The Promise of Happiness), and Mabel Maney. In fact, I originally began visiting the Lesbrary after coming across Danika’s writing on lesbian pulp fiction andRead More
An Unforgettable Experimental Novel: Biography of X by Catherine Lacey Review
In what has quickly become one of my favourite novels of all time, Catherine Lacey’s Biography of X (Picador 2023) reveals a circuitous tale of a woman’s life and an alternate history of the United States that was consuming, compelling, and thrilling to read. When a woman known only as X—a performance artist, author, and infamous socialRead More
Grief, Obsession, and Isolation: One’s Company by Ashley Hutson Review
Content warning: this review includes discussion of suicide, violence, and rape. Ever since I heard the premise of One’s Company, it’s been on my TBR. So when I was choosing the first book to read in 2025, this seemed like the perfect kind of weird, thought-provoking literary fiction I was in the mood for—and itRead More
Love Me Anyway: The Three Lives of Cate Kay by Kate Fagan Review
Within these pages, you will read about what happened from my perspective, as well as from those whose stories collided with my own. And that is how we got here, to this book you now hold in your hands. My memoir, but more than that—it is a monument. Carved from a mass of bad decisionsRead More
Sophomore Sapphic Novel Doesn’t Disappoint: Interesting Facts About Space by Emily Austin
Buy this from Bookshop.org to support local bookstores and the Lesbrary! Interesting Facts About Space by Emily Austin (she/her) is one of my new favorite books. Within the first few pages, Austin personified a tampon box, lamented the indignity of celebrating baby genitals (read: gender reveals), and made the astute, albeit morbid, observation that one of theRead More
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