Familiar with Diane Marina’s work, I expected quite the good read as I delved into How Still My Love; however, I did not anticipate that I would be thrust into a world of characters who could so effortlessly elicit an emotional investment beyond what I am willing to contribute to my own experience. Navigating theRead More
Kalyanii reviews Women Float by Maureen Foley
The names may be different, the locales may boast an unfamiliar topography and the events may have a turn all their own; but, once in a very great while, a work emerges that is capable of providing the seldom-uttered assurance that this story is your story. It is akin to the caress of the author’sRead More
Kalyanii reviews Owl Eyes by Georgie Watts
Typically and perhaps ideally, when the exchange of ideas and the sharing of experience take place between a writer and her reader, the inherent value of both roles within the creative process is affirmed. The story would not exist without the writer, and it would have no reason to exist if not for the reader.Read More
Kalyanii reviews My Awesome Place by Cheryl Burke
It is not in spite of the grit, irreverence and sordid encounters that Cheryl B.’s life serves as an inspiration; rather, it is because of the rawness and honesty with which she relays each and every detail. Without apologies, Cheryl B. within her posthumously published memoir, My Awesome Place, recounts the most tragic and triumphantRead More
Kalyanii reviews Emily’s Art and Soul by Joy Argento
While a novel may entertain, inspire or even frustrate, there is something profound about a work that leaves us with enough insight into the human condition that we are able to forgive the author for elements of its execution that fall short of expectations. At the outset, I would not have imagined this would haveRead More
Kalyanii reviews Tell Me by Deanna DiLorenzo
There is something haunting about a novel that engages in a manner such that the reader feels the story to be her story, seducing to a degree wherein the experience conveyed comes to flow through her veins and beat with her heart until it leaves her all but trembling with emotion, eventually settling within theRead More
Kalyanii reviews Cha-Ching! by Ali Liebegott
Anyone who’s attempted to outrun her demons will attest that the endeavor is ultimately futile; however, it’s something that most of us have given a shot at some point in our lives. Would we have learned as much about ourselves had we done the “wise” thing and heeded the warnings of those around us? CouldRead More
Kalyanii reviews Something in the Wine by Jae
Coming out stories are nothing new to the lesbian romance genre; and, if you are anything like me, you may approach such fictional accounts with a healthy dose of skepticism and relatively low expectations. After all, we’ve all been burned a time or two in attempting to invest ourselves in stories that ended up beingRead More
Kalyanii reviews Imperial Hotel by Diane Marina
Rare is the romance that speaks to the journey of two lovers as they grow fully into themselves just as they merge into one another; yet, that is precisely what Diane Marina offers within Imperial Hotel, a novelette that takes the reader on the most intimate of journeys, lingering in eternal moments of innocence andRead More