From Here to There with Rachel Ford
In this episode, Tara talks to author Rachel Ford (Crimson Yuletide), whose love of lesbian fiction is all over the place in the best possible way, spanning many genres, tropes and styles. She comes to us from her latest trek with some exciting recommendations to get you excited about your reading journey.
Listen to this episode here
Rachel’s Recommendations:
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The Pink Bean Series by Harper Bliss
The Darkness Trilogy by KC Luck
Tara’s Recommendation:
Transcript for Today’s Show
Please note this transcript has not been edited and is automatically generated meaning certain words will be incorrect.
hi I’m Tara and welcome to let’s do books I’m joined today by Rachel Ford author of more than 15 sci-fi and science fantasy novels including the FF science fiction series black flat her latest FF book is a holiday paranormal historical which Suns super fun and it’s called crimson Yuletide and is available right now on Amazon welcome Rachel hello so you are here to share your journey with lesbian fiction where did that begin so for me um my journey with lesbian fiction kind of coincided with my um kind of coming out it was kind of a slow process um you know for me I had never really liked romance very much well then I started you know kind of questioning my identity and I don’t actually remember where but I found one of Harper Bliss’s romances one of the pink bean series and they discovered this beautiful thing yeah that really just kind of kick-started the whole process and you know I love fantasy and science fiction and in general um I like thrillers I like pretty much all genres so from there it was um let’s just say my to read list exploded which is a fantastic thing you know I always loved finding great new books and I found a ton of them so so that was me that was how I came to UM lesbian fiction I’ve been reading now for about a year and a half and every time I think I found you know my new favorite book a base where I find a new one and then I got an audio book kick and so I just yeah my library’s huge you know all kinds of goodies that’s a pretty big thing that happens pretty often in our community so were you already writing when you first started reading oh yes so I’ve been writing since I was like six I think somewhere my mom still has these like hand-drawn dinosaur books that I used to torture her with so um I I read a lot of um like science fiction with the kind of comedy some more serious ones as well but um I had been writing as part of my you know like questioning process I was working on the Black Flag series um writing to me is a little bit like um you know it helps me process things often work through things and so I was writing that and I started really you know just like diving into FF fiction mm-hmm and were there any authors that you came across that were pretty inspirational to you as you were writing the Black Flag series well I you know I was on a really big heart for bliss kick when I started um so I guess inspirational to me it completely different genre but inspirational to me and that like I had never really encountered like this candy you know mainstream lesbian fiction and it was just beautiful and down you know I loved it and I wanted to create something that you know wasn’t like in a niche book so much it’s just somebody could pick it up and say this is good and I enjoy this and that’s I mean like the Pink Bean series and I’m gonna keep going back to that I just I love it the first one I read was out of order everything between us and it just I mean she does such a phenomenal job with really tying in these like sensitive topics about you know body image and you know ego and comfort and you know really genuine emotions and it was just such a phenomenal book that it was inspirational to me despite being you know like I say a completely different genre that um you know I wanted to produce something that somebody could pick up and read and really connect with like I did that one mm-hmm that was one of Caitlin and Joe’s right um that was um yeah Caitlin and Josephine I think they might be my favorite couple in that series me too for coffee shops because I just finished I’m TV markinson’s confession perco a coffee shop and I like you know I really love these coffee shop books yeah we need more barista romances so you also are going to share some of your favorite books so what is the first one that you’d like to talk about but I kind of did is I was thinking about this list and um it’s really hard for me to pick a favorite because there are just so many excellent books up right so I kinda did is I picked some of the ones that really stood out to me in some of the genres and subgenres and I’ve I guess I would have to say like sharpshooter by Leslie Mari it was one of the first Tom action female female books I had read and it just like it was so gripping and terrifying at times you know I really liked um seven I really like Jenni they were both very different but you know they meshed so well um you know their their escape let’s just I really loved that one can you just share a tiny bit of what it’s about for people that don’t know yeah sorry um so Jenny is a doctor with the Peace Corps and she’s working in Bolivia and seven is part of a covert team that’s there to take out a drug kingpin who has helped a bunch of terrorist organizations well they’re double-crossed by someone on the American side and seven is almost killed and Jenny saves er and you know a whole bunch of stuff ensues but there’s some really tense moments where you know there’s one of the villains of the story it’s like super intense and really scary so Leslie Marie just did an amazing job with her um you know kind of nightmare water but but not like you know really graphic or anything like that it was just a brilliant book that sounds fabulous yeah I really loved that one and then um I read a lot of post-apocalyptic I mean dystopian novels and so one of them that really stands out to me is the the darkness series by Casey luck with that one there is on four main characters and they all kind of represent like very different lifestyles very different personalities you know in when quote-unquote the world ends they’re all you know stuck together and they have to UM figure out how to survive well of course there’s also a lot of romantic tension and stuff it’s just it’s a really sweet series but it’s also really just good sci-fi too so that was another one I really like have you read that one I haven’t oh can I think Michelle one of the reviewers of the lesbian review okay I think she read the first one and really liked it yeah I think I got that on the restaurant but that’s how I heard that mm-hmm thank you for being an awesome listen and supporting thoughts the channel that brings you all the podcasts you want to hear Erin listening to talk find more podcasts on the Lisbon talk show comm so what’s your next one so I already kind of touched on my coffee shop obsession so I talked about everything between us I really like beneath the surface too that was another one that really stood out to me Harper does a really amazing job of handling these like delicate themes in this case like trauma and addiction and you know she just handles it so brilliantly that was another one I thought was very poignant no no not like um kind of uh I want to say happier but just you know less serious more like um kind of a fake romance thing yes I recently heard that nerd love by Magnolia Simmons I’m a Trekkie and this one really essentially if you had like a lesbian William Shatner who plays you know like kind of Captain Kirk you know he falls in love with his well she in this case we Simmons you know falls in love with her best friend via this fake bromance and you know it’s a very fun fast-moving plot a lot of you know Meghan only did it a really good job of incorporating all these kind of like geeky themes in there and um as a Trekkie there was a lot of you know like good good good homage to the you know Star Trek and you know the orville and you know this kind of popular TV shows in the culture that goes with them and you know the raving fans who you know to know and so it was a really fun book I like that one a lot okay I am a massive fake relationship okay and I also I wouldn’t say like I’m a hardcore geek but I definitely am like I’m on the geeky side so I this book just is speaking to me and I think I’m gonna have to check it out yeah you’ll love it I think if those are you know tropes you like then she really gets them really well in this song mm-hmm and she does a really good job – because I’m Reese you know the kind of Captain Kirk type she starts oh I didn’t like harissa in the beginning I loved Lucy Lucy was just the nicest person but we you know she was a flawed character she was kind of self-centered and you know she grows as the story goes on and you really like her by the end of the book but she Magnolia did a really good job where she you know she starts in a little bit of a selfish place and you you know kind of pick up clean Lucy you can do better than a mess you know mm-hmm if you like characters like that have you read sunsets and shades by Erika Lee I have not sunshine sunsets in shades okay gonna write that down yeah it’s kind of a bit of an Emory’s to Lover’s and one of the characters is such an asshole but she’s like this lovable asshole and and I don’t want to call her an ice queen because she’s not that at all okay but it’s just that book charmed it totally charmed me so I think it might I think you might like that one well I think my to read list just got a little bigger I would apologize but my to read list has been growing listening to use the name genres so far and subgenres that I’ve read in so far and kind of the books that really stood out to me within them I mean I’ve read a lot of really good books so it was it was hard to you know never down it so many books that I’ve heard such amazing things about that I haven’t even had a chance to read yet so my list will get even longer as time goes on but yeah that’s that’s what I’ve been reading lately so is there anything else that you would want to share with people about your journey as a reader of less fake and you know what that’s what that’s meant for you whether it is just as a reader as an author what I would really like to see is on right now we’re kind of niche I would love to see you know you turn on star trek and just see that lesbian plots you know as normal you just pick up a book in the bookstore and it may very well be female female because for me you know I grew up in like a very like socially concerned very heteronormative and so like it took me a long time to even consider the possibility that hey I might be gay and I think you know the more people just recognize that in the world and see that in the world delicious you know because I think the more we see you know female female and me oh me Ellen you know everything represented I think it’s gonna help a lot of people on you know kind of find themselves and I think I’ll be beautiful yeah I do too so Rachel where can people find you online if they want to connect with you so I’m on Facebook I’m at Rachel afford author I’m on em I have an Amazon author profile you can just stop search Rachel Ford and like you know one of my books like Black Flag or something like that and you can go right to my author profile from there you can follow it and Amazon will send you updates all my books on Amazon so mom you know anytime I publish something girls getting up update I do have a blog that I need to do a better job maintaining uh-huh that one is Rachel Ford author blog spot.com animal awesome but I’m kind of political Rachel Ford on that one actually yeah I’d be happy to to interact if you have any questions you know I need anything like that that’s I love talking to readers and you know hearing what you liked what you didn’t like um let me know that is all for this episode thank you so much for joining me awesome thank you I’m Tara and you’ve been listening to Les Do books you can email me at Tara at the lesbian or Viacom with your questions or comments if you’re an author who’s interested in joining me on the show to talk about the let’s wake you love or the trends that have you interested
