We have two different non-fiction options, some fun sci-fi, and even a romance novel. I rarely pick romances for this feature, so it always feels like a big deal to me when I do.
Do you have any recommendations you’d like to share? Leave ’em in the comments!
Black in Blues
M from the podcast discord recommended this one (and it’s on sale!). Their recommendation was quickly followed up by a couple comments of agreement.
A surprising and beautiful meditation on the color blue—and its fascinating role in Black history and culture—from National Book Award winner Imani Perry
Throughout history, the concept of Blackness has been remarkably intertwined with another blue. In daily life, it is evoked in countless ways. Blue skies and blue water offer hope for that which lies beyond the current conditions. But blue is also the color of deep melancholy and heartache, echoing Louis Armstrong’s question, “What did I do to be so Black and blue?” In this book, celebrated author Imani Perry uses the world’s favorite color as a springboard for a riveting emotional, cultural, and spiritual journey—an examination of race and Blackness that transcends politics or ideology.
Perry traces both blue and Blackness from their earliest roots to their many embodiments of contemporary culture, drawing deeply from her own life as well as art and The dyed indigo cloths of West Africa that were traded for human life in the 16th century. The mixture of awe and aversion in the old-fashioned characterization of dark-skinned people as “Blue Black.” The fundamentally American art form of blues music, sitting at the crossroads of pain and pleasure. The blue flowers Perry plants to honor a loved one gone too soon.
Poignant, spellbinding, and utterly original, Black in Blues is a brilliant new work that could only have come from the mind of one of our greatest writers and thinkers. Attuned to the harrowing and the sublime aspects of the human experience, it is every bit as vivid, rich, and striking as blue itself.
I’m really surprised this m/m sort of flew under the radar. This is an opposites attract romance with a hint of mystery. I think the comparison to The Charm Offensive is a fair one.
Brooklyn 99 meets The Charm Offensive in this sparkling romantic murder mystery: it’s murder cute in the first degree when a detective finds himself falling for the lead suspect in a career-making case.
At 29, Detective Rav Trivedi is the youngest member of the NYPD’s homicide squad, and his future looks bright. He may be a bit of an outsider in the department – an ivy-league educated gay Brit with a weakness for designer suits – but his meteoric rise and solve rate prove he belongs.
So when his CO assigns him lead on the high-profile murder of a record executive, Rav is ready for action. He won’t be distracted by TV crews, tabloids, or what’s trending on social media, nor by the ridiculously hot rock star with a clear motive and no alibi.
This is it, his shot, and he is not going to screw it up—certainly not by falling in love with his number one suspect…
I’m Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom
Do you like quirky, weird, and funny sci-fi? Pargin has a lot of series. If that feels a little too overwhelming to start something that may require a bigger commitment, I believe this one is a standalone.
A standalone darkly humorous thriller set in modern America’s age of anxiety, by New York Times bestselling author Jason Pargin.
Outside Los Angeles, a driver pulls up to find a young woman sitting on a large black box. She offers him $200,000 cash to transport her and that box across the country, to Washington, DC.
But there are rules:
He cannot look inside the box.
He cannot ask questions.
He cannot tell anyone.
They must leave immediately.
He must leave all trackable devices behind.
As these eccentric misfits hit the road, rumors spread on social media that the box is part of a carefully orchestrated terror attack intended to plunge the USA into civil war.
The truth promises to be even stranger, and may change how you see the world.
This one popped onto my radar after seeing it recommended by an IG food account where a British woman makes recipes from other cultures from scratch. It looks like only used copies are the only kinds available. Fingers crossed your library has some!
An eye-opening memoir revealing the stories behind living in and running a Chinese takeaway.
Growing up in a Chinese takeaway in rural Wales, Angela Hui was made aware at a very young age of just how different she and her family were seen by her local community. From attacks on the shopfront (in other words, their home), to verbal abuse from customers, and confrontations that ended with her dad wielding the meat cleaver; life growing up in a takeaway was far from peaceful.
But alongside the strife, there was also beauty and joy in the rhythm of life in the takeaway and in being surrounded by the food of her home culture. Family dinners before service, research trips to Hong Kong, preparing for the weekend rush with her brothers – the takeaway is a hive of activity before a customer even places their order of ‘egg-friend rice and chop suey’.
Bringing readers along on the journey from Angela’s earliest memories in the takeaway to her family closing the shop after 30 years in business, this is a brilliantly warm and immersive memoir from someone on the other side of the counter.
If you want to have a little extra fun, be a little more yourself, and be part of keeping the site open for everyone in the future, we can’t wait to see you in our new subscription-based section with exclusive content and events.
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Book Beat aims to highlight other books that we may hear about through friends, social media, or other sources. We could see a gorgeous ad! Or find a new-to-us author on a list of underrated romances! Think of Book Beat as Teen Beat or Tiger Beat, but for books. And no staples to open to get the fold-out poster.
The Grimoire Grammar School Parent Teacher Association
Author: Caitlin Roazkis Released: May 27, 2025 by Titan Books Genre:Paranormal, Urban Fantasy
From the NYT-bestselling author of Dreadful, Big Little Lies goes to magic school, cozy fantasy perfect for fans of T. Kingfisher, Olivia Atwater and Heather Fawcett. Featuring orange sprayed and stencilled edges, with magic symbols, unicorns and baked goods from the book.
Two parents and their recently-bitten-werewolf daughter try to fit into a privileged New England society of magic aristocracy. But deadly terrors await them – ancient prophecies, remorseless magical trials, hidden conspiracies and the PTA bake sale.
When Vivian’s kindergartner, Aria, gets bitten by a werewolf, she is rapidly inducted into the hidden community of magical schools. Reeling from their sudden move, Vivian finds herself having to pick the right sacrificial dagger for Aria, keep stocked up on chew toys, and play PTA politics with sirens and chthonic nymphs and people who literally can set her hair on fire.
As Vivian careens from hellhounds in the school corridors to demons at the talent show, she races to keep up with all the arcane secrets of her new society—shops only accessible by magic portal, the brutal Trials to enter high school, and the eternal inferno that is the parents’ WhatsApp group.
And looming over everything is a prophecy of doom that sounds suspiciously like it’s about Aria. Vivian might be facing the end of days, just as soon as she can get her daughter dressed and out of the door…
This author’s debut, Dreadful, was recommended in the comments when we featured it on sale. I’m very curious how her follow-up will do!
Author: Farrah Rochon Released: July 15, 2025 by Forever Genre:Contemporary Romance, Romance Series: Doggone Delightful #2
From the New York Times bestselling author of Almost There, a second chance romance between two dog lovers, perfect for readers of Abby Jimenez and Jasmine Guillory.
From the outside, veterinarian Evie Williams appears to have the perfect but boring life. She is desperate to figure out a way to shake it up, but gets more than she bargained for when she finds her fiancé in bed with another woman. Suddenly, Evie is without a fiancé or a job, and isn’t sure what her next steps should be. That is, until her college crush, Bryson Mitchell, returns to town.
Now, a nationally recognized veterinary surgeon, Bryson is stunned when he encounters Evie Williams for the first time in half a decade. When they learn the animal shelter where they used to volunteer is in danger of closing, the two must work together to save it. It has Bryson wondering, can he and Evie also save the friendship they once shared and finally bring it to the next level?
Crushes, forced proximity, and some very cute dogs.
Author: Emma Fontanella Released: October 24, 2023 by DK Genre:Cookbook
Rediscover the joy of cooking simple food using fresh, everyday ingredients.
With easy recipes and time-saving techniques for your favorite pastries, breads, cakes, pasta, pizza, cookies, and more, you’ll find something to satisfy your sweet tooth—or your carb cravings.
Cooking and baking don’t have to be time consuming or difficult. With the right techniques, even the most daunting dishes can be simple to master. Chef Emma Fontanella is known for her ability to translate complex methods into approachable recipes that yield amazing results. Utilizing the conveniences of a modern kitchen, she has developed an indispensable collection of classic desserts, comfort food favorites, and everyday meals, all without sacrificing texture or flavor.
Indulge in the simple pleasure of comfort classics such as The Fluffiest Cinnamon Rolls and Melt-In-Your-Mouth Glazed Donuts, or curl up with a cozy bowl of One-Pot Mac and Cheese or Three-Ingredient Fettuccine Alfredo.
A section on foundational techniques provides detailed instruction on making and decorating cakes, working with yeast-raised doughs, preparing pasta, and more. Armed with Emma’s thoughtful instructions and labor-saving shortcuts, you’ll be able to execute everything from Cheater’s Artisan Croissants to a stunning fresh Strawberry Cake with confidence.
Over 100 recipes for breakfasts, breads and baked goods, pasta dishes, celebration cakes, and holiday baking.
Time-saving techniques and pastry chef shortcuts for restaurant-quality results with a fraction of the effort.
Superfast microwave snacks that cook in a minute.
Nostalgic childhood favorites, such as Instant Frozen Yogurt and Homemade Peanut Butter Cups.
Simple and indulgent? You have my attention. I’m tempted to borrow this one from the library for a test drive.
Jane Austen meets Bridgerton in this sapphic romance between Charlotte Lucas and Mary Bennet that begins four years after the end of Pride and Prejudice.
When Mr. Collins dies after just four years of marriage, Charlotte is lost. While not exactly heartbroken, she will soon have to quit the parsonage that has become her home. In desperate need of support, she writes to her best friend, Lizzie. Unable to leave Pemberley, Lizzie sends her sister Mary Bennet in her stead.
To Charlotte’s surprise, Mary Bennet is nothing like she remembers. Mary’s discovery of academia and her interest in botany (as well as getting out from under her mother’s thumb) have caused her to flourish. Before long, Charlotte is enraptured, and with each stolen glance and whispered secret, their friendship quickly blossoms into something achingly real.
But when her time at the parsonage begins to dwindle and a potential suitor appears, Charlotte must make a choice—the safety and security of another husband, or a passionate life with Mary outside the confines of the ton’s expectations.
A f/f romance featuring Mary Bennet. I’m always on the fence about reimaginings with well-known literary characters, but I’m also not the target Austenite audience.
And, well, yes! It is! The full review (here, warning, mild spoilers) also says that it is “tightly plotted” and otherwise praises the writing for catching up reader on the events of the series while still keeping things moving in the book’s here and now. And, again: Yes! I will take all that. Also, and I say this with just about every novel, it’s nice when the first trade review is a positive one. It means I can relax a little.
More news on The Shattering Peace soon. We are two months out from the release! Things are beginning to pick up momentum.
The Counterfeit Scoundrel by Lorraine Heath is $1.99! This is book one in The Chessmen: Masters of Seduction historical romance series, which makes me laugh. I keep thinking of the chessmen butter cookies.
New York Times bestselling author Lorraine Heath begins a compelling new spin-off series, The Chessmen: Masters of Seduction, centering around three heroes–Knight, Bishop, and Rook–who play to win at any cost.
Born into an aristocratic family, yearning for a life beyond Society’s strictures, Marguerite “Daisy” Townsend is an enterprising sleuth. Hired to obtain proof of a wife’s infidelity, she secures a position in the household of the woman’s lover, never expecting to be lured into the seductive blackguard’s arms herself.
Devilishly handsome, David Blackwood, known widely as Bishop, quickly realizes the enticing maid is interested in far more than dusting. She aims to uncover his sins. Although tempted by the dangerous beauty, he can’t risk her learning the truth: his affairs are chaste. As a boy who witnessed his mother’s abusive relationship, Bishop now helps desperate wives escape unhappy marriages.
Yet when he is accused of murdering the husband of a “paramour,” he is forced to seek Daisy’s assistance in proving his innocence. As their perilous search draws them into a web of deceits, they can no longer deny their simmering desire. Once secrets are revealed, will Daisy’s counterfeit scoundrel give up the scandalous games he plays and surrender his heart into her keeping?
This book is important for women like me, showing that we can absolutely have our HEA with a man and still proudly claim our queerness. Plus, it’s such a joyful celebration of love that it’s like a warm hug. I thoroughly enjoyed it and will read it again.
In a delightful follow-up to Written in the Stars, Alexandria Bellefleur delivers another #ownvoices queer rom-com about a hopeless romantic who vows to show his childhood crush that romance isn’t dead by recreating iconic dates from his favorite films…
Brendon Lowell loves love. It’s why he created a dating app to help people find their one true pairing and why he’s convinced “the one” is out there, even if he hasn’t met her yet. Or… has he? When his sister’s best friend turns up in Seattle unexpectedly, Brendon jumps at the chance to hang out with her. He’s crushed on Annie since they were kids, and the stars have finally aligned, putting them in the same city at the same time.
Annie booked a spur-of-the-moment trip to Seattle to spend time with friends before moving across the globe. She’s not looking for love, especially with her best friend’s brother. Annie remembers Brendon as a sweet, dorky kid. Except, the 6-foot-4 man who shows up at her door is a certified Hot Nerd and Annie… wants him? Oh yes.
Getting involved would be a terrible idea—her stay is temporary and he wants forever—but when Brendon learns Annie has given up on dating, he’s determined to prove that romance is real. Taking cues from his favorite rom-coms, Brendon plans to woo her with elaborate dates straight out of Nora Ephron’s playbook. The clock is ticking on Annie’s time in Seattle, and Brendon’s starting to realize romance isn’t just flowers and chocolate. But maybe real love doesn’t need to be as perfect as the movies… as long as you think your partner hung the moon.
Salt & Broom by Sharon Lynn Fisher is $2.49 at Amazon! The Jane Eyre inspo is obvious here. Carrie said this one would get an A for concept, but the execution was more of B-/C+ territory.
A gifted healer unravels the mysteries of a cursed estate—and its enigmatic owner—in a witchy retelling of Jane Eyre.
Salt and broom, make this room
Safe and tight, against the night.
Trunks packed with potions and cures, Jane Aire sets out on a crisp, clear morning in October to face the greatest challenge of her sheltered girls’-school existence. A shadow lies over Thornfield Hall and its reclusive master, Edward Rochester. And he’s hired her only as a last resort.
Jane stumbles again and again as she tries to establish a rapport with her prickly new employer, but he becomes the least of her worries as a mysterious force seems to work against her. The threats mount around both Jane and Rochester—who’s becoming more intriguing and appealing to her by the day. Jane begins to fear her herb healing and protective charms may not be enough to save the man she’s growing to love from a threat darker and more dangerous than either of them imagined.
Voyage of the Damned by Frances White is $2.99! This is a fantasy mystery set on a ship and has been mentioned before on the site. Have you read it?
A mind-blowing murder mystery on a ship full of magical passengers. If Agatha Christie wrote fantasy, this would be it!
For a thousand years, Concordia has maintained peace between its provinces. To mark this incredible feat, the emperor’s ship embarks upon a twelve-day voyage to the sacred Goddess’s Mountain. Aboard are the twelve heirs of the provinces of Concordia, each graced with a unique and secret magical ability known as a Blessing.
All except one: Ganymedes Piscero—class clown, slacker and all-around disappointment.
When a beloved heir is murdered, everyone is a suspect. Stuck at sea and surrounded by powerful people and without a Blessing to protect him, Ganymedes’s odds of survival are slim.
But as the bodies pile higher, Ganymedes must become the hero he was not born to be. Can he unmask the killer and their secret Blessing before this bloody crusade reaches the shores of Concordia?
Human characters have never been essential to tell a good story. Author Caspar Geon breaks the mold of featuring boring ol’ humans in his newest novel The Immeasurable Heaven. Come along as he takes you through worlds, nay, universes, of his imagination.
CASPAR GEON:
I’ve read that if you go outside and cover a portion of the sky with your outstretched thumb, you’ll be obscuring approximately fifteen million galaxies. There was a clear sky the other night so I went out and did just that, and it’s mind-boggling. That’s fifteen million distant islands, each home to hundreds of billions of stars. And all of that just a drop in a colossal ocean.
This was the starting point for The Immeasurable Heaven: the conviction that there’s so much going on out there independent of everything we know or understand, so much that we’ll never have a hope of glimpsing, and my preoccupation with leaving all earthly issues behind to experience a tiny portion of it in some way. Pure escapism. Escapism with a capital, er, E. Fairly standard behaviour for someone who was put back a year in Primary school for ignoring his work and staring out of the window all the time.
When I finished the final book in my space opera trilogy the Amaranthine Spectrum in 2018 (which had neither earned out, nor, as far as I can tell, earned much at all) the onus was on writing something less ambitious and more commercial. Simple, right? In the Amaranthine books I’d already compiled three biggish novels about the far future of humanity and the strange plethora of mammalian forms that it would eventually become; now I had to get serious.
Elderly relatives who’d made the mistake of trying my books would counsel me earnestly to write something with more human characters and relatable storylines, and I would nod my head, go home and do precisely the opposite, feeling that wicked thrill as I struck out on an adventure with zero human characters at all, set three billion years ago in a distant ring of connected galaxies. I was still writing it five years later.
I wanted to find out what a settled galaxy would look and feel like after hundreds of millions of years of unbroken civilisation, what its inhabitants would have become, and how they would lead their lives. In that process I came up with the Throlken, omniscient machine intelligences that have set up home in the hearts of every star and ruled for a third of an aeon, forbidding violence of any kind. I met Whirazomar, a linguist forced to journey in the cramped, filthy confines of a sentient passenger spore with a hundred rowdy passengers, and Draebol, a hapless explorer of the lower dimensions. And I found the voice at the centre of it all, a prisoner sent far away for a very long time, its mind now utterly rotten.
What I’d somehow assumed would be an equivalent amount of worldbuilding to the last three novels had ballooned into a stack of notebooks heavy enough to knock me unconscious if they toppled over. Spending time in the galaxy of Yokkun’s Depth and its seven linked neighbours had become an obsession as I wrote about reality-hopping sorcerers, walking parasite cities, coral and pollen spaceships, interdimensional multiplayer games and ice moon ocean battles. The book also delved deeper into the concept of mortality than anything I’d ever written, since death is presumably a constant that most sentient beings will at some point in their existence have to contemplate, and to this eternal question there might – somewhere – lie answers.
This went hand in hand with the nature of reality itself, which, when experienced elsewhen and elsewhere, is at its core a malleable notion quantified in countless different ways, especially once you throw a variety of sensory organs and methods of perception into the mix. Who can say which is the correct reality, the one true way of seeing? And what then is death, if reality itself cannot be firmly defined? ‘The Immeasurable Heaven’ (actually the English translation of the lovely Hawaiian name for our own galaxy cluster, Laniakea) was a title I couldn’t resist.
Anyway, despite the constant risk of disappearing into my own belly button and popping out of existence entirely, my number one priority was to have as much fun as I could writing, especially since it seemed to me that this wasn’t going to be a book any traditional publisher would want to take a risk on. The fact that one eventually did still surprises me, even a week from publication.
And so, to reference the book’s afterword, I hope you’ll join me on my leisurely trip across this immeasurable heaven, for there are many more tales to tell.
When I record with Nalini Singh, since she’s in New Zealand and I’m on the east coast of the US, it’s weird hours for both of us – so thank you to Nalini for speaking to me bright and early in the morning. We talk about Atonement Sky, about writing and worldbuilding, and saying goodbye to characters. I also mix up my animal pluralities but I fix it, don’t worry.
NOT thanks to Wilbur, my cat, who was vocally put out with my choices, and ends up with Nalini representing him in feline court.
Inspired by other Patreon folks, including Chris DeRosa at Fixing Famous People, I’ve made some of the Patreon content free so you can sample what we’ve got.
This collection of special previews is available now to all listeners, and there’s a link in the show notes to dive in. And if you like our free samples, join us in the Patreon community where there’s bonus content and more.
What did you think of today's episode? Got ideas? Suggestions? You can talk to us on the blog entries for the podcast or talk to us on Facebook if that's where you hang out online. You can email us at sbjpodcast@gmail.com or you can call and leave us a message at our Google voice number: 201-371-3272. Please don't forget to give us a name and where you're calling from so we can work your message into an upcoming podcast.
The comic book company IDW, in conjunction with Paramount, which owns Star Trek, has come out with a limited edition comic book series called Red Shirts, which is about the security teams in the United Federation of Planets, the first issue of which came out yesterday. Clearly from the cover and the panels you can see here, the comic series will not be shying away from the essential nature of the red shirt in the Star Trek universe, which is, to die for dramatic story purposes.
As most of you know, I wrote a book 13 years ago called Redshirts, which essayed this same concept, albeit not in the Star Trek universe specifically, and it did pretty well, becoming a New York Times best seller and winning the Hugo Award for Best Novel, among others. So how do I feel about IDW/Paramount now coming in and releasing some comic books with almost exactly the same name?
I feel fine about it. One, I don’t own the trademark on “red shirt” or any variation thereof (nor did Paramount when I wrote my novel, I checked), and I wrote a novel, not a comic book series, and anyway I borrowed the concept from Star Trek’s fandom, from whence the phrase came. I can’t exactly get worked up if Paramount and IDW reappropriate a concept I appropriated in the first place. Second, the phrase and concept have been used by others in other media before – there was a card game with just about the same title a while back, as just one example. We’re all working in a same pool. Overlaps will happen.
The only real issue — one I’ve already seen online — is that some folks appear to think I have some participation in this IDW limited series. I don’t. I’m not the writer (a fellow named Christopher Cantwell is), nor did anyone involved in this comic get in touch with me. Not that they should have; from what I can tell about the story it has only the vaguest common elements with my own novel. It’s its own thing, and should be appreciated as such. I mean, I hope it’s good. I wouldn’t want something even mildly adjacent to my own work to be junk. The early reviews I’ve seen of the first installment seem to be pretty positive. So there’s that.
Anyway: Nope, not based on my thing, nope, they didn’t check in with me, nope, I’m not upset at that, and nope, I shouldn’t be upset even if I were. Give it a shot and see if you like it.
At a time when I didn’t have a lot of energy, I was gifted with pounds of joy, laughter, intrigue, and suspense. The Queer Principles of Kit Webb was a fresh approach to historical romance that made me fall in love with the genre again.
Critically acclaimed author Cat Sebastian makes her trade paperback debut in a stunning historical romance about a reluctantly reformed highwayman and the aristocrat who threatens to steal his heart.
Kit Webb has left his stand-and-deliver days behind him. But dreary days at his coffee shop have begun to make him pine for the heady rush of thievery. When a handsome yet arrogant aristocrat storms into his shop, Kit quickly realizes he may be unable to deny whatever this highborn man desires.
In order to save himself and a beloved friend, Percy, Lord Holland must go against every gentlemanly behavior he holds dear to gain what he needs most: a book that once belonged to his mother, a book his father never lets out of his sight and could be Percy’s savior. More comfortable in silk-filled ballrooms than coffee shops frequented by criminals, his attempts to hire the roughly hewn highwayman, formerly known as Gladhand Jack, proves equal parts frustrating and electrifying.
Kit refuses to participate in the robbery but agrees to teach Percy how to do the deed. Percy knows he has little choice but to submit and as the lessons in thievery begin, he discovers thievery isn’t the only crime he’s desperate to commit with Kit.
But when their careful plan goes dangerously wrong and shocking revelations threaten to tear them apart, can these stolen hearts withstand the impediments in their path?
Love at First Set by Jennifer Dugan is $1.99! This is a contemporary romance with bisexual leads. However, a lot of reviews mention toxic mom relationships, if that is your nope button.
The gym is Lizzie’s life—it’s her passion, her job, and the only place that’s ever felt like home. Unfortunately, her bosses consider her a glorified check-in girl at best, and the gym punching bag at worst.
When their son, Lizzie’s best friend James, begs her to be his plus one at his perfect sister Cara’s wedding, things go wrong immediately, culminating in Lizzie giving a drunken pep talk to a hot stranger in the women’s bathroom—except that stranger is actually the bride-to-be, and Lizzie has accidentally convinced her to ditch her groom.
Now, newly directionless Cara is on a quest to find herself, and Lizzie—desperate to make sure her bosses never find out her role in this disaster—gets strong-armed by James into “entertaining” her. Cara doesn’t have to know it’s a setup; it’ll just be a quick fling before she sobers up and goes back to her real life. After all, how could someone like Cara fall for someone like Lizzie, with no career and no future?
But the more Lizzie gets to know Cara, the more she likes her, and the more is on the line if any of her rapidly multiplying secrets get out. Because now it’s not just Lizzie’s job and entire future on the line, but also the girl of her dreams.
One in a Million by Beverley Kendall is $2.99! This is a celebrity romance that published in March. Elyse was pretty excited about this one and mentioned it on Hide Your Wallet.
She’s got everything planned—including when she’ll have kids. Until something completely unplanned turns her world upside down.
World-famous Whitney “Sahara” Richardson is at the top of her game. With four Grammys, an Oscar nod, and a billion-dollar clothing line, her career is skyrocketing. Even her headline-grabbing dating life is looking up. And if everything goes as planned, marriage and children are just a few years away—and they will come in that order.
That is…until a mix-up at the fertility clinic where her eggs are stored puts the cart before the horse. Oops. Whitney suddenly has a daughter…whose biological father is reluctant to share her.
One in a Million is a fun celebrity rom-com with the poignancy of Abby Jimenez and a modern twist on “surprise baby” for fans of Jasmine Guillory.
“A smart, sexy rom-com that had me chuckling from the first page. I loved it.” —BRENDA JACKSON, New York Times bestselling author, on Token
The Launch Date by Annabelle Slator is $1.99! This is a workplace, rivals to lovers romance. I believe this is also Slator’s debut. Did any of you read thi sone?
What if the secret to finding true love on a dating app was meeting them IRL first?
In this witty and fun rom-com debut from Annabelle Slator, rival coworkers become reluctant daters after they’re forced to work together on a brand-new dating app in hopes of winning a promotion—perfect for fans of Sally Thorne’s The Hating Game.
Grace Hastings’s dream job at the popular “true love” dating app, Fate, has turned into a nightmare. Her boss is a leech, her career is stagnating, and her fiancé has just brutally dumped her. Her hope for finding her own love story is waning, and she feels like a fraud for promoting a concept she no longer believes in. When the company’s CEO offers her an opportunity to earn a big promotion, she resolves to fight her imposter syndrome to show she deserves a seat at the table.
The opportunity? To launch a brand-new app focusing on IRL dating and genuine connection.
The problem? She must develop and test-drive a series of “first dates” with the other person gunning for the job: notorious socialite playboy and Grace’s biggest work rival, Eric Bancroft.
During their disastrous hikes, dangerous cooking classes, and steamy yoga sessions, they begin to realize their stark differences may just be surface level and Eric might just be the perfect person to challenge Grace’s perceptions of love, dating culture, and self-worth.
Sometimes, we all need a friend. And sometimes, that friend is a robot that accompanies you to social events so you don’t have to go alone. Follow along in author Allee Mead’s Big Idea as they tell you about how real life feelings of disconnection led to their newest novella, Isaac.
ALLEE MEAD:
I began writing Isaac at a time in my life when I felt disconnected. I had friends at work but didn’t see them much outside of it. I didn’t chat with my grad school classmates. My most cherished loved ones lived a 5-hour drive away. One day, my town was putting on a free concert of a 90s band whose music I enjoyed. I texted only one person to see if she wanted to go, but she didn’t see the message until the next day.
I began imagining a woman who owned a humanoid robot (“android” is the correct term, but “robot” was the word bouncing around my head) purely for social events. She kept him in the closet and only powered him on when she wanted to go to a movie or restaurant. In this vision, the robot finally gained enough sentience to ask if she’d leave him on for the night; eventually he left the house to see the world.
I wondered what kind of character this nameless woman was: where she’d gotten the robot, whether she had enough initiative to purchase him or if she somehow stumbled upon him. The story snowballed until the woman had a name and an estranged family and the robot had a clearer purpose.
Now, despite writing a futuristic story about androids, I’m not a fan of new technologies. I got my first smartphone in 2015 at the age of 24, but I still power on my laptop anytime I want to make an online purchase. I don’t have social media and I once asked a friend if I could drive to her house and drop off cash instead of setting up Venmo. I’m at best ambivalent about technology’s ability to help people connect. I’m also someone who tends to sit on the fence instead of developing a clear opinion about something.
So as I wrote Isaac, I asked myself, “What ways will Isaac help Eleanor reconnect with the world, and what ways will he limit her?” I wrote scenes where Isaac’s presence encouraged Eleanor to go out more than she normally would: to see movies, plays, and concerts; to try new restaurants; and even to go to a bar on a crowded weekend night. I also wrote a scene in which Eleanor is all dressed up and ready to go out, only to find Isaac in the middle of a software update. She misses the play she wanted to attend, stewing in anger until Isaac enters the room. In another scene, her workplace is planning its annual picnic; Eleanor’s excited to go until she can’t think of a story to tell her coworkers about why Isaac isn’t eating.
Ultimately, I cut these last two scenes. What I potentially lost in deleting these scenes of technological limitations I gained in the juxtaposing moments of Eleanor’s fathers John and Javi. While we don’t see John wrestling with new technology, we watch him connect with Javi. Javi, who easily makes friends wherever he goes, encourages John to reach out to his therapist and join a parent support group. John learns that he doesn’t have to do everything on his own, and Javi learns to put down roots. In these moments, it’s less about the limits of technology and more about the benefits of genuine human connection in its many forms: platonic, romantic, and community.
This is an average length book at 368 pages. But it flew past in the blink of an eye. If I were to make a reading recommendation, I would say block off half a day and forbid anyone from interrupting you, then dive into this book and just revel in it.
This is a fake relationship book that has that most rare of things: the reason for the fake relationship actually makes sense. I did not have to suspend my disbelief as to why two people might benefit from a fake relationship. I could just go with what the story was telling me. Lovely!
Abi is a house cleaner and when she is mistaken for the apartment owner’s (fake) girlfriend “Abby,” the boyfriend in question, Declan, sees an opportunity to appear as ‘settled down’ at the annual shareholder’s weekend.
But let me put the blurb here, it shares almost all of the setup:
As a professional cleaner, Abi Mariano never thought her apartment would have any sort of infestation, but because of a building-wide outbreak, she now needs somewhere to stay for a week. As a part-time student with two jobs, she doesn’t have many options. Then the solution presents itself: the owner of the penthouse she cleans is out of town for the week. She normally wouldn’t consider it, but he’s literally never around (she hasn’t even met him). It goes great…until one morning she finds two strangers in the kitchen. They’re the parents of the penthouse owner and they seem to think they’ve heard all about Abi—not as their son’s maid, but as his girlfriend.
Declan Powell has always put his career first, working his way up to become an executive at his company, but he still has his sights set on the next level. When his parents mention that they met his girlfriend, “Abby,” he all but chokes on his escargot. As wonderful as it sounds that she was just darling, he doesn’t actually have a girlfriend—he made her up to get everyone off his back. When Dex finds out who Abi really is, he makes her a proposition: pretend to date him, and he’ll provide everything she needs during their little arrangement. What harm would it do? It’s purely business, no pleasure…right?
This premise gave me major nostalgic vibes for the books I used to read when I first got into romance. Rich dude helps poor lady out and they fall in love. It really scratched an old itch I had. I was curious about how a premise like this would work in 2025 and I was delighted to find out that it worked wonderfully.
Abi is that most treasured thing: a character that feels like a real person. She’s rounded out and detailed and there is a coherent internal logic to her construction. Declan is initially more of a mystery but as he thaws around Abi, we see more of the nuance and depth to his character. As these two get to know each other, the gradual growth of feelings is wonderful. The primary emotion I felt is the rush of falling in love. I was properly giddy and my chest felt warm and I had that gushing feeling in my chest. It was great!
While the emotion is satisfying, it doesn’t have a patch on the BANTER. This is A-grade, magic banter of the highest order. I spent at least 70% of the time smiling at my Kindle. That kind of goofy smile that tells my partner I’m reading a great book and cannot be disturbed. They have inside jokes that run the duration of the book which I love because it made me feel like I was an insider too.
I found Abi and Declan’s emotional maturity to be really satisfying to read. For the most part, they were brave and honest and always followed best practice for enthusiastic consent. These characters had done the work in therapy and it showed.
There was one thing that I found puzzling. It involves the resolution so I’m hiding it behind a spoiler.
Show Spoiler
Their relationship is never revealed as fake to those around them. It goes from fake to real, but the people around them think it was real the whole time. Sarah pointed out to me that this isn’t necessarily a problem. Just because fake dating books usually have some kind of reveal during the ‘dark moment’, this does not need to be the case. My only reservation around the book does hinge on this lack of reveal though. Declan lied to his family and colleagues for a while before Abi entered the picture IRL. Abi fitted into the mould of ‘Abby’ with minimal lying, but there was still very much lying present. So my reservation hinges around the longevity of their HEA. For example, Abi’s parents aren’t dead but Abby’s are. Things like that. I can’t fully relax into the HEA knowing that there are these traps that lie ahead.
I really really enjoyed this book. I wanted it to be so much longer so that I could immerse myself in more of their banter. I happily recommend this book to the Bitchery.
I’ve redownloaded Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey because mentally, I just want to be a buff lady, sneaking up on dudes, and giving them a violent dirt nap. Last time I played in on a console, but I’m trying PC out because I’d rather be cozy in my gaming chair with a beachy candle burning than downstairs on my couch where we don’t have a mini split installed. I’m finding the controls both on keyboard/mouse and a controller a little clunky. Oh well! Sacrifices must be made.
Are you revisiting any cathartic pieces of media lately?
Love k-dramas and want to listen to other people love them too? Did you just watch KPop Demon Hunters and want to dip your toe into the kdrama waters? Might I suggest the Chasing K-Dramas podcast!
They do deep dives episode by episode on various kdramas, so it feels like you’re watching along with friends.
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Don’t forget to share what cool or interesting things you’ve seen, read, or listened to this week! And if you have anything you think we’d like to post on a future Wednesday Links, send it my way!
The League of Gentlewomen Witches by India Holton is $1.99! This is book two in the Dangerous Damsels series, which I found to give me the same vibes as Shelly Laurenston. It’s just over the top, goofy fun!
Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the teahouse…
Miss Charlotte Pettifer belongs to a secret league of women skilled in the subtle arts. That is to say—although it must never be said—witchcraft. The League of Gentlewomen Witches strives to improve the world in small ways. Using magic, they tidy, correct, and manipulate according to their notions of what is proper, entirely unlike those reprobates in the Wisteria Society.
When the long lost amulet of Black Beryl is discovered, it is up to Charlotte, as the future leader of the League, to make sure the powerful talisman does not fall into the wrong hands. Therefore, it is most unfortunate when she crosses paths with Alex O’Riley, a pirate who is no Mr. Darcy. With all the world scrambling after the amulet, Alex and Charlotte join forces to steal it together. If only they could keep their pickpocketing hands to themselves! If Alex’s not careful, he might just steal something else—such as Charlotte’s heart.
The Love Lyric by Kristina Forest is $1.99! This is book three in the Greene Sisters contemporary romance series. It came out in February and was featured on Hide Your Wallet!
An R&B singer and a corporate executive find love that hits the right notes in this romance by Kristina Forest, USA Today bestselling author of The Partner Plot.
Iris Greene used to be a woman with a plan. But all of that changed after she met the love of her life at twenty-four, got pregnant and married…and then became a widow and a single mother all within the span of a year and a half. Now, after years of hustling, Iris is the director of partnerships at a beauty company and raising spunky six-year-old Calla by herself. Despite her busy life, she still can’t help but feel lonely. She just needs to catch her breath—and one night, at her sister’s wedding, when she steps outside to do just that, she sees a certain singer who takes her breath away. . . .
By all accounts, pop R&B singer Angel Harrison has it made. He’s a successful musician and has just scored a brand ambassador deal with an emerging beauty company. But he’s still not fulfilled; he’s not producing songs he’s passionate about, and there’s a gaping hole in his love life. When he visits the Save Face Beauty office to kickstart his campaign, he’s delighted to see Iris, his stylist’s sister—the beautiful woman he’s secretly had a crush on for years.
Despite their obvious attraction to each other, they must stay professional throughout the campaign tour—which doesn’t quite pan out. But when it becomes clear their lives aren’t in sync, can they fall back in step to the same rhythm and beat?
RECOMMENDED: The Highwayman by Kerrigan Byrne is $1.99! Redheadedgirl grabbed this at RT 2015 when it was held in Dallas. She reviewed it and gave it an A-:
What I liked best about this book was the liberal use of crazysauce. It’s a melodramatic tale of a broken man healed by the love of a good woman, and the good woman that’s strong enough to love this man and bring him back into the world.
They’re rebels, scoundrels, and blackguards-dark, dashing men on the wrong side of the law. But for the women who love them, a hint of danger only makes the heart beat faster, in the stunning debut historical romance The Highwayman by Kerrigan Byrne.
STEALING BEAUTY
Dorian Blackwell, the Blackheart of Ben More, is a ruthless villain. Scarred and hard-hearted, Dorian is one of Victorian London’s wealthiest, most influential men who will stop at nothing to wreak vengeance on those who’ve wronged him…and will fight to the death to seize what he wants. The lovely, still innocent widow Farah Leigh Mackenzie is no exception-and soon Dorian whisks the beautiful lass away to his sanctuary in the wild Highlands…
COURTING DESIRE
But Farah is no one’s puppet. She possesses a powerful secret-one that threatens her very life. When being held captive by Dorian proves to be the only way to keep Farah safe from those who would see her dead, Dorian makes Farah a scandalous proposition: marry him for protection in exchange for using her secret to help him exact revenge on his enemies. But what the Blackheart of Ben More never could have imagined is that Farah has terms of her own, igniting a tempestuous desire that consumes them both. Could it be that the woman he captured is the only one who can touch the black heart he’d long thought dead?
World of Wonders by Aimee Nezhukumatathil is $2.99! This is a Kindle Daily Deal. I mentioned this one on a previous Get Rec’d! It’s great if you love learning cool things about nature.
From beloved, award-winning poet Aimee Nezhukumatathil comes a debut work of nonfiction–a collection of essays about the natural world, and the way its inhabitants can teach, support, and inspire us.
As a child, Nezhukumatathil called many places home: the grounds of a Kansas mental institution, where her Filipina mother was a doctor; the open skies and tall mountains of Arizona, where she hiked with her Indian father; and the chillier climes of western New York and Ohio. But no matter where she was transplanted–no matter how awkward the fit or forbidding the landscape–she was able to turn to our world’s fierce and funny creatures for guidance.
“What the peacock can do,” she tells us, “is remind you of a home you will run away from and run back to all your life.” The axolotl teaches us to smile, even in the face of unkindness; the touch-me-not plant shows us how to shake off unwanted advances; the narwhal demonstrates how to survive in hostile environments. Even in the strange and the unlovely, Nezhukumatathil finds beauty and kinship. For it is this way with wonder: it requires that we are curious enough to look past the distractions in order to fully appreciate the world’s gifts.
Warm, lyrical, and gorgeously illustrated by Fumi Nakamura, World of Wonders is a book of sustenance and joy.
Both Athena and I went to go see the new Superman film, and we both came away with differing opinions on it. We thought it would be fun for each of us to put our reviews of the film in the same post so you can see how we got to where we are on this take on the character and the story. Warning: Spoilers are ahead.
If you like this “Two Takes” concept, let us know. We might do more. — JS
ATHENA SCALZI:
I love Superman. He is my favorite superhero, and I am always defending him against those who claim he is “boring.” Needless to say, I was extremely excited for Superman (2025), and had to go and see it on the big screen. I’m sad to report I didn’t really like it all that much. Though I’ve been seeing tons of high praise across the Internet, it was pretty mid in my book, so let’s talk about it. And, of course, here is your spoiler warning.
The first thing of note that this Superman movie does differently than most is that it begins at a time that Superman is already an established hero. This is not an origin story, this is a story in a world that already knows Superman and that he has been active in as a hero for years. While most people find this to be a refreshing take, and that they don’t need to see his origin story for the hundredth time, I can’t say I like the decision. I don’t hate it, but I really love origin stories. I like seeing Superman discover his powers, or having to learn to control them, or save people in his youth and having to keep it a secret. It’s a personal thing more than anything.
Right off the bat, I absolutely hate Lex Luthor’s ensemble of evil employees that are like, video-game-playing-“Gen-Z”-written-by-Gen-X-lackeys that are all like “yes!” and fist pump the air when they land a punch on Superman using their weird consoles. It’s cringe. They’re all cringe. Lex Luthor shouting out letters and numbers is cringe. Especially the line delivery for the exposition of “wow you really seem to know what Superman is going to do next,” and “Lex Luthor has spent the past three years studying all his fights and learning his moves so now he can predict what he will do next.” Great, thanks for that explanation, guys.
So, Clark goes to work at the Daily Planet, and this movie decides to include not only Jimmy Olsen, but Cat Grant, Steve Lombard, and Ron Troupe, as well. This feels like entirely too many players on the board for the reporter gang, as Cat, Steve, and Ron, get absolutely no meaningful screentime or characterization, and the only way you’d even really know who they are is if you’ve seen other Superman media such as My Adventures With Superman, where they are actual characters and serve a purpose. They felt so thrown in at the last minute and like an afterthought in this.
Of course, the real main reporter here is Lois Lane. Now here’s something that I like about the movie. I really love how Superman handled Lois and Clark’s relationship, especially the scene where she interviews him, and it starts out as sort of fun and playful, but quickly turns into a real and meaningful conflict that has a lasting impact on both of them and their relationship. The most important thing about this scene, though, is our insight into Superman’s morals and beliefs.
While Lois grills him about breaking laws, committing potentially devastating acts against a US allied nation, and threatening to cause someone bodily harm or worse, he can’t stop retorting with “people were going to die.” More and more passionately. People were going to die, and he had to stop it. No matter the laws, no matter how the US or the media would see it, he knew he had to stop this loss of life. He knew what was about to happen was wrong, and that was enough for him to act, whether or not it was legally correct.
Lois says the world is viewing him as a representative for the United States in this situation, and he claims he’s not representing anyone but himself, and doing good. Exactly. Because that’s what Superman does. He represents good, he does good. How he goes about doing it is largely questioned by the public, the government, even his girlfriend, but he knows in his heart he is doing good, and that’s what is most important to him. Above everything else, above even the law, he will do good.
I love that this interview scene caused a real fight between Lois and Clark. He doesn’t understand why she’s “being like this.” Why is she acting so against him when he saved people? How could what he did ever be construed as a bad thing? How could people possibly be mad at him for stopping a war? A country was about to be invaded, and he told the tanks to turn around. In what universe is he not a hero here? And how could anyone, especially this person he cares about so much and is supposed to like him, too, question him about his intentions, when his sole intention is to be good and help people. It’s truly a hard watch.
I really hate in Superman media when Superman is wanted by the law, turns himself in, and immediately gets handed over to the bad guys and gets locked up and tortured. It’s so predictable and so unfortunate. I truly didn’t understand how Luthor was even keeping Metamorpho under his control. Yes, Luthor had his son held hostage, but as we later see, when Superman breaks the glass and flies over to rescue his son, Metamorpho flies over right after he does using like a jet propulsion out of his lower body. Okay, so maybe he just wasn’t strong enough to break the glass himself? But later in the movie didn’t he form a giant hammer and smash some tanks? Kind of sounds like he could’ve smashed the glass and flown over to his kid and saved him at like, any point. I guess the only explanation is when he says he can’t hold his son while he changes forms, so I guess that’s the sole reason he needed Superman’s help in rescuing his son. Pretty weak sauce, though.
Anyways, Metamorpho and his son aren’t really the part I want to talk about in the pocket universe. The part I really want to look at is the death of Malik. Malik was a normal person who liked Superman, who even helped Superman one time. And Luthor made sure he paid the price. This scene is so incredibly tragic, and so good. Superman saves people, not gets them killed. And he certainly doesn’t just watch as they get killed. Except in this case, he has to. And it hurts him, deeply. David Corenswet portrayed Superman’s agony and pain perfectly in that scene. You just know he wishes it had been him instead.
Does anyone else just really dislike the Justice Gang? What a bunch of a-holes. I hate this Green Lantern, I hate how they portrayed Hawkgirl, and Mr. Terrific is fine. Again this is another example of too many characters on the board with not enough time to devote to getting to know them or really care about them. Plus, as is shown by Superman’s numerous attempts to mitigate damage, both to civilians, property, and the Kaiju itself, these jerks don’t give a hoot or a holler about collateral damage. Yes, collateral damage happens, but the Justice Gang is so reckless and headstrong that they just shoot first, worry about bodily harm to civilians later. I don’t find them funny, I just think they’re jerks.
And yes, they do “save the day” in the end, but I give them no praise for deciding to actually go be heroes when they were already proclaiming themselves as heroes. Wow, they saved people! Umm, yeah, that’s what they should have been doing anyways? Without needing Superman to convince them to go fight the good fight? Especially Green Lantern saying he only cares about protecting Earth from alien threats. My guy, why even bother protecting a planet from aliens if it’s going to be war-torn, unjust, and cruel? How ’bout you focus on Earth first and then fight the alien threats when they show up later to your awesome, peaceful, not terrible planet.
I also dislike the weird relationship between Jimmy Olsen and Luthor’s current companion, Eve. Eve is obsessed with Jimmy, and offers him information on Luthor and Superman if he agrees to go out with her. This whole relationship is played for laughs, but I find it very uncomfortable and unfortunate for Jimmy. He doesn’t like this girl, but makes her promises in order for her to help them. It doesn’t feel funny, it just feels wrong. Especially because he wants her information, but regards her as stupid and incompetent, and makes fun of her physical appearance. It just feels gross both directions.
Moving on, I also am not a fan of the rift that tears Metropolis in two. I think the rift is like, too much conflict. We have Luthor, Ultraman, the Engineer, the Raptors, and we have the war across the world, do we really need a rift tearing through the planet? It just feels like a bit much, and very silly that the way to fix it is to “hack the system and put in a code.” It feels half-baked.
In that same vein, I don’t think Superman should’ve been stuck in Metropolis fighting his clone, I think Superman should have actually been the hero to save Jarhanpur. Those kids were holding up the Superman flag as the Boravian army invaded, and they stood against the invaders shouting Superman! And who comes to save them? GREEN FUCKING LANTERN. This felt so unsatisfactory and like total BS. Yes, Superman is the one that “called them in” but come on! I don’t want to see Green Lantern flip off tanks, I want to see Superman shield children from bullets, his red cape flowing in the wind. This isn’t a Justice Gang movie! You’re telling me Big Blue is back home throwing his clone into a black hole? Talk about boring. I want to see him SAVE PEOPLE THAT BELIVE IN HIM!
Now, one thing I think this movie gets right is Luthor’s sick obsession with Superman. He is clearly un-fucking-well, and I think this movie and Nicholas Hoult’s portrayal of Luthor really nails that characterization aspect. Hoult’s ability to switch between a cool and collected demeanor, to an absolute madman spitting venom in every hate-filled word towards Superman is wildly impressive. He thinks he is a mastermind genius but really he’s just a crazed, sick individual. And he’s not really all that smart, just a rich, power-hungry, jealous man. Hits close to home, doesn’t it?
So, yeah. I didn’t really like this movie. Which is a shame because I think they nailed Superman’s morals, beliefs, his personality, the way he would interact with the world and with people. They absolutely killed it with Superman’s character. But that’s about it. A good Superman does not a good Superman movie make.
Overall, this movie was like a 5/10, very middling. I didn’t hate it but I don’t like it much, either. To be honest, I prefer Man of Steel. That’s right, I said it. I miss Henry Cavill, what can I say?
What did you think of Superman? What is your favorite Superman movie/media? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!
-AMS
JOHN SCALZI:
There have been several live action Superman movies, going back to Christopher Reeve’s iconic portrayal in the 1978 film (and actually before then, as there was a 1948 serial starring Kirk Alyn, but I’m doing a Jedi hand wave on that for this conversation). Across these many films and actors who have essayed the character, it’s generally agreed upon that the ’78 film, and Reeve’s turn in the blue suit, are the best of the bunch. After watching the 2025 Superman, with David Corenswet as the lead character, Reeve and the ’78 film still remain on top. But! Now there’s a new film, and new actor, in second place.
The reason for this comes down to tone. Superman is fundamentally an optimistic character; he’s decent and kind and humble (as much as a ridiculously overpowered character can be), he puts others before himself, and he fights for truth, justice and the American Way — which is understood to be a positive thing in the Superman mythos, even if in the real world the American Way is often not in a great state. In D&D parlance, he’s true Lawful Good, in a world that keeps wanting to tip over into chaos, or alternately is pushed there via Lex Luthor or other bad actors.
The problem is that lawful good is — sorry — kind of inherently boring. “Fundamentally decent” characters have a high incidence of being a snooze. You have to support them with interesting side characters, interesting situations and, particularly, an interesting antagonist. If you can give your main character an actual personality, that’s a plus too, but you can get away with not doing that if everything else falls in line.
The ’78 Superman (directed by Richard Donner and with a murderer’s row of screenwriters including Oscar winners Mario Puzo and Robert Benton) nailed all of this. The script was light, humorous a lot of the time, but serious when it needed to be. The newsroom of the Daily Planet had a terrific Lois Lane (Margot Kidder) and Perry White (Jackie Cooper). The film’s Metropolis was lived in and alive. And, of course, Gene Hackman’s Lex Luthor is still the best superhero villain (with his own terrific supporting cast in Ned Beatty and Valerie Perrine), full of genial evil.
In the middle of all that worldbuilding and character work, all Christopher Reeve and his Superman had to do was be decent and kind, offer an occasional corny quip (“bad vibrations?”) and save the day. This is not to say Reeve didn’t have to act — you try selling decent and kind while everyone is chewing scenery around you. See how you do. It did mean the filmmakers gave Reeve the space and support to make his turn in the role iconic.
Contrast this with Bryan Singer’s rather ill-fated Superman Returns (2006). Brandon Routh had the look and the decency, but he didn’t have the support. Bryan Singer intentionally tried to ape Richard Donner’s vibe, but as a director he doesn’t have Donner’s lightness of touch, antic where Donner was comedic, and the script was underwhelming. Kate Bosworth’s Lois Lane wasn’t up to the task of being a foil, and Kevin Spacey’s Lex Luthor, smarmy though he was, didn’t gel. The whole affair was off, and everyone felt it.
I actually liked Zach Snyder’s darker and grittier take on the Superman mythos in Man of Steel (2013), because Snyder (and screenwriters David S. Goyer and Christopher Nolan) committed to the bit; Henry Cavill’s Superman was still decent, but the world around him was more dour and Superman darkened to match. Snyder’s problem would be that the only direction you can go from “dark and gritty” is “darker and gritter.” That’s fine for Batman, less so for Superman. Batman vs. Superman was a bummer when it came to Superman; Justice League was a slog.
For the 2025 Superman, James Gunn (who wrote as well as directed) hearkened back to the ’78 Superman vibe and plan, but unlike Bryan Singer, isn’t trying for a slavish continuation. Also unlike Singer, Gunn has an actual sense of humor. That sense of humor is not the same as the one you’ll find in the ’78 Superman — Gunn’s sense of humor is a lot more overt and rather more juvenile. Of all the things that you would call his vision of Superman, “sophisticated” isn’t one of them. But it does keep things light and moving quickly.
Gunn’s Superman, in the form of David Corenswet, matches his sensibility. Reeve’s Superman had a delivery that was dry, even if it could be corny; Corenswet’s Superman, on the other hand, is basically an adorable lunk who means well. He’s not stupid! But he might not think enough steps ahead, and he might be in over his head. He’s the strongest person on the planet but can still get flustered by a very smart, very pretty woman (that would be Lois Lane, in the form of Rachel Brosnahan, who is terrific) who isn’t taking any crap from him. Superman is famously called a “boy scout” but this is the first Superman you could actually see being a Boy Scout, really proud of his all his badges and the fact that he made Eagle Scout without once having to resort to using his superpowers to do it.
(Over on Bluesky I noted that as an actor Corenswet reminded me less of any previous Superman actor and more of Brendan Fraser circa The Mummy and Blast From the Past; this was met by several “OH MY GOD YES”‘s, so I think I’m on to something here)
I like the Gunn/Corenswet version of Superman. I like that he’s decent and kind but still feeling his way in the world, and can be outmaneuvered because of that — and indeed that’s exactly what this iteration of Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult) is doing. This edition of Lex is a vainglorious billionaire who hates not being the alpha dude for the whole planet, and boy, doesn’t the idea of a billionaire weaponizing his insecurities feel a little too close to home at moment. Once again, this film has the second-best live action version of a character; Hoult isn’t going to beat Hackman as the definitive Lex Luthor — who could? — but his take is right for this particular world.
This particular world also has sunlight and color in it, which I really like, as well as probably more back story than any one single movie needs, which I am less enthused about. This is because Gunn is obliged to set up a whole new DC Cinematic Universe, this one subtitled “Gods and Monsters.” There’s criticism that this Superman is overstuffed, and the criticism is on point. I don’t know that it serves this film’s own story to jam in the “Justice Gang,” regardless of how much fun it is to point and laugh at Green Lantern Guy Gardner’s haircut (actor Nathan Fillion apparently insisted on it as it is canonical), or how much of a delightful surprise Edi Gathegi’s Mr. Terrific turns out to be (Isabela Merced’s Hawkgirl is given relatively little to do). And then there’s Krypto the dog, who is there as much for merchandising as plot. I get why Gunn did it, and, fine. It wouldn’t have hurt the film, as a film, to have focused more on Superman and his own supporting team.
With that said, this is the second-best Superman film for a reason. Overstuffed though it might be, it also hits the marks of making a good film with a fundamentally decent main character. The supporting cast ably supports. The antagonist viciously antagonizes. The worldbuilding is solid and mostly smart. The lightness and sense of humor pull us through. Is it a great film? No. But if simply being good is good enough for the character of Superman, it’s good enough for this story about him. James Gunn has put his stamp on the character and the universe, and I’m looking forward to seeing where both of them go from here.
Writers are in conversation with other writers, both the ones who are contemporary to them, and the ones who came before. In this Big Idea for The Dreaming of Man, author Nikoline Kaiser talks about what the takeaway is from these discussions, for this book as well as other things.
NIKOLINE KAISER:
I might be a writer, but I’d never claim to be a master of words. And while I feel I do have some sort of unique voice, made up of my experiences and values, there is no secret to the fact that I stand on the shoulders of giants. By this I mean that I borrow relentlessly from my favorite authors; as many a writer will tell you, reading is often the biggest source of inspiration you can find. And especially nowadays, with the near-oversaturation of tales available to us, giving a new spin to an old idea becomes a necessary go-to.
Here’s the thing though: writers have always been borrowing. Many fans of Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings have heard the story of how J.R.R. himself read the Shakespeare play Macbeth, and was very unsatisfied with how the “no man of woman born” line referred to a man who came into the world via caesarean section and not, you know, a woman. Here (or so the story goes) was born his idea for Eowyn, the warrior maid who disguises herself as a man to fight, fulfilling a similar prophecy from the trilogy. (Incidentally, his ire over the walking forest in Macbeth being soldiers disguising themselves with branches, and not an actual, moving forest, is what gave birth to his idea for the Ents. Tolkien apparently had a lot of beef with Shakespeare).
Growing up, Eowyn was one of my favorite characters. There is something very affirming about seeing a female character in the kind of role she has, especially for the time the novels were written in. Plenty has been written about the cross-dressing aspect of Eowyn and other characters like her. Playing with gender roles takes on a new meaning (or maybe at times an even older one) when reading with a modern lens, and when I started my own venture into writing, I quickly found that this was a source of constant ideas. Who are we when we crawl over the walls erected around us at birth and decide to do things not because of but despite or even without thought to, our gender?
Here’s another aspect of the type of fantasy Tolkien wrote (and the type he decidedly didn’t write) and the precursors Shakespeare and his contemporaries played with in, for example, Macbeth: prophecies. In modern times, a lot of derision has been levelled against the Chosen One archetype; the one hero (usually male, usually white) who is destined to defeat the evil of the land. Of course, he succeeds despite all odds. But those aren’t really the fun prophecies, are they? They aren’t much like the prophecies we know from older times, when the Sphinx warns that Oedipus will kill his father and marry his mother and then, by the very act of trying to avoid this, it ends up happening. It’s certainly not Macbeth in the eponymous play being told that “no man of woman born” can kill him and his end will only come when a whole forest grows legs and starts walking, only for a C-section baby grown into a vengeful man and an army with foliage on their heads to arrive and end his reign.
Those are the clever prophecies, the word-twisters, the djinni-in-a-bottle giving you everything you wished for, except you really, really shouldn’t have been wishing in the first place. They’re often self-fulfilling, because if the protagonist hadn’t reacted to the prophecy, they might never have created the circumstances to make it come true in the first place. It’s here that the “master of words” thing comes back, because if you say something in the right way, any sentence can hold both the venom and the antidote. Shakespeare (who was also heavily inspired by the stories of his lifetime – Macbeth was a real person, though the historical figure seems to have been a lot nicer than his literary counterpart) took the prophecy with a specific focus: “no man of woman born.” Tolkien took his focus elsewhere: “no man of woman born.” And in the gender euphoria of Eowyn, of growing older, of learning things about myself and the world, the words changed in my head too: “no man of woman born.”
There’s no mastery of words necessary for this idea to spring forth, and thank some kind of god for that, because I might have never written my story if there were. But if the giants before me swam in the ocean, I’m in the shallows on shore, the water pooling behind from the waves they created. Plucking out the words and emphasis that suits the ideas in my head – if I could tell people only one thing about writing, I’d say to dive into the waters of those that came before and see what wonders – or horrors – lie beyond the deep.
This guest squee is from Jeevani Charika! Jeevani Charika (also known as Rhoda Baxter) writes romantic comfort reads with a dash of fun. Her books have been shortlisted for multiple awards. Jeevani is British-Sri Lankan. She loves all things science geeky. She also loves cake, Lego and playing with Canva. You can find out more about her (and get a free book!) on her website. Her next book, How Can I Resist You? is available for pre-order.
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When Netflix suggested K-Pop Demon Hunters to me, I added it to my list immediately, based solely on the title. I know very little about K-Pop, but I love fantasy K-dramas. This show is a 100 minute animated film and the title is brilliant.
The setup is exactly what you’d expect from the title. The film is about a K-pop girl band who are…secretly demon hunters. In a world where demons prey on human souls in order to bring life force to their leader in the underworld (Gwi-Ma), every generation has a trio of female hunters whose voices can ignite a force in the hearts of their human listeners and generate a protective force field called the Hunmoon. Right now, the trio takes the form of the super popular girl band Huntr/x.
Rumi (voiced by Arden Cho) is the lead singer, whose voice feeds the Hunmoon, Mira is the main dancer and choreographer while Zoey raps and writes lyrics. They all work hard balancing performing and demon slaying. When they turn the Hunmoon golden, the demons will be trapped in the underworld forever.
Rumi has an extra reason to want to turn the Hunmoon golden. She has a secret that not even her bandmates know about – she is part demon, as evidenced by the symbolic patterns on her arms. Her mentor has told her that when the Hunmoon is golden, she will banish her demon side and become fully human. So, despite her voice sometimes failing, she pushes the band to release their next new single.
Meanwhile, Gwi-Ma is annoyed that his minions have failed once again. The Hunmoon is getting stronger and they need to do something. A demon called Jinu suggests a way to steal the fans away from Huntri/x and weaken the Hunmoon. His suggestion – a demon boy band.
Let’s just sit with that a minute. Demon. Boyband.
Suddenly, Huntri/x’s chart domination has some competition for the mysterious boyband The Saja Boys. The girls quickly work out that the boys are demons. If The Saja Boys win the International Idol Competition, it’s game over for Huntr/x and for the Hunmoon.
This is a kids’ animated film (rated PG). There is a hint of a romantic thread, though there’s no real romance in it, but don’t let that stop you. It’s still awesome. There is an uplifting ending (but, again, it is definitely not a romance ending). There is some violence and mild horror elements because of the demons, but it’s very cartoonish. In general it is bright and jaunty.
First of all, the girls. Rumi, Mira and Zoey are accomplished performers on stage, but messy and real in private. The scenes where the girls are relaxing are some of my favourites – all they want to do is eat a huge amount of food, take long baths and lie around on the couch.
They are messy, chaotic and affectionate. The movie captures the divide between their ‘perfect’ external personas and the messy reality of being human really well. There is a lovely scene where, post-battle, the girls are bruised and scratched, but when they hear their manager coming up in the lift, there’s a flurry of activity, so that by the time the lift doors open, they’ve done their makeup and hair and are looking flawless again.
Next, the boys: The Saja boys are hot (how can animated characters be so hot?!). Jinu is voiced by the Canadian-Korean actor Ahn Hyeo-Seop, who K-drama fans will recognise as the male lead in Business Proposal. The rest of the Saja boys don’t get much air time, but they form a stereotypical boy band – the hearthrob (Jinu), the bad boy, the cute one, the mysterious one and the funny one.
Jinu has real depth. He is racked with guilt about his past, specifically about the people he betrayed when he took his deal with the devil, and if he succeeds in destroying the Hunmoon, his reward will be to have his memories wiped. Being in the real world (and spending time with Rumi) changes him subtly, but even at the end, he still has moments when he looks unsettling. He has a goofy magical tiger and a creepy black bird in a hat as companions.
The tiger is adorable. There’s a lovely scene where Mira asks about the hat the bird wears and Jinu mutters that he made the hat for the tiger, but the bird keeps stealing it. This is a lovely way to humanise a guy who is, essentially, still a demon.
The animation is mostly representations of the real world, but sometimes it veers towards anime and some of it is genuinely funny
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…like how, whenever Zoey sees the abs of ‘Abby’, her eyes start making popcorn (this made me laugh every time it happened).
A lot of the K-drama tropes pop up at various times – the wrist grab, the nosy ahjummas, the moment when the hero helps the heroine when she least expects it. I don’t know enough about K-pop to spot the references, but I gather there are K-pop easter eggs in there too. If you spot any, post in the comments! There are a lot of Korean cultural elements incorporated into the visuals,
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…most notably, for the final performance, when the Saja Boys wear modified hanboks and hats that make them look like mythical grim reapers.
Given that it’s a story about two rival bands battling it out for the hearts and minds of the fans, there’s a lot of music in this film. The songs are surprisingly catchy. It’s been a few days since I watched it and I still catch myself humming ‘Takedown’.
The messaging in the story is great for younger viewers: eat all the snacks, take long baths, trust your besties to have your back.
For me, it was 90+ minutes of pure, uplifting fun.
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