The Neurospicy Bean

  Okay, I’ve been agonizing over this review for literally months. Pulley’s writing here is absolutely beautiful, her characters compelling, her world intriguing. She makes things that absolutely shouldn’t make any sense – talking mammoths anyone? – feel entirely natural. I was captivated from beginning to end. And yet. I have seen some legitimate criticisms of the way the book approaches its subject matter. The idea is that Mars is a human colony, specifically Chinese (although there are several cultural influences). Mars-born humans, being born in lighter gravity, are taller and generally more delicate than Earth-born humans. Earth-born humans (Earthstrongers) are comparatively extremely strong, enough so that a mere touch can pose a threat to a Martian, so they’re segregated from Martians. Our main character, January, is an Earthstronger refugee, while his love interest, Aubrey Gale, is a politician running on the platform of mandatory Earthstronger naturalization. There is a LO...

  More trans romance! It brings me so much joy! Especially great to see T4T and transfemme representation because those are both things that don’t show up very often in any genre. The basic premise of the book is a pretty traditional fake-dating setup – Jean-Pierre needs a girlfriend in order to inherit his family’s culinary empire, and Luna needs money, so they pretend to be in a relationship. But the rest of the book was brilliantly original and avoided most of the repetitive plot elements that come up so frequently in fake-dating stories. I especially loved the ending. I won’t spoil it, but not only was it not where I expected it to go, it was just so filled with trans joy and screw-the-old-rich-people, it was absolutely lovely. My biggest complaint is that the relationship development didn’t quite ring true to me. There were lovely elements, to be sure – Jean-Pierre nicknaming Luna Claire?? Adorable – but the transition from them being annoyed with one another to attracted to o...

  Yeahhh this was a bit too much in the string of cis white lesbians for me. I don’t know why precisely but this one in particular just felt incredibly cisgender. I should have flagged some of the particular moments that rubbed me the wrong way and I didn’t, but there were definitely a few instances where it just didn’t feel like the author had ever considered the trans perspective. Similarly, it often seemed that the author was lumping bi and pan people in with lesbians, which…let’s maybe not. Also, I really struggle with speculation about celebrities’ sexuality. It’s one of my least favorite forms of discourse because a) it inevitably leads to accusations of queerbaiting and b) oh my God you are not entitled to information about anyone’s sexual orientation ever. Even if they seem really super queer. Even if they’re in the public eye. Even if you think it would be really super good for the queer community if someone with that level of influence came out. I. Don’t. Care. It’s not ...

  I am OBSESSED give me all of the trans romance and joy. Thank you so much to Katy Nishimoto from Dial Press for the advance copy of this beautiful book. I really loved so many different aspects of this book, so it’s going to be a bit tricky to parse through them all, but I shall try. First, and this is probably one of the things that has stuck most in my head about it, it was really amazing to see such a sex-positive trans romance. I do think this trend is changing, in the last couple of years in particular, but so often it seems like the reality of sex as a trans person gets completely glossed over. By that I don’t mean that sex is some kind of horrible ordeal, or that all trans people are uncomfortable with it; in fact, anyone who has read this book will know that’s not how it’s treated here at all. It’s more that a lot of authors – cis authors in particular – have seemed deeply uncomfortable committing to the reality of their trans characters’ bodies, whatever that may be. So ...

I am so angry and I am so tired. I’m tired of walking into spaces I expect to be the most accepting of my existence, only to have it denied with a casual “she” from the most prominent drag queen in the city. Tired of watching my classmates jump to correct the professor when she misgenders a classmate, only to hear myself misgendered and wait for the correction – and wait – and wait – until the discussion has moved on and I have to admit to myself, “you’re just not trans enough for them.” I am tired of being misgendered by a gaming friend and thinking “well, maybe he’s just not good at they/them pronouns,” and then hearing him a second later smoothly referencing a non-binary character, the pronouns rolling off his tongue so fluidly and so in contrast to my own stuttering attempt at correction. I am tired of being praised for wearing men’s shorts, as though this is some huge step in my transition, when it is nothing more than a facet of how I choose to present myself. I am especially...