i just finished Running Close To The Wind by Alexandra Rowland and it came at a very good time bc my job has been. bad lately. and apart from DIRELY needing every reminder I can get to stop working myself that hard for places that don't deserve it, i also have direly needed every little treat i have been able to scrape up

(also as someone who easily defaults to a lot of tunglr scrolling on my work breaks, it was very fun and neat to see my brain forget to tunglr scroll bc what it wanted most in the world was to get back to Pirate Book)

so yr honors may it please the court that @ariaste wrote a wonderful Pirate Book and it was bonkers and a delight and I also got one for my friend and I will be recommending it to my library and you can get it here

So we all know that on tumblr when people go "why is no one talking about this", the answer is frequently that people ARE, and the inquirer simply isn't following the right people. Today it occurred to me that there's an inverse to this situation, because I was like "I don't need to say anything, everyone's already talking about it." And no, *everyone* is not talking about it, I'm just following most of the people who would be.

So uh. Everyone should go read Running Close to the Wind by Alexandra Rowland. It's a queer book about pirates and it's HILARIOUS.

I could feel myself slipping into a reading slump this week so I picked up a favorite and reread a taste of gold and iron by alexandra rowland and after I finished it I thought to myself you know my favorite books don’t usually have fanfiction but I bet there’s fanfic for this book so I go on ao3 to check and sure enough there is and the very first one I click on the authors note goes “I actually am the author of this book and I do own the characters what’s up here’s to the fanfic community” and the sheer unexpectedness and the flipping of the usual script for authors notes had me literally on the floor laughing for a solid five minutes so I guess what I’m trying to say is thank you @ariaste for the masterpiece that is a taste of gold and iron and also for making me laugh the hardest I have in recent memory

New book announcement: RUNNING CLOSE TO THE WIND!!! It’s a queer comedy-adventure: Our Flag Means Death meets Six Of Crows in the style of Terry Pratchett’s Going Postal. So many people have been asking whether I’ll write another book set in the world of A Taste of Gold and Iron. The answer: Yes! In fact, all my fantasy books take place in the same world-setting, and I’m thrilled to be announcing this one, which features an entirely new cast of characters, such as…

1) Avra Helvaçi, a mangy little gremlin I found in a dumpster behind a Denny’s, where he was being mugged by possums for the collection of used pizza boxes he was eating. He has zero personal dignity. He makes weird mouth noises. If you let him into your house, he will climb into your vents and you will not be able to get rid of him.

2) Teveri az-Ḥaffār, a very cool pirate captain, which means they own a collection of fabulously coats and are constantly Going Through It. Despite never having been married in the first place, Teveri and Avra have been newly divorced for the last fifteen years.

3) Brother Julian, his juicy biceps, his even juicier brain, and his entirely juiceless oath of celibacy, all of which are personally victimising Tev and Avra on a daily basis.

Running Close to the Wind features all the themes pirate books are legally required to have, such as found families and extremely pointed social commentary about how capitalism is the root of all evil and all cops are bastards. It is also a comedy, because as long as you can laugh, there’s still a part of you that’s free—and pirates are all about freedom.

Some alternate titles that we brainstormed:

Also Featuring:

This is the best book I’ve ever written, and I am bursting with excitement for 2024, when I will do my level best to make you laugh until you physically can’t anymore.

Go read the TorDotCom blog post linked above for the full description!!!

So “A Taste of Gold and Iron” by Alexandra Rowland is an unmitigated delight.

I am not even kidding, I consumed this book in a haze and consciously made myself slow down while reading so I could better savour it. It’s unspeakably good. The world is so rich and detailed and woven into the characters’ personalities and quirks and how they experience their surroundings, it was a joy to read and I cannot stop thinking about it.

(I started writing this review after I read the advanced reader’s copy months ago. In March!! Rest assured I have not stopped thinking about it.)

In this fantasy romance novel with a limited though plot-relevant magic system, Kadou is the Prince of Arasht, struggles with chronic anxiety and his-sister-the-sultan’s annoying lover, and constantly tries his absolute best to do well by his kingdom and the people entrusted to him.

Evemer is a supremely capable bodyguard who gets assigned to Kadou in an effort to keep him out of trouble. He starts out being supremely unimpressed with Kadou. Take one look at the US cover of the book to see just how much he will become attached to his prince—

All of the characters are fleshed out and multidimensional, with realistic flaws and strengths and so much tangibility to them and the context in which they exist, I am absolutely FLASHED by the character work!

Do you like fealty?? Do you like Fealty with Feelings?? Do you like an achingly tender love story of growing devotion where they talk about their positions in each others’ lives long before they realise or admit they’re in love? You will love them. I love them.

Listen to me. Do you enjoy the liege/vassal dynamic but are particular about the power differentials in play? EXCELLENT NEWS the complications therein are addressed in the book, both in general ways relevant to the worldbuilding and relationships with side characters, and between the main couple themselves. Both of them broach the subject on several occasions! Laying open their expectations and fears in scenes most tender and caring and my god it is so well done.

Do you enjoy a world that is dealing intimately with mechanisms of fealty that is gorgeously constructed and thought through and then there is on-page deconstruction of that situation and dissection of what it means and what responsibilities come with it for both vassal and liege, and how the characters deal with that responsibility?? I know I do!!

Are you unsure about the fealty? Have you literally ever looked at fealty in fiction and thought to yourself, “This makes no damn sense—compels me though” ?? Rowland will make you look closer. They will hand you your own emotions and say, look at it. Hold it. Feel the weight of your own heart in your hands. You are allowed to have feelings about it. You are allowed to admit that this is intense, and it is not the same devotion as love is devotion, but it is just as Much, just as Heartwrenching, and NOW watch me add love to it and see how it transforms.

This author lays hands on this trope with absolute precision down to the molecular level and it is so. fucking. good.

And this is not even the only excellently executed and close relationship in the book. Kadou has family he loves, and who love him: the sibling relationship is politically strained and is immediately influenced by the plot. Another plot thread concerns a sexual relationship that ends, with the characters expending effort to transform it into a friendship, and it is not less valued for it.

The plot is gripping! There is a counterfeiting operation going on that threatens the kingdom’s economic stability, and our main characters are charged to investigate it. It flows seamlessly into the worldbuilding and character work. The world itself is queernormative, both regarding relationships and regarding gender, and nuances of it are discussed in narration and between various characters.

I cried about this book twice in one evening bc it has the ABSOLUTE AUDACITY to follow up an intense scene of fealty with an intense scene of the love that is developing underneath.

This book hits is like a needle-fine arrow directly into your heart.

The US edition came out today, the UK edition will be out in two days (September 1st), please read G&I, get it now, enjoy <3

okay hopping on @ariaste​ ‘s really good point about how if you like books even if you aren’t going to pre-order them, hyping them up on social media helps immensely even just wrt getting publishers to be willing to promote them more

I guess gods nearly a year ago time isn’t real I went on an ‘okay has everyone read A Conspiracy Of Truths bc Please Read A Conspiracy Of Truths’ rant (which the sequel, A Choir Of Lies, was just as delightful, and I am deeply looking forward to the moment that I have to read the I think novella sequel to that one Over All The Earth bc just. big We Love Ylfing Mood In This House.) 

I am not a particularly huge blog and do not expect to have a particularly huge reach with this, but the majority of y’all who follow me I feel like kind of do for writing-adjacent and generally fun fiction related stuff? So this is my official I guess first-ever “hey guess what I have pre-ordered this book and this is why you should consider hyping it too” announcement that I have ever made for the reasons of:

1) Alexandra Rowland is a great author and at this point I trust them and trust the quality of their work, especially something that is about 

2) dramatic!!!! court politics!!!!! intrigue!!!! stoic bodyguard and shy beautiful prince!!!!! dramatic fealty dynamics but just all in all not only explicit queer rep but a variety of well fleshed-out relationships that are not thrown aside for a single romantic plotline

3) Look At This Cover I Want This Cover

4) I’ve heard generally really good things about how things like anxiety are treated 

5) can we get back to the queer fantasy court politics and conspiracies and political machinations and the inherent eroticism of a mutually pining royal-and-bodyguard pair in the background of it all, that is where it’s AT

so! I am very hyped for this book! I will actually properly hype it further once I have read it when it comes out! if this sounds like the sort of thing that would be your jam, it is possible to pre-order but also just make a note remember the date consider immediately requesting it at your library etc etc, because I get the feeling that this is a top-notch book, and I think it really deserves to be hyped

Alex let me read an early draft of their book and I can confirm— that cover delivers on its promises. It is top-notch, and sweet, and yearn-y, and nerdy about currency, and I can’t wait to see the even-better final polished version that’s coming to print.

But also it keeps from you my favorite part of this book: not the anxious honorable prince, not the stoic heart-of-gold bodyguard who falls for him, but the loyal, terrible, slitherer-outer, wonderful disaster snake ex-boyfriend of the prince. He’s my boy.

I got to read an early copy too! And stayed up till 3 am finishing it BECAUSE I NEEDED TO KNOW

*slaps cover*

This baby has everything in it that you could ever want

EVERYTHING

Think of your favorite trope??? It’s probably in here.

I’m not even going to list them all because I want you to be surprised by all the gifts Alex is giving us

AND I want to be very clear here

It doesn’t feel like it’s too much.

The right amount of everything we’ve ever wanted from a book.

(If you want to know anything more specific you can reach out and ask)

do u queer nerds want some DAPPER THEATER LESBIANS? I know you do!!

SOME BY VIRTUE FALL is the first book in my new series of adult fantasy novellas! It’s got everything you like best in a book: Fantasy-Elizabethan acting troupes, arson, passionate rivalries, a chaos-gremlin main character, some extremely dapper hats…  

It’s basically Shakespeare In Love meets West Side Story, but they’re all lesbians.

Find the full cover (and preorder links!) at the announcement post on my website’s blog. The cover art is by the INCREDIBLY talented @qwertyprophecy and it is unspeakably gorgeous, go check it out!

Also, if you are not yet sufficiently tempted by the phrase “dapper theater lesbians”, here are the AO3 tags for it:

* queer found families  * rivals to arch-enemies to allies * forbidden flirtation with a member of the opposition * dapper fancy hats * main character is a chaos gremlin and THE most useless lesbian * wlw/mlm solidarity * maybe the real enemy was the patriarchy we smashed along the way * everyone is queer (except one man named Leony Token who is straight and is only mentioned once)