

And it’s kind of a faeries-kidnapping-humans-to-Elfland story. Look: it’s kind of an alien abduction story. I tell you this, because it adds weight to the declaration that Lips Like Ice knocked my fool socks off. Women in popular fantasy don’t tend to have a lot of agency, and the romantic (or simply sexual) relationships they tend to end up in are usually…less than ideal, shall we say. I’m the one who likes dragons and epic quests and in those kinds of stories, my darlings, the romances tend to be very poorly written. Obviously this is an incredibly stupid thing to think, and I’m very glad I learned out of it.īut although I no longer deliberately avoid romance novels, I still manage to…well, never read any.

Not only do I not read romances, but until last year I was one of those horrendous snobs who looked down upon Romances, capital R, as being somehow lesser than my precious spec-fic. Let’s get this out of the way: I do not read romances. Trigger warnings for the book are listed at the end of the review. In a court where monarchs are obeyed and sexual hierarchies are strict, one wrong move could end the Prince for ever. But in a world fraught with hidden dangers, her terms are not open for discussion, not when their thirst for one another could doom them both. And Lydia has awoken in his world with no memory of her life before to find that she has been given to him: as a pet, a plaything, and, if he so desires, a lover.Īs Lydia comes to realize that the Prince is as much a prisoner to his culture's ways as she is, her resentment slowly unfurls into pity, curiosity, and a deeply unpredictable and confusing lust. He is humanoid but not human-fascinating, sensual, at the cusp of maturity, and accustomed to getting what he wants. Representation: Black bisexual MC, alien gender system, physically agender major character who transitions to male against social convention Genres: Queer Protagonists, Science Fantasy
