Reviews with content warning for Infidelity - Queerly Beloved

While this book seemed sometimes ready to tackle radical topics (like how marriage is not the route to queer liberation, or howto reconcile people we love working in unethical industries like oil), it always seemed to end up on a note of maintaining the status quo. As a reader, it sometimes made me wish they hadn't brought the topics up in the first place.

I liked all of the characters, but I would have liked higher stakes between Charley and Amy. Charley's wishy-washy behaviour made it hard for me to get invested, even though they seemed like a nice enough pairing.

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kickitupanotch7's review

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emotional funny lighthearted reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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kj468's review against another edition

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emotional lighthearted reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

1.0

The short review: I’m bored. I’m so bored and I don’t care, and I didn’t like the message, and also, I’m bored.

The longer review, broken down into the biggest issues I had with the book:

The messaging: I’m happy the MC (Amy) figured out how to be authentically herself at work, in a way that benefited her business and helped her feel better about herself, but the journey to get there was a bit sanctimonious and pressure-y. The MC spends a lot of page space on internal monologues explaining that she’s not being authentic/honest/“faithful to the queer community” by not being out at work or super loud and proud with her (homophobic) extended family. The resulting narrative implied that it’s imperative for queer people to be out, and that they’re doing something wrong if they aren’t. Sure, there was some caveats for not outing yourself in unsafe situations, but other than that, the book seemed pretty adamant that queer people should be OUT. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge advocate for queer representation, think people should be able to be out, and celebrate when people do come out — but coming out is never something queer people owe others (not straight people, and not even other queer people). If you believe coming out isn’t an obligation, but a choice, this book will likely rub you the wrong way.

The romance: The relationship happened very off-page — readers don’t actually get to read many interactions between the MC and the LI (Charley). Plus, the LI traveled a lot which almost seemed to be a very convenient way to not write as much of them together. When they were together, there was NO chemistry. I thought the LI was a very flat, boring character; I can’t tell you a single thing about her likes and dislikes, outside of her job. Honestly, one of the brides the MC works for/befriends (Regi) is a more developed character than the LI. I wasn’t invested enough in the relationship, so when they had their big moment in the end, it felt very rushed and unnatural and insta-lovey. There wasn’t the foundation to justify the ease with which they made up, or how far they jumped in the relationship (spoiler:

jumping from not even defining the relationship before the break up, to exchanging “I love you” after the makeup

The writing: The author is definitely a “teller” not a “shower”. There were SO MANY PARTS where the author gave a couple sentence (or even couple paragraph) summary of a scene instead of writing it out — sometimes even writing a sentence summarizing one sentence of dialogue in a conversation, rather than writing out the dialogue. As a result, I felt really detached from the ongoings in the book and wasn’t emotionally invested. Also, I skimmed. A lot.

The “drama”: At 60% of the way through this book, there was basically no drama happening. Early on (like page 40) she gets fired from her job, and then pretty quickly starts the bridesmaid business. And then there’s approximately 200 pages of her just building the business and living her life. It was not an interesting 200 pages. And then, kind of out of the blue, a bunch of things go wrong — her best friend gets mad at her (for reasons I didn’t feel the previous 200 pages supported) and the relationship with the LI implodes. Plus, the whole time, the MC is whining to the reader about feeling like she’s lying to brides because she’s not coming out to them, and worried that she’s a people pleaser because she’s doing whatever she can to make the brides happy (…even though that’s literally what they’re paying her for: to make their events go smoothly and help them be happy).

Queer rep: lesbian MC, sapphic main pairing, background mlm relationships & gay men, background non-binary character, background other lesbian & gay characters

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dogbuttsandbooks's review against another edition

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challenging emotional sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

I’m always on the lookout for more contemporary sapphic romances, especially set in the southern United States, so I was VERY excited to get my hands on an arc of Queerly Beloved. And that’s where the excitement ended. This book had great story concepts, but needed some serious editing - there were so many different storylines. Is it about someone hiding their queer identity at work? Or a professional bridesmaid? Or a sapphic romance? Or a coming of age story? It was trying to do too much and ended up succeeding at none of it. The side characters were all severely underdeveloped and seemed to rely on queer stereotypes. Also this should not be marketed as a romance, it’s barely a part of the storyline and has the most forced HEA of all time. 

So many content warnings for homophobia. 

Last thing - while I love the frequent use of pronouns in the book, that would not have been normal in 2013.

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womanwill's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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applejacksbooks's review against another edition

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emotional lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

I received a copy of this from NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group.

TW: Homophobia, lesbophobia, outing, Toxic relationships, sexual content, religious bigotry.

So here's the good news with this book. It takes place in a time period when a lot of gays were on the edge of their seats about whether or not gay marriage would be legalized (the story takes place in 2013) and I think (based on my memories of the time) it portrays that time period well. Being out and proud about it was becoming more and more prevalent at the time and I think that this story portrays that well, especially since it takes place in Oklahoma, which is generally super conservative (thanks bible belt). Do I wish that there was less homophobia? Yes, but I also understand why it's in the book. It adds nuance to the story that in the post-2015 we sometimes forget about. I also really enjoyed Amy's business venture with being a bridesmaid. I think throughout the story she really took the lemons life gave her and ran with it and that was very much appreciated.

Now here's what I didn't like. I didn't like the love interest at all. After that first meeting (which was adorbs as heck), Charley's characterization fell flat to me. I think that could have been remedied by having dual POVs or seeing more of their (Amy and Charley's) conversations on the page together. I think that if this is going to be marketed as a romance, there should be significantly more romance in it. It felts like there was like 10% of the book focused on the relationship between Amy and Charley and it should have been more.

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