Eight Awesome Queer Historical Fiction Books Like Tipping the Velvet

Last month in Ask Your Friendly Neighborhood Lesbrarian we went to outer space and the possibilities of the future, so it seems fitting that this month we are looking to the past for queer representation in historical fiction. Specifically, I’m responding to this email:

Hi Casey,
Thank you so much for all that you do reccing gay books on Autostraddle! One of my old favorites is Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters, a fun fun fun romp through late 19th century lesbian (or “tom” as she says) England. Do you have any recs for other rad lesbian, bi women, etc. historical fiction books? Preferably ones that don’t focus on gay suffering and how stuff was so hard for us in the past.
Thanks again,
Kristine

This is the first time someone’s asked me about historical fiction! I’m excited to get to talk about a genre that hasn’t gotten enough lesbrarian attention. In case you haven’t read Tipping the Velvet, it’s a now iconic lesbian coming of age story set in the 1880/90s. Nan King goes from simple oyster girl to traveling cross-dressing music hall performer, street sex worker, toy of the rich and idle, and finally worker’s rights activist, all while discovering and exploring, as Kristine wrote, that she is a “tom” aka lesbian. It’s steamy, melodramatic in a fun self-conscious way, and full of lush historical detail, particularly of the segments of society whose lives don’t usually make the history books. It is a queer must-read if you have not already read it!

For this list, I’ve focused on books set in the 19th century or earlier because we’re trying to find books a la Tipping the Velvet, but know that there are also some great queer historical novels set in the 20th century up until, well, whenever you think it’s reasonable to draw the line for what counts as historical fiction. A few of these books below have a deliciously fantastical twist to the historical setting.

The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows by Olivia Waite

The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows is the second book in Waite’s ‘Feminine Pursuits” series of historical romances featuring queer women. Agatha Griffin is a grumpy widow and owner of a print shop. She’s working hard to keep the shop open against the odds of increasing taxes and distaste for radical printers. When she finds a colony of bees in her warehouse, it might be the last straw. Enter Penelope Flood, a beekeeper who defies the gender norms of 19th century England by going about in trousers. The two women’s romance is accompanied by stories about an exiled Queen returning to English shores, “satirical ballads about tight pants,” and the unexpected return of Penelope’s husband. Can her burgeoning love for Agatha overcome her loyalty to the man who allowed her a refuge?

Yabo by Alexis De Veaux

This winner of the 2015 Lambda Literary Award for lesbian fiction is written in beautifully poetic prose. Alexis de Veaux takes on the very concept of time, setting her three stories in different places — Jamaica, North Carolina, and New York — and times. A very queer book in every sense of the word, Yabo takes delight in fluidity: nonbinary and intersex genders, divisions between past and present, and genre. Yabo is also very much a Black book, one that centers Black women and looks critically at the history of slavery in New York. As all great historical fiction might hope to do, Yabo “calls our ghosts back and holds us accountable for memory,” according to Cheryl Clarke. I’ve recommended The Salt Roads by Nalo Hopkinson before; if you read and loved that, Yabo is a great next read!

The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

Some periods are quite overdone in historical fiction — *cough World War II* — which is why this novel set in the 1600s in a Norwegian coastal village is such a welcome addition to the genre. The northern town of Vardø is grieving the loss of forty fishermen in a brutal storm; the only men left are either very old or very young. 21-year-old Maren Bergensdatter and the other women of her community pull together to ensure their survival, including taking on tasks such as fishing that were previously reserved for men. Three years after the tragedy, the shady figure of Absalom Cornet arrives, along with his Norwegian wife Ursa. He has recently burned witches in Scotland. While he sees more heathens and witches in Vardø, Ursa sees an entire town of strong, independent women. She also embarks on a surprising relationship with Maren.

The Best Bad Things by Katrina Carrasco

This historical crime / thriller novel is about Alma Rosales, a badass cross dressing former government spy who now works for an opium smuggling ring in the 1880s. Her boss Delphine — a fellow queer woman of color — has sent her to investigate opium that’s gone missing in the Pacific Northwest at a new port of business. As her alter ego Jack Camp, Alma infiltrates the local organization, trying to discover who the turncoat is while earning the trust of the man in charge. At the same time, she’s sending false dispatches back to the Pinkertons to keep them off her scent. Read this if you like to see bisexual characters in the full spectrum of their sexuality with different partners, morally ambiguous characters, and visceral, bold writing.

The Wicked Cometh by Laura Carlin

London, 1831: Hester White lives in the working class slums and dreams of escaping by any means possible. In addition to the misery of poverty and deplorable living conditions, people have been mysteriously disappearing from Hester’s neighborhood lately. It’s clear why no one is paying attention as their lives are not seen as worthy, but what is happening to them? When Hester manages to connect herself with the aristocratic Brock family and their feminist daughter Rebekah Brock, she takes Rebekah up on her offer to tutor Hester and help her education. Neither woman can ignore the gothic mystery happening in Hester’s community, nor the simmering attraction growing between them. But can they handle the darkness of what they uncover once they are knee deep in investigation?

Everfair by Nisi Shawl

Everfair is a strong response to the vast majority of steampunk that is overwhelmingly white and conveniently ignores 19th century imperialism. This Neo-Victorian historical fantasy is set in the Belgian Congo with a whole host of varied and diverse characters. Fabian Socialists from Great Britain, African American missionaries, and people escaping slavery and colonization make up the inhabitants of a land “purchased” from King Leopold II. They call it Everfair. Their idea is a utopia and a safe haven, but all these people from vastly different life experiences have a lot of labour and communication ahead of them to make it work. Also, they will need to harness the power of steam technology! The novel’s wide scope follows many characters through decades of life. Queer and polyamorous relationships feature significantly in the lives of a few main characters.

She Rises by Kate Worsley

In Essex in 1740, Louise Fletcher is a dairy maid who dreams of seeing more of the world. So when she’s offered a chance to be a lady’s maid to a wealthy sea captain’s daughter in Harwich, a lively naval port, she jumps at the chance. Never mind the cautions Louise has received about the seductiveness of the ocean, as it lured both her father and brother away from their family forever. Interwoven with Louise’s story is that of 15-year-old Luke, whose entry into the navy was unwilling to put it mildly; beaten, press ganged, and forced onto a warship, he tries to survive the brutal life of a sailor. If a tantalizing mixture of inter-class lesbian romance and mid-1700s navy action sounds exciting, read this book! To top it off, Worsley writes in a period authentic rough language that is disorienting and dazzling.

Mrs. Martin’s Incomparable Adventure by Courtney Milan

Elderly Victorian women falling in love and smashing the patriarchy, anyone? 73-year-old Mrs. Bertrice Martin is a badass widow who doesn’t give a damn. She especially doesn’t give a damn about her “Terrible Nephew.” After all, she’s too busy staying youthful by bathing in male tears and regular doses of spite towards people who deserve it. Unfortunately her peaceful life is interrupted by Miss Violetta Beauchamps (a young 69). The Terrible Nephew is staying at Violetta’s rooming house and she wants him gone. Mrs. Martin is intrigued by the seemingly prim and proper Miss Violetta, but she’s not going to go about winning Violetta’s heart in a straightforward way. She hatches a plan that, if it works out, will give her nephew what is due to him, earn the love of a beautiful woman, and allow her to revel in her sense of adventure all at the same time.

These are only eight of the many wonderful historical novels featuring queer characters available these days. Which ones would you recommend?

Keep those lesbrarian questions coming! You can email me at stepaniukcasey [at]gmail.com, comment below, or send in an A+ message.

Top 10 Queer and Feminist Books of 2014

Feature image via shutterstock.

2014 has been really excellent for a ton of new queer/feminist things to read. Here are some of the best.

The Top 10 Queer/Feminist Books of 2014

10. Texts From Jane Eyre by Mallory Ortberg

Texts From Jane Eyre is a compilation, including new material, of Mallory Ortberg’s popular texts from series. The point is less that popular canonical literary characters have phones, and more that depicting them through vapid, hilarious text message means they are dismantled, with a dash of misandry. In a review at the LARB, Sarah Mesle argues Texts From has created a whole new genre of literary criticism and expression:

“Texts from Jane Eyre isn’t really another book in the mode of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies — a book I enjoy, but which stages the collision between high literature and mass culture as a joke for its own sake. Texts from Jane Eyre, by contrast, uses that collision to pointed satiric effect.

The better comparison might be that Texts from Jane Eyre is to literary culture what The Daily Show is to politics: both use satire to expose the contradictions and absurdity enabling powerful figures. And Ortberg’s satire matters because it is fantastically able to express women’s anger toward men: men both real, and imagined.”

9. Playing The Whore by Melissa Gira Grant

In Playing the Whore, Melissa Gira Grant argues that sex workers are entitled to the same rights as people in any other field, and that insisting that sex workers – and everyone – must love their jobs or risk losing them is harmful. In an interview with Carmen at Autostraddle right before Playing The Whore was published, Grant says:

“I wanted to document and question the various interests involved in insisting that any sex workers who for whatever reason still want to do sex work are both an insignificant minority and a dire threat — because they shatter stereotypes, sure, but also because they insist on speaking for themselves. Writing the essay [that led to the book] pulled my perspective around sex work into a new focus, shifting from sex workers’ experiences (including my own) to those people who want to speak for sex workers. Anti-sex work activists, police, politicians, journalists — these people produce fantasies about sex work that bear even less relationship to sex workers’ own lives than what sex workers get paid to play out with customers. Writing this was a classic script flip.”

8. Redefining Realness by Janet Mock

In Redefining Realness, Janet Mock tells her coming-of-age story with a backdrop of the intersection that “bridge[s] between those communities, between the queer and trans community and women of color communities.” In an interview with Rookie, Mock says:

“Those words [i.e., intersectionality] are very powerful tools for describing this oppression, and it’s great that some people have access to them. But most people don’t. For me, it was super important to not use those terms in the book, because they exclude a lot of people who don’t have educational access, or who may not be engaged in social-justice stuff but who want to be enlightened about things and have their political consciousnesses raised a bit. I wanted to write the book for everyone—including that girl who I was in seventh grade who didn’t even know the term transgender. I wanted to give her a book so she could also feel like she was in the know, without being talked down to or made to feel like she has to aspire to something “higher” when she already has all the knowledge she needs to define her own experience. It’s not for me to define it for her. So I wanted to use words and language that she understands.”

7. Women In Clothes edited by Sheila Heti, Heidi Julavits and Leanne Shapton

Women In Clothes is a collaborative, lengthy, multi-form anthology that uses survey answers, personal essays, interviews, discussions, illustrations, photography and more to examine the relationships between women and the way they present themselves. At the Rumpus, Amy Feltman writes:

“In our conversation, Ms. Julavits emphasized the plasticity and continued evolution of the project. The book includes such diverse contributions as essays on perfume selection, whether to wear lipstick as a female Israeli soldier, and wardrobe choices as an Orthodox Jewish woman in an MFA program. […]

Ultimately, it is the multiplicity of perspectives that makes Women in Clothes an immersive, fascinating experience—“un-put-downable,” to borrow a term from a friend. The book is well-balanced between serious, insightful journalism (an essay by human rights journalist Mac McClelland, an account of a collapsed clothing factory in Bangladesh) and pleasurable self-reflection (Julavits’s piece on a misplaced mitten and the downfall of refusing to accept loss). The reader feels included in an intimate, ongoing conversation about the relationship between our physical and emotional selves.”

6. A Cup of Water Under My Bed by Daisy Hernández

Former Colorlines editor Daisy Hernández calls her new memoir on sexuality, family, and class and race her attempt “to answer the questions I had. What did it mean to be bi coming from a Cuban-Colombian home? What did it mean that I longed to be normal?” In a review at Feministing, Juliana Britto Schwartz writes:

“Hernandez’s coming-of-age memoir, A Cup of Water Under My Bed, explores some of the questions we face as young adults navigating gender, race, migration and sexuality in a world that imposes such strict borders on us. She writes her experiences as a queer Latina and daughter of immigrants like a compilation of anecdotes which ultimately tell a whole history.”

5. Smoke Gets In Your Eyes by Caitlin Doughty

Smoke Gets In Your Eyes reads partly like a coming-of-age memoir and partly like an anti-patriarchial reclamation of death and dying. It is gross and it is glorious. (You can read an excerpt at NRP.) In a later chapter, Doughty writes:

“We can wander further into the death dystopia, denying that we will die and hiding dead bodies from our sight. Making that choice means we will continue to be terrified and ignorant of death, and the huge role it plays in how we live our lives. Let us instead reclaim our mortality, writing our own Ars Moriendi for the modern world with bold, fearless strokes.”

4. Like A Beggar by Ellen Bass

The latest poetry collection from Ellen Bass is structural, naked, vivid, and sexy in the sense of “contains lesbian sex.” In a review at the Rumpus, Julie Enszer writes:

“Bass’s deftness as a poet is breathtaking in Like a Beggar. By which I mean: I am left breathless reading these poems and witnessing her control of the line. Then, I am equally awed by my own breathlessness, which Bass, of course, has elicited artfully through her control. Reading each poem I feel as though I have been walking up and down the hills of Esalen with her. Like a Beggar sings with the clarity of a single voice alone in a large concert hall and with the gravitas of a full chorus in the finale of a sold out opera. These poems are large in their ambitions and precise in their observations.”

3. The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters

Sarah Waters’s latest historical novel, set in 1922 London, comes predictably highly praised and centers on the love affair between Frances, who lives in a house newly divided with an apartment for renters, and Lilian, one of the renters. Also there is a murder. In her Year of Reading at the Millions, Emily Gould writes:

“[I]t’s a gripping page-turner in addition to being perfectly written and it’s about something important and real. I wonder whether reviewers’ understandable reticence about revealing the plot twist that changes the book halfway through from masterful historical portraiture to something more like a thriller made it a harder sell than it ought to have been? Anyway, if you like interwar London, fraught lesbian secret affairs, and hot sex scenes, plus crime, punishment, and hard moral questions that keep you thinking long after the book is over — I mean, it’s just hard to imagine anyone not loving this book.”

2. An Untamed State by Roxane Gay

Essayist, short story writer and internet hero Roxane Gay’s debut novel is about a woman who is kidnapped and held for thirteen days and who must then find her way back to herself. In the LARB, Eric Newman writes:

“An Untamed State is a novel about the cultural politics of belonging, and the precarious condition of women in a world organized by male violence. It is important to remember that it is also an exploration of a particular historical moment and place. Gay writes about a Haiti ‘that belonged to men who obeyed no kind of law.’ […]

Looking back on her experience, Mireille reasons that there are at least three Haitis: ‘The country Americans know and the country Haitians know and the country I thought I knew.’ Haiti might ultimately be unknowable to Mireille and Gay’s American readers, but An Untamed State works to illuminate the difference that sutures that unknowability across national borders. Readers won’t forget this painful, beautiful, and important novel.”

1. Bad Feminist by Roxane Gay

In her first essay collection, Roxane Gay addresses gender, sexuality, race and pop culture. Everything about it is amazing. In an edited version of the introduction at Buzzfeed, Gay writes:

“I’m trying to lead, in a small, imperfect way. I am raising my voice as a bad feminist. I am taking a stand as a bad feminist. I offer insights on our culture and how we consume it. The essays in my collection also examine race in contemporary film, the limits of “diversity,” and how innovation is rarely satisfying; it is rarely enough. I call for creating new, more inclusive measures for literary excellence and take a closer look at HBO’s Girls and the phenomenon of the Fifty Shades trilogy. The essays are political and they are personal. They are, like feminism, flawed, but they come from a genuine place. I am just one woman trying to make sense of this world we live in. I’m raising my voice to show all the ways we have room to want more, to do better.”

Honorable Mentions, In No Order

Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine

Prelude to Bruise by Saeed Jones

Lumberjanes by Grace Ellis, Noelle Stevenson, Shannon Watters and Brooke Allen *

Men Explain Things To Me by Rebecca Solnit

Motherland Fatherland Homelandsexuals by Patricia Lockwood

Tomboy: A Graphic Memoir by Liz Prince

Moving Forward Sideways Like a Crab by Shani Mootoo

New York 1, Tel Aviv 0: Stories by Shelly Oria

* Conflict of interest disclosure: Lumberjanes is top 10 in my heart and so is one of its creators. NOT YOU GRACE DON’T WORRY.

If I missed your favorite book of this year and you have feelings about it, please comment using as much punctuation and self-righteous indignation as possible. Or just tell me about what I should read next.

Read a F*cking Book: Late Summer Reading For Queers and Feminists

In a recent essay on her bibliomania, Zadie Smith writes that summer is the most forgiving time of year for compulsive reading, as “the beach is one of the few places pathological readers can pass undetected among their civilian cousins.”

Regardless of the degree of your pathology, these brand-new and forthcoming books look both super exciting and also relevant to your interests. With essays, a cookbook, historical fiction, lesbian romance, memoir, gender studies and more in no particular order*, your to-read list is about to get even longer.

*Except for Bad Feminist. Bad Feminist is first for a reason.

Bad Feminist by Roxane Gay

In her first collection of essays, writer, academic and badass Roxane Gay addresses pop culture, politics, race, class, gender and more. I honestly could not be more excited for this book. In the Los Angeles Review of Books, Erika Schickel writes:

“Gay’s subtext is that to be female in this age and not be a feminist is to be a victim of internalized misogyny. This is how they get us: we are made to believe empowerment just isn’t sexy; in a misogynistic culture, if we become unlikable, and hence, unfuckable, we have failed in our primary purpose as women. In essay after essay, Gay smartly dials in on all the moral concessions we have to make if we’re going to participate in said culture […] Gay’s collection bears witness to the frustration, sorrow, and outrage that any intelligent woman feels when looking to be entertained or understood by the patriarchy. We search for ourselves and each other in the margins of the culture, where women are accorded mostly supporting roles. Sometimes that means we have to take what we can get.”

The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters

The latest novel from the author of classic lesbian fiction like Tipping the Velvet and Fingersmith is set in 1922 London and features such lesbian problems as falling in love with your married tenant and accidentally committing murder with her. According to a starred review in Publishers Weekly:

“Readers of Waters’s previous novels know that she brings historical eras to life with consummate skill, rendering authentic details into layered portraits of particular times and places. Waters’s restrained, beautiful depiction of lesbian love furnishes the story with emotional depth, as does the suspense that develops during the tautly written murder investigation and ensuing trial. When Frances and Lily confront their radically altered existence, the narrative culminates in a breathtaking denouement.”

Smoke Gets In Your Eyes by Caitlin Doughty

Smoke Gets In Your Eyes: And Other Lessons From The Crematory is part coming of age story, part history and part memento mori. In an interview in which she describes her memoir’s target audience as “people who will die,” Doughty says:

“I came in when I was 23, thinking ‘C’mon, you love death; you got this, girl.’ But the reality of the crematory and how the death industry actually works in America was a pretty harsh wake-up call. The idea is to take the reader with me as my perceptions of death change, which hopefully will make them look at death differently as well.”

Women In Clothes edited by Sheila Heti, Heidi Julavits and Leanne Shapton

This large edited collection examines women’s relationship with clothing through personal narratives, poems, survey answers and interviews by contributors like Molly Ringwald, Roxane Gay, Eileen Myles, Miranda July, Zadie Smith, Tavi Gevinson, Kalpona Akter, Ruth Riechl and tons of others. A Kirkus review notes:

“Some flaunt attention-getting fashion choices: wearing silver Doc Martens; coloring their hair bright blue; buying a ‘florescent and hooker-ish’ dress; altering a winter coat by trimming it with lace. One woman removes all tags and labels. ‘In some superstitious way,’ she writes, ‘I feel like this allows the clothes to become more fully themselves….’ Another uses clothes ‘as a way to cast a spell over myself, so that I might feel special.’ Poems, interviews, pieces that read like diary or journal entries — all these responses help the editors fulfill their aims: to liberate readers from the idea that women have to fit a certain image or ideal, to show the connection between dress and ‘habits of mind,’ and to offer readers ‘a new way of interpreting their outsides.'”

Sexual Futures, Queer Gestures, And Other Latina Longings by Juana María Rodríguez

Juana María Rodríguez uses radicalized queer female Latina subjects as a starting point for her discussion of gestures, embodiment and sexual pleasures and practices in the social arena. According to the publisher:

“Situating articulations of sexual subjectivity between the interpretive poles of law and performance, Rodríguez argues that forms of agency continually mediate among these various structures of legibility — the rigid confines of the law and the imaginative possibilities of the performative. She reads the strategies of Puerto Rican activists working toward self-determination alongside sexual performances on stage, in commercial pornography, in multi-media installations, on the dance floor, and in the bedroom. Rodríguez examines not only how projections of racialized sex erupt onto various discursive mediums but also how the confluence of racial and gendered anxieties seeps into the gestures and utterances of sexual acts, kinship structures, and activist practices.”

There Goes The Gayborhood? by Amin Ghaziani

Ghaziani examines the future of gay villages in an American society that has become increasingly queer friendly, and uses census data, polls, primary interviews and news reports to argue that a post-gay era is dawning. According to a Publishers Weekly review that calls the book “passionate and refreshing“:

“Ghaziani’s answers refuse easy scapegoats or facile conclusions, and suggest that the cultural evolution of gayborhoods need not entail their demise. He brings much needed nuance to heated debates about the role of gay neighborhoods in wider patterns of gentrification, and illustrates how the growth of tolerance is not evenly distributed across the country, making the need for ‘safe space’ especially urgent for some LGBT constituencies.”

My Drunk Kitchen: A Guide To Eating, Drinking, And Going With Your Gut by Hannah Hart

YouTube series My Drunk Kitchen’s Hannah Hart‘s first cookbook combines recipes and photography by Autostraddle photographer/A-Camp co-director/perfect human Robin Roemer with life advice, emotional baggage, drawing, cooking tips and more. A Kirkus review notes:

“Hart’s wacky sense of humor carries on in this collection of drink suggestions, which includes fun recipes, cooking tips, photos, quotes and life lessons. Whether the author is elaborating on the basics of kitchen improvisation and ‘filling your heart as well as your stomach,’ embracing the bumpy journey toward adulthood, or exploring the boundaries of love and sexuality, Hart remains entertaining.”

Adult Onset by Ann-Marie MacDonald

The first novel from noted Canadian author Ann-Marie MacDonald since her 2003 The Way the Crow Flies is about love, family darkness and motherhood. According to the publisher:

“As a child, Mary-Rose suffered from an illness, long since cured and ‘filed separately’ in her mind. But as her frustrations mount, she experiences a flare-up of forgotten symptoms which compel her to rethink her memories of her own childhood and her relationship with her parents. With her world threatening to unravel, the spectre of domestic violence raises its head with dangerous implications for her life and that of her own children.”

Taking Fire by Radclyffe

This lesbian romance features two women thrown together by circumstance and forced to cooperate by war and fate. There is also a lot of sex. In an interview with Jody Klaire, Radclyffe notes:

“The book is an action-romance much like Above All, Honor or Trauma Alert — although it is one of the rare books I set outside the US (in part). The story begins in the jungles of Somalia and ends in the jungle of Washington, DC J. There is danger, field surgery, the clash between war and humanitarian goals — and of course, passion.”

Susan Sontag: A Biography by Daniel Schreiber

Newly translated from German, this biography of noted public intellectual Susan Sontag draws on photography, interviews and correspondence to examine her life and cultural influence. In an excerpt from the volume at Flavorwire, Schreiber writes:

“1964 was the year Martin Luther King Jr. was awarded the Nobel Prize and Congress passed the Civil Rights Act. It was the year the peace movement and the New Left began to form; the year a pop group from Liverpool crossed the Atlantic and Beatles hysteria reached the United States; and the year when acts of rebellion, recreational drugs, Eastern religion, and sexual liberation broke out of their bohemian ghetto. Even middle-class kids suddenly began to read Allen Ginsberg, study Zen Buddhism, and smoke marijuana. It was the year Andy Warhol’s muse Edie Sedgwick moved to New York and Warhol himself moved into a new studio on 47th Street in midtown Manhattan, covered it completely with aluminum foil, and thus founded the legend of the Silver Factory. It was also the year Susan Sontag became famous.”

Personally, and in the deeper future, I’m also really excited for Texts From Jane Eyre and Pen & Ink and The Unspeakable: And Other Subjects Of Discussion and a ton of other books I can’t stop adding, deleting and re-adding to my Amazon cart.

What book(s) are you most dying to read right now?

Team Pick: Vaginal Fantasy Discusses “Tipping The Velvet” With Hannah Hart

Laura’s Team Pick:

In celebration of DOMA’s overturn, Felicia Day’s romance book club read Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters in July. The Google Hangout discussion streamed live on Tuesday evening and – like that month of partying in-anticipation-of and raucous-celebration-after gaining new civil rights – it was spectacular.

Also, the book club’s name is “Vaginal Fantasy,” and this is their logo:

Vaginal Fantasy: “A gathering of wine, women and smut as they discuss and dissect a new romance novel each month.”

Per usual, Felicia was joined by her “vadge fan” co-hosts, Bonnie Burton, Kiala Kazabee and Veronica Belmont, a.k.a. the most hilarious, smart and sexy group of geek women to ever grace YouTube/the internet at large. This month, they also had special guest star Hannah Hart, the inimitable star of “My Drunk Kitchen” and “Words With Girls.” Adorably, the group started by going around in a circle to show-and-tell their wine. Then they launched into a chatty, hour long discussion on Tipping the Velvet!

Felicia shows off her bottle of tiny wine, and her co-hosts react appropriately.

If you are one of the few queer ladies who doesn’t already have Tipping the Velvet as part of their lives, here’s a description:

The heroine of this audacious first novel knows her destiny and seems content with it. Her place is in her father’s seaside restaurant, shucking shellfish and stirring soup. At night she often ventures into the nearby music hall, not that she has illusions of being more than an audience member. But the moment she spies a new male impersonator, still something of a curiosity in England 1888, her years of innocence come to an end and lifetime transformation begins.

Throughout the course of Vaginal Fantasy’s discussion, Veronica discovers fanfiction for the first time, Bonnie talks about her feelings on being bi, and Hannah reminds us how awesome Emily and Naomi were in Skins seasons 3 and 4. It’s great! Really really great! And since I don’t want to ruin it for you by giving a play-by-play rundown, you should just watch it.

For more fun, previous episodes are also available on the Vaginal Fantasy website. Past books picks include The Cthulhurotica Anthology by Carrie Cuinn, White Trash Zombie by Diana Rowland, and Succubus Blues by Richelle Mead. (They’re mostly a sci-fi/fantasy romance book club. This is the first piece of lesbian literature that they’ve read, but sometimes not all the characters are human, so I think that’s pretty queer.)

I don’t know about you, but my plan for the day is to listen to all the past episodes and think about how to best incorporate the Vaginal Fantasy logo into my wardrobe. Do I want it emblazoned across my chest? As a hat? Maybe a tattoo? There are just so many wonderful options!

Via Geek and Sundry