Haley Rose | LGBTQ Reads

Today on the site, we’re revealing the cover for the second book in the Heretic’s Guide to Homecoming series, namely The Heretic’s Guide to Homecoming, Book Two: Practice by Sienna Tristen, which releases on October 22nd from the Shale Project! The book features an asexual genderqueer narrator, a queerplatonic partnership, and diverse case, and you can get more info on the first book here. Now read on to see where the story continues!

“All good theory stands up to the test of practice.”

Freshly risen from the underworld of his insecurities, Ronoah Genoveffa Elizzi-denna Pilanovani is halfway through his journey to the fabled Pilgrim State. But the world this side of the Iphigene Sea is not an easy one: violence and subterfuge litter the way forward, and something meaner stalks the edges of Ronoah’s certainty, something that threatens to turn the very reason for his pilgrimage to dust.

To survive, he will have to be clever and kind in equal measure. To ask for help from the acrobats and queens-to-be and foreigners’ gods that cross his path. To confront that beguiling, bewildering companion he travels with, the one whose secrets are so vast and unforgivable. He will have to draw on every story he knows in order to make it to the Pilgrim State with his soft heart intact—and then make it home again.

Mythic and multilayered, the final installment of the Heretic’s Guide to Homecoming duology is a love letter to losing and regaining faith in the world and the way you move through it.

And there’s the gorgeous cover, designed and illustrated by Haley Rose!

Preorder: Books2Read

Sienna Tristen is an author, poet, and literary organizer living in Treaty 3 territory who explores queer platonic partnership, the nonhuman world, and mythmaking in their work. The first installment of their award-winning fantasy duology The Heretic’s Guide to Homecoming came out from indie arts collective The Shale Project in 2018; you can find their poetry in Augur Magazine and Plenitude, and their chapbook hortus animarum: a new herbal for the queer heart is forthcoming from Frog Hollow Press. When the sun is up, they work with The Word On The Street Toronto to showcase the coolest Canadian & Indigenous literature.

Today on the site, we’re welcoming Avi Silver to reveal the cover of their second novel, YA fantasy Three Seeking Stars! This sequel to Two Dark Moons releases July 13th, 2021 through The Shale Project and includes an established F/NB pairing that is slowly becoming an M/F/NB polyamorous relationship, and has ace, aro, bisexual, and neurodivergent rep! Here’s the story:

Sohmeng Minhal is going to fix the world.

With her home still in jeopardy, she doesn’t have much choice. What she does have is Ahnschen, an endearing prince of the dangerous empire that is disrupting the sãoni migration route. If she can convince Hei to trust him long enough to safely return him to his people, Sohmeng might just have a chance of restoring balance to Eiji. That is, until an unexpected piece of her past emerges from the jungle and challenges everything she is trying to achieve.

Now, the future of Eiji rests in Ahn’s hands—but does he have the courage to face the harm inflicted by his people? Determined to do right by the beloved friend who died on his sword, it will take a lot of unlearning to prove to Eiji—and to Hei—that he can, in fact, be good.

In the second chapter of the Sãoni Cycle, Sohmeng, Hei, and Ahn must reconcile their places in the human and natural worlds, all while navigating their complicated feelings about one another.

And here’s the striking cover, designed by Haley Rose!

Preorder: Amazon | Bakka Phoenix | Kobo

Avi Silver is a speculative author (Two Dark Moons, 2019; Three Seeking Stars, 2021), editor (Augur Magazine), and poet. Find their short fiction in Common Bonds: An Aromantic Speculative Anthology, and their poetry forthcoming in Uncanny Magazine. In 2018, they co-founded The Shale Project, an award-winning indie arts collective, and have not stopped worldbuilding since. For more information, visit mxavisilver.com. For lizard pictures, follow them on Twitter @thescreambean.