u/dlstrong

hi there! u/tricky-mention-1700 mentioned that this is a safe Reddit for promo, so I thought I'd both introduce my books and make fanmuppet sounds about some fellow authors here?

I’m the author of Chai and Charmcraft, which was released this May and is still available for this weekend's indie book sale price of $2.99 until tomorrow morning.

(If you'd like to know more about it from someone who is not me, Siavahda wrote an amazing review!) 

I know I write in a particular niche because I want to see more books like this, portraying more people and more parts of the world with a gently loving story-brush. I hadn’t thought that there were many comp titles in a niche that looks like:

🤴🏽A kind, soft, middle-aged Middle Eastern gentleman who…
🫖…loves his home’s food and culture and architecture and definitely the chai…
🧸…and needs a break from all the obligations and expectations and thou-shalts in his life…
🐈…and adores the many cats who wander around his city.
🚋(So much that he made them a little solar powered cat tram!)

Up til that last bit about the tram there, I might also have been talking about Chai and Charmcraft, but I am entirely thrilled to have found C. Quince’s Consorting with the King. (Book buddies! 🤝)

There are differences, of course; Charmcraft is set in medieval Egypt and Consorting with the King is set in Regency-ish Istanbul. We’re telling different ends of the Cinderella story, with Consorting taking the lead-up to the equivalent of Cinderella’s ball and Charmcraft looking more at what happens when you’re trying to figure out the start of a relationship after that one magical night outside one’s customary sphere. 

But I’m also delighted by how much we have in common: Midlife M/M relationships set with a loving look at Middle Eastern / Southwest Asian and North African people and places, gentlemen who are gentle men in the kindest sense of the word, delicious food and feasts, and so many cats. 

All of mine will be on sale until Tuesday morning: 

• Chai and Cat-tales (180ish pages, aro/ace, trans, pan, and MM rep) for $0.99 or the local equivalent
• Haroun and the Study of Mischief (370ish pages, demi/ace and queerplatonic rep) for $2.99 or the equivalent
• Chai and Charmcraft (500ish pages, primarily MM but also aro/ace and queerplatonic rep) for $2.99 or the local equivalent
• And there’s a free sneak preview of Charmcraft’s sequel, Katayef and Kittens, available now too.

 

(They’ll go back to full price tomorrow.)

C. Quince couldn’t enter his book in the indie sale because he works through a publisher and can’t personally set his prices to a discount. But:

• Consorting with the King is available under $5 from Amazon and looks to be on an additional sale through JMS directly.

I’ve got a more lengthy review of Consorting with the King (and, of course, bonus recipes 😆) over at my website.

And taking off my author-with-comps hat, speaking as an enthusiastic reader, if anyone knows of more queer books set in the general ME/SWANA area, I’d love to know about them too!

I know about Alexandra Rowland's Mahisti books; I love Running Close to the Wind, and haven't had the emotional fortitude to absorb all the MC's anxiety in A Taste of Gold and Iron but it sounds amazing and I want to get out of my month of 15 work conventions and associated stress vibrations before I try it again?

I'd describe Running Close to the Wind as "Our Flag Means Death x the Great British Bakeoff as told by the least reliable narrator ever." We have Avra, the manic pixie trash panda with bardic ambitions who has terrifyingly fixated on the idea that all attention is good attention; Tev, a stunningly well-dressed and short-tempered pirate captain who can't manage to pry Avra off their ankles long enough to kick him to the curb; and the unfairly gorgeous and devotedly celibate Brother Julian, whom both of them would very much like to bang like an inadequately secured sail in a storm. 

Has anyone got more recs to throw out there?