Mx. Phoebe

I have read every book in the “A Woman Lost” series and I think A Woman Trapped is the best book in the series.

If you read T.B. Markinson's blog, then you will see the real life events of Markinson's life replayed through Lizzie...and her family's eyes and it is freaking hilarious. There are tits (get your head out of the gutter!), oranges, and trips to real places.

You will also get to view how those of us in Massachusetts trod through the pandemic. COVID-19 hits the Petrie family and its extended family as it has hit everyone: hard, fast, and with stupefaction. How do we manage in this new world? Well if you are anything like Lizzie, you handle it with panic of course (laugh).

I actually think Lizzie handled it pretty much as I have and this is the funny thing. This is the eight book about the Petries and this is the first one that I realized: I am Lizzie! Or maybe Lizzie is me. But, Markinson has never met me (laugh). Hmmm...maybe because we both live in Massachusetts? Osmosis in action rainbows.

For whatever reason, Lizzie seemed relatable to me in this novel and I identified with her actions so much more. Maybe because Markinson was able to tap into what every human was experiencing, or viewing someone they loved doing and giving us an ability to laugh about it. Markinson inserts real-life incidents and I laughed aloud.

Who hasn't been pissed when someone does something we would never do? I have totally been mad about the above quote. Like: Seriously?!

This is the first time in the series that I pick Lizzie as my favorite character. Maybe it is because I am in a different place or because I have issues with self-acceptance (laugh). Markinson makes A Woman Trapped feel new and familiar. All of the familiar voices are there, but Lizzie's actually sounds the loudest. She is not drowned out by the antics of the other characters. Lizzie's voice was finally heard by me.

Like some couples, Lizzie and Sarah end up growing closer during this period of quarantine. I love how Markinson ensures that “lesbian bed death” does not happen to this couple. I also love how after all of this time, Lizzie still lusts after Sarah. There is a comfort in that continuity.

If you have never read a book in the series, that's okay. A Woman Trapped can actually be read as a standalone. This is a family's love story during COVID. It is also a woman's journey to self-awareness in the midst of isolation. Markinson gives us laughter, romance, and Lizzie high-jinks. Markinson also still manages to throw in a surprise at the end.

If you want a married couple surviving to “happily-ever-after” in this crazy time, then A Woman Trapped is for you. Laugh. Love. And keep Lizzie away from online ordering...just saying.

WARNING: This review is heavily tainted with the impact this book had on me personally and has many spoilers and political commentary which everyone may not agree with.

Queer Joints, Wiseguys and G-Men is a collection of stories from Phillip Crawford Jr.'s now-deleted blog “Friends of Ours”.

The above sentence is a tame introduction to this book as I was enthralled just reading the Introduction to this book. I love history and this is yet another facet into gay history that I did not know about and I found just as fascinating as if it was happening today instead of years ago. It does not change my opinion of Nancy Pelosi to know the history of her father that apparently everyone else does, but I do want to know who her campaign manager is as I do not know how she got elected between her father and brother. I can imagine the horror, even if it was thirty years later, that Crawford was printing addresses of mobsters homes in his blogs which I think as a reporter is just awesome. As I was reading it made me want to go to these houses and apartments and see if they are on a tour.

It is amazing to me that over and over again for over twenty years information was given to various Presidents and to Hoover and the Mafia was not “officially” recognized until the 1950s. The reports range from ice cream shops, to cheese shops, to laundry and oddly enough a huge gay scene in Texas in the 1950s. I say oddly because I have lived in Texas and in the 1990s I still had to go to a bar outside of the base with a red light outside of it to show that it was a gay bar. So I was amazed by this section of the book and the knowledge of the gay scene and how it was utilized for crime and all of the young men exploited and how they must feel today. People always talk about women in being used in prostitution, but there is not much talk about gay men or the young men who are questioning whose choices due to circumstances they feel are taken away from them. I just wanted to hug all the boys as I was reading this section thinking of all of the damage done.

This is a short book to read for the amount of history it imparts and I recommend it - even if you just keep it in the bathroom or read it on the bus on the way to work. Read it a chapter at a time. It has something for everyone even if you are not part of the rainbow community. It shows how government works and how we keep making the same mistakes and that the issues we are having today are not new - we really are just repeating the past.

Attorney Crawford if you ever want to sit down and chat, the coffee is on me because I have questions. I loved this book. I have sat for many hours at a microfiche machine reading newspapers to find out just what the weather was for a particular day so that my story rings true or to get information for a client so I can imagine the work that went into your blog and I salute you. I received this book in a giveaway and it is truly a gift. Thank you.

#FridayReads #QueerBookReview #PhillipCrawfordJr #QueerJointsWiseguysGMen #BookReview #PhoebesRainbowWorld #LGBTNonFiction #QueerNonFiction #LGBT #LGBTQ #4Stars #Giveaway #FlippingRainbows #BookReviewer

When Rebekiah walked into Walker & Blackwell all she wanted to do was give away an inheritance. Then she took one look into Lindsey Blackwell's eyes and thought I can wait a few weeks.

Instant attraction. It does not mean it has to be given into. It's there. It's acknowledged. It can be ignored. Looking can't be wrong. As long as I don't give in and cross any lines. Well...what would it hurt to cross the line a little?

Those thoughts could come from either Rebekiah or Lindsey as they both were thinking along those lines. Rebekiah does not do relationships. She only sleeps with friends. She still has not gotten over Emma who left her with all kinds of money and pain. She just found her photography again, she does not want any complications.

Lindsey likes her life organized. A partner was just fired and she just had to take on all of his cases. She spends most of the year traveling and does have time relationships - just ask any of her last partners.

Now if they could just stop thinking about each other.

I think this is the first time I have read a book about a place and a scene I am so intimately familiar with. Providence (Bold Strokes Books, 9781635556216, 2020) written by Leigh Hays takes place almost in my backyard. I have been to many of the places Hays writes about so it was kind of weird and funny at the same time. I had to keep reminding myself that no I did not see Rebekiah or Lindsey there at any time. (hand to head emoji insert here - I can be such a goober!)

I like this story on so many levels. If you are one of my rainbows, you already know that I am going to applaud the BDSM scenes. They are well written and thought out. Kudos to Hays. The sex scenes are all hot and explore many different interests which I love. Variety is the spice of life and love. Reading this already makes me want to read another Hays book (laugh).

The background for the main characters has just as much depth and sincerity. I can relate to both main characters and Hays does not drown us in the issues, but is gives us enough to feel and connect to the MCs. The interactions between Rebekiah and Lindsey are raw and I think I like this most of all. I know this is written, but it feels unscripted and once again I give credit to Hays for this technique.

Love sometimes does not come easy for us and Hays shows this, but man she makes it look worth it.

I received an ARC of this book and I am writing a review without prejudice and voluntarily.

A lawyer defends a woman she knows is innocent from one murder and then the woman is charged with another murder she is innocent of.

Rochelle “Ro” Rabinowitz, attorney-at-law, gets assigned a pro bono case for the defense of a woman who is charged with murdering a professor of her pregnant daughter. Pam Wilson, a 62-year-old woman, claims she is innocent and she has an alibi. Pam is a hard-working cashier during the day and she cleans bathrooms at a bar under the table at night to help pay for her dying wife's, Charlotte, chemo treatments, and her daughter's medical bills while Maddie goes to graduate school. Ro and her team quickly find out that not everything is as simple as it seems as another murder occurs which is linked to Pam. A secret comes out about the professor and his activities with Maddie and other students. He had more than one visitor the night he was killed. Maddie finds her biological father and opens up yet another box of buried secrets and yet another murdered body. As the charges pile up and Pam stops talking other than to say she is innocent, Ro and her team race against time as Charlotte's time is running out, Maddie is about to go into labor, and Pam is facing the death sentence.

Attention: spoilers ahead!!!!

I do not usually write reviews with spoilers in them, but in this case it is a little hard not to as this book asks you to suspend an important belief if you are a movie fan. Anne Hagan was challenged to write this book and someone suggested that she take a famous movie and change the ending and she did. She took one of my all time favorite movies of which I have had many discussions about and even had a class on where we debated the movie and the themes in it. Needless to say in Steel City Confidential (2019), Hagan's first book in the “Steel City Series” it is pretty obvious from the get-go which movie and if you are a huge fan you might shake your head through those parts and have to really suspend your belief and ideas to accept her story-line.

How did I do? Did I give too much away? The mix of mysteries, legalese, and drama is handled with finesse by Hagan. I do find the relationship between Ro and her wife to be a complete mystery because so far they seem to have nothing in common nor do they spend any time doing anything that Ro wants to do. It does not seem as if there is even any chemistry between them. Ro's relationship with her team is explained better than with her wife and one can feel the dynamics between all of them. There are some open story-lines which I assume will either be in Steel City 2 or 3 and I hope to see the mysteries solved as this is where Hagan excelled. The lesbian relationships were paper relationships. As for the ending, once again, I really do not want to give anything away, but it contradicts what Hagan has set up in the book by going back to the movie. I want to read the next book because the legal thriller was really good and that is what I would concentrate on in this series. See you at the next bang of the gavel....

When Wrong Alibi starts I feel like I am in a Stephen King novel and Alaska feels all too real and freakin' scary. I had just finished the prequel, Right Motive, of Christina Dodd's new series “Murder in Alaska” when I started this book. Dodd definitely creates a mood and a red herring (laugh). I was sucked into the storm immediately and could not put the book down.

You do not have to read the prequel first to understand Wrong Alibi. They are both standalone stories. Matter of fact reading the prequel gave me preconceptions for Wrong Alibi so I spent two-thirds of the book waiting for a connection to the first book when there is none. The Chief of Police is the same person at the end of the story, but he is barely in it. Thinking that these two stories were connected kept my mind off of the full story of the book.

Throw your concept of time away when you are reading Wrong Alibi. Our heroine Evie has a lot happen to her in her young life and it happens hard and fast. (Don't be like me and flip through pages to make sure your timeline is correct...just go with the flow. (laugh)) Evie is a fighter even when she does not want to be.

I think the relationships in the book confuse me the most. Ioana is like two different characters in the book. I am most confused by her and her relationship with Evie. She is very cold in the beginning of Evie's story. Ioana abandons her completely. Then when Evie shows up four years later it is with a completely different tune. It is like whiplash and Dodd's explanation just doesn't make sense to me. The same can almost be said for Evie's relationship with her sister.

Now the mystery is beyond good. It is diabolical and you get where the story is going in the book on the first drive. You just don't realize the full extent of the killer's agenda until it is too late...just like Evie. Gives me the creeps just remembering it.

I wish the later connections between Donald White and his future victim is explained better. Why them? Did he know? Did it satisfy the evil within? Was it deeper? So many questions.

There is a minor romantic storyline, but romance isn't the correct word. It is just sex, but somehow it ends up romantic a couple of chapters later. No buildup just an instant “I know this is going to be my person” connection. I think the later connection did not need to be added, it actually would have made more sense for Evie to end up with Hawley who stuck by her and helped her for eight years or even Jeen who made such a big impact on Evie's life.

Wrong Alibi is a mix of action, hold your breath moments, and drama. Evie's story is thrilling, horrifying, and enthralling. Dodd creates a memorable background for Evie. Evie is Wrong Alibi and she is a survivor. A heroine to root for and to read. Check out the vastness of Alaska and the killer's impact in Wrong Alibi.

I received an ARC of this book and I am writing a review without prejudice and voluntarily.