Welcome to week 22 of the 2022 IHS Sapphic Reading Challenge.

Jan won the May $25 Amazon gift card.

Before we get to the books, we want to remind you of two ways you can interact with other readers to enhance your experience during the challenge this year.

First, you can join the I Heart SapphFic Facebook reader group. Every Monday we will announce the category for the week, and every Wednesday you will have the opportunity to post what book you are reading and be entered into the monthly drawing for a $25 Amazon gift card. (For those who are not on Facebook and still want to enter, remember you can email your reading selection to tbm@iheartlesfic.com).

Second, we have created a Goodreads group where readers can discuss books, swap recommendations, and generally have a good time.

Now, to get to the task at hand. We paired Historical Fiction with Pride month.

Below you’ll find reading suggestions. Better yet, 6 of them are on sale, so scoop up some fantastic reads at bargain prices. Before you click any buy buttons, please ensure the sale price matches. (Some international prices may vary.)

The following books are on sale for Historical Fiction week: June 6 through June 10

Mary, Everything

by Cassandra Yorke

FREE $4.99 (Also in Kindle Unlimited)

A young woman born in the wrong reality.

A destiny that will lead her into the past.

And a love so enduring it reaches across time – and existence itself – to bring her home.

A gripping tale of best friends and romance, sorcery and survival, at the dawn of the Roaring 20s.

Courtney is a lonely undergrad at secluded Braddock College in 2004, working a drowsy summer job in the Archives. Assigned to a new project, she becomes haunted by a college yearbook from the 1920s – filled with familiar faces and memories of times she never experienced. A chance encounter with a mysterious girl named Sadie – dressed in long-outdated clothes – alters her reality. But if you were never meant to be born, that reality can expel you like an infection – or kill you outright. While Courtney struggles against forces she cannot comprehend, a psychopathic stalker smells blood and closes in for the kill.

Sadie, now in 1921, races against the clock to save her friend, joined by some remarkable allies – an American combat sorceress and veteran of World War I, an enigmatic professor who specializes in piercing the veil between realities, and two young women who insist they’re Courtney’s oldest friends – one of them even claiming to be her truest love.

Time is running out for Courtney, and a terrifying wilderness – haunted by the dead from centuries past – may hold the key to her salvation. But none who enter have ever returned…

In the Shadow of the Past

by J.E. Leak

$0.99 $4.99 

She fell for the wrong woman … now it’s going to cost her.

New York City, 1943. Reporter Jenny Ryan is plagued with guilt. Plunging into a world of danger after her father’s murder, her burning need for justice drives her to take on a ruthless tycoon. But her plan goes awry when she falls for the criminal’s alluring mistress.

OSS agent Kathryn Hammond seethes with frustration. Trapped stateside in a dead-end assignment, the undercover spy fears she’ll never pay her wartime debts. But when a feisty journalist enters the picture, her resentment blooms into undeniable desire.

When she discovers her revenge could destroy the woman she loves, Jenny is faced with an impossible decision. But as Kathryn falls deeper for Jenny, giving up their forbidden relationship could be her only chance at redemption.

Will their passion cost them their lives, or can the star-crossed lovers still create a happy ending?

Merchants of Milan

by Edale Lane

$0.99 $4.99 (Also in Kindle Unlimited)

Three powerful merchants, two independent women in love, one masked vigilante.

Love blooms between Florentina and Maddie, but Florentina’s role as the vigilante Night Flyer could lead to her death and Maddie’s broken heart.

Florentina, set on revenge for her father’s murder, creates an alter-ego known as the Night Flyer. Madelena, whose husband was also murdered, hires Florentina as a tutor for her children and love blossoms between them. However, Florentina’s vendetta is fraught with danger, and surprising developments threaten both women’s lives.

Miserere

by Caren J. Werlinger

$0.99 $5.99 

1968 – a year of upheaval for the nation and for the Mitchell family. When her father goes MIA in Vietnam, ten-year-old Connemara and her family move to West Virginia and into her mother’s ancestral home – a neglected house whose walls hold old secrets of forbidden love and knowledge of things best forgotten.

For reasons she does not yet understand, Conn is chosen as the one who must unravel the mystery surrounding her ancestor, Caitríona Ní Faolain, who disappeared soon after the Civil War – a mystery that has condemned her family to a curse for over a hundred years.

Set during two of the most turbulent periods of American history, this story takes the reader on an epic journey through time as Conn delves deeper and deeper into her family’s past in order to end the curse before it is passed on to a new generation. Along the way, she teaches the adults around her something of the enduring power of love and hatred – and the terrible price of redemption.

The Sappho Romance

by Sam Skyborne & Jacquie Lyon

$2.99 $6.99 

The best-kept secret of antiquity—the veil has finally been lifted on the legend of Sappho and her true love, Phaon. A vivid tale of rivalry, passion, power, loss and love.

It all started on an ‘unsinkable’ ship, caught in the eye of a raging storm. Here, politics and passion collided and by an act of the Gods, a young slave girl is spared and given another chance at life—a life beyond even her wildest imaginings.

They said a slave could not surpass her master…

They said a wife is the property of her husband…

They said women had no place in a ‘man’s world’…

Three courageous women choose to break the rules… to follow their hearts, leaving a trail of mystery, myth and legend so bizarre that it has taken almost 3000 years to uncover.

The Songs of Bilitis

Biggest hoax of the 19th Century? Or true herald from beyond the grave?

These songs first saw the light of day at the end of the 1800’s, when a French translation was published in Paris by Pierre Louÿs.

Controversy and scandal surrounded them from the start.

Were they merely erotic dreams of the Paris bourgeoisie at the turn of the century? Or are they truly a genuine voice from a far-off past—a young woman growing up in ancient Greece, singing of her loves lost and found and providing us with an important insight into what life was like for women in that time?

Once in Berlin

by Jo Havens

$3.99 $6.99 (Also in Kindle Unlimited)

Could you spy on the woman you loved?

It’s 1938 and Europe teeters on the edge of war.

In Berlin, life for Mila Nessian – genius mathematician, billionaire and womaniser – is one long party. A spot of rocket science by day, the Third Reich’s prettiest daughters by night. She knows what they whisper behind their hands – that Germany’s most dazzling mind has nothing but a calculator where her heart should be, a sliver of ice instead of soul. She smirks through yet another boring cocktail party and hopes they’re wrong.

Cecelia Balfour is dragged to Berlin by her socialite mother – and it’s the last place she wants to be. Cecelia has lost a lover and worries that her heart is too bruised to ever properly love again. To distract her, to maybe get her back in the game, her cousin at MI6 sets up a play: flirt with Mila Nessian, capture her secrets, lure her back to London.
Because what Mila is working on could steer the course of the coming war. The Nazis want her brilliance, British Secret Intelligence wants her silence, and Cecelia – once she has laughed with her, slept with her, sipped champagne on a zeppelin with her and lost her heart to her – Cecelia wants her love.

Can she win Mila’s trust and save her from the powers that control both their lives?

Keep scrolling for more reading suggestions!

Gay Pride and Prejudice

by Kate Christie

Because Queer People Deserve Happily Ever After, Too.

For the Bennet sisters, life in quiet Hertfordshire County is about to change. Netherfield Hall has just been let to a single man of large fortune. But while it is true that such a man is generally considered to be in want of a wife, it is equally true that not all men desire female companionship, just as not every woman dreams of being married.

Like other variations on Jane Austen’s classic romance novel, Gay Pride & Prejudice poses a question: What if some among Austen’s characters preferred the company of their own sex? In this queer revision of the classic original, Kate Christie offers an alternate version of love, friendship, and marriage for Elizabeth Bennet, Mr. Darcy, and others among their circle of friends. But even as the path to love veers from the straight and narrow, the destination remains much the same.

If you have an open mind, dear reader, you may discover the book Jane Austen would likely never have approved, but which, nonetheless, affords a window onto gay and lesbian life in early nineteenth century England.

Turn Again To Life

by A Zukowski

I stared at the photographs, mesmerised by the mystery of the two women. Their bodies and skin have been frozen in time, turned porcelain white and uncovered on the north face of Mont Blanc. They were once lost to the eternal silence of the snowy peaks, waiting to tell their stories. Who were these two unknown mountaineers to each other, and why were they summiting unaided, alone at the pinnacle of wilderness? My search unfolds as a love affair in early twentieth-century England comes to life.

Masquerade

by Anne Shade

Harlem, New York, 1925 is a mecca of cultural and creative freedom, where masquerade drag balls are all the rage and the music, dancing, and loose prohibition laws unite people from all walks of life.

Dinah Hampton came to Harlem for better opportunities for her family but ends up working as a nightclub chorus girl to help make ends meet. Among the nightlife and danger, she finds love in the most unexpected way.

When a scandal rocks Celine Montre’s family and sends them fleeing from New Orleans to Harlem, the gorgeous Dinah Hampton helps her to discover that there’s more to life, and love, than she ever thought possible.

When a notorious gangster sets her sights on seducing Celine, Dinah and Celine are forced to risk their hearts, and lives, for love.

Eyes on the Stars

by Lynn Ames

Jessie Keaton and Claudia Sherwood were as different as night and day. But when their nation needed experienced female pilots, their reactions were identical: heed the call. In early 1943, the two women joined the Women Airforce Service Pilots—the WASPs—and reported to Avenger Field in Sweetwater, Texas, where they promptly fell head-over-heels in love.

The life of a WASP was often perilous by definition. Being two women in love added another layer of complication entirely, leading to ostracism and worse. Like many others, Jessie and Claudia hid their relationship, going on dates with men to avert suspicion. The ruse worked well until one seemingly innocent afternoon ruined everything.

Two lives tragically altered. Two hearts ripped apart. And a second chance more than fifty years in the making.

From the airfields of World War II, to the East Room of the Obama White House, follow the lives of two extraordinary women whose love transcends time and place.

Late City Summer

by Jeanette Bears

It’s the summer of 1946 and Emily Stanton is returning to New York City for her wedding. After graduating from college and having her life planned out for her, she’s ready to walk down the aisle to the perfect man. That is until she’s face-to-face again with the woman who defined her love for the city and so much more over one long summer four years earlier.

Kate Alessi has made a life photographing the times and people around her, while trying to forget the woman who came to town for a few short months and turned her world upside down. When she ends up as the photographer for Emily’s coming wedding, she and Emily will have to navigate how to follow their dreams while realizing the ones that were lost along the way—the biggest of those dreams being their love for one another.

Charity

by Paulette Callen

Available in Kindle Unlimited

The friendship between Lena Kaiser, a sodbuster’s daughter, and Gustie Roemer, an educated Easterner, is unlikely in any other circumstance but post-frontier Charity, South Dakota. Gustie is considered an outsider, and Lena is too proud to share her problems (which include a hard-drinking husband) with anyone else.

On the nearby Sioux reservation, Gustie also finds love and family with two Dakotah women: Dorcas Many Roads, an old medicine woman, and her adopted granddaughter, Jordis, who bears the scars of the white man’s education.

When Lena’s husband is arrested for murdering his father and the secrets of Gustie’s past follow her to Charity, Lena, Gustie, and Jordis stand together. As buried horrors are unearthed and present tragedies unfold, they discover the strength and beauty of love and friendship that blossom like wild flowers in the tough prairie soil.

The Secrets of Willowra

by Kadyan

A family saga of three women, their homestead called Willowra in the Australian outback, and the secrets that link them all.

Gabrielle fled Willowra for Sydney and the freedom to live as an out lesbian, leaving behind all those she loved, especially her cherished grandmother, Victoria. Years later, Gabrielle and her partner, Tess, return to Willowra when Victoria instigates a family gathering to reveal the long-kept secret surrounding her parents, Jason and Maggie, and her own tumultuous past.

As stories and secrets are uncovered, the threads of the past weave together the lives of Jason, Victoria, and Gabrielle and illuminate a new path forward for those who share the legacy of Willowra.

Measure of Devotion

by CF Frizzell

Disguised as her late brother, Cooper, in the 19th Massachusetts Volunteers, Catherine Samson fights to quell the Confederate rebellion and preserve her nation’s unity. She believes the Constitution’s declarations of equality and freedom apply to everyone, and dreams that someday they will extend to her own pursuit of happiness with a woman.

Helping her father raise her siblings on their Gettysburg farm, Sophie Bauer likewise clings to hope for a woman to love, but when she serves as an army aide and meets Cooper, Sophie is confounded by her growing feelings for him. Catherine, meanwhile, wrestles with her deception and the disguise she must maintain. Disclosure could not only repulse Sophie but send Catherine home a social outcast.

When the Battle of Gettysburg engulfs the Bauer farm, Catherine and Sophie learn far more about themselves than they ever expected. But first there’s a war—and hearts—to be won.

Holding Their Place

by Kelly Wacker

It’s 1916 and the end of World War I seems nowhere in sight. Dr. Helen Connery, a reserved British doctor at a field hospital in northern France, knows that a woman surgeon is as good as any man. Working tirelessly to save the lives and limbs of soldiers brought to her from brutal battlefields, she finds herself unexpectedly attracted to a vivacious and enigmatic volunteer ambulance driver. Julia March awakens feelings Helen thought she’d buried long ago. When they are offered a four-day stay by the ocean, a private reprieve from the war provides an opportunity for sexual awakening.

Together Helen and Julia discover that goodness, love, and passion can be found in the most unlikely and even dangerous places.

A Spark of Heavenly Fire

by Kathleen Knowles

Kerry O’Shea and Beth Hammond have plans for the future. Beth dreams of becoming a doctor and helping the poor citizens of San Francisco. More than anything, Kerry wants them to have a home of their own, but she is committed to helping Beth make her dream come true. Kerry makes a fateful decision that could have dire consequences. Can they both have what they want, or will they lose everything, including their love for each other?

Lies of Omission

by Elena Graf

Available in Kindle Unlimited

In 1938, Margarethe von Stahle is desperately trying to practice ethical medicine despite the Nazi policy of “racial hygiene” forcing doctors to collaborate in the extermination of the handicapped and mentally ill. She has always avoided politics, but now she must decide whether to remain on the sidelines or to act on her convictions. At the same time, she is struggling to hold her family together, despite intrigue, secrecy, and an unforgivable indiscretion. The people she holds most dear are conspiring against her for their own ends. Neither of Margarethe’s children are playing to script, frustrating her hopes for the future of the House of Langenberg-Edelheim. Perhaps the only solution is to face the truth…or tell more lies of omission.

Happy reading!

Faith, Em, Miranda, & TB

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