Lavender Speculation " Short Stories" Teen and YA Short Stories, Teen and Young Adult LGBT Fiction, Ages 15-18
Wildling Publishers
Oct 17, 2023
Kindle
168
Amazon
Come along into the forest and bear your heart’s hidden desire.
Sit in the doctor’s chair and trust that the procedure will cure what ails you.
Look your demons in the eye and challenge them to fight.
Enter if you’re daring and feel these tales raise goosebumps along your arms as they take you from modern New Jersey to fairytale lands and back again. From witches to werecats and spirits to surgeries, this collection puts queer women front and center in some of the most popular subgenres of speculative fiction. Horror, dark fantasy, and magical realism coalesce in this stunning collection of all things dark and divergent.
Reviewed by Linda Tonis
Member of the Paranormal Romance Guild Review Team
The Witch of the Woods: Prudence is a young girl who happens to be in love with her best friend Abigail and she dares to make a visit to the Witch of the Woods for something to ensure that Abigail will return her love. Nothing good can ever come from visiting evil and it is a lesson Prudence will learn firsthand.
My New Gown: In a courtesan’s heart her old red dress yells to everyone what she is but her new dress finally gives her courage to be who she really is.
A Necessary Procedure: Rachel is determined to change; her jealousy and anger must go, and she is willing to undergo a procedure to make changes to keep her girlfriend. It is a procedure that is questionable, but it does raise the question of what you would be willing to do for love.
Comatose Beauty: A car crash leaves a young woman in a coma, and she is visited by a young boy who keeps talking to her but is it true that talking to a comatose patient may be the link to waking them up.
A Killer Brunch Special: Sadie has finally run out of reasons for not showing up for brunch with the women from work and unfortunately the one time she agrees she would face a nightmare, blood, death and an attempt to escape.
Eviscerate: Day after day and man writes and day after day a woman succeeds in knocking him down. Now pen to paper he is determined to eviscerate her with his words, only he should be careful it doesn’t come back to haunt him.
Lips as Red as Blood: This is a fable reminiscent of Sleeping Beauty, evil stepmother, dwarves, and escaping evil. The difference is this one makes Sleeping Beauty seem like a sweet, loving story. A tale of good over evil and it was bloody.
Personal Demons: A famous sculpture accepts the fact that he is going to die soon and believes the demon he keeps seeing is just a byproduct of his illness but is it.
Consume: Cronos ruler of the Titans and King of Kings has done everything to eliminate any threat to his rule, including swallowing each of his children at birth but he has a fight before him because it will take evil to destroy evil.
The Abandoned Princess: Bellamy is the youngest princess and unlike her sisters she doesn’t try to gain men’s attention, she only has eyes for a servant named Violet. When she was caught kissing Violet, her parents disowned her and made her live on the lowest floors of the castle until they needed her. They are sick and need medicine that can only be obtained beyond the walls of the castle, where there is poverty, darkness and crime. She has no idea what she will find and whether it will change her life for the better or worse.
The Crukker: A group of college friends are at a Fall Festival on Halloween. They are ready for some Halloween fun and scares but when a local New Jersey legend, The Crukker shows up, it proves that the legend is not legend at all but reality.
Orca: This story is about Makana, an Orca and the man who cares for her at Ocean Planet. He loves Makana and knows he has made his life better in captivity than in the open ocean. When role reversal occurs the truth of whether captivity is better than freedom and is safer is totally explored.
The Devil Down in Jersey: Mia Brown is doing research on traditions and folklore in New Jersey’s Pine Barren’s. She is planning on camping out for two nights and at a visit to Batsto Nature Center she saw a huge sign WANTED: JERSEY DEVIL 250,000 reward. With her camera in hand, she sets out to hopefully find people in the area who could give her firsthand information, but people are not what she comes across, it is a legend and there is no way to collect the reward.
Salt: Exorcising spirits is dangerous, but salt is the weapon that can keep them away. Throw salt and wait for the sizzle.
Green Forest, White Snow: An illness is killing the town’s children, and they disappear. Alyy and her sister Belizna are healthy, so the town’s people are sure her mother who makes potions is responsible. Desperate to save their mother and find the children she is confronted by a bear advising them to go to the White Witch.
Conversations in the Back of an Uber: Two women in love are in the back of an Uber and they know that the end of the trip will be the end of their relationship.
She Has a Cake and Eats it Too: Another birthday celebration in the office and another depressing moment in Carrie’s life. Carrie has been dieting and doesn’t lose weight but gains. Her coworker Zaralena eats anything and everything she wants and stays the same weight. Carrie believes something is wrong and when she sneaks into Zaralena’s computer she discovers why she doesn’t lose and Zaralena doesn’t gain. She finds a way to deal with what she discovers, and it is not what you would expect.
Bride in the Shadows: A bride left at the altar finds the thought of death or Hell the perfect remedy for the heartache she is suffering.
Cat Scratch Fever: Missy and Angie are in the market for a new cat, and they go to a cat café looking for the perfect one. While looking at pictures of all the cats available for adoption Missy pets a cat that scratches her. Worried about infection Missy and Angie leave without a cat and head home to disinfect the bite. Over time Missy begins to act different things she hated eating she now wants, and she has trouble sleeping. Angie goes to a witch shop hoping for answers, but the answers are crazy and hard to believe until it becomes apparent that what you think is crazy might just be the only thing you can count on.
This book is filled with all kinds of short stories and there are guaranteed to be some you will love, some like but none that you will hate.