Read This, Then That: Historical Romance Edition

Once you’ve thought about how trans folks might have lived in history, explore this survey of several recorded instances of AFAB people doing just that. Manion uses they/them pronouns for many of the people discussed, since there is rarely any record of what pronouns they might have preferred. Some lived very clearly as men, while others might have leaned more in the direction of lesbian, and Manion explores what the implications of that might have been over the course of the hundred and fifty years or so of the term “Female Husband” being used in newspapers and pseudoacademic study. You’ll probably leave with more questions than answers, but isn’t that always the way? 

While it’s the second book in the Old West trilogy, Breathless can be read pretty easily on its own (though it’s always a good idea to start with Forbidden). In the Arizona Territory during Reconstruction, Portia manages the books for a grand hotel run by her aunt and uncle, Rhine and Eddy from the previous book. If she’s going to run the hotel herself one day, the last thing she should be doing is marrying an unreliable cowpoke. But Kent wormed his way into her heart years ago, and now that he’s back from his travels, she can’t seem to resist him. 

There are so many people who were fed the story of an incredibly white West by the American film industry, and this book digs into the history of Black men—and women— both on the range and in the public eye through first-person accounts, historical essays, and new research. Their subjects were rodeo stars and trail musicians, cooks and landowners. This book tells us a lot more about Black life in this world than most of us would have ever learned at school. After you’ve made it through this, you can check out the other book edited by Glasrud and Searles (AKA Cowboy Mike), Buffalo Soldiers in the West.

I can confidently say that you’ve probably never read a romance with this setting and characterization. When Dieudonne and Evena meet as adults in Paris after being childhood friends in Saint Domingue, their situations have both changed. Dieudonne, the illegitimate son of a French nobleman, has inherited his father’s title, while Evena is seeking every possible way to save her father from a mysterious illness. Both have very different goals when it comes to marriage, but accidentally find themselves compromised into marrying each other. Their friendship evolves into something else, and we just don’t think about the fact that Mam’zelle Guillotine is being dreamt up somewhere on the other side of Paris.

Strap in, folks, because the story of Daddy Dumas is something else. Alex Dumas, born to an enslaved woman and a French aristocrat, rose through the ranks of service in France. He was imposing and impressive, to the point where the Egyptians were surprised (and disappointed) that he wasn’t Napoleon. This man was the literal example of “I make war so that my son can make art, and so that his son can make really whiny art.” 

When Muriel is granted permission to present a botany paper in New York, she seeks out artist Kit Griffith to do the illustrations for her publication. But Kit is not interested, at least in making art. When some penny-farthing riders challenge Kit to ride across Cornwall on one of his safety bikes (the kind where the wheels are the same size), he says not only can he beat them, but he can do it with a woman! And of course, what woman is it who volunteers? Muriel. But only if Kit does her illustrations. This is quiet and lovely and queer, and it will change your life.  

Sometimes, YA nonfiction really hits the spot, and this book is a great dig into a subject I didn’t know much about. It explores the origin and evolution of the bicycle, and how women used them to expand their abilities to move about cities and the countryside, all while cutting hours out of their day. There are photographs and documents, and the language of the book itself is very approachable. You might want to discover more when you’re done, but you won’t have to.