Most Underrated Book (07)

button 30 Day Book Challenge

Welcome to the Moonlight Library’s 30 Day Book Challenge!
This meme intends to generate discussion, so please feel free to add a comment.
This particular challenge is taken from the 30 Day Challenge Archive on Tumblr.

Day 07 – Most Underrated Book

I feel that the most underrated book I’ve read is:

Ash by  Malinda Lo

Ash

This book is a Cinderella retelling, but Malinda Lo isn’t your average fairy tale reteller. This story is a lesbian romance – well, technically, it’s got a love triangle, so it’s a bisexual romance. The main character is our Ash, who is desired by a male fairy, and falls in love with the King’s Huntress. The romance is very organic and totally believable. One of my favourite things about this book is its feminist theme: the Huntress is always female, and no one questions this. Ash and the Huntress (whose name is eluding me! sorry) don’t need to come out of any closets or even ask the other if they are attracted to girls. It’s like bisexuality is the base sexuality and it’s totally OK if you like boys or girls and you don’t even need to explain to anyone why you don or don’t.

I’m not sure why this book isn’t more popular: Cinderella isn’t my favourite fairy tale, but it’s one of the most popular to retell. Everyone likes the tale of the rags to riches peasant who doesn’t really need to do anything to help themselves but are in fact rewarded by virtue of their goodness and innocence. Everyone dreams at some point of being picked from the crowd and swept of their feet into a life of luxury. Everyone thinks at some point their life is hard.

I think a lot of people might be put off by the fact that this is a bisexual story. I think there might be some ingrained prejudices. I also think this book will never have the fans that say “THIS BOOK IS SO AWESOME THE GUY IS SO HOT I WANT TO HAVE HIS BABIES”… the fairy may be manipulative, but obviously not in the ‘right’ way for readers to find attractive.

I thought this book was sweet and lovely and I totally recommend it to anyone who enjoys fairytale retellings or who isn’t afraid of a little bit of difference in your typical love triangle.

Alternate cover:

Ash

What book do you feel is underrated?

Do you think there is prejudice against non-mainstream romances?

Nemo
Nemo

About Nemo

A lover of kittens and all things sparkly, Nemo has a degree in English Literature and specialises in reviewing contemporary, paranormal, mystery/thriller, historical, sci-fi and fantasy Young Adult fiction. She is especially drawn to novels about princesses, strong female friendships, magical powers, and assassins.

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 1,835 other subscribers

7 thoughts on “Most Underrated Book (07)

  1. bookgeeking

    Looks like a good book, never heard of it before. Added to my TBR pile. I have never read a book that has a gay romance as the main romance. Got nothing against it just never read one that has. Thank you for bringing this book to my attention.

    1. Nemo

      I’ve got nothing against it either, but they are harder to track down, and I find I’m not really interested in books with romance as the primary plot point in the first place. I’d like to see some more books with casual bi or gay leads who don’t necessarily get into a romance, because it all seems to be about that aspect in most of them I think.

  2. Anya

    Good to know! I had this on my list for authors of color, but I’ve also been looking for stories with bisexuality since it seems that bisexuality doesn’t really have a niche. LGBT stories tend to have gay and lesbian characters, which is great, but I want all sexualities portrayed!

    1. Nemo

      I really would like to see more bisexuality books too – or at least books about bisexual characters, not necessarily about bisexuality itself. If you find any more let me know!

    1. Nemo

      Oh yes, I hope you like it! I didn’t find it mind-blowingly amazing but it was sweet and lovely and well worth the read.

Comments are closed.