This is Our Rainbow: 16 Stories of Her, Him, Them, and Us Edited by Katherine Locke and Nicole Melleby | e-ARC Review | TBR and Beyond Book Tour

Hello everyone and welcome back to the blog. Today is my spot in the “This is our Rainbow” Tour, and I couldn’t be more excited!

What you can expect is a review, a playlist and some favorite quotes.

And now, without further ado, let’s start!

The first LGBTQIA+ anthology for middle-graders featuring stories for every letter of the acronym, including realistic, fantasy, and sci-fi stories by authors like Justina Ireland, Marieke Nijkamp, Alex Gino, and more!
A boyband fandom becomes a conduit to coming out. A former bully becomes a first-kiss prospect. One nonbinary kid searches for an inclusive athletic community after quitting gymnastics. Another nonbinary kid, who happens to be a pirate, makes a wish that comes true–but not how they thought it would. A tween girl navigates a crush on her friend’s mom. A young witch turns herself into a puppy to win over a new neighbor. A trans girl empowers her online bestie to come out.
From wind-breathing dragons to first crushes, This Is Our Rainbow features story after story of joyful, proud LGBTQIA+ representation. You will fall in love with this insightful, poignant anthology of queer fantasy, historical, and contemporary stories from authors including: Eric Bell, Lisa Jenn Bigelow, Ashley Herring Blake, Lisa Bunker, Alex Gino, Justina Ireland, Shing Yin Khor, Katherine Locke, Mariama J. Lockington, Nicole Melleby, Marieke Nijkamp, Claribel A. Ortega, Mark Oshiro, Molly Knox Ostertag, Aisa Salazar, and AJ Sass.

Title – This is Our Rainbow
Genre – Middle Grade Anthology
Release date – October 19th, 2021

“This is our Rainbow” is an anthology and one of the firsts I’ve really enjoyed. It’s been refreshing to read all of these stories full of love, acceptance and friendships. There have been stories I absolutely loved and some I’ve liked a bit less, and that’s totally okay.

I enjoyed the fact that I was able to discover a whole new range of authors that I’ve never gotten the chance to read before. My wallet will like it a bit less, but I have to admit that I’ve added all these authors with their works onto my TBR.

The stories all worked well with each other, and it wasn’t disturbing at all to have all these different writing styles in one book. There is also literally a short story for everyone, which makes this anthology even more perfect! It also put a smile all over my face every time I picked this book up on my phone.

If you look for a book that makes you feel accepted and educates you at the same time, then these short stories will work for you. And for everyone else, I highly recommend this book because you didn’t know that you needed this anthology in your currently reading pile. Pick it up! Thank you very much.

My favorite quotes are the following:

“Apparently, I’m supposed to be polite when people disrespect me.”
“Magic would’ve made the job faster, but some things were best done the ordinary way, no shortcuts.”
“[…]she had no idea what to say, besides, What the almighty heck are you doing here? And that seemed a bit rude.”
“She wanted to run. Not to anywhere or from anything. Just because.”

And there are a billion of other quotes, but then I’d need to quote the whole anthology. So I’ll stop right here.

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/50713820-this-is-our-rainbow

Amazon: https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B08VFV49LS/ref=x_gr_bb_amazon?ie=UTF8&tag=x_gr_bb_amazon_ca-20&linkCode=as2&camp=15121&creative=330641

Barnes and Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/this-is-our-rainbow-katherine-locke/1138717904?ean=9780593303948

Book Depository: https://www.bookdepository.com/This-Is-Our-Rainbow-Katherine-Locke/9780593303948?ref=grid-view&qid=1631563242713&sr=1-2

Indigo: https://www.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/this-is-our-rainbow-16/9780593303948-item.html?ikwid=this+is+our+rainbow&ikwsec=Home&ikwidx=0#algoliaQueryId=75546e9ee95700c1b7bca6d06096ffab

IndieBound: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780593303948

Katherine Locke lives and writes in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with their feline overlords and their addiction to chai lattes. They are the author of The Girl with the Red Balloon, a 2018 Sydney Taylor Honor Book and 2018 Carolyn W. Field Honor Book, as well as The Spy with the Red Balloon. They are the co-editor and contributor to It’s A Whole Spiel: Love, Latkes and Other Jewish Stories, and a contributor to Unbroken: 13 Stories Starring Disabled Teens and the forthcoming Out Now: Queer We Go Again. They are also the author of Bedtime for Superheroes and What are Your Words?. They not-so-secretly believe most stories are fairytales in disguise. They can be found online at KatherineLockeBooks.com and @bibliogato on Twitter and Instagram.

Katherine is represented by Lara Perkins at Andrea Brown Literary Agency.

Website: https://www.katherinelockebooks.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/bibliogato

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bibliogato/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8430243.Katherine_Locke

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/katherinelockebooks

Nicole Melleby, a born-and-bread Jersey native, is an award-winning children’s author. Her middle grade books have been Junior Library Guild Gold Standard selections, and have earned the Skipping Stones Honor Award, as well as being a 2020 Kirkus Reviews best book of the year. Her debut novel, Hurricane Season, was a Lambda Literary Award finalist. She currently teaches college literature and creative writing, and spends most of her free time roller skating. She lives with her wife and their cat, whose need for attention oddly aligns with Nicole’s writing schedule.

Website: https://www.nicolemelleby.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/NeekoMelleby

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nicolemelleby/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/18141483.Nicole_Melleby