Small-batch independent yarn dyer Clara Ziegler is eager to brainstorm new color combinations–if only she could come up with ideas she likes as much as last time! When she sees Danielle Solomon’s paintings of Florida wildlife by chance at a neighborhood gallery, she finds her source of inspiration. Outspoken, passionate, and complicated, Danielle herself soon proves even more captivating than her artwork…
Knit One, Girl Twois $1.99/68 pages. Cover art by Jane Dominguez; picture of Clara and Danielle is by @agaricals on commission.
I’m reading this right now and I love it!
Listen, I’m reading this and i’m like 5 pages in (on my kindle app) and ran into this sentence:
“I am so gay,” she whispered to herself happily.
YES. YES EXACTLY THIS. THIS IS ME EVERY FUCKIN DAY I ALREADY IDENTIFIED HARD WITH THIS GIRL OVER MUSICAL THEATER AND YARN BUT NOW I KNOW I WILL FOLLOW HER TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH.
…basically get this cute little novella, it’s precious adorable girl-loving fluff.
💙💚💙💚💙💚💙🌴
I just finished and oh my gosh, I am smiling so much! This story was perfect and so, so sweet! There are queer and trans characters throughout the book apart from the lesbian lead and her bisexual love interest, and even though they only have a couple of lines each (the book is only 68 pages) they have their own individual personalities, and they felt real to me rather than tokens. There are trans characters of all ages, which made me so happy.
The book also shows a lot of the MC’s relationship with her sister, destroying the myth that having a f/f romance, especially one at the center of a story, somehow undervalues platonic relationships between women.
Also, the characters interact with each other in a way that represents how I interact with my friends. family, and partner as a queer person (and a queer nerd at that) I’ve never seen in fiction. There’s this myth we don’t talk about being queer with each other, or think about it all that much. Even when we’re represented in fiction, we rarely talk to each other at all (there should be some kind of queer Bechdel-Wallace test). When we’re allowed to exist in media, we’re expected to do so quietly. (Seeing fanfiction represented as something that resonates with queer people rather than the myth that it’s just for ‘straight teenage fangirls’ meant so much to me, too!)
And, (vague spoiler ahead!) seeing a character’s struggle after trauma to create something using her chosen medium resonated so much with me as a writer who has struggled to write outside of fanfiction (and even then not feeling ‘into it’ like I used to) for years.
This story is seriously amazing and I have actually deleted several paragraphs of me gushing over it because I could go on and on! As a note, I usually don’t like contemporary stories, but I REALLY loved this one. 6/5 stars. :)
