“Gay Apparel” edited by Rachel Sharp

December’s book from the Great Ace Digital Book Box is a collection of short stories! I really enjoy the variety of books that they include in this collection, it’s wonderful to be exposed to different genres and forms that a book can take. And when I say short stories I mean really short, the tales range from 1-3 pages. It is truly a snapshot of a scenario. Sharp collected the stories from online submissions with the only requirements being that the submissions were queer and involved the holidays in some capacity. Other than that, no holds barred. The result is a wonderfully diverse set of stories that you can read all at once, or one per day like an advent calendar.

To be honest my biggest struggle was the length of the stories. It seemed as though every couple of pages you’d have to learn a completely new world since there were fantasy and sci-fi tales thrown in. It made it really hard to binge read, which is the way I like to consume literature. Possibly it would be easier if you were reading one a day, as the author suggested.

This collection’s definite strength is in its diversity. There are people of all genders and sexualities, celebrating all sorts of holidays here. I especially loved the story where a girl buys a pet dragon for her asexual girlfriend, I thought that was super cute. There’s even a story where the protagonist uses zey/zir/zem which was super cool. And of course there’s Christmas stories, Hannukah stories, Kwanza stories, and some Yule or pagan stories. Additionally as I alluded to earlier, there are several genres being represented from the more realistic to fantasy to historical to just fantastical. It makes for a wonderful mix!

So in general this collection is great, despite the fact that I wanted to read more of the individual stories. And it all goes towards supporting queer writers! Check it out and support if you can.