Book Review: CAM GIRL by Elliot Finley Wake (w/a Leah Reader)

Photo credit: Goodreads

So while anything Elliot Wake (Raeder) writes is pretty much on my insta-buy list (and has been since both Unteachable and Black Iris blew me away), when I heard Cam Girl features a nonbinary major character, needless to say I knew I had to buy it ASAP.

So I did. And I'm so glad I did because this book felt really important to me. 

Before I go on, here's the Goodreads summary, as per usual: 

"Vada Bergen is broke, the black sheep of her family, and moving a thousand miles away from home for grad school, but she’s got the two things she loves most: her art and her best friend—and sometimes more—Ellis Carraway. Ellis and Vada have a friendship so consuming it’s hard to tell where one girl ends and the other begins. It’s intense. It’s a little codependent. And nothing can tear them apart. 

Until an accident on an icy winter road changes everything. 

Vada is left deeply scarred, both emotionally and physically. Her once-promising art career is cut short. And Ellis pulls away, unwilling to talk about that night. Everything Vada loved is gone. 

She’s got nothing left to lose. 

So when she meets some smooth-talking entrepreneurs who offer to set her up as a cam girl, she can’t say no. All Vada has to do is spend a couple hours each night stripping on webcam, and the “tips” come pouring in. 

It’s just a kinky escape from reality until a client gets serious. “Blue” is mysterious, alluring, and more interested in Vada’s life than her body. Online, they chat intimately. Blue helps her heal. And he pays well, but he wants her all to himself. No more cam shows. It’s an easy decision: she’s starting to fall for him. But the steamier it gets, the more she craves the real man behind the keyboard. So Vada pops the question: 

Can we meet IRL? 

Blue agrees, on one condition. A condition that brings back a ghost from her past. Now Vada must confront the devastating secrets she's been running from—those of others, and those she's been keeping from herself..."

There are three things you can pretty much expect whenever you pick up one of Raeder's books:

1. Incredibly gorgeous writing.
2. Very sexy scenes throughout. 
3. TWISTS LIKE WHOA.

Cam Girl indisputably delivered on all three points. 

While I found some of the pre-Blue cam girling stuff a bit much for me at the beginning (not a flaw of the book, just a personal taste thing), I'm so glad I kept reading because the story and characters more than made up for it. 

Vada, an artist, deals with chronic pain specifically in her hand and arm from the accident at the beginning of the book. I've read a few books now with characters who struggle with chronic pain, but this depiction resonated the most with me—and the further connection of not being able to do art because of the pain, something I deal with IRL, is something that echoed unexpectedly deeply with me. 

Then there's Vada's relationship with her best friend, Ellis, which I absolutely loved reading. Vada and Ellis have a blurry best friends/more than best friends relationship, but though Vada has accepted that she's bisexual, the thought of having a serious long-term relationship with a girl freaks her out, which is an experience with bisexuality that I haven't seen deeply explored in a book before. It worked really well here in terms of tension and adding a complicated dynamic to Vada and Ellis's relationship, and it felt like a real experience that was important to tackle. 

All of these character elements and more weave incredibly well into the plot, which is messy and complicated and finished off with an ending I totally didn't see coming. I loved the frank discussions about gender and sexuality, and seeing a major nonbinary character figure themselves out and explore their identity is something I really appreciated. 

I loved reading this, will probably re-read in the future, and now I'm even more excited for Raeder's next book, Bad Boy, which features a trans guy major character. If you haven't picked up Raeder's books before and you like (very) steamy, complicated, and dark New Adult books, I honestly can't recommend his writing more.

Diversity note: Vada, the protagonist, is Latina, bisexual, and deals with chronic pain, and another major character is nonbinary (genderfluid). The author is openly bisexual and nonbinary, so it's #ownvoices, too.

Twitter-sized bites:

.@Ava_Jae gives 5 stars to CAM GIRL by Elliot Wake (w/a Leah Raeder). Is this twisty, diverse NA on your TBR? (Click to tweet)

Looking for a NA w/ major nonbinary, disabled, & bi characters? Check out CAM GIRL by Elliot Wake (w/a Leah Raeder). (Click to tweet)

Book Review: BLACK IRIS by Leah Raeder

Photo credit: Goodreads

So about partway through my reading of Leah Raeder’s Black Iris, I knew I was going to have to review it, but it quickly became apparent it was going to be a tougher book to review. Not because I didn’t like it, but because it was so different from anything I’d read in a long time and just felt important, somehow. Like this was an important book for me to be reading. It’s hard to explain.

Before I go on, here’s the summary from Goodreads:

“It only took one moment of weakness for Laney Keating’s world to fall apart. One stupid gesture for a hopeless crush. Then the rumors began. Slut, they called her. Queer. Psycho. Mentally ill, messed up, so messed up even her own mother decided she wasn't worth sticking around for. 

If Laney could erase that whole year, she would. College is her chance to start with a clean slate. 

She's not looking for new friends, but they find her: charming, handsome Armin, the only guy patient enough to work through her thorny defenses—and fiery, filterless Blythe, the bad girl and partner in crime who has thorns of her own. 

But Laney knows nothing good ever lasts. When a ghost from her past resurfaces—the bully who broke her down completely—she decides it's time to live up to her own legend. And Armin and Blythe are going to help. 

Which was the plan all along. 

Because the rumors are true. Every single one. And Laney is going to show them just how true. 

She's going to show them all.”

So first and foremost, Black Iris is a New Adult novel, but holy guacamole it is so very different from 99% of NA novels out there right now. Black Iris is not a contemporary romance—it’s a dark, unsettling Thriller with deeply twisted characters and tons of twists. It’s the kind of book I feel like I’ll need to re-read to fully absorb, because it isn’t until all the pieces fall together that it really all begins to make sense.

Like Unteachable, Raeder expertly weaves a raw, realistic voice with moments of beauty and clarity. The characters are flawed and make few attempts to be likable—and there were some moments where I almost felt like Laney, the protagonist, was getting a little heavy-handed on deliberately portraying herself as unlikable (not so much through actions, but through things she would say about being an unlikable heroine). That said, I liked that many of the characters weren’t trying to be likable—they made ugly decisions, and had terrible thoughts, and they owned them completely.

The only other thing that occasionally threw me off was the timeline. The story is told non-chronologically with chapters jumping back and forth between the present and past, which occasionally got a little confusing (one of the reasons, I suspect, I felt like I would benefit from a second read).

Despite that, I really loved this book. From the gripping plot, to the out-there-for-you-to-see ugly emotions, to a protagonist who wasn’t completely sure about her sexual identity (and wasn’t trying to be sure or put a label on it), to a cast of characters who were twisted, and layered, and all-around fascinating, Black Iris is on my list of favorites.

If you’re looking for a gripping, beautifully-written, dark, and complicated New Adult Thriller, I couldn’t recommend this one more. 4.5/5 stars to this seriously awesome book.

Diversity note: The protagonist doesn’t label herself, but is attracted to (and has on-the-page explicit relationships with) both men and women, and she also has borderline personality disorder. Other major characters are bipolar and have antisocial personality disorder, and two major characters are Persian (including one love interest).

Have you read Black Iris?

Twitter-sized bites: 

.@Ava_Jae gives 4.5/5 stars to BLACK IRIS by @LeahRaeder. Have you read this twisted, raw NA Thriller? (Click to tweet)
 
Looking for a dark, layered, and diverse NA Thriller? Check out BLACK IRIS by Leah Raeder. (Click to tweet)

So You Want to Write NA Contemporary Romance?

Photo credit: idea ablaze on Flickr

Note: The inevitable has happened, my friends. After 600+ posts, I've accidentally re-written a post. The original is here, and this one is slightly different (since, you know, I wrote it thinking I hadn't written it yet). Think of it as having 1.5x the resources if you want to write NA Contemporary Romance. :) 

What is it? 

College (or college-age, at least), swoony book boyfriends (and girlfriends), awesome voices, awkward moments, stepping into adulthood, there are so many components of NA Contemporary Romances.

What do they have in common? They all feature college-age protagonists, are in a modern day setting, and the plot largely revolves around a romance.

Pros/Cons of Writing NA Contemporary Romance: 

Pros: 

• Wonderful voices. Like YA, one of my favorite things about NA are the incredibly diverse and powerful voices. There’s a very distinct sound to NA and some really wonderful voices that set them apart and absolutely fit the age range of their protagonists. 


• Adorable (or heart-wrenching) romances. The tone in NA novels varies greatly, but in the end, the romances are really great. From the light, fluffy and adorable to the darker, emotionally-ridden conflicts, the romances stick with you long after the book has ended. 


• Very popular (right now). Which means there’s so much to choose from! And it’s pretty good from a marketing standpoint, because books in popular categories and genres generally have a better chance of selling well. 

Cons: 

• Stigma/common misconceptions. There are a lot of people out there who still believe (and say) that New Adult is Young Adult with sex. Or that New Adult is the same as erotica. Neither of which are true, but it is an assumption a lot of people make about the category, particularly NA Contemporary Romance. 


• Mostly digital. I mean, this is really only a con if your dream is to be traditionally published in print. NA is actually doing really well in the digital marketplace, and some NA authors have gone on to be traditionally published after their digitally published books took off (see Tammara Webber, Cora Carmack and Jennifer Armentrout, for example). But at the moment at least, NA is mostly a digital phenomena, and while it’s (painfully) slowly breaking in the traditional print sphere, it’s not quite there yet. 


• Very popular (right now). Which means it’s easy to get lost in the crowd. Being part of a popular movement definitely has it’s pros and cons. 

Recommended Reading: 


As I’ve said in every other So You Want To Write post, reading in the genre (and category) you’re writing in is mandatory. Lucky for you, there are loads of awesome books out there to enjoy and learn from.

Note: I’ve read (and enjoyed) all of these except for Unteachable, which is on my TBR list because I’ve heard great things about it.

• Easy (Contours of the Heart duology) by Tammara Webber 
• Faking It (Losing It series) by Cora Carmack 
• Make it Count (Bowler University series) by Megan Erickson
• Only the Good Die Young by K.K. Hendin
• The Sound of Us (Radio Hearts series) by Ashley Poston
• Unteachable by Leah Raeder

For more, check out Goodreads’s New Adult page (which includes more than just Contemporary Romance) and their Popular New Adult books books shelf (which are mostly, but possibly not all Contemporary Romance).

Helpful Links:

• What is ‘New Adult’? Romance Editors and Authors Tell All by Natalie Zutter for bookish.com (partially) reposted on xoxoafterdark.com.
• RT14 Panel Recap: NA: Capturing the New Adult Voice by me on Writability.
• RT14 Panel Recap: NA: What’s Next in New Adult? by me on Writability.
• New Adult: No Sex Required by me on Writability.
• Young Adult vs. New Adult: What’s the Difference? by me on Writability. 

Do you enjoy reading or writing NA Contemporary Romance? Share your experience! 

Twitter-sized bites: 

Thinking about writing NA Contemporary Romance? Writer @Ava_Jae shares some tips, recommendations and more. (Click to tweet)  

Do you write NA Contemporary Romance? Share your experience at @Ava_Jae’s So You Want to Write series. (Click to tweet)