TW : sexual assault, domestic abuse, addictions, abandonment, heavy drugs/alcohol use, bullying

NOTE : I listened to the audiobook edition of this book. There is also a lot of sex scenes, and yeah, I did end up skipping them. I weirdly just can't stomach them since giving birth 😅

PROS :

• Lots of queer characters
• Normalizing masturbation (at ANY age)
• Neurodiversity and disability representations
• Being a sex positive woman (especially in a rural, conservative small town)
• Artwork images included in the physical edition (according to other reviews, which sounds like such a great addition!)
• COVID (I was actually looking forward to reading a book that talks about this, since it IS the world's reality right now)
• Consent

CONS :

• I would've appreciated seeing LGBTQ+ rep other than gay or lesbian, especially since there are quite a few queer characters in the book
• Books set in Alaska are RARE but I felt like it could've legit been anywhere... else. Knowing this didn't add anything unique to the story (which I was looking forward to!)
• I wish the main characters involved weren't all white (there is mention of Native Alaskans, but they are very secondary)
• There is sooooo much happening in this book, just one thing after another... and it all happens within a day or so? I felt like weeks had passed, and it was just too much for me.
•The main characters involved are 18, but even with all the hardships they went through in their lives, they feel immature to me
• Intense flirting in front of a kid? I felt uncomfortable for her, but then again I don't remember what age she is... early teens? Still.

I devoured this beautiful book!
Crystal is a teenager living in Alaska with her grandparents and older brother, and we follow her while she navigates through many challenges, all in the middle of a global pandemic.
Crystal, Haley, and Payton are the main characters in the story.
But this book is absolutely outstanding!
This book was wonderful, exciting, entertaining, and beautifully written!
This heart-warming book which depicts the difficulties of being queer in rural Alaska is an absolute must read!
The audio version was so good! Easy to follow along with!

Now I've got to read Someone To Kiss My Scars!

Thank you so much for gifting me this ebook copy!
NetGalley and Skipstone Publishing very much appreciated.

I enjoyed this quite a bit, I love the theme of girls supporting girls. It's a mix of queer celebration, found family, and fighting back.

There's a lot of heavy topics - estranged parents, domestic violence, assault, teen pregnancy, homophobia, Covid. I was initially nervous about how Covid would be portrayed (and received on my end). I liked that it felt like a realistic portrayal of life and school during the pandemic.

I really liked Crystal from she start, I also liked seeing how the school accommodated her learning disability. I loved seeing her come into herself and her strength. She gained confidence and this fantastic support group. I liked the assortment of main characters and how they came together and protected one another.

My biggest issue with this is the extremely short timeline. It really would have benefitted greatly by taking place over weeks or months. There's a lot going on and it's all crammed into a few days, that takes away some of the believability.

The narration was fantastic. Hayley Peterson did a great job bringing out each character's personality.

I thoroughly enjoyed the audiobook version of this book. I felt that it brought the characters to life and created the atmosphere that I needed to finish the book. After starting to read this book on my kindle, I found myself really struggling at the 25% mark and switched over the audiobook to see if that would help. The narrator did an amazing job at giving each of the characters their own personality and kept me going when I felt like I might have to put the book down.

I really struggled with the story itself, as can be seen in my review on Goodreads, mainly due to the timeline. Everything happened extremely quickly and there was a lot going on from teen pregnancies to returning estranged parents to sexual assault. The age of the characters as well as the fact that it only took place over a few days made the book difficult to get through and less believable as a plot.

This is a book of coming out and protecting the loved ones. It says about homophobia and how teenage girls feel in coming out in a very conservative small town. I quiet enjoyed the audiobook. Also this is the first book that has a representation of Covid. So that makes it a little more realistic.

I'm stopping this audiobook at 32%.

I was very excited about this book because of the gorgeous cover and the promise of a complex, joyful story about queer disabled teenagers finding each other in their struggles. However, as a person with a learning disability, I was both disappointed and offended by the way that IEPs and disabled high school students were portrayed in this book, not least because the author continually used the language of "special needs." I don't know anything about the author, so it's possible that they are themself disabled, but I personally had a very hard time swallowing this representation.

I also found the inclusion of COVID in the book to be flip and the experience of reading it during the pandemic was haunting and stressful.

The audio performance by Hayley Peterson is strong, lush, and smooth.

Thanks to NetGalley and SkipStone Publishing for the ARC.

CW: COVID-19, child abuse, sexual violence, intimate partner abuse

I liked this book, it works well as an audiobook and the narrator is very good. I would recommend Crystal’s House Of Queers to anyone looking for an emotional yet invigorating lesbian romance novel.

Delightfully queer and quite poignant, this tale is hard to categorise. It's part celebration of queerness, part ode to found family and part tale of girls' revenge against awful boys.

Crystal’s House Of Queers by Brooke Skipstone is a charismatic LGBTQ romance novel that I thoroughly enjoyed. Crystal is a young woman who has survived a tragic childhood. She soon discovers that she likes women when she starts having dreams about her close friend Haley. Although the story goes into details about Crystal’s sexual attraction to Haley, the author focuses more on the underlying love that she possesses for her. I love that Crystal values Haley for more than her looks unlike Haley’s former jerk of a boyfriend Dylan.

Brooke Skipstone shines a light on the many personal struggles that come with finding sexual identity and coming to terms with liking someone of the same sex. Crystal is an authentic, but fictional, representation of real-world issues. She struggled with maintaining a friendship with her crush, which I feel is by far the toughest scenario in this story. Telling someone you love them with so much fear in the back of your brain takes a lot of strength. This also includes telling family and friends that you have feelings for others of the same sex. All of this is told in such a compelling and impassioned way that makes your heartache and soar with all the highs and lows.

What I enjoyed the most about reading this observant novel is witnessing Crystal slowly begin to become more confident in herself. She is a great representation of lesbian love in fiction. I also enjoyed the setting of the plot and the merging of other LGBTQ characters. The intensity of the character’s emotions kept me engaged and wanting to read more. I would recommend Crystal’s House Of Queers to anyone looking for an emotional yet invigorating lesbian romance novel.

Crystal’s House Of Queers by Brooke Skipstone is a charismatic LGBTQ romance novel that I thoroughly enjoyed. Crystal is a young woman who has survived a tragic childhood. She soon discovers that she likes women when she starts having dreams about her close friend Haley. Although the story goes into details about Crystal’s sexual attraction to Haley, the author focuses more on the underlying love that she possesses for her. I love that Crystal values Haley for more than her looks unlike Haley’s former jerk of a boyfriend Dyaln.

Brooke Skipstone shines a light on the many personal struggles that come with finding sexual identity and coming to terms with liking someone of the same sex. Crystal is an authentic, but fictional, representation of real world issues. She struggled with maintaining a friendship with her crush, which I feel is by far the toughest scenario in this story. Telling someone you love them with so much fear in the back of your brain takes a lot of strength. This also includes telling family and friends that you have feelings for others of the same sex. All of this is told in such a compelling and impassioned way that makes your heart ache and soar with all the highs and lows.

What I enjoyed the most about reading this observant novel is witnessing Crystal slowly begin to become more confident in herself. She is a great representation of lesbian love in fiction. I also enjoyed the setting of the plot and the merging of other LGBTQ characters. The intensity of the character’s emotions kept me engaged and wanting to read more. I would recommend Crystal’s House Of Queers to anyone looking for an emotional yet invigorating lesbian romance novel.