Romancey Pants

Romance is ducking awesome. And so is diversity. Join us!


The Sexiest Thing About Bad Boys With Benefits (In Which All Dogs Are Happy and Unharmed)

Friends, a while ago, The Man and I read Bad Boy With Benefits by Cynthia St. Aubin—a Harlequin Desire novel. It’s a goodie. We enjoyed it. Plus there’s a distillery in it. Not that I need a whisky—unless, of course, you’re offering—but the setting is fantastic, the main characters have a sizzling connection, AND (this, for me, is OPTIMALLY exciting) Law, the cowboy protagonist, has a book on his shelf about intersectional feminism.

One thing. Just a book. Just a dog-darn spine of a book.

But for all the leeway I am prepared to give the magical and miraculous genre of romance, knowing that a bloke in a cowboy hat who runs a distillery has a book on his shelf about intersectional feminism makes my queer, nonbinary Brit knees tremble in the best of ways.

Intersectional feminism? I’m like a dog with a bone and a log fire.

The dog is well, by the way, IN FRONT of the log fire, because animal rights make my knees tremble too and I’m not going to get a reputation for being a nonbinary person who wants rights for all except dogs.

Glad we got that sorted. Hope you’re having the most romantic of days!



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About US

Welcome! I’m Star Tavares. I am queer and nonbinary, and I use they/them pronouns. My hubby Jake is LGBTQIA+ too. Our plush duck is called Duck and is super-ducking awesome. He likes to call himself an award-winning duck because we wrote a screenplay about him that won some awards, and who are we to argue?

The thing is, we used to publish in the romance genres, but after we came out, we thought romance didn’t want us anymore. But you know what, toots? We were wrong.

Now we’ve rebuilt our confidence and are back to living our Romancey Pants life, writing, reviewing romance movies, reading romance novels, and doing a whole lot of stretching. (Did I mention we’re getting older?)

Want to know more about Star’s writing credits? Under another name, Star has published romance stories, novels, and novellas with presses like Harper Collins and Cleis, and has won awards for their shorter works from the likes of Glimmer Train, Screencraft, and Narrative, where they also worked as an editor. More recently, Star’s nonfiction about gender identity has appeared in The New York Times and at Huffington Post Personal.

Since Jake, who is also a romance author, is starting to add more reviews here (along with Duck’s best frenemy Sir Mallard Jones) watch this space for more about him and his career.

Please sign up for our newsletter below and join us at Romancey Pants for romance reviews and personal rambles.

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