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Brown Sugar Divine's Cafe & Bakery
"She's made of sugar, spice, and everything nice! Please welcome the delicious... the delectable... the succulent... Brown! Sugar! Divine!"
Who's crazy enough to open a drag queen cafe and bakery in Denton, Texas? Brown Sugar Divine, that's who! And her pretty pink business is all the rage! The face behind the fabulous persona, Jonathan Isaacs, beats his face every day to serve his best sweets and his best looks. However, when Jonathan's shady landlord opts to tear down everything he poured his blood, sweat, glitter, and tears into and loops her socially anxious son into the mix, Jonathan calls on the help of his community to bring the house down on her homophobic mess while confronting his complicated past.
Who's crazy enough to open a drag queen cafe and bakery in Denton, Texas? Brown Sugar Divine, that's who! And her pretty pink business is all the rage! The face behind the fabulous persona, Jonathan Isaacs, beats his face every day to serve his best sweets and his best looks. However, when Jonathan's shady landlord opts to tear down everything he poured his blood, sweat, glitter, and tears into and loops her socially anxious son into the mix, Jonathan calls on the help of his community to bring the house down on her homophobic mess while confronting his complicated past.
- GenresQueer
266 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 27, 2024
35 people want to read
About the author
S.A. McClellon
3 books20 followersAuthor, Screenwriter, & mild caffeine addict. ‘Brown Sugar Divine's Cafe & Bakery’ out now!
University of North Texas Alum
Bachelor's in English (Creative Writing concentration) and Bachelor's in Media Arts
University of North Texas Alum
Bachelor's in English (Creative Writing concentration) and Bachelor's in Media Arts
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
September 18, 2024
THIS IS A DISCLAIMER FROM THE AUTHOR!
Do not buy the June 30th version of my book! My ex publisher, Introverted Soul Collective Press, used AI on my book cover without my consent and I am working to get their version de-platformed. The person who did the character art is Speremint, writer and illustrator of Brimstone and Roses on Webtoon.
I have re-published my book through B&N self-publishing with a new hand drawn book cover. But please DO NOT support Introverted Soul Collective Press! I DO NOT AND WILL NEVER SUPPORT AI!
If you see their version of my book on Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Smashwords, etc. DO NOT BUY IT! REPORT IT!
Do not buy the June 30th version of my book! My ex publisher, Introverted Soul Collective Press, used AI on my book cover without my consent and I am working to get their version de-platformed. The person who did the character art is Speremint, writer and illustrator of Brimstone and Roses on Webtoon.
I have re-published my book through B&N self-publishing with a new hand drawn book cover. But please DO NOT support Introverted Soul Collective Press! I DO NOT AND WILL NEVER SUPPORT AI!
If you see their version of my book on Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Smashwords, etc. DO NOT BUY IT! REPORT IT!
June 17, 2025
Це було так солодко та мило, що цукор скрипів на зубах. Тож книга повністю виконала те, що я від неї очікував.
Джонні був викинутий власним батьком з дому, бо він гей. Хлопець не здався та зміг відкрити власну кав'ярню, кожного вечора перевдягається у драг королеву Браун Шугар Дівайн. І кожного вечора розважає своїми виступами публіку.
Кріс - син релігійної жінки. Він приховує від всіх свою орієнтацію, але приходить у кав'ярню Джонні.
Це дуже мила історія. Можливо, навіть, занадто мила та ідеалістична історія. Одна з тих книжок, де гомофобія лікується піснею, або самотністю.
Якщо вам потрібно прочитати книжку, що написана легкою та доступною англійською, до місяця гордості, то вам сюди.
Якщо ви просто втомилися від навколишньої темряві і хочеться чогось по-дитячому наївного, вам сюди.
Якщо вам потрібна книжка, де геї зі всією любовью та добротою перемагають все погане, то вам однозначно сюди.
Дуже приємним доповненням стали рецепти, що розкидані книжкою. Звичайно, повторювати їх я не буду. Востаннє, коли спробував готувати, були знищені Помпеї.
Джонні був викинутий власним батьком з дому, бо він гей. Хлопець не здався та зміг відкрити власну кав'ярню, кожного вечора перевдягається у драг королеву Браун Шугар Дівайн. І кожного вечора розважає своїми виступами публіку.
Кріс - син релігійної жінки. Він приховує від всіх свою орієнтацію, але приходить у кав'ярню Джонні.
Це дуже мила історія. Можливо, навіть, занадто мила та ідеалістична історія. Одна з тих книжок, де гомофобія лікується піснею, або самотністю.
Якщо вам потрібно прочитати книжку, що написана легкою та доступною англійською, до місяця гордості, то вам сюди.
Якщо ви просто втомилися від навколишньої темряві і хочеться чогось по-дитячому наївного, вам сюди.
Якщо вам потрібна книжка, де геї зі всією любовью та добротою перемагають все погане, то вам однозначно сюди.
Дуже приємним доповненням стали рецепти, що розкидані книжкою. Звичайно, повторювати їх я не буду. Востаннє, коли спробував готувати, були знищені Помпеї.
June 15, 2024
I got to read this book early and I'm glad I got the chance. I'm a slow reader with a low attention span but this was a really easy read for me and it doesn't waste your time at all. The characters are really well written, and honestly just pretty refreshing. I highly recommend this book for anyone looking to try something new, outside their comfort zone, and just something that's an overall easy to get into read that isn't very long either!
December 19, 2025
ok I was gonna wait until I’d slept to drop a review but! 3.75 rounded up, not a 100% lighthearted read but still a joyful novel that lightly breaks its fourth wall with a toolkit hammer. The lively descriptions of the different parts of drag, from assembling a look to performing in front of an energetic crowd, were definitely an indicator of the author participating in a ton of these spaces! She said in her author’s note that she did a ton of research when writing the characters, even inquiring her drag performer friends, and it was really obvious! (and I also liked her song choices for the shows, which helped.) I think the only caveat to that specific aspect is that Brown Sugar Divine having her own separate chapters was a bit of a mindfuck— due to her being a persona/character/sorta separate inner voice(??) for Johnny, her POV chapters are worded less like a book character’s and more like an emcee talking to an audience. I know it’s intentional, but the diction read a little strangely to me in text form, I wish there was an audiobook😅
As a character-focused book, it’d be a disservice to have an uninteresting cast, and thankfully, this novel avoids that entirely! Although several of these characters use many different labels, and have to explain parts of them to a POV character just finding out about queer terminology (and himself) (hi Chris. you having the same name as my late dad scares me a little), it doesn’t feel like they solely exist as their identities. There’s relationship drama, figuring out the people you can call your family, and banter that definitely evokes a couple memories of FaceTimes with friends. My favorite dynamics were both in Johnny’s POV, there is one I cannot spoil but I thought was quite sweet, and of course his sibling-adjacent relationship with his cousin, Sunnie.
Some criticisms, though: I thought the POV distribution was clunky… having the Johnny and Chris chapters be broken up by another character felt disconcerting, even though there were reasons for them in the narrative, and there was a distinction in the writing style (the side characters’ chapters were in third person instead of first person). There were also a couple of run-on sentences (I think the author got carried away in the glam sometimes), and the prose skewed a little more towards YA, but with the added bonus of bills and nicotine withdrawals(ah, Chris…)💀 Yes, I catch the irony of my own review having run-on sentences. Shush.
Additionally, the resolutions for the conflict were very rushed. I understand the stuff with Grace being that way, since a lot of her offenses were premeditated, and she was purposefully written to try and shrug them off… but there were some other conflicts, such as what became of Johnny and his mom’s relationship, that I wished were handled with more nuance.
And this doesn’t affect the star rating at all since it’s Hoopla’s fault, but the formatting on my ebook sucked LOL… it’s like when you’re on Ao3, and they don’t allow indents, so they space out the lines?? Shit felt double-spaced😭 Did the text look like that to anyone else?!?
uhhh anyways i wanna try out the recipes at the end but how the hell am i supposed to successfully purée a strawberry
As a character-focused book, it’d be a disservice to have an uninteresting cast, and thankfully, this novel avoids that entirely! Although several of these characters use many different labels, and have to explain parts of them to a POV character just finding out about queer terminology (and himself) (hi Chris. you having the same name as my late dad scares me a little), it doesn’t feel like they solely exist as their identities. There’s relationship drama, figuring out the people you can call your family, and banter that definitely evokes a couple memories of FaceTimes with friends. My favorite dynamics were both in Johnny’s POV, there is one I cannot spoil but I thought was quite sweet, and of course his sibling-adjacent relationship with his cousin, Sunnie.
Some criticisms, though: I thought the POV distribution was clunky… having the Johnny and Chris chapters be broken up by another character felt disconcerting, even though there were reasons for them in the narrative, and there was a distinction in the writing style (the side characters’ chapters were in third person instead of first person). There were also a couple of run-on sentences (I think the author got carried away in the glam sometimes), and the prose skewed a little more towards YA, but with the added bonus of bills and nicotine withdrawals(ah, Chris…)💀 Yes, I catch the irony of my own review having run-on sentences. Shush.
Additionally, the resolutions for the conflict were very rushed. I understand the stuff with Grace being that way, since a lot of her offenses were premeditated, and she was purposefully written to try and shrug them off… but there were some other conflicts, such as what became of Johnny and his mom’s relationship, that I wished were handled with more nuance.
And this doesn’t affect the star rating at all since it’s Hoopla’s fault, but the formatting on my ebook sucked LOL… it’s like when you’re on Ao3, and they don’t allow indents, so they space out the lines?? Shit felt double-spaced😭 Did the text look like that to anyone else?!?
uhhh anyways i wanna try out the recipes at the end but how the hell am i supposed to successfully purée a strawberry
August 28, 2024
So Perfect.
This was the perfect medicine for my bad week. I laughed and cried and got mad and cheered and cried again, finally happy tears. From the opening when Brown Sugar Divine sets the stage to Johnny’s last word, I was rapt. I read it over two days and it lifted my spirits like nothing else could. Do yourself a favour and get this heartfelt cozy queer comedy of family, love, friendship, support, beauty, dignity, and all the good things.
This was the perfect medicine for my bad week. I laughed and cried and got mad and cheered and cried again, finally happy tears. From the opening when Brown Sugar Divine sets the stage to Johnny’s last word, I was rapt. I read it over two days and it lifted my spirits like nothing else could. Do yourself a favour and get this heartfelt cozy queer comedy of family, love, friendship, support, beauty, dignity, and all the good things.
June 1, 2025
I had a wonderful time with this book!
It is a super interesting, charming, and rather gripping story full of great characters, with a lot of [POC] drag & queer lifestyle - who'd thunk? -, music, food, drinks, fun, laughter, drama, tears, heartbreak, and anger.
The book was an absolute joy to read, as it is very well-written, the writing flows so well that it almost immediately sucked me right into the story.
I would say this is best classified as YA/NA queer family & social dramedy.
If a lightly told story with a lot of depth and drama - and an absolute fabulous POC drag queen - sounds like it might be your thing, I would definitely recommend checking it out!
I am now hoping S. A. McClellon will soon write their next book. I am sure as hell going to read it!
There were a few minor editing and proofreading hiccups here and there, in my Kindle ebook version, but nothing that had any major impact on my enjoyment. Another round of proofreading won't hurt, though. ;-)
It is a super interesting, charming, and rather gripping story full of great characters, with a lot of [POC] drag & queer lifestyle - who'd thunk? -, music, food, drinks, fun, laughter, drama, tears, heartbreak, and anger.
The book was an absolute joy to read, as it is very well-written, the writing flows so well that it almost immediately sucked me right into the story.
I would say this is best classified as YA/NA queer family & social dramedy.
If a lightly told story with a lot of depth and drama - and an absolute fabulous POC drag queen - sounds like it might be your thing, I would definitely recommend checking it out!
I am now hoping S. A. McClellon will soon write their next book. I am sure as hell going to read it!
There were a few minor editing and proofreading hiccups here and there, in my Kindle ebook version, but nothing that had any major impact on my enjoyment. Another round of proofreading won't hurt, though. ;-)
April 29, 2025
Like plenty of other readers, I discovered this book because the author had secured a trad deal with a small indie publisher. Initially ecstatic because getting a trad deal is immensely difficult, things crumbled when the publishers wanted to use an AI cover.
This book's rights were returned to the author and self published with the gorgeous artwork by Speremint. I applaud the author for taking a huge risk in favor of artists and really hope another publisher sometime in the future considers pitching this book. The writing is fabulous and easily comparable to the quality expected in trad.
The plot? A cozy, fuzzy and full of sugary cake frosting story of a young Black North Texan named Johnny Isaacs who grew up loving to bake, sing, dance, dress in drag and being attracted to men. Which expectedly causes a rift with his conservative family. One of the key highlights of the book's conflict centers on how plenty of the queer characters are shunned from their biological families and form close bonds with their peers.
Now, 2 years later, Johnny has become a successful businessowner of a bakery with pink, yellow, drag concerts and oodles of fun. Much to the chagrin of Grace, the lease owner who enters conflict between her desire to kick him out because she dislikes his lifestyle choices but also enjoys making money.
Stuck in between Johnny's dream and Grace's scheming is Grace's son Chris, who is a good natured guy struggling to make ends meet in a difficult job market for recent college grads.
One thing that struck me about this book was not only the research done in the world of drag queen culture, but also how a story with a cozy theme serves as a social criticism of various issues afflicting young adults today. Despite having a cast of hard working college educated protagonists, the only jobs available are min wage dishwashing gigs.
Chris is barely scraping by living in an overpriced 1 room apartment riddled with cockroaches. Johnny's business is booming, but like plenty of small business owners, he has to grind 12 hour workdays 6 days a week. Our characters are doing everything right and not breaking any laws, but they are still just 1 medical emergency away from homelessness. And the only characters aware of their precarious situation are people their own age.
Meanwhile, we have Grace, a presumed Generation X aged woman who grew up being aware of her generation's counterculture (and a single parent in a conservative society to boot). One would expect she'd be more aligned to Chris's struggles, but Grace ends up espousing the same money hoarding behaviors her own generation despised when she was growing up. How ironic she, a single parent would not only raise a decent young man with no father in sight, become a successful businesswoman, but end up being cruel to her own son! Grace lives in an upper middle class McMansion, filled to the brim of empty rooms, but she doesn't let her own son live with her! Her lack of business acumen (more likely Machiavellian) doesn't see the purpose of hiring Chris to work in her leasing company.
What does Grace do instead?
She parades around, being a beacon among her parish, someone to look up to. Only that she expects her impoverished son to work as an unpaid laborer managing her church's social media. Sure, the reader can assume she had to become business savvy, and emotionally abusing her son into doing unpaid work 'as a small favor for paying his rent' to obtain 'marketing experience' is worth the extra work. But daaamn, Grace is a cruel, selfish, greedy woman hiding behind a pleasant mask. The author of this book did a mastery class of writing a convincing villain standing right in plain sight.
While the Johnny we meet is thriving, Chris on the other hand as the book's coprotagonist is battling depression, scared of homelessness with an uncertain future. Readers will soon feel identified with his struggles battling a difficult job market, an abusive parent and literally seeing that colorful rainbow filled with sweets and skittles the instant he visits Johnny's bakery for the first time as an escape outlet.
Will there be love in the horizon? Can two characters settle their personal differences and see common ground? Despite being a cozy story filled with caffeinated sugary drinks, this book unwinds plenty of themes fit for an entire semester of Sociology 101. I love how the author successfully balances so many different themes into the same story, which kept me wanting to read without stopping. This book is certainly an underrated quality read!
This book's rights were returned to the author and self published with the gorgeous artwork by Speremint. I applaud the author for taking a huge risk in favor of artists and really hope another publisher sometime in the future considers pitching this book. The writing is fabulous and easily comparable to the quality expected in trad.
The plot? A cozy, fuzzy and full of sugary cake frosting story of a young Black North Texan named Johnny Isaacs who grew up loving to bake, sing, dance, dress in drag and being attracted to men. Which expectedly causes a rift with his conservative family. One of the key highlights of the book's conflict centers on how plenty of the queer characters are shunned from their biological families and form close bonds with their peers.
Now, 2 years later, Johnny has become a successful businessowner of a bakery with pink, yellow, drag concerts and oodles of fun. Much to the chagrin of Grace, the lease owner who enters conflict between her desire to kick him out because she dislikes his lifestyle choices but also enjoys making money.
Stuck in between Johnny's dream and Grace's scheming is Grace's son Chris, who is a good natured guy struggling to make ends meet in a difficult job market for recent college grads.
One thing that struck me about this book was not only the research done in the world of drag queen culture, but also how a story with a cozy theme serves as a social criticism of various issues afflicting young adults today. Despite having a cast of hard working college educated protagonists, the only jobs available are min wage dishwashing gigs.
Chris is barely scraping by living in an overpriced 1 room apartment riddled with cockroaches. Johnny's business is booming, but like plenty of small business owners, he has to grind 12 hour workdays 6 days a week. Our characters are doing everything right and not breaking any laws, but they are still just 1 medical emergency away from homelessness. And the only characters aware of their precarious situation are people their own age.
Meanwhile, we have Grace, a presumed Generation X aged woman who grew up being aware of her generation's counterculture (and a single parent in a conservative society to boot). One would expect she'd be more aligned to Chris's struggles, but Grace ends up espousing the same money hoarding behaviors her own generation despised when she was growing up. How ironic she, a single parent would not only raise a decent young man with no father in sight, become a successful businesswoman, but end up being cruel to her own son! Grace lives in an upper middle class McMansion, filled to the brim of empty rooms, but she doesn't let her own son live with her! Her lack of business acumen (more likely Machiavellian) doesn't see the purpose of hiring Chris to work in her leasing company.
What does Grace do instead?
She parades around, being a beacon among her parish, someone to look up to. Only that she expects her impoverished son to work as an unpaid laborer managing her church's social media. Sure, the reader can assume she had to become business savvy, and emotionally abusing her son into doing unpaid work 'as a small favor for paying his rent' to obtain 'marketing experience' is worth the extra work. But daaamn, Grace is a cruel, selfish, greedy woman hiding behind a pleasant mask. The author of this book did a mastery class of writing a convincing villain standing right in plain sight.
While the Johnny we meet is thriving, Chris on the other hand as the book's coprotagonist is battling depression, scared of homelessness with an uncertain future. Readers will soon feel identified with his struggles battling a difficult job market, an abusive parent and literally seeing that colorful rainbow filled with sweets and skittles the instant he visits Johnny's bakery for the first time as an escape outlet.
Will there be love in the horizon? Can two characters settle their personal differences and see common ground? Despite being a cozy story filled with caffeinated sugary drinks, this book unwinds plenty of themes fit for an entire semester of Sociology 101. I love how the author successfully balances so many different themes into the same story, which kept me wanting to read without stopping. This book is certainly an underrated quality read!
June 24, 2024
Brown Sugar Divine's Bakery & Cafe is a title that is very dear to me as the author is very dear to me. It was an honor to have a friend trust me with beta reading their passion project. That being said, this review is honest and not written with any bias.
This book is a study of being a young queer, who is also constantly online, trying to find out who you are as a person when the world just kind of sucks. It’s filled with tons of pop culture references that you’d only get if you were around for the early 2000s and sort of recently today’s anime and music scene with references to songs that have come out this year. I would say that this is a great book to read for Pride month, but we could be reading queer books year-round and they deserve to be celebrated outside of one month of the year.
This was at times something that hit home in ways that I wasn’t expecting it to; the feeling of dread that someone gets when they don’t know what’s going to happen, but they’re dan sure it’s going to happen, the fear of your family not accepting you for who you really are because they expect something out of you that’s not achievable, not feeling like you belong you’ve never found yourself romantically or sexually attracted to anyone are themes that resonated with me and I’m sure lots of readers will understand as well.
One of the things that I personally related to the most and can see others relation to is Chris and the way that he doesn’t know anything about himself; he’s twenty-four with no friends and close family who only goes from work to home, and then back again and has severe depression and anxiety. I feel like a lot of young twenty-somethings today have that missing piece where they’ve gotten this degree that they didn’t even want and now they’re just in limbo, afraid to be who they are in front of a parent’s love that’s very clearly conditional. His character is absolutely deserving of the growth that he has achieved.
Brown Sugar Divine herself is such a sweet character that if I found myself in the presence of, I’d feel 100% at peace with it. She feels like the type of person who would braid your hair at a sleepover and make sure that you drank water and ate something when you go out drinking. She is totally her own person, separate from Johnny and should have gotten more screen time in my opinion; for it being a book about her and her bakery she wasn’t on screen enough. Her and Johnny working together to make things work is a cute little back-and-forth that just sort of makes sense. Johnny’s journey to being a homeless teen to a fully functioning business owner and performer is something that I would have liked to see, I love when we get to witness the character grow and become the characters we know at the end. It feels like while they were a good chunk of this story Johhny’s main point was to be the person to introduce Chris to this life that he builds up and I just would have liked to see more of them! Please give me a whole other book about that, S.A. McClellon.
This would have been a five-star read for me if not for all the music involved because while I love a good musical my least favorite thing in a book is when music is a huge focal point, it's never been my cup of tea and this has a lot of that. The drag scenes were fun, and I imagine that if I were ever to go to a drag show (a shame that I haven’t honestly) it would be just like this. For a story about a bakery, there was not enough baking for me. Other than that; this is a quick, cute, and fun read about finding yourself in a community where finding yourself is celebrated and has strong themes of found family.
This book is a study of being a young queer, who is also constantly online, trying to find out who you are as a person when the world just kind of sucks. It’s filled with tons of pop culture references that you’d only get if you were around for the early 2000s and sort of recently today’s anime and music scene with references to songs that have come out this year. I would say that this is a great book to read for Pride month, but we could be reading queer books year-round and they deserve to be celebrated outside of one month of the year.
This was at times something that hit home in ways that I wasn’t expecting it to; the feeling of dread that someone gets when they don’t know what’s going to happen, but they’re dan sure it’s going to happen, the fear of your family not accepting you for who you really are because they expect something out of you that’s not achievable, not feeling like you belong you’ve never found yourself romantically or sexually attracted to anyone are themes that resonated with me and I’m sure lots of readers will understand as well.
One of the things that I personally related to the most and can see others relation to is Chris and the way that he doesn’t know anything about himself; he’s twenty-four with no friends and close family who only goes from work to home, and then back again and has severe depression and anxiety. I feel like a lot of young twenty-somethings today have that missing piece where they’ve gotten this degree that they didn’t even want and now they’re just in limbo, afraid to be who they are in front of a parent’s love that’s very clearly conditional. His character is absolutely deserving of the growth that he has achieved.
Brown Sugar Divine herself is such a sweet character that if I found myself in the presence of, I’d feel 100% at peace with it. She feels like the type of person who would braid your hair at a sleepover and make sure that you drank water and ate something when you go out drinking. She is totally her own person, separate from Johnny and should have gotten more screen time in my opinion; for it being a book about her and her bakery she wasn’t on screen enough. Her and Johnny working together to make things work is a cute little back-and-forth that just sort of makes sense. Johnny’s journey to being a homeless teen to a fully functioning business owner and performer is something that I would have liked to see, I love when we get to witness the character grow and become the characters we know at the end. It feels like while they were a good chunk of this story Johhny’s main point was to be the person to introduce Chris to this life that he builds up and I just would have liked to see more of them! Please give me a whole other book about that, S.A. McClellon.
This would have been a five-star read for me if not for all the music involved because while I love a good musical my least favorite thing in a book is when music is a huge focal point, it's never been my cup of tea and this has a lot of that. The drag scenes were fun, and I imagine that if I were ever to go to a drag show (a shame that I haven’t honestly) it would be just like this. For a story about a bakery, there was not enough baking for me. Other than that; this is a quick, cute, and fun read about finding yourself in a community where finding yourself is celebrated and has strong themes of found family.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 28, 2024
This was the perfect medicine for my bad week. I laughed and cried and got mad and cheered and cried again, finally happy tears. From the opening when Brown Sugar Divine sets the stage to Johnny’s last word, I was rapt. I read it over two days and it lifted my spirits like nothing else could. Do yourself a favour and get this heartfelt cozy queer comedy of family, love, friendship, support, beauty, dignity, and all the good things.
July 20, 2024
Author, here!
I'm so excited to be publishing another book again! This story is personal to me as an LGBT person and I hope other people are able to relate to it as well in some way, shape, or form. This took a bit of research, as I wasn't very well versed in the world of drag at the beginning of this project. So BIG shoutout to Flamy Grant, Phoebie Jeebies, Phoenix D'Nasty, and Rex Luther.
If you follow me on Twitter/X, you're probably aware of the debacle I had with my ex publisher that involved the non-consensual use of AI on my book cover. But after posting about that experience in a thread, I was able to gain so much support from the writing community and get introduced to so many other amazing authors and artists. Thank you all for your continued support. A HUGE thank you to Speremint for the amazing cover redesign. She did it as a gift and I cannot thank her enough for it. Go check her out on Webtoon where she's in the middle of the final season of Brimstone and Roses and check out her socials on Twitter and Insta! Also, a HUGE thank you to Allison Wall for helping me through the hair-pulling process of formatting my manuscript!
Finally, I wanna thank my friends and family for their continued support throughout my general writing journey. Y'all will always be my biggest supporters. The journey has been long and hard. But y'all and everyone else mentioned make it a lot easier to manage.
I sincerely hope you all enjoy this story. I still have plenty of stories in the chamber and any and all honest constructive criticism is always welcome!
- S.A. McClellon
I'm so excited to be publishing another book again! This story is personal to me as an LGBT person and I hope other people are able to relate to it as well in some way, shape, or form. This took a bit of research, as I wasn't very well versed in the world of drag at the beginning of this project. So BIG shoutout to Flamy Grant, Phoebie Jeebies, Phoenix D'Nasty, and Rex Luther.
If you follow me on Twitter/X, you're probably aware of the debacle I had with my ex publisher that involved the non-consensual use of AI on my book cover. But after posting about that experience in a thread, I was able to gain so much support from the writing community and get introduced to so many other amazing authors and artists. Thank you all for your continued support. A HUGE thank you to Speremint for the amazing cover redesign. She did it as a gift and I cannot thank her enough for it. Go check her out on Webtoon where she's in the middle of the final season of Brimstone and Roses and check out her socials on Twitter and Insta! Also, a HUGE thank you to Allison Wall for helping me through the hair-pulling process of formatting my manuscript!
Finally, I wanna thank my friends and family for their continued support throughout my general writing journey. Y'all will always be my biggest supporters. The journey has been long and hard. But y'all and everyone else mentioned make it a lot easier to manage.
I sincerely hope you all enjoy this story. I still have plenty of stories in the chamber and any and all honest constructive criticism is always welcome!
- S.A. McClellon
July 23, 2024
This was such a great read, full of tons of energy, wonderful characters, and realism. Slice-of-life, coming of age, friendship heavy stories really hit the sweet spot (no pun intended) for me, and this book had it all. All of the characters had their own unique voices that really came through with each section, there was just the right amount of drama for my preferences, and best of all, I had fun reading! The drag shows in particular were so well-written that I felt like I was there. I wish this bakery really existed because I would absolutely be a regular. I would have loved to see more of Johnny and Chris's developing relationship after the main events were finished (no spoilers!), but that just shows how invested I am in these characters.
All in all, this was a sweet, fun, chill read that checked all the boxes for me. I highly recommend this one! And the inclusion of a few of the recipes from the book was a great touch...I'm going to have to make myself a Pretty in Pink Drink now...
All in all, this was a sweet, fun, chill read that checked all the boxes for me. I highly recommend this one! And the inclusion of a few of the recipes from the book was a great touch...I'm going to have to make myself a Pretty in Pink Drink now...
August 5, 2024
Not my normal genre but I needed something that would be okay being read over my shoulder. Once I started, I couldn’t stop. It sucked me in and I devoured it.
dnf
December 27, 2025DNF Nov 2025
I wanted to like this because the idea was interesting but ye dogs I couldn't. The text was unbelievably childish and the whole thing (written in 1st person POV which I detest) sounded like the author is a teenager who read RuPaul's autobiography and tried to copy it as their own story. No thank you, DNF at 7%.
I wanted to like this because the idea was interesting but ye dogs I couldn't. The text was unbelievably childish and the whole thing (written in 1st person POV which I detest) sounded like the author is a teenager who read RuPaul's autobiography and tried to copy it as their own story. No thank you, DNF at 7%.
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