YA LGBT Books discussion

We had a chat and comment thread down lower in the group - it has now become so long that posting hits an error message. So I'm going to close it and I thought - why not put it up here?

This thread is for whatever chat, comments, encouragement, complaints, fun links, and other stuff you want to share and discuss. Have fun here.

And what's on my mind today?

The good is how many sweet messages I got for my birthday yesterday. And cake - my younger kid made almond-raspberry-whipped cream cake. I'd post a picture, but we've been devouring it. :)

The bad is trying to wake up from Daylight Saving... seriously, is that not an idea whose time has passed? How many of us are working on our farms without artificial light and need the daylight change? Even farmers have lights...

All it does is make us grumpy and arriving at the wrong times for things twice a year. And throws off the schedule of babies, dogs and insomniacs...

You can't tell it was hard to get up this morning eh?

The fun thing today?

It's rounded Pi day at least on the American calender -if you put the month first today is 3.14.16

Last year was truncated Pi day (3.14.15) :D

Celebrate with pie.



(BTW if anyone wants info on how to post pictures or book links etc, feel free to PM me.)

Kaje wrote: "And what's on my mind today?

The good is how many sweet messages I got for my birthday yesterday. And cake - my younger kid made almond-raspberry-whipped cream cake. I'd post a picture, but we've ..."

oh my god you are singing my song. sooooo tired! (((hugs)))

Sammy Goode wrote: "Kaje wrote: "And what's on my mind today?

The good is how many sweet messages I got for my birthday yesterday. And cake - my younger kid made almond-raspberry-whipped cream cake. I'd post a pictur..."

((Hugs)) I hope you're getting better at least. I hope you have an easy week. Spring break here.

Becky wrote: "Happy Pi Day! And happy birthday as well. :)"

Thanks Becky - both come with good food :D

Becky wrote: "Indeed they do. I don't have any pie, but I do have homemade chilli. That's the same, right?! It's my friend's birthday soon, so I'm hoping to buy her a cake (that she will share of course)."

Chili and pie are absolutely the same thing (*fingers crossed behind back*) - and it's your duty as a friend to buy her a large cake :D

The sacrifices we make for friendship :D

Kaje wrote: "And what's on my mind today?"

um I woke up with all the muscles in my left shoulder all knotted up and horribly painful, also its been snowing, again, like 3 days ago it was 70, today its in the 30s with snow and freezing rain, yay New England, hm seems like there's a lot of Monday blues.

Maxman217 wrote: "Kaje wrote: "And what's on my mind today?"

um I woke up with all the muscles in my left shoulder all knotted up and horribly painful, also its been snowing, again, like 3 days ago it was 70, today..."

The weather is crazy like that here in the Midwest too - 60 one day, snowing the next. But hey, gives us something to talk and complain about eh?

I hope your shoulder is better soon.

Happy belated Birthday, Kaje!

And happy Pi day everyone! (Dean Winchester's favorite day, y/y?) ;)

Maxman217 wrote: "Kaje wrote: "And what's on my mind today?"

um I woke up with all the muscles in my left shoulder all knotted up and horribly painful, also its been snowing, again, like 3 days ago it was 70, today..."

I hate when that happens. Erm, shoulder pain, not snow. It pretty much never snows here. Though we did get a good rain on Friday.

Put a heat pack on your shoulder and do stretches at regular intervals throughout the day.

I made enchiladas over the weekend and they're pretty awesome. Also made a ton of rice and beans so I can have them for burritos and stuff. :)

Linda ~ chock full of hoot, just a little bit of nanny ~ wrote: "I made enchiladas over the weekend and they're pretty awesome. Also made a ton of rice and beans so I can have them for burritos and stuff. :)"

My family loves Mexican food - they laugh at me because I'm a total spicy-food wimp. But my mom was Swiss - they consider cinnamon spicy...

Kaje wrote: "Linda ~ chock full of hoot, just a little bit of nanny ~ wrote: "I made enchiladas over the weekend and they're pretty awesome. Also made a ton of rice and beans so I can have them for burritos and..."

LOL. You better love salsa in my family, the hotter the better. ;)

Ooh. Red beans and rice is more a Cajun meal but I love it with spicy chorizo!!

Lovely words for girls (although applicable to boys too) who are struggling:

“You were not born scared and self-loathing”: Read Caitlin Moran's heartfelt open letter to troubled teenage girls

"Pretend you are your own baby. You would never cut that baby, or starve it, or overfeed it until it cried in pain, or tell it it was worthless. Sometimes, girls have to be mothers to themselves. Your body wants to live – that’s all and everything it was born to do. Let it do that, in the safety you provide it. Protect it. That is your biggest job. To protect your skin, and heart."

http://www.stylist.co.uk/people/caitl...

I've got birthday (tomorrow) on my mind (speaking of which, Happy Belated Birthday, Kaje!). Having a birthday between so many cool calendar days is always a blast: leftover pie, motivational Einstein posts all over Facebook, back-stabbings, shamrocks, dark beer, and corned beef.

Happy birthday tomorrow :D

What happened to the Author OTM / Book OTM topic discussions? Discontinued? Just curious. Being new to the genre I found them informative.

Jason wrote: "What happened to the Author OTM / Book OTM topic discussions? Discontinued? Just curious. Being new to the genre I found them informative."

We did Book of the month first - some got a fair bit of discussion, others less, and it began to not have the participation. Some members said they had trouble getting hold of the book - both money and access issues.

We switched to author of the month, to avoid people having to try to get hold of a particular single book. We had some great discussions (especially when some of our member authors were involved) but again it seemed like not many people commented on the last few. And because I'm really the one active mod, it was a lot of work to set up nominations and a poll and a discussion when there were so few participants. All groups struggle with this I think (The adult M/M group has 17,000 members and will get 10-15 on a book discussion thread usually. We have 3,500... it was coming down to 0-2.)

I'd love to have more book-specific discussion if we can figure out how to get people engaged in it. I love that the group serves as an information resource, but participation is harder. (Back when we had more gregarious multiple mods there was more conversation going on.)

Maybe I'll set up a poll on what people might want to see upcoming on the group (since I have to get out the newsletter anyway...)

And you know, if you read something and want to discuss it - feel free to start a new thread "Hey I read X by Y - anyone else read this?" You can even start it in "Hot Topics" at the top of the group, and I can move it later.

Hmm, you'd think that a group this large would result in lots of author/book discussions. Sounds like most people prefer to peruse the threads instead of actively participating. Which seems foreign to me. When I read a great book or find a new author who really knocked my socks off, I want to tell someone about it, discuss it, share in the humorous moments or the parts that needed tissues, the unique writing style or whatever.

And of course I imagine being the only mod would keep you busy. When I was searching for the appropriate thread to place my inquiry I clicked "unread" topics and there where like 963 or something.

I'll keep in mind about starting new threads though, If I just can't hold back. Thanks Kaje. :)

This is a good spot to ask general questions. I need to tidy up a bit LOL.

So, as many of you know, I'm still new to this genre. I've got the 'bug' as they say. The past couple of weeks I have been on a ridiculous book shopping spree.

I created a Microsoft Access database to catalog my titles (I'm kind of a stickler for order).

However, I use the Aldiko reader app for my books and it seems so tedious to edit tags for each book within the app, and I'm not sure that the tags are edited in the epub file or just the app itself. Also some books list last name first, while others list first name last, eg. 'Green, John and John Green' It's driving my OCD crazy!

Is there some sort of Windows software that can help we with fixing these issues?

Any input would be appreciated, thanks.

Have you looked at Calibre - http://calibre-ebook.com/

I don't have it because the Linux version was in beta when I was looking last, but many of my friends swear by it for cataloging and storing copies and even conversions.

Kaje wrote: "Have you looked at Calibre - http://calibre-ebook.com/

I don't have it because the Linux version was in beta when I was looking last, but many of my friends swear by it for cataloging and storing ..."

Oh wow, just watched the demo video. This is exactly what I needed. Thanks Kaje!

Jason wrote: "Kaje wrote: "Have you looked at Calibre - http://calibre-ebook.com/

I don't have it because the Linux version was in beta when I was looking last, but many of my friends swear by it for cataloging..."

I love Calibre and use it to store all my ebooks. I cannot recommend it enough. You can also use the app to read your books on it you want to. It creates folders for each author, and you can create series. It does have some quirks. For instance, depending where you download the ebook from and how the metadata is embedded in the file, sometime the author's name will be Last Name, First Name, and sometimes it'll be First Name Last Name - and this can happen for the same author, creating two different folders for that author. You can fix this easily though if you want to it give uniformity.

I have a Numbers spreadsheet for keeping track of my books too as it's quicker to access.

Linda ~ chock full of hoot, just a little bit of nanny ~ wrote: "Jason wrote: "Kaje wrote: "Have you looked at Calibre - http://calibre-ebook.com/

I don't have it because the Linux version was in beta when I was looking last, but many of my friends swear by it ..."

Girl, I've been messing with it since I downloaded it an hour ago, and it sure is a complicated beast. I finally got it set up and connected to my device. I'm still tweaking the settings, I'm sure I'll figure it out eventually. Got my books imported to my library, and I'm in the process of editing the metadata now.

This software is amazing, I can't believe it was free!

Yes it does take some time to get it all set up and get it where you want it. (That "next" button at the bottom of the metadata window is a time saver though.) But once it's done: huzzah! I don't use tags, so I'm not sure how that works. Sometimes a book will load with a generic cover or no cover at all, but you can find the cover online and copy/paste it into the metadata (if the app doesn't find it for you) or create your own covers if you're so inclined.

I just found out you can sort the series by clicking the series column, which I didn't know was there cuz that little box in the middle hides it. You have to scroll way over to see that column. But you can also click and drag the columns around however you want them, so the ones you use most often come first. I'm sure if I played around with it, I'd figure even more things out. (Or I guess I can read the manual or watch the how-to videos, but where's the fun in that?) ;)

Linda ~ chock full of hoot, just a little bit of nanny ~ wrote: "Yes it does take some time to get it all set up and get it where you want it. (That "next" button at the bottom of the metadata window is a time saver though.) But once it's done: huzzah! I don't u..."

You're right, it's crazy just how much this software can do. The sorting, can download metadata automatically (though I think I'll do it manually, so it's uniform to my own standards), the cover downloads, on and on, sheesh! I just watched a tutorial on youtube and saw I can email books to people. My mom's gonna be so excited. She reads more than I do, being retired and all. But she's kind of computer illiterate though, so I don't know how well that will work, ha ha.

I'm jumping on the Calibre love train here.

I have Calibre setup so that it places its library into my Dropbox folder, so when I get new eBooks, they autosync to my cloud storage.

I then have Dropsync (an Android Dropbox client) and Moon+ reader. So my eBooks autosync into my Moon+ directory on my phone. And then my Moon+ metadata syncs back to my cloud storage when I read a book.

And then I built a Calibre widget that reads the Moon+ metadata, and updates the book's data (marks it as read) and prompts me to put in a star rating the next time Calibre loads.

Now to find or build a widget that interfaces with the Goodreads API and automatically posts those ratings and read dates to GR...

Rez wrote: "I'm jumping on the Calibre love train here.

I have Calibre setup so that it places its library into my Dropbox folder, so when I get new eBooks, they autosync to my cloud storage.

I then have D..."

Calibre is indeed awesome. I'm still fairly new to e-books, so I'm just glad I found it before my collection got too big, that would have been a nightmare to have to go back and edit.

I didn't think about putting my library on dropbox for syncing, sounds like a good idea, is it complicated to set it up that way?

I'm sure I'll just have to mess a bit to figure out the ins-and-outs of this beast.

Jason wrote: "I didn't think about putting my library on dropbox for syncing, sounds like a good idea, is it complicated to set it up that way?"

If you have Dropbox installed on your computer already, it is as simple as changing Calibre's library location. Just hit the 'Calibre Library' button and pick a folder in your Dropbox folder. Be sure to change the radio button to 'Move Library' instead of the other two options; the first one creates a duplicate, and the second one makes you start fresh.)

If you don't have Dropbox, you'd need to sign up for an account and setup the software.

I keep saying Dropbox, but I'm sure there are other could storage solutions out there that work equally well.

Rez wrote: "Jason wrote: "I didn't think about putting my library on dropbox for syncing, sounds like a good idea, is it complicated to set it up that way?"

If you have Dropbox installed on your computer alre..."

Thanks for the insight. I do have Dropbox. Earlier I set Calibre's web server up so I could access my library on my wifi, but Dropbox would be better as I could access it when I'm away from home.

I'm just in awe at this software, the developer put a lot of time and energy into it. Saw a tutorial earlier on Youtube for publishing your own epubs with it. Or even edit existing epubs. I have one book that for some reason doesn't have a TOC, so I made one for it using Calibre...Amazing!

Glad you're having fun with it, Jason. I'm learning new things reading these posts.

Rez wrote: "Jason wrote: "I didn't think about putting my library on dropbox for syncing, sounds like a good idea, is it complicated to set it up that way?"

If you have Dropbox installed on your computer alre..."

You were right Rez, that was super easy. Sooo convienient to have it set up with Dropbox, now I don't have to worry about keeping all my files on my device, when I'm out and about. I can just download the one I want at that particular moment, thanks for the insight.

Rez wrote: "I'm jumping on the Calibre love train here.

I have Calibre setup so that it places its library into my Dropbox folder, so when I get new eBooks, they autosync to my cloud storage.

I then have D..."

I can't thank you enough Rez, for sharing your setup with me. I absolutely love Moon+ reader (so many cool features). Dropbox and Dropsync integration with Calibre makes it so much easier to organize and transfer my library.

Also, you probably already have it, but Calibre has a Goodreads plugin that I installed and it connects with my GR shelves, so cool.

*sigh* So many people love it. I keep thinking I must do the same, then looking at my 3000 ebooks... But with the potential for ebook sources to close down (as publishers and B&N- UK have), having a reserve of copies, organized, is such a good idea.

I didn't know it had a GR plugin. I will have to look into that.

Linda ~ chock full of hoot, just a little bit of nanny ~ wrote: "I didn't know it had a GR plugin. I will have to look into that."

It's easy to install. Just click 'preferences' > 'get plugins', & there are two plugins (Goodreads, and GoodreadsSync).

Once installed a window with a link will display. Just click the link and goodreads should open in your browser and you have to authorize Calibre to access your shelves.

Then restart Calibre and you're good to go.

Kaje wrote: "*sigh* So many people love it. I keep thinking I must do the same, then looking at my 3000 ebooks... But with the potential for ebook sources to close down (as publishers and B&N- UK have), having ..."

I bet you would like it Kaje. But I don't envy the task of organizing 3000 titles, sheesh. ;-). But Calibre makes it easy and in the long run it would be worth it.

Curious is anyone knows of some online ebook library to subscribe to for an endless supply of reads? I know of that one on amazon, but didn't include the books I've planned to read.

1 DVS BSTD wrote: "Curious is anyone knows of some online ebook library to subscribe to for an endless supply of reads? I know of that one on amazon, but didn't include the books I've planned to read."


Depending where you are, there's often a library in a big city you can subscribe to - sometimes for free if you live within the same state, or by paid subscription (which may pay off depending on how you use it.)

If you are in the US you might check the largest city in your state.
I'm not aware of any general online library for fiction.

I recently joined my local library just to take advantage of their ebook collection. But it turns out that their selection of YA LGBT is larger in print than in ebook format. Granted it's by no means large, but if I'm looking for a particular book, if they have it, more than likely it's hardback.

I'm in a state capital, but I'm also in the south, so I am constantly pleasantly surprised when I find what I'm looking for in this genre.

YA is often available in print more than ebook (at least for the mainstream publishers - the smaller pubs, like Harmony Ink, may be easier to request in ebook), while adult LGBTQ books are generally more available in ebook. You can look into inter-library loans too - I used to do that a fair bit through my local library.

If you're looking for eBooks from public libraries, you'll also want to check which ebook platforms are available to that library.

Overdrive is the biggest of the ebook lending sources; it usually is stocked with mainstream titles from the Big-5 publishers. Overdrive is also partnered with Smashwords, and libraries can opt to purchase indie author titles (usually a borrower has to request a title) for ebook borrowers.

Enki is another big ebook lending platform and has a lot of titles from Harlequin Press and their YA and LGBT imprints. Enki also has more titles from smaller publishers so you can find things like Jay Bell's Loka Legends series on there.

There are other ebook lending platforms (3M Cloud, Hoopla, BiblioBoard) but I don't know enough about their content to comment about them.

If you have an opportunity to travel to some of the larger cities in the US, it may be worth buying an out-of-state library card from the library system there just for ebook access. Los Angeles Public Library charges $50 for a one-year card, and if you read more than ten loaned ebooks a year instead of buying then, you're likely making a savings.

Been dealing with an abscessed tooth. OMGosh, painful experience. Right side of my face is swollen like a balloon. Haven't been able to read in four days, :-(. Hopefully the antibiotic will start working soon.

Yikes! That sounds awful! I hope you feel better soon!

Jason wrote: "Been dealing with an abscessed tooth. OMGosh, painful experience. Right side of my face is swollen like a balloon. Haven't been able to read in four days, :-(. Hopefully the antibiotic will start w..."

Aww.... shit. So sorry to hear. Hope you feel better soon! :(

I'm taking antibiotics as well; tonsillitis <- yuck.
Feeling okay though! Just before that hit, I broke my tooth (split in the middle -_-") Thankfully its root-treated, so not much pain.
Feels like a bad-luck 2 weeks.

Thanks guys. Thant's what happened to me Riina. I broke a tooth a month ago and it got infected. Going to have the tooth extracted once the abscess clears up.