Blog tour: Under the Rainbow

Welcome to the blog tour for Under The Rainbow by Celia Laskey!

More about the book…

Big Burr, Kansas, is the kind of place where everyone knows everyone – or so they think. But after being labeled “the most homophobic town in America”, a group of queer activists are moving in, and everything is about to change.

Linda welcomes the newcomers. The less they know about the death of her son, the better. Avery is furious at being uprooted from her life in LA. She dreads her classmates discovering that her mom is the head of the queer task force. And Gabe, a lifelong Big Burr resident, is no longer sure about the life he's built with his wife.

While new friendships are formed, elsewhere tensions reach boiling point. And every resident, old and new, must reconsider the true meaning of community.

More about the author…

Celia Laskey’s debut novel Under the Rainbow is out now with Riverhead Books. Her second novel, So Happy for You, is forthcoming from Hanover Square Press in June 2022. Her other work has appeared in Guernica, The Minnesota Review, Day One, and elsewhere. She has an MFA from the University of New Mexico and currently lives in Los Angeles with her wife and their dog Whiskey.

She enjoys ranting about closeted celebrities, dissecting Taylor Swift lyrics, singing the praises of probiotics and diva cups, learning the names of plants via an app on her phone, rewatching Mad Men for the 43728th time, and picking up her holds from the library.

My impressions…

Was it a page-turner? It was for me. Perhaps not in the way that a fast-paced thriller would have been but I became involved in the lives of the all characters so quickly that I could hardly put the book down.

Did the book meet my expectations? I must admit that I thought this was going to be a work of non-fiction! This misconception was entirely my fault: I saw a rainbow, I read ‘queer activists’ in the synopsis and I joined dots that were not there! Fiction or non-fiction, I bloody loved this book! The characters felt authentic and, while the ending might be perceived to be too neat and pretty, I wouldn’t change it one bit. After all, it DOES get better!

Three words to describe it. Emotional. Funny. Hopeful.

Do I like the cover? I’ve seen two covers and I like them both but my favourite is the one with the rainbow over the signage for Big Burr.

Have I read any other books by the same author? No, this is the author’s debut novel. I can’t wait to read what comes next! Please let it be gay!

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