The details…
- Authors: Elna Holst
- Publisher: NineStar Press
- Publication date: June 21, 2022
- Available formats: ebook
- File size: 993 KB
- Word Count: 18400 (78 pages)
- Genre: contemporary fiction
- Tropes: age-gap, holiday romance, sexual awakening
- Themes: family drama, self-discovery, LGBTQ, island life
The blurb from the publisher…
In the summer of 1972, twenty-one-year-old university undergrad Annette Thornton, aka Thorny Netty, finds herself on a coerced holiday with her younger sister Fiona, expected to spend two long sweltering weeks babysitting said sister on the island of Gran Canaria. To say she’s peeved would be an understatement. But when she catches a glimpse of a stranger on a balcony, impulses long buried begin to surface—impulses that sorely put Thorny Netty’s much-touted self-possession to the test.
From Sappho, with Love is a new series of standalone stories held together by a common theme: a chain of postcards sent from sapphic travellers across space and time.
My thoughts…
Elna Holst’s writing is always a treat, and Queen of Hearts just underlines why readers love her prose. She has an elegant way with words and an enchanting sense for storytelling. Her stories are just a delight; she has an uncanny ability to immerse readers in the narrative, surrounding them with all the sights and sounds of the story world.
For those not familiar with Holst’s work, Queen of Hearts is an excellent opportunity to acquaint themselves with her talent. This piece of fiction is short, sweet, and can be read in just a few hours. Holst accomplishes a lot in just 78 pages, which is impressive. Queen of Heart’s characters are intriguing and their story is compelling. It’s all quite lovely and a fantastic start to her new series From Sappho, with Love, a collection of shorts woven together through postcards sent from various women traveling from different places and times.
Final remarks…
Queen of Hearts is the perfect story for those looking for a short, well-written piece of fiction. The characters are likable, engaging individuals and the story world is completely engrossing. Holst does a lovely job with this tale, and I’m excited to see where she takes readers next in the series.
Strengths…
- Short and sweet
- Lovely writing
- interesting characters
- Immersive story world
A peek inside Queen of Hearts…
Netty adjusted the brim of her hat. Her skin was taking on an angry, hot pink colour that heralded a painful night ahead. She must remember to pick up yoghurt at the mini market: two tubs, enough for Fin as well. The silly goose wasn’t even wearing protective headgear. They would need painkillers, and water too—lots of it.
With near visceral relief, Netty entered into the shade of the lobby. A porter greeted her with a toothy smile, and she offered him a curt nod in acknowledgement, almost tripping over one of the dusty, palmlike plants that were scattered about the place in the process.
The man held out a hand to steady her, gazing quizzically into her eyes.
“No hablo español,” Netty squeaked and scurried off in the direction of the cool metal refuge of the building’s lift system.
“Señorita!” the porter called, but she would not look back. She would not give him any kind of encouragement. She fled into the nearest lift and, as the doors closed behind her, she pressed the button for the ninth floor and exhaled slowly.
Like everyone else—including their anxious parents—Netty had heard the stories of Good English Girls who came back from exotic travel destinations with lifelong souvenirs germinating in their no longer all that virginal wombs. That wouldn’t be happening to either her or Fin, not if Thorny Netty had any say in the matter.
She smoothed a hand down her gingham shirt and studied her gaunt reflection in the mirrored wall of the lift compartment. Her cheeks glowed. Her light, nearly transparent eyelashes fluttered back at her. It certainly wouldn’t happen to her; that was for sure. Good thing too. She had never experienced even a fleeting attraction to the opposite sex. If she could get away with remaining unmarried, she would be as happy as she expected to be in life. After all, as her tutor at Oxford had told her pointedly on a night when they had shared an out of the ordinary glass of wine after an informal one on one, there were women who…who…who were quite content to be old maids, perhaps gaining employment at local libraries and spending their hours of leisure embroidering christening gowns for the broods of their siblings, or cousins, or passing acquaintances. Netty pushed away the thought of what Ms McKendrick might really have hinted at, refusing to acknowledge the heavy, floaty feeling at the pit of her stomach.
Pulling a hand through her lanky hair, she exited the lift, stepped down the corridor, turned her key in the lock of room 902, and went inside. She tossed her bag on her bed and cursed when she realised she had forgotten all about her postcard. She rubbed at the bridge of her nose. Her head was pounding.
Relaxing with a book was out of the question, then. The sentences would only blur together, exacerbating her pain. She might as well make herself useful.
Squaring her shoulders, Netty walked over to the double wardrobe and brought out the ironing board, followed by all the blouses, skirts, and dresses Fiona had found it incumbent on her to bring on a two-week getaway. No point in rifling through her own side of the wardrobe. Netty had ironed her clothes yesterday.
Fin wouldn’t notice—as their long-suffering mother often pointed out, though always with a mild, affectionate glint in her eye—but she probably wouldn’t mind either. Ironing was therapy for Netty. It took her mind off things and made her feel in control. Plus, she took a childish delight in watching the spellworking combination of heat and steel and a sprinkling of water flatten out the most hopelessly wrinkled fabric. This was firmly within her comfort zone.
Except, it was hot work. After half an hour of ironing, when the steam had effectually clouded up the shoebox-size shape of their room, Netty wondered what she had been thinking. Her usually straight hair curled with moisture. Her cotton shirt was soaking, clinging uncomfortably to her as she moved. Even the insides of her thighs slid against one another under her skirt. She was breathing in gasps and sighs.
Conceding defeat, she set the iron down and opened the door to the balcony. A humid sea breeze greeted her, not cool precisely but, compared to the miasma of the steamed-up room, infinitely refreshing. She went out, undoing the topmost button of her shirt, and leaned over the railing.
“Playa del diablo,” she muttered, dropping her chin to her chest and shielding her eyes against the sun.
Below her, on an adjacent balcony one storey down, a woman was sunbathing in a yellow two-piece bathing suit that left precious little to a much less vivid imagination than Netty’s. The canary-tinted bikini set off the honeyed shade of the woman’s skin—a dark amber, like the runny variety of honey produced from the nectar of wild flowers. Netty’s hand went to her neck. She seemed to have forgotten how to swallow.
The woman stretched on her lounger in an entrancing display of long arms, muscular thighs, and supremely touchable, generous curves. Netty felt dizzy. Her heart thudded in her ears. She was staring—no, she was ogling. She should—
The stranger raised her cat’s-eye sunglasses and squinted up at her. She moved her legs. Netty jumped back, hand in front of her mouth, her stomach lurching with embarrassment and with—with something else—as Fin, ever the one for unerring timing, chose that moment to burst through the door to their room.
“What on earth? What’s going on here?” Fiona stalked towards the balcony as Netty shook her head vehemently, coming in and closing the door with a bang.
“Please.” She sounded breathless. “Not so loud.”
Fin gawked at her. “It’s like a sauna in here! Why did you shut the door? Why are all my clothes out? Why—” Fin made a motion to reach for the handle behind her; Netty slapped her hand away.
“Ow!” Fin cradled her hand to her chest, looking more offended than hurt. “Have you lost your—” Her eyes widened. She touched her wrist to Netty’s forehead. “You haven’t had a sunstroke, have you? Only, you dropped your hat in the lobby. The porter gave it to me.” Fin indicated her bed where Netty’s straw hat was lying, on top of a pile of neatly ironed and folded tops.
“Oh,” Netty said sheepishly. “I… I didn’t notice.”
Fin tutted. “Can I open the door to the balcony now?”
“No!” Netty barred the way, desperation making her shrill. “Please, Fin—”
But there was no stopping her sister, who was all of a sudden grinning and worming her way past Netty like she’d done numerous times, Netty remembered bitterly, when they were kids and she had tried to keep Fiona out of her room. She didn’t even know why it was so important to her that Fin shouldn’t see, shouldn’t be able to tell—but tell what? All that would happen would be that her sister made some inappropriate remark, wriggled her eyebrows, and said something about how it was fortunate (or worse: unfortunate) for this sultry stranger they weren’t two brothers occupying room 902, and Netty—well, she couldn’t bear it, that was all. She couldn’t stomach her sister’s not-very-innocent jocularity while her cheeks, her very insides still burned with—
“What are you hiding out there?” Flinging the door open, Fin practically fell onto the balcony. She twisted and spun, looking in every direction, before her puzzled gaze returned to Netty. “There’s nothing here.”
Risking further humiliation, Netty came out to join her sister, peeping over the railing on her right. Fin caught the direction of her gaze, but it didn’t matter: the breathtaking stranger was gone.
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A bit about the author…
Often quirky, always queer, Elna Holst is an unapologetic genre-bender who writes anything from stories of sapphic lust and love to the odd existentialist horror piece, reads Tolstoy, and plays contract bridge.
Connect with the author…
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