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Thirsty: A Novel
Jas Hammonds
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From Jas Hammonds, award-winning author of We Deserve Monuments, comes a gripping read about a queer teen risking it all to pledge an underground sorority with her best friends the summer before college—perfect for fans of Euphoria and Girl in Pieces.
It’s the summer before college and eighteen-year-old Blake Brenner and her girlfriend, Ella, have one goal: join the mysterious and exclusive Serena Society. The sorority promises status and lifelong connections to a network of powerful, trailblazing women of color. Ella’s acceptance is a sure thing—she’s the daughter of a Serena alum. Blake, however, has a lot more to prove.
As a former loner from a working-class background, Blake lacks Ella’s pedigree and confidence. Luckily, she finds courage at the bottom of a liquor bottle. When she drinks, she’s bold, funny, and unstoppable—and the Serenas love it. But as pledging intensifies, so does Blake’s drinking, until it’s seeping into every corner of her life.
Ella assures Blake that she’s fine; partying hard is what it takes to make the cut. But success has never felt so much like drowning. With her future hanging in the balance and her past dragging her down, Blake must decide how far she’s willing to go to achieve her glittering dreams of success—and how much of herself she’s willing to lose in the process.
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Posts about this book from across Bindery
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Wanderland Reads\
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• Mar 20
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Disabled sapphic people exist. You know this, I know this, but sometimes it feels like the greater book community does not, in fact, know this. We love, date, build relationships, and navigate intimacy in ways that deserve space on the page.\
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Romance as a genre has not always made room for our stories.\
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Many books still center on able-bodied characters. And while there is nothing wrong with that, when disability does appear, it often shows up as something to fix, overcome, or use as emotional motivation for another character. Disabled characters become symbols instead of people.\
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I'd love to see the focus shift to something different.\
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Stories where disabled sapphic main characters hold agency, desire, complexity, and full lives. Stories where disability shapes the relationship without reducing the character to it.\
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Moving beyond harmful tropes\
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A few patterns show up again and again in romance.\
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The cure narrative treats disability as a temporary obstacle. By the end of the story, the character improves or is “fixed,” often through love. The way I wish love could cure my chronic illness or disability.\
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The inspiration narrative turns disabled characters into lessons for others. Our role centers on teaching resilience rather than living a full life.\
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The caregiver dynamic creates an imbalance. One partner exists to provide care, while the other becomes dependent in ways that remove autonomy.\
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Desexualization appears often. Y'all disabled people FUCK. Disabled characters rarely receive the same level of desire, attraction, or explicit intimacy as able-bodied characters.\
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These patterns limit storytelling. They flatten characters and reinforce harmful assumptions about disability and worth.\
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Stronger stories move in a different direction.\
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They allow disabled characters to want things. To make decisions. To be messy. To experience joy, frustration, attraction, and connection without being reduced to a single trait.\
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Disability and autonomy\
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Autonomy should sit at the center of disabled sapphic romance.\
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Seeing characters navigate questions around independence, support, and control over their own lives. These questions can shape how relationships develop.\
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A partner may offer help. The key question involves how that help gets negotiated.\
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Does the disabled character maintain control over decisions?\
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Do they set boundaries around what support looks like?\
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Does the relationship respect their independence rather than override it?\
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Good romance pays attention to these dynamics.\
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Support does not mean taking over. Care does not mean removing agency. The relationship works because both people respect each other’s boundaries and needs.\
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For readers, this often leads to more grounded and intentional relationship development.\
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Disability and intimacy\
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Romance often relies on narrow ideas about intimacy. Fast pacing. Physical attraction that follows predictable patterns. Assumptions about what bodies should do and how.\
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Disabled sapphic romance can and should challenge those assumptions.\
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Intimacy becomes more intentional. Characters communicate clearly about needs, comfort, and limits, and tbh this isn't any different than how it should be with able-bodied characters either. Physical connection may look different from mainstream portrayals.\
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Some stories focus on slower pacing. Others show adaptive approaches to physical intimacy. Many highlight emotional connection as central rather than secondary.\
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These shifts do not reduce the romance. They deepen it.\
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Desire remains present. Attraction remains central. The difference lies in how characters express and negotiate that connection.\
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The role of communication\
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Communication carries more weight in these stories.\
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Characters talk about access needs. They discuss boundaries. They name what works and what does not.\
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This creates a different type of romantic tension. Instead of relying on miscommunication or avoidance, these stories often build connection through honesty.\
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Vulnerability becomes part of the relationship from the beginning.\
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Readers get to watch two people learn how to understand each other in real time. That process often leads to a stronger emotional payoff.\
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Intersectionality matters\
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Disability does not exist in isolation.\
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Race, class, gender identity, and culture shape how disability gets experienced. Access to care, community support, and safety vary widely depending on those factors.\
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A disabled sapphic character who is also a person of color will navigate different challenges than a white disabled character. A working-class character will face different barriers than someone with financial stability.\
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Stories that acknowledge these layers feel more grounded.\
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They show how systems intersect. They also show how community, culture, and identity shape relationships in complex ways.\
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What meaningful representation looks like\
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Readers often ask how to identify strong representation.\
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Look for characters with full inner lives. They have goals, fears, desires, and flaws that extend beyond their disability.\
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Look for relationships built on mutual respect. Both partners hold agency. Both contribute to the relationship in meaningful ways.\
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Look for stories where disability exists as part of the character’s life, not the entire story.\
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Look for joy. Disabled characters deserve happiness, pleasure, and connection without the narrative framing those experiences as rare or surprising.\
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When possible, look for authors with lived experience. That perspective often leads to more nuanced and grounded storytelling.\
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Where to find these stories\
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Disabled sapphic protagonists appear across genres.\
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Contemporary romance often explores chronic illness, mental health, and day-to-day access needs.\
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Fantasy and science fiction create space to imagine different bodies, different abilities, and different systems of care.\
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Historical fiction can explore how disability was understood and navigated in earlier periods.\
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Speculative fiction often pushes these questions even further, asking how societies might function if access and care looked different from the start.\
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An invitation to read with intention\
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Disabled sapphic romance expands how we understand love.\
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It shows relationships built through communication, respect, and adaptation. It challenges narrow ideas about desirability and intimacy. It reminds readers that care and autonomy can exist together.\
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These stories deserve attention.\
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If you have read a disabled sapphic romance that stayed with you, share it. If you want to see more of these stories, talk about them. Recommend them. Support the authors writing them.\
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What you read and what you share shapes what gets visibility.\
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And these stories deserve to be seen.\
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Here are a list of a handful of sapphic stories that I have read and enjoyed, and some on my TBR!\
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The Unbroken by C.L. Clark\
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Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant\
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The Never Tilting World by Rin Chupeco\
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Thirsty by Jas Hammonds\
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Treasure by Rebekah Weatherspoon\
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Cleat Cute by Meryl Wilsner\
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Nine of Swords, Reversed by Xan West\
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Ascension by Jacqueline Koyanagi\
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