Reviewed by Cheryl
TITLE: Rainbow Briefs 
SERIES: Volume II
AUTHOR: Kira Harp
PUBLISHER: Self Published
LENGTH: 305 Pages
RELEASE DATE: August 31, 2018
BLURB:
Dragons don’t care what gender you are.
A small town may be a refuge, or a trap.
Some younger brothers really do save the planet.
Three people can be the strongest shape.
There’s nothing quite like a gorgeous girl on a shape-shifting motorcycle.
This second Kira Harp collection brings together LGBTQ teens in 21 stories of adventure, discovery, and romance, in fantasy, paranormal, contemporary, and SciFi settings. Ranging from a few short pages to 12,000 words, each story was inspired by a prompt picture from the YA LGBTQ Books Group on Goodreads.
(Content warnings for abduction, bullying, self harm, substance abuse, suicidal ideation.)
REVIEW:
Each of these short-but-sweet stories were entirely different, with a wide range of styles and characters. They also covered a range of genres from fantasy and sci fi to contemporary. The characters differed in gender and sexual orientation.
The story began with a word picture of a certain scene and the stories included that theme/set of characters.
While I have to admit I took to some stories more than others, I can honestly say that none of them were bad. In every case the editing was flawless, the characterisation surprisingly well rounded given the length of the stories and each story was self-contained with a logical story arc, although a few left me wishing for more and would do well continued into a novel.
My favourite story was the first, All of me With Dragons, which is about the heir to a kingdom on the verge of betrothal. The kick is that Kana is sometimes a girl and sometimes a boy. The kingdom is tense to see whether her intended betrothed, princess of a country that would provide significant benefits were there to be an alliance. Add in dragons and a dignitary who wants to bring down the kingdom, Kana most of all, and you have a delightful story that I would dearly love to be made into a novel, so I can read more about Kana, Anali, Malena and even Duran.
My least favourite was Lifeline, not because there was anything wrong with the story, it just didn’t do anything for me.
To give you an idea of the breadth of subject matter—three more of my favourites are of an apprentice wizard who accidentally turns his crush into a cat, a possibly autistic little brother whose “imaginary” pet saves the world, a boy forced to leave boarding school when his father finds out about his two boyfriends, and the boy who plays Oberon in the school play who just wants to be friends. All of the stories, in their own unique way, are special
All in all I can find little to fault with this book. I am sure that, like me, everyone who reads will find stories to love and stories that do nothing for them, and I don’t think I can give a better recommendation than that.
RATING: 
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