The trope-smashing story about love, lard-crust pies, and a couple of half-baked lesbians.

Nikki, just out of Catholic school, is enjoying her first taste of freedom as a college freshman in New York City. Sameera, an Army medic, is struggling to reclaim her life, her family, and her dream of going to medical school now that her service is done. A walk in the park, and strangers become friends.

Time flies, and Nikki can't believe that she's falling in love with a woman. Battered, broken Sameera doesn't want to love or be loved by anyone at all-until she realizes how much she loves and needs Nikki. Now they must grapple with the consequences of their impossible romance.

- "A slow burn."

- "Great stuff."

- "Such delicious conflict!"

- "A falling-in-love story, something honestly we've all experienced whether with the same or opposite sex-but the conflict Nikki is experiencing from her religious background is what makes it really interesting. Nikki balances between her strong, long-held beliefs and her new feelings."

"Woden's day," Sameera said. "I like starting a trek on Woden's day."

"What are you talking about, Sameera?"

"Wednesday, you know-the days of the week? Didn't we talk about this? The Anglo-Saxon gods are where we get the names for the days of the week."

"Sorry, Professor," Nikki said, "but I was absent for that lecture, or maybe I was asleep."

***

Sameera noticed that Nikki had taken seconds of the roast beef. She watched as Nikki would cut a small piece off to eat, but then she would put her fork down when she found the need to interject something into the conversation. Nikki seemed to have a lot to say. Sometimes the piece of beef would fall off the fork. Sameera, seeing an opportunity for mischief, would spear the beef and eat it. She did this several times before Nikki caught her.

"Hey, what are you doing?" Nikki said to Sameera.

"What?"

"You're eating my food."

"Who, me? I didn't see anything," Sameera said.

"Very funny. Cut it out," Nikki said.

Sameera smiled. Nikki smiled. Emily frowned.

***

"I just know that my mother is going to look at me and see what I did." She paused for a moment. "Last night was my first time. I wanted it to be special-my first time. I wanted it to be with someone I loved. I'm different now. She's going to see it."

Sameera took a moment to realize what Nikki had just said. Nikki hadn't been with anyone before. She hadn't known.

***

Subverting tropes through intimately realized storytelling, at times flirting just on the edge of magical realism, Sameera's Kitchen ranges from goofy to poignant to nail-biting suspense and back again. Cops, lawyers, combat vets, comic book fans, street vigilantes, and a wise great-grandmother all play a part. Ultimately joyous, this warmhearted and quirky debut novel abounds with wit and richly vibrant characters.

Read Sameera's Kitchen-a lesbian LGBT story about coming of age, a soldier's return, and two improbable soulmates and their quest to find the meaning of love.