When Katie Met Cassidy Hardcover – June 19, 2018

I *really* wanted to like this book, Autostraddle played it up big time and I found myself preordering the thing about a month ago.Then I started reading the lives of the white, high powered, bespoke suit wearing finance lawyer Cassidy of the elite New York urbanite Price family who meets the equally high powered (by feminine workplace standards) white, also a lawyer Kentucky born, sorority sister, just-broke-it-off-with-her-male-Woody Allen-film-character-fiancé Katie, and I let out an internal sigh of disappointment.Cassidy is attractive to Katie because she sees the familiar masculinity she so loves in a non-threatening, female package.This describes every single experimental straight girl that hooked up with my soft butch self in college, so no surprise there.From there you throw in the local dive of a gay bar and Katie starting to understand about chosen family and her and Cassidy bonding in ways that only the high powered legal elite can afford on the weekends.For those of you that flip to the last page before investing in a lesbian romance (because despite trying to "avoid" labels, this term is thrown around a lot and "bi" or "pan" never even enter the conversation as potential identities), it's fine, proceed as usual.It felt like a PG-13 rated, less kinky 50 Shades of Grey, with no contracts and Cassidy playing the role of Christian as Katie's guide into a tempting and forbidden world.By the way, this book is for the general masses, there is absolutely zero in the way of graphic sex scenes, so feel free to give it to your straight friends for book club next week to give them a manicured, food artist modified taste of what it is to be queer.If you want Actual intersectionality, pick up Cam Girl from Leah Raedar/Elliot Wake, same plotline set 5 years earlier with real world problems, and oh so much sex.

I bought this book. Read this book from cover to cover. And oh, do I have opinions to share with you all! First of all, I want to say how excited I am that queer fiction is finally (finally!) hitting a more mainstream audience. I found this book sitting front and center on a table at my local Barnes & Nobel, and it set my little lesbian heart aflutter. As I began to read, however, that fluttering stopped. That fluttering died, and sank to the bottom of the sea like an overturned canoe. I’ll save you all the trouble, and let you know now that Cassidy is essentially a wealthy, well-dressed Shane from The L Word. (I know, we loved her, we hated her, we loved to hate her.) Katie, ever the cliched femme heroine, is described off the bat as a leggy blonde. She’s straight, or at least was engaged to a man before the book’s beginning. Y. A. W. N. How many times are we going to replay this old adage? This book has the same plot of every queer girl movie on the market. Girl-gets-heart-broken-and-discovers-she-might-be-gay-because-of-hot-butch-woman. I’d also like to formally introduce Camille Perri to the fact that lingerie exists outside of the realm of “black bras and lacy underwear”, and while those are just fine and dandy and wonderful, give a femme some credit for creativity. Why four stars, you ask? When Katie Met Cassidy is an easy read. I finished it in four 45 minute subway rides to-and-from work. Camille Perri, as drowning in cliches as she may be, is clearly a gifted writer. Four stars because I have endless respect for any writer that is willing and able to give us the queer fiction that our little gay hearts are yearning for. Buy this book. Support queer writers. And keep shouting for more!

Let me start by saying that I am an avid reader and have loved the influx of more "mainstream" queer literature of the last few years. This, however, did absolutely nothing for me. Both Cassidy and Katie were borderline insufferable characters. To me, it felt like the author had watched the L Word once and solely based Cassidy off of Shane: womanizer, illusive, hard working, decidedly not-femme. She's the cookie cutter lesbian "player". Katie's character also pissed me off also. Firstly, she was barely out of a long term relationship and I think both Cassidy and Katie should have respected that instead of never really mentioning it. Her alcoholic spiral was seen as more endearing than problematic. I think most queer women have had some history with a "Katie"; who is not even covering the fact that she is just using Cassidy to figure out her own identity and doesn't want to be seen in public, always ambiguous about the relationship, etc. etc. There also seems to be this real praise of femme women over more masc presenting women. The turning point of the whole book to me was when they sat down for dinner and this line, "Katie may have been the most traditional girl that Cassidy had ever sat down to a meal with. She radiated obedience, but instead of finding this off-putting, it only drew in Cassidy more. How rare to encounter someone so classic and authentic - so timeless". What an incredibly heteronormative way and frankly sexist way of viewing womanhood, to liken obedience to authenticity and timelessness. I made it about 2/3 of the way through this before giving up. Overall, I would say the storyline has potential but the characters completely ruined the book.

I didn't dislike this book, it was just quite odd. It was very tame, you don't really get a sense that Katie truly fancies Cassidy, it's more just she wants her for her masculinity. It was also very short, I was surprised when I reached the end.

Sweet romance, well written, great initial twist but slightly predictable otherwise. I did enjoy it though and the characters were fun.

This is such an enjoyable read. Really good lesfic romance, great characters and really amusing. This is a new author to me but I will certainly try more of her work.

Great book

AWESOME

It was great to have a character that was masculine of center, but the premise was a little basic and Katie a little too naive.

Dull. Dull. Dull.