Reluctantly, she agrees to take her mother's advice and look into finding some Armenian men instead, attending Explore Armenia, the event for Armenian-Americans. She isn't drawn to any of her prospects though. Instead, there an interesting Armenian-American activist woman, Ereduni, attracts her deeply.
Nareh, however, is not out as bisexual, afraid her family will reject her. She starts to see Ereduni secretly despite this. As they grow closer, Nareh has to decide whether she'll stay closeted and in denial or at last be honest about her true self for her to find happiness.
Written by Taleen Voskuni, it came out in January 2023.
Tropes:
- 20 Minutes into the Past: The book came out in January 2023, but is set c. June 2015.
- Affectionate Nickname: Nareh's friends usually nickname her Nar, and her girlfriend later does too.
- Can't Take Criticism: Nareh thinks this of herself, saying her response is either shutting down and then profusely apologizing or hitting back if criticized.
- Closet Gay: Nareh is not out when the story starts to her family as bisexual aside from her sister Diane (though she didn't tell too much), because of the homophobia in her community. At best her mom is of the Condescending Compassion view initially. Nareh's not aware at first of any openly LGBT+ people who are in the Armenian community at all. She then meets Erebuni, an out bisexual woman, who also mentions a gay man named Sako who's still mostly in the closet.
- Coming-Out Story: After she gets forcibly outed and weakly tries to deny her bisexuality, Nareh later admits she's really bisexual. Her cousin, mother and grandmother take it better than she expected (the latter two especially), accepting her. Nareh tells the whole world too through her post on Instagram.
- D-Cup Distress: Nareh has pretty large breasts it seems, often struggling as outfits that fit the rest of her won't also accommodate her bust in a lot of cases, to her annoyance.
- Disappeared Dad: Nareh's father died prior to the events of the book from a car accident while driving drunk. His presence still hangs over her as she misses him but also resents things he left them with, such as taking out a second mortgage on the house which her mother didn't know about.
- Eating the Eye Candy: Nareh can't help but check out Erebuni and Raffi, since both are quite attractive to her.
- Experimented in College: People who knew about them thought Nareh's past sexual experiences with women were only this usually. Even she tried to tell herself it was. Most of the women whom she'd been intimate with were straight and for them it really was just experimenting. She's really bisexual though, and knew this from very early on (age seven) by having crushes on boys and girls.
- Final Solution: The Armenian Genocide comes up in the book multiple times, as it's set in the Bay Area Armenian-American community. Nareh's tired of hearing about it since she thinks Armenians have spent so much time on this. Erebuni however says it's necessary as the Genocide still isn't acknowledged by either the US or Turkey. She's an educator who organizes lectures about the Genocide. Erebuni frequently makes references to it, if not always explicitly, and Nareh feels she brings the Genocide into everything in one way or another. When she sees how vehement some Turks are in flatly denying it and saying the Armenians had committed genocide against them, Nareh gains newfound respect for Erebuni doing these talks. In her own family, it was almost never spoken about, whereas Erebunii's great-grandparents (who were survivors) made a point of documenting their experience for posterity. When an Armenian-American Representative proposes a law that will recognize the genocide, this becomes a big story that Nareh covers as a reporter.
- Forced Out of the Closet: Nareh is caught kissing Erebuni by Sona and her mother, the former of whom promptly spreads the news as a notorious gossip. She tries to play it off as not what it looks like at first, but no one really believes it. Erebuni is quite upset by her doing so, and it's part of why their relationship temporarily dissolves.
- Gossipy Hens: Sona is a gossipy older woman who instantly spreads the news that Nareh was kissing a woman after she catches them at it.
- Heteronormative Crusader: A lot of the Armenian-American community are homophobic, especially the older people. This is why Nareh kept her bisexuality secret from most people for so long. Her mother, who she thought was homophobic too, it turns out really was more worried that they would harm Nareh after having grown up in Lebanon, where this would be a real danger toward out queer people, and this is the reason she was initially upset at her bisexuality.
- Hot Witch: Erebuni is a beautiful young woman who practices some Wiccan traditions along with the Armenian folk magic, like reading coffee grounds. Nareh is attracted to her very quickly, finding her being a witch only makes her sexier.
- Interfaith Smoothie: Erebuni was raised an Orthodox Christian like most Armenians. She also practices Wiccan magic though while taking communion and sculpting traditional cross statues, blending both.
- I Want Grandkids: Nareh is an only child, with her mother often pressuring her to marry and give her grandchildren. After she learns Nareh is dating a woman, she's disappointed by the idea she'll never have them, but then mollified on hearing that queer women do still have children and she'll give her some one day.
- Jerkass: Nareh's colleague Mark is an ass-kissing weasel who's constantly undermining her to further his career. Her boss Richard also never lets her do anything except fluff pieces, and eventually fires Nareh for her understandably defying this. She retaliates by writing an article on how she'd been treated by him, with it clearly having a sexist motive.
- Lipstick Lesbian: Nareh is a feminine bisexual woman with long hair who often wears dresses. Erebuni, a bisexual woman as well, wears sexy blouses and skirts, but isn't quite as feminine, having short curly hair while more often wearing shirts with slacks. Her mom is incredulous at first that Nareh can be into women because she's so girly.
- Longing Look: Nareh shoots Erebuni many of these as she grows closer and more attracted to her, but at first tries hiding it. Erebuni soon catches on though and reciprocates her attraction.
- Queer Establishing Moment:
- Nareh reflects privately that she would be open to a relationship with a man or woman, thus revealing she's bisexual and explicitly references her bisexuality internally later. Soon after this, she expresses attraction to both men and a woman after meeting them (privately at first again).
- Erebuni's ex Sheila being mentioned later tells Nareh she isn't straight, which delights her as she's attracted to Erebuni. Later it turns out she's bisexual like Nareh, mentioning her attraction to men too.
- Quirky Curls: Erebuni lets her curly hair hang loose, unlike lots of Armenian women, as a sign of her laidback and freespirited personality.
- Reading Tea Leaves: Erebuni reads Nareh's coffee grounds to tell her fortune, seeing a stag (protector) and a woman's face. In the latter case, this is clearly Ereduni herself, who Nareh's attracted to (and vice versa). It leads to them having Their First Time since both realize this.
- Rejected Marriage Proposal: Nareh's boyfriend Trevor proposes to her in the opening chapter, but this makes her realize their relationship isn't very good, and she doesn't accept the proposal later after thinking about it.
- Second-Act Breakup: Toward the end of the book, Nareh and Erebuni break up temporarily when the former is outed, denies she had been with her desperately to avoid social stigma while having lied as well about having a fiance. Nareh breaks up with her fiance, comes out and later apologizes to Erebuni, with them getting back together after this.
- Secret Relationship: Nareh starts dating Erebuni secretly after they act on their mutual attraction, since she's not out to her family as bisexual and isn't sure how they'll react.
- Sexy Discretion Shot: At the end of Chapter 13, Erebuni asks Nareh if she wants to see her bedroom. Chapter 14 starts in the wake of them having fantastic sex together.
- Their First Time: Nareh and Erebuni enjoy passionate sex together the first time after the latter has read her fortune. While Nareh mentions being intimate with women before, it's not made clear if that meant full on sex. In any case, she finds this is better than any sex she's ever had with men.
