Welcome to the first Book Unicorn post of the Sapphic Book Bingo! The Book Unicorn categories of the Sapphic Book Bingo represent books with a harder-to-find theme, and the category we’re starting with is a true unicorn: ice queen characters who are younger than their love interest!
In sapphic romance, you’ll find a lot of books that combine an ice queen character with an age gap romance, but usually, it’s the ice queen who is older.
Since ice queens are in a position of power and often at the very top of the food chain in their profession, it takes them a while to get there. That means ice queens are often in their late thirties or forties or fifties. Of course, they could still fall in love with a woman who’s older, but most authors seem to prefer pairing their ice queens with younger love interests.
Download your Book Unicorn bingo card
A quick reminder: The Book Unicorn bingo card is an additional bingo card that you can tackle in addition to the regular bingo card or by itself. The goal is to read one book for each of the 12 squares of the Book Unicorn card. If you haven’t done so already, download your Book Unicorn bingo card here. The PDF is clickable, so you can fill in the titles of the books you read on your computer, or you can print it out and fill it in by hand.
More recommendations for the Sapphic Book Bingo
If you need more book suggestions, here are a few places where you’ll find them:
- My Facebook group for readers. We have a folder to which authors are adding their book cards, showing you where their books fit into the Sapphic Book Bingo categories.
- The Sapphic Book Bingo Goodreads group.
- I put together a page that lists how my own books fit into the Sapphic Book Bingo as well as the IHS Reading Challenge categories.
- The Ylva Publishing book bingo list shows how the Ylva books fit into the squares of the reading challenge.
Sapphic books with an ice queen who is younger than her love interest
Here are my book recommendations for the “ice queen who is younger” category. It’s a much shorter list than usual because younger ice queens are so rare!
Next of Kin by Jae
For years, ambitious Deputy District Attorney Kade Matheson has taken case files and law books, not lovers, to bed, ignoring her personal life in favor of her career. When she finds herself with a stalker, she tries to handle the situation the way she always does: on her own.
Lieutenant Del Vasquez has admired the standoffish lawyer for a while, and she’s determined to protect her at all costs.
When Kade’s stalker situation escalates and she and Del have to hide at her mother’s, Kade is finally forced to face her attraction to women for the very first time.
Suddenly, she’s no longer sure which one is more dangerous—the threat to her life or to her heart?
Available at:
The Awkward Truth by Lee Winter
This funny opposites-attract lesbian romance digs up the awkward truth about what really matters in life.
Ambitious ice queen and corporate lawyer Felicity Simmons has spent her life focused on one thing: scuttling up the career ladder. She’s achingly close to taking charge of a media empire for her boss when she’s sent to investigate a South Bronx charity that helps homeless people’s pets.
Has the charity made off with her boss’s generous donation? And who on earth is that gorgeous soft-butch veterinarian who looks as if she could toss a Shetland pony over one shoulder? Not that Felicity has any interest in some opinionated Amazon or her adorable fleabag of a dog.
Felicity is quite sure she will not be distracted, thank you very much. She has a minor mystery to solve, a mentor to impress, and her life’s dream to fulfil. Even if a distraction might be exactly what she needs.
Available at:
Kissed by Her by Chelsea M. Cameron
I was so looking forward to this summer. My job as a nanny for eleven-year-old twins means never a dull moment, and I’m excited about hanging out with my best friend, Joy, and reading all the books we can get our hands on next to my employer’s fabulous pool.
Then my boss goes and hires a new assistant who is clearly gunning to be his second wife. Honor Conroy could not be more obvious in her motives and I can’t understand how he doesn’t see it.
She keeps getting under my skin, and even the twins are pulling pranks to try and get her out of their lives. I deny any involvement when their father finds out about their hijinks.
Then Honor decides to invade my book club—my sanctuary. I’ve had it, so I decide to confront her and, somehow, in the heat of the moment, her lips end up on mine in the fiercest kiss I’ve ever had in my life.
Turns out the gold-digger I imagined isn’t the real Honor, and my heart may never recover from finding out who she really is under that ice-queen facade.
Available at:
Edge of Glory by Rachel Spangler
As Olympic snowboarder Corey LaCroix and skier Elise Brandies ride the razor’s edge between victory and defeat on the slopes, they also face a heat neither of them is prepared for in their safe worlds of snow and ice. The stakes become steeper than any mountain either of them will ever face when legacies and hearts collide at breakneck speed.
Available at:
Evermore (A Mystic Meteor Tale Book 2) by Elle Hyden
In Book Two of this Mystic Meteor Tale, the meddling spirit Lily is back in matchmaking mode, working with a few new cohorts to help two women find their Evermore.
Raven, a reclusive but wealthy video game developer, needs more than just a paid caretaker; she needs true healing to melt the cold core of her deeply wounded heart. She’s lived her entire life without love and trusts no one. Only once did Raven allow anyone close, but it wasn’t to be, and she vowed Nevermore!
Lynn, a gifted empath, seeks a safe haven not only for herself but for a little girl that she’s sworn to protect. Like Raven, she experienced an early childhood rejection. Although she didn’t close herself off to others, Lynn has never shared herself entirely with another. It has kept her moving on from one relationship to another.
The advent of a spectral raven starts these women down a path that can potentially redress these old hurts if only they can open their hearts to each other. Join these two women in their quest to discover if the spirits and fate will bring them together or tear them apart.
Available at:
Coming soon: Sapphic books with a younger ice queen that will be published in 2023
- Inside These Halls by Adrian J. Smith (out in August 2023)
- Playing by the Rules by Finley Chuva (out in September 2023)
Leave a comment
Leave a comment and let us know what book you’ll be reading for the “younger ice queen” category! If you know of a sapphic book with an ice queen who’s younger than her love interest, please let me know, and I’ll add it to the list.
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I will read (again) The Awkward Truth by Lee Winter
Edge of Glory is a great read. I am going to read Next of Kin
Happy reading!
Kissed By Her as it’s the only one I haven’t read yet ☺️
Kissed by her was such a fun read!
I’d throw in Southbound and Down by KB Draper – it’s not specifically stated that Ryann is older than Drew, but you can make a case for it (Drew’s older brother seems younger than Ryann).
I just emailed KB to ask what she thinks.
Hi, Jae! Has this been confirmed?
K.B. Draper emailed back and said it would probably not be a good fit for this category since the characters are the same age.
I’ve just finished The Awkward Truth.
Enjoyed it immensely.
I purchased Next To Kin by Jae last year. I will read it for my younger ice queen book.
Undone by Bryce Oakley