Hello and welcome to worst bestsellers, where we read about the queen of the little guys so you don't have to.

I'm Renata.

And I'm Kate.

And for this episode, we read Alana, the first adventure by

Tamara Pierce. Joining us to discuss this entry in the Hall of Fame of Books about girls

dressing like boys is Rebecca Kim Welles, former tween fantasy girly and author of queer

young adult fantasy novels, like the angry bisexual dragon

duology, Shadow the Sky, and the still angry bisexual fairy tale reimagining prior girls.

Hello.

Welcome back.

You didn't mention also that you are our bachelor expert.

Yes.

So I've been on for a couple Bachelor memoirs, but this is my first fiction adventure

with you guys. So it's very exciting. And we let you read a good one. Normally, we make people

read a bad one, as you know. As you know. Yeah. So we should mention, of course, this is

Flashback Summer where we revisit childhood favorites

and we're not saying they're bad. We're saying we need a break from reading bad books sometimes.

So if you came here to be like, oh my God, you can't say Alana is a worst bestseller. We're not.

It's just like the name of our podcast. Also, by the way, right before we started recording, I had a panic where I was like,

wait, am I about to mispronounce Tamara Pierce's name? And I was about to mispronounce it.

So just so you know, we've checked it and she herself says it rhymes with camera. Tamara

Pierce. It's not Tamara, which I've been saying for many years. Same decades even.

...