Main Characters and Representation

I just finished The Space Between Worlds, by Micaiah Johnson, and was delighted by the journey.

One of the things I enjoyed the most was the (very) slow burn of a romance. I really appreciated the representation—where the main character was (maybe) bisexual, but her flame of love for her primary romantic interest never really waned. The romance was mostly untouched by death, which doesn't happen often to queer characters. I really liked that it wasn't all smut, and that the romance developed over the course of the whole book, without necessarily being a focal point throughout. The story didn't hinge on stereotypes of queer women, and I thought the portrayed characters had diverse representation.

There was also implied heterosexual romances with secondary characters, which was a change of pace, I thought, as queer secondary characters are often given the same kind of shallow story-line.

In hindsight, it's almost shocking how many books I've read before reading something where for a queer main characters finds a happy and well deserved ending, not just implied happiness or room to imagine a better ending. Usually, I have to deliberately look for a book with that kind of representation, but I genuinely had no idea what I was getting into when I picked this book.

I listened to this as an audiobook, as my library didn't have a text copy, but I'll probably buy the book.

For those have read the book—were you satisfied with the ending? Was this sci-fi enough for you? Do you feel similarly about minority representations in fiction novels?