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Scrappy determination clashes with polished privilege. Let the games begin.
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A World Worth Saving by Kyle Lukoff (4th)
Covid lockdown is over, but A’s world feels smaller than ever. Coming out as trans didn’t exactly go well, and most days, he barely leaves his bedroom, let alone the house. But the low point of A’s life isn’t online school, missing his bar mitzvah, or the fact that his parents monitor his phone like hawks—it’s the weekly Save Our Sons and Daughters meetings his parents all but drag him to.
At SOSAD, A and his friends Sal and Yarrow sit by while their parents deadname them and wring their hands over a nonexistent “transgender craze.” After all, sitting in suffocating silence has to be better than getting sent away for “advanced treatment,” never to be heard from again.
When Yarrow vanishes after a particularly confrontational meeting, A discovers that SOSAD doesn’t just feel soul-sucking…it’s run by an actual demon who feeds off the pain and misery of kids like him. And it’s not just SOSAD—the entire world is beset by demons dining on what seems like an endless buffet of pain and bigotry.
But how is one trans kid who hasn’t even chosen a name supposed to save his friend, let alone the world? And is a world that seems hellbent on rejecting him even worth saving at all?
Lover Birds by Leanne Egan (4th)
Darci catches Elle’s eye the minute she arrives as the new girl in school. But Elle keeps her curiosity in check, and even seems dismissive (which Darci overhears). Then Darci is equally dismissive (which Elle overhears)… and immediately a rivalry is born. Things become knottier when Darci is asked to be Elle’s tutor, and even knottier than that when Elle starts to recognize her feeling as something other than disdain or derision. In fact, it might be… the opposite. There are many misunderstandings that need to be gotten past for Elle and Darci to figure out how perfect they are for each other.
Under the Same Stars by Libba Bray (4th)
It was said that if you write to the Bridegroom’s Oak, the love of your life will answer back. Now, the tree is giving up its secrets at last.
In 1940s Germany, Sophie is excited to discover a message waiting for her in the Bridegroom’s Oak from a mysterious suitor. Meanwhile, her best friend, Hanna, is sending messages too—but not to find love. As World War II unfolds in their small town of Kleinwald, the oak may hold the key to resistance against the Nazis.
In 1980s West Germany, American teen transplant Jenny feels suffocated by her strict parents and is struggling to fit in. Until she finds herself falling for Lena, a punk-rock girl hell-bent on tearing down the wall separating West Germany from East Germany, and meeting Frau Hermann, a kind old lady with secrets of her own.
In Spring 2020, New York City, best friends Miles and Chloe are in the first weeks of COVID lockdown and hating Zoom school, when an unexpected package from Chloe’s grandmother leads them to investigate a cold case about two unidentified teenagers who went missing under the Bridegroom’s Oak eighty years ago.
Dead Happy by Josh Silver (4th)
This is the sequel to HappyHead
Seb was sure surviving the experimental health center of HappyHead would be enough to send him home. But now he joins the top ten contestants in the next stage of the testing, which will take place on a remote island, under the watchful eye of a mysterious couple.
Unsure if Finn is dead or alive, Seb reluctantly teams up with Eleanor again as the pair are forced to compete in a series of ever stranger trials to prove their connection and get their lives back. But Seb can’t stop thinking about Finn and how he may have been too much of a threat to the program.
Determined to find him, Seb’s search uncovers an even darker reality…and the only way to escape the island will be to expose the sinister truth behind HappyHead once and for all.
This Ends in Embers by Kamilah Cole (4th)
This is the sequel to So Let Them Burn
Faron Vincent was once the saint of San Irie. Now, she’s done the unthinkable: betrayed her country. Alone, disgraced, and kidnapped, Faron is forced to help Iya grow his bloody empire. With her soul bonded to a ruthless killer, Faron has become an enemy to her people… and she fears they might be right.
Elara Vincent—the new Empyrean—must undo the damage her sister has caused. San Irie has been brought back to the brink of war as Iya proclaims no nation will be safe from his brutal invasion. But how can Elara save her sister, her best friend, her country, and her world when she’s already cracking under the pressure?
Mutual Interest by Olivia Wolfgang-Smith (4th)
At the turn of the 20th century, Vivian Lesperance is determined to flee her origins in Utica, New York, and avoid repeating her parents’ dull, limited life. When she meets Oscar Schmidt, a middle manager at a soap company, Vivian finds a partner she can guide to build the life she wants-not least because, more interested in men himself, Oscar will leave Vivian to tend to her own romances with women.
But Vivian’s plans require capital, so the two pair up with Squire Clancey, scion of an old American fortune. Together they found Clancey & Schmidt, a preeminent manufacturer of soap, perfume, and candles. When Oscar and Squire fall in love, the trio form a new kind of partnership.
Vivian reaches the pinnacle of her power building Clancey & Schmidt into an empire of personal care products while operating behind the image of both men. But exposure threatens, and all three partners are made aware of how much they have to lose.
The Bones Beneath My Skin by TJ Klune (4th)
There’s nothing more human than a broken heart.
In the spring of 1995, Nate Cartwright has lost everything: his parents are dead, his only brother wants nothing to do with him, and he’s been fired from his job as a journalist in Washington, DC.
With nothing left to lose, he returns to his family’s summer cabin outside the small mountain town of Roseland, Oregon, to try and find some sense of direction. The cabin should be empty. It’s not.
Inside is a man named Alex. And with him is an extraordinary ten-year-old girl who calls herself Artemis Darth Vader. Artemis, who isn’t exactly as she appears.
Soon it becomes clear that Nate must make a choice: let himself drown in the memories of his past, or fight for a future he never thought possible. Because the girl is special. And forces are descending upon them who want nothing more than to control her.
The Lamb by Lucy Rose (4th)
Margot and Mama have lived by the forest ever since Margot can remember.
When Margot is not at school, they spend quiet days together in their cottage, waiting for strangers to knock on their door. Strays, Mama calls them. People who have strayed too far from the road. Mama loves the strays. She feeds them wine, keeps them warm. Then she satisfies her burning appetite by picking apart their bodies.
But Mama’s want is stronger than her hunger sometimes, and when a beautiful, white-toothed stray named Eden turns up in the heart of a snowstorm, Margot must confront the shifting dynamics of her family, untangle her own desires, and make her bid for freedom.
With this gothic coming-of-age tale, debut novelist Lucy Rose explores how women swallow their anger, desire, and animal instincts—and wrings the relationship between mother and daughter until blood drips from it.
Dead in the Frame by Stephen Spotswood (February 4th)
This is the fifth book in the Pentecost and Parker series
NEW YORK CITY, 1947: Wealthy financier and ghoulish connoisseur of crime, Jessup Quincannon, is dead, and famed detective Lillian Pentecost is under arrest for his murder. Means, motive, and a mountain of evidence leave everyone believing she’s guilty. Everyone, that is, except Willowjean “Will” Parker, who knows for a fact her boss is innocent. She just doesn’t know if she can prove it.
With Lillian locked away in the House of D—New York City’s infamous women’s prison—Will is left to root out the real killer. Was it a member of Quincannon’s murder-obsessed Black Museum Club? Maybe it was his jilted lover? Or his beautiful, certainly-sociopathic bodyguard? And what about the mob hit-man who just happened to disappear after the shots were fired?
With the city barreling toward the trial of the century, each day brings fresh headlines and hints of long-buried scandals from Lillian’s past. Will is desperate to get her boss out from behind bars before her reputation is destroyed. Because the House of D is no kind place, especially for a woman with multiple sclerosis. Or one with so many enemies. Her health failing and being targeted by someone who wants her dead, Lillian needs to survive long enough to take the stand.
With time running out on both sides of the prison walls, Will and Lillian must wager everything to uncover who put their thumb on the scales and a bullet in Quincannon’s head. Before Lady Justice brings her sword down, ending Pentecost and Parker’s adventures once and for all.
A Long Time Gone by Joshua Moehling (February 4th)
This is the third book in the Ben Packard series
It’s time to put the past to rest…
Ben Packard was just a boy when his older brother disappeared. Ben watched him walk out the back door of their grandparents’ house and into the cold night.
His brother was never seen again.
Decades later, Deputy Packard finds himself with too much time on his hands. A shooting has him on leave and under investigation, and all he can do is dwell on the past. For the first time in years, new information about his brother has surfaced that may lead them to the location of a body.
The midwinter ground is frozen solid. Worse, Packard is cut off from department resources. As he strikes out to finally uncover the truth behind his brother’s disappearance, he stumbles on a separate, suspicious death. A tenuous connection exists between the two cases, and as Packard starts to dig, he meets fierce resistance from friends and foes alike who want him to stand down.
The winter is long and cold. By the end of it, Packard will risk everything to catch a killer and reveal the shocking truth about his brother.
Cleavage: Men, Women, and the Space Between Us by Jennifer Finney Boylan (4th)
What is the difference between men and women? Jennifer Finney Boylan, bestselling author of She’s Not There and co-author of Mad Honey with Jodi Picoult, examines the divisions―as well as the common ground―between the genders, and reflects on her own experiences, both difficult and joyful, as a transgender American.
Jennifer Finney Boylan’s She’s Not There was the first bestselling work written by a transgender American. Since its publication twenty years ago, she has become the go-to person for insight into the impact of gender on our lives, from the food we eat to the dreams we dream, both for ourselves and for our children. But Cleavage is more than a deep dive into gender identity; it’s also a look at the difference between coming out as trans in 2000―when many people reacted to Boylan’s transition with love―and the present era of blowback and fear.
How does gender affect our sense of self? Our body image? The passage of time? The friends we lose―and keep? Boylan considers her womanhood, reflects on the boys and men who shaped her, and reconceives of herself as a writer, activist, parent, and spouse. With heart-wrenching honesty, she illustrates the feeling of liminality that followed her to adulthood, but demonstrates the redemptive power of love through it all.
With Boylan’s trademark humor and poignancy, Cleavage is a sharp, witty, and captivating look at the triumphs and losses of a life lived in two genders. Cleavage provides hope for a future in which we all have the freedom to live joyfully as men, as women, and in the space between us.
Queer Slashers by Peter Marra (4th)
From Norman Bates dressed as “Mother” in Psycho to the rouged cheeks of Leatherface in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, many slasher icons have borne traces of queer and gender nonconforming behavior since the subgenre’s very beginning.
Queer Slashers presents the first book-length study of how and why the slasher subgenre of horror films appeals to queer audiences. In it, Peter Marra constructs a reparative history of the slasher that affirms its queer lineage extending back as early as the 1920s. It also articulates the queer aspects of the slasher formula that forge an unlikely kinship between queer audiences and these retrograde depictions of queer killers. Marra establishes a queer history and function for the slasher, analyzing several key contemporary “queer slashers”–that is, slashers that are made by queer filmmakers–to better understand how queer artists take up the slasher iconography and put it toward modern queer aims.
Featuring analysis of films such as John Waters’s Serial Mom, Peaches Christ’s All About Evil, and Alain Guiraudie’s Stranger by the Lake, Queer Slashers illuminates the queer meanings of slashers, their foundations, and their future possibilities.
Orion & the Cloudkillers by Harri D. Gordon (10th)
Picking a new name was easy. Finding himself? Not so much.
Starting university in a new city after coming out as trans is Orion’s best chance to press reset. It’s an opportunity to join clubs, make new friends, and forget who he used to be. But before he can find his feet at his very first Pride festival, he bumps into Sebastian Holmsted, the drummer for an all-queer local rock band called Cloudkillers – and a childhood crush he’s not-so-over.
At first, it seems as though Orion’s been given a chance to start over with Seb; his best friend and wingwoman Andy certainly thinks so. But when a crisis with another member results in Orion joining the band and the two of them grow closer than Orion could have dreamed of, past and present begin to intertwine. And when things start to become real between Seb and Orion, he finds himself wondering whether a relationship with Seb is truly what he wants after all.
Jealous exes, asexual crises, and bubble tea abound in this heartfelt story of identity, self-acceptance, and love.
Mountain Upside Down by Sara Ryan (11th)
Alex Eager lives in Faillin, OR with her grandmother, a retired librarian. Life should be great for Alex, since she finally worked up the courage to ask her best friend PJ if they could be more than friends and she said yes. But their new relationship will have to be long distance, because PJ is moving. On top of that, Alex is worried that something is wrong with her increasingly forgetful grandmother. And to make matters worse, Faillin is holding a referendum on library funding, and things aren’t looking good. Will anything good for Alex ever last?
It’s All or Nothing, Vale by Andrea Beatriz Arango (11th)
All these months of staring at the wall?
All these months of feeling weak?
It’s ending—
I’m going back to fencing.
And then it’ll be
like nothing ever happened.
No one knows hard work and dedication like Valentina Camacho. And Vale’s thing is fencing. She’s the top athlete at her fencing gym. Or she was . . . until the accident.
After months away, Vale is finally cleared to fence again, but it’s much harder than before. Her body doesn’t move the way it used to, and worst of all is the new number one: Myrka. When she sweeps Vale aside with her perfect form and easy smile, Vale just can’t accept that. But the harder Vale fights to catch up, the more she realizes her injury isn’t the only thing holding her back. If she can’t leave her accident in the past, then what does she have to look forward to?
Wicked Darlings by Jordyn Taylor (11th)
Aspiring journalist Noa has a secret she’s been keeping. Ever since her sister’s tragic death, she’s felt almost…relieved. Noa and Leah had been locked in competition with one another since childhood, and things came to a head when her sister scored a glitzy internship at a New York society newspaper. Noa can’t help but revel in her new found autonomy.
But when she gets a lead about the sketchy circumstances surrounding her sister’s untimely death, she knows she needs to investigate−she owes it to Leah.
Noa sets out to infiltrate the seedy underbelly of Manhattan high society to investigate her sister’s final days. Along the way she finds herself entangled with the glamorous Avalons and their close-knit circle of friends and frienemies. But will Noa be able to resist the allure of the Avalons’ world and uncover a shocking scandal. Or will she find herself in over her head…like Leah?
Where Shadows Bloom by Catherine Bakewell (11th)
Ofelia has lived her life dreaming of entering Le Château Enchanté—the mysterious court of the god-blessed King Léo, where the Shadow monsters that roam Ofelia’s home never trespass.
Lope has lived her life as a knight, defending Ofelia and her home from Shadows even as she pines silently for her best friend—and dreams of escaping this place and the Shadows with Ofelia by her side.
When the Shadows venture too close, Ofelia’s mother sets out to appeal the King to stay at Le Château Enchanté—but never returns.
Determined to find her, Ofelia sets out with Lope at her side, sending both girls on a journey neither could have anticipated. One that leads them to the dazzling and deceptive Château Enchanté itself, where lush, verdant gardens bloom and glittering dances are held nightly in honor of their immortal king.
Yet what neither Ofelia nor Lope realizes is that the darkness they’ve fled is closer than they think. And if they cannot uncover the truth behind Le Château Enchanté and its blessed king, it will tear them apart.
But Not Too Bold by Hache Pueyo (11th)
The Shape of Water meets Mexican Gothic in this sapphic monster romance novella wrapped in gothic fantasy trappings
The old keeper of the keys is dead, and the creature who ate her is the volatile Lady of the Capricious House—Anatema, an enormous humanoid spider with a taste for laudanum and human brides.
Dália, the old keeper’s protégée, must take up her duties, locking and unlocking the little drawers in which Anatema keeps her memories. And if she can unravel the crime that led to her predecessor’s death, Dália might just be able to survive long enough to grow into her new role.
But there’s a gaping hole in Dália’s plan that she refuses to see: Anatema cannot resist a beautiful woman, and she eventually devours every single bride that crosses her path.
Loca by Alejandro Heredia (11th)
It’s 1999, and best friends Sal and Charo are striving to hold on to their dreams in a New York determined to grind them down. Sal is a book-loving science nerd trying to grow beyond his dead-end job in a new city, but he’s held back by tragic memories from his past in Santo Domingo. Free-spirited Charo is surprised to find herself a mother at twenty-five, partnered with a controlling man, working at the same supermarket for years, her world shrunk to the very domesticity she thought she’d escaped in her old country. When Sal finds love at a gay club one night, both his and Charo’s worlds unexpectedly open up to a vibrant social circle that pushes them to reckon with what they owe to their own selves, pasts, futures, and, always, each other.
The Perfect Matchmaking by Milena McKay (11th)
Life of a Goddess is hard.
There are so many rules.
Rule Number 1: Organize the Annual Cupids’ Convention in Las Vegas.
Rule Number 2: Don’t let Zeus interfere.
Rule Number 3: When Zeus inevitably interferes, avoid getting ambushed by cupids at all cost. Even if it means missing out on your Perfect Match.
When the Goddess of Love herself is made to run the gamut of tropes, from enemies to lover and second chance romance to friends to lovers and close proximity, will she keep her independence from the ever meddling Olympians, or will she chose to surrender to a well-placed cupid’s arrow?
Buy it: Amazon
Mazeltov by Eli Zuzovsky (11th)
At a banquet hall, at the onset of war, Adam Weizmann’s bar mitzvah party turns into a glorious catastrophe. On the cusp of manhood―and the verge of a nervous breakdown―Adam has been bracing for his special day, mired in family neuroses and national dysfunction.
In a chorus of voices, a fractious cast of well-wishers narrates Adam’s coming-of-age in Israel: his newly devout father and the mystic rituals he practiced on his young son; his best friend, Abbie, who points the way to joyful transgression; Khalil, a Palestinian poet, who offers a glimpse of a different way to be; and Adam himself, filled with shame and desire as he faces the brokenness of his world.
Les Normaux by Janine Janssen (11th)
Boy moves to new city. Boy meets vampire. They kiss, then become friends. But both would like something more…
A global Webtoon phenomenon and LGBTQ+ graphic novel about friendship, love and magic- including never before seen special bonus print-only content!
Sébastien recently moved to supernatural Paris hoping to get away from his troubles at home and live a peaceful life learning magic. But what are you going to do when the really hot vampire you made out with last night to forget your troubles turns out to be your new neighbor?
Sébastien (a demisexual boy with “main character hair” and a bunny named Pierre), meet Elia (a hot, supermodel, vampire neighbor and crush).
Join Elia, Sébastien and their assorted crew of wonderful friends, as they navigate the ins and outs of dating in a modern and paranormal love story.
Alligator Tears: A Memoir in Essays by Edgar Gomez (11th)
In Florida, one of the first things you’re taught as a child is that if you’re ever chased by a wild alligator, the only way to save yourself is to run away in zigzags. It’s a lesson on survival that has guided much of Edgar Gomez’s life.Like the night his mother had a stroke while he and his brother stood frozen at the foot of her bed, afraid she’d be angry if they called for an ambulance they couldn’t afford. Gomez escaped into his mind, where he could tell himself nothing was wrong with his family. Zig. Or years later, as a broke college student, he got on his knees to put sandals on tourists’ smelly, swollen feet for minimum wage at the Flip Flop Shop. After clocking out, his crew of working-class, queer, Latinx friends changed out of their uniforms in the passenger seats of each other’s cars, speeding toward the relief they found at Pulse nightclub in Orlando. Zag. From committing a little bankruptcy fraud for the money for veneers to those days he paid his phone bill by giving massages to closeted men on vacation, back when he and his friends would Venmo each other the same emergency twenty dollars over and over. Zig. Zag. Gomez survived this way as long as his legs would carry him.Alligator Tears is a fiercely defiant memoir-in-essays charting Gomez’s quest to claw his family out of poverty by any means necessary and exposing the archetype of the humble poor person for what it is: a scam that insists we remain quiet and servile while we wait for a prize that will always be out of reach. For those chasing the American Dream and those jaded by it, Gomez’s unforgettable story is a testament to finding love, purpose, and community on your own terms, smiling with all your fake teeth.Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon
The Girl You Know by Elle Gonzalez Rose (18th)
The week before Luna’s twin sister Solina was supposed to head back for her final semester at Kingswood Academy, an elite boarding school in the Washington mountains, she told Luna she was dropping out. When Luna refused to let her throw away her future, Solina disappeared.
Twelve hours later, she was dead.
Luna knows Solina’s death wasn’t an accident, even if the police say otherwise. There’s a reason Solina didn’t want to go back to Kingswood, and Luna knows she’ll find the truth there. All she has to do is become Solina. Playing Solina comes easy, but finding answers is far from it. Between the cunning, cruel people Solina called her friends, Luna’s budding feelings for her roommate Claudia, and the harsh realization that Solina had dark secrets, getting to the bottom of her sister’s murder is more difficult than Luna could have ever anticipated. But when you have nothing left to lose, you’re willing to do anything to get what you want. There’s no limit to how far Luna will go to avenge her sister-even if she has to burn all of Kingswood to the ground.
Hungerstone by Kat Dunn (18th)
It’s the height of the industrial revolution and ten years into Lenore’s marriage to steel magnate Henry, their relationship has soured. When Henry’s ambitions take them from London to the remote British moorlands to host a hunting party, a shocking carriage accident brings the mysterious Carmilla into their lives. Carmilla, who is weak and pale during the day but vibrant at night. Carmilla, who stirs up something deep within Lenore. And before long, girls from the local villages fall sick, consumed by a terrible hunger . . .
As the day of the hunt draws closer, Lenore begins to unravel, questioning the role she has been playing all these years. Torn between regaining her husband’s affection and the cravings Carmilla has awakened, soon Lenore will uncover a darkness in her household that will place her at terrible risk.
The Antlered King by Marianne Gordon (18th)
This is the sequel to The Gilded Crown
Hellevir’s gift to raise the dead once thrust her into the center of a court filled with backstabbing and treason, where she became duty bound to protect Princess Sullivain, the sole heir to the kingdom’s throne and target of many rivals eager for the crown. But the more Hellevir risked to keep Sullivain alive, and the more deeply she fell in love with the princess, the greater the cost became—for Hellevir’s power can only be granted by the strange figure who rules the afterlife, and there is always a price to pay.
Now Hellevir may have risked too much, and Sullivain has become obsessed with consolidating power to vanquish her foes once and for all—by whatever means necessary. Cast out to the fringes of a country on the verge of civil war, Hellevir is torn between protecting her heart or giving what little she has left to finish what she started. Yet, her connection with Sullivain runs deeper than the mortal world, and saving her friends and family might mean risking the woman she is still bound to by soul and blood.
To stop a war, Hellevir must unravel the last of Death’s riddles and decide, once and for all, who deserves to live, what a life is worth, and whether she can pay the price.
Bea Mullins Takes a Shot by Emily Deibert (25th)
Some goals are worth falling for.
After a lifetime of humiliating sports experiences, Bea Mullins knows the best way to survive middle school is to stick to the sidelines. When PE is suddenly canceled, though, Bea is forced to join an after-school activity…which is how she ends up as a member of the Glenwood Geese, her middle school’s first all-girls hockey team.
Bea would be happy sitting on the bench, but she doesn’t want to let down her best friend, Celia. Plus, the more time Bea spends on the rinks, the more she comes to enjoy her teammates, especially the incredibly talented–and incredibly cool–co-captain Gabi. But when low funding puts the Geese in danger of never playing again, Bea realizes she may lose everything she didn’t know she wanted.
The Wildest Things by Andrea Hannah (25th)
When her glass coffin unexpectedly shatters, Snow White awakens to anything but a dream. The land is rotting. The animals have mutated. In the twenty years that have passed since Snow bit into the poisoned apple, the kingdom of Roanfrost has transformed from a luscious wild land to a blight-ravaged nightmare. In search of answers and a way to restore her kingdom to its former glory, Snow sets out on a dangerous journey that will test the strength she never knew she had.
Friends will become foes.
New alliances will form.
The Queen with the blood red lips will stop at nothing to seize her power as well as her heart.
If Snow has any chance to survive and restore not only her kingdom, but all of Garedenne, her only option is to become the Seasonkeeper and access the life-giving magic that will heal the plague. But the path to becoming the Seasonkeeper is more treacherous than she could ever imagine―because the wild things have awakened and Snow’s darker impulses yearn to set them free.
Big Name Fan by Ruthie Knox and Annie Mare (25th)
Bexley Simon and Sam Farmer aren’t detectives, but they play them on TV. Well, played, past tense. The iconic cult hit that was Craven’s Daughter ended five years ago, and their friendship died along with it. Fans were disappointed that the pair’s legendary chemistry went unfulfilled—and other fans were crushed that the actual spark between actresses Bex and Sam didn’t pay off, either. The network never intended for two women to get romantic, in life or onscreen, despite the fans. But the bigger tragedy was the loss of their dear friend, makeup artist Jen Arnot, whose accidental death cast a pall over the series’ last episodes.
Now the network has decided on a reunion special, and Bex and Sam are thrust together once more as hosts of a rewatch podcast that will feature favorite episodes. Their first guest—a megawatt star who played a murder victim early on—drops a bombshell. Among the millions of pixels of fanfic written about the show online, one truly prolific author, known in the fiction world as the show’s Big Name Fan, was an insider, almost certainly someone from the cast or crew.
As the podcast moves along—and the spark between Bex and Sam threatens to burn down the studio—the pair realize they’re faced with two actual mysteries: Who is their Big Name Fan? And was Jen’s death an accident, or did someone want her dead? Sifting through clues as they question cast and crew, the duo will need to separate fact from fiction as they make their personal partnership into an unmistakable canon . . .
Isaac by Curtis Garner (25th)
After inexperienced seventeen-year-old Isaac loses his virginity through a dating app – a disappointing yet addictive experience – he spends his final months before university escaping into a dizzying new world of casual sex with forgettable men. This all changes when he meets twenty-eight-year-old Harrison at a party.
Isaac is immediately infatuated by the handsome, charismatic artist, but while they grow closer, his sense of self becomes increasingly hazy. Harrison’s demands shift constantly, and after Isaac tries everything to prove his worthiness, he must take a hard look at his ideas about love, sex and men, and his relationship with himself.
Buy it: Amazon
On Her Terms by Amy Spalding (25th)
Fresh off breaking up with her boyfriend and swerving away from the conventional, TikTok-ready married life she never wanted, Clementine is ready to explore the alternatives. Not that she wants to be single forever, much less die alone. But at thirty-six, it’s time for her to experience new things—including in her love life. And though an invitation to a fake relationship to appease family sounds like a recipe for disaster, Clem finds herself saying yes to smart, spirited dog groomer Chloe Lee anyway . . .
Chloe is long past her own baby gay era, but even before they’ve tackled Clem’s parents’ anniversary party and Chloe’s friend’s wedding, the two of them end up spending a lot of time together. As the attraction between them grows stronger, it all begins to feel pretty real to Clem. Chloe, however, is fine as just friends—plus she’s convinced Clem is just eager for “someone” to take her off the singles list. How to persuade her otherwise? After all, Clem is starting to realize her life is wonderfully full and being “alone” doesn’t scare her a bit. Still, being without the tiny powerhouse that is Chloe, specifically? That’s a whole other story . . .
Trans Technologies by Oliver L. Haimson (25th)
How technology creates new possibilities for transgender people, and how trans experiences, in turn, create new possibilities for technology.
Mainstream technologies often exclude or marginalize transgender users. Trans Technologies describes what happens when trans people take technology design into their own hands. Oliver L. Haimson, whose research into gender transition and technology has defined this area of study, draws on transgender studies and his own in-depth interviews with more than 100 creators of technology—including apps, games, health resources, extended reality systems, and supplies designed to address challenges trans people face—to explain what trans technology is and to explore its present possibilities and limitations, as well as its future prospects.
Haimson surveys the landscape of trans technologies to reveal the design processes that brought these technologies to life, and to show how trans people often must rely on community, technology, and the combination of the two to meet their basic needs and challenges. His work not only identifies the role of trans technology in caring for individuals within the trans community but also shows how trans technology creation empowers some trans people to create their own tools for navigating the world. Articulating which trans needs and challenges are currently being addressed by technology and which still need to be addressed; describing how trans technology creators are accomplishing this work; examining how privilege, race, and access to resources impact which trans technologies are built and who may be left out; and highlighting new areas of innovation to be explored, Trans Technologies opens the way to meaningful social change.
Paperback Releases
Glassworks by Olivia Wolfgang-Smith (4th)
In 1910, Agnes Carter makes the wrong choice in marriage. After years as an independent woman of fortune, influential with the board of a prominent university because of her financial donations, she is now subject to the whims of an abusive, spendthrift husband. But when Bohemian naturalist and glassblower Ignace Novak reignites Agnes’s passion for science, Agnes begins to imagine a different life, and she sets her mind to getting it.
Agnes’s desperate actions breed secrecy, and the resulting silence echoes into the future. Her son, Edward, wants to be a man of faith but struggles with the complexities of the mortal world while apprenticing at a
stained-glass studio.
In 1986, Edward’s child, Novak―just Novak―is an acrobatic window washer cleaning Manhattan high-rises, who gets caught up in the plight of Cecily, a small town girl remade as a gender-bending Broadway ingénue.
And in 2015, Cecily’s daughter Flip―a burned-out stoner trapped in a bureaucratic job firing cremains into keepsake glass ornaments―resolves to break the cycle of inherited secrets, reaching back through the generations in search of a family legacy that feels true.
All the Parts We Exile by Roza Nozari (February 25th)
As the youngest of three daughters, and the only one born in Canada soon after her parents’ emigration from Iran, Roza Nozari began her life hungry for a sense of belonging. From her early years, she shared a passion for Iranian cuisine with her mother and craved stories of their ancestral home. Eventually they visited and she fell in love with its sights and smells, and with the warm embrace of their extended family. Yet Roza sensed something was amiss with her mother’s happy, well-rehearsed story of their original departure.
As Roza grew older, this longing for home transformed into a desire for inner understanding and liberation. She was lit up by the feminist texts in her women’s studies courses, and shared radical ideas with her mother—who in turn shared more of her past, from protesting for the Islamic revolution to her ambivalence about getting married. In this memoir, Roza braids the narrative of her mother’s life together with her own on-going story of self, as she arrives at, then rejects, her queer identity, eventually finds belonging in queer spaces and within queer Iranian histories, and learns the truth about her family’s move to Canada.
