Children’s
Willi Ninja: Vogue Legend by Joy Michael Ellison and Nabi H. Ali
Kicking off a picture book series of LGBTQ+ biographies is this inspiring story of the incomparable dancer Willi Ninja, Grandfather of Vogue and star of the film Paris Is Burning.
When little Willi Leake watched karate movies with his mother in their cozy Queens apartment, he’d slice the air with his arms like swords. He’d swish his hips like the models he saw in magazines and copy ancient pharaohs’ poses from Egyptian hieroglyphs. Bursting with energy, Willi would strut his way down the street, and his mother would tell him not to mind the puzzled looks he’d get. When she took him to the Apollo Theater to watch ballerinas twirling, Willi allowed himself to dream—and the more he dreamed, the more he danced. With an accessible text and dynamic illustrations, Joy Michael Ellison and Nabi H. Ali trace Willi’s path against the odds as he brings his signature moves to the dance style known as vogue and finds his spotlight at the Harlem drag balls where a performer known as Willi Ninja is born. Providing context, community, and comprehension of queer and trans culture for young history buffs, the lively narrative is followed by back matter delving into more details about Willi Ninja and what life was like during his time.
The Perfect Match by Chris Becker and Dan Taylor
Jack begs his dad to tell him his favorite bedtime story, the one about Leo and the royal soccer match. It includes two mean stepbrothers, a fairy squad father, and magical race car ride to the big game. The match is amazing, and Leo scores the winning goal, with an assist from Prince Ollie! But after his uniform starts to change back to his regular clothes, Leo rushes off, leaving his cleat behind. The prince searches high and low for the boy the cleat belongs to, and when he finds him, it’s the perfect match! Leo and Prince Ollie live happily ever after. And one day . . . they have a little boy named Jack who loves soccer as much as they do!
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | B&N
Middle Grade
Opting Out by Maia Kobabe and Swati “Lucky” Srikumar
Bodies are the worst. I wish I didn’t have a body.
Saachi is a storyteller. At school, she’s surrounded by kids she’s known forever — including her best friend, Lyla, who shares Saachi’s love of fantasy novels and creating new worlds.
But as seventh grade starts, kids are changing. Suddenly, it matters who you like and if you can find a boyfriend or girlfriend. Even Lyla seems more interested in hanging out with her new boyfriend than in writing and drawing with Saachi anymore. Saachi’s not interested in any of that boy/girl stuff. Why can’t things just stay the way they were?
Saachi also doesn’t love all the ways her body is changing. What if she doesn’t feel like a girl — or like a boy, either? In a world where there is so much either/or, Saachi is going to need to find her own options . . . and create her own story.
Young Adult
Body Count by Codie Crowley
Seven years ago, Sundae Valentine made a deal with a monster she met at the bottom of a motel pool. She didn’t know the wishes he offered had a price—or that the third wish, the one she still hasn’t made, will cost her life.
Back then, she barely escaped Wildwood alive. Now, the cheerleaders and football players are headed to the Jersey Shore for prom weekend—leaving Sundae no choice but to return to the scene of her sun-bleached nightmares.
Sundae tries to forget, throwing herself into the rides on the pier, the tequila-fueled dance parties, and the guitar-strumming girl she can’t quite look away from. She hopes the beast has forgotten, too.
But there are eyes like silver coins watching from the shadows, and teeth like a rusty saw glinting in the light of the boardwalk. Because Sundae still owes a debt. And whatever it takes, whoever he has to kill, this time the monster’s determined to collect.
Like We Were in Paris by Stephan Lee
Teenager Ben Lee is excited for his French Club’s trip to the most romantic city in the world: Paris.
Ben is hoping this visit will help him feel connected to the memory of his late dad. Ben’s parents, after all, honeymooned in Paris, and maybe Ben can retrace some of their steps.
But things go wrong on the first night, when Ben forgets his curfew and finds himself locked out of his hostel…until morning.
Also locked out? Tyler Travers, the most popular and handsome boy in school.
Years ago, Ben and Tyler were actually best friends. But they lost touch when Tyler moved away. Now that Tyler is back, he doesn’t seem to remember Ben, and Ben has no patience for his golden-boy vibes.
Now that they’re thrown together, Ben and Tyler end up roaming around Paris at night to pass the time. They sneak into cafes, visit the Eiffel Tower, and have more misadventures.
As the night sparkles on, Ben fights his growing attraction to Tyler, who would never want to be with someone like Ben. Besides, Tyler doesn’t even remember him. Right?
Between Sun and Shadow by Laura Genn
Sixteen-year-old Kori struggles to be a dutiful heiress to the Daylands, a post-cataclysmic society reliant on chip implants to retain memory. With a strict routine and an overly cautious mother, Kori has only one friend, Aspect—an industrial robot she’s repurposed. Determined to awaken sentience in her metal companion, Kori crash-lands in enemy territory while hunting for a memory that might do the trick.
Ravaged by radiation from a meteorite, the citizens of the Shadowlands have evolved into beast-like creatures with supernatural abilities. Adria, a winged mutant, has wrested control of the Shadowlands from her bloodthirsty parents—but not everyone is so willing to embrace her leadership. What better way to instill confidence in her court than by capturing a foreign princess and demanding ransom?
However, what began as a political maneuver transforms into a potent attraction as Kori’s longing for relationship echoes Adria’s own. Granted free rein of Adria’s fortress, Kori stumbles upon a startling revelation that could upend the Daylands entirely. As rebellion grows and Adria’s precarious hold on her throne wavers, Adria and Kori must join forces to avert all-out war. Does a queen of shadows really stand a chance with a princess of sunlight? Or has the chasm between their nations grown too wide?
You Pierce My Soul by Jessica Mary Best
In the utopian city of New Ionia, everyone gets a soulmate – and Zada can’t wait for hers. Now that she’s eighteen, it’s her turn to meet her destiny with the help of Heartsong, an algorithm that chooses your perfect match for you.
Then Zada crashes into her soulmate, setting off their shared Heartsong, and the unthinkable happens: she feels nothing for him. But the Heartsong program doesn’t make mistakes, and by the end of the night, Zada is engaged to a man she doesn’t love.
Desperate for a way out, Zada turns to her beautiful, reckless, and utterly impossible former best friend Daphne. Together, the two embark on a quest for the truth that throws Heartsong – and their entire world – into question. As time runs out, Zada must find the courage to choose what she believes and who she loves.
The Cove by Claire Rose
Midsommar meets Fear Street in this modern, sea-soaked folk horror debut about fighting to survive, and fighting to be yourself.
Seventeen-year-old Lindsay Weinberg has just gotten kicked out of another prep school, and has consequently found herself shipped to her Uncle Levi’s farm in the cold, isolated town of Marbury, Maine.
When Lindsay arrives at a big, old farmhouse miles from civilization, she is greeted by her uncle’s new wife, a goy with a little too much Jesus decor for Lindsay’s taste―with Uncle Levi mysteriously away on a business trip. Not only that, but Lindsay isn’t the only teen staying there. In fact, there is a small group of teens going through some kind of reform program. Up at dawn. Manual labor all day. No phones, computers or tablets.
Things start to feel hopeless until Lindsay meets the twins, Phin and Cass. They live on an island off the Peninsula’s coast―and they have internet. Lindsay convinces the others at Haven House to sneak out for a party on the island, and the night is incredible. At least…what they can remember of it. All of them wake up in their beds with sea-shell mementos, no memory of how they got home, and wicked hangovers. All of them except one. And as the disappearances and mysteries pile up, Lindsay and the others realize that they have become involved in a terrifying fight to survive, before the Cove claims them all.
Girls Like Us by Jennifer Dugan
In this sequel to Some Girls Do, two girls struggle when long distance complicates their relationship.
Ruby and Morgan fell for each other during their senior year of high school, and now, almost a year later, they are fighting to keep their spark alive, even while they are apart: Morgan is on a track scholarship at a university several hours away, studying public policy, while Ruby stayed in her hometown, exploring her love of mechanics in the automotive engineering program at the local community college.
Long distance weighs on the girls, with new friendships and flirtatious classmates adding complications, and the two are looking forward to a spring break getaway to Washington, D.C., and the bliss of a whole summer vacation together. But when Morgan discovers she’s a finalist for the perfect internship, and Ruby gets the shot to appear on her favorite automotive TV show, the trip schedule—and their summer plans—are thrown into question. With both girls unwilling to stand in the way of each other’s future, they wonder: has the time come for them to go their separate ways?
Before You Can Fly by Jase Peeples (8th)
In 1988, being different can be dangerous. No one knows this better than fifteen-year-old Clayton Wheeler. He’s too tall, too awkward, and carrying a secret that could ruin him. At school he’s a target. At home, his stepfather makes everything much worse. His only escape—and his greatest joy—is the comic books he creates with his two best friends, imagining worlds where heroes like them finally win.
Then Derek, the childhood best friend Clayton thought he’d lost forever, moves back to town. He used to be an outsider like Clayton. Now Derek is confident, cool, and already a rising star of Redfield High’s football team. They shouldn’t click. Yet the connection between them flares back to life, powerful and risky in ways neither of them expected.
What begins between them becomes a secret that could cost Clayton everything. To survive, he must decide if hiding who he is will keep him safe—or break him before he ever has the chance to fly.
Buy it: Amazon
Adult
The Miseducation of Caroline Bingley by Lindz McLeod
Pride, prejudice, and…lessons in love?
Jane Austen meets My Fair Lady in this joyful, clever opposites-attract Sapphic romance featuring Caroline Bingley and Darcy’s younger sister, Georgiana.
Being snubbed by Mr Darcy—passed over for Elizabeth Bennet, no less—is humiliating.
Being told she’s arrogant and unkind, and that if she doesn’t mend her ways, she might never find love…that’s simply preposterous. Isn’t it?
Feeling the sting of Darcy’s rejection, Caroline Bingley does what any self-respecting woman of means would do: she hatches a plan. Get Georgiana Darcy, the epitome of grace and sweetness, to teach Caroline how to be perfect like her.
But Caroline’s transformation from status-hungry socialite to proper marriage material won’t be easy. She must be charming, and even worse… she must be kind. And Georgiana herself isn’t so sure about playing fairy godmother. Beneath Miss Darcy’s polished facade lies an entirely different set of struggles.
As the two grow closer, Caroline discovers she’s less interested in securing a man, and more intrigued by the woman helping her to reform her character. Before long, their lessons in finding love and acceptance blossom into something completely unexpected…
John of John by Douglas Stuart
Out of money and with little to show for his art school education, John-Calum Macleod takes the ferry back home to the Isle of Harris to find that little has changed except for him. In the windswept croft where he grew up, Cal begrudgingly resumes his old life, stuck between the two poles of his childhood: his father John, a sheep farmer, tweed weaver, and pillar of their local Presbyterian church, and his maternal grandmother Ella, a profanity-loving Glaswegian who has kept a faltering peace with her son-in-law for several decades. Cal wonders if any lonely men might be found on the barren hillsides of home, while John is dismayed by his son’s long hair and how he seems unwilling to be Saved. As lambing season turns to shearing season, everything seems poised to change as the threads holding together the fragile community become increasingly knotted.
Homebound by Portia Elan
It’s 1983 and Becks can’t wait to get the hell out of Cincinnati. She’s nineteen, blasting her Walkman, and hiding from the fact that her beloved uncle, the only person who understood her, is dead. But she has work to do: he left her a half-finished game to complete—one last collaboration to find her way out of loneliness.
Little does she know, what Becks is making will echo far into the future and shape the lives of a scientist, a sentient automaton, and a flinty sea captain in ways she cannot imagine. All are bound together by their search for connection—and by a futuristic traveler on a mysterious mission through space.
Saturn Returning by Kim Narby
Jordan Caleb is a freshman at McCallen College when she meets Trace. From the moment the confident, tattooed Trace compliments Jordan’s Alanis Morissette T-shirt, their friendship feels fated and electrically charged. When the two friends meet mercurial transfer student Silvia, she catches Trace’s eye. Their instant attraction eclipses the nascent pull between Jordan and Trace, forming a messy constellation among the three women.
Over the course of a decade, their orbits send them to opposite coasts: Jordan builds a life in New York City, while Trace and Silvia get engaged in Seattle, yet the three remain linked by the gravitational pull of the past. As they approach thirty and the apogee of their Saturn return, their bond splinters when Trace calls Jordan with a shocking revelation, exposing a web of heartache, secrets, and unspoken desires.
Earthly Playing Field by Radhika Singh
Love and revolution in a crumbling world order.
Roma has a steady job, a mortgage, and a surrogate family in Queens. But as she moves through her daily routines, the powerful Empire that rules her world bares its teeth elsewhere—crushing freedom movements across the planet, including the Punjabi farmers’ uprising where her younger brother struggles on the frontlines.
Roma’s life is upended when her older brother entrusts her with a strange gift: an ordinary-looking plant that manifests a sophisticated bioengineered technology. The ‘cell’ opens a portal for an extraterrestrial spirit-body bearing news of a liberated future–and the potential to hack AI warfare—propelling Roma and her family into the core of a rising resistance.
As dreams and dialectics converge, Roma meditates on the role of faith—ruminating on mystic poetics and anticolonial legacies while yearning for a bewitching woman whose heart will only ever belong to the revolution.
The Rule of Three by Sara Cate
Three hearts. One consuming fire.
Julian Kade hates everyone. But when a power outage traps him in a Paris elevator with sharp-tongued chef Freya Kapoor and charming street fighter Archer Wilde, an unexpected spark ignites between them. By the end of the twelve hours that follow, they’ve shared their darkest desires…and formed a bond none of them could have expected.
Freya Kapoor has dreams, and getting sidetracked by two billionaires wasn’t part of her careful plan. But when the two men who’ve begun to dominate her body and mind present Freya with a chance to open the restaurant of her dreams, boundaries quickly blur…and her orderly world gets increasingly complicated.
Archer Wilde never thought he’d stop fighting long enough to get tangled up with two such different people. Yet the three of them fit together like nothing before, unlocking hidden desires they never knew they craved. But beneath the perfect facade are three individuals battling demons of their own. Ultimately, as passion deepens into something far more dangerous, Freya, Julian, and Archer will have to choose whether they’re willing to risk everything they’ve built for a love as fierce as it is free.
Shy Trans Banshee by Tony Santorella
Brian, Nik, and Darby—three friends well-versed in battling supernatural crime (when Brian isn’t busy committing it once a month as a werewolf)—are dispatched to London to track down a missing colleague. But prowling the city leads them straight into a clairvoyancy smuggling ring.
Who is kidnapping all the fortune tellers in Soho, and why? And is it a coincidence, fate, or something far more sinister that Maeve—a timid trans woman searching for her birth mother—arrives on their doorstep with the uncanny ability to predict what’s coming next?
The Two Roberts by Damian Barr
Scotland, 1933. Bobby MacBryde is on his way. After years grafting at Lees Boot Factory, he’s off to the Glasgow School of Art, to his future. On his first day he will meet another Robert, a quiet man with loose dark curls—and never leave his side.
Together they will spend every penny and every minute devouring Glasgow—its botanical gardens, the Barras market, a whole hidden city—all the while loving each other behind closed doors. With the world on the brink of war, their unrivalled talent will take them to Paris, Rome, London. They will become stars as the bombs fall, hosting wild parties with the likes of Lucian Freud, Francis Bacon, and Elizabeth Smart. But the brightest stars burn fastest.
Stunningly reimagined, The Two Roberts is a profoundly moving story of devotion and obsession, art, and class. It is a love letter to MacBryde and Colquhoun, the almost-forgotten artists who tried to change the way the world sees—and paid a devastating price.
Buy it: Indigo
A Long and Speaking Silence by Nghi Vo
This is the seventh novella in the Singing Hills Cycle
Every story begins somewhere.
On the banks of the Ya-lé River, the town of Luntien gathers to celebrate the start of the rainy season, but the celebration is marred by the arrival of refugees from the sea. Everyone has a story about the foreigners newly in their midst—lazy, violent, unwanted—while the refugees themselves grieve the loss of the home they loved.
Cleric Chih, very recently still Novice Chih, is also a stranger in Luntien. A moment of carelessness and bad luck leaves them waiting tables as they struggle to establish themself as a real cleric. A cleric’s job is to listen and record, but the stories emerging in Luntien are ugly and violent, as hard to predict as the river itself. With their hoopoe companion Almost Brilliant by their side, Chih must help the refugees while also unraveling a mystery that may have roots in their own faraway home in the abbey of Singing Hills.
In the seventh entry of the award-winning Singing Hills series, we meet Chih and Almost Brilliant just beginning their journey together as Chih assumes their place on the road and in the world.
The novellas of the Singing Hills series are standalone stories linked by the Cleric Chih, and may be read in any order.
The Lilac People by Milo Todd
This is the paperback rerelease.
In 1932 Berlin, Bertie, a trans man, and his friends spend carefree nights at the Eldorado Club, the epicenter of Berlin’s thriving queer community. An employee of the renowned Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld at the Institute of Sexual Science, Bertie works to improve queer rights in Germany and beyond, but everything changes when Hitler rises to power. The institute is raided, the Eldorado is shuttered, and queer people are rounded up. Bertie barely escapes with his girlfriend, Sofie, to a nearby farm. There they take on the identities of an elderly couple and live for more than a decade in isolation.
In the final days of the war, with their freedom in sight, Bertie and Sofie find a young trans man collapsed on their property, still dressed in Holocaust prison clothes. They vow to protect him–not from the Nazis, but from the Allied forces who are arresting queer prisoners while liberating the rest of the country. Ironically, as the Allies’ vise grip closes on Bertie and his family, their only salvation becomes fleeing to the United States.
Non-Fiction
Conversion Therapy Dropout by Timothy Schraeder Rodriguez
A gay Christian’s behind-the-scenes account of evangelical megachurches and eight years in conversion therapy before finding wholeness and authenticity.
Timothy Schraeder Rodriguez was an invisible architect behind evangelical Christianity’s digital empire, crafting messages of belonging for some of the most influential megachurches–Hillsong Church, Elevation Church, Willow Creek–all while secretly questioning his own place within the faith.
In a desperate attempt to “fix” himself, he turned to conversion therapy, spending eight years trying to pray the gay away. And he wasn’t alone. More than 700,000 people in the US have undergone some form of conversion therapy. Even though Exodus International, the largest ex-gay organization, closed in 2013, the practice still thrives in many conservative religious communities. After years of this harmful “therapy,” Schraeder Rodriguez’s sexuality never changed. But his faith did.The more time he spent in evangelical Christianity, the more he witnessed the hypocrisy of institutions that claimed to love everyone while quietly pushing people like him into silence. But Schraeder Rodriguez wouldn’t remain silent. Instead, he forged a new path, discovering a vibrant faith beyond the constraints of non-affirming theology and finding a community that embraced his whole self.
Conversion Therapy Dropout is a behind-the-scenes look at megachurch culture, the hidden harm of non-affirming Christian spaces, and the ongoing impact of conversion therapy on gay Christians. This isn’t just a coming-out story–it’s about what happens after. About rebuilding a life outside the only world you’ve ever known. And the radical act of stepping into the light after being told your whole life to stay in the shadows. Sometimes, the greatest act of faith isn’t holding on–it’s letting go.
(Out) on the Road: The Radical Joy of Queer Travel by Lindsey Danis
Queer people spend around $100 billion annually on travel, and are twice as likely as the general population to hold a passport. In short, they love to travel!
Despite their lavish spending, queer travelers are often underserved. They are either overlooked when it comes to travel guides, or are encouraged to stick to a handful of “safe” destinations. This conventional wisdom doesn’t build their confidence or validate their identities. Nor does it teach them how to advocate for themselves as travelers or plan off-the-beaten-path adventures to new places. And, with the advent of anti-LGBTQ+ policies across the United States and elsewhere, travel has become more fraught than ever for queer individuals.
Weaving personal experience with data and interviews, (Out) On the Road empowers LGBTQ+ travelers to face their fears, expand their comfort zones, find community, and thrive on the road. This book provides readers with a framework for planning travel, navigating risks, and becoming self-reliant. Written in a tone that centers female and nonbinary points of view, (Out) On the Road offers a deep dive into the queer travel experience.
