New Releases: June 18, 2024

A Shore Thing by Joanna Lowell

Former painter and unreformed rake Kit Griffith is forging a new life in Cornwall, choosing freedom over an identity that didn’t fit. He knew that leaving his Sisterhood of women artists might mean forfeiting artistic community forever. He didn’t realize he would lose his ability to paint altogether. Luckily, he has other talents. Why not devote himself to selling bicycles and trysting with the holidaymakers?

Enter Muriel Pendrake, the feisty New-York-bound botanist who has come to St. Ives to commission Kit for illustrations of British seaweeds. Kit shouldn’t accept Muriel’s offer, but he must enlist her help to prove to an all-male cycling club that women can ride as well as men. And she won’t agree unless he gives her what she wants. Maybe that’s exactly the challenge he needs.

As Kit and Muriel spend their days cycling together, their desire begins to burn with the heat of the summer sun. But are they pedaling toward something impossible? The past is bound to catch up to them, and at the season’s end, their paths will diverge. With only their hearts as guides, Kit and Muriel must decide if they’re willing to race into the unknown for the adventure of a lifetime.

Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon

Continue reading New Releases: June 18, 2024

Most Anticipated LGBTQ+ Adult Fiction: July-December 2024

Peregrine Seas by R.C. Ballad (July 1st)

Prince Peregrine couldn’t be happier to be kidnapped by pirates.

Peregrine wasn’t cut out for the restrictive life of a nobleman – he’s hungry for adventure, prone to duelling, and his family refuse to believe he’s any kind of man at all. Despite his royal origins, he has more in common with the outcasts and rebels aboard the Cygnus that anyone onshore.

He just needs to convince the captain of that before his ransom’s paid.

Captain Alastar Macdara knows better than to trust an English prince. He has his hands full keeping his ragged crew together, and the last thing he needs is to be burdened with some foppish dandy—however charming. This particular hostage is more trouble than Alastar planned for: used to getting his own way, as stubborn as Alastar and not afraid to tell him when he’s wrong. But Alastar knows a thing or two about being an outcast, and his honourable streak refuses to let him send Peregrine back to a life of misery.

The ransom might be off, but that doesn’t mean Peregrine is part of the crew. Now he must prove he’s courageous and quick-witted enough to earn his place on the Cygnus before Alastar dumps him at the next safe harbour.

It won’t be easy for Peregrine to prove himself amidst the many dangers of life at sea: navy patrols, sea serpents—and the grim, handsome Alastar. The more time they spend together the more he fears he’s falling for his captain, and honourable or not … a pirate is a pirate.

Can they chart a course to being together, or will Alastar’s secrets and Peregrine’s reckless drive to prove himself steer the Cygnus into perilous waters?

Buy it: Amazon

Continue reading Most Anticipated LGBTQ+ Adult Fiction: July-December 2024

Fave Five: Sapphic New Adult Romance, Part I

One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston

Tryst Six Venom by Penelope Douglas

Catch and Cradle by Katia Rose

Out on Good Behavior by Dahlia Adler

Marriage of Unconvenience by Chelsea M. Cameron

Bonus: These are all full-length novels, but for a novella, check out Treasure by Rebekah Weatherspoon

Pride Month Spotlight: Memoirs

Lesbian Love Story by Amelia Possanza

When Amelia Possanza moved to Brooklyn to build a life of her own, she found herself surrounded by queer stories: she read them on landmark placards, overheard them on the pool deck when she joined the world’s largest LGBTQ swim team, and even watched them on TV in her cockroach-infested apartment. These stories inspired her to seek out lesbians throughout history who could become her role models, in romance and in life.

Centered around seven love stories for the ages, this is Possanza’s journey into the archives to recover the personal histories of lesbians in the twentieth century: who they were, how they loved, why their stories were destroyed, and where their memories echo and live on. Possanza’s hunt takes readers from a drag king show in Bushwick to the home of activists in Harlem and then across the ocean to Hadrian’s Library, where she searches for traces of Sappho in the ruins. Along the way, she discovers her own love—for swimming, for community, for New York City—and adds her record to the archive.

At the heart of this riveting, inventive history, Possanza asks: How could lesbian love help us reimagine care and community? What would our world look like if we replaced its foundation of misogyny with something new, with something distinctly lesbian?

Buy it: BookshopAmazon

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Fave Five: Queer YA Set at Summer Camp

Camp by L.C. Rosen

Nothing Happened by Molly Booth

Keeping Her Secret by Sarah Nicolas

Flamer by Mike Curato

Wish You Weren’t Here by Erin Baldwin

Bonus: These are all contemporary, but for supernatural horror, check out Dead Girls Walking by Sami Ellis 

New Releases: June 11, 2024

Middle Grade

Camp Prodigy by Caroline Palmer

After attending an incredible concert, Tate Seong is inspired to become a professional violist. There’s just one problem: they’re the worst musician at their school.

Tate doesn’t even have enough confidence to assert themself with their friends or come out as nonbinary to their family, let alone attempt a solo anytime soon. Things start to look up when Tate attends a summer orchestra camp—Camp Prodigy—and runs into Eli, the remarkable violist who inspired Tate to play in the first place.

But Eli has been hiding their skills ever since their time in the spotlight gave them a nervous breakdown. Together, can they figure out how to turn Tate into a star and have Eli overcome their performance anxieties? Or will the pressure take them both down?

Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon

Continue reading New Releases: June 11, 2024

Most Anticipated LGBTQ+ Young Adult Fiction: July-December 2024

A Darker Mischief by Derek Milman (July 2nd)

When Cal Ware wins a scholarship to an elite New England boarding school, he’s thrilled to leave his past behind. Back home in Mississippi, he was the poor, queer kid who never fit in. But at Essex Academy, he’ll be able to reinvent himself. Or so he hopes…

But at Essex, Cal’s classmates only see his cheap clothes and old iPhone. They mock his accent, and can’t believe he’s never left the country, or heard of The Hamptons. Cal, at his breaking point, is about to give up and return to Mississippi when he learns about a secret society on campus — the key to becoming Essex royalty.

Cal knows he’s not exactly secret society material, but to his surprise, he finds an unlikely champion in the handsome, charismatic, and slightly dangerous Luke Kim. As they get swept up in the mystery and glamour of the Rush process, Cal finds himself falling in love for the first time.

But as the initiation rituals grow riskier — and increasingly nefarious — Cal must decide how far he’s willing to go, and how much of himself he’s willing to sacrifice, to save everything and everyone he cherishes most. Because nothing at Essex — not even Cal’s first love — is quite what it seems.

Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon

Continue reading Most Anticipated LGBTQ+ Young Adult Fiction: July-December 2024

Pride Month Spotlight: Graphic Novels

Early Reader

Batcat by Meggie Ramm

First in a full-color graphic novel series for emerging readers about accepting yourself and others from up-and-coming author-illustrator Meggie Ramm, creator of the comic strip The Littlest Dungeon Guard and cohost of the Pop! Whiz! Bang! comics podcast.

Batcat loves being all alone in their home on Spooky Island. Up in their tree house, they pass the time playing video games and watching TV. But when Batcat suddenly finds themself haunted by an annoying, ice cream–stealing ghost, they visit the local Island Witch for a spell to remove their ghastly guest permanently!

With their Ghost-B-Gone spell in hand, Batcat travels across Spooky Island to gather ingredients—to the Cavernous Caves where the bats tell them they’re too round to be a bat, and to the Whispering Cemetery where the cats will help only if they commit to being a true cat. But Batcat is neither and that’s what makes them special, right?

Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon

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Spotlight on: 2024 Lammy Finalists for Best Anthology

Today on the site we’re shining the spotlight on the 2024 finalists for the Lambda Literary Award for Best Anthology! Anthologies are pretty near and dear to my heart, having edited five of them, and I’m thrilled to help showcase these editors, contributors, and volumes before the Lammy Awards take place on June 11th!

2 Trans 2 Furious: An Extremely Serious Journal of Transgender Street Racing Studies ed. by Tuck Woodstock & Niko Stratis (Rapid Onset Gender Distro / Self-published)

The ironic subtitle of this book says it all. Canadian zine 2 Trans 2 Furious is anything but “extremely serious.” And the playful descriptive copy perfectly captures the tone of this labor of fan love: “More than 40 trans writers and artists have joined forces to explore the deeper meanings of the Fast & Furious franchise (and also gender). There’s really no way to know why this exists, but it does, and you can own it!” Co-editor Niko Stratis dates her love of the franchise back to when she saw the first Fast & Furious movie “the month before trying to come out as trans for the first time.” The first print run has already sold out, but we’re holding out hope that it will be back in stock soon so everyone can enjoy this compilation of fiction and nonfiction that explores the queer subtext of the iconic street racing film saga.

Continue reading Spotlight on: 2024 Lammy Finalists for Best Anthology

Queering up your shelf, one rec at a time!