Happy Lesbian Visibility Day 2024! We’re celebrating with these lesbian protagonists, and you can too! For more recs, check out past years’ posts!
Young Adult
We Got the Beat by Jenna Miller
Jordan Elliott is a fat, nerdy lesbian, and the first junior to be named editor in chief of the school newspaper. Okay, that last part hasn’t happened yet, but it will. It’s positive thinking that has gotten Jordan this far. Ever since Mackenzie West, her friend-turned-enemy, humiliated her at the start of freshman year, Jordan has thrown herself into journalism and kept her eyes trained on the future.
So it’s a total blow when Jordan discovers that she not only didn’t get the editor in chief spot, but she’s been assigned the volleyball beat instead. And who is the star and newly crowned captain of the volleyball team? Mackenzie West. But words are Jordan’s weapon, and she has some ideas about how to exact a long-awaited revenge on her nemesis. Then things get murky when forced time together has Mack and Jordan falling back into their friendship, and into something more. And when Mack confesses the real reason she turned on Jordan freshman year, it has Jordan questioning everything—past, present, and future.
If Jordan lets her guard down and Mack in, will she get everything she wants, or will she be humiliated all over again?
Author of LOVE AT 350 Lisa Peers‘s MOTOR CITY BABY, a sapphic romance about a woman’s efforts to save a club she managed—and where she fell in love—with a Detroit indie rock star in the ’90s, until the rock star dropped out of the industry and the woman’s life; a blowout benefit concert forces her to reckon with her past and find happily ever after where she least expects it, to Katy Nishimoto at Dial Press, by Frances Black at The Literary Counsel (world).
A highly illustrated middle-grade series that celebrates new friendships, first crushes, and getting out of your comfort zone.
Ever since they can remember, fifth-graders Kenzie (aka Kenzilla) and Shelly (aka Bomb Shell) have dreamed of becoming roller derby superstars. When Austin’s city league introduces a brand-new junior league, the dynamic duo celebrates! But they’ll need to try out as a five-person team. Kenzie and Shelly have just one week to convince three other girls that roller derby is the coolest thing on wheels. But Kenzie starts to have second thoughts when Shelly starts acting like everyone’s best friend . . . Isn’t she supposed to be Kenzie’s best friend? And things get really awkward when Shelly recruits Kenzie’s neighbor (and secret crush!) for the team. With lots of humor and an authentic middle-grade voice, book one of this illustrated series follows Kenzie, Shelly, and the rest of the Derby Daredevils as they learn how to fall—and get back up again.
Piper Kitts is spending the summer living with her grandmother, training at the barn of a former Olympic horseback rider, and trying to get over her ex-girlfriend. Much to Piper’s dismay, her grandmother is making her face her fear of driving head-on by taking lessons from a girl in town.
Kat Pearson has always suspected that she likes girls but fears her North Carolina town is too small to color outside the lines. But when Piper’s grandmother hires Kat to give her driving lessons, everything changes.
Piper’s not sure if she’s ready to let go of her ex. Kat’s navigating uncharted territory with her new crush. With the summer running out, will they be able to unlock a future together?
After an embarrassing loss to her ex-girlfriend in their first basketball game of the season, seventeen-year-old Scottie Zajac gets into a fender bender with the worst possible person: her nemesis, Irene Abraham, head cheerleader for the Fighting Reindeer.
Irene is as mean as she is beautiful, so Scottie makes a point to keep her distance. When the accident sends Irene’s car to the shop for weeks’ worth of repairs and the girls are forced to carpool, their rocky start only gets bumpier.
But when an opportunity arises for Scottie to get back at her toxic ex—and climb her school’s social ladder—she bribes Irene into an elaborate fake- dating scheme that threatens to reveal some very real feelings.
Morgan, an elite track athlete, is forced to transfer high schools late in her senior year after it turns out being queer is against her private Catholic school’s code of conduct. There, she meets Ruby, who has two hobbies: tinkering with her baby blue 1970 Ford Torino and competing in local beauty pageants, the latter to live out the dreams of her overbearing mother. The two are drawn to each other and can’t deny their growing feelings. But while Morgan–out and proud, and determined to have a fresh start–doesn’t want to have to keep their budding relationship a secret, Ruby isn’t ready to come out yet. With each girl on a different path toward living her truth, can they go the distance together?
To Daya Wijesinghe, a bruise is a mixture of comfort and control. Since her parents died in an accident she survived, bruises have become a way to keep her pain on the surface of her skin so she doesn’t need to deal with the ache deep in her heart.
So when chance and circumstances bring her to a roller derby bout, Daya is hooked. Yes, the rules are confusing and the sport seems to require the kind of teamwork and human interaction Daya generally avoids. But the opportunities to bruise are countless, and Daya realizes that if she’s going to keep her emotional pain at bay, she’ll need all the opportunities she can get.
The deeper Daya immerses herself into the world of roller derby, though, the more she realizes it’s not the simple physical pain-fest she was hoping for. Her rough-and-tumble teammates and their fans push her limits in ways she never imagined, bringing Daya to big truths about love, loss, strength, and healing.
After getting kicked off the basketball team for a fight that was absolutely totally not her fault (okay maybe a little her fault), Mara is dying to find a new sport to play to prove to her coach that she can be a team player. A lifelong football fan, Mara decides to hit the gridiron with her brother, Noah, and best friend, Quinn-and she turns out to be a natural. But joining the team sets off a chain of events in her small Oregon town-and within her family-that she never could have predicted.
Inspired by what they see as Mara’s political statement, four other girls join the team. Now Mara’s lumped in as one of the girls-one of the girls who can’t throw, can’t kick, and doesn’t know a fullback from a linebacker. Complicating matters is the fact that Valentina, Mara’s crush, is one of the new players, as is Carly, Mara’s nemesis-the girl Mara fought with when she was kicked off the basketball team. What results is a coming-of-age story that is at once tear-jerking and funny, thought-provoking and real, as Mara’s preconceived notions about gender, sports, sexuality, and friendship are turned upside down.
Annie is a smart, antisocial lesbian starting her senior year of high school who’s under pressure to join the cheerleader squad to make friends and round out her college applications. Her former friend BeeBee is a people-pleaser—a trans girl who must keep her parents happy with her grades and social life to keep their support of her transition. Through the rigors of squad training and amped up social pressures (not to mention micro aggressions and other queer youth problems), the two girls rekindle a friendship they thought they’d lost and discover there may be other, sweeter feelings springing up between them.
There are two things that Corinne Parker knows to be true: that she is in love with Maggie Bailey, the captain of the rival high school’s cross-country team and her secret girlfriend of a year, and that she isn’t ready for anyone to know she’s bisexual.
But then Maggie dies, and Corinne quickly learns that the only thing worse than losing Maggie is being left heartbroken over a relationship no one knows existed. And to make things even more complicated, the only person she can turn to is Elissa — Maggie’s ex and the single person who understands how Corinne is feeling.
As Corinne struggles to make sense of her grief and what she truly wants out of life, she begins to have feelings for the last person she should fall for. But to move forward after losing Maggie, Corinne will have to learn to be honest with the people in her life…starting with herself.
Amber McCloud’s dream is to become cheer captain at the end of the year, but it’s an extra-tall order to be joyful and spirited when the quarterback of your team has been killed in a car accident. For both the team and the squad, watching Robbie get replaced by newcomer Jack Walsh is brutal. And when it turns out Jack is actually short for Jaclyn, all hell breaks loose.
The players refuse to be led by a girl, the cheerleaders are mad about the changes to their traditions, and the fact that Robbie’s been not only replaced but outshined by a QB who wears a sports bra has more than a few Atherton Alligators in a rage. Amber tries for some semblance of unity, but it quickly becomes clear that she’s only got a future on the squad and with her friends if she helps them take Jack down.
Just one problem: Amber and Jack are falling for each other, and if Amber can’t stand up for Jack and figure out how to get everyone to fall in line, her dream may come at the cost of her heart.
The UNS Women’s Lacrosse team doesn’t have an official policy against inter-teammate relationships, but those words might as well be carved into stone tablets in the middle of the field. After witnessing way too much drama in the past, Captain Becca Moore is intent on keeping her players’ love lives out of the locker room.
Becca has no time or tolerance for any distractions from the game. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what Hope Hastings has been since the day she showed up for tryouts: one walking, talking, charismatically dorky and way-too-kissable distraction.
Hope knew she was headed straight to the danger zone from the moment she saw Becca’s flame-red hair and surly captain smirk. She’s spent the past two years writing off her attraction as a harmless crush, but starting a new semester fresh out of an awful relationship makes Hope realize just how far from harmless the heat between her and Becca really is.
The friendships of a tight-knit team and their shot at the title are all lying on the line, but as Hope and Becca get closer to bending rules they’ve sworn never to break, they realize they’ve put their hearts on that line too. Losing has never been an option, but winning might cost more than they’re willing to pay.
Audrey Caplan knew what she wanted. It was simple, really: get the spot as captain of her college soccer team, and focus on school. That was it, and with her aptitude for structure and discipline, it’d be easy to ignore distractions. At least it would’ve been if Morgan Bailey hadn’t shown up. If there was one thing Audrey’s bulletproof restraint wasn’t prepared for, it was an annoying, adorable show-off with a heart of gold.
Germany’s Meike von Bismarck is rich, famous, and the top-ranked amateur female tennis player in the world. She seems to have it all, but the Nazis want more. Can Meike deliver the victories Adolf Hitler requires on court while keeping her soul intact off it?
Brash American Helen Wheeler has reached the upper echelons of women’s tennis, but her fiery temper and headline-grabbing social life have prevented her from being accepted by the genteel sport’s fans. When a shadowy government agent presents Helen with compromising photographs of her with Meike von Bismarck, her one-time doubles partner and former lover, will Helen allow her career to be derailed by an inevitable morals charge or will she agree to spy on the woman she once loved?
She should have just been a cheer-camp hookup, but fate decided to toss Echo Rosenthal back into my life ten years later. She coaches the Heartwood Bulldogs, the squad that beat my Corsica Tigers at the New England Cheer Championships. Now we’re both headed to Nationals and I have one thing on my mind: revenge.
My squad is fired up and ready to go—until the Rosedale High School gym burns down. Guess who has to host them for practices a month before Nationals? Now I, Kiri Kentwood, am forced into even closer proximity to Echo and she’s really starting to get on my nerves, not to mention she’s in ridiculous shape and can still do a standing full. Bitch. I can’t decide which is worse, that I want to ram a set of poms down her throat, or that I want to shove my tongue in her mouth.
As the pressure builds toward Nationals, I can’t get her out of my mind and, after a huge argument, we end up right back where we started: in bed.
We’re headed for a battle, and I don’t know which one of us is going to come out on top, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to lose to her again: on the mat or off.
During her career, Caro was one of the best defense players in women’s hockey. These days, she keeps to herself. Her all-girls hockey camp is her life, and she hopes it’ll be her legacy. Sure, her new summer hire is charming and magnetic, but Caro keeps her work and personal life strictly separate.
Amy Schwarzbach lives life out loud.
Amy’s as bright and cheerful as her lavender hair, and she uses her high-profile position in women’s hockey to advocate for the things she believes in. Ten weeks in Chicago coaching a girls’ training camp is the perfect opportunity to mentor the next generation before she goes back to Boston.
Letting love in means putting yourself out there.
When the reticent head coach offers to help Amy get in shape for next season, her starstruck crush on Caro quickly blossoms into real chemistry. As summer comes to an end, neither of them can quite let go of this fling—but Amy can’t afford a distraction, and Caro can’t risk her relationship becoming public and jeopardizing the one thing that’s really hers.
Eva Angeles is a professional barrel racer headed for her third world title when a competition mishap throws her in the path of an on-the-loose bull. She is saved from impending disaster by a tall, dark, and handsome bullfighter—a woman. Toma Rozene is an equestrian stuntwoman fresh off the set of a blockbuster film when a family emergency calls her home to help run the family business: rescuing fallen rodeo riders before blustering bulls and bucking broncos trample their dreams. Eva and Toma’s shared passions and competitive spirits make friendship easy, but, as their feelings deepen, they must decide if the divergent futures they seek will stand in the way of love.
Corey LaCroix only wanted to snowboard, but Olympic medals and world championships only carry you so far when your knees ache and you’re suddenly an underdog for the first time in her career. Elise Brandeis doesn’t need a training partner, especially an unorthodox has-been snowboarder with an attitude. But Elise has already lost a full season to injury, and she’s struggling to make the Olympic ski team. Can teaming up with Corey give her the edge she needs to go for gold, or will the snowboarder’s infuriatingly cocky smile and rock hard abs prove a distraction she simply can’t afford?
Both champions brace themselves for the run of a lifetime. Putting their broken bodies on the line, they fight the competition, the clock, and the frozen terrain for one more chance at glory. But this time, as they ride the razor’s edge between victory and defeat, the stakes are steeper than any mountain they will ever face when legacies and hearts collide.
Recently divorced Tina Durham is trying to be self-sufficient, but her personal-training career is floundering, her closest friends are swept up in new relationships, and her washing machine has just flooded her kitchen. It’s enough to make a girl cry.
Instead, she calls a plumbing service, and Joanne “Joe Mama” Delario comes to the rescue. Joe is sweet, funny, and good at fixing things. She also sees something special in Tina and invites her to try out for the roller derby team she coaches.
Derby offers Tina an outlet for her frustrations, a chance to excel, and the female friendships she’s never had before. And as Tina starts to thrive at derby, the tension between her and Joe cranks up. Despite their player/coach relationship, they give in to their mutual attraction. Sex in secret is hot, but Tina can’t help but want more.
With work still on the rocks and her relationship in the closet, Tina is forced to reevaluate her life. Can she be content with a secret lover? Or with being dependent on someone else again? It’s time for Tina to tackle her fears, both on and off the track.
Talented golfer Morgan Spencer has never won a major but it’s so close she can taste it—no thanks to her sexist father, a golfing legend who won’t even give her the time of day.
Television producer Adrienne Wyatt has thrown herself into her career after her lover left her a year ago. She has a brilliant new plan: a documentary featuring Morgan’s rise and rise, capitalizing on the young woman’s star appeal.
The main problem is that the reserved golfer treats Adrienne’s plan like an invasion of privacy. The other issue is her growing feelings for the irritatingly attractive woman—an unprofessional lapse that would get her ridiculed by her peers if anyone found out.
When things come to a chaotic head, as fierce desires, risked careers, age differences, and dreams all come into play, what will win?
One Life by Megan Rapinoe and Emma Brockes (Memoir)
Megan Rapinoe is one of the world’s most talented athletes. But beyond her massive professional success on the soccer field, Rapinoe has become an icon and ally to millions, boldly speaking out on the issues that matter most. In recent years, she’s become one of the faces of the equal pay movement and her tireless activism for LGBTQ rights has earned her global support.
In One Life, Rapinoe embarks on a thoughtful and unapologetic discussion of social justice and politics. Raised in a conservative small town in northern California, the youngest of six, Rapinoe was four years old when she kicked her first soccer ball. Her parents encouraged her love for the game, but also urged her to volunteer at homeless shelters and food banks. Her passion for community engagement never wavered through high school or college, all the way up to 2016, when she took a knee during the national anthem in solidarity with former NFL player Colin Kaepernick, to protest racial injustice and police brutality – the first high-profile white athlete to do so. The backlash was immediate, but it couldn’t compare to the overwhelming support. Rapinoe became a force of social change, both on and off the field.
Using anecdotes from her own life and career, from suing the United States Soccer Federation alongside her teammates over gender discrimination to her widely publicized refusal to visit the White House, Rapinoe discusses the obligation we all have to speak up, and reveals the impact each of us can have on our communities. As she declared during the soccer team’s victory parade in New York in 2019, “[T]his is everybody’s responsibility, every single person here, every single person who is not here, every single person who doesn’t want to be here, every single person who agrees and doesn’t agree…. It takes everybody. This is my charge to everybody. Do what you can. Do what you have to do. Step outside yourself. Be more. Be better. Be bigger than you’ve ever been before.”
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
To Add to Your TBR
Out of Our League ed. by Dahlia Adler and Jennifer Iacopelli (YA anthology)
Welcome to England, where the Protectorate enforces the Public Good. Here, there are rules for everything – what to eat, what to wear, what to do, what to say, what to read, what to think, who to obey, who to hate, who to love. Your safety is assured, so long as you follow the rules.
Gabriel is a natural born rule-breaker. And his biggest crime of all? Being gay.
Gabriel knows his sexuality must be kept secret from all but his closest friends, not only to protect himself, but to protect his boyfriend. Because Eric isn’t just the boy who has stolen Gabriel’s heart. He’s the son of the chief inspector at Degenerate Investigations - the man who poses the single biggest threat to Gabriel’s life.
And the Protectorate are experts at exposing secrets.
“It’s not every day you get to put the fear of Medusa into a god.”
Emma Stone, medusa, is the groundskeeper for Olson College of Extensive Education, a place where everyone is welcome, from the mythical to the magical. When her selkie best friend loses her skin in Fresher’s week, the race is on to find it before someone uses it against her.
The search brings Emma face to face with her oldest enemy – and forces her to confront the worst nightmares of her past.
Sky Baker may be openly gay, but in his small, insular town, making sure he was invisible has always been easier than being himself. Determined not to let anything ruin his senior year, Sky decides to make a splash at his high school’s annual beach bum party by asking his crush, Ali, to prom—and he has thirty days to do it.
What better way to start living loud and proud than by pulling off the gayest promposal Rock Ledge, Michigan, has ever seen?
Then, Sky’s plans are leaked by an anonymous hacker in a deeply homophobic e-blast that quickly goes viral. He’s fully prepared to drop out and skip town altogether—until his classmates give him a reason to fight back by turning his thirty-day promposal countdown into a school-wide hunt to expose the e-blast perpetrator.
But what happens at the end of the thirty days? Will Sky get to keep his hard-won visibility? Or will his small-town blues stop him from being his true self?
When Otto and Xavier Shin declare their love, an aunt gifts them a trip on a sleeper train to mark their new commitment—and to get them out of her house. Setting off with their pet mongoose, Otto and Xavier arrive at their sleepy local train station, but quickly deduce that The Lucky Day is no ordinary locomotive. Their trip on this former tea-smuggling train has been curated beyond their wildest imaginations, complete with mysterious and welcoming touches, like ingredients for their favorite breakfast. They seem to be the only people onboard, until Otto discovers a secretive woman who issues a surprising message. As further clues and questions pile up, and the trip upends everything they thought they knew, Otto and Xavier begin to see connections to their own pasts, connections that now bind them together.
Lark spent the first twenty-four years, nine months, and three days of his life training for a righteous quest: to rid the world of monsters. Alongside his partner Kane, he wore the cage and endured the scourge in order to develop his innate magic. He never thought that when Kane left, he’d next see him in the company of FBI agents and a SWAT team. He never dreamed that the leader of the Fellowship of the Anointed would be brought up on charges of abuse and assault.
He never expected the government would tell him that the monsters aren’t real–that there is no magic, and all the pain was for nothing.
Lark isn’t ready to give up. He is determined to fulfill his quest, to defeat the monsters he was promised. Along the way he will grapple with the past, confront love, and discover his long-buried truth.
JD Scott conjures up unruly personae that are propelled by queer fantasies, youthful regrets, incantations, and apocryphal parables. Mask for Mask is a kaleidoscopic poetry collection, one that is both formally innovative and an imaginative descent into LGBTQ+ undergrounds and underworlds.
Seventeen-year-old Pakistani immigrant Zara Hossain has been leading a fairly typical life in Corpus Christi, Texas, since her family moved there for her father to work as a pediatrician. While dealing with the Islamophobia that she faces at school, Zara has to lay low, trying not to stir up any trouble and jeopardize their family’s dependent visa status while they await their green card approval, which has been in process for almost nine years.
But one day her tormentor, star football player Tyler Benson, takes things too far, leaving a threatening note in her locker, and gets suspended. As an act of revenge against her for speaking out, Tyler and his friends vandalize Zara’s house with racist graffiti, leading to a violent crime that puts Zara’s entire future at risk. Now she must pay the ultimate price and choose between fighting to stay in the only place she’s ever called home or losing the life she loves and everyone in it.
Over the past ten years, we have witnessed the rise of queer and trans communities that have defied and challenged those who have historically opposed them. Through bold, symbolic imagery and surrealist, overlapping landscapes, queer illustrator and curator Syan Rose shines a light on the faces and voices of these diverse, amorphous, messy, real and imagined queer and trans communities.
In their own words, queer and trans organizers, artists, healers, comrades, and leaders speak honestly and authentically about their own experiences with power, love, pain, and magic to create a textured and nuanced portrait of queer and trans realities in America. The many themes include Black femme mental health, Pacific Islander authorship, fat queer performance art, disability and healthcare practice, sex worker activism, and much more. Accompanying the narratives are Rose’s startling and sinuous images that brings these leaders’ words to visual life.
Our Work Is Everywhere is a graphic nonfiction book that underscores the brilliance and passion of queer and trans resistance.
Includes a foreword by Lambda Literary Award-winning author and activist Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, author of Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice.
Thirteen-year-old Eli likes baggy clothes, baseball caps, and one girl in particular. Her seventeen-year-old sister Anna is more traditionally feminine; she loves boys and staying out late. They are sisters, and they are also the only family each can count on. Their dad has long been out of the picture, and their mom lives at the mercy of her next drink. When their mom lands herself in enforced rehab, Anna and Eli are left to fend for themselves. With no legal guardian to keep them out of foster care, they take matters into their own hands: Anna masquerades as Aunt Lisa, and together she and Eli hoard whatever money they can find. But their plans begin to unravel as quickly as they were made, and they are always way too close to getting caught.
“History” sounds really official. Like it’s all fact. Like it’s definitely what happened.
But that’s not necessarily true. History was crafted by the people who recorded it. And sometimes, those historians were biased against, didn’t see, or couldn’t even imagine anyone different from themselves.
That means that history has often left out the stories of LGBTQIA+ people: men who loved men, women who loved women, people who loved without regard to gender, and people who lived outside gender boundaries. Historians have even censored the lives and loves of some of the world’s most famous people, from William Shakespeare and Pharaoh Hatshepsut to Cary Grant and Eleanor Roosevelt.
Join author Lee Wind for this fascinating journey through primary sources―poetry, memoir, news clippings, and images of ancient artwork―to explore the hidden (and often surprising) Queer lives and loves of two dozen historical figures.
Naomi Grant has built her life around going against the grain. After the sex-positive start-up she cofounded becomes an international sensation, she wants to extend her educational platform to live lecturing. Unfortunately, despite her long list of qualifications, higher ed won’t hire her.
Ethan Cohen has recently received two honors: LA Mag named him one of the city’s hottest bachelors and he became rabbi of his own synagogue. Taking a gamble in an effort to attract more millennials to the faith, the executive board hired Ethan because of his nontraditional background. Unfortunately, his shul is low on both funds and congregants. The board gives him three months to turn things around or else they’ll close the doors of his synagogue for good.
Naomi and Ethan join forces to host a buzzy seminar series on Modern Intimacy, the perfect solution to their problems–until they discover a new one–their growing attraction to each other. They’ve built the syllabus for love’s latest experiment, but neither of them expected they’d be the ones putting it to the test.
Once upon a time, there was a wicked fairy who, in an act of vengeance, cursed a line of princesses to die. A curse that could only be broken by true love’s kiss.
You’ve heard this before, haven’t you? The handsome prince. The happily-ever-after.
Utter nonsense.
Let me tell you, no one in Briar actually cares about what happens to its princesses. Not the way they care about their jewels and elaborate parties and charm-granting elixirs. I thought I didn’t care, either.
Until I met her.
Princess Aurora. The last heir to Briar’s throne. Kind. Gracious. The future queen her realm needs. One who isn’t bothered that I am Alyce, the Dark Grace, abhorred and feared for the mysterious dark magic that runs in my veins. Humiliated and shamed by the same nobles who pay me to bottle hexes and then brand me a monster. Aurora says I should be proud of my gifts. That she . . . cares for me. Even though it was a power like mine that was responsible for her curse.
But with less than a year until that curse will kill her, any future I might see with Aurora is swiftly disintegrating—and she can’t stand to kiss yet another insipid prince. I want to help her. If my power began her curse, perhaps it’s what can lift it. Perhaps, together, we could forge a new world.
Nonsense again.
Because we all know how this story ends, don’t we? Aurora is the beautiful princess. And I—
Tina never worries about being “ordinary”—she doesn’t have to, since she’s known practically forever that she’s not just Tina Mains, average teenager and beloved daughter. She’s also the keeper of an interplanetary rescue beacon, and one day soon, it’s going to activate, and then her dreams of saving all the worlds and adventuring among the stars will finally be possible. Tina’s legacy, after all, is intergalactic—she is the hidden clone of a famed alien hero, left on Earth disguised as a human to give the universe another chance to defeat a terrible evil.
But when the beacon activates, it turns out that Tina’s destiny isn’t quite what she expected. Things are far more dangerous than she ever assumed–and everyone in the galaxy is expecting her to actually be the brilliant tactician and legendary savior Captain Thaoh Argentian, but Tina….is just Tina. And the Royal Fleet is losing the war, badly–the starship that found her is on the run and they barely manage to escape Earth with the planet still intact.
Luckily, Tina is surrounded by a crew she can trust, and her best friend Rachel, and she is still determined to save all the worlds. But first she’ll have to save herself.
After years of trying to break into New York City’s literary scene, Madeline Slaughter is emotionally and physically exhausted. When a friend offers her a safe haven as the live-in companion to reclusive, bestselling novelist Victor Hallowell she jumps at the chance to escape the city.
Madeline expects to find rest and quiet in the forests of Upstate New York. Instead, she finds Victor, handsome and intensely passionate, and Audrey Coffin, Victor’s mysterious and beautiful neighbor.
When Victor offers her a kiss and the promise of more Madeline allows herself to become entangled even as Audrey is also claiming her heart. The only problem is that Audrey and Victor are ex-lovers with plenty of baggage between them. As Madeline finds herself opening up and falling in love with both she starts to wonder, can there be a future for all three?
When twin heirs are born in Tourin, their fates are decided at a young age. While Izaveta remained at court to learn the skills she’d need as the future queen, Asya was taken away to train with her aunt, the mysterious Firebird, who ensured magic remained balanced in the realm.
But before Asya’s training is completed, the ancient power blooms inside her, which can mean only one thing: the queen is dead, and a new ruler must be crowned.
As the princesses come to understand everything their roles entail, they’ll discover who they can trust, who they can love—and who killed their mother.
Derek is LitenVärld’s most loyal employee. He lives and breathes the job, from the moment he wakes up in a converted shipping container at the edge of the parking lot to the second he clocks out of work 18 hours later. But after taking his first ever sick day, his manager calls that loyalty into question. An excellent employee like Derek, an employee made to work at LitenVärld, shouldn’t need time off.
To test his commitment to the job, Derek is assigned to a special inventory shift, hunting through the store to find defective products. Toy chests with pincers and eye stalks, ambulatory sleeper sofas, killer mutant toilets, that kind of thing. Helping him is the inventory team—four strangers who look and sound almost exactly like him. Are five Dereks better than one?
Piper Kitts is spending the summer living with her grandmother, training at the barn of a former Olympic horseback rider, and trying to get over her ex-girlfriend. Much to Piper’s dismay, her grandmother is making her face her fear of driving head-on by taking lessons from a girl in town.
Kat Pearson has always suspected that she likes girls but fears her North Carolina town is too small to color outside the lines. But when Piper’s grandmother hires Kat to give her driving lessons, everything changes.
Piper’s not sure if she’s ready to let go of her ex. Kat’s navigating uncharted territory with her new crush. With the summer running out, will they be able to unlock a future together?
It’s the summer before middle school and eleven-year-old Bug’s best friend Moira has decided the two of them need to use the next few months to prepare. For Moira, this means figuring out the right clothes to wear, learning how to put on makeup, and deciding which boys are cuter in their yearbook photos than in real life. But none of this is all that appealing to Bug, who doesn’t particularly want to spend more time trying to understand how to be a girl. Besides, there’s something more important to worry about: A ghost is haunting Bug’s eerie old house in rural Vermont…and maybe haunting Bug in particular. As Bug begins to untangle the mystery of who this ghost is and what they’re trying to say, an altogether different truth comes to light—Bug is transgender.
Prince Tal has long awaited his coming-of-age tour. After spending most of his life cloistered behind palace walls as he learns to keep his forbidden magic secret, he can finally see his family’s kingdom for the first time. His first taste of adventure comes just two days into the journey, when their crew discovers a mysterious prisoner on a burning derelict vessel.
Tasked with watching over the prisoner, Tal is surprised to feel an intense connection with the roguish Athlen. So when Athlen leaps overboard and disappears, Tal feels responsible and heartbroken, knowing Athlen could not have survived in the open ocean.
That is, until Tal runs into Athlen days later on dry land, very much alive, and as charming—and secretive—as ever. But before they can pursue anything further, Tal is kidnapped by pirates and held ransom in a plot to reveal his rumored powers and instigate a war. Tal must escape if he hopes to save his family and the kingdom. And Athlen might just be his only hope…
With no water, no air, and no native life, the planet Gora is unremarkable. The only thing it has going for it is a chance proximity to more popular worlds, making it a decent stopover for ships traveling between the wormholes that keep the Galactic Commons connected. If deep space is a highway, Gora is just your average truck stop.
At the Five-Hop One-Stop, long-haul spacers can stretch their legs (if they have legs, that is), and get fuel, transit permits, and assorted supplies. The Five-Hop is run by an enterprising alien and her sometimes helpful child, who work hard to provide a little piece of home to everyone passing through.
When a freak technological failure halts all traffic to and from Gora, three strangers—all different species with different aims—are thrown together at the Five-Hop. Grounded, with nothing to do but wait, the trio—an exiled artist with an appointment to keep, a cargo runner at a personal crossroads, and a mysterious individual doing her best to help those on the fringes—are compelled to confront where they’ve been, where they might go, and what they are, or could be, to each other.
After an embarrassing loss to her ex-girlfriend in their first basketball game of the season, seventeen-year-old Scottie Zajac gets into a fender bender with the worst possible person: her nemesis, Irene Abraham, head cheerleader for the Fighting Reindeer.
Irene is as mean as she is beautiful, so Scottie makes a point to keep her distance. When the accident sends Irene’s car to the shop for weeks’ worth of repairs and the girls are forced to carpool, their rocky start only gets bumpier.
But when an opportunity arises for Scottie to get back at her toxic ex—and climb her school’s social ladder—she bribes Irene into an elaborate fake- dating scheme that threatens to reveal some very real feelings.
Broken taillights, faulty dishwashers, you name it. There are very few things I can’t make brand-new again. If it’s broken, malfunctioning, or just in need of a hand, it lands in my lap. That’s how Trey ended up in front of me, an unexpected stranger in my kitchen.
Only, he’s not broken.
Far from it. He’s gentle, creative, compassionate, and bright, all wrapped up in this timid, cagey package of blond curls and shy smiles. He’s been dealt a bad hand, running from someone that hurt him more than just physically, and he needs my help. My protection.
But Trey is different from every other guy.
He makes me feel things I don’t quite comprehend. Things I didn’t know were buried inside. No matter how hard I try to keep them quiet, I can’t ignore the way his attention quickens my heartbeat or how his soft eyes and even softer lips stir up desires I’ve never had before, and now that he’s this close to me, I’m not letting anything or anyone take him away.
Jetta is in the center of a war. With her magical power, she could save everyone, save her country… or she could destroy it all.
Jetta’s home is spiraling into civil war. Le Trépas—the deadly necromancer—has used his blood magic to wrest control of the country, and Jetta has been without treatment for her malheur for weeks. Meanwhile, Jetta’s love interest, brother, and friend are intent on infiltrating the palace to stop the Boy King and find Le Trépas to put an end to the unleashed chaos.
The sweeping conclusion to Heidi Heilig’s ambitious trilogy takes us to new continents, introduces us to new gods, flings us into the middle of palace riots and political intrigue, and asks searching questions about power and corruption. As in the first two books, the story is partly told in ephemera, including original songs, myths, play scripts, and various forms of communication.
That’s a well-established fact among his tight-knit friend group, and they love him anyway.
Jack is an ass.
Jack, who’s always ready with a sly insult, who can’t have a conversation without arguing, and who Oscar may or may not have hooked up with on a strict no-commitment, one-time-only basis. Even if it was extremely hot.
Together, they’re a bickering, combative mess.
When Oscar is fired (answering phones is not for the anxiety-ridden), he somehow ends up working for Jack. Maybe while cleaning out Jack’s grandmother’s house they can stop fighting long enough to turn a one-night stand into a frenemies-with-benefits situation.
The house is an archaeological dig of love and dysfunction, and while Oscar thought he was prepared, he wasn’t. It’s impossible to delve so deeply into someone’s past without coming to understand them at least a little, but Oscar has boundaries for a reason—even if sometimes Jack makes him want to break them all down.
After all, hating Jack is less of a risk than loving him…
Dean Foster knows he’s a trans guy. He’s watched enough YouTube videos and done enough questioning to be sure. But everyone at his high school thinks he’s a lesbian—including his girlfriend Zoe, and his theater director, who just cast him as a “nontraditional” Romeo. He wonders if maybe it would be easier to wait until college to come out. But as he plays Romeo every day in rehearsals, Dean realizes he wants everyone to see him as he really is now––not just on the stage, but everywhere in his life. Dean knows what he needs to do. Can playing a role help Dean be his true self?
A group of right-wing Christians has put an initiative on the November ballot to allow health officials to force people with HIV into quarantine camps―and it looks like it’s going to pass. Rios, now living in LA, agrees to be counsel for a group of young activists who call themselves QUEER [Queers United to End Erasure and Repression]. QUEER claims to be committed to peaceful civil disobedience. But when one of its members is implicated in the bombing of an evangelical church that kills its pastor, who publicly supported the quarantine initiative, Rios finds himself with a client suddenly facing the death penalty.
At age nineteen, the queer narrator of Green Glass Ghosts steps off a bus in downtown Vancouver, a city where the faceless condo towers of the wealthy loom over the streets to the east where folks are just trying to get by, against the deceptively beautiful backdrop of snow-capped mountains and sparkling ocean. It’s the year 2000, and the world is still mostly analogue–pagers are the best way to get ahold of someone and resumes are printed out on paper and dropped off in person, and what’s this new fad called webmail?
Our hopeful hero arrives on the West Coast on the cusp of adulthood, fleeing a traumatic childhood in an unsafe family plagued by religious extremism, mental health crises, and abuse in a conservative town not known for accepting difference. They’re eager to build a new life among like-minded folks, and before they know it, they’ve got a job, an apartment, and a relationship, dancing, busking, and making out in bars, parks, art spaces, and apartments across the city. But their search for belonging and stability is buried in drinking, jealousy, and painful memories of the past, distracting the protagonist from their ultimate goal of playing live music and spurring them to an emotional crisis. If they can’t learn to care for themselves, how will they ever find true connection and community?
With haunting illustrations by Gem Hall that conjure the moody, misty urban landscape, Green Glass Ghosts is an evocation of that delicate, aching moment between youth and adulthood when we are trying, and often failing, to become the person we dream ourselves to be.
The sequel to Anna K, set over the course of the next summer, as the characters come to terms with Vronsky’s tragic death
How the mighty have fallen. Anna K, once the golden girl of Greenwich, CT, and New York City, has been brought low by a scandalous sex tape and the tragic death of her first love, Alexia Vronsky. At the beginning of the summer, her father takes her to the other side of the world, to connect with his family in South Korea and hide her away. Is Anna in exile? Or could this be her chance to figure out who she really is?
Back in the U.S., Lolly has forgiven Steven for cheating on her, and their relationship feels stronger than ever. But when Lolly meets a boy at her beloved theater camp, she has to ask herself how well Steven will ever really know her. Meanwhile, in Manhattan, everything between Kimmie and her new boyfriend, Dustin, is easy—except when it comes to finally having sex. And Bea escapes to LA, running away from her grief at her beloved cousin’s death, until a beautiful stranger steals her heart. Is Bea ready to finally forgive Anna, and let herself truly fall in love for the very first time?
Set over the course of one unforgettable summer, Jenny Lee’s Anna K Away is full of the risk, joy, heartbreak, and adventure that mark the three months between the end of one school year and the beginning of the next.
Note: As you may have noticed, a lot of pub dates are doing some last-minute changes due to the global pandemic. We’re doing our best to keep up with the moves but the photo collage was made far in advance and does not reflect the most up-to-date pub schedules. (It’s possible the post does not either, but it’s certainly a closer fit.)
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Bitty is heading to junior year of college and though he has overcome his fear of getting ‘checked’ on the ice, he and Jack now face new challenges. They must navigate their new relationship while being apart and also decide how they want to reveal their relationship to those around them. Not only that, but Jack and the Falconers are now a big part of the NHL—and Bitty’s life! It’s a hockey season filled with victories and losses.
A collection of the second half of the mega-popular webcomic series of the same name, Check, Please!: Sticks and Scones is the last in a hilarious and stirring two-volume coming-of-age story about hockey, bros, and trying to find yourself during the best four years of your life.
Before Quinn Ryan was in love with Jamie Rudawski, she loved Jamie Rudawski, who was her best friend. But when Jamie dumps Quinn a month before their senior year, Quinn is suddenly girlfriend-less and best friend-less.
Enter a new crush: Ruby Ocampo, the gorgeous and rich lead singer of the popular band Sweets, who’s just broken up with her on-again, off-again boyfriend. Quinn’s always only wanted to be with Jamie, but if Jamie no longer wants to be with her, why can’t Quinn go all in on her crush on Ruby? But the closer Quinn grows to Ruby, the more she misses Jamie, and the more (she thinks) Jamie misses her. Who says your first love can’t be your second love, too?
In this epic sequel to Once & Future, to save the future, Ari and her Rainbow knights pull off a heist…thousands of years in the past.
Ari Helix may have won her battle against the tyrannical Mercer corporation, but the larger war has just begun. Ari and her cursed wizard Merlin must travel back in time to the unenlightened Middle Ages and steal the King Arthur’s Grail—the very definition of impossible.
It’s imperative that the time travelers not skew the timeline and alter the course of history. Coming face-to-face with the original Arthurian legend could produce a ripple effect that changes everything. Somehow Merlin forgot that the past can be even more dangerous than the future…
A young pilot risks everything to save his best friend–the man he trusts most and might even love–only to learn that he’s secretly the heir to a brutal galactic empire.
Ettian Nassun’s life was shattered when the merciless Umber Empire invaded. He’s spent seven years putting himself back together under its rule, joining an Umber military academy and becoming the best pilot in his class. Even better, he’s met Gal Veres–his exasperating and infuriatingly enticing roommate who’s made the Academy feel like a new home.
But when dozens of classmates spring an assassination plot on Gal, a devastating secret comes to light: Gal is the heir to the Umber Empire. Ettian barely manages to save his best friend and flee the compromised Academy unscathed, rattled both that Gal stands to inherit the empire that broke him and that there are still people willing to fight back against Umber rule. As they piece together a way to deliver Gal safely to his throne, Ettian finds himself torn in half by an impossible choice. Does he save the man who’s won his heart and trust that Gal’s goodness could transform the empire? Or does he throw his lot in with the brewing rebellion and fight to take back what’s rightfully theirs?
After an assault, bigender seventeen-year-old Aleks/Alexis is looking for a fresh start―so they voluntarily move in with their uncle, a Catholic priest. In their new bedroom, Aleks/Alexis discovers they can overhear parishioners in the church confessional. Moved by the struggles of these “sinners,” Aleks/Alexis decides to anonymously help them, finding solace in their secret identity: a guardian angel instead of a victim.
But then Aleks/Alexis overhears a confession of another priest admitting to sexually abusing a parishioner. As they try to uncover the priest’s identity before he hurts anyone again, Aleks/Alexis is also forced to confront their own abuser and come to terms with their past trauma.
Indigo, the newest collection by Ellen Bass, merges elegy and praise poem in an exploration of life’s complex grey areas. Whether her subject is oysters, high heels, a pork chop, a beloved dog, or a wife’s return to health, Bass pulls us in with exquisite immediacy. Her lush and precisely observed descriptions allow us to feel the sheer primal pleasure of being alive in our own “succulent skin,” the pleasure of the gifts of hunger, desire, touch. In this book, joy meets regret, devotion meets dependence, and most importantly, the poet so in love with life and living begins to look for the point where the price of aging overwhelms the rewards of staying alive. Bass is relentless in her advocacy for the little pleasures all around her. Her gaze is both expansive and hyperfocused, celebrating (and eulogizing) each gift as it is given and taken, while also taking stock of the larger arc. She draws the lines between generations, both remembering her parents’ lives and deaths and watching her own children grow into the space that she will leave behind. Indigo shows us the beauty of this cycle, while also documenting the deeply human urge to resist change and hang on to the life we have, even as it attempts to slip away.
Nadya doesn’t trust her magic anymore. Serefin is fighting off a voice in his head that doesn’t belong to him. Malachiasz is at war with who–and what–he’s become.
As their group is continually torn apart, the girl, the prince, and the monster find their fates irrevocably intertwined. They’re pieces on a board, being orchestrated by someone… or something. The voices that Serefin hears in the darkness, the ones that Nadya believes are her gods, the ones that Malachiasz is desperate to meet—those voices want a stake in the world, and they refuse to stay quiet any longer.
In her dramatic follow-up to Wicked Saints, the first book in her Something Dark and Holy trilogy, Emily A. Duncan paints a Gothic, icy world where shadows whisper, and no one is who they seem, with a shocking ending that will leave you breathless.
A cocktail-spitting, norm-pinching dive into everyday queer life in the twenty-first century—a hilarious, moving memoir
Life’s a drag . . . Why not be a queen?
When you peel off the sequins and lashes, wipe away the lipstick and mascara, open your heart and your eyes—what does the life of a drag queen really look like? Crystal (and Tom) Rasmussen tell all in this outrageous, raunchy, moving, naked (in more ways than one) memoir about life on and off the stage.
Born into a loving working-class family in northern England, Crystal finds her way to London, to a coveted, soul-crushing job in New York fashion, and back again. Searching for good sex, good stories, and “the one,” she shags men of all kinds from all sorts of platforms, sells cider to tourists, and performs with her college drag band, DENIM. She learns about true love from her mum and falls in love with her best friend. Charting her day-to-day adventures over the course of a year, we encounter tucks, twists, and unfiltered sexy bits, heinous overspending, body shame and self-love, and endless nights sprinting from snag to snafu in a full face of makeup.
In these pages the previously unspeakable becomes the everyday and the celebrated, and Crystal makes sure we feel every single thing along the way. A full-hearted, full-throated, full-disclosure portrayal of the queer experience that makes you laugh and cry and wish for understanding, Diary of a Drag Queen is a dazzling, true performance of a real, flawed, extraordinary life.
Tattoo artist Jamie Winston is used to caring for others. Between her assistant manager position at a tattoo parlor, single-parenting her twelve-year-old daughter and supporting her alcoholic parents, Jamie rarely prioritizes her own needs—unless Sierra Clark is in her chair. The bubbly younger woman somehow manages to make Jamie feel like the carefree teenager she never got to be, making anything seem possible.
For Sierra, time with Jamie is a much-needed escape. She takes her work as a social worker seriously, but with budget cuts threatening her job, there’s a lot riding on the fund-raiser she’s planning with Jamie. The fact that it means working closely with the sexy older tattooist is a bonus—a deliciously tempting bonus. Sierra isn’t one for relationships, but she’s never felt such a strong desire to mix business with pleasure.
Sizzling chemistry quickly erodes Jamie’s fears of being too old for Sierra, but navigating a romance with someone who’s at such a different stage in life is no easy task. They’ve each come to rely on themselves more than anyone else, but having a future together will mean letting their guards down and accepting each other as a safe place to fall.
Tom Rastrelli is a survivor of clergy-perpetrated sexual abuse who then became a priest in the early days of the Catholic Church’s ongoing scandals. Confessions of a Gay Priest divulges the clandestine inner workings of the seminary, providing an intimate and unapologetic look into the psychosexual and spiritual dynamics of celibacy and lays bare the “formation” system that perpetuates the cycle of abuse and cover-up that continues today.
Under the guidance of a charismatic college campus minister, Rastrelli sought to reconcile his homosexuality and childhood sexual abuse. When he felt called to the priesthood, Rastrelli began the process of “priestly discernment.” Priests welcomed him into a confusing clerical culture where public displays of piety, celibacy, and homophobia masked a closeted underworld in which elder priests preyed upon young recruits.
From there he ventured deeper into the seminary system seeking healing, hoping to help others, and striving not to live a double life. Trained to treat sexuality like an addiction, he and his brother seminarians lived in a world of cliques, competition, self-loathing, alcohol, hidden crushes, and closeted sex. Ultimately, the “formation” intended to make Rastrelli a compliant priest helped to liberate him.
She’s never crashed a party, never stayed out too late. She’s never even been kissed. And it’s not just because she’s gay. It’s because she and her two best friends, Maritza and JaKory, spend more time in her basement watching Netflix than engaging with the outside world.
So when Maritza and JaKory suggest crashing a party, Codi is highly skeptical. Those parties aren’t for kids like them. They’re for cool kids. Straight kids.
But then Codi stumbles upon one of those cool kids, Ricky, kissing another boy in the dark, and an unexpected friendship is formed. In return for never talking about that kiss, Ricky takes Codi under his wing and draws her into a wild summer filled with late nights, new experiences, and one really cute girl named Lydia.
The only problem? Codi never tells Maritza or JaKory about any of it.
Rick’s never questioned much. He’s gone along with his best friend Jeff even when Jeff’s acted like a bully and a jerk. He’s let his father joke with him about which hot girls he might want to date even though that kind of talk always makes him uncomfortable. And he hasn’t given his own identity much thought, because everyone else around him seemed to have figured it out.
But now Rick’s gotten to middle school, and new doors are opening. One of them leads to the school’s Rainbow Spectrum club, where kids of many genders and identities congregate, including Melissa, the girl who sits in front of Rick in class and seems to have her life together. Rick wants his own life to be that … understood. Even if it means breaking some old friendships and making some new ones.
Jubilee has it all together. She’s an elite cellist, and when she’s not working in her stepmom’s indie comic shop, she’s prepping for the biggest audition of her life.
Ridley is barely holding it together. His parents own the biggest comic-store chain in the country, and Ridley can’t stop disappointing them–that is, when they’re even paying attention.
They meet one fateful night at a comic convention prom, and the two can’t help falling for each other. Too bad their parents are at each other’s throats every chance they get, making a relationship between them nearly impossible . . . unless they manage to keep it a secret.
Then again, the feud between their families may be the least of their problems. As Ridley’s anxiety spirals, Jubilee tries to help but finds her focus torn between her fast-approaching audition and their intensifying relationship. What if love can’t conquer all? What if each of them needs more than the other can give?
What does it mean to be non-binary in the 21st Century? Our gender identity is impacted by our personal histories; the cultures, communities and countries we are born into; and the places we go and the people we meet. But the representation of contemporary non-binary identities has been limited, until now. Pushing the narrative around non-binary identities further than ever before, this powerful collection of essays represents the breadth of non-binary lives, across the boundaries of race, class, age, sexuality, faith and more. Leading non-binary people share stories of their intersecting lives; how it feels to be non-binary and neurodiverse, the challenges of being a non-binary pregnant person, what it means to be non-binary within the Quaker community, the joy of reaching gender euphoria. This thought-provoking anthology shows that there is no right or wrong way to be non-binary.
Though the Beast is seemingly subdued for now, a new threat looms in Four Paths: a corruption seeping from the Gray into the forest. And with the other Founders preoccupied by their tangled alliances and fraying relationships, only May Hawthorne seems to realize the danger. But saving the town she loves means seeking aid from the person her family despises most–her and Justin’s father.
May’s father isn’t the only newcomer in town–Isaac Sullivan’s older brother has also returned, seeking forgiveness for the role he played in Isaac’s troubled past. But Isaac isn’t ready to let go of his family’s history, especially when that history might hold the key that he and Violet Saunders need to destroy the Gray and the monster within it.
Harper Carlisle isn’t ready to forgive, either. Two devastating betrayals have left her isolated from her family and uncertain who to trust. As the corruption becomes impossible to ignore, Harper must learn to control her newfound powers in order to protect Four Paths. But the only people who can help her do that are the ones who have hurt her the most.
With the veil between the Gray and the town growing ever thinner, all of the Founder descendants must put their grievances with one another aside to stop the corruption and kill the Beast once and for all.
But maybe the monster they truly need to slay has never been the Beast…
When university student Ludwik meets Janusz at a summer agricultural camp, he is fascinated yet wary of this handsome, carefree stranger. But a chance meeting by the river soon becomes an intense, exhilarating, and all-consuming affair. After their camp duties are fulfilled, the pair spend a dreamlike few weeks camping in the countryside, bonding over an illicit copy of James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room. Inhabiting a beautiful natural world removed from society and its constraints, Ludwik and Janusz fall deeply in love. But in their repressive communist and Catholic society, the passion they share is utterly unthinkable.
Once they return to Warsaw, the charismatic Janusz quickly rises in the political ranks of the party and is rewarded with a highly-coveted position in the ministry. Ludwik is drawn toward impulsive acts of protest, unable to ignore rising food prices and the stark economic disparity around them. Their secret love and personal and political differences slowly begin to tear them apart as both men struggle to survive in a regime on the brink of collapse.
In a series of personal essays, prominent journalist and LGBTQIA+ activist George M. Johnson explores his childhood, adolescence, and college years in New Jersey and Virginia. From the memories of getting his teeth kicked out by bullies at age five, to flea marketing with his loving grandmother, to his first sexual relationships, this young-adult memoir weaves together the trials and triumphs faced by Black queer boys.
Both a primer for teens eager to be allies as well as a reassuring testimony for young queer men of color, All Boys Aren’t Blue covers topics such as gender identity, toxic masculinity, brotherhood, family, structural marginalization, consent, and Black joy. Johnson’s emotionally frank style of writing will appeal directly to young adults.
Bunny Lampert is the princess of North Shore—beautiful, tall, blond, with a rich real-estate-developer father and a swimming pool in her backyard. Michael—with a ponytail down his back and a septum piercing—lives with his aunt in the cramped stucco cottage next door. When Bunny catches Michael smoking in her yard, he discovers that her life is not as perfect as it seems. At six foot three, Bunny towers over their classmates. Even as she dreams of standing out and competing in the Olympics, she is desperate to fit in, to seem normal, and to get a boyfriend, all while hiding her father’s escalating alcoholism. Michael has secrets of his own. At home and at school Michael pretends to be straight, but at night he tries to understand himself by meeting men online for anonymous encounters that both thrill and scare him. When Michael falls in love for the first time, a vicious strain of gossip circulates and a terrible, brutal act becomes the defining feature of both his and Bunny’s futures—and of their friendship.
Today on the site, we’ve got some extra fun in the form of character portrait and excerpt reveals from one of my absolute favorite upcoming releases, Late to the Party by Kelly Quindlen! The book releases on April 21 from Roaring Brook Press/Macmillan, but you can get to know its stars now! (And, a fun note: you can also come see me and Kelly talking about said book at Books of Wonder this summer in NYC on Thursday, June 18th at 6:00 p.m., so save the date!)
Here’s a little more info on Late to the Party:
Seventeen is nothing like Codi Teller imagined.
She’s never crashed a party, never stayed out too late. She’s never even been kissed. And it’s not just because she’s gay. It’s because she and her two best friends, Maritza and JaKory, spend more time in her basement watching Netflix than engaging with the outside world.
So when Maritza and JaKory suggest crashing a party, Codi is highly skeptical. Those parties aren’t for kids like them. They’re for cool kids. Straight kids.
But then Codi stumbles upon one of those cool kids, Ricky, kissing another boy in the dark, and an unexpected friendship is formed. In return for never talking about that kiss, Ricky takes Codi under his wing and draws her into a wild summer filled with late nights, new experiences, and one really cute girl named Lydia.
The only problem? Codi never tells Maritza or JaKory about any of it.
And here are the portraits and excerpts! All portraits in this post have been done by Rima Salloum, a good friend of the author’s.
Codi Teller – the protagonist and narrator, a quiet artist who is questioning her wallflower status
You know how adults are always talking about teenagers? When I was in fourth grade, my family drove past a house that had been rolled with toilet paper, and my dad shook his head and chuckled Teenagers under his breath. My mom griped about Teenagers every June, when dark figures hung over the monkey bars of the clubhouse playground long after closing hours, but she never actually seemed mad; she seemed wistful. And then there’s all those shows and movies, the ones where thirty-year-old actors pretend to be high schoolers, and they go on dates and drive their fast cars and dance at crazy house parties where their fellow Teenagers swing from chandeliers and barf into synthetic tree stands. You grow up with these ideas about Teenagers, about their wild, vibrant, dramatic lives of breaking rules and making out and Being Alive, and you know that it’s your destiny to become one of them someday, but suddenly you’re seventeen and you’re watching people cannonball into a swimming pool in the pouring rain, and you realize you still haven’t become a real Teenager, and maybe you never will.
Maritza Vargas – Codi’s best friend, a headstrong dancer who is determined to expand her social world
Maritza leaned forward, an urgent energy about her. “Listen to me,” she said. “Last night we picked up your little brother from a date, something none of us have ever experienced, and we watched him almost kiss a girl for the first time, something I’ve been wanting to do for ages. Didn’t that feel as shitty for you as it did for me? I’m tired of feeling like I’m missing out. We keep hanging out just the three of us, doing the same shit we always do, watching bad movies we’ve already seen . . .” She clasped her hands in front of her and steeled herself. “We need to try something different, meet people who are different. It’s like Einstein said: The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and hoping for a different result.”
JaKory Green – Codi’s other best friend, a hopeless idealist trying to push beyond his anxiety
“Did you feel horrible yesterday, too?” JaKory asked.
I looked up from the colors I was mixing. “The worst I’ve felt in a long time.”
JaKory was silent. Then he screwed up his mouth and said, “I went home and wrote a poem about it.”
I smiled wryly. “’Course you did.”
“There was one line I really liked. ‘My youth is infinite but my fears are intimate.’”
I mixed my orange and yellow paints. Such bursts of color, such vibrant promises, like the infinite youth JaKory spoke of. And yet those intimate fears loomed larger.
“I’m scared, too,” I admitted. “Scared of . . . I don’t even know what.”
“I’m so pissed at myself,” JaKory whispered. “I always knew I was different . . . black, nerdy, queer… but that’s not why I’m missing out. It’s because I’m standing in my own way.”
Ricky Flint – the closeted football player who takes Codi under his wing and introduces her to a new social group
After a while, we ended up along the river. Ricky parked with his truck facing the water, and we kicked our feet up on the dash, slurping the last of the ice cream from the bottoms of our cups.
“So what do you and Maritza and JaKory do when you hang out?” Ricky asked. “Is it anything like this?”
I told him. I kept checking his expression the whole time, worrying that I was boring him, but he had this open look on his face that made me feel like he cared what I had to say. When I’d said enough, I asked him, “What about your friends? What’s your favorite thing about them?”
He looked out over the river. A whole minute must have passed, but he didn’t seem pressed to come up with the answer right away. Finally, he started nodding to himself and said, “That I feel like I could have met them in kindergarten.”
“What do you mean?”
“I didn’t meet most of my friends until high school, but every single one of them is someone I could have met on the kindergarten playground—it’s natural and easy, nothing held against each other. Remember how easy it was to make friends at that age?”
Lydia Kaufman – Codi’s crush who is trying to be brave during her last summer before college
She bit her lip, a secret grin on her face. “What’s your favorite color?”
I laughed unexpectedly. “That’s what you want to follow up with?”
“Yes.”
I smiled, my hands in my lap now, all thought of the painting abandoned. “It changes all the time. Right now it’s violet.”
“I love that.”
“What’s yours?”
“Green,” she said right away.
I nodded, unsurprised. “Like your eyes.”
She laughed. “Not for that reason.”
“Why?”
“The first house my family lived in was green. Like a pastel shade, you know? And anytime a friend’s mom would drop me off, we’d turn on my street and I’d say, ‘My house is the green one.’ I didn’t know how to count the mailbox numbers but I knew my house was green, and I loved it.”
My heart expanded inside me. In that moment I felt like it was okay to be exactly who I was, because she was being exactly who she was, and that must have meant something. I absorbed it all: her eyes, her secrets, her space in the world.
The only thing I managed to say was, “I like knowing that.”
“I like knowing that you know it.”
***
Kelly Quindlen is the author of the young adult novels Late to the Party and Her Name in the Sky. A graduate of Vanderbilt University and a former teacher, Kelly has had the joy of speaking to PFLAG groups and high school GSAs. She currently serves on the leadership board of a non-profit for Catholic parents with LGBT children. She lives in Atlanta. Follow her on Twitter @kellyquindlen.
There’s a New Queer Year upon us, and so much goodness within it can hardly be contained in a single post! Below are 72 (!) new US and UK YA titles releasing in the next six months, filled with representation across genres and genders, races and orientations.
If you’re looking for trends and landmarks, as I always do, you might notice the continued rise of queer (and especially Sapphic) YA fantasy, or the record-setting number of trans guy protags, or the first traditionally published bigender and demiboy MCs in YA. You might notice that a significant number of these books are set outside the US (yes, even the ones publishing there), and that you know some of these authors names quite well but have never seen them write queer YA before. You might notice that these covers are particularly phenomenal, so a huge shoutout to everyone responsible for them. (You can find info on a bunch of them here.)
(You also might notice that this post was a ton of work, so please do avail yourself of those affiliate links for Amazon and especially IndieBound and preorder yourself some goodness while also helping financially support the site!)
Moving on from her m/m fantasy series with a bang, Sim tackles a retelling of The Count of Monte Cristowith a literal vengeance, alternating between the points of view of Amaya, who’s been in servitude on a debtors’ ship for way too long, and Cayo, who’s in a similarly precarious though far more privileged situation, especially when someone he cares about is harmed. When she finds an opportunity for revenge and he falls into her crosshairs, sparks fly in all the ways, which is perhaps inconveniently timed for all the betrayal going on around them. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Relationship breakups may be heavily covered in YA, but friendship breakup stories are still few and far between. Enter the story of James and Kat, two girls who were once beyond close and now watch their friendship unravel as college nears. Things are complicated for both girls: James’s mother has left her and her father for another guy, and she doesn’t know how to talk about it, not even to Kat or her still-too-present ex, Logan. Kat’s discovering that her feelings for her new friend Quinn aren’t strictly “friendly,” and in fact, she’s realizing she’s bisexual and falling head over heels for a girl. It’s a bittersweet story to be sure, and while it definitely has its fun scenes, close moments, painful familial interactions, and tingly romance (what Spalding book doesn’t??), you’ll spend much of the book wishing you could push the characters together and say “Justtalkalready”…but isn’t that exactly how life goes? (Amz|B&N|IB)
If you’re a fan of queer YA, it’s a pretty safe bet you’re familiar with this particular pioneer of it, which will make this short story collection all the sweeter. Want to revisit “A” of the Every Day series? How about the characters of Two Boys Kissing? Or would you rather meet some new romantics entirely? Perhaps some non-fiction? Maybe even verse? This book inspired by Levithan’s tradition of his writing his friends a story each Valentine’s Day has got a little something for everybody, whether or not you’ll find a paper heart on your desk come February 14. (Amz|B&N|IB)
The author who brought you lesbians surviving a bloody apocalypse is back with a main character named Amelia who’s questioning a whole lot more than her sexuality (though there is that too); when she wakes up in the hospital in recovery from a fall, she doesn’t remember a thing…except that she was pushed, no matter how hard everyone else tries to deny it. The only person she can trust to help her find the truth is her new boyfriend, Liam, but maybe she doesn’t want the truth…or maybe trying to find it will be the last thing she ever does. (Amz|B&N|IB)
This newest McLemore title will make their fourth queer book in four years, and I think I can safely speak on behalf of the entire queer community when I say we are emphatically lucky for it. (And that there’s no sign of them letting up, either, with at least two more queer books slated for the next couple of years.) While McLemore generally writes with a sort of timelessness, this romantic and magical dual-timeline narrative is half set in 1518 Strasbourg, inspired by the dancing plague, where it stars a Romani cis girl in love with a trans boy, and half set in modern day, where centuries later, dancing fever threatens to return to Rosella Oliva, who happens to have the affectionate of attention of Emil, descendant of that same Romani family and the only one who might know how to help her. (Amz|B&N|IB)
That’s right, your contemporary (and so lightly speculative it’s basically contemporary) fave is diving headfirst into magical fantasy with his fifth book, and while it’s definitely a departure, there’s plenty you’ll recognize, including characters from the Bronx, diverse racial representation, and, of course, queer main characters. And yes, that’s an intentional plural! There are four points of view in this series opener: brothers Emil (who’s gay) and Brighton, who are obsessed with the powerful Spell Walkers and anxiously awaiting the discovery of whether or not they’ll be among them when their eighteenth birthday hits; Maribelle, who’s already a super well-known Spell Walker, and Ness, who’s…complicated. (And bisexual, as is Maribelle.) The Spell Walkers aren’t the only magical game in town, though, and having to watch their backs from the magic-siphoning Specters is getting both tiring and violent. When one of the twins’ (and only one’s) powers manifest during a fight, it rocks their world, especially when it turns out his powers are greater than anyone could’ve imagined, and it’s about to land them both in an all-out war. (Amz|B&N|IB)
If you dig SFF with a heavy dose of shenanigans, England is your author. Here they’re jumping from sci-fi over to fantasy but maintaining the zany, troublesome cast, led by Diz, who, together with her three best friends, make their cash the less-than-legal way by siphoning highly illegal maz, aka magic, which used to be free to all but has now gone the way of the drug trade. When they uncover an explosive new strain, it’s up to Diz and her gang to dig into the conspiracy behind it and save the world as they know it. Is there also a little time for kissing with one of those friends, nonbinary spellweaver Remi? There might be. Theeeeeere might be. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Finally, ’tis the year for trans guy main characters, and Canada’s kicking us off with this intense contemporary thriller about a grieving trans boy named Jason who’s out to prove his sister’s death was no accident. When a clue leads him to a boxing gym, Jason finds not just a mystery but a pastime he actually enjoys, especially given he’s got plenty of experience fighting. But balancing his (actually pretty wonderfully affirming) new friendships with his deadly quest might be more than he can handle. This is a hi-lo title, meaning it’s specifically designed for “high-interest, low-reading level” book lovers, and it definitely delivers when it comes to pacing, action, mystery, and representation. (Amz|B&N|IB)
This f/f YA horror set in 17th century Hungary recounts the story of a scullery maid working for Countess Elizabeth Báthory, which is just about the most awesome damn thing I’ve ever heard. (I am here for allll the horrifying and bloody Sapphic villains, to be clear.) But Anna doesn’t stay a scullery maid for long, because when Elizabeth takes a shine to her, she promotes her to chambermaid and keeps her, uh, pretty close. Close enough that Anna is drifting completely away from her old life to be absorbed into the countess’s, until she realizes she’s nothing more than a prisoner. And there’s nothing to keep a prisoner safe from becoming a serial killer’s next victim. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Fresh off one of my favorite YA fantasy duologies of all time, queer or otherwise (though it is most definitely queer), Miller is back with another magic-filled fantasy with a dual-POV, one of which belongs to a biromantic ace girl named Annette who comes from humble beginnings but gets a chance to shed them and pursue her love of the Midnight Arts when our other heroine, the aristocratic Emilie, begs her to do an identity swap so she can run off to become one of the few female students of medicine. (And might there be an attractive, charming, and intelligent trans guy at that school? There might.) As the land around them tilts toward revolution, both Emilie and Annette will have to figure out their places and how to work together to bring peace and justice. (Amz|B&N|IB)
This is a lovely and bighearted debut chock full of space nerdery, big dreams, new beginnings, and social media scandal. Cal’s life is completely uprooted when his dad shocks them all by being chosen for a space mission, something his family had never taken seriously as a lifelong dream. Worst of all, he’s forbidden from documenting life in the new compound, forcing him to leave his massive social media following behind. On the bright side, there’s Leon, son of another astronaut on the program and immediate thief of Cal’s heart. But when things go awry in the program and secrets are revealed, Cal will have to decide exactly what he’s willing to do to get the truth out there, and who he’s willing to lose. (Amz|B&N|IB)
The post-apocalyptic zombie-filled UK YA debut stars Peter, a resident of a community called Wranglestone that’s survived thus far by living in a national park surrounded by water that serves as a barrier to the Dead. But when winter comes and the water ices over, the water can no longer save them…and Peter puts them all in grave danger by bringing in a stranger. Now he’s been exiled, and all he can do is help Cooper, the rancher he’s been crushing on forever, herd the dead before the lake completely ices over. But as the two work together and fall for each other, they uncover a dark secret that’ll change everything. (The Book Depository)
Celia and Anna are “inklings,” Profeta devotees who use magic to tattoo flowers that represent the will of the Divine and steer the inked to action. Once upon a time they believed like everyone else that it was a noble calling, but now they know the truth: that their marks strip away free will and the temple is actually a prison. When they finally get a chance to escape, it seems like a bright future is ahead…until the very deity they sought to escape comes a-calling. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Janelle “Ellie” Baker is a Black demisexual girl living in a center in NYC controlled by the Ilori, aliens who invaded Earth two years earlier and who keep all humans in fear of death by punishing emotional transgressions by death. All manners of art are illegal, but Ellie flouts the rules with a secret library…a library from which a book disappears, putting her life on the line. In fact, lab-born M0Rr1S is sent to bring her to her death, but he has his own “moral failing”: he’s obsessed with human music. Together, they bond over their love of the forbidden arts and embark on a dangerous road trip, armed with books and music, toward a destination thousands of miles away that may be their only hope for salvation. (Amz|B&N|IB)
The Inn at Havenfall has protected refugees for generations, with one major rule: if you disrupt the peace, you are never to come back. Maddie loves it at the inn, where her uncle serves at innkeeper, as she will too someday; it’s an escape from her traumatic family, the place where she fell in love with soldier boy Brekken, and her future. But then the peace is completely shattered by a murder, and now her uncle is injured, Brekken is missing, and Maddie is in charge, which means she’s the one who has to learn the truth of what’s happened…together with Taya, a new staff member at the inn who’s both way too compelling and knows too much. (Amz|B&N|IB)
The Winner’s Curse happens to be my favorite YA fantasy series, so I am especially thrilled to see Rutkoski return with a new one that’s f/f! It stars Nirrim, who lives in a shady society with strict rules for all but those of high status; someone like Nirrim isn’t allowed to enjoy so much as a cupcake. Then she meets Sid, a charming traveler who encourages her to seek out the same magic the High Caste enjoys. It’ll mean giving up her old life, and on the suggestion of someone who probably can’t be trusted. But both the head and heart want what they want… (Amz|B&N|IB)
Greasegoes gay YA in this rom-com about two boys whose dreamy summer fling comes crashing into a harsh reality when our lead, Oliver, transfers to Will’s school thanks to a family crisis-driven move, only to find out Will isn’t Out and isn’t about to be. As Ollie finds his own ways to settle in, he can’t seem to shake Will’s presence. But whether there’s a future for them remains to be seen. This sophomore novel is warmly delightful and delightfully warm, with some tears on the side for the aforementioned family crisis, and some hard-earned queer solidarity is the icing on the cake. (Amz|B&N|IB)
2019 and 2020 are truly the years of the Sapphic YA witches, and we are here for every single one. Latimer’s debut utilizes ancient Celtic mythology in its story of Dayna, a girl with somatic OCD who’s just been outed as bi in her conservative Irish town and seen her long-lost mom return. But the only things she really wants to focus on is that she about to finally become a full witch, at least until another coven comes to town and gets in her way. Worst of all is the granddaughter of the coven’s leader, Meiner King, who’s charming, maddening, and Dayna’s only hope at helping her find a serial killer who’s returned to targeting witches. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Ekata lives in perpetual danger, but when her brother is named heir to the dukedom of Kylma Above, she’ll finally be able to leave her deadly family for good, even if it means leaving behind everything else she loves. Then her entire family falls under a mysterious sleeping sickness, and Ekata alone is left to be duke and to find a cure. At least it comes with one perk: she also gets her brother’s warrior bride, which will have to make up for the fact that the rest of her life is now filled with diplomacy, war, power, war, and magic she’s never wanted and will now have to learn to use to her advantage if she’s going to survive. (Amz|B&N|IB)
What do you do when you’re conquering the hell out of adult SFF? If you’re Gailey, who barely seems to need to breathe before authoring another critically acclaimed novel of awesomeness, you come to the place the real magic happens: YA! Their debut young adult novel brings together a group of magical girls who accidentally kill a boy on prom night and have to work together to fix it. Unfortunately, it’s not going so well, and it makes things a little more complicated each time they fail, which sucks since things were already a little complicated what with Alexis being in love with her best friend and all. Yikes all around? Yikes all around. (Amz|B&N|IB)
This bi YA may not be new to the UK, but it’s newly jumping over the pond to the US this year, and I am very grateful for that! It stars sixteen-year-old Vetty, who’s kept things pretty close to the vest since her mom died and her family relocated. But now, four years later, they’re moving back to their old neighborhood, and that means Vetty just might start to get her life back. Item one on the agenda? Reconnecting with Pez, her childhood best friend. But Pez has changed a lot in the last four years, and it isn’t easy to find who he was beneath who he’s become. It is, unfortunately, easy to fall for March, who happens to be Pez’s girlfriend. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Speaking of UK YA by authors who’ve crossed into the US (though not with this title yet, so hint hint, American publishers!), Steven’s first queer YA is a bi rom-com about a physics genius named Caro who’s crushing it at school but not so much at romance. Then she figures out how to use her academic skills to help her love life, and finds herself in a new sort of mess: juggling her new relationship with her longtime crush (and whether or not the feelings are real) with the fact that she’s suddenly into her female best friend. How much is the experiment and how much is her heart? Can’t wait to find out! (The Book Depository)
Claire is a superhero fangirl, a card-carrying member of Warrior Nation. And when she finds an unexpected way (with some unexpected help) into winning an internship with the Chicago WarNat branch, it should be everything she’s ever dreamed of. But that unexpected help is proving very difficult to work with; it’s in the form of Girl Power (aka Joy), the newest hero and a pain in Claire’s butt. A very, very cute pain in Claire’s butt. But distraction or no distraction, Claire’s determined to prove herself, especially when she and Bridgette, a WarNat, who’s tired of being “the girlfriend” to an even more famous hero, decides to mentor her and they end up having to be exactly the heroes Chicago needs. (Amz|B&N|IB)
The cover of Sproul’s historical (Yep, 1999 counts as that now) debut may be dreamy, but having a crush on your best friend? Is kind of a nightmare. Such is the situation for Taylor, who’s queen of her high school both literally and figuratively, but isn’t interested in settling for a cozy life of 2.5 kids and a dental hygienist job with a homecoming king. The time has come for Taylor to move the hell on from her school, her town, her boyfriend, and Susan…but how? (Amz| B&N|IB)
Lulu may be a bit of a social media celebrity, but That Video wasn’t meant for public consumption, and it certainly wasn’t meant for her boyfriend to see. But anyway, it’s all happened and then suddenly there’s Cass, a girl who doesn’t care about Lulu’s online fame, or about online fame at all. She only cares about getting to know Lulu at The Hotel, and Old Hollywood-style spot that’s become Lulu’s dream getaway from it all. But can she really get out of the spotlight, or is she doomed to become a social media cautionary tale? What will it take for Lulu to get her own life back? (Amz|B&N|IB)
One of my favorite things about how much queer YA we get these years is that we’re finally allowed to have the messy stuff, the representation that isn’t the neatest and most pristine and clear cut and dare I say the whitest? In no 2020 YA that I’ve read is this more evident than in Kanakia’s sophomore, about a boy named Nandan who surprises everyone, including himself, by hooking up with new boy Dave. But what starts with him being pretty chill about this development starts to increase his anxiety about what it means that he’s now with a guy. Is he bisexual? Is he in it to be more interesting? Is he always going to be “different” now, even more than before? So many questions and no great answers, but exploring the complexity of it all is the beauty of this book. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Talley is one of queer YA’s most prolific genre jumpers, but she seems to be making herself beautifully at home in historical with this follow-up to 2018’s Pulp, again set amid a context of vital queer American history. This time around, it’s 1977, and Tammy Larson would love more than anything to come out of the closet as a lesbian, but that’s a major no-go where she lives. Her only outlet is to write “letters” to the activist Harvey Milk, at least until she’s matched with a pen pal to whom she can write letters for real. Sharon makes for a much better companion than Tammy’s diary, and she can sympathize, given her brother is gay and feeling all the same misery in the wake of Anita Bryant’s leading to a successful repeal of their protections. Together they’ll find their own brand of activism and learn to fight back against a world of hate. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Oseman’s crossed the pond before with Radio Silence, so this American’s fingers are crossed she’ll do it again with her newest, about a girl named Georgia who’s struggling with the fact that she’s eighteen and has never had so much as a crush. She’s sick of people thinking she’s broken or weird, and it isn’t like she isn’t into romance; she’s just not into it for herself. When she gets to university, she thinks maybe she can “fix” things with her roommate’s help. But what if it turns out there’s nothing to fix, and Georgia’s great and perfectly capable of happiness just as she is? (The Book Depository)
This f/f standalone fantasy stars Lia, a teenage queen, and Xania, the spymaster she brings in who, unbeknownst to her, actually agrees to the job as part of a plot to avenge her father and figure out who killed him. It’s a tricky situation full of secrets, treason, betrayal, and, oh yes, romance. At present it’s publishing strictly in Ireland, but thankfully, we have ways of getting our hands on it anyway because seriously, who could pass up an f/f queen/spymaster romance?? Not I, said the person who preordered this book while writing this blurb! Not I. (The Book Depository)
You know we’ve gotta sound the airhorn whenever a First for traditionally published queer lit is involved, so step up and take note of its first on-page bigender main character! That character is Aleks/Alexis, who gets a fresh start by moving in with their uncle, who happens to be a priest. But their new home provides something they definitely didn’t anticipate: an earful of confessionals, which inspires them to want to help these “sinners.” But all the enjoyment of finding a goodwill mission crumbles when they overhear a confession that rocks them to their bones and brings back the very trauma they’re escaping, trauma they’ll have no choice but to face now. (Want a sneak peek? Click here for the entire first chapter!) (Amz|B&N|IB|Lerner)
Breaking up is hard to do, but breaking up with your best friend is even harder, and when your school’s got slim pickins in terms of out queer kids? Well. Let’s just say Quinn is not taking it all that great, especially when she suspects Jamie might be recovering much faster than she is. But when sexy, heretofore-thought-unattainable Ruby Ocampo suddenly comes back on the market and turns out to be bi, it looks like Quinn might just get her second chance at happiness. But what if that second chance is happening with the wrong person? This YA debut is sweet, funny, and heartbreaking in all the right places. (Amz|B&N|IB)
When this was originally published in the UK in early 2019, it sounded so good I begged to know when it was coming over. Turns out I got both my answer and my confirmation that yes, this is an A+ queer thriller. It stars a girl named Sydney who’s not just grieving the death of her dad, but investigating it; it seems impossible he just went off the road like that, and the creepy texts she’s been getting since his funeral seem to confirm that. Another mystery? Why June, the most popular girl in school, with the most perfect relationship, seems to be one of her dad’s top mourners. That’s a mystery more easily solved when she reveals she was one of Sydney’s dads psychological patients, but why she’s still hanging around Sydney? That’s another story. (B&N|IB)
Think The Never Tilting World by Rin Chupeco meets The Good Luck Girls by Charlotte Nicole Davis plus a little John Steinbeck (yeah, I said what I said) and you’ll have something like this fantasy about an experimental town in mid-20th-century Oklahoma led by a witch and created at the whim of the goddesses. Our (seemingly unwitting?) Sapphic, Sal, has been the town outcast ever since she predicted a rain that never came, but she’s making up for it now that she’s been chosen at the successor to Mother Morevna, the witch who runs the entirety of Elysium and makes all its rules. Of course, the job isn’t all what she imagined, and the arrival of Asa, a demon disguised as a human who has his own wild powers, just makes things even more confusing. When Sal and Asa screw up and find themselves exiled into the Desert, they’ll have to join up with a girl gang led by a fellow exile and do whatever they can to halt the inevitable apocalypse. (Amz|B&N|IB)
To traditional publishing, Quindlen is a debut, but those of us who’ve been following queer-girl YA for a while know she’s behind one of its biggest indie titles, the Catholic Louisiana-set best friends-to-lovers romanceHer Name in the Sky. Whether you knew her before or not, though, you’re definitely gonna wanna get on board for this deeply felt and highly relatable one about a girl trying to find her way forward out of late-bloomerdom and into happiness. Codi’s never been kissed, which doesn’t put hertoofar behind her best friends Maritza and JaKory, but far enough that despite all of them being late bloomers, she’s the one they both seem to agree is hopeless. So when she stumbles into a new social circle, one in which she’s valued and no one knows her as a dork, she decides to keep it all for herself, even if it means not telling her best friends she’s falling in love. But Codi doesn’twantto abandon them, so what’s she supposed to now that she’s been lying for weeks? Is there a way to have everything she wants with just the right amount of who she used to be? (Amz|B&N|IB)
Dugan debuted with one of my absolute favorite queer YA rom-coms (seriously, if you haven’t yet read Hot Dog Girl, do yourself a favor), so I’m thrilled to see her returning with another one, this one an m/f pairing where both halves of the couple are bi (or, more accurately, one is bi and one is still figuring it out). Juliette is an elite cellist with a major audition coming up and a side job working at her stepmom’s indie comic shop. Ridley works at his parents’ comic shop too, only theirs is a big chain, and no friend to the little guy. Which makes it a little difficult when the two meet at a comic-con prom and immediately hit it off, despite their family feud. I’ll take Romeo & Juliet with a much happier ending and heaps of bisexuality any day, wouldn’t you? (Amz|B&N |IB)
The one non-fiction entry on this list is a memoir-manifesto by noted queer Black activist and journalist George M. Johnson, about his life from childhood through college in New Jersey and Virginia, including bullying, sexual relationships, and other ups and downs. Intended to serve as “a primer for teens eager to be allies as well as a reassuring testimony for young queer men of color,” clearly this is a book that is not to be missed. (Amz|B&N|IB)
One of the things I’m often asked to recommend is books that feature mlm and wlw solidarity, and I especially love giving answers that show it not just in characters but in authorship. Here, two Canadian rock stars of queer YA come together with a story about cousins named Mark and Talia who are reunited from their respective Canadian coasts after a death in the family and decide to take a road trip together to Toronto so Talia can see her non-binary partner and Mark can get to Pride. The two don’t have much in common, and they’ll have to let Mark’s little sister tag along, but they both know some kind of magic awaits them in TO, and they can’t wait to get there. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Whether you’re a fan of queer pirate novels, queer witch novels, or just dreamy, adventurous romance, this just might be the book of your dreams. Flora knows the only way to get by on the pirate ship she calls home is to be the merciless Florian to everybody else, but when she’s charged with guarding a beautiful passenger on a voyage that will see all its ticket holders turned into hostages, she hits her limit. There’s no way she can destroy Evelyn’s life like this, which means the two have no choice but to escape and find a notorious witch who might be able to help them. But the witch has plots of her own, and no one is safe in this tremendous journey of the unexpected. This is one of the most breathlessly romantic and adventurous queer fantasies I’ve ever read, and also one of the best explorations of gender fluidity I’ve read in YA. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Klune’s doing double duty this year (or maybe even more? Damn, it’s hard to keep up), following up an adult contemporary fantasy with his first entry into YA, about a boy named Nick who happens to be the Extraordinaries fandom’s most popular fanfic writer, and who aims to be even more extraordinary when he meets the hero he’s been crushing on. (But maybe he’s in love with his best friend, Seth? It’s complicated. It’s always complicated.) (Amz|B&N|IB)
I swear Kat Dunn must’ve been reading my dream journal to come up with an f/f fantasy set during the French Revolution. It stars Camille, the daughter of a revolutionary who’s a rebel in her own right, leading a group of misfits under the banner of the Battalion des Morte. But when they save a girl who isn’t the aristocrat-in-hiding she seemed to be, they all have questions: what is up with her dangerous powers and why are people on both sides of the revolution hunting her? (The Book Depository)
Allen’s been a personal favorite of mine since her subversive feminist debut, 17 First Kisses, and I’m thrilled to see her releasing her first queer YA, which basically looks like a gay Traveling Pants except not all the girls actually wanna be spending the summer together at the lake house where their moms became besties. Most of them can’t even stand their moms right now. All of them have secrets. And two of them…well, two of them are in love with each other, so one way or another it’s gonna be a hell of a summer. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Callender is having a monster of a publication year, having released both an adult fantasy (Queen of the Conquered) and a queer Middle Grade contemporary (King and the Dragonflies) in the last six months. Now they’re capping it off with this extraordinary trans YA about a boy (usually, which is another part of the story, and one that I will happily spoil results in trad-pubbed YA having it’s first on-page demiboy) named Felix who’s hell-bent on getting revenge against a transphobe at school, only to find the person he assumed was the culprit might actually be the exact person he needed in his life. (Amz|B&N|IB)
You may have already heard me talking about this sophomore novel by the author of Girls Made of Snow and Glass as maybe my new favorite f/f YA fantasy, and if not, lemme tell you right now, if you haven’t heard me say it before, you’re gonna wanna hear it now: do not miss this Persian mythology-inspired book. It stars a girl named Soraya who’s been cursed from birth to poison anyone she touches, and who finally emerges into the public on the day of her brother’s wedding, setting off a chain of events that have her finding love, acceptance, and power in the most unexpected of places. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Eliopulos has brought you some of your queer faves as an editor, but thrillingly, this is his first time bringing the rainbow goodness on the author side of the desk. Sam and his best friends, James and Delia, live in a small Georgia town where magic is frowned upon, but their school provides a respite in the form of a magic club. Then Sam realizes he might be in love with James, Delia’s getting tired of the club, and James has accidentally screwed them all over by getting involved with some shady magickers over the summer. So much for a great senior year… (Amz|B&N|IB)
It’s New Year’s Eve, 1929 at the Cloak & Dagger in the French Quarter, and Millie’s serving as the speakeasy’s MC while her best friend, Marion, aka “The Boy in the Red Dress,” stars in the show. Then a fancy stranger sashays in with a mouth full of questions a photo of a boy who happens to look just like Marion. When she’s found dead in the back alley, Marion becomes the prime suspect, which Millie will not let stand. While she pursues proof that her best friend is innocent, she’s also got two other attractive distractions: waitress Olive and bootlegger Bennie, the latter of whom promises to help her on her quest. Can she find who’s framing Marion before time runs out for them both? (Amz|B&N|IB)
Sideways is a misfit lesbian witch, which sounds awesome to you and me but less so to the West High social food chain. At least until three of its most popular girls pay her cash to cast a spell at their Halloween party, luring her into their clique and forming a coven. She never expected to become best friends with these girls, but they’ll all have to learn to count on each other if they’re going to save themselves from fundamentalist witch hunters! (And yes, this is the first in a trilogy!) (Amz|B&N|IB)
Okay, so get this: Enemies-to-lovers. With rival henna businesses. Set in Ireland. And both protags are WoC. (I KNOW.) Our heroine, Nishat, is a Bengali lesbian who’s maybe not quite as artistically talented as our love interest, the gifted and new-to-school Afro-Brazilian Flávia, with whom Nishat reunites at a Desi wedding after going to school together as kids. The girls have instant chemistry, but they also have a pretty instant problem, as Flávia not only creates a competing henna business for their class project, but sees no problem with having appropriated a cultural custom of Nishat’s to do it. (Not to mention that her partner is the school’s most notorious racist.) So now Nishat’s gotta contend with Feelings she really doesn’t wanna have, competition with a business that shouldn’t even exist, the fact that her coming out to her family didn’t go so well…but wait, there’s more! Is there possibly a happily ever after to be found amid all the drama? (Amz|B&N|IB)
If this book looks like the cutest, fluffiest, most make-you-melt kind of romance, it’s because it is…at least in the little romantic bubble that ensued when when Kai took advantage of a dare that requires Bryson Keller to agree to date the first person to ask him out every Monday morning for that week. But outside the bubble, the world is still wondering who Bryson Keller’s mystery girlfriend is, the one person not to shout from the rooftops that she’s got the guy. And Kai isn’t gonna be the one to tell them it isn’t a girl at all; his spontaneous request made Bryson the first and only person he’s ever come out to. But when both the answer and Kai himself are forcibly outed, he and the boy he’s come to fall for, the boy who’s only just realized he himself is gay, will have to band together and put their relationship through the ultimate test. (Amz|B&N|IB)
This post-apocalyptic debut set in the aftermath of a modern-day plague has trans, intersex, bisexual seventeen-year-old Pip taking fellow survivor twelve-year-old Iris under her wing. Together, the two are forced to flee Spokane to avoid slave traders, gangs, and all manners of violence, but they do find a third member of their new found family in a brave older girl named Fly. Now they must all work together to survive in their terrifying new reality. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Fresh out of UK YA’s 2019 lineup, this coming-of-age novel-in verse tells the story of a mixed-race (half Jamaican, half Greek Cypriot) gay kid named Michael who’s struggling to balance his identities and being different from other kids while growing up in London. It isn’t until he heads off to university that he finally finds his identity and style as a drag artist named The Black Flamingo. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Rosen already has one of my favorite queer YAs of all time with Jack of Hearts, but he managed to deliver another one packed with heart and important conversations in this wonderful love letter to queer spaces. When Randy returns to Camp Outland as Del in the hopes of finally landing The Guy (who happens to be an athlete, and who would never be caught dead with nail polish on his fingers), he’s convinced that if he can just land Hudson, the object of his long-time affection will fall in love with not just who he’s pretending to be that summer, but who he really is. It…goes about as well as you’d expect! But it also sets up an important exploration of masc4masc culture and what it means to change yourself for someone else. (Amz|B&N|IB)
The subtitle of this follow up to theAll Outanthology is “Queer We Go Again,” and if that’s not the best thing you’ve ever heard than we are very different people. This time around, the collection is going contemporary, with voices like Julian Winters (How to Be Remy Cameron), Katherine Locke (The Spy With the Red Balloon), CB Lee (Not Your Sidekick), Candice Montgomery (By Any Means Necessary), Caleb Roehrig (Death Prefers Blondes), Mark Oshiro (Anger is a Gift), and more taking a variety of genres set in the here and now and with one major thing in common: every main character is queer and/or trans. (Amz|B&N|IB)
This coming-of-age debut stars a trans boy named Pony who’s keeping his transness under wraps in his new school, exhausted with how much attention it garnered at his old one. Still, it’s hard not to stay on his guard, especially when he meets Georgia, a gorgeous cheerleader who’s ready to put her “keep a low profile” plans on hold when sparks fly with the new boy. The chemistry between them is utterly adorable, and Pony knows he can’t enter a physical relationship without telling her. He’ll have to decide whether she’s worth the risk, and whether his heart can take it if she isn’t. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Mashing romance with the unexpected is kinda Dietrich’s thing, for those who haven’t read The Love Interest, and here it’s romance and thriller that are going head to head. What happens when the son of a mobster and the son of a police commissioner realize they’ve got a thing for each other? Probably nothing neat and easy, but that’s the problem facing Matt and Jason, even if they don’t know it yet. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Sign me the hell up for literally every enemies-to-lovers f/f rom-com, but especially this one, where the girls who hate each other at Alabama’s Conservatory for the Arts have no idea they’re falling for each other online as they collaborate on a graphic novel for a fanfic site under their online identities. That’s…everything I love in book? Yep, pretty much! (Amz|B&N|IB)
Ami’s been living in seclusion her whole life at Heavenly Shepherd, her family’s survival compound. And it’s been fine, and even lucky, or so she thought. But then her grandfather arranges a marriage for her, and Ami realizes she’s not ready to live out her “destiny” to procreate, even if she’s one of the last few at the compound who can. And so she escapes on a search for her long-lost mother, and meets people her age for the very first time, including a girl she hadn’t even known she was capable of wanting. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Dylan and Ellis’s relationship is a secret, or at least it was until it was exposed online. Now Dylan’s been forced out, but is pleased to find the reception to his news is surprisingly positive. Wasn’t it? Because something has to explain why Ellis’s personality has suddenly changed, and why he lost control of the car. Something has to explain why Dylan lost Ellis to the lake that night. And as he mourns the loss of the boy he loved, Dylan is determined to figure out what it was, no matter how much it hurts. (The Book Depository)
Sapphic witches meets enemies-to-lovers in this bi f/f YA fairy tale about a girl named Lina who gives herself up to the queen in order to save the boy she loves from Caldella’s annual custom of sacrificing a boy to the full moon to save the city from the deadly tide. Queen Eva gladly accepts Lina’s sacrifice; as long as someone dies and the city is saved, that’s all that matters. Until they spend time together waiting for the full moon to come. Until Lina and Eva start to fall for each other. Until the streets begin to fill with water. Until a choice must be made whether to save themselves or their city. (Amz|IB)
Sage and Charlie are that non-couple, the one everyone things are destined for love, if only they’d figure it out. But Charlie isn’t the Carmichael twin Sage is into (that’d be his brother, Nick), and Charlie’s more interested in new boy Luke, something he isn’t comfortable with anybody knowing. As Charlie worries his secret relationship will get out and Sage stresses about things with Nick moving too fast, the two will have to find solace in each other and their friendship to make things work with their respective boyfriends. (Amz|B&N|IB)
When an earthquake quite literally rocks Sasha’s world, it leaves her effectively orphaned and living with her estranged grandparents, who have a vision of exactly how to turn Sasha into the perfect girl. But Sasha isn’t interested in their plans, including a relationship with the boy of their choosing; all she can do is try to make it work and find solace in the time she spends with Lily, a new friend who gives Sasha a serious case of Feelings. Being with Lily is definitely not The Right Path, but can Sasha put herself first even if it means upsetting the last family she has left? (Amz|B&N|IB)
Attending Pennington College and becoming a doctor has always been Liz’s plan for getting out of her small town, but when her financial aid falls through, the one thing she wanted most now looks impossible. Of course, there’s one shot at winning a scholarship, but that would mean winning becoming prom queen, and there’s no way she can deal with all the crap that involves, is there? With her eyes on the prize, Liz shoves her fear of the spotlight, trolls, and all the rest to the side, determined to one thing crown, and soon, there’s only one thing in the way: the fact that she’s falling for her competition. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Queer YA that discusses HIV are few and far between, but the slow climb has been one of the best trends of the past couple of years. Adding to that conversation in a big way is this Brazilian import set in Rio, and revolving around three boys: Ian, who was recently diagnosed positive; Victor, who was recently diagnosed negative, and Henrique, who’s been living with HIV for three years. Victor and Henrique are boyfriends, but Victor is seriously pissed to have learned of Henrique’s positive status only after they had sex. But when he meets Ian while they’re both getting tested and Ian’s test comes back positive, he knows Henrique’s guidance is too invaluable not to connect him with Ian, even if it means staying in his life. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Kisner is three for three in putting gloriously queer YA on shelves, and I am in love with the idea of this newest, which takes the famous “Twelve Angry Men” and situates it in Mock Trial with an ace lead. Raina’s killing it at life, until suddenly she isn’t. Millie’s in a similar spot, having just been ousted from the all-male Mock Trial team. When the two pair up to start a rival girls’ team, it isn’t just their opponents they’re gunning for—it’s the whole motherfluffin’ patriarchy. (Amz|B&N|IB)
‘Tis the year for political YAs, for obvious reasons, and this contemporary romance also does double duty of being a touching demisexual coming out story that happens to take place across the aisle. (The political aisle, that is.) When Dean, the son the of the Republican candidate, and Dre, son of the Democratic candidate, find themselves locked in close quarters, they’re surprised to find that they quite enjoy the company of someone else who knows what it’s like to be in the junior spotlight. Soon, romance sparks, which is a bit of problem considering the whole “opponents” thing, not to mention Dean still trying to figure out how to deal with and discuss the fact that he’s demisexual. But someone out there seems determined to make their problem much, much bigger, and they’ll have to figure out who wants their relationship outed, how they can make it work, and how they can reconcile a future. (Amz|B&N|IB)
Alex Sanchez is the author of the first gay YA I ever read, so it’s very cool to see him and Blue is the Warmest Color illustrator Julie Maroh picking up the pens for DC’s Aqualad. Set in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, our hero Jake is decidedly not a swimmer, but he still loves the ocean and dreams of going to college on the coast. And so he secretly applies to Miami University, against the wishes of both his mother and his best friend. Hell, he’s already living dangerously just by having a crush on the rebellious swim team captain, Kenny. And there’s also the small matter of the blue marks on his skin that light up when they touch water…what’s the deal with those, anyway? (Amz|B&N|IB)
Love books that make you laugh, swoon, and cry? Then you are going to fall head over heels for Smyth’s debut, an Ireland-set romantic contemporary about a girl named Saiorse who’s losing her mother to early-onset dementia and is determined never to get involved with anyone as a result…until she meets Ruby, and all bets are off. The girls agree to a no-strings-attached summer of just the good parts of romance, the movie montage where the couple does all sorts of fun things as they fall in love. But when the end of the summer comes, will they be able to let go? (Amz|B&N|IB)
Yadriel’s family isn’t buying that he’s a boy, leaving him just one choice: prove that he’s a real brujo by finding and freeing the ghost of his murdered cousin. The only problem is that whoops, he’s accidentally summoned Julian Diaz, school bad boy, instead, and Julian isn’t having it, not without solving the mystery behind his death first, even if it means dragging Yadriel along as an unwilling participant. But the more time the boys spend together, the less, uh, “unwilling” their hanging out gets to be in this paranormal trans Latinx debut that promises to have your heart flip-flopping all over the damn place. (Also, let the record show that Thomas has another book releasing next year, and though it isn’t queer, that’s still pretty badass.) (Amz|B&N|IB)
Duet Books, the all-queer publisher responsible for Summer Love, among many other wonderful queer titles, is back with another short collection, this one populated by Julia Ember (The Seafarer’s Kiss), Jude Sierra (Idlewild), Tom Wilinsky and Jen Sternick (Snowsisters), and Kate Fierro (Love Starved). For more info on the book and the stories within it, click here. (Amz|IB|Book Depository)
In this queer retelling of Snow White and Rose Red, Ivory and Rosie have been on the road for years with their mother’s circus, and finally, they’re returning to Port End. But it’s a different Port End from what they remember, filled with preachers and fundamentalists and portents of doom. Still, they prepare a dazzling homecoming show, but when Rosie’s tightrope act goes wrong, Ivory and the magician she loves will have to find an evil priest and save their family. (Amz|B&N|IB)
This YA sci-fi Dystopian stars Nate, a genetically engineered medical surrogate (GEM) who was created to be a cure for the elite of Gathos City to help with the rapidly traveling fatal lung rot and was smuggled out of the lab as a child and kept prisoner in the lawless region of the Withers. There, he becomes a Tinker, fixing broken technology for room and board, and he meets and falls for the sweet Reed, who comes with a gang of misfits that feels like the first group Nate could ever call family. But as a GEM, Nate is reliant on a medication controlled by the city in order to stop from aging, and violence in the Withers cuts off his supply and harms Reed. Now Nate has to make a choice, whether he’s going to join a terrorist group to get the meds he needs to stay alive, or remain in the Withers with Reed and watch their lives ebb into nothing. (Amz|B&N|IB)
2020 is seriously Lee’s year, debuting with an MG series (yes, series—you can already preorder three of them) and with this bi K-pop that’s got one of my favorite covers ever and also happens to have a sequel in the works. Skye Shin knows no one thinks she or any other fat girl has any business on stage, but she doesn’t care what they say; she cares about becoming a K-Pop star. When a successful audition allows her to do just that, it’s a dream come true, even as trolls and fatphobes do their best to turn it into a nightmare. And then there’s Henry, who’s supposed to be Skye’s competitor, so why does she want nothing more than to, uh, make beautiful music with him? (Amz|B&N|IB)
Queer thrillers are having a fabulous day in the sun, and if you’re as big a fan of the genre as I am, then check out this one starring a bi girl named Flora who’s haunted by having found a classmate’s body years earlier and has all that pain brought to the forefront when a text from her old flame, Ava, has her showing up just in time to see her die. Now Flora’s on a determined mission to find not only who shot Ava, but who’s responsible for the deaths of all the girls whose killers have never been found and brought to justice. But she doesn’t expect the massive conspiracy she uncovers, and threats from the killer aren’t helping. If she gives up the hunt, she’ll never get justice. But if she doesn’t, she might not live to see another day. (Amz|B&N|IB)
But wait, there’s more! Stay tuned for a separate post on upcoming queer sequels! And until then, tell me: what YA are you dying to read in 2020?
![Catch and Cradle: An FF College Sports Romance by [Katia Rose]](https://i0.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41rGengFigS.jpg?w=230&ssl=1)
![Bring Her On by [Chelsea M. Cameron]](https://i0.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51O3fCalN1L.jpg?w=230&ssl=1)
![Roller Girl (Lake Lovelace Book 3) by [Vanessa North]](https://i0.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61jFaUmfk2L.jpg?w=230&ssl=1)
