For new queer YA horror with female MCs, click here.
The Pledge by Cale Dietrich
Your Lonely Nights Are Over by Adam Sass
The Spirit Bares its Teeth by Andrew Joseph White
Beholder by Ryan La Sala
This Pact is Not Ours by Zachary Sergi
Bonus: Coming in 2024, Malicia by Steven Dos Santos
Double Bonus: While it’s not Horror, The Forest Demands its Due by Kosoko Jackson is a paranormal thriller that definitely fits the vibe of spooky season!
![Eli Over Easy by [Phil Stamper]](https://i0.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51kdy9fKGVL.jpg?resize=197%2C298&ssl=1)
The last few months have been pretty tough for Eli. He moved to New York City and left his small-town in Minnesota with his extended family and everyone he knows. He hasn’t made any new friends. And his mom died unexpectedly, shattering his whole world. He misses Mom more and more every day, but Dad refuses to talk about her, leaving Eli alone in his grief.
Then Eli finds a stash of instructional cooking videos his mom made, revealing her dream of being a celebrity chef. With the help of the cute new neighbor boy, Mathias, Eli decides to follow his mother’s recipes using her videos. If he can recreate his mom’s special dishes, then maybe a part of her can stay with him forever. But what happens when the videos run out?
![How to Get Over the End of the World: A Novel by [Hal Schrieve]](https://i0.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51P3TgoMcYL.jpg?resize=194%2C291&ssl=1)
James Goldman, self-described neurotic goth gay transsexual stoner, is a senior in high school, and fully over it. He mostly ignores his classes at Cow Pie High, instead focusing on fundraising for the near-bankrupt local LGBTQ+ youth support group, Compton House, and attending punk shows with his friend-crush Ian and best friend Opal. But when James falls in love with Orsino, a homeschooled trans boy with telepathic powers and visions of the future, he wonders if the scope of what he believes possible is too small. Orsino, meanwhile, hopes that in James he has finally found someone who will be able to share the apocalyptic visions he has had to keep to himself, and better understand the powers they hold.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Soma Kear’s verses have gone viral. Trouble is, she didn’t exactly think her slam poetry video through. All she knew was that her rhymes were urgent. On fire. An expression of where she was, and that place…was a hot mess.
Following her Ba’s deportation back to Cambodia, everything’s changed. Her Ma is away trying to help Ba adjust to his new life, and her older sister has taken charge with a new authoritarian tone. Meanwhile, Soma’s trending video pushes her to ask if it’s time to level up. With her school’s spoken word contest looming, Soma must decide: Is she brave enough to put herself out there? To publicly reveal her fears of Ba not returning? To admit that things may never be the same?
With every line she spits, Soma searches for a way to make sense of the world around her. The answers are at the mic.
Regent Academy has a long and storied history in the small, sleepy town of Winslow, Vermont. But so does the vast, dense forest that surrounds its campus. While the prestigious school is known for molding teens into world leaders, its history is far more nefarious—and far more entangled with the forest—than anyone could begin to suspect.
Seventeen-year-old Douglas Jones wants nothing to do with Regent’s king-making; he’s just trying to forget his past and survive his present. But then a student is killed and, by the next day, no one remembers him ever exiting, except for Douglas and the groundskeeper’s son, Everett Everley. As Douglas begins to research what he finds to be a centuries-long curse in the town, he and Everett awaken a horror hidden within the forest. And to save the town, and the school, the forest wants more blood as payment. The question is, will Douglas and Everett be able to pay the debt?
Critically acclaimed author Kosoko Jackson explores how power can—and will—corrupt absolutely and how cycles of violence are perpetuated throughout history in this high-octane, page-turning dark academia mystery of murder and magic.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | B&N | IndieBound
Nigel Barrett has spent his whole life preparing for the Culling, a spell-casting competition that determines which of the world’s teenage magicians will be stripped of their powers to preserve magical balance. But nothing could have prepared him to face Ori Olson, a broody rival whose caustic wit cloaks a painful past.
From the moment Nigel and Ori meet, sparks fly. Their powers are stronger, more thrilling, the closer they get—not that they can risk becoming attached. Because as the field narrows and the Culling grows more dangerous, Nigel and Ori realize there’s more at stake than just their powers. The greatest threat to magic, their future, and all of humanity might be the connection growing between them…
Cerulean Gene is free everywhere except school, where they’re known for repeatedly challenging authority. Raised in a free-spirited home by two loving parents who encourage Cerulean to be their full self, they’ve got big dreams of moving cross-country to live off the grid with their friends after graduation. But a fight with a teacher spirals out of control, and Cerulean impulsively drops out to avoid the punishment they fear is coming. Why wait for graduation to leave an oppressive capitalist system and live their dreams?
Cerulean is truly brilliant, but their sheltered upbringing hasn’t prepared them for the consequences of their choice — especially not when it’s compounded by a family emergency that puts a parent out of work. Suddenly the money they’d been stacking with their friends is a resource that the family needs to stay afloat.
Salt the Water is a book about dreaming in a world that has other plans for your time, your youth, and your future. It asks, what does it look like when a bunch of queer Black kids are allowed to dream? And what does it look like for them to confront the present circumstances of the people they love while still pursuing a wildly different future of their own?
No one survived the party at the penthouse. Except Athan.
Athanasios “Athan” Bakirtzis has made it far in life relying on his charm and good looks, even securing an invitation to a mysterious penthouse soiree for New York City’s artsy elite. But when he sneaks off to the bathroom, he hears a slam, followed by a scream. Athan peers outside, only to be pushed back in by a boy his age. The boy gravely tells him not to open the door, then closes Athan in.
Outside the door, the party descends into chaos. Through hours of howls, laughter, and sobs, Athan stays hidden. When he finally emerges, he discovers a massacre where the corpses appear to have arranged themselves into a disturbingly elegant sculpture―and Athan’s mysterious savior is nowhere to be found. Athan―the only known survivor―is now the primary suspect.
In a race to prove his innocence, Athan is swept up in a supernatural mystery, one of secret occult societies and deadly eldritch horrors with rather distinctive taste. Something evil is waking up in the walls of New York City, and it’s compelling victims toward violence, chaos, and self-destruction. Bound to him by a mysterious hereditary power, Athan has felt this evil hiding behind his reflection his entire life, watching him. Waiting. Now, it’s taking over.
The summer before college Luca Piccone returns to Copper Cove, the idyllic campsite he and his closest friends have visited every year since they were kids. To Luca, Copper Cove is like the setting of the fantasy movies he loves, a sanctuary, protected from the dangers of the outside world, where nothing goes wrong and everything stays the same.
But this year things are changing.
Desperate to make this summer the best one yet, Luca tries to ignore the freshly torn rifts within his tight friend group, the pangs of unrequited love, the anxiety attacks he thought he’d left back at school, and the shadows at the edge of the forest threatening to break free. Until he learns the terrible truth.
Every generation the children of four families are bound by a pact. A pact designed to keep the camp pristine and the monstrous force lurking beneath the campsite imprisoned. But in order to do this, an unthinkable price must be paid–a price that has soaked the previous generations in blood. Can Luca keep his friends, and his favorite place, from being ripped apart?
By the end of the summer, only one thing is for certain: Copper Cove will never be the same again.
Peter Thompkins needs a public image overhaul. After a tense confrontation with one of the few other queer kids in his small-town high school, rumors about him are becoming more elaborate by the day. Meanwhile, his best friend Alan (aka teen drag queen Aggie Culture) is throwing Mason County’s debut Drag Extravaganza. Although Peter is a self-described “dragnostic,” he decides to help produce the show, hoping to prove that he isn’t a self-hating gay. In the process, he finds himself facing down angry guard dogs, angrier bigots, and a very high-strung church lady. As backlash grows, Peter begins to wonder whether he’s setting fire to his already damaged reputation and if his friendship with Alan will survive past curtain call.
Julie is a coked-up, burnt-out thirty-year-old whose only retirement plan is dying early. She’s been trying to establish herself in the NYC magic scene, and she’ll work the most gruesome gigs, exorcize the nastiest demons, and make deals with the cruelest gods to claw her way to the top. But nothing can prepare her for the toughest job yet: when her best friend, Sarah, shows up at her door in need of help. Keeping Sarah safe becomes top priority.
Julie is desperate for a quick fix to break the dead-end grind and save her friend. But her power grab sets off a deadly chain of events that puts Sarah – and the entire world – directly in the path of annihilation.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | B&N
Rosemary meets Ash at the farmers’ market. Ash—precise, pretty, and practically perfect—sells bars of soap in delicate pastel colors, sprinkle-spackled cupcakes stacked on scalloped stands, beeswax candles, jelly jars of honey, and glossy green plants.
Ro has never felt this way about another woman; with Ash, she wants to be her and have her in equal measure. But as her obsession with Ash consumes her, she may find she’s not the one doing the devouring…
“Wait—rewind. I was still a girl back then, before the universes converged.”
Guided by premonitions and a fateful car ride, a burned-out retail worker stumbles into the grand exit from womanhood. Meanwhile, in a galaxy not so far away, an alien prince goes rogue with his sentient spaceship, seeking purpose in the great glimmering void. As the two of them come together in a fusion of body and mind, they must reckon with their assigned identities.
Tender, witty, and daring, Pluralities is a slipstream-meets-space-
Buy it: Amazon | Atthis Arts
Vade is an anarchist, a Phantom Dragon. Althus is a Touchstone―an Imperial agent.
Their love was never meant to survive.
In a world of magical empires and the anarchists that would tear them down, A Necessary Chaos is the story of Althus and Vade, assigned to spy on the other by opposing sides. But now that they’ve both caught feelings, where will their loyalties fall? They must each decide if they’ll follow orders or find a way to make their romance thrive beyond the lies.
Part of the Neon Hemlock Novella Series.
A face-off with the devil! From writer Emmett Nahil (Leatherwood) and illustrator George Williams (Croc and Roll) comes a queer horror story set against the backdrop of an outbreak of “satanic panic” sweeping the New Jersey suburbs in 1979.
When Pastor Holley’s wife, Kelly, is found murdered, FBI agent Garrett takes on the case with local New Jersey Sheriff Mullen. Together they start drumming up a convenient satanic-flavored scapegoat to cover up their own crimes of murder and experimentation. That scapegoat comes in the form of four friends: Mitch, Terri, Lupe, and Jackson. The punks, the queers, and the outcasts. Soon the group becomes the prime suspects of Kelly’s murder. Now on the run from Garrett and Mullen, the group finds themselves in the midst of a deal with the devil themself.
In eighth grade, Amy was voted “Most likely to appear on Jeopardy!” by her classmates. Decades later, this trailblazer finally got her chance. Not only did she walk away with $1.3 million while captivating the world with her impressive forty-game winning streak, but she made history and won an even greater prize—the joy of being herself on national television and blazing a trail for openly queer and transgender people around the world. Now, she shares her singular journey that led to becoming an unlikely icon and hero to millions. Her super power: Boundless curiosity and fearless questioning.
In the Form of a Question explores some of the innumerable topics that have fascinated Amy throughout her life—books and music, Tarot and astrology, popular culture and computers, sex and relationships—but they all share the same purpose: to illustrate, and celebrate, the results of a lifetime spent asking, why?
It’s 1976 and Jamaica is on fire. The country is on the eve of important elections and the warring political parties have made the divisions between the poor and the wealthy even wider. And Irie and Jilly come from very different backgrounds: Irie is from the heart of Kingston, where fighting in the streets is common. Jilly is from the hills, where mansions nestled within lush gardens remain safe behind gates. But the two bond through a shared love of Reggae music, spending time together at Irie’s father’s record store, listening to so-called rebel music that opens Jilly’s mind to a sound and a way of thinking she’s never heard before.
As tensions build in the streets, so do tensions between the two girls. A budding romance between them complicates things further as the push and pull between their two lives becomes impossible to bear. For Irie, fighting—with her words and her voice—is her only option. Blood is shed on the streets in front of her every day. She has no choice. But Jilly can always choose to escape.
Can their bond survive this impossible divide?
Discover the infinite realms of asexual love across sci-fi, fantasy, and contemporary stories
From a wheelchair user racing to save her kidnapped girlfriend and a little mermaid who loves her sisters more than suitors, to a slayer whose virgin blood keeps attracting monsters, the stories of this anthology are anything but conventional. Whether adventuring through space, outsmarting a vengeful water spirit, or surviving haunted cemeteries, no two aces are the same in these 14 unique works that highlight asexual romance, aromantic love, and identities across the asexual spectrum.
They say Léon Delafosse will be France’s next great pianist. But despite his being the youngest student ever accepted into the prestigious Paris Conservatory, there’s no way an impoverished musician can make his way in 1890s Paris without an outside patron.
Young gossip columnist Marcel Proust takes Léon under his wing, and the boys game their way through an extravagant new world. When the larger-than-life Count Robert de Montesquiou-Fézensac offers his patronage, Léon’s dreams are made real. But the closer he gets to becoming France’s next great thing, the further he strays from his old country life he shared with his family and his best friend Félix . . . a boy he might love.
With each choice Léon makes, he must navigate a fine line between two worlds—or risk losing them both.
Frenemies Whit and Zay have been at odds for years (ever since he broke up with her in, like, the most embarrassing way imaginable), so when they’re forced to organize the fall formal together, it’s a literal disaster. Sparks fly as Whitney—type-A, passionate, a perfectionist, and a certified sweater-weather fanatic—butts heads with Zay, a dry, relaxed skater boy who takes everything in stride. But not all of those sparks are bad. . . .
Has their feud been a big misunderstanding all along?
London, 1593. Sixteen-year-old Will Hughes is busy working on Shakespeare’s stage, stuffing his corsets with straw and pretending to be someone else. Offstage, he’s playing a part, too. The son of traitors, Will is desperate to keep his identity secret—or risk being killed in the bloody queen’s imperial schemes. All he wants is to lay low until he earns enough coin to return to his family.
But when his mentor, the famous playwright Christopher Marlowe, is murdered under mysterious circumstances, Will’s plans are hopelessly dashed. What’s worse, Marlowe was a spy for the queen, tasked with stalking a killer rumored to be part of an elusive order of assassins, and his secrets and untimely death have put Will under a harsh spotlight. And so, when Will unwittingly foils an attempt on the queen’s life, she names him her next spymaster.
Now, to avoid uncomfortable questions, prison, or an even more terrible fate, Will reluctantly starts his new career, which—yes—will secure him the resources to help his family…but at what cost? Adding insult to injury is the young Lord James Bloomsbury, Will’s new comrade in arms, whose entitled demeanor and unfairly handsome looks get under Will’s skin immediately.
Together, the two hunt the cunning assassin, defend the queen’s life, and pray to keep their own…all while an unexpected connection blossoms between them.
It’s 1930s Mississippi. Magic is permitted only in certain circumstances, and by certain people. Unsanctioned broom racing is banned. But for those who need the money, or the thrills…it’s there to be found.
Meet Billie Mae, captain of the Night Storms racing team, and Loretta, her best friend and second-in-command. They’re determined to make enough money to move out west to a state that allows Black folks to legally use magic and take part in national races.
Cheng-Kwan – doing her best to handle the delicate and dangerous double act of being the perfect “son” to her parents, and being true to herself while racing.
Mattie and Emma — Choctaw and Black — the youngest of the group and trying to dodge government officials who want to send them and their newly-surfaced powers away to boarding school.
And Luella, in love with Billie Mae. Her powers were sealed away years ago after she fought back against the government. She’ll do anything to prevent the same fate for her cousins.
Logan Gray is the stereotypical bad boy of Hollywood—a talented but troubled actor who the public loves to hate. Mattie Cole is an up‑and‑coming golden boy, adored by all but plagued by insecurities.
When Mattie is cast as the love interest in Logan’s newest film, the two are persuaded into a fake‑dating scheme to bring positive publicity to the project. But as the two actors get to know their new characters, real feelings start to develop. And while both need the movie to be a success for their own reasons, neither thought opposites would really attract.
But as the public scrutiny intensifies and old wounds resurface, will they have the courage to chase their own happily ever after?
Intelligent but isolated physics graduate Annie Fisk feels an undeniable pull toward space. When she lands a job as a NASA secretary during the Apollo 11 mission, she feels certain this path is her destiny. Her memories of childhood darkened by loss, she’s left behind her home, her mother, and her first love. And now she’s finally found her purpose. Even typing dictation, the work is everything she dreamed, and despite her budding attraction to one of the engineers, she can’t let herself be distracted. Not now.
So when her inability to ignore an engineer’s mistaken calculations propels her into a new position, Annie finds herself torn between her ambition, her heart, and a mysterious discovery that upends everything she knows to be scientifically true. Can she overcome her fears and reach toward the limits of human advancement? Will she chase her ambitions, and risk losing herself in them?
This is the sequel to Lavender House
San Francisco, 1952. Detective Evander “Andy” Mills has started a new life for himself as a private detective―but his business hasn’t exactly taken off. It turns out that word spreads fast when you have a bad reputation, and no one in the queer community trusts him enough to ask an ex-cop for help.
When James, an old flame from the war who had mysteriously disappeared, arrives in his offices above the Ruby, Andy wants to kick him out. But the job seems to be a simple case of blackmail, and Andy’s debts are piling up. He agrees to investigate, despite everything it stirs up.
The case will take him back to the shadowy, closeted world of the Navy, and then out into the gay bars of the city, where the past rises up to meet him, like the swell of the ocean under a warship. Missing people, violent strangers, and scandalous photos that could destroy lives are a whirlpool around him, and Andy better make sense of it all before someone pulls him under for good.
When a transphobic woman bombs Frankie’s workplace, she blows up Frankie’s life with it. As the media descends like vultures, Frankie tries to cope with the carnage: binge-drinking, fucking strangers, pushing away her friends. Then, she meets Vanya. Mysterious, beautiful, terrifying Vanya.
The two hit it off immediately, but as their relationship intensifies, so too does Frankie’s feeling that Vanya is hiding something from her. When Vanya’s secrets threaten to tear them apart, Frankie starts digging, and unearths a sinister, depraved conspiracy, the roots of which go deeper than she ever imagined.
Cam is living in Los Angeles and falling apart after the love of his life has died. Kai’s ghost won’t leave Cam alone; his spectral visits wild, tender, unexpected, and explosive. When Cam returns to his hometown of Houston, he crashes back into the orbit of his former best friend, TJ, and TJ’s family bakery. TJ’s not sure how to navigate this changed Cam, impenetrably cool and self-destructing, or their charged estrangement. Can they find a way past all that has been said – and left unsaid – to save each other?
This is the second book in the Avery Byrne, Tattooed Vigilante series
Young tattoo artist Avery Byrne refuses to accept that her friend’s death was an accident. Armed with determination and a thirst for justice, Avery dives into Phoenix, Arizona’s adrenaline-fueled world of street racing and vintage hot rods.
Teaming up with Roz, an unlikely ally who operates a spy shop, they navigate the city’s high-octane underbelly. As they edge closer to uncovering the truth, danger surges around every corner and the body count begins to rise.
Amidst the chaos, Avery finds herself torn grappling with the grief of losing her ex, while being inexplicably drawn to Roz. She must unravel her complicated feelings as she wrestles with her mission, plunging deeper into a world stained with blood and burnt rubber.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon
Three years after running away from home, Olivia is stuck with a dead-end job in nowhere town Chapel Hill, Pennsylvania. At least she has her best friend, Sunflower.
Olivia figures she’ll die in Chapel Hill, if not from boredom, then the summer night storm which crashes into town with a mind-bending monster in tow.
If Olivia’s going to escape Chapel Hill and someday reconcile with her parents, she’ll need to dodge residents enslaved by the storm’s otherworldly powers and find Sunflower.
But as the night strains friendships and reality itself, Olivia suspects the storm, and its monster, may have its eyes on Sunflower and everything she loves.
Including Olivia.
Tori Moore, a popular high-school chemistry teacher, an avid home baker, and a soon-to-be empty nester, auditions for the American Bake-o-Rama TV competition at the urging of her twin teenagers. If she somehow makes it all the way, the prize money could allow her to finally open her own bakery. But still reeling from her divorce and being naturally risk-averse, it’s not just money that’s standing between Tori and her dreams.
Once on the set in Sonoma wine country, Tori catches the eye of Kendra Campbell, the notoriously ruthless celebrity chef and Bake-o-Rama judge. Kendra is desperate to save her restaurant and expand her Chippy Chunk cookie empire. The show is her ticket to financial security, but she’s been told to soften her approach to appease viewers seeking feel-good entertainment. After years spent fighting for space in a male-dominated industry, Kendra finds it challenging—yet surprisingly rewarding—to make the shift from harsh critique to encouragement.
Tori is drawn to the uncompromising way Kendra moves through the world and senses a tenderness beneath her tough exterior. She and Kendra find it increasingly hard to keep their distance amid six weeks of cooking challenges and kitchen disasters. For both of them, the best prize of all might just be love.
Set against a backdrop of 1950s New York, this experimental novel follows an ensemble cast of all-singing, all-dancing butch dykes and Yiddish anarchists through eternal Friday nights, around the table, and at the bar.
In one of many bars, Frankie Gold sings while Sammy Silver plays piano after a day job at the anarchist newspaper. The Butch Piano Players Union meets in the corner next to the jukebox. Laur smokes on the back steps, sweaty thigh to thigh with Vic. Frankie’s childhood sweetheart, Lily, turns up at yet another bar to see a second Sammy play every Friday night. And before all that, there’s always dinner at Marg’s. Fabulated out of oral histories, anthologies, as well as the fiction of the butch-femme bar scene and Yiddish anarchist tradition, Greasepaint is a rollicking whirlwind of music and politics―the currents of community embodied and held inside the bar.
Buy it: Amazon
Margot Murray is a newly single, successful businesswoman with no interest in a cutesy seasonal romance after her breakup with her long-term girlfriend. Ben Gibson is an unlucky-in-love sweetheart in need of a woman to bring home for the holidays. Together, they make a pact: Margot gets two blissful weeks away from London in a picture-perfect manor, and Ben gets a fake girlfriend for his holiday at home with his family.
Upon arriving to the manor, Margot meets Ben’s sister, Ellie, who is suspicious of the supposed relationship right from the start. Ellie intends to get to the bottom of their relationship, not being able to see how the two of them work as a couple. As Ellie and Margot grow closer, will Ben and Margot be able to keep the charade up, or will Margot and Ellie risk the chance at something real?
Heather McKenna has no idea how to be a werewolf. Her wolf might be free from its cursed cage but has shut the door between the two of them, leaving Heather still reeling from the emptiness. When Heather discovers her mother is in the hospital, she is certain that closure from the person who cursed her in the first place will settle her wolf’s grudge and is quick to pack a bag.
V Raines sees the problems with werewolf society all around them. Despite being a nonbinary outcast in their own pack, they still have the responsibilities of being the Alpha’s only child. When their father attempts to pair them off with a dominant male pack member, V is all but ready to abandon their pack.
When V is called to the hospital to take care of a possible rogue shifter, they aren’t ready for the consequences of finding their true mate in Heather. V’s all in as Heather worries she’s not wolf enough to stand between V’s intense pack and her true mate. Fate just made their lives a lot more difficult.
Beauty and the Bear: Can these opposites fake their way into something real?
Sheldon Soleskin should be having a horrible day. Even though he’s been unexpectedly transferred to a new school right before the holidays, has only one day to set up his new classroom, and just discovered his twin sister’s been hiding an invitation to his ex-boyfriend’s Christmas Eve wedding, he’s still ready to take on the world with a smile on his face and a skip in his step.
Theo Berenson just wants to be left alone to his custodial duties. But when the chipper new first-grade teacher needs help moving furniture the Sunday after Thanksgiving, he’s forced to do something he detests. Help. To make matters worse, Theo’s overbearing parents are coming for Hanukah in a few weeks, and he’s told them he has a boyfriend. Except he doesn’t. Because who would want to date an oaf like Theo?
Working together, these opposites discover they might be able to help each other out. Agreeing to be each other’s dates, they become friends as they practice for their upcoming events. But when all the rehearsing starts feeling a little too real, and both men’s pasts come roaring back to haunt them, will they be able to pull off the ultimate holiday masquerade?
All Elle Campbell wants to do is meet their hero, non-binary icon Nuri Grena. Well, okay, they’d like a bit more than that — they’d like to learn how to do cat eye makeup, for queen bee Casey to stop critiquing their outfits, and for the finale of Elle’s favorite show to have been less terrible. But meeting Nuri means the most of all.
So when Elle learns that Nuri is coming to town for book signing on Saturday, Elle is thrilled. It’s the perfect chance to meet their hero! Elle’s never been happier since they came out as non-binary, but they have a lot of questions — questions only Nuri can answer.
But Elle’s dreams are dashed when an altercation with a surly substitute teacher lands Elle in Saturday detention. Elle is ready to give up until their two best friends come up with a plan to bust them out of school. A plan so outrageous, it just might work.
Yet that’s just step one. The kids also have to make their way across town with no money, no phones… and no driver’s licenses. But they refuse to give up — even if that means “borrowing” scooters from elementary school loan sharks, or winning a laser tag tournament with a cash prize.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Magni animi numquam moriuntur. Great minds never die.
The students in Corbin College’s elite academic society, Magni Viri, have it all—free tuition, inspirational professors, and dream jobs once they graduate. When first-gen college student Tara is offered a chance to enroll, she doesn’t hesitate.
Except once she’s settled into the gorgeous Victorian dormitory, something strange starts to happen. She’s finally writing, but her stories are dark and twisted. Her dreams feel as if they could bury her alive. An unseen presence seems to stalk her through the halls.
And a chilling secret awaits Tara at the heart of Magni Viri—one that just might turn her nightmares into reality; one that might destroy her before she has a chance to escape.
Momo Gardner is the kind of friend who’s always ready to lend a helping hand. She’s introverted, sensitive, and maybe a little too trusting, but she likes to believe the best in people. PG, on the other hand, is a bit of a lone wolf, despite her reputation for being a flirt and a player. Underneath all that cool mystery, she’s actually quick to smile, and when she falls for someone, she falls hard. An unexpected meet-cute brings the two together, kicking off the beginning of an awkward yet endearing courtship—but with their drastically different personalities, Momo’s overprotective friend, and PG’s past coming back to haunt her, Momo and PG’s romance is put to the test.
New Beginnings and Unbreakable Bonds
When Duff O’Brien moves to Hiawassee, Georgia to escape her traumatic past, she finds solace in her friendship with the ambitious and fierce Marian “Mac” Shepherd. Together with the enigmatic Quincy Banks, they form The Scottish Play, North Georgia’s hardest-rocking all-female band.
Rising Stars and Shrouded Secrets
Five years later, the band is living their dream in Athens, Georgia, playing gigs and enjoying their newfound fame. When the captivating Lawrence MacLaren enters their lives, love blossoms between him and Mac, and he envisions even greater success for the band. But when tragedy strikes, and two of their closest allies die under mysterious circumstances, Duff and bandmate Ross begin to suspect that Mac and Lawrence may be involved.
A Journey to Unveil the Truth
As The Scottish Play embarks on a trip to Scotland’s historic Glamis Castle for the performance of a lifetime, Duff must confront the prophecies of The Hecks, a trio of bewitching witches from her past–one of whom she is now dating. With danger lurking around every corner, she questions if she ever truly knew her best friend Mac and wonders if she could be the next target.
Sam Becker loves―or, okay, likes―his job. Sure, managing a bed and bath retailer isn’t exactly glamorous, but it’s good work and he gets on well with the band of misfits who keep the store running. He could see himself being content here for the long haul. Too bad, then, that the owner is an infuriating git.
Jonathan Forest should never have hired Sam. It was a sentimental decision, and Jonathan didn’t get where he is by following his heart. Determined to set things right, Jonathan orders Sam down to London for a difficult talk…only for a panicking Sam to trip, bump his head, and maybe accidentally imply he doesn’t remember anything?
Faking amnesia seemed like a good idea when Sam was afraid he was getting sacked, but now he has to deal with the reality of Jonathan’s guilt―as well as the unsettling fact that his surly boss might have a softer side to him. There’s an unexpected freedom in getting a second shot at a first impression…but as Sam and Jonathan grow closer, can Sam really bring himself to tell the truth, or will their future be built entirely on one impulsive lie?
Saint Petersburg, 1812. Russian forces have defeated Napoleon at great cost, and the Tsar’s empire is once again at peace. Sasha, a captain in the imperial army, returns home to Grand Duke Felix, the disgraced second son of the Tsar and his irrepressibly charming lover, but their reunion is quickly interrupted. Everything changes with the arrival of Sofia, a mysteriously persuasive figure whose disruptive presence Sasha suspects to be something more than human. Felix, insisting that Sasha’s old-fashioned superstitions are misplaced, takes Sofia into his confidence–a connection that quickly becomes both personal and political. On her incendiary advice, Felix confronts his father about the brutal conditions of the common people in the aftermath of the war, to disastrous results, separating him from Sasha and setting him on a collision course with a vocal group of dissidents: the Koalitsiya.
Meanwhile, the Koalitsiya plan to gridlock Saint Petersburg with a city-wide strike in hopes of awakening the upper classes to the grim realities of the laboring people’s circumstances. Marya, a resourceful sometime-thief and trusted lieutenant of the Koalitsiya, also falls under Sofia’s spell, and allied with Felix and her fellow revolutionaries, finds herself in the middle of a battle she could never have predicted. As Sofia’s influence grows and rising tensions threaten the Tsar’s peace, Sasha, Felix, and Marya are forced to choose between the ideals they hold close and the people they love.
After years of putting aside her dreams of travel and adventure, Bailey George is ready to leave Lanford Falls and her responsibilities behind on a long-awaited vacation to New York City. But when the volunteer who took over her leadership position for the town’s Winter Wonderfest has a medical emergency, Bailey finds herself stuck in Lanford Falls. She gets roped into reassuming her old role, not wanting to let the town or her friends and family down.
Staying home seems slightly less terrible when Bailey runs into her high school crush, Maria Hatcher. A kiss they shared years ago in the town’s mistletoe grove was a life-defining moment for them both. Maria quickly offers to pitch in and help with Winter Wonderfest. Her sunny disposition and holiday cheer perk up Bailey’s grinchy feelings about everything.
However, one disaster after another snowball on the day of the festival. Bailey’s frustration boils over, and she ends up on the town’s old wooden bridge. There, she meets fabulous drag queen Clara Angel. Bailey declares that she wishes she hadn’t been born in this Christmas-obsessed, suffocating small town. With a little of the magic Clara possesses, she shows Bailey how wrong she is about Lanford Falls and her place in it. And that with a little hope and some true holiday spirit, there is a way to attain all her dreams.
In “Dark Academia and the Lesbian Masterdoc,” a millennial English professor finds viral fame on TikTok, but her newfound notoriety could wreck her already unstable life. In “Patriots’ Day,” a man having an affair finds himself caught up in larger currents of anti-Asian violence. Throughout the collection, an array of loners and artists—a young poet haunted by the ghost of Oscar Wilde, a home brewer and wife during lockdown, a boy with wings—struggle for connection and fulfillment in a world battered by the pandemic and reactionary politics. A daring writer with limitless range, SJ Sindu can depict shocking cruelty as readily as small moments of queer joy.
Jun Ironway—hacker, con artist, and occasional thief—has gotten her hands on a piece of contraband that could set her up for life: proof that implicates the powerful Nightfoot family in a planet-wide genocide seventy-five years ago. The Nightfoots control the precious sevite that fuels interplanetary travel through three star systems. And someone is sure to pay handsomely for anything that could break their hold.
Of course, anything valuable is also dangerous. The Kindom, the ruling power of the star systems, is inextricably tied up in the Nightfoots’ monopoly—and they can’t afford to let Jun expose the truth. They task two of their most brutal clerics with hunting her down: preternaturally stoic Chono, and brilliant hothead Esek, who also happens to be the heir to the Nightfoot empire.
But Chono and Esek are haunted in turn by a figure from their shared past, known only as Six. What Six truly wants is anyone’s guess. And the closer they get to finding Jun, the surer Chono is that Six is manipulating them all.
It’s a game that could destroy their lives and devastate the stars. And they have no choice but to see it through to the end.
It’s the west end of Toronto, the apartments are small, and everybody is twenty-seven and making some kind of art. In the wake of her mother’s death, Sophie pays rent by making stained glass mosaics for rich people and plays house with her childhood friend and sometimes-lover, the beautiful boy Alex. Both are from Newfoundland but move easily in this world of crowded patios and DIY movie shoots.
When Sophie meets the glamorous poet Maggie, who is the downtown product of a hundred cool queer bars, she falls into a bewildered infatuation, but secrets emerge that threaten to crumble the foundation of her relationship with Alex and Maggie both.
Moving from bohemian Toronto to an arts colony in a castle in France and then back to Newfoundland, Mudflowers examines the impact of family that one is born into and family one chooses, exploring new and unconventional intimacies.
Welcome to Chung’s. For here or to go?
Nineteen eighties Detroit was a volatile place to live, but above the fray stood a safe haven: Chung’s Cantonese Cuisine, where anyone—from the city’s first Black mayor to the local drag queens, from a big-time Hollywood star to elderly Jewish couples—could sit down for a warm, home-cooked meal. Here was where, beneath a bright-red awning and surrounded by his multigenerational family, filmmaker and activist Curtis Chin came of age; where he learned to embrace his identity as a gay ABC, or American-born Chinese; where he navigated the divided city’s spiraling misfortunes; and where—between helpings of almond boneless chicken, sweet-and-sour pork, and some of his own, less-savory culinary concoctions—he realized just how much he had to offer to the world, to his beloved family, and to himself.
Served up by the cofounder of the Asian American Writers’ Workshop and structured around the very menu that graced the tables of Chung’s, Everything I Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant is both a memoir and an invitation: to step inside one boy’s childhood oasis, scoot into a vinyl booth, and grow up with him—and perhaps even share something off the secret menu.
Ánte’s life has been steeped in Sami tradition. It is indisputable to him that he, an only child, will keep working with the reindeer. But there is something else too, something tugging at him. His feelings for his best friend Erik have changed, grown into something bigger. What would people say if they knew? And how does Erik feel? And Erik’s voice just the push of a button away. Ánte couldn’t answer, could he? But how could he ignore it? Fire From the Sky is a sharp and intelligent story about heritage, family ties and age-old commitments to the past. But also about expectations, compassion, feelings that course through your body like electricity.
Growing up in the dark tourism capital of the United States, sixteen-year-old Olive should be comfortable with death. But ever since an allergic reaction almost sent her to the wrong side of the grass, she’s been terrified that there is no afterlife. And after the death of her surrogate grandmother, Olive has kept everyone at arm’s length because if there’s Nothing after we die, relationships and love can only end in sorrow.
When she summons a spirit to answer her questions about death, Olive meets Jay, a hitchhiking ghost trapped in the woods behind the poorhouse where he died. Olive agrees to help Jay find his unmarked grave in exchange for answers about the other side and what comes next.
Meanwhile, someone―or something―is targeting Olive’s classmates, and the longer Jay lingers, the more serious the attacks become. Blaming herself for having brought Jay back, Olive teams up with maybe-nemesis, maybe-crush Maren, ex-best friend Davis, and new girl Vanessa to free Jay’s spirit before he’s trapped as a malevolent shade and the attacks turn deadly. But in doing so, Olive must face her fear of death and risk losing another person she loves to the Nothing.
![Iris Kelly Doesn't Date by [Ashley Herring Blake]](https://i0.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41-lCkf+8qL.jpg?resize=214%2C321&ssl=1)
Everyone around Iris Kelly is in love. Her best friends are all coupled up, her siblings have partners that are perfect for them, and her parents are still blissfully married. And she’s happy for all of them, truly. Iris doesn’t want any of that—dating, love, romance. She’ll stick to her commitment-free hookups, thanks very much, except no one in her life will just let her be. Everyone wants to see her settled down, but she holds firmly to her no dating rule. There’s only one problem—Iris is a romance author facing an imminent deadline for her second book, and she’s completely out of ideas.
Perfectly happy to ignore her problems as per usual, Iris goes to a bar in Portland and meets a sexy stranger, Stefania, and a night of dancing and making out turns into the worst one-night stand Iris has had in her life. To get her mind off everything, Iris tries out for the lead role in a local play, a queer retelling of Much Ado About Nothing, but comes face-to-face with Stefania, whose real name turns out to be Stevie. Desperate to save face in front of her friends, Stevie asks Iris to play along as her girlfriend. Iris is shocked, but when she realizes the arrangement might provide her with some much-needed romantic content for her book, she agrees. As the two women play the part of a happy couple, lines start to blur, and they’re left wondering who will make the real first move….
![Tempted by the Bollywood Star: A Passionate F/F Opposites Attract Romance by [Sophia Singh Sasson]](https://i0.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51EjXzNiMnL.jpg?resize=217%2C341&ssl=1)
She once turned her back on love…
Now she’s risking everything for a second chance.
During one perfect holiday, Bollywood star Saira Sethi fell hard for producer Mia Strome. Ending their fling to protect her public image is her biggest regret. Now, years later, she’s in Hollywood and Mia is a producer on Saira’s new show!
Mia never forgot their intense connection—nor her heartbreak when Saira walked away. Their chemistry still sizzles, but lingering frustrations cause clashes that threaten the show…and their future.
Buy it: Amazon
Riley Beckett met Gianna Mäkinen – drop-dead gorgeous influencer, trilingual, daughter of world-famous models, yes, that Gianna Mäkinen – their first year at Boston University, and it changed everything for the both of them. After all, when you find the person who just gets you, nothing feels quite “the same” right?
And in the ten years since, Riley has come to depend on Gianna more than anyone else in her life. She knows Gianna just as well as she knows herself – maybe better, some days. She knows Gianna is incredibly sex-positive, she knows Gianna doesn’t do romance or relationships, and she knows nothing could ever come between them.
This is what makes sense to her, all of this is status-quo. But when a holiday party mix-up sets in motion a domino effect of changes to these previously inalienable truths, Riley has to question everything she thought she knew about their relationship. What, exactly, does Gianna mean to her after all?
Buy it: Amazon
This holiday, will the man next door tempt him with a second chance?
Actor Carter Jiménez lived a glamorous life until he lost his wife to the dark side of fame. Now he’ll protect his young daughter by avoiding celebrity at all costs. Then his seemingly understated neighbor, Stephan Devereaux-Smith, tempts his still-wounded heart. Is this Carter’s second chance at love?
But Stephan isn’t an average man caring for a sick relative. He’s part of a billionaire family and the ritzy world Carter left behind. Torn between new love and old demons, can Carter trust Stephan with his family—and his heart?
Buy it: Amazon
In 17th-century London, unnatural babies are being born, with eyes made for the dark and webbed digits suited to the sea.
Sarah Davis is intimately familiar with such strangeness—having hidden her uncanny nature all her life and fled to London under suspicious circumstances, Sarah starts over as a midwife’s apprentice to a member of the illegal Worshipful Company of Midwives, hoping to carve out for herself an independent life. But with each new unnatural birth, the fear in London grows of the Devil’s work.
When the wealthy Lady Wren hires her to see her through her pregnancy, Sarah quickly becomes a favorite of her husband, the famous architect Lord Christopher Wren, whose interest in the uncanny borders on obsession. Sarah soon finds herself caught in a web of magic and intrigue created by those who want to use her power for themselves, and whose pursuits threaten to unmake the earth itself.
Santiago “Saint” Vega gets a second shot at love with Lola León, but when duty to his family forces him to do something she’ll never forgive, will everything he’s built come crumbling down?
Years ago, Saint walked away from the girl he loved to fulfill his duty. Now he’s struggling to build bridges between his drifting family, take on more responsibilities at his uncle’s construction company, figure out why his daughter refuses to talk at school and curtail his mischievous abuelo’s escalating pranks. Then she walks back into his life.
Social justice advocate Lola León has returned to Humboldt Park for two reasons: to help care for her dear abuelo and to serve the community center she loved, particularly the shelter for unhoused LGBTQIA+ youths. When she finds out that the Vegas are responsible for endangering both, she is more than ready to go to war—even if the boy she never forgot is standing at the front of the battlefield.
Neither of them expects to become allies in saving the shelter, helping Saint’s daughter or ending the decades-long feud between their grandfathers. They definitely don’t expect all of their old feelings to come rushing back. As Saint and Lola enter combat, they can’t help but wonder where the other’s true allegiance lies, and whether they’ll win these battles only to lose each other.
Bookstore Romance Day is a delightful annual tradition founded in 2019 (you can read about the team behind it here), and as an avid romance fan and an appreciator that it is always queer-inclusive, here are some great ways to celebrate the people making it special for 2023!
First off, here’s the all-important link to the Love is Queer event, which takes place on August 20th at 6 pm EDT: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/love-is-queer-tickets-680645016567?aff=ebdsoporgprofile
Continue reading Happy (Upcoming) Bookstore Romance Day 2023!
Today on the site we’re doing a dive into Night of the Living Queers, an all-queer Horror anthology edited by Alex Brown and Shelly Page and releasing August 29th from Wednesday Books! Not only is this collection super queer, but the lineup is entirely comprised of authors of color, providing fresh perspectives for an anthology that is not to be missed! Here’s the official description:
Night of the Living Queers is a YA horror anthology that explores a night when anything is possible, exclusively featuring queer authors of color putting fresh spins on classic horror tropes and tales.
No matter its name or occasion, Halloween is more than a Hallmark holiday, it’s a symbol of transformation. NIGHT OF THE LIVING QUEERS is a YA horror anthology that explores how Halloween can be more than just candies and frights, but a night where anything is possible. Each short story is told through the lens of a different BIPOC teen and the Halloween night that changes their lives forever. Creative, creepy, and queer, this collection brings fresh terror, heart, and humor to young adult literature.
Contributors include editors Alex Brown and Shelly Page, Kalynn Bayron, Ryan Douglass, Sara Farizan, Maya Gittelman, Kosoko Jackson, Em Liu, Vanessa Montalban, Ayida Shonibar, Tara Sim, Trang Thanh Tran, and Rebecca Kim Wells.
And here’s a little more on some of the stories, from the authors themselves!
Sara Farizan, A Brief Intermission
A Brief Intermission is about two cinephile employees at a drive-in movie theater who have to work overtime on Halloween and play a movie for some ghostly guests. I’ve long been interested in the history of drive-ins in the U.S. as well as Chevy Bel-Air cars and thought this would be a good vehicle for those interests. Get it? Vehicle? Anyway, if you like cinema, jokes, ghouls, and fear conformity, you might get a kick out of this story.
Rebecca Wells, Guested
I’m a big scaredy-cat, so I began my short story by brainstorming all the horror tropes that frighten me. The answer of course is all of them, but one I found myself circling back to was the idea that someone in my life (possibly myself!) could be possessed. Mindswaps, multiverses where people come back “wrong,” possession by demons or parasites or even other people – it’s all scary. Add on to that the idea that I might know what’s wrong but not be able to convince anyone of the truth? Downright horrifying. But the scariest part (to my main character, anyway) is that most of the characters in my story want to be possessed. Just not in the wrong way…
Kosoko Jackson, Rocky Road with Caramel Drizzle
My story, Rocky Road with Caramel Drizzle, was inspired by the idea of killing your gays. So many stories only focus on queer pain and how queers need to ‘rise above’ their attackers, to become a better person and grow from it. While that may be a valid route for some, people, all people, deserve to use their rage and process their pain how they see fit. And sometimes, that’s through punishment. I wanted to write something with magic, darkness, validity and romance, to show queer kids sad events don’t mean sad lives, and that whatever path you take, when hurt, is okay and valid. I also love crossroad demons and wanted to write a queer twist on that.
Ayida Shonibar, Save Me from Myself
Save Me from Myself is about a teen’s dread made manifest—the character’s, and my own. It’s a tragedy. And a love story. Horror as a genre resonates for me in how it justifies a current of fear permeating the narrative. Existing alongside frequent intrusive worries, especially ones rooted in environments that raised you, means some are bound to come true. An inner fear materialising into reality can feel like “proof” that you should continue carrying all the fears with you and can send you into bone-chilling panic over missed opportunities to prevent it. It feels like your worst thoughts, intangible yet large and powerful, control your world more than you do—a sort of cosmic horror. This is why stories like Kafka’s “Die Verwandlung / The Metamorphosis” really spoke to me growing up. You might think you’re impossible to love—that if, miraculously, somebody does make the mistake of loving you, it can’t be real, or it’ll be lost, or you’re not worth the sacrifice it takes. That loving you is the missed opportunity. I tried to encompass this cold terror in the ending—the abject, abrupt devastation I struggled to make sense of as a teenager in the face of misfortune. But deeply uncomfortable fears and worthiness of love can coexist. They’re not mutually exclusive. When things go horribly wrong, you can, and should, still be loved. I hope the ending leaves the reader with a belief in love that remains unshakeably true and deserved, even despite the ugliest of outcomes that can’t always be controlled.
Shelly Page, Anna
My story, Anna, is about a teen who must save the kids she’s babysitting from a ghost. I knew I wanted to write something along the lines of Halloween and Ouijia, but with a twist. My story explores themes of abandonment, loneliness, and, of course, fear. I wanted to show readers that the past doesn’t have to dictate your future, and that giving into fear ensures you stay trapped. I hope my story connects with teen readers who feel afraid to take a chance or make a change. If you can find the courage to overcome your fear, even if it takes a helping hand, it can mean true happiness.
Maya Gittelman, Leyla Mendoza and the Last House on the Lane
The texture of my story is written with deep love for the Philippines, and the communities of Philippine diaspora Leyla and I belong to. Fraught love tangled in tension and grief, but love at the core of it, love as the force of it, love learning how best to grow. Love inextricable, woven tight into the dissonance.
The plot of Leyla Mendoza emerged out of two concepts. First, the Western fear of aging and the elderly—I wanted to respond to the fairytale and horror trope of “there’s someone old and alone, and that means we as a community deserve to judge them.” And secondly, I wanted to use that response as a vessel to explore other experiences of non-belonging. The core of this story came together as: what does it mean to imagine a possible trans future for yourself when you have no real-life examples of it? What might it mean to imagine a transmasc future when you don’t have a role model for the kind of man you want to be, a future in which your femininity belongs to you without needing to align with anyone else’s? I wanted to breathe magic into the fact that for many trans people, even though we might have to build that future for ourselves, it’s possible and it’s necessary and it’s more beautiful that you can imagine. And—you are not alone.
Alex Brown, The Three Phases of Ghost-Hunting
The Three Phases of Ghost Hunting is about two best friends (who want to be more than just friends) who are spending their Halloween night in a mall food court as they search for the truth behind an infamous local legend: Terrifying Bob, the (alleged) pizza-stealing ghost of a pirate who died a few centuries ago. What starts out as a light-hearted investigation turns into an adventure that brings them face-to-face with an entity that’s way more powerful than a ghost.
This story is my ode to every paranormal believer and skeptic pairing out there! I wanted to pay homage to one of my favorite trope-y pairs in a fun (and vaguely existentially terrifying way). Daisy and Iris are both queer Asian Americans, like me, and I was delighted and honored to bring them to life (and get them together at the end)!
My Dearest Darkest by Kayla Cottingham
People Like Us by Dana Mele
Fraternity by Andy Mientus
A Lesson in Vengeance by Victoria Lee
As I Descended by Robin Talley
Bonus: Coming this fall, The Forest Demands its Due by Kosoko Jackson, and coming in 2024, With Love & Mischief by Derek Milman
Today’s post is sponsored in honor of the release of Going Bicoastal, now available from Wednesday Books in hardcover and ebook and in audio from OrangeSky, narrated by Mara Wilson!
Books of Wonder (signed!) | B&N | Bookshop | Amazon | Libro.fm | Kobo | Apple | Target | Indigo | Blackwells
Sixteen-year-old Maya Krishnan is fiercely protective of her friends, immigrant community, and single mother, but she knows better than to rock the boat in her conservative Florida suburb. Her classmate Juneau Zale is the polar opposite: she’s a wealthy white heartbreaker who won’t think twice before capsizing that boat.
When Juneau invites Maya to join the Pugilists—a secret society of artists, vandals, and mischief-makers who fight for justice at their school—Maya descends into the world of change-making and resistance. Soon, she and Juneau forge a friendship that inspires Maya to confront the challenges in her own life.
But as their relationship grows romantic, painful, and twisted, Maya begins to suspect that there’s a whole different person beneath Juneau’s painted-on facade. Now Maya must learn to speak her truth in this mysterious, mixed-up world—even if it results in heartbreak.
Continue reading Most Anticipated Young Adult Fiction: July-December 2023
*These are new titles, which means their eBooks and Audiobooks are eligible as well.
Female Protags
Male Protags
Nonbinary Protags
Anthologies
Female Protags
Male Protags
Nonbinary Protags
Anthologies
Female Protags
Male Protags
Nonbinary Protags
Female Protags
Male Protags
Nonbinary Protags
Today on the site I’m delighted to reveal the cover of Kosoko Jackson’s The Forest Demands its Due, a paranormal thriller releasing October 3rd from Quill Tree, an imprint of The Publisher That Needs To Come to the Table and Talk to Its Union Already. For more on the HCP Union and how you can help support its efforts, click here. I also encourage you to use the Bookshop preorder link below, which directly supports the Strike fund. And now, the story:
Regent Academy has a long and storied history in the small, sleepy town of Winslow, Vermont. But so does the vast, dense forest that surrounds its campus. While the prestigious school is known for molding teens into world leaders, its history is far more nefarious—and far more entangled with the forest—than anyone could begin to suspect.
Seventeen-year-old Douglas Jones wants nothing to do with Regent’s king-making; he’s just trying to forget his past and survive his present. But then a student is killed and, by the next day, no one remembers him ever exiting, except for Douglas and the groundskeeper’s son, Everett Everley. As Douglas begins to research what he finds to be a centuries-long curse in the town, he and Everett awaken a horror hidden within the forest. And to save the town, and the school, the forest wants more blood as payment. The question is, will Douglas and Everett be able to pay the debt?
Critically acclaimed author Kosoko Jackson explores how power can—and will—corrupt absolutely and how cycles of violence are perpetuated throughout history in this high-octane, page-turning dark academia mystery of murder and magic.
And here’s the chilling cover, illustrated by Joel Tippie!
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | B&N | IndieBound
Kosoko Jackson is a digital marketer during the day and an author of books that champion queer Black male characters during his free time. When not writing novels that champion holistic representation of black queer men across genres, he can be found obsessing over movies, drinking his (umpteenth) London Fog, or spending far too much time on Twitter. He lives in The New York Metro area with his Golden Retriever, Artemis. YESTERDAY IS HISTORY was his debut young adult novel, published by SourcebooksFire in 2021.
Happy Black History Month! Like the other eleven months, it’s an excellent time to buy queer books by Black authors! (Want even more recs? Check out previous posts!)
Please note that this post contains titles published by HarperCollins. Please note that the HarperCollins Union has been on strike since 11/10/22 to get a fair contract for their workers, and this site very much supports that effort. Visit the HarperCollins Union linktree to learn how you can support their fight for a fair contract: linktr.ee/hcpunion.
Bradley Graeme is pretty much perfect. He’s a star football player, manages his OCD well (enough), and comes out on top in all his classes . . . except the ones he shares with his ex-best friend, Celine.
Celine Bangura is conspiracy-theory-obsessed. Social media followers eat up her takes on everything from UFOs to holiday overconsumption–yet, she’s still not cool enough for the popular kids’ table. Which is why Brad abandoned her for the in-crowd years ago. (At least, that’s how Celine sees it.)
These days, there’s nothing between them other than petty insults and academic rivalry. So when Celine signs up for a survival course in the woods, she’s surprised to find Brad right beside her.
Forced to work as a team for the chance to win a grand prize, these two teens must trudge through not just mud and dirt but their messy past. And as this adventure brings them closer together, they begin to remember the good bits of their history. But has too much time passed . . . or just enough to spark a whole new kind of relationship?
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
This is the sequel to Cameron Battle and the Hidden Kingdoms
After his first adventure as the Descendant, Cameron can’t sit through seventh grade classes. Especially when his mother is still trapped in Chidani and his father is still missing. But he encounters a particularly nasty bully in his new school, and it doesn’t take long for Cameron and his trusty friends Zion and Aliyah to realize that the troubles of Chidani won’t stay away for long.
With the Book to guide them, Cameron and his crew end up transported to Chidani sooner than anticipated–and the gods and goddesses they encounter don’t intend to make Cameron’s journey easy. Can he finally outwit and outlast the villainous god set on destroying their worlds?
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Give in to this irresistible paranormal romance anthology filled with tales of the mortal and the monstrous. In Eternally Yours, fifteen of today’s bestselling writers explore love in its many forms . . .
Contributors include Kalynn Bayron, Kendare Blake, Kat Cho, Melissa de la Cruz, Hafsah Faizal, Sarah Gailey, Chloe Gong, Alexis Henderson, Adib Khorram, Anna-Marie McLemore, Casey McQuiston, Sandhya Menon, Akshaya Raman, Marie Rutkoski, and Julian Winters.
Vampires and merpeople, angels and demons—the stories in this anthology imagine worlds where the only thing more powerful than the supernatural, is love.
A girl in a graveyard goes on an unexpected date, a shipwrecked sailor makes a connection on a forbidden island, a piano melody summons a soul mate. Creatures of folktales and legend, of land and sea, of centuries past and life after life, all wrapped into one spellbinding compendium. Once you sink into its pages, it’ll never let you go.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Mahalia Harris wants.
She wants a big Sweet Sixteen like her best friend, Naomi.
She wants the super-cute new girl Siobhan to like her back.
She wants a break from worrying—about money, snide remarks from white classmates, pitying looks from church ladies . . . all of it.
Then inspiration strikes: It’s too late for a Sweet Sixteen, but what if she had a coming-out party? A singing, dancing, rainbow-cake-eating celebration of queerness on her own terms.
The idea lights a fire beneath her, and soon Mahalia is scrimping and saving, taking on extra hours at her afterschool job, trying on dresses, and awkwardly flirting with Siobhan, all in preparation for the coming out of her dreams. But it’s not long before she’s buried in a mountain of bills, unfinished schoolwork, and enough drama to make her English lit teacher blush. With all the responsibility on her shoulders, will Mahalia’s party be over before it’s even begun?
A novel about finding yourself, falling in love, and celebrating what makes you you.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Seventeen-year-old Carter Harper may have created an award-winning iPhone app and have a 3.93 GPA, but her successes are overshadowed by brutal bullying, debilitating depression, and biting loneliness. Tired of being treated as the popular girls’ plaything, Carter hatches a plan to gain their respect, and maybe even gain a bit of popularity of her own. When that doesn’t work, she thinks her only choice is to die by suicide.
Abby Wallace is a member of “the POPS” (the Petty, Oppressive, and Popular Shitbags, according to Carter)—subordinate only to Kelsey, her best friend with benefits. The ambitious poet destroys reputations without care—especially Carter’s—to prove how cool, cruel, and strong she is, all while pushing down her past trauma and secret guilt. But she faces an unexpected adversary when Kelsey tries to make Carter her new pet project. Angry and betrayed, Abby pushes Carter to the edge—facing consequences she never could have imagined.
Carter and Abby’s tumultuous relationship comes to a boiling point when Abby stops Carter from attempting suicide. But what happens when their shared enemy tries to come for them both again, and they end up in the unfortunate position of trying to protect one another? If Carter and Abby can stand each other for more than three minutes, they can stop Kelsey’s court of misrule from harming more girls.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Real or imaginary, geekdom is where it’s at in this multi-genre YA anthology that celebrates “the geek,” with stories by some of today’s top bestselling, critically acclaimed Black authors.
Contributors include Amerie, Kalynn Bayron, Terry J. Benton-Walker, Roseanne A. Brown, Elise Bryant, Tracy Deonn, Desiree S. Evans, Isaac Fitzsimons, Lamar Giles, Jordan Ifueko, Leah Johnson, Amanda Joy, Kwame Mbalia, Tochi Onyebuchi, Shari B. Pennant, K. Arsenault Rivera, Julian Winters, and Ibi Zoboi.
A girl who believes in UFOs; a boy who might have finally found his Prince Charming; a hopeful performer who dreams of being cast in her school’s production of The Sound of Music; a misunderstood magician of sorts with a power she doesn’t quite understand.
These plotlines and many more compose the eclectic stories found within the pages of this dynamic, exciting, and expansive collection featuring exclusively Black characters. From contemporary to historical, fantasy to sci-fi, magical to realistic, and with contributions from a powerhouse list of self-proclaimed geeks and bestselling, award-winning authors, this life-affirming anthology celebrates and redefines the many facets of Blackness and geekiness—both in the real world and those imagined.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Seventeen-year-old Theo Wright has it all figured out. His plan (well, more like his dad’s plan) is a foolproof strategy that involves exceling at his magnet school, getting scouted by college recruiters, and going to Duke on athletic scholarship. But for now, all Theo wants is a perfect prom night. After his best friend Jay dares Theo to prompose to his crush at Chloe Campbell’s party, Theo’s ready to throw caution to the wind and take his chances.
But when the promposal goes epically wrong, Theo seeks refuge in an empty bedroom while the party rages on downstairs. Having an existential crisis about who he really is with and without his so-called best friend wasn’t on tonight’s agenda. Though, as the night goes on, Theo finds he’s not as alone as he thinks when, one by one, new classmates join him to avoid who they’re supposed be outside the bedroom door. Among them, a familiar acquaintance, a quiet outsider, an old friend, and a new flame . . .
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Fifteen-year-old Kermit Sanders knows grief and its all-encompassing shadows. After losing his beloved older sister in a tragic car accident, nothing quite punctures through the feelings of loss. Everywhere Kermit goes, he is reminded of her.
But then Kermit finds a mysterious invitation in his locker, signed anonymously with “-1.” He has no idea what he’s in for, but he shows up to find out. Dubbed the “Minus-One Club,” a group of his schoolmates has banded together as a form of moral support. The members have just one thing in common—they have all suffered the tragic loss of someone they loved.
The usual dividing lines between high school classes and cliques don’t apply inside the Minus-One Club, and Kermit’s secret crush, the handsome and happy-go-lucky Matt (and only out gay student at school), is also a part of the group. Slowly, Matt’s positive headstrong approach to life helps relieve Kermit of his constant despair.
But as Kermit grows closer to Matt, the light of his new life begins to show the cracks beneath the surface. When Matt puts himself in danger by avoiding his feelings, Kermit must find the strength to not only lift himself back up but to help the rest of the group from falling apart.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Nova Albright, the first Black homecoming queen at Lovett High, is dead. Murdered the night of her coronation, her body found the next morning in the old slave cemetery she spent her weekends rehabilitating.
Tinsley McArthur was supposed to be queen. Not only is she beautiful, wealthy, and white, it’s her legacy—her grandmother, her mother, and even her sister wore the crown before her. Everyone in Lovett knows Tinsley would do anything to carry on the McArthur tradition.
No one is more certain of that than Duchess Simmons, Nova’s best friend. Duchess’s father is the first Black police captain in Lovett. For Duchess, Nova’s crown was more than just a win for Nova. It was a win for all the Black kids. Now her best friend is dead, and her father won’t fact the fact that the main suspect is right in front of him. Duchess is convinced that Tinsley killed Nova—and that Tinsley is privileged enough to think she can get away with it. But Duchess’s father seems to be doing what he always does: fall behind the blue line. Which means that the white girl is going to walk.
Duchess is determined to prove Tinsley’s guilt. And to do that, she’ll have to get close to her.
But Tinsley has an agenda, too.
Everyone loved Nova. And sometimes, love is exactly what gets you killed.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
For most of her life, Aaliyah’s home situation hasn’t been great, but she’s at least had her childhood best friend and role as a cross-country star to balance it out. But once she got outed by a church elder last spring, everything came undone — including Aaliyah.
Now, senior year is about to start and she is determined to come back faster and wiser. No more letting other people define her. No more losing herself to their expectations.
Except… well, with new friends, old flames, nosy school counselors, and teammates who don’t trust her yet, the route already feels rough. And what’s with the new girl, Tessa, who gives Aaliyah butterflies every time she looks at her? Regardless, she’ll be fine. Because this is the year to prove to everyone―and most of all, herself―that she’s more than her mistakes. After all, even Aaliyah can’t outrun everything.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Xavier Reynolds is doing less than stellar. He just got dumped, was passed over for a prestigious fellowship, and to top it all off he’s right back home in Harper’s Cove, Maine (population: 9,000). The last thing he wants to do is to work as a prep chef in the kitchen of the hip new restaurant in town, The Wharf. Especially since the hot, single-father chef who owns it can’t delegate to save his life.
Logan O’Hare doesn’t understand Xavier or why every word out of his mouth is dipped in sarcasm. Unfortunately, he has no choice but to hire him—he needs more help in the kitchen and his tween daughter, Anne, can only mince so many onions. It might be a recipe for disaster, but Logan doesn’t have many options besides Xavier.
Stuck between a stove and a hot place, Logan and Xavier discover an unexpected connection. But when the heat between them threatens to top the Scoville scale, they’ll have to decide if they can make their relationship work or if life has seasoned them too differently.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
In Feels Right, Kemi Adeyemi presents an ethnography of how black queer women in Chicago use dance to assert their physical and affective rights to the city. Adeyemi stages the book in queer dance parties in gentrifying neighborhoods, where good feelings are good business. But feeling good is elusive for black queer women whose nightlives are undercut by white people, heterosexuality, neoliberal capitalism, burnout, and other buzzkills. Adeyemi documents how black queer women respond to these conditions: how they destroy DJ booths, argue with one another, dance slowly, and stop partying altogether. Their practices complicate our expectations that life at night, on the queer dance floor, or among black queer community simply feels good. Adeyemi’s framework of “feeling right” instead offers a closer, kinesthetic look at how black queer women adroitly manage feeling itself as a complex right they should be afforded in cities that violently structure their movements and energies. What emerges in Feels Right is a sensorial portrait of the critical, black queer geographies and collectivities that emerge in social dance settings and in the broader neoliberal city.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
London, 1885. Gabriel Utterson, a 17-year-old law clerk, has returned to London for the first time since his life― and that of his dearest friend, Henry Jekyll―was derailed by a scandal that led to his and Henry’s expulsion from the London Medical School. Whispers about the true nature of Gabriel and Henry’s relationship have followed the boys for two years, and now Gabriel has a chance to start again.
But Gabriel doesn’t want to move on, not without Henry. His friend has become distant and cold since the disastrous events of the prior spring, and now his letters have stopped altogether. Desperate to discover what’s become of him, Gabriel takes to watching the Jekyll house.
In doing so, Gabriel meets Hyde, a a strangely familiar young man with white hair and a magnetic charisma. He claims to be friends with Henry, and Gabriel can’t help but begin to grow jealous at their apparent closeness, especially as Henry continues to act like Gabriel means nothing to him.
But the secret behind Henry’s apathy is only the first part of a deeper mystery that has begun to coalesce. Monsters of all kinds prowl within the London fog―and not all of them are out for blood…
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Janie believes there’s a best way to do everything. When she sticks to a schedule, she and her mom can tackle anything. But Janie’s perfect schedule—and her life—are getting shaken up this year. Her new stepmom, Keisha, is moving in, along with her daughter, Makayla.
Worst of all? Makayla brings a cat with her. And Janie hates cats.
Even though it’s hard, Janie tries to welcome Makayla to her new school. And honestly, she maybe does too good a job. Soon, Makayla is volunteering with Janie’s beloved Sunshine Club, and Janie’s friends all love her. The only one who pays any attention to her anymore is Makayla’s nosy cat. It feels like her new sister is taking over! What’s a gal to do with a copycat in her life?
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Thirty years ago, a young woman was murdered, a family was lynched, and New Orleans saw the greatest magical massacre in its history. In the days that followed, a throne was stolen from a queen.
On the anniversary of these brutal events, Clement and Cristina Trudeau—the sixteen-year-old twin heirs to the powerful, magical, dethroned family—are mourning their father and caring for their sick mother. Until, by chance, they discover their mother isn’t sick—she’s cursed. Cursed by someone on the very magic council their family used to rule. Someone who will come for them next.
Cristina, once a talented and dedicated practitioner of Generational magic, has given up magic for good. An ancient spell is what killed their father and she was the one who cast it. For Clement, magic is his lifeline. A distraction from his anger and pain. Even better than the random guys he hooks up with.
Cristina and Clement used to be each other’s most trusted confidant and friend, now they barely speak. But if they have any hope of discovering who is coming after their family, they’ll have to find a way to trust each other and their family’s magic, all while solving the decades-old murder that sparked the still-rising tensions between the city’s magical and non-magical communities. And if they don’t succeed, New Orleans may see another massacre. Or worse.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Ranita Atwater is “getting short.”
She is almost done with her four-year sentence for opiate possession at Oak Hills Correctional Center. With three years of sobriety, she is determined to stay clean and regain custody of her two children.
My name is Ranita, and I’m an addict, she has said again and again at recovery meetings. But who else is she? Who might she choose to become? As she claims the story housed within her pomegranate-like heart, she is determined to confront the weight of the past and discover what might lie beyond mere survival.
Ranita is regaining her freedom, but she’s leaving behind her lover Maxine, who has inspired her to imagine herself and the world differently. Now she must steer clear of the temptations that have pulled her down, while atoning for her missteps and facing old wounds. With a fierce, smart, and sometimes funny voice, Ranita reveals how rocky and winding the path to wellness is for a Black woman, even as she draws on family, memory, faith, and love in order to choose life.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Could I one day inspire happiness in others, the same way he seemed to do in me?
It’s 2005 and Harley has dropped out of college to move home, back to rural England where he works a dead-end job at a movie theater. Estranged from his father and finding every attempt at happiness futile, he is on the verge of making a devastating final decision. Fortunately for him, things don’t go according to plan, and his attempt on his own life is interrupted by his new roommate, Muddy.
Muddy is everything Harley is not: white, ostensibly heterosexual, freewheeling, confident in his masculinity. Despite their differences, a deep friendship blossoms between them when Muddy takes Harley under his wing and shows him everything that, in his eyes, makes life worth living: birdwatching, karaoke, rugby, and the band Oasis.
But this newfound friendship is complicated. It has enormous repercussions for the pair’s romantically entangled friend group—with Chelsea, an overbearing striver whose generosity they begrudgingly rely on; with Finlay, her raffish and uncouth boyfriend; and with Noria, who despite her simmering confidence is smarting from a series of unreturned affections. And then there’s the violent affair with an older man that Harley finds himself slipping back into…
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Elsie is a sexy, funny, and fiercely independent woman in south London. But, at just 28, she is also tired. Though she spends her days writing tender poetry in her journal, her nights are spent working long hours for minimum wage at a neighborhood dive bar. Not even sleeping with her alluring coworker, Bea, can quell her existential dread. The difficulty of being estranged from her family, struggle of being continually rejected from jobs, and fear of never making money doing what she loves is too great. But Elsie is determined to keep the faith, for a little longer at least. Things will surely turn around. They have to.
But when Elsie is suddenly evicted from her social housing, her fragile foundations threaten to collapse entirely. With nowhere left to go, Elsie turns to her childhood friend, Juliet, for help.
Among Juliet’s mismatched cushions and shelves lined with trinkets, Elsie is able to breathe for the first time in years. But between their reruns of Drag Race and nights smoking on the balcony, something else soon begins to glimmer in Elsie’s heart . . . Sometimes what you’ve been searching for has been there all along. Can Elsie see it in time?
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Ellie Engle doesn’t stand out. Not at home, where she’s alone with her pet fish since her dad moved away and her mom has to work around the clock . Not at the bakery, where she helps out old Mr. Walker on the weekends. And definitely not at school, where her best friend Abby—the coolest, boldest, most talented girl in the world—drags Ellie along on her never-ending quest to “make her mark.” To someone else, a life in the shadows might seem boring, or lonely. But not to Ellie. As long as she has Abby by her side and a comic book in her hand, she’s quite content.
Too bad life didn’t bother checking in with Ellie. Because when a freak earthquake hits her small town, Ellie wakes up with the power to bring anything back to life with just her touch. And when a video of her using her powers suddenly goes viral, Ellie’s life goes somewhere she never imagined—or wanted: straight into the spotlight.
Surviving middle school is hard enough. Surviving middle school when paparazzi are camped out on your front lawn and an international pop singer wants you to use your powers on live tv and you might be in love with your best friend but she doesn’t know it? Absolutely impossible.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Mickey Hayward dreams of writing stories that matter. She has a flashy media job that makes her feel successful and a devoted girlfriend who takes care of her when she comes home exhausted and demoralized. It’s not all A-list parties and steamy romance, but Mickey’s on her way, and it’s far from the messy life she left behind in Maryland. Despite being overlooked and mistreated at work, it seems like she might finally get the chance to prove herself–until she finds out she’s being replaced.
Distraught and enraged, Mickey fires back with a detailed letter outlining the racism and sexism she’s endured as a Black woman in media, certain it will change the world for the better. But when her letter is met with overwhelming silence, Mickey is sent into a tailspin of self-doubt. Forced to reckon with just how fragile her life is–including the uncertainty of her relationship–she flees to the last place she ever dreamed she would run to, her hometown, desperate for a break from her troubles.
Back home, Mickey is seduced by the simplicity of her old life–and the flirtation of a former flame–but her life in New York refuses to be forgotten. When a media scandal catapults Mickey’s forgotten letter into the public zeitgeist, suddenly everyone wants to hear what Mickey has to say. It’s what she’s always wanted–isn’t it?
Buy it: Amazon | IndieBound
THE BSE (Best Summer Ever) LIST!
1. Blueberries
2. Art show in ShoeHorn
3. Lizzo concert
4. Thrift shop pop-up
5. Skinny Dipping at the lake house
6. Amusement Park Day!
7. Drew Barrymarathon
8. Paintball day
Oh, and ….
9. Fall out of love with Hailee
Andrea Williams has got this. The Best Summer Ever. Two summers ago, she spent all her time in bed, recovering from the latest surgery for her cerebral palsy. She’s waited too long for adventure and thrills to enter her life. Together with her crew of ride-or-die friends, and the best parents anyone could ask for (just don’t tell them that), she’s going to live it up.
There’s just one thing that could ruin it: Her best friend, Hailee, finding out Andrea’s true feelings. So Andrea WILL fall out of love with Hailee – even if it means dating the cute boy George who keeps showing up everywhere with a smile.
Do we want Andrea to succeed? No! Does she? We’re not telling!
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
In 2019, R.K. Russell broke the mold when he came out as bisexual in an essay for ESPN that ignited the sports world. Now, in his powerful memoir, The Yards Between Us, he shares his story and explores his love of football, men and women, walking the devastating tightrope of keeping his sexuality secret, the tension between his private and public lives, and the importance of crashing through barriers.
Told through the people and moments that have shaped him, Russell traces the highs and lows of his life in and out of football, from his early life as a shy kid struggling with the expectations on a Black boy and the pull between his quiet nature and his athletic ability, to being drafted by his hometown team the Dallas Cowboys, and then on to seasons with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Buffalo Bills. And as his time in the sport comes into full bloom, Russell realizes that keeping his secret in the NFL is easier than in college when life and football are so much more connected to social worlds.
Through being cut, injured, and frustrating setbacks, Russell’s confidence lags as the secret of his sexuality weighs heavier and heavier. And when that frustration is combined with the devastating loss of his best friend and sole confidant, the darkness that follows also brings a deep understanding that perhaps it’s time to make a change. In Los Angeles, against the backdrop of the swaying palm trees and warm sands of Malibu, Russell falls in love and it’s the final push he needs to stand up for every part of himself—a professional athlete, a writer, a son, a friend, a lover, a bisexual Black man. In The Yards Between Us, R.K. Russell shows us the life-changing power of embracing who you are and fighting to make space so others can do the same.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Transness is as varied and colorful as magic can be. In Transmogrify!, you’ll embark on fourteen different adventures alongside unforgettable characters who embody many different genders and expressions and experiences—because magic is for everyone, and that is cause for celebration.
Featuring stories from:
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
I’m safe here.
That’s how Sadie feels, on a perfect summer day, wrapped in her girlfriend’s arms. School is out, and even though she’s been struggling to manage her chronic anxiety, Sadie is hopeful better times are ahead. Or at least, she thought she was safe. When her girlfriend reveals some unexpected news and the two witness a violent incident of police brutality unfold before them, Sadie’s whole world is upended in an instant.
I’m not safe anywhere.
That’s how Sadie feels every day after—vulnerable, uprooted. She retreats inside as the weeks slip by and relies on her phone to stay connected to the outside world. When Sadie’s therapist gives her a diagnosis for her debilitating panic—agoraphobia—she starts on a path of acceptance and healing. Meanwhile, Sadie’s best friend, Evan, updates her on the protests taking place in their city. Sadie wants to be a part of it, to use her voice and affect change. But how do you show up for your community when you can’t even leave your house?
I can build a safe place inside myself.
That’s what Sadie learns over the course of one life-changing summer, with some help from her family, her best friend, an online platform for activists, and a magnetic crush she develops for the new boy next door.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
In the shared and private spaces of Iowa City, a loose circle of lovers and friends encounter, confront, and provoke one another in a volatile year of self-discovery. At the group’s center are Ivan, a dancer turned aspiring banker who dabbles in amateur pornography; Fatima, whose independence and work ethic complicates her relationships with friends and a trusted mentor; and Noah, who “didn’t seek sex out so much as it came up to him like an anxious dog in need of affection.” These three are buffeted by a cast of poets, artists, landlords, meat-packing workers, and mathematicians who populate the cafes, classrooms, and food-service kitchens of Iowa City, sometimes to violent and electrifying consequence. Finally, as each prepares for an uncertain future, the group heads to a cabin to bid goodbye to their former lives—a moment of reckoning that leaves each of them irrevocably altered.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Unlike her private school classmates, 17-year-old and Yale-bound Kennedy Devon wasn’t born into a life of privilege. In fact, Kennedy and her mother are homeless. Kennedy refuses to be pitied, so she hides her secret from her friends and her girlfriend, Gwen Clark.
Kennedy’s secret is discovered when Senator Clark, her girlfriend’s father, finds out she’s homeless. Kennedy blackmails him into giving her a home and then some because she wants power and opportunity, to be a future President. He agrees that if she becomes his summer intern and excels, he’ll mentor her through the world of politics.
Only, at her internship, she discovers that Senator Clark is hiding a scandal so explosive it could tarnish his legacy.
Now Kennedy is caught between being loyal to the girl she loves, the senator who can wreck her life, and the country she hopes to serve. Because somebody’s life is going to implode, and she needs to make sure it’s not her own.
Buy it: Amazon
Charity Curtis has the summer job of her dreams, playing the “final girl” at Camp Mirror Lake. Guests pay to be scared in this full-contact terror game, as Charity and her summer crew recreate scenes from a classic slasher film, Curse of Camp Mirror Lake. The more realistic the fear, the better for business.
But the last weekend of the season, Charity’s co-workers begin disappearing. And when one ends up dead, Charity’s role as the final girl suddenly becomes all too real. If Charity and her girlfriend Bezi hope to survive the night, they’ll need figure out what this killer is after. Is there is more to the story of Mirror Lake and its dangerous past than Charity ever suspected?
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Peaches Monroe and Jamie Hunt are core members of their Texas friend squad and have so much in common. They’re successful at their careers in personal care. They take Austin’s “Keep It Weird” vibe to heart, each leaning into their own unique talents and sense of style. And they’re both ready to go on to even bigger things. Is pushing past the boundaries of friendship into something deeper one of them? The red-hot fantasy is there…but so is real life.
Jamie’s college dreams will take her far from her hometown. She’s already road-tripping to possibilities from San Antonio to Houston. And Peaches has obligations of her own. Not only is she planning to expand her business, but she’s taking care of her family after her mother’s passing, leaving her overwhelmed and under pressure.
No matter how perfect Jamie and Peaches are for each other, is this the right time for romance? Finding their true selves comes first. Only then can they hope to pursue a future of lasting love—together.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Heavy is the crown James has been born to wear, especially as the first Black heir to the British throne. But with his father’s recent passing, and with a new boyfriend to hide, James is woefully unprepared for the sudden shine of public scrutiny.
When his secrets come spilling forth across tabloid pages and the man he thought he loved has suddenly disappeared, James finds himself on the precipice of ruin. As every detail of his life becomes public knowledge, his sense of safety is shattered and the people he trusts the most become the likeliest suspects.
What dangers lurk behind the palace walls—and will the new king find out before it’s too late?
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Don’t go outside past dark. Come straight home after church. And above all—never, ever, go into Red Wood.
These are the rules Latavia’s aunt tells her as soon as she arrives in Sanctum, Alabama for the summer. Weird, but Latavia isn’t here to solve any scary small town mysteries; she’s here for six weeks and six weeks only, and then she’s off to college and won’t look back. Still, Sanctum has its perks—mainly, the cute girl who works at the local ice cream shop.
But Latavia can’t ignore how strange her aunt’s tiny town is. The residents are suspicious of her and at times hostile, and it’s clear she’s some kind of outsider. That’s proven when Latavia is dragged out of her house in the dead of night, into the forbidden Red Wood, and presented as a human sacrifice to an ancient monster.
Latavia won’t be eaten without a fight. She’ll do whatever she has to do to survive—even if that includes making a deal with the monster, endangering her crush and family, and even risk turning into a monster herself.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
This is the third and final book in the Nightmare-verse
Alice and her crew are doing their best to recover from the last boss battle, but some of them keep having these. . . dreams: visions of a dark past―and an even darker future. Sadly, the evil in Wonderland may not be as defeated as they’d hoped.
Attacked by Nightmares unlike any they’ve ever seen, Alice will have to step between the coming darkness and the mortal world once more. But this time is different. This time, the monsters aren’t waiting for her on the other side of the Veil.
They’re in her own back yard.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Alex Wise feels like his world is ending. His best friend, Loren, is leaving town for the summer, his former friend and maybe sort of crush Sky hasn’t spoken to him since he ditched Alex on first day of sixth grade, and now his mom is sending him and his annoying younger sister, Mags, on a cruise with the dad who abandoned them. And, as if things couldn’t get worse, a creepy shadow monster may or may not be stalking him.
But none of this could prepare Alex for the actual end of the world. Too bad that is exactly what’s coming, after the definitely-real Shadow Man kidnaps Mags and she is possessed by the ancient spirit of Death—one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Luckily (depending on who you ask), Alex is possessed as well by a powerful god who imbues Alex with their powers in an effort to stop the Horsemen…if he can figure out how to use them. So begins an epic battle between good and evil: Alex, Loren, a grumpy demi-god, and Alex’s fourth grade teacher vs. Death, Pestilence, Famine, War, and the waves of chaos and destruction they bring to LA and soon the rest of the globe. Just your average summer vacation.
Alex is more used to being left behind than leading the way, but now he’s the only one who can save his sister—and the world. That is, if he can unlock his new powers and and see himself as the hero he is.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Regent Academy has a long and storied history in the small, sleepy town of Winslow, Vermont. But so does the vast, dense forest that surrounds its campus. While the prestigious school is known for molding teens into world leaders, its history is far more nefarious—and far more entangled with the forest—than anyone could begin to suspect.
Seventeen-year-old Douglas Jones wants nothing to do with Regent’s king-making; he’s just trying to forget his past and survive his present. But then a student is killed and, by the next day, no one remembers him ever exiting, except for Douglas and the groundskeeper’s son, Everett Everley. As Douglas begins to research what he finds to be a centuries-long curse in the town, he and Everett awaken a horror hidden within the forest. And to save the town, and the school, the forest wants more blood as payment. The question is, will Douglas and Everett be able to pay the debt?
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Delphine’s life is made up of secrets. About her job, her sexual identity, and even her past.
She coasts along on a tide of half-truths until a familiar “straight” woman splashes deeper into her world, threatening her tenuous peace of mind.
This woman wants to be everything Delphine has never had before – a confidant, a seductress, a trusted lover. By giving in to this siren, is Delphine setting herself up for heartbreak?
Buy it: Amazon
It’s like I keep stumbling into a dark room, searching for the switch to make things bright again. To make me remember. But the switch isn’t there. Was it there before?
Sade Hussein is starting her third year of high school, this time at the prestigious Alfred Nobel Academy boarding school. After being home-schooled all her life and feeling like a magnet for misfortune, she’s not sure what will happen. What she doesn’t expect though is for her roommate Elizabeth to disappear after Sade’s first night. Or for people to think she had something to do with it.
With rumors swirling around her, Sade catches the attention of the most popular girls in school – collectively known as the ‘Unholy Trinity’ – and they bring her into their fold. Between learning more about them – especially Persephone, who Sade finds herself drawn to – playing catch-up in class, and trying to figure out what happened to Elizabeth, Sade has a lot on her plate. It doesn’t help that she’s already dealing with grief from the many tragedies in her family.
And then a student is found dead.
The more Sade investigates, the more she realizes there’s more to Alfred Nobel Academy and its students than she realized. Secrets lurk around every corner and beneath every surface…secrets that rival even her own.
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Buy it: Amazon | IndieBound
This post contains titles published by HarperCollins. Please note that the HarperCollins Union has been on strike since 11/10/22 to get a fair contract for their workers, and this site very much supports that effort. Visit the HarperCollins Union linktree to learn how you can support their fight for a fair contract: linktr.ee/hcpunion.
This is the sequel to Cameron Battle and the Hidden Kingdoms
After his first adventure as the Descendant, Cameron can’t sit through seventh grade classes. Especially when his mother is still trapped in Chidani and his father is still missing. But he encounters a particularly nasty bully in his new school, and it doesn’t take long for Cameron and his trusty friends Zion and Aliyah to realize that the troubles of Chidani won’t stay away for long.
With the Book to guide them, Cameron and his crew end up transported to Chidani sooner than anticipated–and the gods and goddesses they encounter don’t intend to make Cameron’s journey easy. Can he finally outwit and outlast the villainous god set on destroying their worlds?
Buy it: Bookshop | Amazon | IndieBound
Continue reading TBRainbow Alert: 2023 MG and YA Starring QTBIPoC
