Year of Queer Lit

June is here and that means it is time to celebrate with books. This list has something for everyone, organized by genre so you can skip straight to your corner of queer lit and find your next read. Happy Pride, friends.

Sapphic Fantasy

Can’t Spell Treason Without Tea by Rebecca Thorne
Two badass women, an established sapphic relationship, a bookshop that serves tea, and a murderous queen throwing the world’s biggest temper tantrum. Cozy fantasy with actual stakes and all the warmth you need.

M/M Romance

We Could Be So Good by Cat Sebastian
A 1950s New York newsroom, two men slowly falling for each other while the world tells them they cannot, and prose so tender it will make your chest hurt. This is slow burn at its most beautiful.

Sapphic Romance

One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston
A cynical college student falls for a gorgeous girl who is somehow stuck in time on the train. It is funny and swoony and delightfully weird and the sapphic romance at the center of it is absolutely everything.

Mystery

Scorched Grace by Margot Douaihy
Sister Holiday is a tattooed, chain smoking nun investigating a murder at her New Orleans school. She is one of the most unforgettable protagonists in recent queer fiction and this book is sharp, atmospheric, and completely unlike anything else you will read this year.

Sci-Fi

Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
Okay I have to be honest with you. This book was not for me. I tried, I really did. But I also know that I am apparently one of about twelve people who feel that way because the rest of the queer lit world is absolutely feral about it. Necromancers in space, a locked room mystery, a sardonic swordswoman with incredible one liners, and one of the most beloved sapphic dynamics in modern fantasy. If you have not read it yet, Pride Month is your sign.

YA

Pet by Akwaeke Emezi
In a future city that has supposedly eliminated all monsters, a creature emerges from a painting to tell a young trans girl that something dangerous is hiding in plain sight. It is a YA novel about the cost of saying everything is fine when it is not, written with extraordinary care by a nonbinary Nigerian author. Short, powerful, and unforgettable.

Memoir

I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together by Maurice Vellekoop
A stunning graphic memoir about a gay man reckoning with the secrets and silences of his deeply religious family, his own sexuality, and a life lived in the space between who he was raised to be and who he actually is. The art is gorgeous and the honesty is breathtaking.

Paranormal

Payback’s a Witch by Lana Harper
Emilia is back in her magical hometown for the annual witch games and has absolutely no intention of staying, until she meets two very compelling reasons to reconsider. This is a warm, funny, inclusive paranormal romance with a bisexual lead and the coziest possible vibes. Perfect Pride Month comfort read.

Horror

You Weren’t Meant to Be Human by Andrew Joseph White
Alien meets Midsommar in rural West Virginia. Crane is a trans, autistic, nonverbal man devoted to a sentient alien hive that gives him the life he always wanted, until the hive makes a demand he cannot refuse. This is visceral, unflinching queer body horror that will stay with you long after you finish it. Please check the author’s full trigger warning list at andrewjosephwhite.com before picking this one up. This is not a book to go in blind.

Nine books, nine genres, nine very different ways to celebrate Pride Month through queer lit. Drop a comment and tell me which one you are grabbing first, and come celebrate with us in the Discord all month long for the first annual UNO Reading Challenge!

Join us here: https://discord.gg/6fb475q76B