LGBTQ+ Literature Recommendations

I'd recommend Tommy's Tale by Alan Cumming. The ending left a stupid-looking smile on my face.

Father of Frankenstein by Christopher Bram, a fiction novel about the life of James Whale, director of Frankenstein and The Invisible Man is a great book. It even got made into a movie, Gods and Monsters.

edited 27th Mar '15 1:02:38 PM by JohnWalrus

If you want some more heady period literature, The Price of Salt and the Color Purple are both good classic works with lesbian and/or bisexual protagonists. Both have a lot of ambiguity though and some brutal themes, so be forewarned. The Color Purple at least has a pretty good ending.

If you're looking for published genre stuff, The Exile And The Sorcerer by Jane Fletcher is ok heroic fantasy. It doesn't move very quick but hey, magical lesbian amazons. I haven't read past the first book though. I've also enjoyed The Lady Knight by L.J. Baker, but this is like, REALLY corny medieval romance stuff, just with lesbians in it. Can you sense a pattern?

And if you're willing to read some amateur fiction that has a lot of heart, Kinda Super Gay and The Solstice War are pretty cool. Kinda Super Gay is a comedic superhero fiction with gay characters, while The Solstice War is world war 2 fantasy with a ton of gay, lesbian, and even transgender/gender nonconforming characters. Both are super fun in my opinion even if they aren't like, professional level and well worth it for some gay reading.

edited 12th Apr '15 1:26:36 PM by Nanoka

Jacqueline Carey, in particular santa olivia and saints astray.

Everything ever written by Nicola Griffith.

Swordspoint and sequels, Ellen Kushner.

Melissa Scott - In particular I would draw your attention to the order of the air omnibus which is currently ridiculously cheap on kindle.

I wish I could recommend the Psychic City series, which is Urban fantasy with a side of gay and lesbian romance and (nonsexual) comedy, but it seems to have disappeared off amazon, and that was the only place to get it.

That is not to say I don't have recommendations, though. I do enjoy lesbian romance, especially in fantasy or sci-fi settings. Here's a few recommendations (though all are likely only available through Amazon):

If you don't mind over-erotic stuff (which bugged me, though not enough to stop reading, because the book was damn good), try Crucible of Changes: Forging Day. It's strange, hilarious, and damn good, being about a world where 1/3 of the population gets turned into various fantasy races and the main character, who became a dark elf, has to stop her ex-boyfriend, who became a werewolf, from killing her and her two new lovers. It's better than it sounds, trust me.

If you're looking for a short read, try Artificial Sky. It's about a woman who falls in love with a fully sentient robot that she helped build. The problem I had with it is that it is short, so you don't se the reasons for the love or the consequences of the decision she makes at the end.

My favorite take on the vampire-werewolf love thing: Awakened by Shei Darksbane. It's the first in a series, and involves our hapless heroine, Dakota Shepard, gaining access to hellfire, and discovering she's a werewolf and the woman she has a crush on is a vampire. It's quite good, though I won't spoil anything else about it.

To Be Unbroken is about a woman who fell under a curse that caused her to turn to stone if she fell in love and out of it. She then spends the next 2700ish years in stone, only able to walk about in her true form at night, searching for her lost lover. It's a great read, if occasionally annoying with the couple that own her statue and know her true nature.

Others I have ready to read, but haven't yet (stars mean I only have a sample. No star means I've read the sample and decided to buy the book, question marks indicate I'm, not 100% on the genre, but I am certain about the girl on girl pairing). Don't take these as recommendations, but options to pursue if you desire:

• Star Angel (Lesbian sci fi)*
• Nova: the Dark Reach Wars volume 1 (Lesbian sci fi)*
• Regrets of The Fallen (Lesbian Fantasy)
• Techromance Scrolls: Adept (Lesbian Science fantasy?)*
• Darkness Descends: The Silver Legacy Book 1 (Lesbian supernatural fantasy) Currently reading, and it's quite good if very dark
• Bound Together by Corinn Heathers (Lesbian Urban Fantasy?)*

edited 19th Sep '15 12:08:35 AM by Acebrock

I would suggest Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. I absolutely adored it when I read it, and I will admit, I was brought to tears more than once.

Side note: apologies for the numerous edits, I'm still learning the markup.

edited 21st Jan '16 12:49:03 PM by SNEAKYSandSquid

Goodreads has tons and tons of lists. The Left Hand of Darkness is my all time favorite exploration of gender in literature, and it works well for those who don't want more sexually explicate relationships in their books, too.

I would recommend Tipping the Velvet . Great at immersing you into the setting of Victorian England.

I've been looking through Good Reads lists and I'm having difficulty finding something I'm into and could do with a good recommendation. Most of what I keep finding is either erotica (not what I'm looking for) or its some 'gay slave boy' premise with a dom/sub thing going on and I'm equally not interested into that cliche.

I'm usually into more Fantasy series but Si-fi isn't out of the question. I'm looking for a gay male romance. Preferably something that doesn't have some 'Its so hard to be gay' tone or conclusion to it.

I know it sounds like I'm being overly negative on what I'm looking for, but after spending hours on Goodreads looking for something good to pick up, I'm finding its easier to define what is turning me off to a book than what's catching my interest.

I haven't read it myself yet, but a while ago I picked up an e-book on the recommendation of a blog I follow. The book is called 'Blood and Clockwork'. Like I said, I haven't read it so I can't tell you if it's good, but the premise sounded interesting enough and like it fits what you're looking for.

I picked it up. It was kind of just ok. I appreciate the recommendation, but it ended up kind of unsatisfying. Most if not almost all of the mysteries the novel presents go unanswered by the end of the story and it felt like a lot of those ended up being excuse plots to facilitate the romantic subplot instead and even that kind of felt a tang bit... insta-romance? If it were apart of a larger series or just the first 10 chapters of a novel, I wouldn't care, but I think this is it.

Like, The story has 10 chapters, but they don't actually do a whole ton during those 10 chapters. A lot of the puzzles are either 'turn the key and make sure you get cut so there's blood to power the machine' or they're solved in about a paragraph or so rather than something to actually be solved. The romance felt a bit off because I totally understood the attraction between the characters, but they don't really know much of anything about each other before one of them is deciding to jump ship from our world to the POV character's which... considering it doesn't sound like he has a bad life or any ulterior motive to abandon his home, I just call bullshit that spending about a single day with a guy would make you abandon everything. I get the impression that the writer really just wanted to write the romance (since most of the mysteries get brought up and then never answered), but they didn't give the two any real serious connection or reason to be besides 'You're cute and you're strange, crass, and absurd way of talking is attractive'. Neither of them seem to have much in the way of conflict either. The POV Character has some in regards to being uncomfortable with being asexual because of how his society views sex and sexuality (potential romantic conflict?), but its not really relevant to the action so its just a cool bit of representation more than anything.

Not trying to sound critical. Just sharing my thoughts for anyone who was curious about the same novel.

I liked Lord of the White Hell, but it has a bit of a "oh no, being gay is so difficult" thing to it because although the main character has absolutely no issue with his own sexuality, one of the cultures involved is all "oh no, being gay is the bad". The following books lost my interest because the author didn't follow through with the "oh no, being gay is so bad" culture. Somehow everything ended with a neat happy bow in an environment where it really shouldn't have. It was annoying.

And I think that's all I got. In high school I had a Midas Touch of Gay where every book I picked up at random would end up having some homosexual romance in it, but that doesn't mean any of them were good.

Yeah. I seem to be running into the same problem it seems. Most anything I find is erotica or its some 'coming of age/being gay sucks but its ok to be gay' story and I really hate to complain about that last one since there ARE people in high school and college who need those stories, but I'm still so tired of that being it.

It's funny: I'm actually writing a very weird, involved fantasy story with quite a bit of gay stuff afoot, and part of my motivation is so wonderfully crystallised in the fact that I can't name a good book to recommend you in that vein. Maybe if I did some digging, sure, but nothing particularly accessible.

For classic YA, Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden would work.

edited 8th Feb '17 5:25:21 PM by DreamCord

I really enjoy Dreadnought - Nemesis by April Daniels. It's a superhero story about a transgender girl. The superhero plot is admittedly flawed, but I really love some characters in the story, especially the protagonist.

I recommend the graphic novel Fun Home.It's written and illustrated by Alison Bechdel about her own life and coming to terms with her sexuality. It is absolutely stunning.

I don't read as much as I used to, but if you are into Greek mythology, Song of Achilles is an excellent read. It retells The Iliad from the POV of Patroclus and in this book he is in a relationship with Achilles. The depiction is lovely that i always can imagine the protagonist's inner life and emotion. And it isn't a complete sausage party like many gay romance or Greek mythology tale as it has 2 solid prominent supporting female characters as well.

I would not recommend Andrew Holleran. Yes, he's highly regarded for some reason, but I found his characters to be unrelatable.

I have my own:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B079SSP8X2

Btw its running a free prommotion right now.

Does anyone have LGBT recommendations without romance or at least where it's not the main focus? I don't generally read too-romantic stuff, particularly YA stuff with a shoehorned love triangle XD;

edited 4th May '18 10:56:01 AM by lalalei2001

I recently read a book called The Stars Are Legion by Kameron Hurley. It has an all-female cast of characters, and it does have some romance, even if the romance isn't the driving force of the story.

It can be a bit bleak at times, mostly due to the harsh and unforgiving setting, but I consider it a good kind of bleak: enough to make you feel like the place is a really dangerous and crappy place to live in, but still leaves enough of a light at the end of a tunnel.

Thanks! :)

I know the comment is old, but I can maybe recommend The Company Of Death, a Zombie Apocalypse/sci-fi/fantasy novel. It has no explicit romantic arc, but it has an at least biromantic main character (who may or may not be asexual?), and one lesbian character in a flashback. Also, the vampire Leif sure as hell likes to ogle the male human lead, although whether it's only as a delicious snack or as possibly something else is up for debate.

Outside of that though, it's a damn entertaining book, its only problem being that as the first in a trilogy it's more of a Prolonged Prologue.

Edited by Lyendith on Apr 27th 2019 at 2:32:43 PM