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Red, White & Royal Blue meets Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell in debut author Freya Marske’s A Marvellous Light, featuring an Edwardian England full of magic, contracts, and conspiracies. Discover a fantasy of very bad manners when harried baronet Robin Blythe is mistakenly assigned as the civil service liaison to a hidden magical bureaucracy. Now he must contend with a deadly curse, a dangerous conspiracy, and Edwin Courcey, his cold and prickly magician counterpart, who clearly wishes Robin were anyone and anywhere else.
It’s the last newsletter send of the year! And what a year it’s been. Personally, I’ve seen a lot of change this year in my personal life, even more so than 2020. It’s left me in a good spot, and although I’m loathe to go into the new year with any sort of expectations at all, at least I know there are plenty of great queer books to look forward to then.
This week, I’m promoting a nonprofit close to Book Riot’s heart: EveryLibrary. It’s an organization that fights censorship in U.S. libraries, which if you’ve been paying attention this year, you know is at new heights, especially targeting LGBTQ and BIPOC books. We just ran a matching campaign that finished yesterday, but they could still use your support. Even if you can’t donate, Americans can sign a petition to support the freedom to read for all.
My Favorite Queer Reads of 2021
For this last newsletter of 2021, I can’t resist sharing with your some of my favourite queer reads of the year. While I set out to make this just my favourites that I picked up this year, because I was reading so much front list for All the Books, I believe they all ended up 2021 releases. It’s mostly sapphic books, because that’s most of what I read.
These aren’t in any particular order. It was hard to narrow it down to 10; there were plenty of other great queer books I read this year, including Cool for the Summer by Dahlia Adler and One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston, but here is just a selection of the reads that stuck with me this year.
Milk Fed by Melissa Broder
This was a reading experience like no other. I don’t recommend it lightly, because it really puts you in the head of someone who has an eating disorder and obsesses over her weight. I found myself reading this compulsively, unable to tear my eyes away from the page. Rachel falls in love with a fat woman, and the experience changes how she thinks about food and her body. It’s also about Judaism, her relationship with her mother, and discovering her bisexuality. It’s uncomfortable and engrossing, and I found it so cathartic to read. It’s a book that asks, What is your worst fear of your body? Isn’t that person worthy of love?
The Heartbreak Bakery by A.R. Capetta
I had to suppress a shriek of delight after finishing this book. It’s such a celebration of queerness. It feels like a hug. It’s about Syd, a nonbinary baker who processes a recent breakup by making brownies — and then everyone who eats them breaks up, including the owners of the Proud Muffin. Syd and the genderfluid bakery delivery person, Harley, have to try to track down everyone who ate them and repair the damage. It’s fun, lightly magical, and has so much queer representation — including a polyam brunch.
A Dowry of Blood by S.T. Gibson: This is a queer polyamorous take on the brides of Dracula! It’s bloody, sexy, and feminist. It’s also a story about an abusive relationship, so be prepared for that going in.
The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo: I hope you’ve already heard of this incredibly queer Vietnamese American retelling of The Great Gatsby. Not only is Gatsby/Nick made textual, but it’s told from Jordan’s perspective, who is bisexual. This is beautifully written with an undercurrent of magic.
Unbroken by C.L. Clark: I finished this in April and feel like I’m still processing it. It’s a military fantasy about a colonial occupation, and it makes for a thought-provoking and sometimes brutal read. The F/F relationship is hardly a fairytale romance, but it completely pulled me in.
Follow Your Arrow by Jessica Verdi: I haven’t heard anyone else talking about this book, which is frustrating, because I think it’s such a great examination of biphobia. If you liked Perfect On Paper, give this one a try.
The Meet Cute Diary by Emery Lee: This is such an intriguing take on the fake dating trope. I love that the main character is flawed, and we see his growth throughout the book. The nonbinary side character Devin steals the show, in my opinion.
Indestructible Object by Mary McCoy: I loved this book’s take on having to “represent” bisexuality well, and this is another one with a messy, flawed main character. It also explores polyamory, with a focus I haven’t seen in YA before.
Rise to the Sun by Leah Johnson: This was an amazing summer read, especially because it’s set at a music festival. At the same time that it has a cute F/F romance, though, it also discusses gun violence and sexual harassment, giving this story a lot of depth.
The Reckless Kind by Carly Heath: Please pick this historical YA book over the holidays! It’s queer teens who need to win a winter horse race to save the family farm! But it’s also about disability (including internalized ableism), queerness, and belonging. There is an M/M relationship as well as an asexual (and possible aromantic?) main character, with the three of them forming a queerplatonic found family.
Censorship Corner
As promised, I’m not collecting all the stories of anti-queer book censorship, but here are a few overviews that are worth checking out.
- “There is no one better than queer kids to tell us that book bans do a lot more harm than good.”
- A Texas public library will close for 3 days as librarians hunt for kids’ books about LGBTQ issues and antiracism.
- Juno Dawson wrote a piece for the Guardian called It’s 2021 and once again they’re banning books. What message does that send?: “What sort of message would removing the title from libraries send out to those kids? That they’re shameful? That they’re sinful? They ought to be hidden from sight? I feared it would force them to the back of the closet.”
- “As a scholar who has written a book and many articles on the history of obscenity law, I can assert with absolute certainty that such targeted books in North Hunterdon as Jonathan Evison’s Lawn Boy and Maia Kobabe’s Gender Queer categorically do not meet the legal standards for obscenity. They don’t even come close.“
All the Links Fit to Click
- LGBTQ holiday reads to make the Yuletide gay.
- 15 Incredible Books By Trans, Genderqueer, and Non-Binary Authors Released In 2021
- Here are some of the most anticipated LGBTQ+ YA books from the first half of 2022!
- A history of the early decades of queer YA.
- Baba Yaga is a lesbian.
- Here’s some gay fiction set in Italy.
- Revisiting Fried Green Tomatoes, 30 years later.
- On December 15, 1928, The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall hit US bookstores.
- Patricia Highsmith: Her Diaries and Notebooks: 1941–1995 was reviewed at the LA Review of Books.
- Malinda Lo was interviewed at NPR about winning a National Book Award for Last Night at the Telegraph Club.
- Lee Lai was interviewed at Electric Literature about her graphic novel Stone Fruit.
- Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore was interviewed at the Rumpus about her book Between Certain Death and a Possible Future: Queer Writing on Growing Up with the AIDS Crisis.
Don’t forget you can get three free audiobooks at Audiobooks.com with a free trial!
LGBTQ Book Riot Posts
- Love That Queer Book? Read This Queer Comic!
- 10 Queer Fantasy Romances to Warm Your Cold, Cold Heart
- “I Know It When I See It”: Who Pulled Gender Queer from Wake County Library Shelves?
- Book Riot Will Match Your Donations to EveryLibrary to Challenge Censorship
- From the vault: 7 Rules for Making a Modern Gay Villain
New Releases This Week (& Next)
This is a pretty slow time for publishing, but there are still some titles worth checking out! Since there isn’t any newsletter going out next week, I’ve lumped in the few December 28th releases here, too.
If You Love Something by Jayce Ellis (M/M Romance)
DeShawn just got a phone call that will change everything. His grandmother is terminally ill and is leaving half of her estate to DeShawn’s husband, Malik. To make things more complicated, he didn’t think he had a husband anymore: turns out, the divorce wasn’t completely finalized. Now his shady uncle is contesting the will, and to get the lawsuit thrown out, DeShawn and Malik have to convince everyone they’re back together. It’s fake dating, but it’s also a second chance romance!
The Midnight Girls by Alicia Jasinska (F/F YA Fantasy)
Would you believe there are two sapphic monster girl love stories on this list?? What a gift. This follows Marynka and Zosia, rival witches’ apprentices who are competing for the prince’s heart — literally. But as they keep escalating their murder attempts and risking being caught by the villagers, they reluctantly begin to fall for each other. This is inspired by Polish folklore, and it’s set during a winter festival, so it’s seasonal! And also murder-y. If you like the cat-and-mouse aspect of Killing Eve, or if you always fall for the villains of the story, you’ll love this one.
One in Me I Never Loved by Carla Guelfenbein (Sapphic Short Stories)
The Price on Her Head by Suzanne Clay (Trans F/F Monster Romance)
A Broken Blade (The Halfling Saga #1) by Melissa Blair (Queer Fantasy): This was a TikTok mystery, complete with codes to decipher, but the author has now been revealed!
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Here’s To Us (What If It’s Us #2) by Becky Albertalli & Adam Silvera (M/M YA Contemporary)
Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo (Sapphic YA Historical) (Paperback Rerelease)
Eros/Psyche by Maria Llovet (F/F Graphic Novel)
My Mom Had an Abortion by Beezus B. Murphy and Tatiana Gill (Asexual Lesbian Graphic Memoir)
Gender Identity Journal: Prompts and Practices for Exploration and Self-Discovery by Katie Leikam (Nonfiction)
That’s it for me this week! I hope that you have a safe and cozy next few weeks and that 2022 treats you well.
Until next time, you can find me at my bi and lesbian book blog, the Lesbrary, as well as on Twitter @danikaellis. You can also hear me on All the Books or you can read my Book Riot posts.
Happy reading!
Danika