With the summer just around the corner, we thought it was time to scour the metaphorical bookshelves and put together a list of LGBTQ+ books to add to your reading list. Whether you’re looking for a hardback to flick through when you’re on the beach, or you want a new read to enjoy on an evening after a busy day at work, this top-five list has you covered…
And Then I Got Fired: One Transqueer’s Reflections on Grief, Unemployment & Inappropriate Jokes About Death (buy on Amazon)
J Mase III is a black, trans, queer poet based in Seattle, and the founder of awQward, the first ever trans and queer people of color-specific talent agency.
You might expect his debut book to be filled with the ins and outs of life as a trans black man, and whilst it certainly covers that to a healthy degree, it offers so much more to boot.
The book features a healthy mix of poems, testimony, jokes, and even a choose-your-own-journey workbook that covers grief, black trans survival, and the arts. “The book is for all of us who deserve a place to be honest when things get hard,” the author said of the title.
Once you start reading, you won’t want to put it down.
It’s a hilarious, heart-warming and thought-provoking book by a writer we’re bound to be hearing more of, and with Mase releasing the #BlackTransPrayerBook with awQward artist Lady Dane Figueroa Edidi in the coming months, we won’t have to wait long.
Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda (buy on Amazon)
“Straight people should have to come out too,” professes Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda, “and the more awkward it is, the better.” This novel follows Simon Spier, a sixteen-year-old student trying to work out who he is, and what he’s looking for.
He emails Blue back and forth, but before long, one of those emails gets into the wrong hands, and things get pretty complicated. Simon was adapted into the award-winning Love, Simon blockbuster released last year, but there’s always something special about reading a book that inspired a screenplay. It’s thought-provoking, moving, and clever – a cozy read for every LGBTQ+.
Less tells the story of Arthur Less, a failed novelist about to turn fifty. After receiving a wedding invitation from an ex-boyfriend of nine years who is engaged to someone else, he begins to accept the invitations on his desk to half-baked literary events around the world.
It’s not a novel about being gay, as such, but instead a story of a man who just happens to be gay. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2018, we’re expecting huge things from author Andrew Sean Greer, who already has a host of interesting titles in his back catalog.
Winner of the Boyz Best LGBT Book and shortlisted for the Polari Book Prize 2017, Straight Jacket is a book every man needs to add to his reading list.
It’s a call for all gay men, and for their friends and family to boot. It’s part-memoir, part-attack on the facade of contemporary gay culture and asks some serious questions, like whether gay people are as happy as they could be.
It offers advice to gay men and tells some true tales on today’s society – certainly no rainbow-washing. It’s brutal, honest, thought-provoking, and maybe even life-changing.
Ignore the cute book cover. Or don’t.
Ask a Queer Chick is a guide to sex, love, and life for girls who like girls is useful whether you’re a lady-dating veteran or still trying to come out to yourself.
Featuring words from advice columnist and queer chick Lindsay King Miller, the book offers a full 360 of life as a lesbian, covering everything from parents, romcoms, the L word, and gay sex, and helps lesbians lead authentic, safe, happy, sexy lives.
It’s a fresh, authentic read, and you don’t have to be a lesbian to make sense of the advice it offers…
Any recommendations of your own? Let us know on Twitter using @gayboybible.