Book Riot’s Read Harder Challenge: Pride Edition

Many, many queer kids read Harriet the Spy and felt a spark of recognition, and that’s no accident, because the author was a lesbian. This biography shows how Fitzhugh struggled in a society that didn’t accept queer people, and how her work was quietly subversive.

This is a new release that just came out in 2021. It blends together a biography of James Baldwin with how his political commentary still applies to the U.S. today. It positions the election of Trump and the rise of white nationalism as not an aberration, but a continuation of patterns that Baldwin had already been speaking out about.

If you want to read banned and censored books, this is the book to read this year. I’ve found it puzzling that the book that has drawn the most vitriol from right wing book banners for “sexualizing” children is in fact a memoir partly about Kobabe’s journey to realizing e is asexual. This is a sensitive, thoughtful portrayal of what it’s like to grow up nonbinary, and it’s an important story for teens to have access to, considering how little representation there is for nonbinary (and asexual) people in media. If you have a moment, consider clicking through to the Amazon reviews and marking some of the many positive reviews as helpful, to make that front page a little more accurate.

This is the story of Walden’s decade of having her life dominated by figure skating. After she switched schools, found a new hobby, and began to fall for a girl, she began questioning what she wanted for her future and whether figure skating fit into it. This is a story about letting go of something once central to your identity, and the simultaneous terror and freedom of that.

Sure, there are some great queer romances with main characters in their 40s, but why not pick up a book with an age demographic that doesn’t often get a starring role in these series? This is a historical romance with a 73-year-old main character and a 69-year-old love interest, and they plot their revenge against Bertrice’s Terrible Nephew.

I know this doesn’t come out for a while, but it was impossible to answer this prompt without mentioning “the MILF book,” as TikTok and Twitter have dubbed it. When college senior Cassie goes to meet her best friend’s mom, Erin, during Family Weekend, she isn’t expecting to run into her steamy one night stand from last night. What’s worse is that none of that chemistry has abated, despite how much of a bad idea this is, which leads to the two of them sneaking around.

This likely goes without saying, but Giovanni’s Room is a must-read for any queer book aficionado. Published in 1956, it follows David, a young American living in Paris. When his girlfriend leaves for Spain, he begins an affair with Giovanni, a man he met in a gay bar. James Baldwin is an incredibly influential author, and this is a great place to start with his work.

Nobuko Yoshiya, on the other hand, may be a name you’re not familiar with, but she is a fascinating historical figure. She wrote novels that would go on to inspire the Class S and shojo genres. In 1919, she wrote Two Virgins in the Attic, which was exceptional because the two girls not only were in a relationship in school (something that could be dismissed as childish/play-acting a relationship), but also stayed together after graduating. She wrote many stories about relationships between girls, and she was one of the most successful and widely read writers of her time. She lived with her partner for 50 years, and legally adopted her so they could have the same rights as a couple. While sadly Two Virgins in the Attic isn’t available in English, one of her short stories, “Yellow Rose” is available as an ebook.

This is set in 1992 Warsaw, Poland. A Russian physicist who designed a portable atomic bomb has just disappeared, and others have been murdered who seem to have connections to the nuclear science. A straight white FBI agent and a gay Black CIA agent team up to try to find the scientist — and the bomb — before it’s too late.

I will yell about this book any time I have an opportunity. It’s set in 1904 just outside of Norway, and follows three main characters, all of whom are queer and disabled and/or have mental health issues. (Asta is asexual, and possibly aromantic. Gunnar and Erland are dating.) They become friends through theater, then they become a found family after tragedy. There’s a horse race to save the family farm! I love this story to bits. Do look up trigger warnings before diving in, though, especially for ableism and violence/injury.

This is the sort of poetry that punches you in the gut. It’s accessible even for a poetry novice (like me), but it’s moving, thought-provoking, and passionate. Like all of their books, it discusses race and racism, disability and ableism, politics and everyday life. (I recently also read Care Work and loved that, too.) I highly recommend this one, even if I don’t feel qualified to talk about it.

This is part mystery/thriller, part romance, part procedural. Finn is a travel writer who has decided to stay at a lesbian resort. On a layover, she bumps into Luisa, and they spend a memorable hotel room night together. Then they part ways, as Luisa begins her job working for the Mexican Federal Police, trying to break apart a drug cartel. Soon, they find themselves unexpectedly thrown back together as the cartel overruns the resort.

Fingersmith is the best book I’ve ever read, and it’s actually been adapted twice: one by the BBC, and one reimagining by Park Chan-Wook. This adaptation moves the setting from Victorian England to Japan-occupied Korea. It’s gotten some criticism for supposedly having a “male gaze,” especially in the sex scenes, but I personally disagree. What I love about this adaptation is that it sparks a really interesting conversation with the book. They not only have different settings, but also different endings. I think it really adds something to an already amazing story.

Anathema is an online speculative fiction (including SFF, horror, fabulism, and more) literary magazine that publishes three times a year. The stories are all by queer POC/Indigenous/Aboriginal creators. The covers alone are gorgeous, and I can’t wait to dive into some of these stories.

Two of the books I’m recommending for this category, this one and Gender Queer, have been among the most challenged in the last year of increased censorship. Read them yourself to see the beautiful, important stories that young people are being denied. These essays explore Johnson’s childhood, along with advice to young people (especially Black queer and trans people) about surviving and growing in a world that can be hostile to them. Reading All Boys Aren’t Blue will make it obvious that this book is being willfully misinterpreted, because Johnson is so generous in their explanations of the ideas they’re exploring here.

Did I pick this partly because of the cover? Of course. But this series is also edited by a legend in lesbian sci-fi, Melissa Scott, best known for Trouble and Her Friends. There are also stories from well-known authors like Zen Cho (2011), Ellen Kushner (2011), Amal El-Mohtar (2012), Nalo Hopkinson (2012), Jewelle Gomez (2013), Malinda Lo (2013), Ken Liu (2015), Darcie Little Badger (2015), Seanan McGuire (2015), and more. PLUS: they’re all only $1 each as ebooks!

I went back and forth a little bit about whether to include this title, because I don’t really think of it as horror — but vampires get a free pass into the horror genre, I think. This is a classic not just of lesbian literature, but of literature in general. It follows Gilda as an enslaved woman in 1850s Louisiana through her becoming a vampire and centuries of her undead life — ending in 2050! It’s a set of interrelated short stories, all in different time periods and settings. It explores racism and homophobia throughout time, and it’s a gorgeous, thought-provoking read.

This is a Book Riot favorite, and it won the 2021 Harvey Award for Book of the Year. It also appeared on the best books of the year lists in Publishers Weekly, Kirkus Reviews, the New York Public Library, and more. It’s a YA graphic novel about a Vietnamese American teen trying to come out to his mom. There’s also a legendary tweet from the author: “People wanna ban my book for only gay reasons, nobody ever ever mentions the cannibalism 😔”

One lesser known event in queer American history is the 1973 fire that burned down the Up Stairs Lounge in New Orleans. It was set by an arsonist, killing dozens of people, and it devastated the local gay community. The mourning survivors reeled in the aftermath, when families decided not to claim bodies, and Catholic churches refused burials. This further pain was the driving force behind a wave of activism that demanded gay liberation and basic rights.

There are lots of great nonfiction books and memoirs that focus on disability that are by disabled authors, but that isn’t the only option for this prompt. You can also read any book by disabled author, including fiction and poetry. Bodymap is my favorite poetry collection, as I mentioned earlier, with cutting and insightful poems that address sexuality, gender, race, and disability in a readable and memorable style. In Care Work, Piepzna-Samarasinha writes about disability justice and networks of support in thought-provoking essays.