Laura Sackton is a queer book nerd and freelance writer, known on the internet for loving winter, despising summer, and going overboard with extravagant baking projects. In addition to her work at Book Riot, she reviews for BookPage and AudioFile, and writes a weekly newsletter, Books & Bakes, celebrating queer lit and tasty treats. You can catch her on Instagram shouting about the queer books she loves and sharing photos of the walks she takes in the hills of Western Mass (while listening to audiobooks, of course).
Reviews are a response to an art, so enjoying them AFTER finishing a book is a whole different experience.
20th century queer lit reminds us that not only have queer people alway been here, but they've always been just as joyful and complicated. Start with Harlem Shadows by Claude McKay.
These beautiful examples of queer science and nature writing explore queer identity and celebrate nature in all its complex glory, including How Far the Light Reaches by Sabrina Imbler.
The nonlinear structure of Pageboy is not a gimmick. It's part of a rich lineage of queer and trans storytelling.
These queer books are award winners—and you probably have not heard of them. Here's why you should read them.
In 2020, after a lifetime of loving speculative fiction, I lost all interest in it. I am slowly coming back to SFF, but in a new way.
These nonfiction books by trans and nonbinary Asian authors will have you rethinking what you know about nature, gender, and life itself. Start with How Far the Light Reaches by Sabrina Imbler.
This list of brilliant books from the 2000s include a haunting literary masterpiece, fun stories in Tahiti, and lost more, like Blonde Indian by Ernestine Hayes.
My choice not to review comfort books has nothing to do with their "literary merit." It has everything to do with setting boundaries.
Take a dive into the Weird Queer genre, where traditional genres and binaries of all kinds disappear, merge, and mutate delightfully.