PRIDE Fantasy Stack
❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🖤🤍🤎
Happy pride to our LGBTQ+ community! To celebrate, here is a stack of fantasy & sci-fi book recommendations which combine my love for the genre with my love for love stories. I want everyone I meet, in real life or fiction, to end up with their true love. (Unpopular opinion: Sansa Stark was one of my favorite Game of Thrones characters.) All of these books have queer rep and are books that I loved to read.
I am including a little “who’s represented” section for each book in case you are in the market for some specific representation. It is not meant to be an exhaustive list of all relationships and identities in the book, but identities that were strongly featured and perhaps explored.
Leave a comment and let me know if you’ve read any of these!
The Fifth Season
[goodreads description]
This is the way the world ends. Again.
Three terrible things happen in a single day. Essun, a woman living an ordinary life in a small town, comes home to find that her husband has brutally murdered their son and kidnapped their daughter. Meanwhile, mighty Sanze — the world-spanning empire whose innovations have been civilization’s bedrock for a thousand years — collapses as most of its citizens are murdered to serve a madman’s vengeance. And worst of all, across the heart of the vast continent known as the Stillness, a great red rift has been torn into the heart of the earth, spewing ash enough to darken the sky for years. Or centuries.
Now Essun must pursue the wreckage of her family through a deadly, dying land. Without sunlight, clean water, or arable land, and with limited stockpiles of supplies, there will be war all across the Stillness: a battle royale of nations not for power or territory, but simply for the basic resources necessary to get through the long dark night. Essun does not care if the world falls apart around her. She’ll break it herself, if she must, to save her daughter.
Why I like it
❤️ World building. The plot starts quick, but the POVs and timelines can be a bit confusing at first. The world is so intricate and becomes so real so quickly.
Who’s represented?
Bisexual & Polyamorous relationships. (It may take until book 2 before you start seeing relationships bloom – but it’s worth it! )
Cemetery Boys
[goodreads description]
Yadriel has summoned a ghost, and now he can’t get rid of him.
When his traditional Latinx family has problems accepting his gender, Yadriel becomes determined to prove himself a real brujo. With the help of his cousin and best friend Maritza, he performs the ritual himself, and then sets out to find the ghost of his murdered cousin and set it free.
However, the ghost he summons is actually Julian Diaz, the school’s resident bad boy, and Julian is not about to go quietly into death. He’s determined to find out what happened and tie up some loose ends before he leaves. Left with no choice, Yadriel agrees to help Julian, so that they can both get what they want. But the longer Yadriel spends with Julian, the less he wants to let him leave.
Why I like it
🧡 I love the characters so, so much. I would honestly just watch them make dinner if that was what Aiden Thomas wanted to write.
Who’s represented?
Transgender main character
Cinderella is Dead
[goodreads description]
It’s 200 years after Cinderella found her prince, but the fairy tale is over. Teen girls are now required to appear at the Annual Ball, where the men of the kingdom select wives based on a girl’s display of finery. If a suitable match is not found, the girls not chosen are never heard from again.
Sixteen-year-old Sophia would much rather marry Erin, her childhood best friend, than parade in front of suitors. At the ball, Sophia makes the desperate decision to flee, and finds herself hiding in Cinderella’s mausoleum. There, she meets Constance, the last known descendant of Cinderella and her step sisters. Together they vow to bring down the king once and for all–and in the process, they learn that there’s more to Cinderella’s story than they ever knew . . .
This fresh take on a classic story will make readers question the tales they’ve been told, and root for girls to break down the constructs of the world around them.
Why I like it
💛 If I could only read one type of book forever, it would be Cinderella retellings. They never get old for me. Cinderella is Dead completely changes the story like…what if Prince Charming was evil? Good times.
Who’s represented?
Lesbian romance
Once & Future
[goodreads description]
King Arthur as you’ve never imagined! This bold, sizzling YA retells the popular legend with the Once and Future King as a teenage girl — and she has a universe to save.
I’ve been chased my whole life. As a fugitive refugee in the territory controlled by the tyrannical Mercer corporation, I’ve always had to hide who I am. Until I found Excalibur.
Now I’m done hiding.
My name is Ari Helix. I have a magic sword, a cranky wizard, and a revolution to start.
When Ari crash-lands on Old Earth and pulls a magic sword from its ancient resting place, she is revealed to be the newest reincarnation of King Arthur. Then she meets Merlin, who has aged backward over the centuries into a teenager, and together they must break the curse that keeps Arthur coming back. Their quest? Defeat the cruel, oppressive government and bring peace and equality to all humankind.
Why I like it
💚 I don’t JUST love Cinderella retellings, I like all kinds of retellings. I was sold at “queer, feminist, King Arthur retelling.” The sequel is even better!
Who’s represented?
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Non-binary
The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue
[goodreads description]
A Life No One Will Remember. A Story You Will Never Forget.
France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets.
Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world.
But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.
Why I like it
💙 I thought the writing was beautiful. According to the chatter on the internet, you will either LOVE this book or think it was boring and overhyped.
Who’s represented?
Bisexual main character
The Starless Sea
[goodreads description]
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Night Circus, a timeless love story set in a secret underground world—a place of pirates, painters, lovers, liars, and ships that sail upon a starless sea.
Zachary Ezra Rawlins is a graduate student in Vermont when he discovers a mysterious book hidden in the stacks. As he turns the pages, entranced by tales of lovelorn prisoners, key collectors, and nameless acolytes, he reads something strange: a story from his own childhood. Bewildered by this inexplicable book and desperate to make sense of how his own life came to be recorded, Zachary uncovers a series of clues—a bee, a key, and a sword—that lead him to a masquerade party in New York, to a secret club, and through a doorway to an ancient library hidden far below the surface of the earth. What Zachary finds in this curious place is more than just a buried home for books and their guardians—it is a place of lost cities and seas, lovers who pass notes under doors and across time, and of stories whispered by the dead. Zachary learns of those who have sacrificed much to protect this realm, relinquishing their sight and their tongues to preserve this archive, and also of those who are intent on its destruction. Together with Mirabel, a fierce, pink-haired protector of the place, and Dorian, a handsome, barefoot man with shifting alliances, Zachary travels the twisting tunnels, darkened stairwells, crowded ballrooms, and sweetly soaked shores of this magical world, discovering his purpose—in both the mysterious book and in his own life.
Why I like it
💜 world building, characters – again, this book got a lot of hype when it first came out, and most readers either fell in camp “this is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever read and I want to tattoo symbols on my body” or “dnf – was there a plot? So slow!” This book is really great if you want to just hang out in a magic library for 500 pages. And really, who doesn’t want to hang out in a magic library for 500 pages??
Who’s represented?
Gay romance
These Violent Delights
[goodreads description]
The year is 1926, and Shanghai hums to the tune of debauchery.
A blood feud between two gangs runs the streets red, leaving the city helpless in the grip of chaos. At the heart of it all is eighteen-year-old Juliette Cai, a former flapper who has returned to assume her role as the proud heir of the Scarlet Gang—a network of criminals far above the law. Their only rivals in power are the White Flowers, who have fought the Scarlets for generations. And behind every move is their heir, Roma Montagov, Juliette’s first love…and first betrayal.
But when gangsters on both sides show signs of instability culminating in clawing their own throats out, the people start to whisper. Of a contagion, a madness. Of a monster in the shadows. As the deaths stack up, Juliette and Roma must set their guns—and grudges—aside and work together, for if they can’t stop this mayhem, then there will be no city left for either to rule.
Perfect for fans of The Last Magician and Descendant of the Crane, this heart-stopping debut is an imaginative Romeo and Juliet retelling set in 1920s Shanghai, with rival gangs and a monster in the depths of the Huangpu River.
Why I like it
🖤 Another retelling! This time, Romeo & Juliet. Again, loved the characters. Would hang out with them at a club or watch them make dinner. Fair warning – there is a deadly pandemic in this book. If you aren’t ready for that in your fiction, fair enough.
Who’s represented?
Transgender side character
Thanks for reading! Which book are you most excited to read? What else should be added to this list?
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