On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous

by Ocean Vuong

A shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling. With stunning urgency and grace, Ocean Vuong writes of people caught between disparate worlds, and asks how we heal and rescue one another without forsaking who we are.

Real Life

by Brandon Taylor

A novel of startling intimacy, violence, and mercy among friends in a Midwestern university town, from an electric new voice. Real Life is a novel of profound and lacerating power, a story that asks if it’s ever really possible to overcome our private wounds, and at what cost.

Under the Rainbow

by Celia Laskey

When a group of social activists arrive in a small town, the lives and beliefs of residents and outsiders alike are upended, in this wry, embracing novel.

The Lauras

by Sara Taylo

Sara Taylor brings the American landscape to vivid life in an unforgettable road novel that strikes at the heart of a mother-child bond and the exploration of gender identity.

Prudence

by David Treuer

A haunting and unforgettable novel about love, loss, race, and desire in World War II–era America. Awaiting Frankie Washburn at home for one last visit before he goes to the war, are his family and Billy, the childhood friend who over the years has become something much more intimate.

A Little Life

by Hanya Yanagihara

A profoundly moving novel about four college friends working in New York City’s art and theatre scenes over several decades. Their relationships change and develop deeply over the years, but remain centered around the talented young lawyer, Jude, whose childhood horrors have haunted him into adulthood.

Giovanni’s Room

by James Bladwin

In a novel that has resonated with the queer community since it was first published decades ago, a young man finds himself caught between desire and morality in 1950s expat Paris. While much has changed since Baldwin wrote it, many aspects of life, love, and heartbreak remain the same.

The Picture of Dorian Gray

by Oscar Wilde

If you read this classic about a man who doesn't age while his hidden portrait gets older and older and missed the gay subtext, it's time to give Wilde's story another read. Maybe one of the most subtly LGBT books on this list, you'll catch the references the second time around.

Call Me by Your Name

by André Aciman

When an adolescent boy falls in love with a summer guest at his parents' cliffside home in the Italian Riviera, they're both caught off guard by the passion that ensues. This obsessive, reckless love story became a major motion picture. You'll see why it's an instant international sensation.

We the Animals

by Justin Torres

From the intense family unity that surrounds a child to the resilience and permanence of brotherhood to the profound alienation a young man endures as he begins to see himself in the world, this novel reinvents the coming-of-age story in a way that is sucker-punch powerful. It leaves us reminded that our madness is both caused by, and alleviated by, our families, and that we might not reconcile who we are with who our loved ones see, or who we want to be for them.

When Katie Met Cassidy

by Camille Perri

Kentucky native Katie has a deep-seated set of traditional values, but she's just been dumped by her fiance and is still smarting. Cassidy is a powerful, self-assured New York native and Katie finds her irresistibly sexy. This rom-com flips the script on your favorite tropes, while still following them in ways that are as comfortable as an old pair of pjs.

The Hours

by Michael Cunningham

Drawing on the life of Virginia Woolf, Cunningham weaves several stories together to paint a rich tapestry of characters struggling to meet the demands of friends, lovers, and family. This extraordinary book will resonate with anyone who's ever had to juggle multiple roles at once, especially when they conflict with one another.

Under the Udala Trees

by Chinelo Okparanta

After getting displaced by civil war in Nigeria, a young girl begins a love affair with a fellow refugee. The cards are stacked against them in a variety of ways: They're from different cultures, different places, and they're the same gender. The way this book reckons with both culture and sexuality is beautiful, and worth a read.

All the Better Part of Me

by Molly Ringle

Against a backdrop of ‘80s new wave songs and the landscapes of London and Seattle, a young actor in the modern day tackles his bisexuality as he finds himself falling for his best friend. 

No Other World

by Rahul Mehta

From the author of the prize-winning collection Quarantine, an insightful, compelling debut novel set in rural America and India in the 1980s and ’90s, part coming-of-age story about a gay Indian American boy, part family saga about an immigrant family’s struggles to find a sense of belonging, identity, and hope.

The Charioteer

by Mary Renault

This romance novel is primarily set in 1940 and 1941 during the immediate post-Dunkirk period of World War II at a military hospital in England during nightly bomb raids and blackouts. The story's protagonist, Laurie (Laurence) 'Spud' Odell, is a young soldier wounded at Dunkirk, who must decide if his affections lie with a younger conscientious objector working at his hospital or a naval officer whom he had 'worshiped' when they had both been pupils at an all-boys boarding school and with whom he has suddenly been reconnected.

The Price of Salt

by Patricia Highsmith

The story of Therese Belivet, a stage designer trapped in a department-store day job, whose salvation arrives one day in the form of Carol Aird, an alluring suburban housewife in the throes of a divorce. They fall in love and set out across the United States, pursued by a private investigator who eventually blackmails Carol into a choice between her daughter and her lover.

The Female Man

by Joanna Russ

The suspenseful, surprising, darkly witty, and boldly subversive chronicle of what happens when Jeannine, Janet, Joanna, and Jael—all living in parallel worlds—meet.  When the four women begin traveling to one another’s worlds, their preconceptions on gender and identity are forever challenged.

Beijing Comrades

by Bei Tong

When Handong, the ruthless, wealthy son of Communist party officials, is introduced to Lan Yu, a naïve, working-class architecture student, the attraction between the two young men is instant and all-consuming. Despite their very different lives, they spend their nights together, establishing a deep connection. But when their loyalties are tested, Handong is left questioning his secrets, his choices, and his very identity.