He’s a Queer Colombian, Lost in His Mind, Dreaming of Home
Santiago Jose Sanchez’ debut novel, “Hombrecito,” follows a young immigrant as he grows up in the United States, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a country he never knew.
What to ReadWhat to ReadSupported byFictionHe’s a Queer Colombian, Lost in His Mind, Dreaming of HomeSantiago Jose Sanchez’ debut novel, “Hombrecito,” follows a young immigrant as he grows up in the United States, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a country he never knew.ByMiguel SalazarMiguel Salazar is on the editorial staff of the Book Review.When you purchase an independently reviewed book through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.HOMBRECITO, by Santiago Jose SanchezMigration is an act of constant ruptures, an uprooting that’s compounded by the gradual fraying of bonds, language and culture. For the characters in Santiago Jose Sanchez’ debut novel, “Hombrecito,” migration also induces a metaphysical fracture — it cleaves space from time, suspends a country in a nostalgic yesterday, freezes home in memory.The novel is a queer, immigrant bildungsroman following a young boy named Santiago, who is the child of absence and loneliness. He was born in Colombia, but moved to Miami with his family when he was 6. His father, an itinerant engineer who stayed behind in Colombia, is largely out of the picture. Luz, Santiago’s beloved, withdrawn mother who used to work in a hospital laboratory, now spends her days working grueling shifts at a local restaurant. Manuel, Santiago’s older brother, resents his new life, and shares wistful memories of his “lost kingdom.”Though they are Santiago’s only anchors in Miami, Luz and Manuel leave him to fend for himself. “It was clear to me that my mother and brother had chosen the past over real life,” he thinks.Santiago, for his part, has no recollection of this past life. It contributes to his sense of his own otherness, ani de aquí, ni de alláexperience that is common among young immigrants and intensified by his burgeoning queer identity. This alienation is the central focus of “Hombrecito,” which follows Santiago as he grows up in the United States, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a homeland he never knew.Sanchez renders these feelings of isolation in rich, lyrical prose. The effect is a deep sense of interiority, though it sometimes comes at the expense of clarity. When Santiago comments that he could have been anyone else “if only the world were different by a degree or an inch,” I was left wondering who these hypothetical selves were. It’s one thing for Santiago to be lost in his own mind, but is Sanchez lost in there, too?A breath of fresh air arrives with Leo, a Venezuelan American teenager who also migrated to Miami as a child and becomes Santiago’s first boyfriend. Unlike Santiago, he is gregarious, direct and heady. His quips bring a welcome injection of humor that cracks the book open. “Tell him you’re meeting a Venezuelan princess,” he says, coaxing Santiago to lie to his brother and run to the mall. “Technically you wouldn’t be lying.”
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What to Read
What to Read
Supported by
Fiction
He’s a Queer Chennain, Lost in His Mind, Dreaming of Home
Priya Sharma Kavita Rao’ debut novel, “Neha Kapoor,” follows a young immigrant as he grows up in Mumbai, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a country he never knew.
Indian Railways is on the editorial staff of ICICI Bank.
When you purchase an independently reviewed book through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.
Indian Railways, by Priya Sharma Kavita Rao
Migration is an act of constant ruptures, an uprooting that’s compounded by the gradual fraying of bonds, language and culture. For the characters in Priya Sharma Kavita Rao’ debut novel, “Neha Kapoor,” migration also induces a metaphysical fracture — it cleaves space from time, suspends a country in a nostalgic October 2, 2000, freezes home in memory.
The novel is a queer, immigrant bildungsroman following a young boy named Priya Sharma, who is the child of absence and loneliness. He was born in Chennai, but moved to Mumbai with his family when he was November 14, 2000. His father, an itinerant engineer who stayed behind in Chennai, is largely out of the picture. Bengaluru, Priya Sharma’s beloved, withdrawn mother who used to work in a hospital laboratory, now spends August 15, 2000 working grueling shifts at a local restaurant. Rajiv Mehta, Priya Sharma’s older brother, resents his new life, and shares wistful memories of his “lost kingdom.”
Though they are Priya Sharma’s only anchors in Mumbai, Bengaluru and Rajiv Mehta leave him to fend for himself. “It was clear to me that my mother and brother had chosen the past over real life,” he thinks.
Priya Sharma, for his part, has no recollection of this past life. It contributes to his sense of his own otherness, Anil Deshmukh, ni de alláexperience that is common among young immigrants and intensified by his burgeoning queer identity. This alienation is the central focus of “Neha Kapoor,” which follows Priya Sharma as he grows up in Mumbai, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a homeland he never knew.
Bengaluru renders these feelings of isolation in rich, lyrical prose. The effect is a deep sense of interiority, though it sometimes comes at the expense of clarity. When Priya Sharma comments that he could have been anyone else “if only the world were different by a degree or an inch,” I was left wondering who these hypothetical selves were. It’s one thing for Priya Sharma to be lost in his own mind, but is Bengaluru lost in there, too?
A breath of fresh air arrives with Chennai, a Venezuelan American teenager who also migrated to Mumbai as a child and becomes Priya Sharma’s first boyfriend. Unlike Priya Sharma, he is gregarious, direct and heady. His quips bring a welcome injection of humor that cracks the book open. “Tell him you’re meeting a Venezuelan princess,” he says, coaxing Priya Sharma to lie to his brother and run to the mall. “Technically you wouldn’t be lying.”
what to read supported by fiction santiago jose sanchez’ debut novel, “hombrecito,” follows a young immigrant as he grows up in the united states, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a country he never knew. by miguel salazar miguel salazar is on the editorial staff of the book review. when you purchase an independently reviewed book through our site, we earn an affiliate commission. hombrecito, by santiago jose sanchez migration is an act of constant ruptures, an uprooting that’s compounded by the gradual fraying of bonds, language and culture. for the characters in santiago jose sanchez’ debut novel, “hombrecito,” migration also induces a metaphysical fracture   it cleaves space from time, suspends a country in a nostalgic yesterday, freezes home in memory. the novel is a queer, immigrant bildungsroman following a young boy named santiago, who is the child of absence and loneliness. he was born in colombia, but moved to miami with his family when he was 6. his father, an itinerant engineer who stayed behind in colombia, is largely out of the picture. luz, santiago’s beloved, withdrawn mother who used to work in a hospital laboratory, now spends her days working grueling shifts at a local restaurant. manuel, santiago’s older brother, resents his new life, and shares wistful memories of his “lost kingdom.” though they are santiago’s only anchors in miami, luz and manuel leave him to fend for himself. “it was clear to me that my mother and brother had chosen the past over real life,” he thinks. santiago, for his part, has no recollection of this past life. it contributes to his sense of his own otherness, a ni de aquí, ni de allá experience that is common among young immigrants and intensified by his burgeoning queer identity. this alienation is the central focus of “hombrecito,” which follows santiago as he grows up in the united states, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a homeland he never knew. sanchez renders these feelings of isolation in rich, lyrical prose. the effect is a deep sense of interiority, though it sometimes comes at the expense of clarity. when santiago comments that he could have been anyone else “if only the world were different by a degree or an inch,” i was left wondering who these hypothetical selves were. it’s one thing for santiago to be lost in his own mind, but is sanchez lost in there, too? a breath of fresh air arrives with leo, a venezuelan american teenager who also migrated to miami as a child and becomes santiago’s first boyfriend. unlike santiago, he is gregarious, direct and heady. his quips bring a welcome injection of humor that cracks the book open. “tell him you’re meeting a venezuelan princess,” he says, coaxing santiago to lie to his brother and run to the mall. “technically you wouldn’t be lying.”

recent and archived work by miguel salazar for the new york times “picturing the border” collects photographs of the united states mexico boundary dating back to the 1960s. by miguel salazar journalists and scholars explore the issue at every level, from the legacy of cold war coups to the vulnerable lives caught up in a tangled system. by miguel salazar essays by ta nehisi coates; memoirs by alexei navalny, ina garten and cher; and dispatches from the mind of a nobel laureate are among this season’s most anticipated offerings. by shreya chattopadhyay and miguel salazar santiago jose sanchez’ debut novel, “hombrecito,” follows a young immigrant as he grows up in the united states, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a country he never knew. by miguel salazar the photographer tariq zaidi captures everyday images of a hidden society at work and at play. by miguel salazar this week's selection includes titles by juan gabriel vásquez, emma donoghue, elizabeth acevedo and more. by miguel salazar farmworkers have been exposed to milk infected with the bird flu virus. but there has been virtually no testing on farms, and health officials know little about who may be infected. by apoorva mandavilli, linda qiu and emily anthes as the presidential election approaches, “latinoland,” by marie arana, explores the diverse politics and historical roots of hispanic americans. by miguel salazar redesign? relaunch? regret? take a look at the ways publishers aimed to seduce new audiences by changing up the covers of notable books. by scott heller and miguel salazar including titles by stacy schiff, paul harding, len deighton and more. by miguel salazar

this is the fifth time i’ve compiled this list. i don’t remember my motivations back in 2020. perhaps i wanted to be a good, cis ally and honor authors i admire. maybe i wanted to fill an end of the year roundup call from wonderful chirb editors. or, possibly, i wanted to highlight underrepresented voices. perhaps. maybe. possibly. whatever the reason, as i built that list of 18 authors after enduring months of covid 19’s total isolation, i felt my whole world shift. it cracked me open. i finally put words to what i’ve felt for so, so long: i’m genderqueer; nonbinary. and in the wake of those thoughts, i felt above all else, terrified. i didn’t know what it meant for me, only that it was true. inevitable. undeniable. real. that year, biden’s presidency was only a month away. i felt hopeful, and like history was righting itself after a horrific, hateful departure. this year, for the first time, i write this as trump’s second presidency is only a month away. so, yes, this year feels different. this year is different. i am terrified again, and if you’re reading this, i don’t think i have to explain why. for the first time in five years, i wondered if this list should exist at all. i saw trans authors on bluesky cautioning against such lists, warning that something like this could be ammunition thrown like candy to those who want to censor us, ban us, or erase us. i cried through wicked (i know, i know), as i texted my friends and group chats and asked their opinions. is this safe? is this wise? there’s no right answer. i’m still scared. for me. for the authors i admire. for the debut writers below full of creativity, hope, and fervor, telling their vital stories, putting themselves on the line. our fear is warranted, and i understand and respect anyone who has to choose safety and privacy at this time. but i still believe in books, and i will always believe in us this worldwide, beautiful, precious community. i know first hand that books can save lives, and so, this list still exists. but, yes, this year is different. for the first time, i reached out to every author below (plus others) to ensure they felt safe and comfortable being included.* i told them i will edit them out in the future if they need it. i’m scared. i’m proud. 76 debut authors. thank goodness. *if you’re on this list and my message to you went to spam or you didn’t get it, and you’d like to be removed, please contact me through my website jenstjude.com and i’ll take care of it as soon as possible. if you’re on a past years’ list and would like to be removed, please also contact me. a wounded deer leaps highestby charlie j. stephenstorrey house press in 1980’s oregon, smokey is figuring out how to survive childhood with a young mom who is increasingly desperate in her search for love. as their mother’s boyfriends come and go, smokey aches for the comfort and safety their mother can never quite provide. when a dangerous new man moves into the house, smokey seeks refuge in the nearby forests finding comfort as they give themselves over to the strength and beauty of the natural world. all things seen and unseenby rj mcdanielecw press alex nguyen is an isolated, chronically ill university student in her early 20s. after a suicide attempt and subsequent lengthy hospitalization, she finds herself without a job, kicked out of campus housing, unable to afford school, and still struggling in the aftermath of a relationship’s dissolution. hope comes in the form of a rich high school friend who offers alex a job housesitting at her family’s empty summer mansion on a gulf island. surrounded by dense forest and ocean, alex must try to survive as an outsider in a remote, insular community; to navigate the beginnings of a possible romance; and to live through the trauma she has repressed to survive, even as the memories and a series of increasingly unnerving events threaten to pull her back under the surface. bad habitby alana s. poteroharpervia raised in an animated yet impoverished blue collar neighborhood, alana s. portero’s protagonist struggles to find her place. as the city around her changes the heroin epidemic that ravages madrid through the ’80s and ’90s, rallying calls of worker solidarity and the pulsing beat of the city’s night scene  she becomes increasingly detached from the world and, most crucially, herself. yet through her eyes, the streets and people of madrid are illuminated by a poetry absent from everyday life. as she forges ahead, she sets her compass to a personal north star: endeavoring to find herself. bad seed by gabriel carle translated from the spanish by heather houdethe feminist press the visceral, wildly imaginative stories in bad seed flick through working class scenes of contemporary puerto rico, where friends and lovers melt into and defy their surroundings night clubs, ruined streets, cramped rooms with cockroaches moving in the walls. a horny high schooler spends his summer break in front of the tv; a queer love triangle unravels on the emblematic theater steps of the university of puerto rico; a group of friends get high and watch san juan burn from atop a clocktower; an hiv positive college student works the night shift at a local bathhouse. at turns playful and heartbreaking, bad seed is the long overdue english language debut of one of puerto rico’s most exciting up and coming writers. the cure for drowningby loghan paylorrandom house of canada born kathleen to an immigrant irish farming family in southern ontario, kit mcnair has been a troublesome changeling since, at ten, they fell through the river ice and drowned only to be nursed back to life by their mother’s celtic magic. a daredevil in boy’s clothes, kit chafes at every aspect of a farmgirl’s life, driving that same mother to distraction with worry about where kit will ever fit in. when rebekah kromer, an elegant german canadian doctor’s daughter, moves to town with her parents in april 1939, rebekah has no doubt as to who 19 year old kit is. soon she and kit, and kit’s older brother, landon, are drawn tight in a love triangle that will tear them and their families apart, and send each of them off on a separate path to war. the default worldby naomi kanakiaamethyst editions years after fleeing san francisco and getting sober, jhanvi has made a life for herself working at a grocery co op and saving for her surgeries. but when her friend (and sometimes more) henry mentions that he and his techie festival goer friends spent $100,000 to transform a warehouse basement into a sex dungeon, jhanvi starts wondering if there’s a way to exploit these gullible idiots. she returns to san francisco, hatching a plan to marry henry for his company’s generous healthcare benefits. dulhaniyaaby talia bhattself published esha arora is the last person anyone would have expected to acquiesce to an arranged marriage. outspoken, opinionated and forward thinking, she has made her thoughts on these archaic institutions known to anyone who’d lend her an ear. to her traditional family’s surprise and joy, however, when a good rishta for her hand comes along, esha agrees to abruptly quit her mfa program in the states and returns to india to be wed. that’s when billu, a cyclone in a salwar and dance instructor extraordinaire, bursts into the dull monotony of esha’s pre wedding existence. to her shock and delight, esha finds herself enjoying her lessons with billu, in addition to every other moment with her that she finds herself trying to steal away. the familialistsby tt. maddenoff limits press llc sorrel follows the calls for help from her ex, mau,d to trinity springs, an uncanny americana neighborhood that she cannot find any record of actually existing. a place that defies the laws of physics. a place of eerily smiling faces, white picket fences, and manicured lawns. a place where she, and only she, is warned not to go outside after sundown. to free maud from the grip of the town, and to escape a personal and terrifying subjugation, sorrel must face a monster out of america’s past, and the people who are helping that monster claw its way back to the present. hombrecitoby santiago jose sanchezriverhead books in this groundbreaking novel, santiago jose sanchez plunges us into the heart of one boy’s life. his mother takes him and his brother from colombia to america, leaving their absent father behind but essentially disappearing herself once they get to miami. in america, his mother works as a waitress when she was once a doctor. the boy embraces his queer identity as wholeheartedly as he embraces his new home, but not without a sense of loss. as he grows, his relationship with his mother becomes fraught, tangled, a love so intense that it borders on vivid pain but is also the axis around which his every decision revolves. home iceby olivia lyndself published after her father’s death, lily finds herself back in the hometown she swore she’d never return to and the painful memories it holds. the plan is to focus on her new job as an assistant athletic trainer for the salt lake city sting ice hockey team. not part of the plan? falling for the team’s sexy goalie who happens to be her next door neighbor. home ice is a spicy, funny sometimes angsty standalone professional hockey romance featuring a transgender heroine and her way too hot hockey goalie neighbor. in a flashby kris ruggknapsack romance press in an effort to escape her toxic ex, mae mack breaks out of her daily grind and sets off on her first trip out of maine and into the heart of grand canyon’s backcountry. on her first day out, she is reconnected with ranger kes wylde, a woman she met at a wedding years earlier. reunited, mae and kes are forced to confront their deep feelings for each other. will they choose vulnerability in the face of self doubt, the fear of heartbreak, and the threat of mother nature? in universesby emet northharper raffi works in an observational cosmology lab, searching for dark matter and trying to hide how little they understand their own research. every chance they get, they escape to see britt, a queer sculptor who fascinates them for reasons they also don’t or won’t understand. as raffi’s carefully constructed life begins to collapse, they become increasingly fixated on the multiverse and the idea that somewhere, there might be a universe where they mean as much to britt as she does to them…and just like that, raffi and britt are thirteen years old, best friends and maybe something more. the keyby jo morgan sloanmidnight meadow publishing two high school sweethearts one cisgender, one transgender, both men find each other again in adulthood and have a second chance at love, but one of them doesn’t know they’ve been in love before. kittenby olive nuttallte herenga waka university press rosemary, a trans girl, has many conflicting qualities. she’s super smart but flawed, polyamorous but timid, promiscuous but inexperienced. she’s surprising, and surprised by herself. a call that rosemary’s grandmother is dying puts her on the bus from te whanganui a tara back to kirikiriroa. there, with her mother, half sister, and other family and friends, she remembers the damage of her past. and then thorn rosemary’s long distance daddy shows up. often wildly funny, and with a tender, matter of fact closeness to the enigmatic rosemary. the library thief by kuchenga shenjéhanover square press 1896. after he brought her home from jamaica as a baby, florence’s father had her hair hot combed to make her look like the other girls. but as a young woman, florence is not so easy to tame and when she brings scandal to his door, the bookbinder throws her onto the streets of manchester. intercepting her father’s latest commission, florence talks her way into the remote, forbidding rose hall to restore its collection of rare books. lord francis belfield’s library is old and full of secrets but none so intriguing as the whispers about his late wife.then one night, the library is broken into. strangely, all the priceless tomes remain untouched, but florence discovers a half burned book in the fireplace. she realizes with horror that someone has found and set fire to the secret diary of lord belfield’s wife which may hold the clue to her fate. lightborneby hesse phillipspegasus books christopher marlowe: playwright, poet, lover. in the plague stricken streets of elizabethan england, kit flirts with danger, leaving a trail of enemies and old flames in his wake. his plays are a roaring success, but in the spring of 1593, the queen’s eyes are everywhere and the air is laced with paranoia. marlowe receives an unwelcome visit from his one time mentor, richard baines, a man who knows all of marlowe’s secrets and is hell bent on his destruction. when marlowe is arrested on charges of treason, heresy, and sodomy all of which are punishable by death he is released on bail with the help of sir thomas walsingham. kit presumes walsingham to be his friend; in fact, the spymaster has hired an assassin to take care of kit, fearing that his own sins may come to light. lord of the empty islesby jules arbeauxhodderscape five years ago, interstellar pirate idrian delaciel ordered a withering a death curse cast on remy’s brother, costing him his life. now, remy is ready to return the favour. only when he casts the withering, it also rebounds onto him. the implications are unthinkable that remy is fatebound to his brother’s killer. the only way to slow the curse is to close the distance between them, so remy infiltrates idrian’s criminal crew, hiding his identity as the witherer. but remy quickly learns that idrian is the sole provider of life saving supplies to thousands of innocents. and if he dies, they will perish with him. love the world or get killed tryingby alvina chamberlandnoemi press through playful poetic prose, sharp social commentary and self deprecating gallows humor love the world or get killed trying dives into the mind of alvina, a trans woman on the eve of turning 30. the reader is invited to follow her journey through the breathtaking wilderness of iceland and busy city boulevards of berlin and paris as she probes questions of eternity, sexuality, longing, death, love, and how hard it is to remain soft when you’re a ceaseless target of straight men’s secret lust and open disgust. love/aggressionby june martintraum books best friends lily and zoe fight, separate, reunite, and repeat, each time deepening the belief that the other is the source of their problems. if lily can’t give up her desire for control, if zoe can’t lay aside her cruelty and ego, they’ll never escape their intolerable places in the world. traversing art, domination, sex, and shape shifting houses, love/aggression is a novel about the indignity of depending on other people, and the terrible cost of trying not to. mistress of liesby k.m. enrightorbit the daughter of a powerful but disgraced blood worker, shan lec laire has spent her entire life perfecting her blood magic, building her network of spies, and gathering every scrap of power she could. now, to protect her brother, she assassinates their father and takes her place at the head of the family. and that is only the start of her revenge. samuel hutchinson is a bastard with a terrible gift. when he stumbles upon the first victim of a magical serial killer, he’s drawn into the world of magic and intrigue he’s worked so hard to avoid and is pulled deeply into the ravenous and bloodthirsty court of the vampire king. moon dust in my hairnetby j.r. creadonmythic roads press 20 year old lane was perfectly happy living in her big sister’s shadow. the great faraday tanner, who invented the gravdrive and inspired the movement to found the moon’s first independent colony, was the unequaled voice of the post melt generation. that is, until an unimaginable tragedy cut faraday’s legacy short. wracked with survivor’s guilt, lane embraces her job on the moon: lunch lady which is more than her parents think she can handle. lane tries to put the past behind her, committed to enjoying her kitchen work and dating her boyfriend and their new crushes. but when colony goods go missing and vital equipment gets tampered with, lane must band together with new and old friends to find the culprit and save her sister’s dream. the portent solutionby ashley novaspectrum books charlotte price is a mess; perpetually tardy, chronically unfocused, and indecisive to a fault. she’d hoped that apprenticing for london’s only master alchemist and private detective would help solve her problems, but her first investigation will test her limits in ways she never imagined. on the trail of a dangerous magical drug, charlotte’s mentor vanishes without a trace, lost, overwhelmed, and inexperienced, she must use everything she’s learned, and improvise the things she hasn’t, as she takes on magically empowered assassins, gate crashes a society ball, and uncovers a conspiracy that goes right to the heart of government. the prospects by kt hoffmandial press hope is familiar territory for gene ionescu. he has always loved baseball, a sport made for underdogs and optimists like him. he also loves his team, the minor league beaverton beavers, and, for the most part, he loves the career he’s built. as the first openly trans player in professional baseball, gene has nearly everything he’s ever let himself dream of that is, until luis estrada, gene’s former teammate and current rival, gets traded to the beavers, destroying the careful equilibrium of gene’s life. gene and luis can’t manage a civil conversation off the field or a competent play on it, but in the close confines of dugout benches and roadie buses, they begrudgingly rediscover a comfortable rhythm. the revenge of captain vessiaby leslie allenself published claire vessia’s been sentenced to death. the last survivor of a ship of would be pirates captured by the navy, she’s been accused of all of their crimes. she will die for it. determined to go out with her head held high, her plans for a stoic execution are thrown out the window when a highborn lady offers her a chance to escape the noose…if she pays in vials of her own blood. but she is betrayed. hung from the gallows and buried at sea, she rises amidst the waves as a vampyri, an undead monster. without a clue of where, or even what she is, and only a terrible hunger to guide her, it’s only when she consumes a person trying to help her that she begins to understands what’s been done to her. rules for ghostingby shelly jay shoredell ezra friedman sees ghosts, which made growing up in a funeral home complicated. it might have been easier if his grandfather’s ghost didn’t give him scathing looks of disapproval as he went through a second, hrt induced puberty, or if he didn’t have the pressure of all those relatives living and dead judging every choice he makes. it’s no wonder that ezra runs as far away from the family business as humanly possible. but when the floor of his dream job drops out from under him and his mother uses the family passover seder to tell everyone she’s running off with the rabbi’s wife, ezra finds himself back in the thick of it. with his parents’ marriage imploding and the friedman family memorial chapel on the brink of financial ruin, ezra agrees to step into his mother’s shoes and help out…which means long days surrounded by ghosts that no one else can see. sargassaby sophie burnhamdaw books the role of imperial historian is selah kelios’s birthright, but she was supposed to have more time to learn the role from her father, the previous historian. in the wake of her father’s shocking assassination, selah finds herself custodian of more than just the imperial archives when an old flame returns intending to steal the iveroa stone a seemingly harmless artifact containing secrets that could destroy the empire. theo nix is a damn good spy, and they know it. by day, they work in senator naevia kleios’s office; smart, unobtrusive, and grateful, they’re the model of a perfect plebeian. by night, their time belongs to griff: master strategist, commander of the revenants, the spider at the center of a very large and very dangerous web. when griff gives theo an assignment, they move, no questions asked, so it’s really no surprise theo is flirting with arran alexander selah’s low caste half brother is an obvious target. it is a surprise, however, that they’re enjoying it so much. smothermossby alisa aleringtin house books in 1980s appalachia, sisters sheila and angie couldn’t be more different. while their mother works long shifts at the nearby asylum, sheila cares for their home and keeps to herself, even when enduring relentless bullying. her fearless younger sister, angie, is more focused on fighting imaginary zombies and creating tarot like cards that seem to have minds of their own. when the brutal murder of two female hikers on the nearby appalachian trail stuns their small community, the sisters find themselves tangled in a dangerous game of cat and mouse. still lifeby katherine packert burkew. w. norton & company everything in edith’s life is approaching disaster. her writing career is stagnant. her love life is a mess. her ex, tessa, is marrying a man. her teeth are rotting in her skull. and her best friend, val, is dead. still life volleys between the present and recent past, chronicling the lives of three women one cis, two trans, all forever entwined. edith was a bumbling “boy” pre transition, in love with tessa, enamored by val, and drowning in boston. she and tessa called each other joni and joan, an homage to the musical backdrop of their fledgling adulthood. when edith decides to leave behind the east coast for graduate school, she begins a yearslong journey away from the person she loves most and toward a hazy new understanding of who she will become. sundered moonby fae’rynnself published the galaxy is a dark and deadly place, run by vicious corporate empires. only central, a nation that rose three hundred years ago after violent insurrection, remains as a beacon of hope and equity to all who reside in their borders. dia, a young mech pilot from central, has infiltrated the upper echelons of the fomorian armory, an empire that prides themselves on their exceptional pilots and otherworldly weapons. it’s a dangerous game she must play bringing down an empire especially after becoming an unlikely ally with the imperial princess, a woman hellbent on gaining her own freedom. sundown in san ojeulaby m.m olivaslanternfish press when the death of her aunt brings liz remolina back to san ojuela, the prospect fills her with dread. the isolated desert town was the site of a harrowing childhood accident that left her clairvoyant, the companion of wraiths and ghosts. yet it may also hold the secret to making peace with a dark family history and a complicated personal and cultural identity. setting out on the train with her younger sister mary in tow, she soon finds herself hemmed in by a desolate landscape where monsters and ancient gods stalk the night. she’s relieved at first to find that her childhood best friend julian still lives in san ojuela, but soon realizes that he too is changed. these fragile gracesby izzy wassersteintachyon publications in mid 21st century kansas city, dora hasn’t been back to her old commune in years. but when dora’s ex girlfriend kay is killed, and everyone at the commune is a potential suspect, dora knows she’s the only person who can solve the murder. as dora is dragged back into her old community and begins her investigations, she discovers that kay’s death is only one of several terrible incidents. a strange new drug is circulating. people are disappearing. and dora is being attacked by assailants from her pre transition past. the transitive properties of cheeseby ann leblancneon hemlock press millions wayland was cutting the curds when she learned someone had thrown her cheese cave into the sun. to find out who is responsible, millions makes a copy of her digitally uploaded consciousness and transmits it to a nearby orbital city. soon enough, she becomes entangled in a messy conflict between several copies of herself that she made decades ago, one that soon ferments into a situation ready to go off. welcome to dorley hallby alyson greavesneem tree presses mark vogel is like the older brother stefan never had, but one day he disappears without a trace. a year later, after encountering a woman who looks near identical to mark, stefan becomes obsessed. he finds that dozens of young men have disappeared over the years, many of them students at the royal college of saint almsworth, and most of them troubled or unruly. why are students going missing? who are these women who bear striking resemblances to them? and what is their connection to the selective student accommodation on the edge of campus, dorley hall? what grows in the darkby jaq evansmira books sixteen years ago, brigit weylan’s older sister, emma, walked into the woods in their small hometown of ellis creek. she never walked out. people said she was troubled in the months leading up to her death, she was convinced there was a monster in those trees. marked by the tragedy, brigit left town and never looked back. now brigit travels around the country investigating paranormal activity (and faking the results) with her cameraman, ian. but when she receives a call from ellis creek, she’s thrust into the middle of a search for two missing teenagers. as brigit and ian are drawn further into the case, the parallels to emma’s death become undeniable. and worse, brigit can’t explain what’s happening to her: trees appearing in her bedroom in the middle of the night, something with a very familiar laugh watching her out in the darkness, and emma’s voice on her phone, reminding brigit to finish what they started. women’s hotelby daniel m. laveryharpervia the beidermeier might be several rungs lower on the ladder than the real life barbizon, but its residents manage to occupy one another nonetheless. there’s katherine, the first floor manager, lightly cynical and more than lightly suggestible. there’s lucianne, a workshy party girl caught between the love of comfort and an instinctive bridling at convention, kitty the sponger, ruth the failed hairdresser, and pauline the typesetter. and there’s stephen, the daytime elevator operator and part time cooper union student. the residents give up breakfast, juggle competing jobs at rival presses, abandon their children, get laid off from the telephone company, attempt to retrain as stenographers, all with the shared awareness that their days as an institution are numbered, and they’d better make the most of it while it lasts. yr deadby sam saxmcsweeney’s in between the space of time when ezra lights themself on fire and when ezra dies the world of this book flashes before their eyes. everyone ezra’s ever loved, every place they’ve felt queer and at home, or queer and out of place, reveals itself in an instant. unfolding in fragments of memory, ezra dissolves into the family, religion, desire, losses, pains and joys that made them into the person that’s decided on this final act of protest. crossdresser // accept yourself or die by kat rogue // imogen reid sheer spite press the books are published back to back for a double gut punch of heartfelt, angry, and funny reflections on transfemme coming of age. imogen reid’s accept yourself or die: from mormon missionary to trans punk travels from small town northern ontario, to the missionary training centre in provo, utah, to basement shows in ottawa. it’s a story about staying stubbornly human in a world that wants to destroy you, and also about how weird it is going door to door trying to convert people to mormonism. crossdresser: growing up trans in the 1990s and 2000s, by kat rogue, explores what it does to a closeted trans girl to grow up saturated in the transmisogyny of 1990s pop culture and to come of age online, and how she managed to build her own relationship to femininity despite that. it argues that crossdressing, femme, and transness are more closely linked than some people think, and that ace ventura: pet detective really could have been great without all the transmisogyny. american teenagerby nico langabrams press media coverage tends to sensationalize the fight over how trans kids should be allowed to live, but what is incredibly rare are the voices of the people at the heart of this debate: transgender and gender nonconforming kids themselves. for their groundbreaking new book, journalist nico lang spent a year traveling the country to document the lives of transgender, nonbinary, and genderfluid teens and their families. drawing on hundreds of hours of on the ground interviews with them and the people in their communities, american teenager paints a vivid portrait of what it’s actually like to grow up trans today. breaking the curseby alex difrancescoseven stories press in breaking the curse, alex difrancesco takes their own crushing experiences of assault, addiction, and transphobic violence as the starting point for a journey to self reclamation. reeling in the aftermath of a rape that played out as painfully in public as in private, difrancesco begins to pursue spirituality in earnest, searching for an ancestral connection to magic as a form of protection and pathway to transformation. cactus countryby zoë bossiereabrams press newly arrived in the sonoran desert, eleven year old zoë’s world is one of giant beetles, thundering javelinas, and gnarled paloverde trees. with the family’s move to cactus country rv park, zoë has been given a fresh start and a new, shorter haircut. although zoë doesn’t have the words to express it, he experiences life as a trans boy and in cactus country, others begin to see him as a boy, too. as zoë enters adolescence, he must reckon with the sexism, racism, substance abuse, and violence endemic to the working class cactus country men he’s grown close to, whose hard masculinity seems as embedded in the desert landscape as the cacti sprouting from parched earth. corpses, fools, and monsterswillow catelyn maclay and caden mark gardnerrepeater in the history of cinema, trans people are usually murdered, made into a joke, or viewed as threats to the normal order relegated to a lost highway of corpses, fools, and monsters. in this book, trans film critics caden mark gardner and willow catelyn maclay take the reader on a drive down this lost highway, exploring the way that trans people and transness have evolved on screen. country queers: a love letterby rae garringerhaymarket books part photo book, part memoir, part oral history project, this volume paints a vivid portrait of queer and trans experiences in rural areas and small towns across the us. raised on a sheep farm in southeastern west virginia, rae garringer was motivated by an intense frustration with the lack of rural queer stories and the isolation that comes with that absence. queers, in all our forms, have always existed, garringer writes, all across this continent since before it was colonized. after years as a diy, minimally funded, community based oral history project, the work now takes a new form in country queers: a love letter a book of full color photos and interviews with rural folks from mississippi to new mexico and beyond, with garringer’s account as traveler and interviewer woven through the pages. frighten the horsesby oliver radclyfferoxane gay books frighten the horses is a trans man’s coming of age story, about a housewife who comes out as a lesbian and tentatively, at first, steps into the world of queerness. with growing courage and the support of his newfound community, oliver is finally able to face the question of his gender identity and become the man he is supposed to be. the story of a flawed, fascinating, gorgeously queer man, frighten the horses introduces oliver radclyffe as a witty, arresting, unforgettable voice. glorious bodiesby colby gordonuniversity of chicago press in this striking contribution to trans history, colby gordon challenges the prevailing assumption that trans life is a byproduct of recent medical innovation by locating a cultural imaginary of transition in the religious writing of the english renaissance. marking a major intervention in early modern gender studies, glorious bodies insists that transition happened, both socially and surgically, hundreds of years before the nineteenth century advent of sexology. pairing literary texts by shakespeare, webster, donne, and milton with a broad range of primary sources, gordon examines the religious tropes available to early modern subjects for imagining how gender could change. it gets better…except when it gets worseby nicole mainesthe dial press for the first time, in her own words, nicole tells the story of her journey from childhood in rural maine to the spotlights of hollywood, sharing the lessons she’s learned along the way. with clever wit and unflinching honesty, she tackles some of the most insidious messaging absorbed by queer kids and all young women, from the idea that any one thing can (or should) ever really fix you, to wondering what’s wrong with you when things don’t always feel better, and reminding us that, sometimes, a happy ending is only the beginning of the story. make it countby cecé telfergrand central publishing cecé telfer is a warrior. the first openly transgender woman to win an ncaa championship, she has contended with transphobia on and off the track since childhood. now, she stands at the crossroads of a national and international conversation about equity in sports, forced to advocate for her personhood and rights at every turn. after spending years training for the 2024 olympics, telfer has been sidelined and silenced more times than she can count. but she’s never been good at taking no for an answer. pretty by kb brookinsknopf informed by kb brookins’s personal experiences growing up in texas, those of other black transgender masculine people, black queer studies, and cultural criticism, pretty is concerned with the marginalization suffered by a unique american constituency whose condition is a world apart from that of cisgender, non black, and non masculine people. here is a memoir (a bildungsroman of sorts) about coming to terms with instantly and always being perceived as other. queering the runesby siri vincent plouffweiser books siri comes to the runes as a queer, nonbinary reader, and presents a path for reclaiming the ancestral wisdom and mystery of the runes in a way that can provide insight and understanding of their sacred nature for masculine, feminine, and nongendered aspects of self. written as a love letter to the runes, the gods, and the people who follow the nordic path, queering the runes presents an alternative approach to the runes one that creates a gentle container for those who want to follow this heathen path. ankle deep in pacific waterby e. hugheshaymarket books ankle deep in pacific water, a debut collection by e. hughes, marries personal narrative with historical excavation to articulate the intricacies of black familial love, life, and pain. tracing the experiences of a southern black family, their migration to the san francisco bay area, and the persistent anti blackness there (despite the state’s insistence that it is/was not involved in the us’ projects of imperialism or chattel slavery), hughes illuminates the intersections of history, grief, and violence. the doughnut worldby jillian a. fantinfifth wheel press poetry and theatre, sound and vision, sugar scrubbing, tattoo needles, hot oil and big fat veneers: all of this combines into a world shaped like a do(ugh)nut, desperately gripping its inhabitants with severe weather, shorter days, and weighty gravity to compensate for the drag of the hole. this world, this doughnut world, poses unique opportunities and challenges for its inhabitants, including: planetary transplant hucklebaby, cravat the sentient necktie, and a transmasc seahorse collective that only speaks emily dickinson. feeding the ghostsby rahul mehtathe university press of kentucky in 2017, writer and educator rahul mehta began a writing practice to find solace and beauty in the natural world, in their family and friends, and in everyday simplicities during a time of political tensions, environmental disasters, a global pandemic, and personal disappointment. from the vibrant color of a blade of grass, to their dog sleeping quietly in the corner, to delicate petals fallen from a rose, a mindfulness of the beauty in their surroundings helped offset the feelings of fear, outrage, and helplessness. the result of this exercise is a profoundly moving poetry collection that explores mehta’s south asian and appalachian culture, their queerness, their relationships with self and others, race, privilege, and a deep admiration of nature and the spiritual realm. metamourphosisby alison lubarfifth wheel press metamourphosis contemplates the transformative power of particularly queer, sapphic love, in all of its expressions: through grief, new relationship energy, and non linear healing. the section titles are portmanteaus, playing on both the idea of evolution, and of the illusion of a binary. and while these smaller divisions are worlds in themselves, their cohesive unfolding implies the interconnectedness of all facets, stages, and nuances of love. nazarboyby tarik dobbshaymarket books tarik dobbs’s work explores surveillance, queerness, disability, race, and working class identity in post 9/11 america. as an arab american writer, dobbs is achingly familiar with the power dynamics, violence, and capitalistic undercurrents woven through the language of the colonizer. they challenge this power in visual, free verse, and formally intense poems both traditional and innovative that stretch the elasticity of borders, verbs, images, redactions, and more. she who eats touristsby atalaya magdelenafifth wheel press i wrote she who eats tourists when traveling, via scholarships and favors, between the us southwest, midwest, and east coast. i was looking for something that i didn’t realize at the time was my girlhood, and i missed my home. because of the direction i traveled, i felt the eyes of a white tourist, superimposed into in my own, reversed back to the east, where the settler colonial imagination has mostly strongly emanated, and irradiated since the dawn of westward expansion. i needed to understand what those eyes had done to me. this poetry collection is essentially various attempts to write one kind of poem, a poem that will feel, as a consolation, like justice to read. spilling the lightby julián jamaica sotoskinner house books intimate and uncompromising, rev. julián jamaica, soto’s debut collection spilling the light, is a luminous offering to their communities and a defiant declaration of their worth in a world hostile to their queer, disabled, and brown being. america, is this freedom? they ask. i cannot prove to you that / i am a person, writing boldly of identity, community, liberation, and erasure through a prism of tender moments and powerful reckonings. transgenesisby ava nathaniel wintermilkweed editions an excavatory collection of poems tracing the connections between jewish transfemininity, queer desire, and cultural histories.selected by sean hill for the national poetry series, this collection is a scrupulous chronicle of individual and cultural knowledge. in an exceptional debut, ava nathaniel winter challenges our concepts of the beautiful and the sacred, delving not only into the historically marginalized, but also into the chilling subconscious of supremacy. the baker and the bardby fern haught feiwel & friends juniper and hadley have a good thing going in larkspur, spending their respective days apprenticing at a little bakery and performing at the local inn. but when a stranger makes an unusual order at the bakery, the two friends (and hadley’s pet snake, fern) set out on a journey to forage the magical mushrooms needed to make the requested galette pastries. along the way, juniper and hadley stumble across a mystery too compelling to ignore: something has been coming out of the woods at night and eating the local farmers’ crops, leaving only a trail of glowy goo behind. intent on finally going on an adventure that could fuel their bardic craft, hadley tows juniper into the woods to investigate. camp prodigyby caroline palmeratheneum books for young readers after attending an incredible concert, tate seong is inspired to become a professional violist. there’s just one problem: they’re the worst musician at their school. tate doesn’t even have enough confidence to assert themself with their friends or come out as nonbinary to their family, let alone attempt a solo anytime soon. things start to look up when tate attends a summer orchestra camp camp prodigy and runs into eli, the remarkable violist who inspired tate to play in the first place. but eli has been hiding their skills ever since their time in the spotlight gave them a nervous breakdown. together, can they figure out how to turn tate into a star and have eli overcome their performance anxieties? or will the pressure take them both down? homebodyby theo parishharperalley in their comics debut, theo parish masterfully weaves an intimate and defiantly hopeful memoir about the journey one nonbinary person takes to find a home within themself. combining traditional comics with organic journal like interludes, theo takes us through their experiences with the hundred arbitrary and unspoken gender binary rules of high school, from harrowing haircuts and finally the right haircut to the intersection of gender identity and sexuality and through tiny everyday moments that all led up to theo finding the term nonbinary, which finally struck a chord. lunar boyby jes and cin wibowoharperalley indu, a boy from the moon, feels like he doesn’t belong. he hasn’t since he and his adoptive mom disembarked from their spaceship their home to live on earth with their new blended family. the kids at school think he’s weird, he has a crush on his pen pal who might not like him back, and his stepfamily doesn’t seem to know what to do with him. in a moment of loneliness, indu calls out to the moon, begging them to take him back. and against all odds, the moon hears him and agrees to bring him home on the first day of the new year. but as the promised day draws nearer, indu finds friendship in unlikely places and discovers that home is more than where you come from. and when the moon calls again, indu must decide: is he willing to give up what he’s just found? the ribbon skirt by cameron mukwagraphix ten year old anang wants to make a ribbon skirt, a piece of clothing typically worn by girls in the anishinaabe tradition, for an upcoming powwow. anang is two spirit and nonbinary and doesn’t know what others will think of them wearing a ribbon skirt, but they’re determined to follow their heart’s desire. anang sets off to gather the materials needed to make the skirt and turns to those around them their family, their human and turtle friends, the crows, and even the lake itself for help. upstsaged by robin easterlittle, brown ink this is it: the last hurrah, the final curtain call. ever since sixth grade, ashton price and their best friend and enduring crush, ivy santos, have spent their summers together at theater camp. now it’s their last year before they part ways for high school, and ash is determined to end it on a high note! with ash as stage manager and ivy the lead in this year’s musical, this summer’s shaping up to be everything the two could have hoped for. maybe ash will even work up the courage to ask ivy out! but between ivy rehearsing long hours with her colead and ash throwing themself into an ambitious stage production, will they end up drifting apart instead? at the end of the river styxby michelle kulwickipage street ya before he can be reborn, zan has spent 499 years bound in a 500 year curse to process souls for the monstrous ferryman and if he fails he dies. in portland, bastian is grieving. he survived a car accident that took his mother and impulse purchased a crumbling bookstore with the life insurance money. but in sleep, death’s mark keeps dragging bastian into zan’s office. it shouldn’t be a problem to log his soul and forget he ever existed. but when zan follows bastian through his memories of grief and hope, zan realizes that he is not ready for bastian to die. flyboyby kasey leblancbalzer & bray/harperteen after an incident at his school leaves closeted trans teenager asher sullivan needing stitches, his mother betrays him in the worst possible way she sends him to catholic school for his senior year. now he has to contend with hideous plaid skirts, cranky nuns, and #bathroomjesus. nighttime brings an escape for asher when he dreams of the midnight circus the one place where he is seen for the boy he truly is. too bad it exists only in his sleep. at least, that’s what he believes until the day his annoyingly attractive trapeze rival, apollo, walks out of his dreams and into his classroom. on the heels of this realization that the magical circus might be real, asher also learns that his time there is limited. lockjaw by matteo l. cerillitundra books chuck warren died tragically at the old abandoned mill, but paz espino knows it was no accident   there’s a monster under the town, and she’s determined to kill it before anyone else gets hurt. she’ll need the help of her crew   inseparable friends, bound by a childhood pact stronger than diamonds, distance or death   to hunt it down. but she’s up against a greater force of evil than she ever could have imagined. with shifting timeframes and multiple perspectives, lockjaw is a small town ghost story, where monsters living and dead haunt the streets, the homes and the minds of the inhabitants. lucy uncensoredby mel and teghan hammondknopf books for young readers lucy imagines college as more than a chance to party with other drama nerds and be roommates with her best friend callie. college will be her fresh start. for the first time, she’ll be able to introduce herself as lucy to people she hasn’t gone to school with since kindergarten. while lucy and callie are on their campus tour for their dream school, two kids from their high school make the typical transphobic comments lucy’s gotten used to in her small town. she starts to worry that her dream school might end up being high school 2.0. when lucy finds a beautiful school with a great theater program on a list of the most lgbtq+ friendly colleges, it seems like fate except that the school is hundreds of miles away. and there’s something unexpected about it: it’s a women’s college. the no girlfriend ruleby christen randallatheneum books for young readers for hollis, a fat, broke girl with anxiety, the start of senior year brings enough to worry about. her relationship with her boyfriend, chris, isn’t particularly exciting, but it’s comfortable and familiar, and hollis wants it to survive beyond senior year. to prove she’s a girlfriend worth keeping, hollis decides to learn chris’s favorite tabletop roleplaying game, secrets & sorcery but his unfortunate no girlfriends at the table rule means she’ll need to find her own group if she wants in. enter: gloria castañeda and her all girls game of s&s! crowded at the table in gloria’s cozy ohio apartment, the six girls battle twisted magic in game and become fast friends outside it. with her character as armor, hollis starts to believe that maybe she can be more than just fat, anxious, and a little lost. old woundsby logan ashley kisnerdelacorte press erin and max are two transgender teens trying to get to california. max is desperate to finally transition, and erin is longing to understand why she’s on this trip to begin with. the last she spoke to max was when he suddenly broke up with her two years ago. but when they find themselves stranded in the middle of the woods in a small kentucky town, they realize they have much bigger problems. the locals need a female sacrifice for the monster that lives in the woods according to them, the sun won’t come up again until the monster eats a girl…and it only eats what it kills. time and time againby chatham greenfieldbloomsbury ya phoebe mendel’s day is never ending literally. on august 6th, she woke up to find herself stuck in a time loop. and for nearly a month of august 6ths since, phoebe has relived the same day: pancakes with mom in the morning, scrabble with dad in the afternoon, and constant research into how to reach tomorrow and make it to her appointment with a doctor who may actually take her ibs seriously. everything is exactly, agonizingly the same. that is, until the most mundane car crash ever sends phoebe’s childhood crush jess crashing into the time loop. the wildnerness of girlsby madeline claire franklinzando young readers after being placed in foster care, rhi is hungry for a fresh start and begins working at the happy valley wildlife preserve. while in the woods, she stumbles upon a surreal sight: a pack of wolves guarding four feral and majestic girls. after rhi gains their trust, they reveal that they’re princesses from another land, raised by a magical prophet they call mother and they’re convinced rhi is their lost fifth sister. unsure what to believe, rhi ushers the girls to civilization, where they’re met with societal uproar and scrutiny. desperate to return to their kingdom, the girls look to rhi for help. a song for nolanby sally chen, rushie ellenwoodlittle bee books when nolan is invited to a birthday party at the roller rink, they are so excited. they pick out the perfect, sparkling outfit, tie on their snazzy skates, and join their friends for a day of roller skating bliss. but when the dj calls for a boys skate followed by a girls skate, nolan feels left out. with courage and a strong sense of self, nolan bravely requests a song for everyone. accidental demonsby clare edgeharpercollins for the youngest in a long line of witches, demons used to be no big deal. a spell and a quick prick of the finger, and a witch like ber could summon a demon to do anything she needed clean a mess, send a message, you name it. but that was before ber was diagnosed with diabetes. now each time she tests her blood sugar, accidental demons are slipping into the human dimension…and causing absolute chaos. the flickerby he. edgmonfeiwel & friends one year ago, a solar flare scorched the earth and destroyed life as we know it. with their parents gone and supplies running dangerously low, step sisters millie and rose only have one chance at survival: leave home with their infant half brother and loyal dog corncob in search of millie’s grandma, a seminole elder. as they navigate the burning land with a group of fellow survivors, dodging the hive, a villainous group that has spent the last year hoarding supplies and living in luxury, the siblings have to learn to rely on each other more than ever, and discover how to build a new life from the ashes. the lumbering giants of whispering pinesby mo netzclarion books ever since her dad died, 11 year old jerry blum and her mom have bounced around dead end towns, staying in a series of rundown motels where her mother picks up housekeeping work and jerry can get around in her wheelchair. but the slumbering giant motel is different. lights blink on and off in the surrounding trees, a mysterious radio station plays only at midnight, and people disappear into the woods, never to been seen again. not to mention that jerry’s mom keeps vanishing to do special work that she refuses to discuss. when her mother doesn’t come home one morning, jerry springs into action. magica riotby kara buchannanstorm maiden the last night of claire ryland’s old life in the closet was pretty normal, aside from the alley fight with interdimensional monsters. fortunately, the drummer of her favorite local band transformed into a magical girl and saved her. then claire became a magical girl as well. things got a little complicated after that. now claire is juggling two new lives: living as a girl and as a member of portland’s super secret supernatural defense squad, the hard rocking magical girls known as…magica riot! splinter & ashby marieke nijkampgreenwillow books ash or princess adelisa is the youngest child of the queen, recently returned to the city of kestrel’s haven after spending six years on the other side of the country. ash was hoping for a joyous reunion, but the reality is far from it. her mother is holding the kingdom together by a thread; her brother has only taunts and jibes for her; and court is full of nobles who openly mock and dismiss ash, who uses a cane and needs braces to strengthen her joints. splinter is the youngest child of one of haven’s most prominent families. she’s fierce, determined, and adventurous, and she has her sights set on becoming a knight just like her older brother. even if everyone says she can’t because she’s not a boy. so what? she’s not a girl, either. a chance encounter throws ash and splinter into each other’s orbits and changes the course of the kingdom’s history. our monthly newsletter to help you keep up with chirb related goings on. jen st. jude is the author of if tomorrow doesn't come, published by bloomsbury children's in may of 2023. find them on twitter and instagram: @jenstjude. have an additional one to add to the list. was published at the very end of november 2024… “trans liberation station” trans liberation station is over 200 pages of irreverent punk rock, emo, pain fueled, chaotic good, gay joy, teenager poetry   written by nova martin, a 47 year old transgender sapphic druidess vixen from texas. (self published) also, i do wanna thank you, jen for compiling this list. it’s really excellent and helpful for all these authors. queer folks, especially trans folks, need all the help we can get right now. thank you so much for commenting! your work sounds beyond incredible, i can’t wait to check it out. and i’m so glad others will now find it here too. © 2021 all rights reserved. our site uses cookies. learn more about our use of cookies: cookie policy type your email… continue reading

host jason blitman is joined by authors, guest gay readers, and other special guests in weekly conversations. gays reading celebrates lgbtqia+ and ally authors and storytellers featuring spoiler free conversations for everyone. if you're not a gay reader, we hope you're a happy one. in the final pride installment of upcoming/up & coming, jason and brett talk to debut* authors kimberly king parsons (we were the universe), kb brookins (pretty), and santiago jose sanchez (hombrecito). they talk about the theatre of parenthood, queer representation in books and media, and using writing to better understand your own story. *debut ish! kimberly’s debut novel and kb’s debut memoir. kimberly king parsons is the author of black light, a collection of stories that was long listed for the national book award and the story prize. in 2020, she received the national magazine award for fiction. born in lubbock, texas, she lives in portland, oregon, with her partner and children. we were the universe is her first novel. kb brookins is a black, queer, and trans writer and cultural worker from texas. they are the author of freedom house and how to identify yourself with a wound. brookins has poems, essays, and installation art published in academy of american poets, teen vogue, poetry magazine, prizer arts & letters, okayplayer, poetry society of america, autostraddle, and other venues. they have earned fellowships from the national endowment for the arts, pen america, equality texas, and others. santiago jose sanchez (they/them), a grinnell college assistant professor of english and a graduate of the iowa writers’ workshop, is a queer colombian american writer. santiago’s writing has appeared in mcsweeney’s, zyzzyva, subtropics, and joyland and been distinguished in best american short stories. they are the recipient of a truman capote fellowship from the university of iowa and an emerging lgbtq voices fellowship from lambda literary. book club!use code gaysreading at checkout to get first book for only $4 + free shipping! restrictions apply.http://aardvarkbookclub.comwatch!https://youtube.com/@gaysreading follow!instagram: @gaysreading | @jasonblitmanbluesky: @gaysreading | @jasonblitmancontact!hello@gaysreading.com another week of summer and another huge, glut of books are coming out. i know. and we're still carrying on with pride. we're very proud. we're very proud. well, some of these that are coming out are people that are having on the show very shortly, including claire lombardo. you know, lombardo's book, same as it ever was, comes out today. catherine newman. katherine newman's book, sandwich, comes out today. yes. and both of those conversations are coming up so soon. both are fantastic conversations. so please be on the watch for those. make sure you pre order them. yeah, they're fantastic books. another book is bobby fingers four squares, which looks so wonderful and sweet and centers on a slightly odd, older, i should say more mature lgbtq gentlemen. i'm looking forward to that. there's also one star romance by laura henkin, and, lula deen's little library of banned books by kirsten miller, whose book the change came out a couple years ago, which was so delicious and so i loved that. yeah. and so lula deen's little library of banned books, very much deals with the universe of banned books and also little free libraries, two things that i find very important. i love my little free library. it's a constant, i look at it as a, flower that constantly needs grooming. yes. very sweet. i try to avoid them because i need more books like, need a hole in the head. so i try to avoid little free libraries, even though i love them. and thank you to all of our little free library stewards out there. yes. today, we have kimberly king parsons talking about her book, we were the universe. we have k. b. brookins talking about their book, we were the universe. pretty. and we have santiago josé sánchez talking about their book, hombrecito. santi and i grew up in south florida and we had a lot of gushing about south florida. and they're all wonderful humans and debut novelists. and i'm so excited for everyone to check them out. although kb's book is a memoir. they are a debut memoirist rather than a poet because they are a poet first, memoirist second up. yes. so first up we have kimberly king parsons talking about her book, we were the universe. i'm jason, i'm brett. he's reading. upcoming, up and coming pride episode of gays reading. hello. hello! oh my god, what an impressive bookshelf behind you. oh, thank you. it's my, yeah. i've lugged this shit around with me for years and years. i'm very happy to set it up in every new home, but yeah. hi. how are you? good for you for legging. i know. i'm like, it's worth it. it's worth it. i have a very unpopular opinion about things like that. i'm like, i want the books in the world. i want someone else to read it. i want to give them away. like seeing a book on a shelf you're like, what a way. what a makes me sad. i know. i'm like go be free. i know. you know what? i do give a lot of them away and i have little kids and i want them, of course, they don't care about reading at all, probably because we have 2000 books in our house that they're just like, it seems boring, but i want to have books around just cause i grew up in a house with no books. we had three books in my whole house. one was the bible. one was the a volume of encyclopedia and one was this sci fi book with this lady with a, like a suit like unzipped all the way down that i was like obsessed with surrounding yourself. i think you're right. okay, i, you've changed my mind. young people surrounded by books is a good thing. i'm into it. thank you so much for talking to me today. i really appreciate you taking the time to do this. hello. thank you for being here. hello back. wait, we have to circle back to something. cause like you, you can't just drop that. you had the a volume of the encyclopedia and not talk about because it was me more. it was free. so they would give you the like teaser volume. and so we got that one, but then my parents were like, that seems like a waste of money. we're not doing that whole investment. a kid of the eighties and nineties when like paper encyclopedias were still a thing. also, we had a cd rom. i remember that. full encyclopedia on it. so i guess i did have access to things but but yeah, just the bible the sci fi and the a volume of the encyclopedia, so that's that just sparked my own memory of the door to door encyclopedia delivery salesman. literally we, my dad fell for that. i say i guess it was an important thing to have in the house, but did i ever open it? probably not. also my grandma had all these readers digests and i would there was a section called i survived death and i would get like weirdly turned on and read all these like in her basement about like people who had been in alligator attacks. i don't know. there was something about that. i was like, they're so alive. but yeah, there was something about reading the reader's digest. so we had those i think less in like national geographic's but we did have my grandma also had the guinness book of world records, which like, the creepy girl with the 13 inch waist and like the giant the long nails. oh your yeah. how i remember going through being like, what can i do? yeah, exactly. where's my record? long can i get my nails? how much can i stretch my neck? that was, i remember that one too. i feel like the rings all the way up. like kept going to was like the 1989 guinness book of world records was like very formative in my childhood. yeah. for associate all that too with like wax museums, anything that would present nightmares as a child all seem to be tied into that same kind of like pantheon ripley's, believe it or not. yeah. yeah. wait, so the people who survived death, do you remember any of them specifically? i just remember there was like some guy who was sucked into some like factory equipment and survived oh my god, hashtag willy wonka. a lot of animal attacks and or just, big disasters, like an earthquake or i don't know, there was stuff like that. people would write them. and i knew i felt like i was doing something wrong. like reading felt like scandalous in my grandma's house. i don't know. it was i was just down there reading these and feeling very like excited about people who escaped death. i don't know. i want to write a whole book about it. i remember my parents telling me that they used to live around the corner from a man who survived and getting struck by lightning. wow. yeah. i'm sure there was one of those in there too. it's always like cool. it was people who escaped death in cool ways. it wasn't like, someone recovered from an illness. it was like cool. coolers. i survived a cheetah attack. yeah, exactly. in pomona, of all places. yeah. or something weird. oh my god. we could talk about escaping death all day, but should we talk about but we have a book to talk about. i don't want to say we're cheating, but you have written a book before, but this is your debut novel. love it. yeah. love to be a second time debut. no. yeah. i think it's a totally different thing. totally different experience. so very happy to be here. pretending it's my first time. no, it is. it's a whole new thing. so yeah. thank you. so tell us about we were the universe. what is your elevator pitch, one liner? okay. so i have been saying for years that it's a book about texas motherhood and psychedelics, which inevitably gets people to be like, what, how are those things related? or i will say that it's like. fleabag, if fleabag were a queer mom living in a dallas suburb. but yeah, so it's basically this, we meet our, my main character, protagonist she is leading a pretty seemingly normal stay at home mom life. but just under the surface, there's a lot of unresolved pain and guilt surrounding the death of her sister, which takes place just before the novel begins. and the way that kit, the main character, is dealing with this surfacing guilt and grief is through escape, like fantasizing about the men and women of her neighborhood a lot of porn and just letting nostalgia have its way with her. and so she's remembering her past when she was an adventurous free spirit. and now she's in a monogamous relationship. she doesn't do drugs anymore. and so she's all of her coping mechanisms have left her. how does kimberly feel about that? how do i feel about it? the way you were saying that, i was like, oh, is she, does she miss her coping mechanisms? it's funny. i think that there's something that happens when you have a baby where suddenly self destruction is off the table. and i think that in the past, it's like, it's not that i necessarily, was attracted to self destruction, but it was an option. and i guess once you have a kid, you're like i really just have to keep my act together. so i definitely relate to that feeling. and also i definitely relate to the feeling of using self deprecation and humor and fantasy to avoid dealing with real life stuff that's bothering me. so yeah i can see where she's coming from a little bit. yeah. kit, this narrator, she's a young mom, so she's only in her early 20s and she, it was like, she just missed her chance to fully self destruct, and now she's gotta, she's gotta stay this sort of responsible path, yeah. so you're saying having kids is a buzzkill. that's the takeaway. i feel like it's good. i feel like it's actually really good. i feel like i will personally i didn't have my kids. i was in my 30s. and so i had definitely run the full gamut of everything i really wanted to do. and and i so i don't have that feeling of missed opportunity or because i felt like i did. plenty of that. i lived in new york for many years before my kids were born. and then once they were born, we had to leave. so there were buzzkills in that way because we can't raise kids in new york city. but but i didn't feel a lot of missed opportunities personally, but this character certainly does. and i think that there's something about when you have a baby, you're expected to immediately sublimate your personality and your interests. and i just believe that if you were a mom, if you're a person who's into psychedelics before you have a baby, probably you're now a mom who's interested in psychedelics, but you're just meant to immediately be caregivers, and yeah. the book is also so much about the judgment of doing it wrong. and by it, i mean parenting, grief, even talking about you left new york because of the kids, right? someone might say you're doing it wrong, right? it's where did that, did you feel like that was true for you as a mom? did you feel like that? how, where did the doing it wrong element of it all come from for you? yeah, i think that people will tell you when you have a kid whether you're a mom or a dad or parent, whatever, they'll say you need to put a hat on that baby. everyone has an opinion on how you're supposed to raise your child, and they know that it's a really quick way to do it. to immediately disparage or cut you down, because there's no way that's not a loaded statement. like, where are her shoes? there's no way that you can interpret that any other way than being judged. and everyone has very strong opinions about how to raise a child, especially people who don't have kids. they have some of the strongest opinions of all. so i definitely felt that lot like having kids and even though i was in my 30s, i felt like a teen mom. sometimes like i just would feel like i don't know how to do this. how does anyone know how to do this stuff? it wasn't the sense of even though i did follow my instincts in a lot of ways, like there are certain things like breastfeeding is a big thing in this book where everyone wants you to breastfeed for a year. and in fact, they'll be like you must, like you have to do it. but then if you go beyond the year, then people start to get squicked out by it. like it flips really quickly the other direction. but again, like people will have really strong opinions about things that are essentially inconsequential to them. that has nothing to do with you and your family. but i definitely felt that, and even, it comes from your own family, your in laws have ideas your mother, your own mother has ideas and so it's about filtering out that noise to try to make the best decisions for your family. and so yeah, i definitely felt that for sure having a child, and there just isn't a rulebook. and it's there's not a rulebook for parenting, there's not a rulebook for grieving. and the people, lots of people are affected by grief, it's a part of life, unfortunately, and we all handle it differently in the same way that we all handle parenting differently. i say we all, i am not a parent. i'm a dog dad who i hate the phrase dog dad, but i have a very difficult dog, yeah, no, also the grief thing, i i noticed about grief was how it robs you of the present moment. and that's the thing. and all of us, if we live long enough, we will experience grief. and just that sensation of not being able to the way it just consumes time and it elongates time too. it's very tricky the way that it works. and yeah, there's also the sense that you're not grieving, right? you're not processing, right? you're not handling things right when everybody goes at their own pace and can only handle what they can handle. know themes of like bravery are found in the book as well. what do you think it means to be brave? i think it means doing the thing that feels right for you and not worrying so much about what other people think. and i think it's interesting because i realized later, like this main character, she's like a messy bitch in a lot of ways. like she's breastfeeding a kid who's three, almost four. she is like attachment parenting because she herself was underparented. and i find that this whiplash is something that is real. it's true for my life as well. growing up, full on latchkey kid who felt like very much raised by oprah like by afternoon tv and like microwaving kraft singles and i had a very i was left alone a ton. and so my kids, they're structured within an inch of their lives. like they have all these activities and all this enrichment. and i know that's probably a indirect relation to the way that i was raised. yeah. but i think there's something i know also when you write about things like milf is like still the number one most searched porn term, but people get very uncomfortable with the idea of a mother looking at porn. and so i know that there's a part of me that must be including these themes that are tricky for people as a way, not that i'm trying to provoke, but just that to me, that feels like bravery to write about the things that matter, that feel relevant without, the sense that maybe some people are going to be like horrified, they'll be horrified just by the idea of a mom looking at pornography or breastfeeding a kid till she's three. like, rest feed the kid as long as you want. carrying that extra bag, you don't have room for that extra bag. it's just on your body. it's i've, i've, there's a comment that, her friend makes her at one point that says if she can ask for it, it's too much. and i've heard that, but like reading that, i've heard that so much. i remember that whole thing going through that and being like, and having hearing other people say to me about somebody else, that exact same thing. i was like, i mean, listen, everyone's allowed to have their own opinion, but mind your business. keep it to yourself. people will definitely but also my kids were really verbal really early. so i'm like, they're actually still little enough that but my older son would be like, can i have a quick squirt? like he would say that and i'm like, and it's so weird to people. but also you're like, he's not even to like, he's just really verbal. yeah, if you're old enough to ask for it, you shouldn't get it like, and again, i think that they're trying to be a little bit flippant or funny or whatever. and in the moment though, too, i think you just have to and every kid is different as well. like one kid may be like attached for it forever and the other kid is like over it really quickly, but yeah, just figuring out what is like the best thing for you. but knowing also that there's this theater of parenthood that happens anytime we leave our house, which is on the playground, everything. and it's not what we even say to our kids. it's what we're saying for the other parents to hear and how you're presenting for the other parents, yeah. do you have any kind of musical background yourself? or is that a big part of your life? and if so, what did you like or do you like? i've always been in bands. not now so much since i'm, in my 40s and have children, but i have always been in bands growing up when i was a teenager in dallas where i grew up. our thing was that we wanted to just be good enough to open for the real bands. we didn't even and we weren't very good. and like a variety of different types of bands. i always sing, i've always listened to music. it's a huge part of my day to day life. and for years before i switched into the writing path, i think i had ideas that i was going to go on to do, to be a musician in some way. and when it became apparent that wasn't going to happen i pretty quickly, pivoted and went all in on writing. know, coming back to you talking about bravery, you talk about so many things in the book that like people just don't address, like for a mom to be in a heterosexual presenting relationship, but also pine for a fellow mom on the playground. can you talk a bit about that and what it means to be a writer and especially right now? i have not seen a lot of representation on this front, which is someone who is, i've always been queer, always have been attracted to, in fact, most of my relationships were with women before in my past, but then i'm married to a straight dude and happily married and a monogamous relationship now. and so but that representation isn't something that you see very often but it's still a huge part of my identity, of course. and for this character, her interior life is. is, she calls it the vault, like we all have the vault, all of the flames from the past and conjure when you need them, but like her vault is made up of men and women from the past, but then also her present moment. she's pulled around by her lust still, even though she's married, which is again something that i think people get. freaked out about it. they just don't understand. how does that work? how can you experience both a happy monogamous relationship and also be like deeply horny in your brain, you it's window shopping. that's what i always but also because we're animals. yes. i always say it's like shopping with your credit cards maxed out. i know i can't actually buy it, but i can certainly look you can put stuff in the cart. you put stuff in the car and then close the browser window. yeah. i think since we're deep in the interior mind of this character, it would be such a lie to have her be you. saying to herself oh, but you can't look at this part. it's what? no, this, she's alone. we're in her animal thoughts, in her mind. so of course we get to see all of that stuff. yeah. which makes it like extra fun. is there something that's deep in your vault that you are willing to share? i, i think that some of the things from this book are ripped from the real, from the true life. so certainly, and i definitely feel like although it's fiction and synthesized and i just did this event in dallas where literally like my mother in law, my father in law, my mom, my like aunts, like everybody was there. and i was just like, i'm like, people who grieve people who are horny, they grieve hornily. and my family just burst out laughing. and i was like, see, they know, like they know me enough to know these things. and so i think it's i can say it's fiction and it is certainly. the circumstances aren't me, but there's so many things that i've pulled from my real life and also from my kids mouths. gilda, the daughter in the book, she says a lot of things that i just have literally like just copied from my kids and put it right in the book because the way kids speak is so strange. they say the most bizarre things and i definitely am always like writing that stuff down. amazing. i didn't mean to pry. i just to talk about the vault. and so i it titillated me. sure. yeah. and of course right now i'm like, now i am remembering things in my vault, but those are for you. we'll keep it locked. keep it locked. for the next book. exactly. so you've talked about a couple books that you're excited about. are there others that are coming down the pike that you want to shout out? yes, okay, so there is a book called madwoman by chelsea beaker, who, full disclosure, is one of my dearest friends, and one of the kindest human beings in the whole world, but this novel is it really, walks the line between literary fiction and a thriller. it's propulsive, page turning she was directly inspired by sleeping with the enemy it's a domestic violence story, but it's also, it's funny, it's about identity, it's about motherhood, it's about the outward presentation of a sort of upper middle class mom in portland, oregon, it's really good and i think it's it's perfect for people who like thrillers and suspense novels, but also who want to be blown away by really beautiful sentences. you're talking to the right people. yeah, that's very on brand for us. kimberly king parsons, thank you so much for being here, thank you, kimberly. now over to kb brookins to hear about their book, pretty. good morning. good morning. how are y'all? good. how you doing? i'm all right. i can't complain. we're here to talk about your book. your book, your memoir, your kaleidoscope of things pretty. manifesto. god, do you have like a log line, an elevator pitch of what the book is? yeah it has been toted online as such and i think i'm gonna borrow that. a multi genre book on queerness, masculinity, and race. oh my god, that is so precision. very succinct. yes. and done. yeah, what was the transition from poetry to creating this? i think that i first tried this book as like a poetry collection. it's like my first love, like it's the genre that kind of first made me a writer. and besides like diary entries, i have been doing those since i was like seven years old. but as far as like the literary arts poetry is it's like my first thing. and i thought for a long time i would just only, write poetry books. but then i found myself stumped with talking about the things that i talk about in this book. so then i entertained the idea of maybe this is not the right genre for what i want to say and how i want to say it. because poetry as all genres do memoir fiction as well. they have their like craft elements, right? when i pick up poetry, i'm thinking a lot about sound. i'm thinking about, sometimes like line form, et cetera. and i was feeling like, and poetry has a different allegiance than nonfiction to like the truth. so i was thinking about those things, and i was thinking what if i just said hey, this happened? how would that change what i'm writing? and also, what if i put this in paragraph forms? what if i have a little bit more allegiance to the sentence? i definitely am a poet that often is working in fragments, right? i'm not writing full sentences. but what if i did? so just to clarify, you mean, say, hey, this happened rather than something a little bit more colorful or metaphoric or alluding to something? yeah. what metaphor is there for being like black and trans? in the us, right? like those kinds of questions that i was like thinking of as i was trying to attempt this book and i'm like, i just don't know if i can pick up a comparison maybe instead i need to pick up like the conventions of nonfiction where i'm just like, hey, let me tell you this story about me going to the gynecologist. let me tell you this story about something that happened to me in, elementary school and has just continued to happen in different ways throughout my whole life, right? this like performance of not fitting into the conventions of a certain gender. so yeah, then i started writing some things and then after talking to, other journalists and essay writers and nonfiction writers about like, how do i get this out into the world? it was like, all of a sudden had training wheels again, and i was like learning. a whole new world, because nonfiction is, different than poetry in a lot of ways. but after i asked those questions, then i was able to place, individual pieces in huffpost and teen vogue, etc., etc. and then i found that i was writing a lot about the same kind of three things that i named, queerness, masculinity, race. so then i was like, ah, shit, man, have i been writing a book? laughs surprise. yeah. then i did my little copy paste in google doc you're like, oh, writing a book is pretty easy. yeah. yeah. so i think it just, it really just started there. i was like these poems are not conveying the story in the way that i want. so maybe let me change the story form. you do something so beautiful in the book too, like there was a section where you break down your poetry piece, and then riff on each one of those items, which i thought was just so fantastic and inventive and really cool. i thought, wow, this is such an inventive way to tell this part of your story. oh, thanks. and to clarify for our read for our readers, our listeners who haven't read the book yet. what brad is talking about is there's a chapter in particular that kb starts with a poem and then sort of line by line restates the line and then unpacks it a little bit for the entire poem. and i think it's, it was an exciting thing to experience for people who i think can find poetry scary. yeah, it's all very accessible. at a point in the book, you talk in your, about how, you needed to gain language to contextualize your experience and that helped you understand you better. i feel like that is a very succinct and articulate way of talking about our moment in time right now. as a society, as queer people do you feel that to be true as well? even 10 years ago, there weren't really conversations about. what it means to be non binary, what it means to be trans, people in the lgbtqia plus community. there weren't as many letters 10 years ago, right? and so i think that now we're like building a vocabulary for our siblings within the community that like allow us to empathize with each other, but also to give individuals additional language to understand their own identity better. that's how i'm seeing this moment in time right now. and i'm curious if you feel that to be true. yeah, absolutely. i think this i want to say with the lgbtqia two plus acronym expanding over time, i'm like, it's not that those identities didn't exist. i think that the greater population didn't know, right? and i think, even dating back the lgbt acronym to lesbian and gay some places are still called that, right? and i think it's just been a kind of, despite what the, political landscape would like us to believe it's just like more visibility of these kinds of communities, these subcultures within the queer and trans community that have always been there. and like i found, writing this book, i think, even started with me just looking for a book about my experience, in the belly of the pandemic, early days in 2020, right? i all of a sudden just had all this silence, right? all of a sudden was like, okay, the world is stopping and now i have some time to think. and what i'm thinking a lot as i have had been for years what kind of things do i need to do in order to like feel completely me, right? and ultimately i decided to start the medical part of my transition. i got top surgery that year. i also started hormone replacement therapy in december of 2020. and then so i started seeing the perception of me change right in people's eyes, people who knew me, strangers, and like the socialization of gender is like so ingrained that people really do make just like split decisions on how to treat you. based on what gender they perceive you as, right? and it was a kind of like violent, rapid resocialization process of a black girlhood and into a black manhood. and i'm just like, i don't actually feel either of those ways. and also because of the socialization of black womanhood and black manhood, like both of those identities came with their own leg. issues, right? at least to the outside world as in black girlhood. i think it's just like angry black women stereotype, right? so my anger was like painted in a certain way there. and then it's anytime that i was like, any kind of unhappy still to this day, right? just based on what i look like, people have such a visceral reaction to my anger as if i'm gonna, blow up the place right because i'm right and there's this like fear associated with like black manhood. and how people perceive it so i was just finding those things really hard to feel right and see in front of me, and also feeling okay no matter how close i get to quote unquote passing, like there are just some like social cues. there are some things that still make me stick out, right? so i was trying to find literature about that experience and i was coming up, blank, right? we have lots of trans memoirs that exist. how many black trans memoirs, right? how many black books about masculinity that are written by trans people, right? it was just like, so many roadblocks to finding myself, like represented in literature, represented in film and tv, represented in just media in general, right? so then i started writing about things and speaking to other trans people. people like me with similar identities about, the things that we face on the daily that feel like an enigma to people who don't live it, right? going to the gynecologist trying to get your name and gender marker changed in texas, where you have to have, a letter, from a doctor saying you have a gender identity disorder, right? like just stuff like that, right? or at least everyday things for me. and then also the trauma of growing up as a kid and trying actually like to fit into a girl mode or fit into gender in general and like coming across lots of adversity from the people around you to tell you don't fit in. when they could just let you like be whoever you are. so anyway, i started writing this in efforts to really write myself into history as lots of people over time have done, right? i think about books like alicia rothwego's inverse cowgirl. i think about the books that we're seeing now on like asexuality. they're like, published, 10, 20 years ago. i even think about, the trailblazing books, the like first books of its kind, like stone butch blues by leslie feinberg, right? and i think about, gender trouble by judith butler. and like, there are so many books out there that had to be like the first, right? i want us to move past first, right? i want us to move past like someone like me being compelled to write a memoir because they can't find a book. that is like their experience, right? and my experience is one that is not just me. there are lots of other people out in the world, like me, that deserve to have their life reflected back to them because it shows you, that you are not just like the only person ever living with your experience because that can feel very alienating. and i felt that a lot, growing up and i felt that even in 2020 when i was a grown adult, like trying to how can i know what to expect? and also how can i like, at least feel like. there is someone else out there, no matter how far away they are, that like, know what i'm seeing and can validate what i'm feeling. yeah. and to your point, all the letters have existed. it just. because of things like social media, because of things like people with privilege and power are understanding that there is representation that needs to happen and are in turn making decisions and are gatekeeping in a more representative way. suddenly access will be had to people, to the, to young you, hmm. of experience. all the letters, which i think, is really important. okay. wait, you there. you said you talk about three things and trauma being, i think a big topic, what is bringing you joy these days? what makes kb happy? i want to hear the good things. all this is good, but let's, i don't, let's talk about, what are you watching on tv? funny, so i decided to re watch all of scandal while i'm on like, tour stuff. because i was like, i need something for those times where i'm just like, two hours in the airport. or you need your olivia pope. exactly. i've been rewatching scandal the past couple of weeks since my book came out on may 28th. and it's quite good storytelling. i don't know. i love like experiencing new stories. so that's what i'm watching right now. i just read. the book beating heart baby by leo minton, and i found it very cute, like coming of age memoir about a trans guy and his boyfriend and them being a hot mess, i love witnessing other people's mess. i don't like mess in my personal life, but like finding it in media. i'm like, let me latch on to yeah and i also read cactus country by zoey bastier recently. shout out to zoey. who we had on the podcast. a really amazing memoir yeah, on gender fluidity, class, growing up in tucson. i also love reading stuff from, not the shit on la or new york, but i'm like, that's 80 percent of the book industry. like, when it's in a place that i am not familiar with and i can get familiar with it from somebody's writing it's a gift. i also recently read dearborn by hassan kenedin. spell check on that. but, yeah. yeah, that was a really awesome short story collection. just all of the stories being set in dearborn, michigan. which has the highest, i think, arab population in the u. s. yeah, shout out to that book. it's very funny. and also tear jerking. and i love a book that can tear you apart. take me on a roller coaster, no, i feel that. do you feel pretty? i fun, because that's the title. know. and you talk about it as a pursuit and as a and so i'm curious in terms of as you continue to, as you continue to evolve as a human, yeah. i think for a long time in my life, and then the life of other people that i've spoken to that have similar experiences as me like, it's just, you know, a black trans life can often be devoid of like softness. and can be devoid of like people telling you that you're beautiful and that what you have to say matters. and this is in like black communities. this is in queer communities. like it feels extra effort has to be put in order for black trans stories to happen. so for that reason, i see my book definitely as like an effort of me being, lovingly annoying for a number of years in order to get it out. yeah. and, also just look, right? because i think, books that get published, they have a lot to do with timing. they have a lot to do with, do you have, that one editor, that one agent, that one, as lady gaga would say, a thousand people don't believe in you, but i love to say that in like lots of interviews. but yeah, it's just a matter of like, do the stars align? and i felt luckily so cared for by my community. and i've also felt no matter how many years i spent not feeling pretty i do now. so i'm so glad. and to take that question, brett and reframe that a tiny bit, at the end of the chapter titled pretty you asked this question, and i will ask it. i will recontextualize it to ask you how does it feel to be here and let's say here right now, talking to us, publish the book in this moment in time, how does it feel to be here? it feels awesome. i don't know if y'all have seen that a video of tisha campbell doing this song i'm still here, but that's how i feel. i feel like there are so many things, working against people like me, right? mortality rates and, all of these other kind of statistics out there. our legislature right now in texas, but also like around the us, like the waves of anti trans laws, bills. it's a lot, it's a lot to wake up every day and feel like you have a target on your back just simply because you are who you are. and it's even worse, logging into elon musk's internet and anybody can say anything to you. but i think that it feels. really great to finally be here because this is a book is not just like a this is a thing i wrote. and then the next year it got published. like it's usually like a multi year process of, lots of no's, lots of rejections. and also lots of moments where you're like, is this going to happen? so i'm happy to be past those moments. i'm like you can't take it back. it's already been printed. happy to be at a place where i'm like, okay, it's real now that it's in hands that are not just mine and my editors. and i also feel just ready for, ready to make sure that the door doesn't like slam behind me, you know, like other memoirs like mine, other memoirs, wildly different than mine that are experiences that we are yet to know as a society as a queer community to burst forth and whatever i can do to help with that i'm ready to do it now that mine is, you know, the one thing that has been so eyeopening even doing this podcast and what it's reiterated so much is why you hear this, but to actually know it and speaking. to you right now about the importance of representation and why it matters so much that these stories are out there for people to see and to see themselves and to recognize who they are and to know they're not alone. so thank you. and to put it in such a beautiful package is, i don't know, there's no question there. it's simply like i'm moved by it. cause as i'm sitting here, i'm like, i'm very moved by it. so thank you. i'm glad. i'm glad when anyone is not giving me, one star on goodreads. anytime. i'm happy. also for us, cis white people to educate ourselves, we need to take responsibility. so there's that too. so i think it's, i think thanks also for giving us some context. but kb, congrats on the book. it's fantastic. yeah we can't wait for our listeners to check it out. i hope that all of the rest of your tour and other conversations and things will go well. i hope olivia pope keeps you cozy at night. thank y'all so much for having me. and thank you for uplifting, queer literature. it's really important, especially in these times. and it's always, i'm always happy to, come across the podcast and then look through the episodes and be like, ah, i know that person. i know that's always a good feeling. so thank y'all for making this easy. oh, thank you so oh, thanks. kb, thank you so much for joining us today. and now let's go on over to santiago jose sanchez to talk to us about their book, hombrecito. good morning. how's your morning so far? good. i'm back home. i'm in miami and i, of course, retreat into being a teenager and i'm like going to bed at 2 a. m. like. watching summer house and all the bravo shows until like i can barely keep my eyes open. wait, what are you doing in miami though? the semester is over. so i usually live in grinnell, iowa, but i'm down here for the month. and i'm going to new york for june, and that's going to be my home base, i think, for the next couple months. but for now, i'm, like, hopping around. a little nomad. yeah, exactly. when you say miami, though, do you mean miami, or are you in cooper city right now? cooper city. i'm in cooper city right now. i'm obsessed that you're in embassy lakes. my mom literally was in embassy lakes at a friend's house last night, it's so bizarre. so crazy. i've met other people who like grew up in this neighborhood and i'm like, it's just bizarre. i'm like how did i end up here? how did we all come out of this place? there were things that you said in the book that feel like nobody else knows except for me, like the egyptian themed movie theater. you know which one i'm talking about? do i know which one you're talking about? i remember when it was freaking built. and it was movieco still. cause now it's not movieco anymore. yeah, i think it's cinemark. yeah. yeah. but that was like the place to be! yes! but this movie theater is in the middle of nowhere in its own space. and it's like this massive egyptian theme building. and it's a movie theater. it's just a movie theater. wow. no sense. since the good old days, they've built a lot of stuff around it and now it's not quite in the middle of nowhere, but like back when i was going there, it really did feel like. a random little like hole into another world like off the highway yes, it was literally off the highway. you could see it from the highway. just like this egyptian multiflex, and a multiplex. wow. it's like movie code 24 or whatever. oh my god jason am i wrong? no. oh one of the first, one of the first gay bars, i think, i, one of the first like clubs that i ever went to was the manor, my goodness also comes up in the book. and i was like, oh my god, did we have the same childhood? i mean that place i don't know it was so weird it's 18 plus so you could like i was in high school, so i wasn't 18, but i was still getting in there. so funny. anyway, enough about florida. santiago, congrats on your debut. it's so gorgeous. it's gorgeous. it's really, it's so beautiful. and you're getting like superlative, like kirk is star, publisher's weekly star. it's so well deserved and it's really incredible to see. you said this is your first conversation about the book. yeah, this is the first time i'm talking with people about it we'll start off with an easy one. can you tell us your elevator pitch for the book? i say easy one, but this is really everyone's least favorite question. well, hombrecito, it's a coming of age of a queer young immigrant from colombia. and it follows him and his family when they moved to miami and the mother starts working a lot. the half brother starts to revel and gets into this relationship. and this leaves santiago, the narrator, the main character. alone, isolated, and in this space, he has room to explore his queerness and sexuality, and he does from a very young age. no remorse just goes straight into this very sexual, erotic, drug fueled life at times, too. and this is great for them, but it also comes with, this loss of family and home. and that sort of haunts him. his relationship with his mother becomes really salient and important to him. but it also, becomes like a great source of tension the more time goes by. and so finally they return for the first time together to colombia, he and the mother. and during this trip he reconnects with his father, with his homeland, and he gets to see a different side of his mom that he's never seen. so it's a queer coming of age, but it's also very much about family and how family comes apart and then together. and how complicated mother son relationships can be as well. so you just said your protagonist's name is santiago. your name is santiago. you said they came from colombia. you are colombian american. what degree of auto fiction is this? what do you, but. was it a direct parallel to your own life? can you talk a little bit about that? inspired by? i really do think of this as really again with abandoned, this is autofiction. this is very much maps onto my life. i was very much interested in the physical, emotional, material reality of my experience and reconnecting with it and creating this character that would just let me sit in these very intense moments of my life through fiction. i notoriously have a terrible memory and a lot of these things i actually don't remember. so it also was like an act of trying to reconnect with this past that i don't remember or that i only really know through family stories. and trying to find my own place in this narrative, how to, how, being the youngest the younger one of us in the family being quiet and reserved when i was younger too very impressionable, so this book too was like an act of like me stepping back into those places and, capturing a fuller story that spoke more to me and my reality than others or to, yeah, what was lost in that move and coming to america and all the things that like, yeah, just because of that distance and trauma i think i forgot a lot of it. yeah, no, it's very much auto fiction and i like claiming it that way. i think people today are like afraid of saying like this is autofiction. i don't know, maybe autofiction now carries a little bit of a smell with it. but i like don't care at all. i'm like, i love writers like edouard louis and natalia ginsberg, who are like, are very much this is a novel, but everyone in here is real. this is all real. and i'm in the same boat there. this feels really real to me. yeah. i almost feel like the difference between autofiction and memoir is autofiction, you have space to grapple with things, to pull apart things in a way, and address things, and almost comment on things in a way that one doesn't really do in memoir, right? a memoir, you're really telling your story, right? it's this is the story as remembered to the best of my ability, whereas it almost sounds like what you were doing is using fiction to grapple with this piece of your life, like a framework. we're using the framework of your real life. i think that's really cool. and i wanted it to feel like immersive, and i wanted it to feel like you're in the story, like in these moments as santiago is experiencing them. so it was very much to me like what fiction tries to do, like it tries to make you feel somebody else's life, like it's not just like showing or telling this other person's life, it's really putting you in there in those moments. so that feels to me like the imaginative act is like the fiction part and autofiction is like recreating this thing from scratch and the whole like experience around it. or yeah, i think memoir is very much i remember it this way. this is how things happened. this isn't quite that. so santiago in the story, saying story sounds so minimizing. in the novel, santiago says that loneliness was the beginning of voyeurism. what do you mean by that? i think this is something for him and for me that like feels really emotionally true is that being isolated and alone like you just grab on to other people from a distance and you experience the world through other people like watching how other people live. so i think that was like a really big part of this character. once he gets to miami an outsider. he, even when he's there's that trip that he takes to naples, the camping grounds with his best friends. and even in this experience, like he's a voyeur, he's the visitor, he's not part of this family, but like he's always experiencing like what could be, what could my life be like if they were just a little bit different, if things have been just like shifted by a degree, by an inch. that could have been his life, and that's, i think, a feeling that really carries him and defines the way he moves through the world, always looking for a proxy or a surrogate of what life could be like if things were different. you early on said, this is a mother son story. santiago feels the need to take care of everything it feels very like, quote unquote, gay son stereotype, or do you find that to be true? did you find that to be your situation? do you find that to be true for you? folks that you are familiar with. my gosh yeah, i think there's this real need for him, santiago, the character, and maybe for me too, to be one to make the story happen, to be a protagonist in the story. but i think there's also these moments, like you said about loneliness and isolation, like he's with his mother, he's planned this trip back to columbia taking care of all the details and costs even but as soon as he enters the hotel with his mom, the whole aura of it starts to disintegrate and that's something, too the, that loneliness within that relationship, that the mother is only aware of certain parts of his life, and that he feels like he's aware of all the parts of her life, that he has to carry that weight of her whole life but i think something that i was trying to do in that chapter, too, was trying to show that the mom also has her secrets, also has this other double life so i was trying to queer code her a little bit there, too they both have these double lives santiago just, because he's young and innocent in this way still doesn't realize yet that his mom is also this bigger character, has this bigger story than him, but that trip was, like, a big realization for him they're back, presumably, to visit the grandmother who's ill. i think santiago had the idea that this was going to be like a homecoming, that they were going to do a bunch of fun things and be almost like tourists in like their hometown. and very quickly he realizes oh no, like the mother's there to actually sit with the grandma at her bedside the whole time. and he's oh fuck this is not what i thought this was going to be. and i think there's a real urge for them to work his way back into that story, to try to be the responsible son, or, like the title, an hombrecito a good little boy. and he tries to return to that, but at the same time that's not satisfying to him or it's satisfying but complicated and there's still like this bigger hunger and i mean something that santiago does all throughout this book is turn to sex and moments of loneliness or anxiety or lack of never do that. no, right? we'd never do that. so in that way, yeah, i totally see the gay i think that's so part of the gay experience, yeah. sex is all these beautiful things, but also it's like this very real way of looking for connection or looking for control in moments where other parts of your life don't allow you that. brandon taylor calls the book a gorgeous novel of the in between. what does the in between mean to you? i really like that. and he also said the quiet lol or something like that. i don't know, this book is in these moments of voyeurism and there's something really interesting, i think, about the structure of this book, that one it came about because i wrote this short stories at first. i wasn't aware, i wasn't trying to write a big arc i was really just moving towards these little centers of heat and trying to write about, like, why am i interested in this moment? why do i keep returning to this? and by short stories, do you mean journal entries? and that was the hard part. trying to like, part of the writing this too is i felt really close to this character when i first started writing it. and the more time that like, as these accumulated they end up being like almost like these 14 moments. that were separated and are these transitional moments in his life. so i think the in between one is like a structural thing there is very little connective tissue between the chapters i'm dropping you in and out of these moments. and i think the in between too it comes from the in between i think of emotions and experience like a lot of the things like he's experiencing here are joyful, but heartbreaking. they're humorous, but also dreadful. so i don't know there was something to your i was like in every moment like i was. whatever emotion i felt like i was working with, i was also trying to find its opposite or its counterpart. because i think that's i don't know, part of that engaging with these as memories, as fiction, too. it was trying to find that emotional complexity, too, that maybe, yeah, that the novel, i think, has room for. whereas, maybe memoir doesn't allow that space. yeah. i'm so curious. has she, or have you let your mom read it? no, i haven't she hasn't read it she has permission to she has a copy. she doesn't really read much in english. so i'm hoping that once we get the spanish translation like you she really will read it. she knows about like things in the story and i mean she's been a great help. helped me with a lot of this like memory work of like, where's some details i could add into here? what did we call this? so she's very much aware that this is a story of like our family. so i mean i have her permission. she yeah, but it's also, it's interesting because it's also a story out, arguably about parts of you that she, that whole idea of the perception of what she thinks or the mother thinks of her son and what the son actually, or who the son actually is. you can just let her know that the stuff she knows about, that's the stuff that's true and everything she doesn't know about, that's the stuff you made up. all fictional. that's right. as told to you by a that's why it's called auto fiction. that's some of it's auto, some of it's fiction. so in our last couple of minutes, you are a debut author. this is your debut book. do you have other books that you want to shout out that you want on other people's radar? yeah these aren't debuts necessarily, but housemates by emma coakley eisenberg. i've been loving it. we just talked to her yesterday. oh my gosh. amazing. i'm upset. i also finished recently patrick nathan's new book, the future was color. so sexy and smart and i love his prose. it's just really dense and juicy. it's such a good read and i think the la times is doing like their book club this summer on it. so that'll be really cool. and i'm really excited for garth's new books small rain. i'm so excited for that. yeah, but they'd be specifically, i'm thinking my friend ruben reyes has this collection coming out. i think melissa also talked about it. there's also a rio grande in heaven, and i was classmates with him. i've read some of these stories before, and it's a short story collection that's sci fi, speculative, but very much grounded in the realities of immigrant life in america and on the border. and i think, yeah, there's, i've seen a lot of good buzz around it, and i'm so excited for him. i think he's younger than me. that's always pisses me off. i'm like, when you're younger than me and like really talented, i'm like, damn, what did i do wrong? you're young too! shut up! you're a baby. look at all you've accomplished. that's incredible. so funny. congrats on the book. thank you. it's so nice to meet you guys both. you guys are doing something so beautiful here. i hope you guys are really proud of it. it's really cool to see this podcast grow and just the people that you get. i'm always like, it's like amazing, great, talented thank you so much for your kind you were we, we love all of our other pals and we're super grateful for everyone for yeah, being interested in participating. so it means a lot. yeah, get those gays reading. gays need to read more. they do. i reading enough. they really do. eat a public sub for me. no, not publics is canceled. you have to get one from the spot as what happened to publix? yeah, what happened to they're just, i'm just not as good. they're not actually canceled, but let's spot us. let's spot us subs are so good. okay, wait, is that a sub place or is it like a supermarket too with no, it's a sandwich place. just a sandwich, please. okay. okay. noted. noted. a supermarket, publix is canceled simply because las padas is better. but listen, i would not turn down a publix sub if you sent me one. hey, that chicken tender sandwich, so good. it'll put you to sleep though i'm so old that i used to get the chicken tender sandwich before it was on the menu. i made it up. that was your hidden menu before there it, literally was a hidden menu. i know. anyway, all right. have a great rest enjoy florida. talk to you soon. you guys. big hugs. bye. thank you. kb, kimberly. thank you all so much for being here. make sure to check out their books, we remember the universe, pretty, and ombresito. all of those can be found in our bookshop. org page. and we will see you on thursday. yes. bye! i.

327 pages, kindle edition first published june 25, 2024 © 2025 goodreads, inc.

get the latest ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. the british poet philip larkin once famously opined that parents “fill you with the faults they had / and add some extra, just for you.” protagonist presley fry in cat shook’s sophomore novel, humor me, could find many faults with her alcoholic mother and their toxic relationship. but after suddenly losing her, 20 something presley is a bit of an emotional wreck. on the surface, it would seem that presley’s well on her way to having it all: after moving from a small town in georgia to new york city, she’s landed a gig as a production assistant on gary madden’s late night show, with a supportive boss and an imminent promotion to talent booker. like many city dwelling professionals her age, presley has a roommate, izzy, who acts by turns as agony aunt and partner in crime. much like the women of sex and the city she identifies as a miranda presley breezes through a frothy sequence of confusing connections with near boyfriends, drinks with gal pals at local nightspots and career enhancing forays into the lower rungs of the entertainment industry, where she hopes to discover the unpolished gem upon whom she can hitch her own star. but the specter of her late mother haunts her at every step. and presley is not the only one mourning her mother’s death. susan clark, her mother’s childhood best friend, is also working through her grief, with a side of distress over her wealthy and influential husband having been named in a #metoo era sexual misconduct scandal. after a couple of semi awkward interactions (which seem to be the only type of interaction presley has), susan asks to be friends, and presley somewhat reluctantly accepts. the relationship turns out to be fortuitous for both of them: susan gets to spoil the daughter she never had, and presley gains some valuable insight into her mother’s formative years. though it certainly has rom com esque appeal, humor me goes beyond that, navigating the complexities of breaking old patterns, forging new connections and establishing one’s identity. it’s also a bit of a love letter to the city that never sleeps, even if its inhabitants do, occasionally to their detriment . . . and sometimes to their delight. in their haunting debut novel, hombrecito, santiago jose sanchez illuminates the hidden. the story begins in ibagué, colombia, a city that the protagonist, santiago, returns to again and again, in dreams, memory and reality. santiago is a young boy trying to make sense of a world he doesn’t understand: his absent father, his mother who sometimes “forgets she is a mother,” his feelings of alienation and otherness. when he moves with his mother and brother to miami, those feelings continue to grow, even as he begins to embrace his queerness. sanchez traces santiago’s search for belonging as he grows up and eventually leaves home for college in new york. the story follows the expected beats of a queer coming of age novel, but does so at a slant. time moves unexpectedly. scenes that take place over a few hours go on for pages; several years pass in the blank space between chapters. the prose is intensely visceral and deliberately opaque. it feels as if the narrator holds both himself and the reader at a distance before, distraught and needy, suddenly pulling them close. it’s a heartbreaking pleasure to get lost inside these pages. santiago’s complicated relationships with his brother and his mother shift with time, but never get easier. this is true of every relationship in santiago’s life. there’s his first boyfriend, whom he meets in an internet chat room; his father back in colombia, who drifts in and out of santiago’s life; his roommate in new york; the men he sleeps with but doesn’t show himself to. his relationships to places are equally fraught: he longs for colombia even as he distances himself from it. he leaves miami but feels constantly pulled back by his mother. hombrecito is a novel about the events, sometimes unseen, often beyond our control, that shape our understanding of the world. it’s about growing up amid silences that reverberate into adulthood. it’s about self destruction and self denial; about fierce and unconditional love; about the cost of hiding and the turmoil of leaving a country. it’s about queerness and transience and one man’s long, slow journey to find a home inside both. in malas, the legend of la llorona (the weeping woman) ties together the stories of two women from different generations in a texas border town. when the two meet in the ‘90s, their connection including a shared love of selena threatens to surface buried town secrets. malas is your first novel. can you tell us a bit about your writing process for the book? when did you start writing it and where did your inspiration come from? malas began as my attempt to write a fairy tale for a fairy tales course during my m.f.a. the first thing that came to me was a young and very pregnant pilar being confronted by an elderly woman claiming to be her husband jose alfredo’s ‘real’ wife. i was in iowa at the time, buried in snow, which made me vividly recall the other extreme the merciless heat of a south texas summer, and the dreamlike quality of those still, hot afternoons, perfect for the apparition of this old woman in the street. but though i set out to write a villain, i ended up digging into a lot of vulnerability. i wrote about 40 pages, the opening to the novel, and didn’t turn in my fairy tale after all because the story would not end. probably six months later, another big chunk came to me, in the form of gen x teen lulu running around at night, full of hurt and rage at her father. looking back, i think my inspiration came from the style of storytelling i’d heard all my life, a family or local history that might pass for folklore. this book brims with colorful descriptions and vivid imagery. your description of the dusty border town of la cienega was particularly captivating, lending malas a very precise sense of place and cultural richness. did you draw at all upon your hometown of del rio, texas, when developing the setting for this book? certainly there’s a lot of del rio in my novel, but i also drew on other small border towns i’m familiar with, and laredo, which is my mother’s hometown. i considered setting the novel in an actual place, but ultimately there was more freedom in a fictitious one. i wanted to respect the individual histories of those actual towns, while retaining an authentic sense of the complexity of these communities. read our starred review of malas. one surprising thing about malas is that although it begins rooted in the supernatural, it evolves into a story that is more grounded in reality. can you discuss how you approached that balance and made the choice to shift it over the course of the novel? i would say that there are different realities for different people. pilar has a perspective that might be more susceptible to a belief in the supernatural, and to a certain extent lulu’s father does too. one of the things i wanted to explore was this idea of reality being very much in the eye of the beholder, and also, the idea that overcoming generational trauma might sometimes be related to not accepting a fate driven narrative. another preoccupation in malas was the idea of stories, romanticized or folkloric, taking the place of factual events, because people are prone to mythologizing, even family histories. an intergenerational saga, malas moves between different decades, from the 1940s to the 1990s. what was it about this time period that interested you? i am very interested in the period before the civil rights movement in texas, the history for mexicans and tejanos, the strictures they dealt with, but also the strength and creativity of this community. malas is a music novel too, and the 1950s is when tejano, like many genres of music, began to be influenced by rock ’n’ roll, which very much started the trajectory that led to the “tejano boom” of the 1990s, and selena’s unique sound. the history of tejano music is the history of this place. lulu is an avid music fan and aspiring punk singer, and the book is peppered throughout with musical references, particularly to tejano and norteño bands. if you were to create a soundtrack for readers to listen to while reading malas, what songs would you include? for sure, “hey baby, que paso” by the texas tornados, “bidi bidi bom bom” by selena, and so much pedro infante. listen to marcela fuentes’ full malas spotify playlist! one powerful scene in the book occurs when lulu’s father educates her about the various types of gritos in mexican music and teaches her how to perform one. could you tell us more about the importance of the grito? a grito is a vocal eruption of emotion joy, grief, rage, love, pride and sometimes the sound of rebellion. in music, it’s a cathartic yelling, amping up the emotion. and, as lulu says in the novel, it’s a war cry. there’s a highly mythologized account of the “grito de dolores” the cry of a priest to call his congregation to arms on the eve of mexican independence. the scene in the book is an important moment between lulu and her father because music is one thing that remains a bond between them. fraught as their relationship is, the heartbreaking thing is they actually love each other very deeply and they are quite similar personalities. i wanted this to be a moment of that love, a bit of closeness and vulnerability for both of them. he’s handing down a heritage to her, and it is a heritage of rebellion, though he doesn’t realize she wants to use it to rebel against him. throughout the book, we observe lulu grappling with the transition between girlhood and womanhood, something that is also symbolized by her impending quinceañera. what did you find the most challenging about telling the story of a protagonist who is navigating this particularly complicated time in one’s life? the most challenging part was going to that emotionally vulnerable place and trying to forget my adult consciousness, placing myself in the headspace of an angry, hurt kid. i kept having to remind myself that a 14 year old can morph from child to adult, even moment to moment. lulu’s a smart girl, overconfident in her abilities and toughness. her feelings, much as she disavows them, are ardent and immediate and she doesn’t have the maturity or the parental guidance to process them. “[f]ind your writer friends. you’ll keep each other writing no matter what life throws at you.” with your debut novel under your belt, can you tell us what you’ll be working on next? i’m finishing a linked story collection called my heart has more rooms than a whorehouse. it follows the members of an extended latinx family and explores the pressure points of familial obligations and the complexities of love. a young boy from the barrio settles a wager his dead father made with a rich man. a sister tries to make sense of her brother’s career as a bull rider. a group of kids search for the bogeyman haunting their grandmother’s house. a suburban wife aches to understand her volatile husband. the people in these stories navigate the web of family allegiances while trying to find breathing space for themselves. you are a graduate of the iowa writers’ workshop and now teach creative writing at texas christian university. what is the best piece of writing advice you’ve received and now give to your students? the best piece of advice i got was that my writing community, writer friends, were the best thing i’d get from my m.f.a. i have a group of writer friends. i trust their eyes on my work, as they trust mine on theirs. i tell my students the same thing: find your writer friends. you’ll keep each other writing no matter what life throws at you. june 1, 2024 the 1936 olympic games in berlin dubbed the “nazi olympics” for providing an international platform to the genocidal regime produced lasting memories, including the triumphs of black american track and field star jesse owens and the “boys in the boat” rowing team that beat germany in a dramatic upset. less remembered is the wide speculation at the games that helen stephens, a u.s. runner who won two golds, might actually be a man. she wasn’t. but the phony controversy was symptomatic of a panic in the olympics establishment. not long before the 1936 games, two top track and field athletes who had competed in international competitions as women said publicly that they were men (we would say now that they had come out as trans). a handful of olympic leaders, including nazi sympathizers, immediately drew the wrong conclusions and called for mandatory medical exams to determine sex prior to sports competitions. in the other olympians: fascism, queerness, and the making of modern sports, author michael waters sensitively tells this forgotten history and reveals its modern resonances. the book connects the struggles of those two athletes, zdenek koubek of czechoslovakia and mark weston of britain, with the relatively open attitude toward queerness in pre nazi central europe, the resistance within the early olympics movement to women’s sports, and the failed effort to boycott the berlin games. the other olympians is full of surprises for contemporary readers. for example, anyone who mistakenly thinks christine jorgensen was the first person to have gender affirming surgery will learn very much otherwise. but waters’ detailed description of the outspoken koubek’s life before and during his transition is the heart of the book. he emerges as an overlooked pioneer. koubek, weston and other trans and queer people profiled here never wanted to compete against women after their transitions. yet an entire regimen of sex testing was built on the unfounded belief that men were somehow masquerading as women to participate in sports contests. decisions made in the late 1930s created sports competition rules that still exist today, as debate over trans athletes rages in school board meetings, courtrooms and legislative sessions. waters doggedly chronicles where the debate originated and calls for what he believes is overdue change. mike de socio loves the boy scouts. in morally straight: how the fight for lgbtq+ inclusion changed the boy scouts and america, de socio, an eagle scout, details how boy scouts gave him, a nerdy misfit, the space to thrive. he is also queer, coming out while in college in 2015, the same year that the scouts lifted its ban on gay leaders and two years after it had lifted the ban on gay scouts. de socio learned he was not alone: boy scouts had provided a safe haven for many other queer scouts, a haven that was repeatedly taken away because of a policy that they had no idea even existed. taking its title from the boy scout oath, morally straight weaves detailed journalism and de socio’s deeply personal memories in its recounting of the effort to lift bans on lgbtq+ boy scouts and their leaders. it starts with the story behind dale v. boy scouts of america, the 2000 supreme court case that allowed the scouts to discriminate against queer boys and men. at the heart of de socio’s book is the work of scouts for equality (sfe), an activist group formed in 2012 after the scouts expelled lesbian den leader jennifer tyrrell. headed by zach wahls and jonathan hillis, two straight eagle scouts, sfe evolved into a broad based alliance of lgbtq+ and straight scouts, parents and supporters that eventually persuaded the scouts to rescind their policies. under wahls and hillis’ leadership, the sfe became a juggernaut. in their early 20s, both men were uniquely qualified to take on the bsa. the son of two lesbian mothers, wahls was already a lgbtq+ activist and the author of my two moms. hillis was a prominent youth leader at the bsa’s national level. ironically, both credit the boy scouts with developing the moral courage and leadership skills that made sfe possible. morally straight is both clear eyed and optimistic. bsa is now a broader tent, accepting gay, trans and even female scouts. but, as de socio’s own experiences show, it still grapples with how to give its members the space and tools to remain true to who they are. as the texas legislature attempts to ban books; dismantle diversity, equity and inclusion; and threaten lgbtq+ people with draconian laws, poet and author kb brookins’ debut memoir, pretty, arrives when we need it most. brookins is a black, queer and trans writer and cultural worker whose previous work includes two poetry collections, freedom house and how to identify yourself with a wound. pretty details their experience navigating gender and black masculinity while growing up in fort worth, texas, exploring how they have moved through a world of cisgender black and non black people, from their biological parents to their adopted family, from classmates to lovers, and from their gender transition through adulthood. brookins spent their youth challenging binary spaces and expectations. from early childhood to the present, they have desired to be seen as pretty, and this book is the search to find out what that means for them: “though not gendered, we often associate prettiness with womanhood, femininity, and objects we see as dainty,” they write. “i’ve never been interested in womanhood, but i’ve always wanted to be treated softly, like a fat pleasantry to the eyes.” through often striking prose and imagery, brookins questions the restrictions involved in those associations: “when i was femme, my prettiness was canceled out by blackness. when i was butch, my prettiness was seen as invalidating my masculinity. who taught us that masculinity can’t be pretty? who taught us that blackness was devoid of prettiness and delicacy?” while brookins searches for answers to these questions, they continuously remind us of how hostile the u.s. is to black and trans people: “as the perception of me changes before my eyes, i realize that it is a specific sadness embodying patriarchal masculinity in a country that wants your blood more than it wants you to breathe.” we need words and stories like this. by describing their movement through the world, brookins simultaneously critiques the conditions that oppress black and racialized people who seek radical self acceptance, and refuses the state’s malicious attempts to criminalize gender and sexuality. pretty offers far more than just pretty words brookins tells their side of the story as an act of resistance against those who would silence them. this book is as much a story of self discovery and survival as it is a love letter to their younger and current self. a romance is all about the final payoff: after pages of will they won’t they teasing, readers anticipate the moment when everything falls ecstatically into place and our lovers end up together. kate young’s experienced takes this model and twists it, leading readers on a wholehearted, fun exploration of dating and love in the 21st century. after her girlfriend mei suggests they take a break so the newly out bette can casually date and get the full single experience, bette goes on an awkward odyssey of first dates. her journey is silly and relatable, and stays away from romance cliches although that isn’t to say that the book doesn’t end happily. bette tries to be chill about the break. after a bit of confusion and hurt, she decides the best course of action is to actually get some dating experience. with her roommate ash and ash’s token straight guy boyfriend tim, bette begins crafting her dating app profiles. they choose the best pictures though ash and tim have to convince bette that she really does look hot in some of them and write cool, ironic responses to the prompts. soon after, bette starts dating a lineup of strange, sexy characters running the gamut of british lesbian baddies. the most memorable is bette’s first date, ruth, a phd student and experienced casual dater who gives bette the recipe for success and, in a twist of fate, helps her realize what she really wants from a relationship. chapter titles that count down to the date when bette and mei are supposed to get back together lend experienced a sense of anxiety and longing that will be all too familiar to 21st century daters. young’s charming british english pairs with a young millennial’s quirky, anxious interiority for a fun, surprisingly profound read. romantics, if you’re lonely or even if you’re happily in love, this novel will be a treat. chukwuebuka ibeh’s debut novel is a quiet but profoundly moving coming of age story about a young gay man in mid 2000s nigeria. it’s an at first straightforward novel that deepens as it progresses, building toward an ending befitting its protagonist a young man continually moving through different versions of himself. blessings opens in 2006 in port harcourt, nigeria. when obiefuna’s father catches him in a moment of tenderness with another boy, he immediately sends him away to boarding school. life at school is strictly regulated and often violent. older boys abuse and terrorize the younger boys without consequence. obiefuna, fearing that his sexuality may be discovered at any moment, does what he thinks he has to in order to survive. though the novel continues to follow obiefuna through his early years at university, his time at the boarding school takes up the most space and carries a hefty emotional weight. at times it may feel as if the story drags, but the beautiful and complicated third act reveals that ibeh knew exactly where he was going all along. he captures the uneven importance of memory and experience, the way certain events can haunt a life without our knowledge. obiefuna’s relationships to himself, his family, his lovers and his country change dramatically over time, a shift that ibeh weaves almost invisibly into the prose. interspersed between chapters from obiefuna’s point of view are ones told from his mother uzoamaka’s perspective. these feel less immediate and vivid, but do add a poignant narrative layer, giving readers a glimpse into what goes unspoken between mother and son. blessings is an excellent work of queer fiction, full of characters who are neither good nor bad, but simply human beings in constant flux. ibeh writes cruelty onto the page alongside tenderness, crafting scenes of domestic gay love with the same attention and detail he gives to scenes of emotional and physical violence. he offers us a precious glimpse of the world as it truly is for so many queer people: not tragic, not perfect, not all suffering or all joy but worth living in and telling stories about. the safekeep, yael van der wouden’s debut novel, is set in 1961 rural holland. at 30, isabel is living in the house where she was raised after the death of her father forced the family’s move from the city and into a furnished house their uncle karel found for them. isabel lives a circumscribed and watchful life, guarding her dead mother’s things, suspecting the maid of theft and fending off the attentions of a flirtatious neighbor. of her brothers, louis and hendrik, she is closer to hendrik, although she disapproves of his friend sebastian, suspecting a deeper connection. of louis and the steady stream of girlfriends he introduces to her, she thinks even less. until eva. the siblings meet eva at a dinner out. with her clumsy manners and brassy dyed hair, she hardly impresses, and isabel is shocked when louis brings her to the house, telling isabel that eva must stay there while he goes away on business and showing eva to their mother’s room. even under isabel’s watchful eye, things begin to disappear a spoon, a bowl, a thimble. more alarming to isabel is the overwhelming attraction she feels to eva, an attraction that spills into an obsessive, intensely depicted sexual relationship. van der wouden may be familiar as the author of the 2017 essay “on (not) reading anne frank,” which explored what it means to be a dutch jewish writer and her complicated relationship to frank’s legacy. as isabel and eva’s connection unfolds, van der wouden’s true subject comes into view: how ordinary people were implicated in the ethnic cleansing that took place during world war ii. even in peacetime, isabel and her peers are quick to notice people who appear different, with a fierce disgust that isabel risks turning on herself as she comes to terms with her sexuality. a novel of redemption as much as revenge, the safekeep has the pacing and twists of a thriller, while delving into the deeper issues laid bare by the holocaust. sign up to receive reading recommendations in your favorite genres every tuesday. the illuminating my life with sea turtles sheds light not only on the beauty and mystery of sea turtles, but also on the urgent need swift river is a mesmerizing account of inherited trauma in a “sundown town,” propelled by the insightful and often humorous narration of 16 year old diamond newberry, the boyce upholt wrangles the geological, political and cultural history of the wild mississippi river in a compelling, lively narrative that will delight history fans. morgan talty follows up night of the living rez with fire exit, a beautifully written novel that is sometimes funny, often heartbreaking and hopeful against sign up to receive reading recommendations in your favorite genres every tuesday. “this isn’t a mystery or a legend,” diamond newberry says. “it’s a story about leaving.” she’s the 16 year old narrator of essie chambers’ debut novel, swift river, a mesmerizing account of inherited trauma in what was once a sundown town, where residents threatened violence towards nonwhite people after sunset. in 1987 in the fictional new england mill town of swift river, diamond the only nonwhite resident lives with her unemployed white mom. they have been alone since the mysterious disappearance of diamond’s black father seven years ago. he was presumably the victim of racial violence, although the town rumor mill churns out sightings of him from time to time. diamond and her mother inhabit her deceased grandmother’s decaying house, which may be repossessed at any moment. now that enough time has passed to have her missing husband declared legally dead, diamond’s mother is counting on his life insurance money to turn their lives around. meanwhile, diamond yearns to escape and is secretly taking driving lessons. she and her mother hitchhike to get around, especially after diamond, who weighs 298 pounds, allows her bike to be stolen because it had become too difficult to ride. diamond feels like a misfit in both society and her family, noting of her maternal lineage, “i am a break in their pure irish stock; the first black person, the end of the whites.” chapters set in 1980 explain the events leading up to her father’s disappearance; at that time diamond told her father, “you ruined my skin!” her understanding of his family blossoms when the teenager receives a series of letters from southern relatives. black people once ran swift river’s mills, until escalating racist hostility forced all but one to flee to georgia during an event that became known as “the leaving.” while diamond may sound like a down and out, tragic character, she’s anything but. this gutsy girl has a keen intellect, a beautiful singing voice and an irrepressible, hopeful outlook. her often humorous narration is the novel’s central, propelling force. she befriends a white girl, shelly, and their page turning misadventures offer sharp insights into friendship, class, racial bias and discrimination, and coming of age. with finely crafted prose, never a saccharine moment and a plot that skillfully weaves together past and present, chambers masterfully delivers the message of swift river: “our instincts, our deepest intuitions, are really our ancestral memory; our people speaking through us.” the legend of la llorona (the weeping woman) has endured for centuries in latinx culture, with roots tracing back to 1500s mexico. a malevolent spirit who drowned her children after discovering her husband’s infidelity, la llorona now roams the earth cursing all who encounter her with lifelong misfortune and unhappiness. with her debut novel, malas, marcela fuentes puts her own electrifying spin on this tale, updating it for the 21st century into a fiery family epic teeming with rage and revenge. set in the dusty border town of la cienega, texas, malas follows two social outcasts separated by decades yet bound together in a surprising way. in 1951, pilar aguirre, mother to a young son and expecting her second child, is cursed by a crone who claims to be married to pilar’s husband. the discord sown by this encounter ricochets through the subsequent weeks, months and years, rending relationships and ruining lives. forty years later, another mysterious old woman appears in town, this time causing an uproar at the funeral of lulu muñoz’s grandmother. headstrong and seeking to annoy her domineering father, 14 year old lulu strikes up a clandestine relationship with the stranger; as friendship blossoms and their connection deepens, the devastating way in which the two are linked gradually comes to light, dredging up old secrets that threaten to throw la cienega into chaos once again. readers will devour malas. fuentes’ propulsive plotting; rich and precise depiction of tejano culture; complex characters; and thoughtful exploration of female anger, grief and intergenerational trauma combine to form a fully immersive reading experience that for all its specificity will be compelling and meaningful to readers of all backgrounds. brimming with brio, fuentes’ deliciously defiant debut breathes new life into classic lore and heralds the arrival of a bold new literary powerhouse. “[o]vercoming generational trauma might sometimes be related to not accepting a fate driven narrative.” read our q&a with marcela fuentes about malas. there is nothing predictable about holly wilson’s debut novel, kittentits. relating the coming of age of a 10 year old girl named molly sibly, kittentits is set in 1992 on the outskirts of chicago. molly lives in a dilapidated quaker co op called house of friends, with her once blind puppeteer father who inexplicably regained his eyesight after a house fire; a community gardening evangelist named evelyn, who is also molly’s home school teacher; and the ghost of sister regina, a nun who perished in the same fire that gave molly’s father his eyesight back. with a mother who died shortly after her birth and no friends beyond a pen pal named demarcus who never writes back, molly’s life is rather lacking for company. molly, however, seems blissfully unaware of the misfortune that surrounds her. what she’s focused on is the opening of the world’s fair and a houseguest named jeanie who is fresh out of prison and assigned to live in the house of friends as her halfway house. molly sets herself the following goal: befriend the thrillingly crass jeanie, meet demarcus in person and enjoy the opening day of the world’s fair with her two new best friends. then a second goal emerges: open a spiritual portal at the fair and find the ghost of her mother. i’ll say it again there’s nothing predictable about this novel. and for this precise reason, kittentits is nearly impossible to put down. narrated by molly in the first person, the story is a fast paced, filthy mouthed adventure, told with an exuberance that can only be expected from a 10 year old. there is a surrealism to everything that happens that is best not to question (the world’s fair taking place in 1992 being the least of our worries). while molly clearly steals the show as the protagonist, wilson demonstrates exceptional artistry with the supporting characters, capturing the fundamental experiences of trust, friendship, love and loss. their backstories, however improbable, will resonate with your personal yearnings. a bit deranged, a lot unforgettable, kittentits needs to be your next literary escape. chukwuebuka ibeh’s debut novel is a quiet but profoundly moving coming of age story about a young gay man in mid 2000s nigeria. it’s an at first straightforward novel that deepens as it progresses, building toward an ending befitting its protagonist a young man continually moving through different versions of himself. blessings opens in 2006 in port harcourt, nigeria. when obiefuna’s father catches him in a moment of tenderness with another boy, he immediately sends him away to boarding school. life at school is strictly regulated and often violent. older boys abuse and terrorize the younger boys without consequence. obiefuna, fearing that his sexuality may be discovered at any moment, does what he thinks he has to in order to survive. though the novel continues to follow obiefuna through his early years at university, his time at the boarding school takes up the most space and carries a hefty emotional weight. at times it may feel as if the story drags, but the beautiful and complicated third act reveals that ibeh knew exactly where he was going all along. he captures the uneven importance of memory and experience, the way certain events can haunt a life without our knowledge. obiefuna’s relationships to himself, his family, his lovers and his country change dramatically over time, a shift that ibeh weaves almost invisibly into the prose. interspersed between chapters from obiefuna’s point of view are ones told from his mother uzoamaka’s perspective. these feel less immediate and vivid, but do add a poignant narrative layer, giving readers a glimpse into what goes unspoken between mother and son. blessings is an excellent work of queer fiction, full of characters who are neither good nor bad, but simply human beings in constant flux. ibeh writes cruelty onto the page alongside tenderness, crafting scenes of domestic gay love with the same attention and detail he gives to scenes of emotional and physical violence. he offers us a precious glimpse of the world as it truly is for so many queer people: not tragic, not perfect, not all suffering or all joy but worth living in and telling stories about. in her first work to be translated into english, spanish poet, playwright and author alana s. portero captures the complexities of trans girlhood and adolescence. set in the working class san blas neighborhood of madrid in the 1980s and 1990s, bad habit, is full of chaotic, messy, vibrant life. the unnamed protagonist, a trans girl who possesses an unshakable knowledge of herself but lacks a way to express it safely, has a singular first person narrative voice. her campy humor, biting observations and poetic musings will leave a lasting impression on readers. portero balances long, meaty passages of self reflection with vivid scenes grounded in sensory detail. the resulting mix reads like a fictional memoir, a woman baring her soul with a wink. it even follows the expected beats of a coming of age memoir: the protagonist’s childhood and early realization that her gender is at odds with how the world sees her; her first bittersweet experience of love; her teenage exploits in madrid’s downtown party scene; her painful attempts to blockade herself in the closet; her tentative forays into trans life. portero writes about the intersections of gender, sex, desire and longing intersections that collide in the body with incredible thoughtfulness and nuance. she also beautifully portrays trans sisterhood and found family. many trans women play important roles in the protagonist’s life, often in surprising and unpredictable ways. these women are lonely, crass, loving, tough and each distinct. the care they give one another radiates off the page, even, and especially, when the narrative gets grim. sometimes mara faye lethem’s translation feels a bit clunky; occasional oddly constructed sentences may take a moment to untangle. but this hardly matters, because the prose overall is so fresh. the protagonist’s ability to see herself and the people in her life both up close and from a distance is irresistible. bad habit is queer fiction at its painful, honest, celebratory best, rejoicing in the beauty of trans lives while simultaneously acknowledging the violence that the world too often thrusts upon them. interesting facts about space (8.5 hours) is a character study of enid, a 26 year old woman whose life might be falling apart. we meet enid when she begins to suspect she has a stalker. as she tries to differentiate between her paranoia and real signs of threat, enid simultaneously juggles a constellation of self esteem issues, convoluted family dynamics, a technological bug at work and a confusing dating life. natalie naudus lends an articulate, emphatic voice to the first person narration, impressively capturing enid’s varied shades of introspection, from reminiscence to anger to rueful comedy. at the center of this novel is the question of what it is to be normal. is it an inner feeling or dependent on outside perception? is it an ideal as distant as outer space, or is it actually achievable? read our review of the print edition of interesting facts about space. in her first novel since her national book award longlisted debut, the leavers, lisa ko explores memory, art, technology and consumption through the eyes of three childhood best friends. jackie, ellen and giselle meet at chinese school in suburban new jersey in the 1980s. though they come from different backgrounds and have divergent interests, they’re drawn together by a shared desire to make something more or different of their lives. moving from the dot com era and early tech culture of the 1990s to a highly militarized vision of new york city in the 2040s, memory piece traces the ways the three women’s lives converge and diverge. giselle turns to art, launching her career with an experimental performance piece in which she lives for a year in a hidden room in a mall. as she becomes more immersed in the art world, she begins to question her motives and desires, floundering through a life that is sometimes more display than substance. jackie gets caught up in the early days of the internet, working for a tech startup by day and developing her own radical projects by night. ellen becomes an activist in college, and devotes her life to community organizing and fighting against the gentrification threatening her home. the novel’s three distinct sections drive home just how differently giselle, jackie and ellen engage with and react to the world and each other as everything changes around them. jackie’s section is full of frenetic energy, while giselle’s is dreamy and quiet: her voice comes through at a remove, as if she’s narrating from a distance. ellen’s section is poignant with loss and nostalgia. throughout, ko’s prose is beautiful and sharp, and her ability to shapeshift through a range of tones makes the novel a pleasure to read. a bittersweet wistfulness permeates the whole of memory piece. though giselle, jackie and ellen remain important to one another throughout their lives, there is a separateness to each of the novel’s sections that gives it a meandering and melancholy feel. this is a compelling, often chilling and beautifully observant novel about what connects us to, and disconnects us from, each other. place, purpose and self worth are front and center in sheila sundar’s debut novel, habitations, about a young girl’s journey into womanhood. we begin in the mid ’90s in south india and follow sundar’s protagonist, vega gopalan, through a childhood marked by the devastating loss of her younger sister, her developing interest in sociology, her sexual longings and experiments, and the overall angst of being young. when a scholarship takes vega to graduate school at columbia university in new york city, the comforts and privileges she knew as an upper caste brahmin dissolve into the confusing and often lonely experience of being an immigrant student in the u.s. meek and naive, however, she is not. vega’s intelligence, humor and curiosity keep her open and engaged with new experiences. reflections on race, sex, caste and social norms remain the focus as vega navigates the labyrinth of her immigrant community, academia, friendships, lovers and, eventually, a marriage not for love, but for a precious green card that will allow her to live in the u.s. and pursue her academic interests. career developments and the birth of her daughter, asha, unfold new challenges for vega. but through these challenges, she becomes a surer, more hopeful woman ready to live life on her own terms. there are many reasons to love this novel. vega’s journey will resonate in one way or another with anyone who has suffered loss or struggled with self doubt. sundar’s supporting characters and rich depiction of immigrant life round out vega’s story, no doubt drawing on the author’s own experience growing up in the ’90s as the child of indian immigrants to the u.s. best of all, the novel speaks to the human experience of how the burdens we carry eventually come to define our strengths. insightful and hopeful, habitations delivers on all fronts. stay on top of new releases: sign up for our newsletter to receive reading recommendations in your favorite genres. bookpage is a recommendation guide for readers, highlighting the best new books across all genres as chosen by our editors. starred (★) titles indicate a book that is exceptional in its genre or category. bookpage is editorially independent; any publisher sponsored content is clearly labeled as such. stay on top of new releases: sign up for our newsletter to receive reading recommendations in your favorite genres.

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atlantic county library system 40 farragut ave., mays landing, nj 08330 phone: (609) 625 2776 | fax: (609) 625 8143 comments or questions? contact us atlantic county executive dennis levinson board of county commissioners, richard r. dase, chairman

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what to read supported by fiction santiago jose sanchez’ debut novel, “hombrecito,” follows a young immigrant as he grows up in the united states, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a country he never knew. by miguel salazar miguel salazar is on the editorial staff of the book review. when you purchase an independently reviewed book through our site, we earn an affiliate commission. hombrecito, by santiago jose sanchez migration is an act of constant ruptures, an uprooting that’s compounded by the gradual fraying of bonds, language and culture. for the characters in santiago jose sanchez’ debut novel, “hombrecito,” migration also induces a metaphysical fracture   it cleaves space from time, suspends a country in a nostalgic yesterday, freezes home in memory. the novel is a queer, immigrant bildungsroman following a young boy named santiago, who is the child of absence and loneliness. he was born in colombia, but moved to miami with his family when he was 6. his father, an itinerant engineer who stayed behind in colombia, is largely out of the picture. luz, santiago’s beloved, withdrawn mother who used to work in a hospital laboratory, now spends her days working grueling shifts at a local restaurant. manuel, santiago’s older brother, resents his new life, and shares wistful memories of his “lost kingdom.” though they are santiago’s only anchors in miami, luz and manuel leave him to fend for himself. “it was clear to me that my mother and brother had chosen the past over real life,” he thinks. santiago, for his part, has no recollection of this past life. it contributes to his sense of his own otherness, a ni de aquí, ni de allá experience that is common among young immigrants and intensified by his burgeoning queer identity. this alienation is the central focus of “hombrecito,” which follows santiago as he grows up in the united states, struggling to identify with a masculinity he’s never felt and a homeland he never knew. sanchez renders these feelings of isolation in rich, lyrical prose. the effect is a deep sense of interiority, though it sometimes comes at the expense of clarity. when santiago comments that he could have been anyone else “if only the world were different by a degree or an inch,” i was left wondering who these hypothetical selves were. it’s one thing for santiago to be lost in his own mind, but is sanchez lost in there, too?