Category Archives: Queer Lit

The Pearl Thief by Elizabeth Wein

The Pearl Thief by Elizabeth Wein

When fifteen-year-old Julia Beaufort-Stuart wakes up in the hospital, she knows the lazy summer break she’d imagined won’t be exactly like she anticipated. And once she returns to her grandfather’s estate, a bit banged up but alive, she begins to realize that her injury might not have been an accident. One of her family’s employees is missing, and he disappeared on the very same day she landed in the hospital. Desperate to figure out what happened, she befriends Euan McEwen, the Scottish Traveller boy who found her when she was injured, and his standoffish sister, Ellen. As Julie grows closer to this family, sh… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Attempted sexual assault
  • Death of a grandfather recounted

The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer

The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer

The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer

Ambrose wakes up on the Coordinated Endeavor, with no memory of a launch. There’s more that doesn’t add up: Evidence indicates strangers have been on board, the ship’s operating system is voiced by his mother, and his handsome, brooding shipmate has barricaded himself away. But nothing will stop Ambrose from making his mission succeed—not when he’s rescuing his own sister.

In order to survive the ship’s secrets, Ambrose and Kodiak will need to work together and learn to trust one another… especially once they discover what they are truly up against. Love might be the only way to survive.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Depression & depressive episodes
  • Suicide
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Self-harm
  • Seizures
  • Graphic injuries
  • Cancer
  • Murder
  • Gaslighting

The First Sister by Linden A. Lewis

The First Sister by Linden A. Lewis

The First Sister by Linden A. Lewis

First Sister has no name and no voice. As a priestess of the Sisterhood, she travels the stars alongside the soldiers of Earth and Mars—the same ones who own the rights to her body and soul. When her former captain abandons her, First Sister’s hopes for freedom are dashed when she is forced to stay on her ship with no friends, no power, and a new captain—Saito Ren—whom she knows nothing about. She is commanded to spy on Captain Ren by the Sisterhood, but soon discovers that working for the war effort is so much harder to do when you’re falling in love.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Misgendering
  • Racism
  • Sexual assault implied
  • Sex work of a minor
  • Child abuse
  • Threats of sexual violence
  • Post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
  • Anxiety
  • Gender dysphoria & body dysmorphia
  • Blood depiction
  • Amputation
  • Nonconsensual surgery & implants, including body modifications
  • Medical experimentation
  • Graphic injury
  • Murder
  • Torture
  • Loss of bodily autonomy
  • Blackmail

In the Shadow of Spindrift House by Mira Grant

In the Shadow of Spindrift House by Mira Grant

In the Shadow of Spindrift House by Mira Grant

Nature abhors a straight line. The natural world is a place of curves and softened edges, of gentle mists and welcoming spirals. Nature remembers deviation; nature does not forgive.

For Harlowe Upton-Jones, life has never been a straight line. Shipped off to live with her paternal grandparents after a mysterious cult killed her mother and father, she has grown up chasing the question behind the curve, becoming part of a tight-knit teen detective agency. But “teen” is a limited time offer, and when her friends start looking for adult professions, it’s up to Harlowe to find them one last case so that they can go out in a blaze of glory.

Welcome to Spindrift House.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Necrophilia mentioned
  • Suicide

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke by Eric LaRocca

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke by Eric LaRocca

Sadomasochism. Obsession. Death. A whirlpool of darkness churns at the heart of a macabre ballet between two lonely young women in an internet chat room in the early 2000s—a darkness that threatens to forever transform them once they finally succumb to their most horrific desires. What have you done today to deserve your eyes?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Homomisia
  • Parental abandonment & disownment
  • Child abuse recounted
  • Domestic abuse
  • Abusive dom-sub relationship
  • Psychosis
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Attempted suicide
  • Graphic self-harm
  • Pregnancy
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Body horror
  • Death of an infant
  • Animal death & cruelty

The Pirate’s Booty by Alex Westmore

The Pirate’s Booty by Alex Westmore

The Pirate's Booty by Alex Westmore

When Quinn Gallagher’s childhood friend is abducted from a dock in Ireland, she’ll do whatever it takes to come to the rescue—even if that means dressing as a man and joining the crew of one of the most notorious pirate captains the world has ever seen.

Quinn soon finds there is much to enjoy living as a man, in particular the company of other women. When she finds herself falling hard for Lady Fiona, a woman far above her own station, she is torn between revealing her true identity and continuing the façade of being a male pirate. Love is never easy, especially in the sixteenth century and especially under false pretenses.

Can Quinn live with one foot in two different worlds, or must she consign herself to either the lusty life of a pirate or the loveless life of a noble woman? Come sail the high seas in this exciting and erotic adventure with the fierce pirate Gallagher as your guide. You’re in for a wild ride and may even score some booty along the way.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Sexism
  • Homomisia
  • Gore
  • Slavery

When I Arrived at the Castle by Emily Carroll

When I Arrived at the Castle by Emily Carroll

When I Arrived at the Castle by Emily Carroll

“A castle, a killer, and prey all bound and blurred by lust and blood.”

Like many before her that have never come back, she’s made it to the Countess’ castle determined to snuff out the horror, but she could never be prepared for what hides within its turrets; what unfurls under its fluttering flags. Emily Carroll has fashioned a rich gothic horror charged with eroticism that doesn’t just make your skin crawl, it crawls into it.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Graphic body horror & blood depiction
  • Kidnapping
  • Knife violence
  • Suicide mentioned

InSEXts Vol 1: Chrysalis by Marguerite Bennett

InSEXts Vol 1: Chrysalis by Marguerite Bennett

InSEXts Vol 1: Chrysalis by Marguerite Bennett

Collecting the first seven issues of the hit series INSEXTS, from writer Marguerite Bennett and artist Ariela Kristantina. At the dusk of a century, a pair of vengeful Victorian vixens discover a horrifying power that transforms them into rich and strange new creatures. Armed with their dark, evolving forms, they descend into a world of the cultured and occult, with new senses and new sensuality, to forge a life for themselves and the child of their love

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Sexism
  • Racism
  • Sexual assault, implied
  • Body horror & gore
  • Torture

The Rebel Army by V.E. Schwab

Shades of Magic Vol. 3: The Rebel Army by V.E. Schwab and illustrated by Andrea Olimpieri

Once just a single ship, now the pirate fleet of the Rebel Army numbers in its thousands. Made up of traitors from each of the three empires, the fleet, who once made the open waters of the Blood Coast their home, have set their sights on establishing their own land based empire with London as their capital.

The Rebel Army is a battalion made up of traitors to each of the three empires, who’ve claimed the open waters of the Blood Coast as their territory. Led by a Faroan, a Veskan, and an Arnesian (Rowan, the Antari from the Night of Knives), the RA started as a rag-tag gang, a single ship, but in the last few months, they’ve gained momentum… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Suicide
  • Torture

The Steel Prince by V.E. Schwab

Shades of Magic, Vol. 1: The Steel Prince by V.E. Schwab and illustrated by Andrea Olimpieri

Delve into the thrilling, epic tale of the young and arrogant prince Maxim Maresh, long before he became the king of Red London and adoptive father to Kell, the lead of A Darker Shade of Magic!

The youthful Maresh is sent to a violent and unmanageable port city on the Blood Coast of Verose, on strict orders from his father, King Nokil Maresh, to cut his military teeth in this lawless landscape.

There, he encounters an unruly band of soldiers, a lawless landscape, and the intoxicatingly deadly presence of the newly returned pirate queen, Arisa…

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Blood depiction
  • Torture