September’s Most Anticipated LGBTQIA+ Literature

The heat is breaking and autumn is just around the corner as we enter the last stretch of 2022. Whether you’re getting ready for a new school year, anticipating the return of all things pumpkin spice, or just mildly to moderately shocked and horrified by how fast the year has gone by, we’ll have something to pique your interest in September’s installment of our most anticipated LGBTQIA+ book releases.

Do you remember shopping for school supplies? Are you nostalgic for the halcyon days of yore, when you trawled Staples for the sleekest model of three ring binder, maybe enclosed in a zipper with a bright fabric cover? Or perhaps you preferred the classic plastic edition, with its endless potential for customization through your very own 8.5 x 11 cover slipped into the front pocket. If this sounds familiar, or you’ve got a younger cousin with a birthday coming up, return to high school with The 99 Boyfriends of Micah Summers, a charming YA romance with a New York subway missed connections quest. If you want YA but have a hankering for thrills (Halloween isn’t that far away after all), try The Killing Code, a historical serial killer mystery about a young codebreaker in 1940s Virginia.

If, like me, grade school brings back memories of propping a book under your desk with subject matter as far from the building’s halls as you could find, September is ready for you with plenty of speculative fiction titles. Lammy-nominated Margaret Killjoy’s We Won’t Be Here Tomorrow: And Other Stories brings you to an anarchist tea farm during the apocalypse, LARPers living in a burned out forest, and more. Lambda nominee Neon Yang can take you all the way to outer space with The Genesis of Misery, an immersive fantasy following a non-binary interplanetary nobody with dangerous magical abilities.

Or maybe you fondly— or not so fondly— remember school crushes, notes passed, diary entries, moody and romantic playlists burned to CD/tape/Spotify/posted on LiveJournal for your many internet friends (select the correct option for your age demographic). Pick up a romance novel, like KG MacGregor’s Bringing Me Dreams, about a lesbian romance forged through shared grief. Were you one to write poems rather than sprawling diary confessions? This month brings plentiful poetry collections from former Lambda Literary fellows, be it Michael Chang’s lovely Almanac of Useless Talents or Jayme Ringleb’s lush So Tall It Ends in Heaven.

We hope fall brings you renewal as well as reflection. As usual, if you have a book coming out soon, email us at editor@lambdaliterary.org for consideration in our upcoming lists.

• The Black Period: On Personhood, Race, and Origin by Hafizah Augustus Geter, Random House
• Both Sides of the Fire Line: Memoir of a Transgender Firefighter by Bobbie Scopa, Chicago Review Press
• Boy with the Bullhorn: A Memoir and History of ACT Up New York by Ron Goldberg, Fordham University Press
• Crybaby: Infertility, Illness, and Other Things That Were Not the End of the World by Cheryl E. Klein, Brown Paper Press
• A Girlhood: Letter to My Transgender Daughter by Carolyn Hays, Blair
• ​​Half In: A Coming-of-Age Memoir of Forbidden Love by Felice Cohen, Dividends Press
• Memories of a Gay Catholic Boyhood: Coming of Age in the Sixties by John D’Emilio, Duke University Press
• No Country for Eight-Spot Butterflies: A Lyric Essay by Julian Aguon, Astra House
• A Place Called Home by David Ambroz, Legacy Lit
• Sinkhole: A Legacy of Suicide by Juliet Patterson, Milkweed Editions
• When I Was Red Clay by Jonathan T. Bailey, Torrey House Press

• Concerning My Daughter by Kim Hye-Jin, trans. Jamie Chang, Restless Books
• First Consonants by John Whittier Treat, Jaded Ibis Press
• Less is Lost by Andrew Sean Greer, Little Brown
• The Lost Century by Larissa Lai, Arsenal Pulp Press
• A Minor Chorus by Billy-Ray Bellcourt, Hamish Hamilton
• The Old Place by Bobby Finger, G. P. Putnam’s Sons
• The Sleeping Car Porter by Suzette Mayr, Coach House Books
• Urban Gothic: The Complete Stories by Bruce Benderson, Itna Press
• The Virtuous Ones by Christopher Stoddard, Itna Press

• Before We Were Trans by Kit Heyam, Seal Press
• Last Call Chicago: A History of 1001 LGBTQ-Friendly Taverns, Haunts & Hangouts by Rick Karlin and St Sukie De La Croix, Rattling Good Yarns Press
• LGBTQ+ Icons: A Celebration of Historical LGBTQ+ Icons in the Arts by David Lee Csicsko and Owen Keehnan, Trope Publishing Co
• Pink Triangle Legacies: Coming Out in the Shadow of the Holocaust by W. Jake Newsome, Cornell University Press
• The Red Widow: The Scandal That Shook Paris and the Woman Behind It All by Sarah Horowitz, Sourcebooks

• Brown and Gay in LA: The Lives of Immigrant Sons by Anthony Christian Ocampo, New York University Press
• Feels Right: Black Queer Women and the Politics of Partying in Chicago by Kemi Adeyemi, Duke University Press
• A Kiss Across the Ocean: Transatlantic Intimacies of British Post-Punk and US Latinidadby Richard T. Rodríguez, Duke University Press
• On the Inconvenience of Other People by Lauren Berlant, Duke University Press
• Queer Forms by Ramzi Fawaz, New York University Press

• Bringing Me Dreams by KG MacGregor, Bella Books
• Catboat Road by Kate Rounds, Bywater Books
• A Good Chance by Ali Vali, Bold Strokes Books
• The Holiday Trap by Roan Parrish, Sourcebooks Casablanca
• A Perfect Fifth by Jaycie Morrison, Bold Strokes Books

• Murder at Union Station by David Se. Pederson, Bold Strokes Books 
• Real Bad Things by Kelly J. Ford, Thomas & Mercer

• Bone Weaver by Aden Polydoros, Inkyard Press
• The Genesis of Misery by Neon Yang, Tor 
• Lark Ascending by Silas House, Algonquin Books
• Leech by Hiron Ennes, Tor
• No Gods for Drowning by Hailey Piper, Agora Books
• Nona the Ninth by Tasmyn Muir, Tor
• Siren Queen by Nghi Vo, Tor
• Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke and Other Misfortunes by Eric Larocca, Titan Books
• The Unbalancing: A Birdverse Novel by R. B. Lemberg, Tachyon Publications
• We Won’t Be Here Tomorrow and Other Stories by Margaret Killjoy, AK Press
• We’re Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction 2021 edited by L. D. Lewis and Charles Payseur, Neon Hemlock Press

• Book of Dreams by Kevin Craig, Interlude Press – Duet Books
• Destination Unknown by Bill Konigsberg, Scholastic
• How to Succeed at Witchcraft by Aislinn Brophy, G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers 
• I’m the Girl by Courtney Summers, Wednesday Books
• The Killing Code by Ellie Marney, Little Brown Books for Young Readers
• Lark & Kasim Start a Revolution by Kacen Callender, Amulet Books
• Silver Under Nightfall by Rin Chupeco, Gallery / Saga Press
• The Sunbearer Trials by Aiden Thomas, Feiwel & Friends
• The 99 Boyfriends of Micah Summers by Adam Sass, Viking Books

Children’s/Middle Grade Literature

• A Costume for Charly by C. K. Malone and Alejandra Barajas, Beaming Books
• Moonflower by Kacen Callender, Scholastic*
• Something Great by Jeanette Bradley, Levine Querido
• The Trouble with Robots by Michelle Mohrweis, Peachtree Publishers
• Whoever You Are: A Baby Book on Love & Gender by Josephine Wai Lin and Sandy Lopez, Collective Book Studio
• You Only Live Once, David Bravo by Mark Oshiro, HarperCollins

• Alive at the End of the World by Saeed Jones, Coffee House Press
• Almanac of Useless Talents by Michael Chang, Clash Books
• Bad Hobby by Kathy Fagan, Milkweed Editions
• The Certain Body by Julia Guez, Four Way Books
• Gash Atlas by Jessica Lawson, Kore Press
• Intimacies, Received by Taneum Banbrick, Copper Canyon Press
• A Shiver in the Leaves by Luther Hughes, BOA Editions
• So Tall It Ends in Heaven by Jayme Ringleb, Tin House Books
• The Song of Circe and Other Simple Musings by J. Matthew Helms, Belle Isle Books
• Togetherness by Wo Chan, Nightboat Books
• Your Emergency Contact Has Experienced an Emergency by Chen Chen, BOA Editions

• Coven by Jennifer Dugan and Kit Seaton, G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers
• Fungirl: You Are Revolting by Elizabeth Pich, Silver Sprocket
• Look Again by Elizabeth A. Trembley, Street Noise Books
• Supper Club by Jackie Morrow, Image Comics