Staff Picks

Clocking in at 153 pages, this is the book to read when you're looking to get back into reading. Chambers writes a delightfully hopepunk near-future sci-fi set during climate crisis, in which astronaut Ariadne and three crewmates make a crowdfunded journey into space. Delightfully queer and sincere.

 

Publisher description:

In a stand-alone novella from the award-winning, critically acclaimed author of the Wayfarer series, Ariadne O'Neill and her crewmates are hard at work in a planetary system 15 light-years from Sol, on a mission to ecologically survey four habitable worlds. Faced with the possibility of returning to a planet that has forgotten those who have left, Ariadne begins to chronicle the wonders and dangers of her mission.

 

A different kind of romance novel featuring middle-aged protagonists who are still learning about themselves. Thoughtfully written to include a demisexual hero and a lot of online gaming. Role Playing is a great book if you're looking for diversity in a romance.

 

Publisher's description:

An unapologetically grumpy 48-year-old recluse, Maggie, to appease her college-aged son, joins an online gaming guild where she forms an online connection with Otter, a 50-year-old optimist, but when they take their relationship into real life, things do not go as planned.

 

This is a super-cute graphic novel that is very queer and very sweet. It's a great depiction of young, giddy love with a Shakespearan/magical twist. Perfect for fans of Alice Oseman and Molly Ostertag.

 

Publisher description:

The course of true love never did run smooth . . . and neither does high school in this new graphic novel series for fans of Heartstopper and The Prince and the Dressmaker.

Vi came to Arden High for a fresh start and a chance to wear beanies and button-ups instead of uniform skirts. And though doing it without her twin feels like being split in half, Vi finds her stride when she stumbles (literally!) into broody and beautiful poet-slash-influencer, Orsino. Soon Vi gets roped into helping plan the school's Twelfth Grade Night dance, and she can't stop dreaming about slow dancing with Orsino under the fairy lights in the gym. The problem? All Vi's new friends assume she's not even into guys. And before Vi can ask Orsino to the dance, he recruits Vi to help woo his crush, Olivia. Who has a crush of her own . . . on Vi.

 

 

 

 

This romance is the first in a series set in the idyllic (and sadly fictional) Bright Falls, Oregon. It explores important female relationships of all types, from sisters, to best friends, to lovers, and even mothers. Great melodrama, spicy scenes, and a satisfying happily ever after.

 

Publisher's description:

Delilah Green swore she would never go back to Bright Falls--nothing is there for her but memories of a lonely childhood where she was little more than a burden to her cold and distant stepfamily. Her life is in New York, with her photography career finally gaining steam and her bed never empty. Sure, it's a different woman every night, but that's just fine with her. When Delilah's estranged stepsister, Astrid, pressures her into photographing her wedding with a guilt trip and a five-figure check, Delilah finds herself back in the godforsaken town that she used to call home. She plans to breeze in and out, but then she sees Claire Sutherland, one of Astrid's stuck-up besties, and decides that maybe there's some fun (and a little retribution) to be had in Bright Falls, after all. Having raised her eleven-year-old daughter mostly on her own while dealing with her unreliable ex and running a bookstore, Claire Sutherland depends upon a life without surprises. And Delilah Green is an unwelcome surprise...at first. Though they've known each other for years, they don't really know each other--so Claire is unsettled when Delilah figures out exactly what buttons to push. When they're forced together during a gauntlet of wedding preparations-including a plot to save Astrid from her horrible fiancé--Claire isn't sure she has the strength to resist Delilah's charms. Even worse, she's starting to think she doesn't want to

 

This book is so lovely and endearing as it explores one woman's reflection of her life and the choices she made. The story is heartwrenching and utterly addicting. It follows Hollywood starlet Evelyn Hugo as she looks back on her life and the beauty and pain she experienced in the industry.

 

Publisher's description: 

Aging and reclusive Hollywood movie icon Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. But when she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now? Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband has left her, and her professional life is going nowhere. Regardless of why Evelyn has selected her to write her biography, Monique is determined to use this opportunity to jumpstart her career. Summoned to Evelyn's luxurious apartment, Monique listens in fascination as the actress tells her story. From making her way to Los Angeles in the 1950s to her decision to leave show business in the '80s, and, of course, the seven husbands along the way, Evelyn unspools a tale of ruthless ambition, unexpected friendship, and a great forbidden love. Monique begins to feel a very real connection to the legendary star, but as Evelyn's story near its conclusion, it becomes clear that her life intersects with Monique's own in tragic and irreversible ways.

Find The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo in our online catalog

 

An insightful pop psychology book that explores the often-overlooked "B" in LGBTQ. Not quite accepted as fully queer or straight, bisexual people are often left to occupy a gray area in both spaces. As a bi woman herself, Shaw lends a unique view to the history, challenges, and culture of bisexuality.

 

Publisher's description:

A provocative, eye-opening, and original book on the science of sexuality beyond gender from an internationally bestselling pop-psychologist. Despite all the welcome changes that have happened in our culture and laws over the past few decades in regards to sexuality, the subject remains one of the most influential but least understood aspects of our lives. For psychologist and bestselling author Julia Shaw, this is both professional and personal— Shaw studies the science of sexuality and she herself is proudly and vocally bisexual. It's an admission, she writes, that usually causes people's pupils to dilate, their cheeks to flush, and their questions to start flowing. Ask people to name famous bisexual actors, politicians, writers, or scientists, and they draw a blank. Despite statistics that show bisexuality is more common than homosexuality, bisexuality is often invisible. In BI: The Hidden Culture, History, and Science of Bisexuality, Shaw probes the science and culture of attraction beyond the binary. From the invention of heterosexuality to the history of the Kinsey scale, as well as asylum seekers trying to defend their bisexuality in a court of law, there is so much more to explore than most have ever realized. Drawing on her own original research— and her own experiences— this is a personal and scientific manifesto; it's an exploration of the complexities of the human sexual experience and a declaration of love and respect for the nonconformists among us.

 

Legendborn (and Bloodmarked) are fun and exciting imaginings of King Arthur's legacy in the present day. I laughed and cheered for Bree as she learned to control her own power. It reminded me of a cross between the Girls of Paper and Fire series and the Bitter Root comics.

 

Publisher description:

After her mother dies in an accident, sixteen-year-old Bree Matthews wants nothing to do with her family memories or childhood home. A residential program for bright high schoolers at UNC–Chapel Hill seems like the perfect escape—until Bree witnesses a magical attack her very first night on campus. A flying demon feeding on human energies. A secret society of so called “Legendborn” students that hunt the creatures down. And a mysterious teenage mage who calls himself a “Merlin” and who attempts—and fails—to wipe Bree’s memory of everything she saw. The mage’s failure unlocks Bree’s own unique magic and a buried memory with a hidden connection: the night her mother died, another Merlin was at the hospital. Now that Bree knows there’s more to her mother’s death than what’s on the police report, she’ll do whatever it takes to find out the truth, even if that means infiltrating the Legendborn as one of their initiates. She recruits Nick, a self-exiled Legendborn with his own grudge against the group, and their reluctant partnership pulls them deeper into the society’s secrets—and closer to each other. But when the Legendborn reveal themselves as the descendants of King Arthur’s knights and explain that a magical war is coming, Bree has to decide how far she’ll go for the truth and whether she should use her magic to take the society down—or join the fight.

 

O'Connell is a brilliant and irreverent author who has uniquely captured queer disabled life in this incredible spitfire of a novel. This book is not only laugh-out-loud funny, but also very enlightening on the often not discussed topic of being a disabled queer person.

 

Publisher's description: 

Elliott appears to be living the dream as a successful TV writer with a doting boyfriend. But behind his Instagram filter of a life, he's grappling with an intensifying alcohol addiction, he can't seem to stop cheating on his boyfriend with various sex workers, and his cerebral palsy is making him feel like gay Shrek. After falling down a rabbit hole of sex, drinking, and Hollywood backstabbing, Elliott decides to limp his way towards redemption. But facing your demons is easier said than done.