LGBT YA

[eyeblink]

I'm not asking if it exists, as I know it does. Recommendations, comments etc please.

Lesbian:

Julie Burchill, Sugar Rush. (I have read this and was underwhelmed. JB is a well-known and rather confrontational print journalist in the UK and this apparently was her attempt to write a YA novel that crossed over to adults. I was never really convinced by the central character who sounded more like JB than anyone else. However, it was the basis of a TV serial which ran to two series and is, just for once, much better than the book. There is a book sequel, Sweet, but I haven't read it.)

Gay (Male):
Paul Magrs, Strange Boy. Another adult novelist goes YA. Set in the 80s. Not read it.

(sort of) Meg Rosoff, What I Was. Recommended but only marginally gay, for reasons you'll have to read the novel to find out.


Bisexual:

Can't think of any. Anyone?

Transgender/Transsexual:
Julie Anne Peters, Luna. Not read it.

There's also David Walliams's The Boy in the Dress. I've not read it, and I tend to be suspicious of celebrities who've suddenly always wanted to write a children's book. I'm not sure quite who it's aimed at - it looks like a MG book (complete with Quentin Blake illustrations, not that there's anything wrong with that) but the content is by all accounts YA. (Not just the cross-dressing theme, but there's apparently a scene where the protagonist finds his Dad's porn collection.) Most of the reviews on Amazon are favourable, but I notice they're all by adults, not teens. Has anyone here read it?


No doubt there's lots more, and I'd be interested in any recommendations.

 

[Shady Lane]

Lesbian:

Keeping You a Secret and Between Mom and Jo and I think there a few others...by Julie Ann Peters (she does a lot of GLBT stuff). I haven't read these, but my sister's a big fan. (She loves Luna as well.)

Gay male:

Boy Meets Boy and The Realm of Possibility and others by David Levithan. I adore him.

Rainbow Boys, Rainbow High, and Rainbow Road and others by Alex Sanchez. He does a lot of interracial gay relationships, which are interesting, but I find his writing to be lacking.

My Heartbeat by Garret Freymann-Weyr--this is one of my favorite books EVER. It's so subtle and so beautiful, told from the POV of the sister watching her brother and his best friend (?) boyfriend (?) and subsequently falling in love with this best friend/boyfriend. It's unbelievably smart, never underestimates the reader's powers of perception, and doesn't offer any straight answers, but God it's fantastic.

 

[veinglory]

While not gay per se 'The Brazen Mirror' has some material about gender and sexual orientation.

 

[wandergirl]

The Bermudez Triangle by Maureen Johnson features a bisexual (and a lesbian) main character.

 

[Cassidy]

Hello...
Lee Wind's website (leewind.org) is called I'm Here, I'm Queer, Now What do I Read? and lists, categorizes and reviews GLBT YA novels. Elisabeth Hegerat is a Canadidan librarian who keeps a list of Canadian GLBT fiction-- here's the link:

http://elisabethreads.wordpress.com/category/all_sorts_of_books/glbt_books/

I loved My Heartbeat. Beautifully written book.

A brand new book by a Canadian writer is Gravity by Leanne Lieberman-- the main character is a teenage girl trying to reconcile her sexuality with her religious beliefs (she is Jewish).

Another book about a trangendered main character is Ellen Wittlinger's novel Parrotfish. Does anyone know of others?

Some of my own books have queer characters. My first novel, Out of Order, has a main character who is trying to figure out her sexuality, among other things, and also a secondary character who is a lesbian. My forthcoming YA novel, Inferno , has a queer main character though this is not the focus of the book.

I have heard that the Bermudez Triangle is good... look forward to following up on some of the recomendations here.

 

[nayner]

and doesn't offer any straight answers,

tee hee, PUN!

 

[nayner]

I second the rec for Boy Meets Boy. I loved it!

there's also Geography Club, by Brent Hartinger which was OK. It has a sequel, Order of the Poison Oak, which I have not read.
EDIT: Geography Club's protag is gay male, but there are also lesbians involved in the story.

For lesbian, there's always the classic Annie on my Mind.

 

[eyeblink]

One I forgot about - Aidan Chambers's Dance on My Grave from 1982 (gay male).

The same author's Postcards from No Man's Land is recommended but not really a LGBT novel - though it does have a gay man and a bi man as major characters.

Thanks for the suggestions, everyone. As I'm on the other side of the Atlantic to most of you, it's good to get US titles on this list. And thanks for keeping this thread at a civilised level - not the case with the last gay-themed thread in this forum!

 

[Stunted]

Nick and Norah has some gay guys.

 

[Ken]

lesbian YA:

Recently wrote one, myself. Will let you know if it makes it to print ;-)
Came out okay, and also felt good to be promoting open-mindedness

 

[Cassidy]

Oh, I just remembered another that I absolutely loved: Peter Cameron's Someday This Pain Will Be Useful To You.

 

[Shady Lane]

Oh, I just remembered another that I absolutely loved: Peter Cameron's Someday This Pain Will Be Useful To You.

My sister got me this for Christmas! I'm so excited to read it.

 

[Dichroic]

I think even if I were an actual young adult (as opposed to just a reader of YA) I've have little interest in reading something whose plot was "I think I'm gay, now what?" What I would like to read is "Oh no, I have to save the world - oh, and being L, G, B or T happens to be part of who I am". In other words, the same books I read anyway (my YA faves tend to be SF or fantasy) but with a more realistic* distribution of sexuality. That is, certainly some of these MCs should be gay, or bi-curious, or feeling like they're in the wrong body or whatever. One that comes to mind is one of Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar trilogies - it's been long enough that I forget the titles. What others are like that?


*Over the years I've noticed I knew a *lot* more LGBT folks online than in the flesh, enough to make me suspect that the truth was that a lot of people still aren't comfortable coming out in public. Given that in the last year I've had a close relative and a close friend come out about their sexuality and a coworker announce that he is transitioning M to F, I'm pretty sure that hypothesis is correct.

 

[Shady Lane]

I agree, Dichroic--though I don't read SFF, it's always refreshing to read a GLBT book with plot and character motivations that aren't--or at least not only--coming out related angst. There's so much more to the GLBT teenage experience.

 

[Nakhlasmoke]

I think even if I were an actual young adult (as opposed to just a reader of YA) I've have little interest in reading something whose plot was "I think I'm gay, now what?" What I would like to read is "Oh no, I have to save the world - oh, and being L, G, B or T happens to be part of who I am". In other words, the same books I read anyway (my YA faves tend to be SF or fantasy) but with a more realistic* distribution of sexuality. That is, certainly some of these MCs should be gay, or bi-curious, or feeling like they're in the wrong body or whatever. One that comes to mind is one of Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar trilogies - it's been long enough that I forget the titles. What others are like that?


*Over the years I've noticed I knew a *lot* more LGBT folks online than in the flesh, enough to make me suspect that the truth was that a lot of people still aren't comfortable coming out in public. Given that in the last year I've had a close relative and a close friend come out about their sexuality and a coworker announce that he is transitioning M to F, I'm pretty sure that hypothesis is correct.

If mine ever gets published... *grins*

Although it's YA urban fantasy, so might not be up your alley.


er

so to speak.

 

[eyeblink]

There are two stages to this process, generally defined by relaxation of censorship and social acceptability or otherwise.

The first stage is that you have stories which say "I'm gay, now what?" as Dichroic puts it. In short, stories about LGBT people where the story is all about their being LGBT people and if the story was about something else they would be straight. There are a lot of 60s and 70s films that fall into this category. Similarly there are stories about other minorities that are all about being in a minority - the disabled, interracial marriages etc etc - and the story is all about the experience of being in a minority and nothing else. Take the 1971 film Sunday, Bloody Sunday for example (starring Peter Finch, Murray Head and Glenda Jackson). It's the story of what would now be called a poly arrangement, or a bisexual triangle - Murray Head plays a man who shares his sexual favours with a gay man and a straight woman. It's a good film, very well acted by Finch and Jackson and considered somewhat shocking in its day. But my point is that just exploring that kind of set-up would be enough to power an entire feature film nearly forty years ago. Now it wouldn't really be sufficient - and indeed less shocking.

A second stage story is one where you have a LGBT character or character(s) and they're integrated into the lives of the other characters and the social settings - friendships, loves, hatreds, family bonds - etc that are in your story. That does acknowledge that almost all of us know some LGBT people, even if we don't know we do - we go to school with them, work with them, know them socially, are brothers/sisters/sons/daughters of them, or we are them. And a story, YA or otherwise, that portrays all that is far more interesting than a simple coming-out narrative.

 

[Shady Lane]

I've written three books that deal with GLBT characters (by the way, is LGBT the standard in the UK and GLBT here? that's weird). The first two, one of which is a sequel to the other, is about a group of five boys. Of the five, 1, 2, or 3 is/are gay, depending on your definition of the word and predilection for labeling. There's no "oh my God he's gay" drama--the drama comes, actually, when boy A, who we assumed would be hung up on boy B forever (and is boy B gay?? oh, the wondering) suddenly goes for boy C (who we knew basically nothing about.) And then boy B wants him back...but none of this is the main plot, just things that go on within the 5 boys's main conflict.

My third is about two boys in a relationship, switching viewpoints between them and the people around them. But the fact that they're both boys is (and I did this intentionally) basically the only thing they don't angst about. They have trouble getting and staying together because they're in completely different places socially--one's captain of the soccer team, the other's a high school pariah--and because they have a complicated past.

I like writing about GLBT relationships, probably because, although I'm straight, due to my lesbian sister and the fact that I followed her everywhere for seventeen years, the large majority of the people I know consider themselves queer. I usually have a hint of sexual ambiguity in anything I write.

Plus, I hate writing girls, and man it's fun to write a kissing scene that doesn't include any.

 

[eyeblink]

I didn't know there was a standard order of the letters, except that BLGT sounds like the contents of a sandwich.

I'm glad I can write lengthy opinionated AW posts at 7 in the morning and have them come out coherent, and thanks for your reply. Your three novels sound like exactly what I meant by "second stage" works.

I hate writing girls

I'm the opposite, and do it a lot. On the other hand I don't hate writing about boys/men - I have been known to do it from time to time...

 

[Dichroic]

There are two stages to this process, generally defined by relaxation of censorship and social acceptability or otherwise.

Makes sense to me. Given your definitions I'd say that we as a society are transitioning from Stage 1 to Stage 2 and so there are both sorts of books coming out just now (still more of 1 than 2, I think).

Thing is, I suspect that Stage 1 books are critically important at a particular point in time (to a teenager just figuring herself out, for instance) it's the Stage 2 books that have the staying power and can be read for decades, just because they're not single-issue stories. This is assuming good writing in both cases, obviously.

 

[Shady Lane]

Completely agree, Dichroic. To pull my sister back into it, I remember there was a time when she was fourteen or fifteen that she read nothing but coming-out books. I couldn't understand how she didn't get bored. Now, she reads a lot more of the Stage 2 type books. As do I--I never really got into the Stage 1s.

 

[Bonnie Shimko]

Here's a shameless plug:

My first novel, Letters in the Attic, won a Lambda Literary Award and has been published in Chinese and Italian.

 

[reenkam]

For those of you looking for LGBT that isn't just a coming out story...

Perry Moore's Hero

gay superhero. i think it did well. stan lee wants to make a movie.

 

[Nakhlasmoke]

ooh i've heard of it Reen, and I'm dying to read.

 

[AyJay]

Hey Joe by Ben Neihart is a great male coming of age novel that deals with a young man's homosexuality in a very matter of fact way.

 

[eyeblink]

Thread resurrection...

I'm currently writing a LGBT YA novel (see sig) - the L and the B part, in a love triangle - so thanks again for the recommendations. I'll be looking to get hold of copies of some of these, partly to get some idea of how other writers have dealt with the subject. What I'm particularly aiming at is a "second-stage" novel as I define it above, with the reactions to friends, family etc to the central triangle being vital. In some ways, these other people have an investment in one or more of the central three characters, and I'd like to show how some of these investments come under threat.

As most of the books mentioned are US-published only, Amazon will have to be my friend. Accordingly to Wikipedia, about ten or a dozen YA novels on LGBT themes are published in the USA every year, but in the UK it's been a handful at best. (And Aidan Chambers was clearly way ahead of his time in 1982.) Further evidence that YA as a publishing category seems to be a lot more developed in the USA than it is the UK.