Our Most Anticipated Queer Books for May 2026

I swear publishers used to overload June with all the queer books but then figured out a couple years ago that the month then became too crowded so pushed some LGBTQ+ titles to May…making May just as crowded as June. Listen, I’m not complaining about the volume of queer books getting published; I just think we can spread them out a little more year-round instead of making them all early summer releases?! Anyway, all that to say: There are soooooo many queer books coming out this month. You’ll find our top picks at the start of this list, followed by the rest of the releases we’re keeping an eye on. It looks like there’s some great sci-fi and also hybrid nonfiction work heading our way this month. I’m especially excited about the latter! This list is not exhaustive, so shout out anything we missed that you think deserves attention in the comments!

Set in 1980s Cincinnati but also 600 years into the future, this novel is about 19-year-old Becks, who takes on the project of finishing her recently deceased and beloved uncle’s partially completed gaming project amid her grief.

Great news: MURDERBOT IS BACK in the next installment of the award-winning, bestselling Murderbot Diaries series (recently adapted for television on Apple TV).

We’ve already got a review up about this astrology-laden, very lesbian novel! Writes Mia Arias Tsang in her review: “I read the entire book in one sitting, spurred on by Narby’s propulsive prose. She is a remarkably observant writer whose characters are so human you can’t help but get sucked into their emotional hurricane. You’ll want to wrap your arms around them just as often as you’ll want to shake them by the shoulders and scream WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO YOURSELVES?”

In this thriller, a Native Hawaiian teen travels to luxury island vacation destination Kōpaʻa Island Resort in search of her missing twin sister, where other mysteries begin to unfold.

This incisive new memoir considers questions of beauty and ugliness. What does it mean to be seen as ugly? And how are women’s lives shaped by the ways other perceive their looks? Stephanie Fairyington explores these things through the lens of her own experiences, her lesbianism, and her queer motherhood and feelings as the non-gestational parent of her traditionally feminine daughter.

The cult author’s debut collection of short stories is set amongst a community of trans women in a large midwestern town, where anxiety and despair can give way to joy, where lives intersect through polyamorous triads, hookup apps, obsessive TERFs and post-surgery care rotations. It’s “the sardonic heartbeat of a new generation of American trans women.”

Offering a “brilliant and scathing commentary on the cisgender gaze,” All Us Saints tells the story of a family upended by tragedy. In May 1992, 17-year-old Roland St. Cloud fatally stabbed his twin sister Edna’s three best friends, a tragedy that then becomes true crime and tabloid fodder and even inspires a horror movie franchise. Every year on the anniversary of the event, Edna reenacts the murders with her husband Rover, her younger sister Calla, her younger brother James and his girlfriend Heather, and her teen daughter Wren. I honestly don’t want to know much about this one going into it!

It genuinely is difficult to box this project into any one genre, and that’s part of its appeal. Eleni Sikelianos excavates the stories and histories of her queer and visionary ancestors, using the past to give new meaning to the present. This is a gorgeous book, full of hybrid memoir, poems, and images.

Oh hell yeah, I always seize an opportunity to recommend Julián Delgado Lopera’s debut novel Fiebre Tropical, and I’m so hype for this next novel which will take you into Columbia’s queer nightlife. It’s set in 1990s Bogotá and follows a father and daughter: Ignacio and Valentina.

I’m reading this right now, and let me tell you, you should be reading it, too! It alternates perspectives between two gay men from the Afghan diaspora who eventually collide in Istanbul. It’s about family, friendship, home, and the violence of borders. But it’s also so, so deeply tender in its portrayals of romance and desire. It’s a strong debut from a writer I cherish.

I’ve been so excited for this one. Co-creator of the podcast Cruising Rachel Karp and her wife and best friend go on a cross-country trip to visit all of the lesbian bars left in the U.S. to gather their stories and speak with members of their communities. The book weaves together more than 100 hours of interviews with bar owners, staff, and regulars.

This expansive and imaginative new novel set in East Village in the summer of 1984 and about a young lesbian named Renata who has the ability to see ghosts, which starts happening more frequently as her friends start dying of complications associated with AIDS. Her best friend Mark passes and she waits to see his ghost, who keeps not showing up. The novel also tackles gentrification, community organizing, and looks at sociopolitical movements of 1980s New York through its speculative lens.

And now enjoy the rest of the books we’re looking forward to this month!

The seventh book in the Hugo-Award winning Singing Hills Cycle, this one focused on wandering cleric Chih’s earliest days as Novice and a newly arrived refugee in Luntien.

Pitched as both “Hades and Persephone reimagined on a tidally locked planet” and “a science fantasy Beauty and the Beast,” this novel also promises sapphic yearning and a charming robot.

Sundae Valentine made a deal with a monster she met at the bottom of a motel pool, and now, her prom queen weekend on the Jersey Shore — electrified by the girl she’s crushing on — could come to a bloody, excruciating end.

Mixing personal narrative with interviews and data, Danis challenges LGBTQ+ travelers to explore the world with confidence, comfort and a healthy appetite for the unexpected.

The sequel to trans coming-out graphic novel stars a purple, blue-haired alien space princess with a loving girlfriend and a talking corgi bodyguard is trying to chart a course for her own future, and the superhero lifestyle it may or may not entail.

The sequel to charming YA romance Some Girls Do sees Ruby and Morgan struggling with post-high-school long distance and major, unexpected opportunities on the horizon.

These interconnected tales are set in the cozy, creature-laden town of Cryptid Creek. A skate park romance with a nightcrawler! A butch/femme karaoke bar encounter with a Sasquatch!

From the author/illustrator of Gender Queer, the story of Saachi, seventh grader who loves to tell stories and build fantasy worlds struggling as her peers start getting into that “boy/girl stuff” and she grows increasingly weary of her own body.

Lindsay, the novel’s 17-year-old protagonist, has recently been kicked out of prep school and exiled ot her uncle’s farm in Marbury, Maine, where her life becomes controlled by her new aunt’s evangelical mission to reform troubled teens. She meets a pair of twins living on a nearby island, and it changes everything.

A queer twist on Pride and Prejudice, this is an opposites-attract sapphic Regency rom-com.

Educator Mischa Oak combines research, personal narratives, and various learning tools to craft these lessons aimed both at queer people and their allies.

Pre-Stonewall queer historical accounts and events are so important to study, and here we have a new offering that focuses specifically on the early queer history of Cincinnati.

Narrative and formally playful poems here explore family and queerness, all set in the North Bronx.

This speculative novel “of anti-imperialist queer imagination,” according to the publisher, explores the Punjabi global diaspora through its Queens-based protagonist. With a dollop of queer longing!

A satirical romp about three friends battling supernatural crime in London — a follow-up to the word-of-mouth bestseller Bored Gay Werewolf.

The ebook version of this book about the impact of queer independent bookstores on queer liberation and movements comes out on May 7, with a physical release slated for Pride month.

This poetry collection grapples with what it means to find meaning in a screen-lit world, exploring joy and grief as well as pleasure and struggle along the way.

This is the second book in the Time of Iron series. A fantasy reader ends up in her favorite fictional world full of swords and sorcery.

On the planet Callisto, an AI media conglomerate called Inspiration owns everything and controls what stories get told. Kelli Reynolds, who is autistic, works for the company as a script supervisor, smuggling original stories in where she can. She reconnects with her ex Rowan, a trans man who needs Kelly’s help with something illegal after he gets tangled up in the black market trying to get money for gender-affirming surgery.

A 17-year-old girl explores her own queerness while also reckoning with her late father’s. Mira Howard didn’t know her father was gay when he was alive, but when his boyfriend Richard tries to come to his funeral, she goes looking for answers about her dad’s life and her own.

Gemma O’Brien is a butch running a lobster fishing business and is trying to stay sober while also keeping an eye on her unpredictable younger sister. Chef Kay Grammar is busy opening her dream restaurant, and her path crosses with Gemma’s when the restaurant becomes a potential buyer for the lobster business. They clash immediately, but attraction simmers.

A look at post-Stonewall queer music history through the start of the 21st century.

An autistic teen, burned by a breakup that leaves her carefully curated world in tatters, is paired with mysterious volleyball legacy who quickly distracts her from her quest to get that boyfriend back.

A genderqueer teen survives a near-apocalypse in this rural horror monster tale.

In this queer horror romantasy, two famous villainous women from literature —Lady Macbeth and Klytemnestra — end up entwined in a magical realm.

Though we’re unsure just how many stories in this collection —which on the 2024 Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction — are queer, the pre-pub Kirkus review does make mention of queer characters. The collection sounds like it is strongly rooted in place, exploring nature and landscapes from Seattle to Istanbul.

Hazel chronicles their own journey, having come out as bisexual to their parents when they were 12-years-old, and then eventually coming into their self as a nonbinary transmasc person in a loving queer relationship. The panels entwine Hazel’s own story with queer history.

Tackling complex stories of gender, desire, bodies, and kink, The Body Riddle follows Lex in the aftermath of their chest surgery and their nonmonogamous relationship with Lex, a cis woman, who also starts dating a cis man, making Lex spiral about whether Ada might prefer cis masculinity. Lex then meets Sadie, a nonbinary coworker, who Lex is immediately drawn to and who awakens them to new possibilities.

Described as “Jonathan Franzen meets The Price of Salt,” Whitaker’s novel is a sweeping story of a Kentucky family living the American Dream with four healthy children and a growing family-owned business whose surface begins cracking as the 1980s begin. For Fran, the matriarch and her family’s core, it comes in the form of a crush on Wendy, a cashier at her store.

A trans man in his thirties finds romance where he least expects it after taking a break from a fractured life to spend the summer at a picturesque seaside cottage rental in Cape Cod.

Hovey blends personal stories with research to explore what causes prejudice in queer spaces — and offers actionable, empathetic tools for change, embodying his well-known fearless approach to difficult conversations.

Two women are made mortal enemies by an ancient curse, despite their latent love for each other.

Savannah decamps to her parents’ lake house in upstate New York after a devastating friendship breakup. She spirals out and drinks a lot and wakes up one morning in the woods next to the dead body of Ava, whose journal Savannah begins to read and whose ghost she can’t move on from.

This special annotated version of the book unfairly at the center of so many book ban efforts brings in other voices beyond Kobabe’s, including other queer writers and artists and academics who further contextualize the work.

Opposites attract in this college-set sapphic softball romance.

This is the sequel to Hench and features a cast of queer and neurodivergent characters. As with the first book, it’s set in a world of superheroes and their various foils and shenanigans. In this one, former henchpeople lean into full-on villainy.

Here we have some aroace representation in this aromantic “romance,” which follows 19-year-old pop star Sasha who is on the aroace-spec and sings about love stories but does not pursue them herself. It sounds sweet!

A trans romantasy! This follows Acrasia, a trans girl who’s also an intergalactic moth-goddess, and Opus Zhao, a trans guy who piloted a robotic tiger. They go from hating each other to falling in love to their universes moving apart, but he suddenly shows up in her dimension again. Multidimensional trans love!

This meta epic skewers the likes of the Bible and major mythological epics with the tales of a nonbinary artist recruited by God named Yara and a lesbian prophet named Adrena. It sounds like an ambitious (and hilarious) work of satire.

More queerleaders! Here, two cheerleaders fall in love in a satirical sapphic romance for the Bring It On heads.

Twelve stories centering aromantic experiences comprise this anthology aimed at young folks. They straddle various fiction genres, including some speculative offerings.

Find sapphic folk horror in this 1635-set fantasy about a young nun and a peasant running away on a big journey together.

Steven Pfau analyzes the figure of the Gay Uncle in this hybrid work of memoir and cultural criticism, writing on his own uncle Bruce who was a mentor figure during his young gay boyhood. Queer history and personal narrative are woven together to create this portrait of the Gay Uncle, and that really is my favorite kind of nonfiction.

This is a queer horror romance retelling of The Picture of Dorian Gray, from the author of Our Infinite Fates.

Neither Maya nor Gabe are particularly thrilled to be spending the summer at Spruce Lake. Maya recently confessed her unrequited feelings for her best friend Rashida. Gabe was sent here by her mom hoping to keep her out of trouble, and she does not like nature. Maya and Gabe hatch a fake-dating plan to make Rashida jealous.

A coming-of-age political romance about Eli Goldstein taking a job at the roadside museum he loves, where Eli’s coworkers start organizing, led by his school rival Efraín.

The 90s marked a transitional period for queer culture and movements, and Hugh Ryan tracks those changes through personal narrative. The author is a historian, but in this case, he’s using his personal accounts of the 90s to flesh out a portrait of the time period for queer life.

Protagonist Jamie is flailing, stuck at a dead-end newspaper job in Baltimore and having breakup sex with one ex while haunted by what-ifs about her ex-girlfriend Mari, who she also used to be in a band with that broke up when they broke up. Jamie hasn’t been able to sing since. Then an opportunity to sing with Mari’s new band in DC arises.

At 18 years old, Louisa Wade inherits her late great Uncle George’s bar, which turns out to be a queer bar called The Frisky Cricket, completely upending Louisa’s perception of Uncle George as some football hometown hero of Rustin, Alabama. She encounters his grumpy ex-partner Hatch, who wants to sell the bar, but Louisa wants to keep it going, and she develops a crush on Aubrey Calhoun, the pretty and popular popular daughter of the local university’s new football coach, along the way.

Two young siblings are con artists scamming the rich and famous in this YA thriller set in Hollywood’s Golden Age that includes a queer romance.

Six single queers navigate love and other entanglements in this collection of linked modern sapphic stories. Queer women and nonbinary people of color are centered in these tales.

In this psychological thriller set in the 1980s, a figure skater recovering from a brain injury goes in search of her missing sister after receiving a mysterious postcard.

As the wife of the author of last year’s preeminent lesbian clown novel, you know I’m excited for this clown anthology out from Dopamine and edited by icon Michelle Tea. It features work from Megan Milks, Julián Delgado Lopera, Andrea Lawlor, and other favorites of this books column.

A fitness coach and a witch fall into each other’s realms in this magical rom-com.

Idaho’s first openly LGBTQ+ lawmaker pens this personal history of queer resistance from within a red state, and as a writer living and working in Florida, this subject matter definitely speaks to me.