LGBT literature News | Autostraddle

Lez Liberty Lit: I Love A Semicolon

Semicolons are the best; so is having a nemesis; remembering gay bars; “the continual project of reckoning with ourselves”; and more.

two people with long hair about to kiss while one holds a book

Lez Liberty Lit: A Cute Panopticon

Why literature is so self-aware, living like an artist, caring for others without destroying yourself and more.

Two women are lounging in a cozy indoor space covered in blanket and pillows with a warm yellow light as if by a flashlight at night, one person reading from their phone screen and one hunched over reading from a hardback book

Lez Liberty Lit: What’s Up With Reading Lists

What is Afrofuturism, readings on climate and clean energy transition, a new anthology of radical trans poetics and more.

a graphic of the cover of mcsweeney's queer fiction issue, and a photo of the author patti yumi cottrell. the cover features tendrils, foliage and plants with a hand at the bottom.

What Is Queer Fiction? An Interview with Patty Yumi Cottrell

The first time I encountered a book with queer characters must have been James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room. At the time I remember feeling afraid of its intensity. Now it’s one of my most returned-to books along with Lydia Davis’ The End of the Story.

Kamala’s First Novel Zigzags Is Out Today!

Ultimately, Zigzags was fueled by the nostalgia of all the places I’ve loved and left and missed. There’s a lot of flirting and parties and witty banter, but it’s very much about the necessary and heartbreaking recognition of when it’s time to move on.

A non-binary student taking notes in class.

As School Season Begins, Fight for Trans Representation in Public Libraries

The public library is in the unique position to pick up where public education leaves off—to succeed where public education fails. It’s time we start rethinking what a library can be.

two women with light sexual tension reading together on blue sheets with their faces obscured by the same book

Lez Liberty Lit: Running on Queer Time

What do we do with unthinkable thoughts in the time of covid? Plus: how crime fiction enables police brutality, zines and self-discovery, celebrating the Clueless anniversary, every book you’ll want to read for the next five months and more.

a woman with natural hair reading an ereader in a hammock

Lez Liberty Lit: Just Say No to a Coronavirus Novel

The problem with new anti-racist book clubs, 50 Black-owned bookstores to support, writing good sex scenes and more.

two hands sharing a joint, cover of 'we had no rules' by Corinne Manning

Crafting The Narrative Of Abuse

Narratives of violence and abuse are so familiar in our history and culture that we hardly notice them. Corinne Manning shares what it took to notice and transform these narratives in their own fiction and their story collection, We Had No Rules.

Lez Liberty Lit Is Motivated By Drive (Or Fear)

Is there a difference between drive and fear? Where are the abortion memoirs? What fall books should you definitely read?

Lez Liberty Lit: Likability Is Dehumanizing

Why likability is a lie, a new edition of Colonize This!, the publisher reissuing queer genre fiction from the 60s to 90s, abandoning books and more.

A transfeminine non-binary person and transmasculine gender-nonconforming person reading a magazine together.

Lez Liberty Lit Is Cussing Like No One’s Listening

Writing and money, machines learning from our texts (and replicating our power structures), whether books are clutter and more.

Lez Liberty Lit Is Checking Out These Hot Literary Rivalries

Getting real about the financial realities of writing, creative forces of subculture, K-pop, the branded ephemera of Frida Khalo, and shedding books to survive academia.

Lez Liberty Lit Is Investigating Creative Sustainability

A website that generates short stories based on phone numbers, the feminist Western, financially sustaining a creative life, books to read before “The L Word” comes back, and more.

Lez Liberty Lit Is Writing Honestly About The Body

“Why are we so quick to conclude that marginalized writers’ work is autobiographical?” Plus books about love triangles, a secret lesbian code, why you need to start writing letters to trans people in prison and more.

Lez Liberty Lit: Imagining a Safer Future

Still mourning Mary Oliver. Plus why “books” are not a personality, the mood of reading, feminist bookstores to support right now and more.

Lez Liberty Lit Is Full of Its Past Selves

A humble argument for not counting how many books you read. Plus: Lin-Manuel Miranda saved a bookstore, Mari Kondo doesn’t actually want you to get rid of all your books, and more.