Charlie McGill's 3 favorite reads in 2023

As someone who wrote a queer spin-off of Frankenstein, it's obvious that I love monsters—particularly how the horrific and the monstrous in fiction have long been used as metaphors for queer expression, for better or for worse. 

It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror is a collection of twenty-five essays by queer authors examining their (often complicated!) relationships to influential horror films. I particularly enjoyed Carmen Maria Machado's piece on the camp cult classic Jennifer's Body, Viet Dinh's on the notorious Sleepaway Camp, and Zeyfr Lisowski's on the ableism of The Ring and Pet Sematary.

Ironically, I haven't even seen most of the movies discussed—I love reading horror but totally chicken out at the gorier stuff on screen! But for me, that only made it all the more fascinating to learn about horror film history through the eyes of those who, like myself, often find themselves relating more to the monsters than the "hero."

I’ve loved every Sarah Waters book I’ve read so far, and this one was no exception! Tipping the Velvet follows Nan Astley, a young woman who leaves her humble family home in Whitstable after falling in love with Kitty Butler, a charming “male impersonator” (i.e., drag king) working the music halls of Victorian England.

Eventually, Nan becomes a famous male impersonator, too, and is drawn into a world of drama, heart-break, and self-discovery. I loved following Nan through the glitz and glitter of nineteenth-century showbiz and queer subculture, particularly the way Waters tackled the slippery divide (or lack thereof!) between queer sexuality and gender nonconformity in this era.

A must-read for fans of sapphic historical fiction!

This historical fantasy absolutely charmed me from start to finish! Unapologetically queer and steeped in Jewish history and culture, the story follows Uriel the angel and Ashmedai (a.k.a. Little Ash), the demon, who've been meeting up for centuries to study the Talmud in a tiny shtetl in turn-of-the-century Poland.

When a young woman who recently left for New York fails to write back to her family as promised, the pair decide to journey to America to support their community—or, in Little Ash's case, explore new avenues of mischief. I adored Lamb's exploration of Uriel and Little Ash's inherent genderqueerness as non-human characters and the running theme of "What does it mean to be human, anyway?"

In this respect, as well as tone and setting, I was pleasantly reminded of Helene Wecker's The Golem and the Jinni—so if you enjoyed that one, I'd highly recommend you check out this one, too!