Books like I Hope We Choose Love — picked by fans

This is a big ambitious book with a huge literary and emotional payoff.

It’s set in Chicago, a town I don’t know well during the AIDS epidemic, an experience that has stayed with me. It’s also set in Paris, a place we all love to read about, in the art world, where I like to linger. I don’t always appreciate a multiple timeline structure; here, however, it really enriches the plot, heightens the stakes, and amplifies the theme of love within tragedy.

Every character is well-drawn and makes a lasting impression as you jump into not only a community in crisis, but also a world of visual art, found families, mortality, and memory. It’s a stunningly sublime story about the experiences and people who forever change us.

There were only three Tales of the City books when I picked up my first copy. There are now nine of them, spanning 40 years.

First written as a newspaper serial, the collected Tales explore the lives and loves of a diverse group of folks living in the same boarding house at 28 Barbary Lane in San Francisco. Among them is landlord Anna Madrigal, an early trans icon, and gay everyman Michael ‘Mouse’ Tolliver, a hopeless romantic looking for love in the Castro.

The book is an easy read with short chapters, lots of dialogue, and zany plot twists. What I love most is how much these characters – some of whom are estranged from their biological families – start to feel like close friends whose lives you get to follow. 

Five women find salvation in each other in a beachside hamlet on Uruguay’s eastern coast. With no running water or electricity, the isolated Cabo Polonio becomes their sanctuary, a place where these cantoras (women who "sing”) can exercise their voice – something denied them as queer women under the Uruguayan dictatorship of 1970s and 80s.

The book follows the friends over the span of 35 years as they continue to return to this family home of theirs, sometimes together, sometimes with new lovers. Beautifully written, the book is brimming with heart and is a testament to the power of activism and solidarity. 

It’s a common occurrence for the latest generation to think they invented everything, but Mordden sets the record straight and deftly answers the question posed by his book’s title: It’s been going on for a long, long time…

Epic in scope, this brick of a book opens at an underground gay bar in Los Angeles in 1949 and ends on Gay Pride Day in New York City in 1991. In between, we’re introduced to a boatload of queer characters from across the US, all trying to survive the trials that life throws at them.

At some point, many cross paths. It’s all here folks: raids on gay bars, secret affairs, falling in love, sex work, the birth of the pride movement, the torment of AIDS. I didn’t want it to end.

The key to loving yourself is knowing yourself and accepting that person entirely. That is, not just the polished, perfect parts of you but the inner layers. The insecurities. The vulnerabilities. The pain. The mistakes. Written as a bite-sized self-help book of prose that can be easily digested in one or two sittings, Mind Platter is brimming with pieces that changed my perspective of my healing journey for the better. 

If you’re learning to love yourself better, Mind Platter is a great book to dive into for many reasons. It’s a book that unveiled many truths for me, such as the cause of my discomfort and pain (often hidden in my unrealistic expectations of myself and me ‘making a home’ in other people), how to be more forgiving, and the importance of growth and moving on. This book taught me how to be kinder to myself through its discussion of… show more.

This was one of the first romance novels I’d ever read—ironically while I was on vacation—and for that reason alone, it will always hold a special place in my heart.

It’s a compelling summer romance about young love with undertones of social issues, and it highlights the challenges of making difficult decisions at a young age. The main character can either choose to support her family or fight to be with the boy-next-door despite her mother’s disapproval and pressures to uphold the family image.

I personally love books where the characters fight against the status quo, and this book absolutely delivered.

It is a classic must-read book that not only sets up an interesting, thought-provoking premise but also grounds us in the thoughts of very different teens and how they find their way to each other under a system designed to keep them apart. Malorie Blackman’s writing is concise and crisp, her gaze unflinching, and yet the book is all heart.

Honestly, this book crushed me, but in the most beautiful way possible.

It taught me that love can be found in the most unexpected places, even when faced with life's harshest realities. This narrative made me appreciate the small but significant moments in life, a lesson I try to convey in my own writing.

This powerful book will return you to the remembrance of how to trust your own intuition and get into a most miraculous and co-creative space with the Divine. Filled with personal stories of growing up with their father, the late renowned spiritual teacher Dr. Wayne Dyer and their mother, Marcelene, The Knowing is a trusted ally in opening yourself up to remembering the spiritual wisdom within you. The book also clearly shares 11 lessons to understand the quiet urges of your soul, which provide a comprehensive pathway to reconnect to the power you’ve always had, but now know how to unlock.

Hazel Hill thinks she’s the only girl in the 7th grade who likes girls that way, until Tyler tells her that Ella Quinn told him she likes Hazel.

But Ella Quinn is pretty and popular, and she’s Hazel’s biggest rival in the upcoming speech contest. They talk. Ella confesses she only told Tyler that to stop his sexual harassment. It turns out, Tyler has been harassing a lot of girls.

They tell the school, but the teachers won’t do anything about it, even blaming the girls and punishing them. It is not a coincidence that Tyler’s mom is the superintendent of schools. Determined not to let Tyler get away with it, Hazel comes up with a plan.