100 Books Like Kill Game

This book is an unconventional romance, but it is a sweeping one, with language that made me swoon and a love story that gave me reason to hope again. The main character, Vin, was a mystery I needed to solve. King Perry is the first in a book series that has opened my heart in ways I didn’t even know my heart needed opening. It’s a beautiful book (and series) that has the potential to change the way you look at life. Yes, it’s that good. 

I love a good world-building tale, and this series is phenomenal. I also felt a real connection with Kai in the second book, The Soldier, but to understand him, you have to read this book first. Kai’s thrown into a situation not of his own making, but he manages to land on his own feet. Not only that, but he finds the courage to open his heart in a situation where he’d be justified in completely shutting down. His bravery is something to behold. I also loved Tam’s unwavering optimism and their Master’s heart of gold. Unconventional relationships are my jam, and this is a gem of a series.

Jordan L. Hawk took a tired kind of trope and turned it into something amazing. I love paranormal stories, but with vampires, I need to be convinced. By the end of the first chapter, Jordan had me convinced. He took an opposites-attract story, threw a cranky vampire in the middle of it, and turned it into a love story that I now cannot wait for when each new installment is published. It’s fresh, exciting, and I’m still coming back for more. Jordan’s one of my auto-buy authors, and this is one of my favorites of his series. Hands down. The characters are vivid, the adventures unique, and their love story is one for the ages. There’s nothing ordinary about this book.

It takes a lot to make me emotional, and Jenn Burke managed to get me in the feels with each book in this series, starting with Not Dead Yet. Wes Cooper is not living, but not quite dead due to a spell performed by a witch. He can travel between the living plane and the other plane. When Wes witnesses a murder by something otherworldly, he’s not sure what to do. Crossing paths with his one-time lover Hudson Rojas isn’t what Wes expected, but it does mean he has help to figure out what’s going on. He just doesn’t expect to fall in love again. And oh what a love it is. More than once, I got choked up over Wes and Hudson. Read it. You won’t regret it.

I love romance novels with characters who care about others who are different than themselves. In this one, an extraterrestrial crash-lands on Earth and is rescued by a human man. They’re both emotionally lost, devastated by the deaths of their respective spouses, but as the man nurses the alien back to health, they both regain the will to live. The way they protect each other, despite barely being able to communicate, is heart-wrenchingly beautiful.

I knew Jim, so I’m biased, but he was a fine poet–one of the real ones, as another poet said of him.

He isn’t as well known as he should be. He writes simply, honestly, and beautifully. Some of his poems make me want to weep, no matter how many times I read them.

Instead of telling you about the book, I’ll get out of the way and quote from one poem:

“Sometimes I’m their first. / Sweet, sweet men. / I light candles, burn the best incense. / Make them think it’s some kind of temple / and it rather is. // Like this guy who hauled parts for a living, / whatever the hell that means. / He was like caught light through glass, / and so the candles and the incense. / What would you do with a new colt? // He touched my body the way… show more.

This book focuses on ten-year-old Archie, as he comes to terms with his father coming out as gay. Archie’s difficulties, and some of the book’s drama, come from his dad’s inability to talk to Archie honestly and openly about what’s going on and family uncertainty resulting from the divorce, rather than any issue that Archie has with his dad being gay. My favourite thing about this book is its portrayal of LGBTQ+ community - from teenage babysitters with dyed hair to drag queens and lesbian mums - as a place that’s warm and supportive for people of all ages. This book makes being LGBTQ+ sound like a whole load of glitter-filled fun! And that gets my vote every time.  

As a pastor’s kid, this light, lyrical book about a church community gathering awakens my earliest memories: the bells and banners, candles and choir, warm greetings, and toddler wiggles. This community offers something many of us lacked: “A church for all!” From the first image of a mixed-race queer family waking early for church to the assembling “Weak and healthy/ Neat and messy/ Poor and wealthy/ Plain and dressy” chatting and worshiping together—this brightly illustrated book captures a true spirit of inclusion. Like many queer people, I had to leave my first faith community. Later I was amazed to find houses of faith like this one. I even married a pastor. Young me couldn’t have imagined living out, opening a service with a book like A Church for All.

This book gets triple points in my opinion, as it specifically addresses adoption by two dads who are an interracial couple. There are very few children’s books that cover all of these topics and even fewer that do it as simplistic and easy as this one. We have this one in our personal library and it has been one of our go-to books for helping our own daughter who my husband and I adopted.  

The fact that this queer masterpiece was written entirely in the solitude of a prison cell is only the first of many awe-inspiring truths about the book and its author. The drag queen Divine, a pimp named Darling Daintyfoot and Our Lady populate the book (published in 1943) offering a glimpse into a voluptuous Parisian fringe world. It was the thrilling—at times disturbing—story that first drew me in as a budding writer, but ultimately it was my realization that a book can be at once highly artful and literary as well as deeply erotic. It opened up a new freedom that I draw on every day as a novelist.