Here are 100 books that Spectr fans have personally recommended if you like
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As part of the LGBTQ+ rainbow, I know firsthand what it is to be othered, and I grew up desperately wanting to read about and watch characters like me in books and movies. Now that I’ve found a genre of books that celebrates LGBTQ+ lives, I can’t help but want to read and write the stories I’ve always wanted to see and experience in the world of fiction and romance. Everyone deserves love, and I want to share that love with as many people as I can.
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.
In a trendy San Francisco art gallery, out-of-towner Vin Vanbly witnesses an act of compassion that compels him to make investment banker Perry Mangin a mysterious offer: in exchange for a weekend of complete submission, Vin will restore Perry’s “kingship” and transform him into the man he was always meant to be.
Despite intense reservations, Perry agrees, setting in motion a chain of events that will test the limits of his body, seduce his senses, and fray his every nerve, (perhaps occasionally breaking the law) while Vin guides him toward his destiny as 'the one true king.'
Awakening the handsome prince is supposed to end the fairy tale, not begin it. But the Highvalley witches have rarely done things the way they're supposed to. On the north Pacific island of Eidolonia, hidden from the world by enchantments, Prince Larkin has lain in a magical sleep since 1799…
As part of the LGBTQ+ rainbow, I know firsthand what it is to be othered, and I grew up desperately wanting to read about and watch characters like me in books and movies. Now that I’ve found a genre of books that celebrates LGBTQ+ lives, I can’t help but want to read and write the stories I’ve always wanted to see and experience in the world of fiction and romance. Everyone deserves love, and I want to share that love with as many people as I can.
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.
At twenty-seven, Tamelik has been a slave more than half his life. Submissive by nature, he can't help but fall in love with the master who treats him kindly.
When the mistress walks out, Tam dares to hope his love will be enough.
Then he's ordered to purchase another slave.
He wants to hate Kai for being unruly and ungrateful. For being of the same race as the men who murdered his family. For being his eventual replacement in their master's bed. But it's hard to hate a man who cries himself to sleep, flinches…
As part of the LGBTQ+ rainbow, I know firsthand what it is to be othered, and I grew up desperately wanting to read about and watch characters like me in books and movies. Now that I’ve found a genre of books that celebrates LGBTQ+ lives, I can’t help but want to read and write the stories I’ve always wanted to see and experience in the world of fiction and romance. Everyone deserves love, and I want to share that love with as many people as I can.
This book and series has everything, an enigmatic main character, an elusive serial killer, and best of all, a romantic relationship between LGBTQ+ characters that’s enviable and healthy and something to aspire to. Levi Abrams is likely my favorite character in any book I’ve ever read. He’s prickly, difficult, whip-smart, and driven, but he’s also vulnerable, genuine, and fiercely loyal. I love that I didn’t guess who the killer was in the first book (I had a theory, but I genuinely didn’t know for sure until the big reveal), and this series kept me on my toes the whole time. The writing is solid and the character development is spot on. It’s the kind of series I wish I had written myself.
Homicide detective Levi Abrams is barely holding his life together. He’s reeling from the fallout of a fatal shooting, and his relationship with his boyfriend is crumbling. The last thing he’s prepared for is a serial killer stalking the streets of Las Vegas. Or how he keeps getting thrown into the path of annoyingly charming bounty hunter Dominic Russo.
Dominic likes his life free of complications. That means no tangling with cops — especially prickly, uptight detectives. But when he stumbles across one of the Seven of Spades’s horrifying crime scenes, he…
Awakening the handsome prince is supposed to end the fairy tale, not begin it. But the Highvalley witches have rarely done things the way they're supposed to. On the north Pacific island of Eidolonia, hidden from the world by enchantments, Prince Larkin has lain in a magical sleep since 1799…
As part of the LGBTQ+ rainbow, I know firsthand what it is to be othered, and I grew up desperately wanting to read about and watch characters like me in books and movies. Now that I’ve found a genre of books that celebrates LGBTQ+ lives, I can’t help but want to read and write the stories I’ve always wanted to see and experience in the world of fiction and romance. Everyone deserves love, and I want to share that love with as many people as I can.
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.
Don’t miss this thrilling and suspenseful second chance romance, book one in a fan-favorite supernatural detective series from Jenn Burke.
Dying isn’t what it used to be.Wes Cooper was dead. Then he wasn’t—though he’s not exactly alive, either. As an immortal not-ghost, he can transition between this world and the otherplane, which makes him the perfect thief for hire. For seventy years he’s made a “living” returning items to their rightful owners, seeing his fair share of the bizarre in the process. But he’s never witnessed murder. Until now.
His latest mission brings him more than he bargained for: a…
I’ve loved books about vampires ever since reading Dracula at much too young an age, but I was always looking for stories in which the women were more than virtuous heroines, objects of desire, or hissing brides. Or wearing negligees. I was also drawn to tales that explored the practical and ethical challenges of being a vampire. Fortunately, the vampire fiction boom beginning in 1980 opened the way for new stories, many by women, that depicted the nuances of vampirism through a female gaze. Travel from 6th century Byzantium to Mexico City to futuristic Mars with these novels that put new spins on the old conventions and introduce some fascinating female vampires.
Gilda begins her life as a runaway slave in pre-Civil War Louisiana and this beautifully-written novel explores her life over the next two hundred years as she faces danger, love, and loss. It’s memorable not only for the lens of Black and LGBTQ history that it brings to the vampire myth, but for the main character’s commitment to maintaining her connection to community, both vampire and mortal, and her openness to the world that transforms around her.
Before Buffy, before Twilight, before Octavia Butler's Fledgling, there was The Gilda Stories, Jewelle Gomez's sexy vampire novel.
"The Gilda Stories is groundbreaking not just for the wild lives it portrays, but for how it portrays them--communally, unapologetically, roaming fiercely over space and time."--Emma Donoghue, author of Room
"Jewelle Gomez sees right into the heart. This is a book to give to those you want most to find their own strength." Dorothy Allison
This remarkable novel begins in 1850s Louisiana, where Gilda escapes slavery and learns about freedom while working in a brothel. After being initiated into eternal life as…
Ever since coming out as gay in my early 20s, I’ve sought out books that tell queer stories. Seeing ourselves reflected in the stories we read is so important, as it helps you learn and discover new things about yourself and makes you realise you’re not alone. I don’t limit myself to LGBT stories, but I always get a thrill when I find one in the bookstore and I do my best to support queer fiction. I’m now the author of gay uplit novel A Man and His Pride, which draws from some of my own experiences and explores what it means for gay people today to find their pride and learn to love themselves.
This is such a life-affirming Australian story about a transgender teen and how their unlikely friendship with an elderly man sets them on a path to self-acceptance and peace. There are some heavy themes explored in this book – from suicide to drug abuse – but it is ultimately an uplifting and deeply moving novel that is told in such a tender way. It personally opened my eyes to the struggles transgender people go through with gender dysphoria, and shows how having the right people in your life can be the difference between life and death. It’s essential reading for LGBT people and allies.
Late in the night, fourteen-year-old Sam Watson steps onto a quiet overpass, climbs over the rail and looks down at the road far below.
At the other end of the same bridge, an old man, Vic, smokes his last cigarette.
The two see each other across the void. A fateful connection is made, and an unlikely friendship blooms. Slowly, we learn what led Sam and Vic to the bridge that night. Bonded by their suffering, each privately commits to the impossible task of saving the other.
I think Mother Goose got it all wrong. I have been creating books and coloring books for LGBTQ families for over two decades. I believe we deserve stories about LGBTQ children that are jubilant and adventurous; that are about love, mystery, time travel, and all the things everyone else treasures in their favorite books without being lesson books about bullying or being “different.” I have closed many children's books as soon as I get to the part where they are beaten up and made fun of for being gender non-conforming. I am also a visual artist and I love well-written books that are beautiful to look at.
I love how you casually get introduced to the main character’s brother’s boyfriend, Peleke, while the children are on a scavenger hunt for natural things in all the colors of the rainbow. If I were a teacher and had to grade this, I would give it an A+++. The publisher, Flamingo Rampant Press, states, “we don’t publish books that have primary narratives about bullying, ostracization, harassment or violence. If your book is about a kid who is made to feel like their identity or family is a problem, that’s not going to be a book for us.” That is one terrific reason for me to love this book.
The world is bursting full of beautiful colors, from the blue of the fish to the green of the leaves! Even more wondrous are the many names the different peoples of the world have for them. Join these Hawai’ian kids, their older brother and his boyfriend as they adventure around their island to learn their colours – and a little about love along the way.
Every time I write a romance novel, I find myself returning to the same themes: seeing people for who they are beneath the surface, respecting others despite differences, and choosing to love those who might seem a little odd. Whether they’re angels, mermaids, or plain old humans, my characters lead lives where, despite marginalization and alienation, love and a sense of belonging are possible. My Christmas novella, Mistletoe Mishap, was a Lambda Literary Award finalist.
In this emotional tour de force, a judge falls in love with the federal marshal who protects him during a terrorism-related trial. He’s kind, caring, and ethical; he’s intelligent, hardworking, and competent; and he knows all too well that in many people’s eyes, none of that matters. That betrayal feels painfully familiar; his spectacular vindication, cathartic.
A federal judge running from the truth. A U.S. marshal running from his past. A trial that can plunge the world into war.
Federal Judge Tom Brewer is finally putting the pieces of his life back together. In the closet for twenty-five long years, he's climbing out slowly, and, with the hope of finding a special relationship with the stunning Mike Lucciano, U.S. Marshal assigned to his D.C. courthouse. He wants to be out and proud, but he can't erase his own past, and the lessons he learned long ago.
But a devastating terrorist attack in the heart of DC,…
Allan D. Hunter came out as genderqueer in 1980, more than 20 years before “genderqueer” was trending. His story is autobiographical: the story of a different kind of male hero, a genderqueer person's tale. It follows the author from his debut as an eighth grader in Los Alamos, New Mexico until his unorthodox coming out at the age of twenty-one on the University of New Mexico campus in Albuquerque.
Here’s a story focused on a gender-atypical main character where the book isn’t about being genderqueer or being nonbinary or whatever.
Birdie’s gender characteristics are just there, the same way that a book set in Manhattan can have Manhattan in the foreground without being a book about Manhattan. I like the way that being gay and being trans are discarded as not really applicable to Birdie without some other replacement identity being pushed forward instead.
An emotional and uplifting debut about a girl named Jack and her gender creative little brother, Birdie, searching for the place where they can be their true and best selves.
After their mama dies, Jack and Birdie find themselves without a place to call home. And when Mama's two brothers each try to provide one--first sweet Uncle Carl, then gruff Uncle Patrick--the results are funny, tender, and tragic.
They're also somehow . . . spectacular.
With voices and characters that soar off the page, J. M. M. Nuanez's debut novel depicts an unlikely family caught in a situation none of…
Allan D. Hunter came out as genderqueer in 1980, more than 20 years before “genderqueer” was trending. His story is autobiographical: the story of a different kind of male hero, a genderqueer person's tale. It follows the author from his debut as an eighth grader in Los Alamos, New Mexico until his unorthodox coming out at the age of twenty-one on the University of New Mexico campus in Albuquerque.
In this autobiographical sketch, the author describes being assumed by people he meets on Grindr to be either a drag queen or a trans woman.
He is neither; Princess WaWa is femme. It’s different. The passion of his life is Derek Island, his romantic obsession. But caring about someone, or even caring about the outcome, is frightening when your primary way of coping with how life treats you is to refuse to care.
A loud-mouth, black, gay teenager struggles to find himself in rural America. After having realized his inability to attend his top-choice school, Waldell Goode embarks on a journey to reevaluate why the grand departure appealed to him in the first place. He learns that as much as he can control his nonexistent love life, there are other factors that aren’t as easily mutable. He comes to terms with his peculiar relationship with his mother, the inevitable heartbreak in store for him no matter how hard he’s tried avoiding it, and the voice of God, in all her beguiling glory.
