Q Quest Kids: Queer and GenderQueer SF/F lists!

Posted byhaddayrPosted inUncategorized
BOOKS & STORIES WE READ FROM IN THE WORKSHOP
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin

Pioneering feminist science fiction dealing with gender on a world where people assume a gender only to mate and those who are permanently one gender or another are seen as bizarre and disturbing.

Gooseberry Bluff Community College of Magic: The Thirteenth Rib by David J. Schwartz (one of the workshop presenters)
Alternate history of the world in which magic is the ruling force of power, not nuclear power. An investigator from the Magical Bureau of Investigations goes undercover as a professor at a community college of magic. Discussions of race, disability, gender, and queer sexuality. Author is a genderqueer local nebula-award-nominated writer.

Ascension: a Tangled Axon Novel, by Jacqueline Koyanagi

Space opera/romance touching on polyamory, disability, race, class, sisterhood, and queer sexuality

Glitter & Mayhem Anthology
Nightclub- and roller derby-themed anthology with several queer/trans/genderqueer stories (David J. Schwartz’s “Apex Jump” about the intergalactic trans roller derby girl is included)
FURTHER READING

Ancillary Justice/Ancillary Sword/Ancillary Mercy by Ann Leckie: Describes a far-future society from the POV of a person who perceives all gender as female by default, regardless of physical sexual characteristics

Ring of Swords AND A Woman of the Iron People by Eleanor Arnason

Describes a world in which homosexuality is the default and heterosexuality is a sign of being like an animal (and thus in need of extermination)
Shadow Man by Melissa Scott
Planetary science fiction in which the pharmaceuticals used to enable humans to survive FTL travel have caused humanity to manifest five sexual patterns, and new gender norms have developed and are strictly enforced

Elemental Logic series, by Laurie J. Marks

Fantasy quartet (Book 4 coming soon!) with multiple queer and non-monogamous relationships.

Swordspoint and Privilege of the Sword, by Ellen Kushner

Fantasy novels set in the mythical city of Riverside, centered around a pair of gay male characters.

One For Sorrow, by Christopher Barzak

Ghost story about a troubled bisexual teen, set in small-town Ohio.

Solitaire, by Kelley Eskridge

Near-future corporate techno-thriller with a lesbian protagonist.

Ammonite, Slow River, and Hild by Nicola Griffith

Two science fiction novels with lesbian protagonists, and one historical fiction novel with a subtly queer protagonist.

Anthologies

Beyond Binary: Genderqueer and Sexually Fluid Speculative Fiction, edited by Brit Mandelo

Fantasy & Science fiction addressing genderqueer and sexually fluid themes

Short Stories:

“And Salome Danced” and “Eye of the Storm” by Kelley Eskridge

Two short stories, one psychological horror/erotica, one fantasy, in which the narrator’s gender is never specified, so that the reader is forced to question their assumptions about gender and sexuality

“Love Might Be Too Strong a Word” by Charlie Jane Anders (available online at http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/love-might-be-too-strong-a-word/)

A far-future comic short story in which there are several genders

Lightspeed Magazine, June 2015 (Queers Destroy Science Fiction! Special Issue)
All-queer anthology of well-known science fiction authors

Published by haddayr

Writer, parent, cripple, queer; worker, dancer. City dweller. Bicyclist. I love whiskey, tea, and cussing.