Genre: LGBTQ+

A story of grief and loss mixed with contemporary romance and mythological fantasy flavor, Find My Way Down to You by Julian Winters is a wholesome and sweet YA novel covering somber topics. By exploring the long, individual road to healing while honoring loved ones lost, the book feels like a warm and supportive hug that maintains an uplifting and hopeful outlook even when the pain feels unending. Well‑intentioned and earnest, it sometimes plays things too safe and doesn’t push its strongest narrative elements far enough, but it remains an accessible read with strong YA appeal. Marketed as a YA romance with crossover elements in fiction, social issues, and fantasy, the book blends a wide range of narrative components into a story focused on grief and loss. Its greatest strength is its relatability for YA readers. Purposely flawed and immature to a fault, the main character August and his internal logic match his age, highlighting teenage shortsightedness and tunnel vision. Winters captures teenage angst well, especially in the wake of August’s catastrophic loss of his boyfriend London, around whom he built his entire world. The portrayal of grief is particularly strong, from August pushing away those around him, including his…

A floating city, foreign invading airships, an immigrant woman who longs to be a dragon rider, and a three-headed dragon who’s tired and wants to remind humankind that he is to be feared. Following a jaded three-headed dragon whose heads comically quarrel amongst themselves, John Wiswell’s the Dragon Has Some Complaints is a book pitched as a cozy fantasy meets epic fantasy story of battles, friendship, and reflections of being a monster. With earnest intentions, this book succeeds in the friendship department with lots of positive therapeutic empathy and inclusive queer representation. Yet, its other aspects feel less successful and cohesive resulting in a somewhat disjointed and underwhelming reading experience. Based on its premise and marketing as a light-hearted fantasy story, that one goofy three-headed dragon fanart meme instantly comes to mind. And though I can’t verify if this provided any inspiration for the book’s concept, it invokes a similar tone, at least initially. Garrodigh’s three heads act the three stooges; Centerhead being the leader and snarky one, Bottomhead who is feral one (the book’s description not mine, they seemed more like the impulsive child than feral to me), and Upperhead who is the anxious and slightly neurotic one who…

Strained and conflicting scifi tv show actors faking a friendship as a publicity stunt to save their acting career is an incredibly fun concept that serves as the premise for Cat Sebastian’s contemporary queer romance novel Star Shipped. Entertainment industry expectations, social media and online fandom engagement, a fake friendship road trip across the American southwest, this book has no shortage of good narrative hooks. A comfy and safe space of a romance novel, unfortunately the execution across the board hinders its great potential and results in a book that feels like it lacks a purpose or direction. One of my highly anticipated queer literature reads of 2026, this book wasn’t for me and was quite the disappointment at every turn despite it having good intentions and nice mental health representation. Star Shipped follows television actor Simon Devereaux who’s attempting to depart from the popular long-running TV-show Out There whose simplistic and limited acting opportunities have left him feeling uninspired and artistically constrained. It doesn’t help that he’s spent the last seven years co-starring against Charlie Blake, a built and handsome man who has less impressive acting and an unprofessional history on set. With the impending end of his contract…

Fandom culture, celebrity woes, teen heartthrob shows, and nerd-inspired paranormal romance, Fan Service by Rose Danan is a romance novel that’s both light-heartedly fun and relatably honest. Featuring a great premise and a very likable and wholesome FMC, this book is an easy and enjoyable read that smartly incorporates many popular romance tropes while also striving to do more through great queer representation and light socio-political commentary. Despite some reservations with its less impressive portrayal of its MMC and perhaps failing to do more with its compelling story, Fan Service is an otherwise safe and easy romance read with a nice geeky and quirky spin. I will be the first to admit that I’m quite an inexperienced reader when it comes to paranormal romance, this being one of my few forays into the genre and adjacent stories. That said, Fan Service initially caught my eye thanks to its premise of a former teen heartthrob actor teaming up with a jaded yet hardcore life-long fan set around an original tv-show that’s not so subtly inspired by the CW/MTV shows of the late 90’s and early 2000’s. This book is perfectly pitched for millennial readers who grew up during the community forums,…

What do a legendary cryptid, gods, angels and demons, the Hundred Year’s War, an immortal arcanist and his succubus housekeeper have in common? Ordinarily nothing at all unless it’s Cameron Sullivan’s novel The Red Winter. An ambitious book mixing together fantasy and historical fiction elements across the board heightened with touches of paranormal horror, the Red Winter is as entertaining as it is imaginative with a unique and quirky tongue in cheek tone. Unexpectedly humorous and endearing while describing French countrymen being viscously torn apart, Sullivan’s storytelling is an incredible vibe made all the more impressive as a debut novel. While its far-reaching story, slow pacing, and complex split timeline approach can make it a challenging read for some, this is otherwise a really fun and off-beat historical fantasy book. At its core, the story behind the Red Winter is one of French turmoil that cleverly provides plausible fantasy origins to mysterious historical events. Presented as a written recollection or memoir of the events by the immortal arcanist Sebastian Graves, the book follows Sebastian and his demon possession “guest” Sarmodel returning to impoverished province of Gévaudan after the deadly events around the famed beast nearly twenty years ago. In addition…