I’m gay and woman-adjacent and I love fantasy and sci-fi! Hit me with your recs. Here’s stuff I’ve read and enjoyed:
* Hench
* Payback’s a Witch
* Once & Future
* Not Your Sidekick
* Carmilla
* The Moth Diaries
I already own:
* The Jasmine Throne
* Gideon the Ninth
* The Hells of Notre Dame
* Cinderella is Dead
* Malice
* Wild Beauty
* This is How You Lose the Time War
* An Absolutely Remarkable Thing
Do you have any recommendations, or any suggestions for which of the above I should start first? I’m fine with romance being a main plot line, or a side thing, and I’m down for anything sapphic. As it says, approximately, on the State of Liberty: give me your lesbians, give me your bi women, give me your pan women, give me your aces, give me your aros, give me your enbies, give me your trans women, give me your polyamorous women…
YA, middle grade, and adult fiction are all good, graphic novels are good, good audiobooks are a plus, I’m also up for self-published books you’ve enjoyed!
by thesusiephone
11 Comments
You have to get to the end, but it’s worth the journey: We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry
Do you like romantasy? (Romance-fantasy)? If yes – Outcast by KJ. A woman falls through a portal at the back of a laundromat into a new world, finds out she has magic, is the chosen one,and falls for the princess
Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon – it has similar themes to Jasmine Throne, but different imagery
A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine — sci-fi with sapphic romantic subplot
Black Water Sister by Zen Cho — urban fantasy with lesbian protagonist
Adrienne Tooley has a couple YA fantasy books that you may like: Sweet & Bitter Magic and Sofi and the Bone Song
* The City in the Middle of the Night by Charlie Jane Anders. One explicitly lesbian character, and a pair of women who are a couple.
* The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers. Part of a series, but this is the only one with a lesbian romance.
* Karen Memory by Elizabeth Bear. Steampunk lesbian romance.
* Anything by Kameron Hurley. My personal favourites are the Bel Dame Apocrypha series and the stand alone novel The Stars Are Legion.
* The Imperial Radch series by Ann Leckie. You could start either with book 1, Ancillary Justice, or with Provenance.
* Manhunt by Gretchen Felker-Martin. Be warned: contains slurs, graphic gore and sex, and scenes of rape.
* Autonomous by Annalee Newitz. Features bi/pansexuality.
* Trouble And Her Friends by Melissa Scott. Lesbian romance.
I don’t know most of the books on your list, so I can’t advise on where to start. Additional recommendations:
* **Pet** and **Bitter** by Akwaeke Emezi
Trans girl protagonist and polyamorous parenting in *Pet*, bi/pan protagonist in *Bitter* (which is a prequel to *Pet*). It’s not the main topic in either book, though. The audiobooks are spectacularly good; *Pet* in particular will be on my mind forever. Although technically only *Bitter* fits your request, I recommend them both.
* **We Set the Dark on Fire** and **We Unleash the Merciless Storm** by Tehlor Kay Mejia
Lesbian romance dystopian revolutionary spy fantasy – truly a wild genre mix. The audiobooks are good.
* **Legends & Lattes** by Travis Baldree
Cozy fantasy with some romance. The audiobook is fun!
* **The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet** by Becky Chambers (as already mentioned). The second book in the series, **A Closed and Common Orbit**, features a relationship between a female and a genderfluid character that may or may not be read as romantic. The third book, **Record of a Spaceborn Few**, also has a lesbian couple. The whole series is set in a completely non-heteronormative universe and absolutely delightful. Becky Chambers’ other series, **Monk and Robot**, has a non-binary protagonist. I only know the English audiobook for *Monk and Robot*, which I loved.
On my TBR:
* *Light from Uncommon Stars* by Ryka Aoki
* *Lucha of the Night Forest* by Tehlor Kay Mejia
* *The Deep* by Rivers Solomon
* *She Who Became the Sun* by Shelley Parker-Chan
* *Can’t Spell Treason Without Tea* by Rebecca Thorne
* *Even Though I Knew the End* by C.L. Polk
* *The Priory of the Orange Tree* by Samantha Shannon
​
To the person/people downvoting this request and every answer: You have a very sad life. Go and be somewhere other than here.
Bitterthorn by Kat Dunn is intense and sad but amazing. The All These Gifts series by Skye Kilaen has great chemistry and slow burn. The Unbroken by C.L. Clark has wonderfully complex characters. The Language of Roses by Heather Rose Jones is really smart and compelling.
A Restless Truth by Freya Markse is really great. It is a book 2 of a trilogy though, and book 1 is m/m. I think it could stand alone if you didn’t mind some dangling plot threads.
The Alpennia books by Heather Rose Jones. *Daughter of Mystery, The Mystic Marriage, Mother of Souls,* and *Floodtide*.
The Northern Girl by Elizabeth Lynn. Fantasy.
Crier’s War
Priory of the Orange Tree
She Who Became the Sun
Space Between Worlds
Ink Blood Sister Scribe
Dowry of Blood