The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister


Anne Lister - 1992
    She kept extensive diaries of her life and loves, written partly in code. Made up of Greek letters mingled with other symbols of her own devising, Anne referred to the code as her "crypthand," and the use of it allowed her the freedom to describe her intimate life in great detail. Her diaries have been edited by Helena Whitbread, who spent years decoding and transcribing them.

What Doesn't Kill You: A Life with Chronic Illness - Lessons from a Body in Revolt


Tessa Miller - 2021
    At first, she toughed it out through searing pain, taking sick days from work, unable to leave the bathroom or her bed. But when it became undeniable that something was seriously wrong, Miller gave in to family pressure and went to the hospital—beginning a yearslong nightmare of procedures, misdiagnoses, and life-threatening infections. Once she was finally correctly diagnosed with Crohn’s disease, Miller faced another battle: accepting that she will never get better.Today, an astonishing three in five adults in the United States suffer from a chronic disease—a percentage expected to rise post-Covid. Whether the illness is arthritis, asthma, Crohn's, diabetes, endometriosis, multiple sclerosis, ulcerative colitis, or any other incurable illness, and whether the sufferer is a colleague, a loved one, or you, these diseases have an impact on just about every one of us. Yet there remains an air of shame and isolation about the topic of chronic sickness. Millions must endure these disorders not only physically but also emotionally, balancing the stress of relationships and work amid the ever-present threat of health complications.Miller segues seamlessly from her dramatic personal experiences into a frank look at the cultural realities (medical, occupational, social) inherent in receiving a lifetime diagnosis. She offers hard-earned wisdom, solidarity, and an ultimately surprising promise of joy for those trying to make sense of it all.

Film for Her


Orion Carloto - 2020
    Through photographs, poetry, prose, and a short story, Orion Carloto invites readers to remember the forgotten and reach into the past, find comfort in the present, and make sense of the intangible future. Film photography isn’t just eye candy; it’s timeless and romantic—the ideal complement to Carloto’s writing. In Film for Her, much like a visual diary, word and image are intertwined in a book perfect for both gift and self-purchase.

Journal of a Solitude


May Sarton - 1973
    That is what is strange—that friends, even passionate love,are not my real life, unless there is time alone in which to explore what is happening or what has happened." In this journal, she says, "I hope to break through into the rough, rocky depths,to the matrix itself. There is violence there and anger never resolved. My need to be alone is balanced against my fear of what will happen when suddenly I enter the huge empty silence if I cannot find support there."In this book, we are closer to the marrow than ever before in May Sarton's writing.

Mean


Myriam Gurba - 2017
    Blending radical formal fluidity and caustic humor, Mean turns what might be tragic into piercing, revealing comedy. This is a confident, funny, brassy book that takes the cost of sexual assault, racism, misogyny, and homophobia deadly seriously.We act mean to defend ourselves from boredom and from those who would cut off our breasts. We act mean to defend our clubs and institutions. We act mean because we like to laugh. Being mean to boys is fun and a second-wave feminist duty. Being mean to men who deserve it is a holy mission. Sisterhood is powerful, but being mean is more exhilarating.Being mean isn't for everybody.Being mean is best practiced by those who understand it as an art form.These virtuosos live closer to the divine than the rest of humanity. They're queers.Myriam Gurba is a queer spoken-word performer, visual artist, and writer from Santa Maria, California. She's the author of Dahlia Season (2007, Manic D) which was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award, Wish You Were Me (2011, Future Tense Books), and Painting Their Portraits in Winter (2015, Manic D). She has toured with Sister Spit and her work has been exhibited at the Museum of Latin American Art in Long Beach. She lives in Long Beach, where she teaches social studies to eighth-graders.

All We Knew But Couldn't Say


Joanne Vannicola - 2019
    She makes the decision to cut her mother out of her life, and over the next several years goes on to create a body of work as a successful television and film actor. Then, after fifteen years of estrangement, Joanne learns that her mother is dying. Compelled to reconnect, she visits with her, unearthing a trove of devastating secrets.Joanne relates her journey from child performer to Emmy Award-winning actor, from hiding in the closet to embracing her own sexuality, from conflicted daughter and sibling to independent woman. All We Knew But Couldn’t Say is a testament to survival, love, and Joanne’s fundamental belief that it is possible to love the broken and to love fully, even with a broken heart.

Uncanny Magazine Issue 15: March/April 2017


Lynne M. ThomasElsa Sjunneson-Henry - 2017
    Qiouyi Lu, reprinted fiction by Kameron Hurley, essays by Sam J. Miller, Elsa Sjunneson-Henry, Shveta Thakrar, Dawn Xiana Moon, and Paul Booth, poetry by Cassandra Khaw, Brandon O’Brien, Bogi Takács, and Lisa M. Bradley, interviews with Stephen Graham Jones and Sarah Pinsker by Julia Rios, a cover by Julie Dillon, and an editorial by Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas.

We Slept Here


Sierra DeMulder - 2015
    In this sequence of memoir-esque poems, Sierra DeMulder pulls at the threads of a past abusive relationship and the long road to forgiveness. The poems themselves become an act of recovery and reclamation, wherein the poet finds again the voice which was taken from her. These are hard poems, made up of clarity and healing, which attempt to share some of their peace with the world.

Body Talk: 37 Voices Explore Our Radical Anatomy


Kelly Jensen - 2020
    Just as every person has a unique personality, every person has a unique body, and every body tells its own story.   In Body Talk, thirty-seven writers, models, actors, musicians, and artists share essays, lists, comics, and illustrations—about everything from size and shape to scoliosis, from eating disorders to cancer, from sexuality and gender identity to the use of makeup as armor. Together, they contribute a broad variety of perspectives on what it’s like to live in their particular bodies—and how their bodies have helped to inform who they are and how they move through the world.   Come on in, turn the pages, and join the celebration of our diverse, miraculous, beautiful bodies!

The Normal Heart


Larry Kramer - 1985
    It tells the story of very private lives caught up in the heartrendering ordeal of suffering and doom - an ordeal that was largely ignored for reasons of politics and majority morality.Filled with power, anger, and intelligence, Larry Kramer's riveting play dramatizes what actualy happened from the time of the disease's discovery to the present, and points a moral j'accuse in many directions. His passionate indictment of government, the media, and the public for refusing to deal with a national plague is electrifying theater - a play that finally breaks through the conspiracy of silence with a shout of stunning impact. As Douglas Watt summed it up in his review for the New York Daily News,THE NORMAL HEART is "an angry, unremitting and gripping piece of political theater. You are bound to come away moved."

Punch Me Up to the Gods


Brian Broome - 2021
    Brian’s recounting of his experiences—in all their cringe-worthy, hilarious, and heartbreaking glory—reveal a perpetual outsider awkwardly squirming to find his way in.Indiscriminate sex and escalating drug use help to soothe his hurt, young psyche, usually to uproarious and devastating effect. A no-nonsense mother and broken father play crucial roles in our misfit’s origin story. But it is Brian’s voice in the retelling that shows the true depth of vulnerability for young Black boys that is often quietly near to bursting at the seams.Cleverly framed around Gwendolyn Brooks’s poem “We Real Cool,” the iconic and loving ode to Black boyhood, Punch Me Up to the Gods is at once playful, poignant, and wholly original. Broome’s writing brims with swagger and sensitivity, bringing an exquisite and fresh voice to ongoing cultural conversations about Blackness in America.

Borrowed Time: An AIDS Memoir


Paul Monette - 1988
    A National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and the winner of the PEN Center West literary award.

Waves


Ingrid Chabbert - 2017
    Their relationship is put to the test as they forge ahead, working together to rebuild themselves amidst the churning tumult of devastating loss, and ultimately facing the soul-crushing reality that they may never conceive a child of their own.Based on author Ingrid Chabbert’s own experience, coupled with soft, sometimes dreamlike illustrations by Carole Maurel, Waves is a deeply moving story that poignantly captures a woman’s exploration of her pain in order to rediscover hope.

Sincerely, Your Autistic Child: What People on the Autism Spectrum Wish Their Parents Knew About Growing Up, Acceptance, and Identity


Sharon daVanportMallory Cruz - 2021
    Furthermore, it is widely believed that many autistic girls and women are underdiagnosed, which has further limited the information available regarding the unique needs of girls and nonbinary people with autism.Sincerely, Your Autistic Child represents an authentic resource for parents and others who care about autism written by people who understand this experience most, autistic people themselves. From childhood and education to culture, gender identity, and sexuality, this anthology of autistic contributors tackles the everyday challenges of growing up while honestly addressing the emotional needs, sensitivity, and vibrancy of the autistic community with a special focus on autistic girls and nonbinary people. Written like letters to parents, the contributors reflect on what they have learned while growing up with autism and how parents can avoid common mistakes and overcome challenges while raising their child.Sincerely, Your Autistic Child calls parents to action by raising awareness and redefining "normal" in order to help parents make their child feel truly accepted, valued, and celebrated for who they are.Contributors: B. Martin Allen, B. Rankowski, K. Asasumasu, M. Baggs, L. Wiley-Mydske, H. Moss, L. XZ Brown, K. Rodriguez, A. Schaber, J. St. Jude, M. Sparrow, M. Cruz, A. Sequenzia, K. Lean, L. Soraya, K. Smith, A. Forshaw, H. Wangelin/HW, V.M. Rodríguez-Roldán, J. Strauss, O.M. Robinson, K. Levin, J. Winegardner, D. Lyubovskaya, E.P. Ballou, S. daVanport, and M. Giwa Onaiwu. Foreword and Afterword by J. Wilson and B. Ryan.

Let the Record Show: A Political History of ACT UP New York, 1987-1993


Sarah Schulman - 2021
    --Alexander Chee Twenty years in the making, Sarah Schulman's Let the Record Show is the most comprehensive political history ever assembled of ACT UP and American AIDS activism In just six years, ACT UP, New York, a broad and unlikely coalition of activists from all races, genders, sexualities, and backgrounds, changed the world. Armed with rancor, desperation, intelligence, and creativity, it took on the AIDS crisis with an indefatigable, ingenious, and multifaceted attack on the corporations, institutions, governments, and individuals who stood in the way of AIDS treatment for all. They stormed the FDA and NIH in Washington, DC, and started needle exchange programs in New York; they took over Grand Central Terminal and fought to change the legal definition of AIDS to include women; they transformed the American insurance industry, weaponized art and advertising to push their agenda, and battled--and beat--The New York Times, the Catholic Church, and the pharmaceutical industry. Their activism, in its complex and intersectional power, transformed the lives of people with AIDS and the bigoted society that had abandoned them.Based on more than two hundred interviews with ACT UP members and rich with lessons for today's activists, Let the Record Show is a revelatory exploration--and long-overdue reassessment--of the coalition's inner workings, conflicts, achievements, and ultimate fracture. Schulman, one of the most revered queer writers and thinkers of her generation, explores the how and the why, examining, with her characteristic rigor and bite, how a group of desperate outcasts changed America forever, and in the process created a livable future for generations of people across the world.