Book picks similar to
Spelling Mississippi by Marnie Woodrow
fiction
lgbt
queer
lesbian
Agatha of Little Neon
Claire Luchette - 2021
Their world is contained within the little house they share. The four of them are devoted to Mother Roberta and to their quiet, purposeful life.But when the parish goes broke, the sisters are forced to move. They land in Woonsocket, a former mill town now dotted with wind turbines. They head up a halfway house, where they live alongside castoffs like the jawless Tim Gary and the headstrong Lawnmower Jill. Agatha is forced to venture out into the world alone, to teach math at a local all-girls high school, where for the first time in years she will have to reckon with what she sees and feels all on her own. Who will she be if she isn't with her sisters? These women, the church, have been her home--or has she just been hiding?Disarming, delightfully deadpan, and full of searching, Claire Luchette's Agatha of Little Neon offers a view into the lives of women and the choices they make. It is a novel about female friendship and devotion, the roles made available to us, and how we become ourselves.
The Enchanted Life of Adam Hope
Rhonda Riley - 2013
She rescues him, and it quickly becomes clear he is not a man...and not one of us. The rescued body recovers at an unnatural speed, and just as fast, Evelyn and Adam fall deeply in love. In The Enchanted Life of Adam Hope, Rhonda Riley reveals the exhilarating, terrifying mystery inherent in all relationships: No matter how deeply we love someone, and no matter how much we will sacrifice for them, we can only know them so well...
Beyond the Pale
Elana Dykewomon - 1997
The richly textured novel details Gutke Gurvich’s odyssey from her apprenticeship as a midwife in a Russian shtetl to her work in the suffrage movement in New York. Interwoven with her tale is that Chava Meyer, who was attended by Gurvich at her birth and grew up to survive the pogrom that took the lives of her parents. Throughout the book, historical background plays a large part: Jewish faith and traditions, the practice of midwifery, the horrific conditions in prerevolutionary Russia and New York sweatshops, and the determined work of labor unionists and suffragists.
Zipper Mouth
Laurie Weeks - 2010
Ranting letters to Judy Davis and Sylvia Plath, an unrequited fixation on a straight best friend, exalted nightclub epiphanies, devastating morning-after hangovers — Zipper Mouth chronicles the exuberance and mortification of a junkie, and transcends the chaos of everyday life.WINNER OF A 2012 LAMBDA LITERARY AWARDSelected by Dave Eggers for Best American Nonrequired Reading."Laurie Weeks' Zipper Mouth is a short tome of infinitesimal reach, a tiny star to light the land." —Eileen Myles, author of Inferno"Zipper Mouth is a brilliant rabbit hole of pitch-black hilarity, undead obsession, the horror of the everyday, and drugs drugs drugs." —Michelle Tea, co-founder of Sister Spit
Little Fish
Casey Plett - 2018
At first she dismisses this revelation, having other problems at hand, but as she and her friends struggle to cope with the challenges of their increasingly volatile lives--from alcoholism, to sex work, to suicide--Wendy is drawn to the lost pieces of her grandfather's life, becoming determined to unravel the mystery of his truth. Alternately warm-hearted and dark-spirited, desperate and mirthful, Little Fish explores the winter of discontent in the life of one transgender woman as her past and future become irrevocably entwined.
My Tiki Girl
Jennifer McMahon - 2008
After her mother dies in a tragic accident and she is left to feel responsible, Maggie leaves her popular crowd behind and befriends a fellow outsider like herself, but when her new friendship with Dahlia becomes something more intense, Maggie's ideas of everything she thought she once was is forever changed as love begins to blossom.
Kiss of the Fur Queen
Tomson Highway - 1998
Their language is forbidden, their names are changed to Jeremiah and Gabriel, and both boys are abused by priests.As young men, estranged from their own people and alienated from the culture imposed upon them, the Okimasis brothers fight to survive. Wherever they go, the Fur Queen--a wily, shape-shifting trickster--watches over them with a protective eye. For Jeremiah and Gabriel are destined to be artists. Through music and dance they soar.
Olivia
Dorothy Strachey - 1949
Dorothy Strachey’s classic Olivia captures the awakening passions of an English adolescent sent away for a year to a small finishing school outside Paris. The innocent but watchful Olivia develops an infatuation for her headmistress, Mlle. Julie, and through this screen of love observes the tense romance between Mlle. Julie and the other head of the school, Mlle. Cara, in its final months. “Although not strictly autobiographical, Olivia draws on the author’s experiences at finishing schools run by the charismatic Mlle. Marie Souvestre, whose influence lived on through former students like Natalie Barney and Eleanor Roosevelt. Olivia was dedicated to the memory of Strachey’s friend Virginia Woolf and published to acclaim in 1949. Colette wrote the screenplay for the 1951 film adaptation of the novel. In 1999, Olivia was included on the Publishing Triangle’s widely publicized list of the 100 Best Gay and Lesbian Novels of the 20th Century. “Dorothy Strachey (1865-1960) was the sister of the novelist Lytton Strachey and a prominent member of the Bloomsbury Group…….Olivia, originally published under a pseudonym, is her only novel.” -- Amazon.com
The Adventures of China Iron
Gabriela Cabezón Cámara - 2017
Pronounced ‘cheena’: designation for female, from the Quechua. Iron: The English word for Fierro, reference to the gaucho Martín Fierro, from José Hernández’s epic poem.) This is a riotous romp taking the reader from the turbulent frontier culture of the pampas deep into indigenous territories. It charts the adventures of Mrs China Iron, Martín Fierro’s abandoned wife, in her travels across the pampas in a covered wagon with her new-found friend, soon to become lover, a Scottish woman named Liz. While Liz provides China with a sentimental education and schools her in the nefarious ways of the British Empire, their eyes are opened to the wonders of Argentina’s richly diverse flora and fauna, cultures and languages, as well as to its national struggles. After a clash with Colonel Hernández (the author who ‘stole’ Martín Fierro’s poems) and a drunken orgy with gauchos, they eventually find refuge and a peaceful future in a utopian indigenous community, the river- dwelling Iñchiñ people. Seen from an ox-drawn wagon, the narrative moves through the Argentinian landscape, charting the flora and fauna of the Pampas, Gaucho culture, Argentinian nation-building and British colonial projects. In a unique reformulation of history and literary tradition, Gabriela Cabezón Cámara, with humour and sophistication, re-writes Martín Fierro from a feminist, LGBT, postcolonial point of view. She creates a hilarious novel that is nevertheless incisive in its criticism of the way societies come into being, and the way they venerate mythical heroes.
The Diviners
Margaret Laurence - 1974
For Morag Gunn, growing up in a small Canadian prairie town is a toughening process – putting distance between herself and a world that wanted no part of her. But in time, the aloneness that had once been forced upon her becomes a precious right – relinquished only in her overwhelming need for love. Again and again, Morag is forced to test her strength against the world – and finally achieves the life she had determined would be hers.The Diviners has been acclaimed by many critics as the outstanding achievement of Margaret Laurence’s writing career. In Morag Gunn, Laurence has created a figure whose experience emerges as that of all dispossessed people in search of their birthright, and one who survives as an inspirational symbol of courage and endurance.The Diviners received the Governor General’s Award for Fiction for 1974.
Three Day Road
Joseph Boyden - 2005
Xavier Bird, her sole living relation, is gravely wounded and addicted to morphine. As Niska slowly paddles her canoe on the three-day journey to bring Xavier home, travelling through the stark but stunning landscape of Northern Ontario, their respective stories emerge—stories of Niska’s life among her kin and of Xavier’s horrifying experiences in the killing fields of Ypres and the Somme.
Guilty Hearts
Jade Winters - 2014
Little does he realise that the honey trap is to leave a bitter-sweet taste for everyone… Central London. The honey trap is set. The bait: the young, uninhibited Rachel is in every way the perfect temptress. Intelligent and attractive, she is no stranger to sexual encounters and relishes the thought of her latest challenge: the unsuspecting wife Kathryn. When the two women meet, the attraction is instant and electric. However, Rachel soon realises her ‘love-target’ Kathryn is more than just a bi-curious wife, she is in fact a revered and successful Interior Designer, someone who Rachel has long admired. As genuine feelings between the two women intensify, will their chance of happiness be destroyed by the truth?
Legacy of Love
Marianne K. Martin - 1997
"What do you want from me?" she whispered.Suzanne pressed up into Sage's embrace, her body making demands on the skillful hands, commanding pleasure from the exciting mouth. "I need you to love me...as long as you possibly can".What was it about Sage Bristo that drew women to her? Maybe it was the tall, toned body and androgynous good looks. Perhaps they liked her confidence -- her movements and manner so sure and decisive. Or was it the air of mystery, the temptation of a challenge to unravel?Sage couldn't explain the attraction, but she had certainly benefited from it, at least physically. As her reputation as a Don Juana grew, so did her black book of admiring women. Women who wanted to spoil her, to own her, to please her. Women who would do anything for her. But never the woman she needed the most -- the one woman who could lead her through the realm of desire, to the thing she desires most...
Dancer
Colum McCann - 2003
Spanning four decades and many worlds, from the horrors of the Second World War to the wild abandon of New York in the eighties, Dancer is peopled by a large cast of characters, obscure and famous: doormen and shoemakers, nurses and translators, Margot Fonteyn, Eric Bruhn and John Lennon. And at the heart of the spectacle stands the artist himself, willful, lustful, and driven by a never-to-be-met need for perfection.
Hot Milk
Deborah Levy - 2015
She's frustrated with Rose and her constant complaints but utterly relieved to be called to abandon her own disappointing fledgling adult life. She and Rose travel to the searing, arid coast of southern Spain to see a famous consultant, Dr. Gomez—their very last chance—in the hope that he might cure Rose's unpredictable limb paralysis, but Dr. Gomez has strange methods that seem to have little to do with physical medicine, and as the treatment progresses, Rose's illness becomes increasingly baffling. Sofia's role as detective—tracking Rose's symptoms in an attempt to find the secret motivation for her pain—deepens as she discovers her own desires in this transient desert community.