Queer SF - February 2027
February 2, 2027
Where Fire Reigns — Jared Pechaček
Genre: Epic fantasy
Rep: Queer
Award-winning author Jared Pechaček takes us to a vast salt desert where wars are fought over water, a flaming angel brings judgment, and the only hope for mercy is a feral girl who knows nothing of her destiny.
Once, there were seas. Then the god of fire came. He defeated water, and under his rule the world has burned. The survivors live in the wasteland called the Salt, a vast desert where water is priceless and lives are cheap.
The Mother of Waters promised she’d return to save humanity, reborn into the world she lost generation after generation. She promised to die for us, and bring a flood to quench the world’s thirst. Unfortunately, at the moment of greatest need, the Church lost track of her. The promised child was lost, raised by robotic scavengers, ignorant of her destiny. That feral messiah is now in the hands of a ragtag crew of fugitives with no plan to save anything but themselves.
Tomas is a pyric, blessed with the divine gift of fire and burdened with a stolen airship. At the helm are Three and Four, twin cyborg navigators who escaped the wreckage of their last vessel and now long for freedom from the August Union that created them. On their tail is Violet, chief paladin of the church of water, intent on bringing the messiah to her destiny. And in their cargo hold is the girl who can call lightning and bring rainstorms. Her life could save the rest of humanity.
What is that girl’s life worth in this dried-up world?
Link: Macmillan
The Literary Remains of Cornelia Feyen — Johanna van Veen
Genre: Fantasy, light academia
Rep: Sapphic
Fall in love with half-fae romance author Cornelia Feyen in this wonderfully romantic, light academia novel full of whimsy, perfect for fans of Heather Fawcett.
Cornelia Feyen is missing two things: a lover, and a book. The first she lost in a storm of tears, while the second has yet to be written—and her editor is on her back. Cornelia’s only sanctuary is her brother Alfred’s medical practice on a small Dutch island, where she plans to wallow in heartbreak.
Alfred is struggling to get the locals into his practice, but Cornelia’s gift of breaking curses might just help—you’re never too far away from being cursed on an island brimming with fae. Unfortunately for Alfred, Cornelia has moping to do and is not at all keen to unwittingly incur a faerie’s wrath by breaking any curses they’ve cast.
When the pair save governess Josefien from a faerie attack, they become the talk of the town. Suddenly business is booming, and Cornelia seems to have found in Josefien a woman who finally understands her. But Cornelia and Alfred are soon to discover there are consequences to breaking the wrong faerie’s curse…
Link: Kobo
February 9, 2027
Monstrous Beautiful Things — Taylor Grothe
Genre: YA historical horror
Rep: Sapphic
A darkly gothic sapphic body-horror fantasy steeped in medieval history. Perfect for fans of Ava Reid, Rachel Gillig, and The Starving Saints.
Plagued by sick headaches that are considered an ill portent in her superstitious village, Ediva has prayed to the Goddess Warmth for a cure. Too ill to marry and too weak to farm, she is desperate to contribute to her family’s survival.
When her prayers are finally answered, it isn’t by the Goddess, but by the Vivari—learned men from the North—who claim Ediva’s pain makes her special. They offer a cure in exchange for forsaking the Goddess Warmth and repaying them in lymph, allegedly the source of Ediva’s illness. Upon their orders, Ediva traverses the shimmering auras that appear with her sick headaches to the Otherworld—a strangely beautiful plane where Ediva is free of pain yet haunted by many-limbed beasts.
Pursued by horrors, Ediva is saved by a hard, fearsome girl named Brigid, who claims the Vivari aren’t trying to take away their pain but give it purpose. Ediva wants to believe her, but the more she explores the Otherworld, the more she suspects the Vivari’s promises of power will only be offered to the one who survives. To save the girl she loves, Ediva faces a choice: retreat to a world where her pain means nothing or become like the monsters she fears.
This gothic gem is perfect for readers who love clashes between decaying gods and upstart cults with a heartrending sapphic monster romance. A bloody brilliant reflection on power, pain, and the body’s inherent worthiness.
Link: Goodreads
The Haunting of Lady Death — Maddie Martinez
Genre: Dark fantasy, retelling
Rep: Sapphic
From bestselling author Maddie Martinez comes a deliciously dark sapphic retelling of The Phantom of the Opera drenched in Slavic folklore–perfect for fans of Ava Reid, Catherynne M. Valente, and S.T. Gibson.
A tale of obsession and desire…
The city of Larzeg glitters as bright as its famous Nectar Performance House, where violinist Kasia has worked her fingers to the bone to chase one dream: becoming Perła, the theater’s prestigious concertmaster. When the current Perła mysteriously dies during a performance, Kasia refuses to be distracted by whispers of a phantom in the theater’s wings. All she sees is her chance to replace the fallen star—until the orchestra director refuses her an audition because of her Azjarian heritage.
Devastated, Kasia is desperate enough to strike a bargain with the phantom of the theater—revealed to be Death herself. Behind her dark veil, Lady Death is prepared to help Kasia in her quest to become Perła, if Kasia becomes her companion. But one cannot be companion to Lady Death without bearing her mark, and soon Kasia discovers that her music is entrancing, capable of bending the audience to her will.
This alluring new gift thrusts Kasia into the spotlight, but also into the city’s highest circles of power, where influential men seek to control her, Lady Death’s demands grow increasingly dangerous, and Kasia finds herself falling further into the thrall of a master who promises her everything… as long as Death can call Kasia hers.
Link: Macmillan
The House on Garnet Hill — Logan Spurgeon
Genre: Gothic horror
Rep: Gay
Blair Caraway never wanted to see Adrian Galbraith again. Not after what happened between them. It took everything in his power to move on with his life, build a career, and get over his heartbreak. But when Blair receives a strange letter from Adrian, he must make a choice. Confused and curious, Blair agrees to visit Adrian at his family’s home, Garnet Hill. While Adrian is eager to reignite their relationship, Blair is initially cautious about trusting Adrian again.
As time passes, Blair begins to see things that aren’t really there—people from the past and visions of the future. His journal entries don’t line up with his memories, and he fears he’s losing his mind as he starts to fall back in love with Adrian. Visions aren’t the only thing wandering the halls of Garnet Hill. Someone has been sneaking into the Galbraith home and attempting to steal the family’s most cherished possession—The Shattered Heart, a precious gemstone from the family’s garnet mine. Together, Blair and Adrian must uncover the secret facets of Garnet Hill before they’re brought to ruin.
Link: Goodreads
Dream the Light — Clara Ward
Genre: Science fiction
Rep: Queer; ace; non-binary MC
Series: Book 2 of the Light From the Deep Duology
Having escaped to a mysterious ocean world, Ryn must navigate social spikes, uncertain allies, and unfamiliar cultures. Resident cephalopods offer friendship, creative communications, and new perspectives on science and history.
Dream the Light is a sci-fi future filled with hope, a budding ace relationship, and the building of community.
Link: Atthis Arts
February 11, 2027
Eternity in Three Acts — Ann Sei Lin
Genre: Fantasy
Rep: M/M
A dying god. A collapsing world. The fate of time lies in their hands.
The god of time is dying, and the world is unravelling with his every, laboured breath. There is only one solution: create a new god, to replace the old. An idea so blasphemous it is punishable by death.
Shion is the chosen candidate. He has known no life but the one chosen for him. At once a sacrificial lamb and divine successor, he has no time for dreams, no space for love. Then he meets Junyu, a charismatic player carving out a new life on the stage. Once a Ferrier, carrying sacrifices across the sea, he is the only one who can help Shion reach his goal.
But first the two men will have to brave time-warped landscapes, wild beast, and perilous seas, all the while evading the Hourglass Temple's notice. And as they journey, Junyu awakens something in Shion he was never meant to feel.
To save the world, Shion must die, and Junyu must bear the burden of letting him go. It can only end in tragedy...
Link: Hachette
February 14, 2027
After the Stars Died — Nathan Gibson
Genre: Space opera romance
Rep: M/M
Series: Book 1 of The Miracle
The last stars went out a long time ago.
What remains of humanity survives around a single black hole, drawing power from a machine the size of a star that no one alive understands. Two stations hold the species. On Meridian, an insulated elite keeps the archives, the grow chambers, and the belief that all of it was earned. On Threshold, the people who keep it running die young.
Solen Luminous is a scribe and the son of Meridian’s governor. Kael Vasik walks the surface of the Harness, where his parents are still buried in the plating. They meet once, badly, across a room neither of them was supposed to cross.
Then the bridge between the stations comes apart, and both men fall.
Stranded on the sphere with suits that cannot speak to each other, they have to invent a language out of grip and gesture or die on the plating. What they build there will be called treason on both stations.
Link: Author’s Website
February 16, 2027
Every Room a Hunger — Nino Cipri
Genre: YA horror
Rep: Queer; non-binary & transmasc MCs
Nobody comes to Home House by choice.
Leo was pressured into accepting a juvenile diversion sentence after a security guard overreacted and labeled him a threat. Rowan’s doctor told them it was the only in-patient psych facility with an available bed. Caroline, horrified at having been labeled a lesbian by her evangelical parents, expects conversion therapy. Frankie, who is transmasc, hides his longing for acceptance under a firebrand personality, but as a veteran of troubled teen programs thanks to his hateful birth mother, he’s the only one who knows to expect the worst.
When these teens arrive at Home House, they’re promised a fresh start. But they’re quickly ambushed by their own traumas in attack therapy and bullied in the name of growth. Plus, the House’s strange atmosphere twists everything, making it hard to tell what’s real and what’s not.
Though the program is designed to isolate them and poison them against each other, when the horror becomes all too real, Rowan, Frankie, Leo, and Caroline can agree on one they must escape. But it’s not the adults running the house or their fellow inmates that are trying to keep them inside the house’s four walls—it’s Home House itself that doesn’t want them to leave.
Link: Macmillan
Eclipse & the Wolf — Akwaeke Emezi
Genre: Epic fantasy
Rep: Queer
Enter St. Paradise, a city pulsing with blood magic, where clan secrets and shifting allegiances rule the land. For the first time, bestselling novelist Akwaeke Emezi brings their powerful talents to epic fantasy!
Ten years ago, Eclipse Orinabe and her aunt, Silver, were the sole survivors of a massacre that nearly wiped out their family.
Then the Orinabe unleashed their revenge: the annihilation of the clans who betrayed them, and the release of rapture, a drug so potent that the Orinabe—once peaceful pharmaceutical makers—soon have St. Paradise in a chokehold.
Disturbed by the Orinabe’s bloody rise, the surviving clan leaders nonetheless make peace with Silver, known as the Butcher, and accept Eclipse—a weapon disguised as a glamorous debuante. With the foundations of St. Paradise trembling, one spark will set the city aflame and embers are everywhere, watched from the shadows by Clan Heron, spies so secretive that no one knows their true Heir.
Wolf, Heir to the devout Goldshots, is on the run from his own people, armed with holy golden bullets and haunted by his sins. Noah, the volatile Heir to the psychic Ṣolarin clan, is pushed into a consuming relationship with Eclipse by his clan leaders. But neither Heir is what the other thinks—and the secret Noah is keeping is powerful enough to destroy St. Paradise in an instant.
An ancient magic ties these clans together and a brutal reckoning will come as the Heirs collide and claim their fraught inheritance. Emotionally rich, explosively thrilling, and finely wrought as all of Emezi’s work, their new standalone novel is perfect for fans of the author or Fonda Lee, R.F. Kuang, and V.E. Schwab.
Link: HarperCollins
Chimera — Gretchen Felker-Martin
Genre: Horror
Rep: Queer
A powerful family’s terrible secrets threaten to consume them in Chimera, a visceral body horror novel from Gretchen Felker-Martin, the author of Manhunt and Cuckoo.
Centuries ago, in the dark of the woods, a pact was made. A gift was given. And the costs have echoed down the bloodlines.
The clans of skin dancers—humans able to shapeshift into the form of any animal they've eaten—rule the 1980s New England crime scene. A late-summer wedding between two families is meant to usher in a new era of peace between households and stifle the brewing tensions that threaten to boil over into war.
But something is lurking in the forest outside the family compound. Something ancient, angry...and starving.
Link: Macmillan
Dreams of Ivy — Tiffany A. Joisson
Genre: Fantasy
Rep: Queer, Haitian
Syanna Onyx is the most powerful mambo in Haiti since the dragons of old decided to tell the world of magic’s existence at the turn of the twentieth century. She is impulsive, but does good work bringing peace and happiness to the people around her.
But being the most powerful means that there are always eyes on her.
When she goes to investigate a disruption in Cap-Haitien, she is scouted by the President of a magical university in the United States. Tasked with finding a secret library, Syanna travels to the magical HBCU Nevern A&M University. There she meets with other magicians of traditions like New Orleans voodoo, hoodoo, and santeria.
In this magical world of secret societies and southern tradition, Syanna needs to rely on more than her own wits and magic, and with Baron Samedi coming to collect, she needs to pay the piper—and fast.
Link: Author’s Website
Godbound — Rowan Skye
Genre: High fantasy
Rep: Sapphic
In this page-turning high fantasy debut, a petty thief on the run from her all-seeing god is unwillingly drawn into a murder conspiracy when she finds herself cursed.
Brimming with unpredictable gods, unreliable narrators, and suspense, this gripping Sapphic standalone is perfect for fans of Six of Crows and Godkiller.
Every promise has its price...
Annethe Tavery fell in love with a god. Now, he hunts her in a twisted game of cat and mouse. If she so much as thinks of him, her past, or even her real name, it will call him like a beacon to her. So she runs—straight to a port town, where a failed pickpocketing attempt leaves her with a nasty curse.
There’s only one way to free herself: do the bidding of the nobleman she tried to rob. Annethe soon finds herself embroiled in a murder plot amongst the dangerous world of godbound—nobles whose pacts with gods have twisted them in horrifying ways. If Annethe doesn’t complete the nobleman’s task, the curse will rot her from the inside out. But the longer she stays, the more chance there is that her god will find her—and he isn’t the only one looking.
Link: Penguin Random House
The False Hero — Zorah Starr
Genre: Romantasy
Rep: Black, pan, bi, & lesbian characters
Series: Book 1 of the Prophecy of Lies Duology
In a mystical war as old as time himself, nearly all hope is lost… And Kione is done waiting.
Spirits roam Myre, possessing, torturing, and murdering mortals. The people lie in wait for the Destined, a powerful figure prophesied to save them. But after a deadly attack on her island, outcast Kione decides enough is enough.
Leaving behind everything she’s known, Kione takes up the mantle of The Destined and sets off to defeat the spirit king, Veros. But to do so, Kione will have to traverse across Myre, assemble a team to help her, and try not to get uncovered as a fraud along the way.
But Kione soon discovers that the prophecy is much more complicated than they’ve all been led to believe. No one is telling the truth, and as the spirits rally to end the war once and for all, Kione must ask herself: what if she really is the Destined? Or what if she’s something else entirely?
This first book in Zorah Starr’s Prophecy of Lies Duology follows a powerful cast of Black and queer characters on a journey of subverted tropes, religious trauma, and destiny.
Link: Publisher’s Website
February 23, 2027
Tangled Roots — S.T. Gibson
Genre: Fantasy romance
Rep: Queer, polyamory
Series: Book 2 of Unearthly Delights
He will fulfil their wildest desires, for a price.
In this lush, sin-stained sequel to the Sunday Times bestselling Savage Blooms, Eileen, Finley, and Nicola embark on a quest to rescue kidnapped Adam from the faery underworld, plunging into a centuries-old power struggle between humans and the fae.
There is only one rule they must follow in the faery court, where pain and pleasure are elevated to entertain the king, or suffer the consequences of his boredom.
Getting close to the enigmatic and alluring faery king isn’t just a matter of survival; it is the only hope Eileen and her lovers have of escaping Craigmar’s curse.
Adam, Nicola, Finley and Eileen must scheme and seduce their way through court, all in the name of breaking the others free. But it’s so hard to want to be a hero when the faery king offers them each the fulfilment of their wildest desires… for a price.
Link: Goodreads
March of the War Priests — Samuel Jensen
Genre: Speculative, post-apocalyptic
Rep: Queer
Five punks with nothing to lose skateboard across a climate-ravaged and ultra-authoritarian America, desperate for meaning and determined to face the apocalypse on their own terms in this prescient literary debut, for readers of American War and Chain-Gang All-Stars.
In the year 2054, everything moves… at least those who are smart. The rest of the world, knowing it’s too late to do anything about the climate’s destruction, has closed its eyes. There was realization and panic and war; now there is only waiting around for the end. Born into this time of nihilistic lethargy and endgame capitalism, five skater kids in El Paso become obsessed with a viral movement called No Choice: punks across the nation banding together at the California coastline, ready to greet doomsday when it comes.
They have little to leave behind and much to escape. For Yol, her family’s poverty in the climate-refugee tenements. For white boy Sunshine, his dad’s buffalo cloning farm, and for corporate daughter Gabby her arranged marriage and unbearable grandmother. For Iggy, kicked out by his mom, the choice to leave is simple. But the real reason is Ariel: a skating genius and magnetic beauty on the verge of fame, and with whom each of them, in their own way, is in love.
There are three gates to pass through: First, the border into the west, militarized and highly controlled since the nation fractured into Zones. After that, the Flood engulfing southern Arizona, the water lifeless, scorched, and crawling with inland pirates. Finally, California, its burning wilderness and megacities like false jewels between the skaters and their destination.
As their journey puts them at greater and greater risk, the skaters’ faith—in each other, in No Choice, and in Ariel—is tested. Ariel himself is unshaken, a vector pointing west to glory, dignity, and maybe even revenge for inheriting a ruined world. They just have to survive long enough to take it. A saga told in page-turning episodes, March of the War Priests is a speculative odyssey for our new era and whatever lies beyond.
Link: HarperCollins
In Vacuo — Andrea Morstabilini
Genre: Gothic fantasy
Rep: Queer
A queer gothic coming of age novel about a young boy confronting the ghosts of the past and the restless, obsessive pursuit of immortality. Perfect for fans of Susannah Clarke and Kelly Link.
All bones have a story.
Henry arrives at the vast estate of Dr Robertson Hammond alongside his pregnant mother one rain-soaked night. But after a sudden tragedy, the young boy finds himself orphaned and the ward of the enigmatic doctor.
But stories surround Dr Hammond. There are those who call him an alchemist, those who accuse him of murder. And the more Henry hears, the more he questions his life at the house. Why won’t Dr Hammond talk about his mother’s sudden death? Why are the entire household staff sent away on the anniversary of the event? And what is the truth of the wild woman who roams the woods, whispering the names of the dead?
As the years pass Henry starts to explore the land upon which he lives, from the wilds of Bald Mountain to the impossible revelations of the towers that he climbs with the enigmatic Xavier. And when the truth behind Dr Hammond’s research is finally uncovered, Henry will have to make a decision that will affect everyone he cares about, and which has the power to change reality as we know it.
Link: Penguin Random House
The Starlight Samsara — A.D. Sui
Genre: Science fiction, horror
Rep: Queer, M/M
Series: Book 2 of The Cosmic Wheel
A pair of monastic siblings struggle to help a sentient spaceship suffering through an existential crisis in this philosophical novel about what constitutes life, love, humanity, and death, for fans of Martha Wells’s The Murderbot Diaries and The Deep Sky by Yume Kitasei.
Unable to forgive himself for his actions aboard the Counsel of Nicaea, Iris left the religious Starlit Order. People died, he lost his heart to a man of science, and he sacrificed his best friend—an implanted AI companion—to shut down the murdering consciousness birthed within the spaceship. Still devoted to serving others, Iris labors aboard a space station near Nicaea’s husk, a reminder of his frailties and his failures.
Vessel Bacai believes that leadership of the Northern Temple of the Starlit Order is hers by right of inheritance. But her adopted brother Iris was always their late mother’s choice, despite having no ambition to assume the role. Bacai needs Iris to officially step aside so she can continue the holy work he selfishly abandoned.
Iris also left his work on the Nicaea unfinished. The ship has awakened, attacking the space station without warning, harming its inhabitants. And the ship sends Iris a message, begging the former Vessel to end its suffering—by helping it to die.
Now, Iris is returning to Nicaea, accompanied by Bacai and a science team—including the beloved engineer he left behind, Yan Fukui—to confront a sentient AI that understands the behaviors and emotions that drive human nature...
Link: Penguin Random House