Favorite Fridays highlight media the HCDL staff recommend. Find your next favorite book, audiobook, movie, TV show, magazine, etc., here every Friday this summer—and share your own favorites in the weekly posts’ comments!

In celebration of Pride month, this week we’re sharing some of our librarians’ favorite LGBTQA+ books. If you’ve read these titles, share your thoughts in the comments along with your own favorite LGBTQA+ books!

*Hoopla is available to Howell library district residents only.

Gender Queer : a Memoir by Maia Kobabe

Call# Graphic Novels 921 Kobabe

This graphic novel is a very moving, intimate look into one person’s journey through self-discovery. While some of Maia’s experiences felt familiar and resonated with me, the experiences and feelings so different from my own opened my eyes, mind, and heart, helping me understand and feel more connected to my fellow human beings.

Life Isn't Binary : on Being Both, Beyond, and In-between by Meg-John Barker

Call# 305.3 Bar

Life Isn’t Binary is a reflection and exploration of binaries, both in terms of sexual identity and gender binaries, as well as societal binaries like normal/abnormal, nature/nurture, able/disabled and more. I appreciated the broad and open discussion of binaries throughout society. Barker and Iantaffi were careful not to brand one way of thinking as right or wrong, as even that (right versus wrong) is a binary worth challenging.

Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston

Call# Fiction Mcquiston

A light & easy read that I could not put down! Friendship, royalty, American politics, and a queer love story done right. Plenty of humor & exactly the kind of escape from reality I needed. 

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

Call# Fiction Miller

An engrossing and moving retelling imagines the relationship between Achilles and Patroclus found in Homer’s Iliad and is way more readable than that classic tale of the Trojan War. Told from Patroclus’ point of view, this is a beautiful and tragic story of love and war. Be prepared to cry. I highly recommend the audiobook and the author Madeline Miller’s other works.

This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel

Call# Fiction Frankel

Claude is born as the youngest of five boys, but when he grows up he wants to be a girl. This Is How It Always Is tells a story of family, love, acceptance, and the constant struggle of never knowing if you are doing the right thing as a parent. I fell in love with the entire family and was sad to set the book down when it was over.

Witchmark by C. L. (Chelsea L.) Polk

Call# Fantasy Polk

A historical fantasy set in Edwardian England in which having magic is despised, yet those in power secretly wield their magical gifts to their country’s and their own benefit. We follow the magic-marked Miles Singer as he tries—and fails—to live his life outside of magic. The subtle though apparent romance between him and the mysterious yet alluring gentleman Tristan slowly builds through the story and has a wonderful pay off. There’s a murder mystery in there, some particularly despicable characters, and great reveals. After finishing this audiobook, I eagerly awaited the second in this Kingston Cycle series, Stormsong.