This book sucked me right in, in the best way. The story is a written account by Lamat Paed, an experienced mountain-climber who lives on the side of a mountain so tall that space-suits are needed before an explorer can even see the summit. Lamat has already tried to reach that height once. The journey ended her marriage, killed her lover, and froze much of the skin and muscle from her face. Now she works in a tiny mountain village, running her ex-husbands bar and guiding tourists up to the monastery and the observatory. Until, that is, Mother Disaine shows up. Disaine is an outcast, a priest, scientist, and inventor. She wants to reach the top of the mountain and met God. Lamat has made a living out of lying low, but she is unable to resist the gravitational pull of Disaine's ambitions. So the pair set out upwards, Lamat rolling the dice a second time to see what, this time, the mountain will take from her. This story is queer, political, philosophical and deeply satisfying. I recommend it.

This book collects short stories by Erin Nations, some auto-bio, some fictional. He writes about experiences growing up as a triplet, his transition, working at a grocery store, biking around Portland and road trips. Also included are personal ads of stereotypical Pacific Northwesterners and stories about Tobias, a sweet gay teen plagued by constant unrequited crushes. The different types of material are interspersed a bit randomly, but I enjoyed it all.

A wonderful collection of Julia Kay's webcomic Up and Out Comic, which can be read on tumblr and instagram. These strips span the first year of Julia's transition including a cross-country move and many other new starts. I had previously read most of this material online but it was great to be able to hold the book in my hands.

I cannot for the life of me remember who recommended this book to me, but I'm glad I got it. It's a collection of short stories all featuring trans main characters. The majority of the stories are set in various parts of Canada, New York City or the Pacific Northwest, all places I believe that author has also lived. These are stories of relationships, some sexy, some messy, most complicated- relationships with lovers, exes, parents, friends, pets and cities. My favorite story was the longest one which takes up the center part of the book, "Not Bleak". The narrator is Carla, a bookstore manager, who lives with a long term open partner, Liam, who is funny, slutty, and very kind. I loved the dynamic between the two of them perhaps most of all the couples in the whole book. Liam and Carla often host young queer kids, many of whom have been kicked out by their families. They let these kids sleep on their couch until they get their barrings in the new city and can find a job and place to stay. They host a kid named Zeke who has not yet decided if they are a boy or a girl, but seems nice, followed by a much less respectful guest who Carla barely talks to. A few days later, Liam realizes their passports have been stolen, as well as some other items. They confront Zeke over it, but she has no idea what they are talking about. It ends up being just another shitty break and life goes on. But then Zeke starts hanging out at Carla's bookstore, asking for reading recommendations and inviting her to lunch. Then Zeke asks Carla a huge favor, the kind that Carla has no interest in fulfilling, except she kind of can't say no. And the story spins out from there. You have to pick up the book if you want to know what happens next :)

I've backed a lot of comic anthologies on kickstarter by this point, and this one really stands out. Every story in the book is written and drawn by a trans author or team including a trans author. There are fiction and nonfiction pieces, humorous and sad, serious and hilarious. There are so many strong pieces it's hard to pick favorites but a few that really stood out to me were "Abominatrix" by Morgan Sea, "A Brief Timeline of the Singular They" by Melanie Gillman, "Tiffany Banks" by Ajuan Mance, "Tiresias" by Lily Ash Sakula, "For Real" by Renny Triangle, "Thots with Thoughts" by Noah Grigni, "Hagios, Hagios, Hagios" by Bis Thornton, "Love is Like A Cephalopod" by Bishakh Som, "I was just 18" by Nox Fox.... I said it was hard to choose! You should just buy the book and read the whole thing.

This is a slim but exceptional volume. I've been a fan and follower of Alok Vaid-Menon's online presence for a long time; it's absolutely delightful to dig deeper into their poetry. It's hard to pick a favorite piece because all of the poems are so strong, and also come from the same emotional place. One line that has kept ringing in my head, even two weeks after reading it, is this: "it is hard to have your abundance mistaken as absence" (pg 7).

This debut novel by Joshua Whitehead, an Oji-Cree Two-Spirit author, is light on plot but rich in details. The main character is Jonny, also a Two-Spirit Indigiqueer and member of Peguis First Nation. He has moved to Winnepeg and is supporting himself as a digital sex-worker when a call comes from his mother to say his step-father has died. Jonny had a complicated relationship with the deceased, but he wants to make the expensive trip back home to support his mom during the funeral. The bulk of the book cuts back and forth between Jonny skyping and snapchatting with clients and memories of his childhood on the rez. He had a loving grandmother who supported and accepted his queer femininity, and a best friend/lover who alternately watched his back and betrayed him. His mother loved him the best she could, but was often absent. Replacement father figures appear mainly as instruments of enforcing masculinity. I loved the many descriptions of food and family as well as the passages of extreme tenderness and self-discovery.

This short young adult novel started a little slow, but seized my heart with unexpected force at the end. Montgomery is a teen unimpressed with most of the offerings of her small California town and public high school. She has two friends, a cheerful gay theater boy named Thomas, and a sanguine Lune Lovegood named Naoki. These three are the only members of The Mystery Club and all of the company that Monty feels she needs (aside from her family- Mama Kate, Mama Jo, and her sport-obsessed younger sister Tesla). Until, that is, Reverend White an internet famous anti-LGBTQ preacher moves to town. Just when Monty most needs more allies, it seems like everything she does drives people away.

It's very rare that I read a book of poetry front to back in essentially one sitting, but this is a really extraordinary volume. The author, Andrea Gibson, is currently on an international tour taking these words and others to a staggering number of stages. The poems are full of the mixed up process of pain and healing, of being strong and vulnerable at the right times, of questioning gender, of queer love and heartbreak. Published in 2015, they chronicle a rising awareness of racism and racial violence. The two line poem titled "Ferguson" reads simply "A sea of blood, America,/and not even a shell held to your ear." Other poems range to four or five pages. Other poem titles include: "A Letter to White Queers, a Letter to Myself", "Things That Don't Suck", "An Insider's Guide on How to Be Sick", "A Genderful Pep-Talk For My Younger Self" and "Etiquette Leash". I can tell these will be poems I return to, and I look forward to reading more of Gibson's work.

This is a fantastic book. It's set in the near future in Canada, a future in which global climate change has brought about a massive collapse of civilization. Also, white people have lost the ability to dream. All of the characters in this book are native people, living on the run from the Canadian government which has instated a massive program to capture all native people and torture the dreams out of their bodies. The main character Frenchie is an awkward, damaged, brave teenager who lost his whole family before he found a new community: RiRi, a smart and curious little girl; Slopper, a messy young boy; a set of twins, Tree and Zheegwon; and two other teens, Wab, who lost one eye to a knife before she came to the group and Chi-boy who is quietly in love with her. These young ones are lead by two adults: Miigwans, a man experienced with living wild but weighed down by grief, and Minerva, the Elder, who can sometimes tell stories or share words from past times. This found family do what they can to survive and care for each other in a world of danger and ruin. Bittersweet, queer, and wonderful.