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Library Displays: June 2024: It's Pride Month

LGBTQ Pride Month

Lost Boi

Lambda Literary Award finalist In Sassafras Lowrey's gorgeous queer punk reimagining of the classic Peter Pan story, prepare to be swept overboard into a world of orphaned, abandoned, and runaway bois who have sworn allegiance and service to Pan, the fearless leader of the Lost Bois brigade and the newly corrupted Mommy Wendi who, along with the tomboy John Michael, Pan convinces to join him at Neverland. Told from the point of view of Tootles, Pan's best boi, the lost bois call the Neverland squat home, creating their own idea of family, and united in their allegiance to Pan, the boi who cannot be broken, and their refusal to join ranks with Hook and the leather pirates. Like a fever-pitched dream, Lost Boi situates a children's fantasy within a subversive alternative reality, chronicling the lost bois' search for belonging, purpose, and their struggle against the biggest battle of all: growing up. Sassafras Lowrey is a straight-edge queer punk who won the Lambda Literary Emerging Writer Award and was named to the inaugural Trans 100 list by We Be Trans. Sassafras's books, Kicked Out, Roving Pack, and Leather Ever After, have been honored by organizations ranging from the National Leather Association to the American Library Association.

An Archive of Hope

Harvey Milk was one of the first openly and politically gay public officials in the United States, and his remarkable activism put him at the very heart of a pivotal civil rights movement reshaping America in the 1970s. An Archive of Hope is Milk in his own words, bringing together in one volume a substantial collection of his speeches, columns, editorials, political campaign materials, open letters, and press releases, culled from public archives, newspapers, and personal collections. The volume opens with a foreword from Milk's friend, political advisor, and speech writer Frank Robinson, who remembers the man who "started as a Goldwater Republican and ended his life as the last of the store front politicians" who aimed to "give 'em hope" in his speeches. An illuminating introduction traces GLBTQ politics in San Francisco, situates Milk within that context, and elaborates the significance of his discourse and memories both to 1970s-era gay rights efforts and contemporary GLBTQ worldmaking.

Running with Lions

Bloomington High School Lions star goalie Sebastian Hughes should be excited about his senior year: His teammates are amazing, and hes got a coach who doesnt ask anyone to hide their sexuality. But when his estranged childhood-best-friend Emir Shah shows up at summer training camp, Sebastian realizes the teams success may end up in the hands of the one guy who hates him. Determined to reconnect with Emir for the sake of the Lions, he sets out to regain Emirs trust. But to Sebastians surprise, sweaty days on the pitch, wandering the towns streets, and bonding on the weekends spark more than just friendship between them.

LGBTQ Fiction and Poetry from Appalachia

This collection, the first of its kind, gathers original and previously published fiction and poetry from lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer authors from Appalachia. Like much Appalachian literature, these works are pervaded with an attachment to family and the mountain landscape, yet balancing queer and Appalachian identities is an undertaking fraught with conflict. This collection confronts the problematic and complex intersections of place, family, sexuality, gender, and religion with which LGBTQ Appalachians often grapple. With works by established writers such as Dorothy Allison, Silas House, Ann Pancake, Fenton Johnson, and Nickole Brown and emerging writers such as Savannah Sipple, Rahul Mehta, Mesha Maren, and Jonathan Corcoran, this collection celebrates a literary canon made up of writers who give voice to what it means to be Appalachian and LGBTQ.

Sugarless

Things look bad for Rick Lahrem, a high school sophomore in a cookie-cutter Chicago suburb in 1976. His mother's second husband is a licensed psychologist who eats like an ape, his stepsister is a stoner slut, and his father is engaged to a Southern belle. Rick's only solace is his growing collection of original Broadway-cast LPs, bought on the sly at Wax Trax.     After he brings two girls in speech class to tears by reading a story aloud, Rick is coaxed onto the interscholastic forensics team to perform an eight-minute dramatic interpretation of The Boys in the Band, the controversial sixties play about homosexuality. Unexpectedly successful at this oddball event, Rick begins winning tournaments and making friends with his teammates.     Rick also discovers the joys of sex--with a speech coach from a rival school--just as his mother, reacting to a deteriorating home environment, makes an unnerving commitment to Christ. The newly confident Rick assumes this too shall pass--until the combined forces of family, sex, and faith threaten to undo him at the state meet in Peoria.     James Magruder's Sugarless offers a ruefully entertaining take on the simultaneous struggles of coming-out, coming-of-age, and coming-to-Jesus.     A selection of InsightOut Book Club   Finalist, Lambda Book Award for Gay Debut Fiction, Lambda Literary Foundation   Finalist, TLA Gaybie Award for Best Gay Fiction   Semi-finalist, James Branch Cabell First Novelist Award, Virginia Commonwealth University   Semi-finalist, William Saroyan International Prize For Writing, Stanford University

Dan Sharp Mysteries 3-Book Bundle

The first three novels of the Dan Sharp mystery series, winner of the Lambda Award for best gay mystery Collected into a single volume, the Lambda-award winning Dan Sharp series by Jeffrey Round follows a gay father and missing persons investigator as he weaves from upper-class enclaves to the seedy underbelly of Southern Ontario. Dan Sharp, missing persons investigator, has his hands full. His partner, Bill, is dodgy about commitment and loves to taunt Dan about his lurid past. His son, Kedrick, is the shifting centre of his world, a weak spot in his hardboiled life, and a serious complication in his relationships. And then there's the work. A wedding guest is swept off a yacht and vanishes beneath the waves, but the wrong person ends up reported missing. In Toronto, someone is murdering sex offenders. And why is a son still searching for man who left a suicide note - and six dead horses - when he disappeared, twenty years ago? A chance meeting in a bar sends missing persons investigator Dan Sharp in search of a woman presumed dead in the Tiananmen Square Massacre. But there may be international consequences and big players in a mystery that spans two continents. "Such devotion to his work makes Rounds writing absorbing for readers. You sympathize with Sharp, even as he falls into a whiskey-drenched hell, and you wait for him to rise again." - Xtra! "The writing is raw, the emotions are taut and author Jeffrey Round brings it together in a breathtaking conclusion." - Hamilton Spectator "Jeffrey Round is the gay Margaret Atwood!" - Luba Goy, Comedian Includes Lake on the Mountain Pumpkin Eater The Jade Butterfly