Today July 30th marks the last day of Pride Month, a month in celebration of the LGBTQIA community. Or more precisely, a month for the celebration of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, intersex and asexual people.

“I am a human being just as deserving of love and happiness as the next person. I tell myself this every day.”

– Dirty London by Kelley York

June has been a month filled with both sadness and happiness, one where we have seen that there is still a lot of hate and ignorance towards the LGBTQIA community but also a lot of love. We have seen people come together to fight against that hate, to fight hate with love. As we exit this month, I think we should all remember that though there are people out there who wish great evil upon the LGBT community, there are thousands more that are filled with love, acceptance and hope. Love is love is love, and love always wins in the end.

This month has been a great month when it comes to books in correlation to the LGBT+ community. We have had Julia Ember (author of Unicorn Tracks) and her #ReadProud challenge which I think has been an absolute success. You can tell that people have really read more LGBTQIA books with this tag, have promoted more of these books and put them in the spotlight they very much deserve.

However, this brings me to another important topic that I think we should all remember. June, the official Pride Month, is a month once a year where we celebrate LGBTQIA, however, we need to remember that every single month is Pride Month for this community. The ups and downs, the good and the bad, they’re something people in this community face every day and therefore the support for this community and the books connected to this community should be there in the spotlight more than just once a year. The support we have seen this month, we should see it every month. We have to support LGBTQIA authors and LGBTQIA books all the time. Therefore I want to recommend you as many LGBTQIA books as I can, both books that are already published and books that are yet to come. We should also remember that when we support authors, we should put extra focus on books that are #ownvoices, and also have intersectional diversity because these are the books that need the attention the most. These are the books readers need.

Here is a list of books from all colors of the rainbow. Get these on your radar, read them, support them and give them the love they deserve. The books deserve it, the authors deserve it, but most importantly the readers deserve it. Make sure that people can find these books and get the chance to see themselves in them.

L as in Lesbian

• Unicorn Tracks by Julia Ember
• Tell Me Again How A Crush Should Feel by Sara Farizan
• Huntress by Malinda Lo
• Lies We Tell Ourselves by Robin Talley
• Dirty London by Kelley York
• Everything Leads To You by Nina LaCour
• Lies My Girlfriend Told Me by Julie Anne Peters
• Read Me Like A Book by Liz Kessler
• South of Sunshine by Dana Elmendorf
• Georgia Peaches and Other Forbidden Fruit by Jaye Robin Brown

G as in Gay

• Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli
• Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
• The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller 
• We Are the Ants by Shaun David Hutchinson
• Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan
• Two Boys Kissing by David Levithan
• How to Repair a Mechanical Heart by J.C. Lillis

B as in Bisexual

• Far From You by Tess Sharpe
• Not Otherwise Specified by Hannah Moskowitz
• Adaptation by Malinda Lo
• About A Girl by Sarah McCarry
• Five Times My Best Friend Kissed Me by Anna Martin
• Otherbound by Corinne Duyvis
• Fire by Kristin Cashore
• Our Own Private Universe by Robin Talley
• Vanished by E. E. Cooper
• Been Here All Along by Sandy Hall
• Whatever. by S.J. Goslee

T as in Trans

• If I Was Your Girl by Meredith Russo
• Beautiful Music for Ugly Children by Kirstin Cronn-Mills
• Roller girl by Vanessa North
• I am J by Cris Beam

• The Art of Being Normal by Lisa Williamson

I as in Intersex

• None of the Above by I.W. Gregorio
• Alex as Well by Alyssa Brugman
• Pantomime by Laura Lam

A as in Asexual

• We Awaken by Calista Lynne
• How To Say Goodbye in Robot by Natalie Standiford
• Radio Silence by Alice Oseman

This list is in no way complete or shows every LGBTQIA book out there (there are so many more, both old and new, that are yet to be discovered by me and by you which is quite exciting if you think about it). Also note that though I have divided this list after the letters in LGBTQIA they often overlap, which is an amazing thing.

(P.S. Q as in Queer has not been forgotten but since it’s an umbrella term and I don’t have any books specifically going under that letter I have chosen not to include it).

Do you have any more books you think should be added to this list? Feel free to let me and I’ll definitely do so.

By the way, last week I made a tumblr post with the theme of girls loving girls (which sort of inspired this blog post) and I thought I’d link it to you guys. The books in the post are the same as here but I also have a playlist that I think some of you might think is nice, you can find it here.