06/17/2026
What we read shapes what we understand.
ACW staff are sharing books with LGBTQ+ representation that expand perspective, and reflect lived experience.
🌈All Boys Aren’t Blue is a memoir-manifesto that is written using the author’s personal experiences growing up as a LGBTQ+ person of color on the East Coast. The book touches on topics like childhood bullying, toxic masculinity, homophobia, family, sexual assault, and black joy. This book is a New York Times Best Seller written by George M. Johnson.
🌈Wild Things by Lynette Reini-Grandell follows her story as a cis-gendered woman and her transgender spouse. The book follows the couple’s story throughout the transition while navigating the communities that surrounded them as well as the hostility they faced. A note from the author, “Most of this story took place at a time when the kind of knowledge and terminology we now have about being trans didn't exist.”
🌈Carry On by Rainbow Rowell is a New York Times Best Seller. This book follows a young mage, Simon, as he needs to defeat an evil force that is causing problems in the magic world. Throughout the story, Simon uncovers many conspiracies while working alongside his roommate and nemesis, Baz, leading to a kindling romance.
🌈Queering Sexual Violence by Jennifer Patterson is a book that discusses how marginalized individuals, specifically people in the LGBTQ+ community, experience sexual violence. The book also talks about institutions like the healthcare and the justice system, and how they often re-traumatize marginalized victims. The book also offers really helpful strategies to heal for individuals who are experiencing similar situations to stories and experiences talked about in the book.
🌈On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a New York Times Best Seller written by Ocean Vuong. This semi-autobiographical book is a letter written by a young Vietnamese- American man, Little Dog, to his illiterate mother. In this letter he talks about intergenerational trauma from immigration as well as a gay man.
