2022 Pride Month TBR

Happy almost Pride Month, everyone! I hope you’re all doing well. Like last year, I am planning on reading books with LGBTQ+ rep in June. As a person with a family member who is transgender, support for the LGBTQ+ community is important to me. I’m setting my TBR lower this year, so hopefully I can get through all of them.

Heartstopper: Volume Three and Volume Four by Alice Oseman

I finished the second volume a little while ago and I can’t wait to read the rest of them. Charlie and Nick are so perfect together. I am an adamant “book before movie/TV show” person, so I had to read the first two volumes before I watched the show. And now I need to watch the show because everyone is raving about it.

In this volume we’ll see the Heartstopper gang go on a school trip to Paris! Not only are Nick and Charlie navigating a new city, but also telling more people about their relationship AND learning more about the challenges each other are facing in private…

Meanwhile Tao and Elle will face their feelings for each other, Tara and Darcy share more about their relationship origin story, and the teachers supervising the trip seem… rather close…? (Volume 3 synopsis)

Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas

This has been on my TBR since last year sometime and I’ve been putting off reading it for no reason. So I put it on this list so I can hopefully and finally get to it. I read Thomas’ other book, Lost in the Never Woods and enjoyed that so I have good hopes for this one too.

Yadriel has summoned a ghost, and now he can’t get rid of him.

When his traditional Latinx family has problems accepting his gender, Yadriel becomes determined to prove himself a real brujo. With the help of his cousin and best friend Maritza, he performs the ritual himself, and then sets out to find the ghost of his murdered cousin and set it free.

However, the ghost he summons is actually Julian Diaz, the school’s resident bad boy, and Julian is not about to go quietly into death. He’s determined to find out what happened and tie up some loose ends before he leaves. Left with no choice, Yadriel agrees to help Julian, so that they can both get what they want. But the longer Yadriel spends with Julian, the less he wants to let him leave.

The Ghosts We Keep by Mason Deaver

I found this out from another blogger who really enjoyed it so of course I had to read it. I think this might be the book I’m going to start off the month with, so I hope it’ll be good!

Perfect for fans of Adam Silvera and Becky Albertalli, this book will rip your heart out before showing you how to heal from tragedy and celebrate life in the process.

When Liam Cooper’s older brother Ethan is killed in a hit-and-run, Liam has to not only learn to face the world without one of the people he loved the most, but also face the fading relationship with his two best friends. 

Feeling more alone and isolated than ever, Liam finds themself sharing time with Marcus, Ethan’s best friend, and through Marcus, Liam finds the one person that seems to know exactly what they’re going through, for the better, and the worse. 

This book is about grief. But it’s also about why we live. Why we have to keep moving on, and why we should.

Rise to the Sun by Leah Johnson

After reading You Should See Me in a Crown and loving it, I knew I had to read Leah Johnson’s next book. I meant to read this last year, after it was in one of my anticipated releases post, but as things are, more books came up and took priority. So now I’m making this one a priority.

Three days. Two girls. One life-changing music festival. 

Olivia is an expert at falling in love . . . and at being dumped. But after the fallout from her last breakup has left her an outcast at school and at home, she’s determined to turn over a new leaf. A crush-free weekend at Farmland Music and Arts Festival with her best friend is just what she needs to get her mind off the senior year that awaits her.

Toni is one week away from starting college, and it’s the last place she wants to be. Unsure about who she wants to become and still reeling in the wake of the loss of her musician-turned-roadie father, she’s heading back to the music festival that changed his life in hopes that following in his footsteps will help her find her own way forward.

When the two arrive at Farmland, the last thing they expect is to realize that they’ll need to join forces in order to get what they’re searching for out of the weekend. As they work together, the festival becomes so much more complicated than they bargained for, and Olivia and Toni will find that they need each other, and music, more than they ever could have imagined.

The (Un)Popular Vote by Jasper Sanchez

I don’t remember where I found out about this book, but it has transgender representation, which I thought was appropriate. I haven’t ever read a book where the main character is transgender, so I’m looking forward to reading from a different perspective.

Vaseline on the teeth makes a smile shine. It’s a cheap stunt, but Mark Adams knows it’s optics that can win or ruin an election.

Everything Mark learned about politics, he learned from his father, the congressman who still pretends he has a daughter and not a son. To protect his father’s image, Mark promises to keep his past hidden and pretend to be the cis guy everyone assumes he is. But when he sees a manipulatively charming candidate for student body president inflame dangerous rhetoric, Mark decides to risk the low profile he assured his father and insert himself as a political challenger.

One big problem? No one really knows Mark. He didn’t grow up in this town, and he has few friends; plus, the ones he does have aren’t exactly with the in-crowd. Still, thanks to countless seasons of Scandal and The West Wing, these nerds know where to start: from campaign stops to voter polling to a fashion makeover. Soon Mark feels emboldened to get in front of and engage with voters—and even start a new romance. But with an investigative journalist digging into his past, a father trying to silence him, and a bully front-runner who stands in his way, Mark will have to decide which matters most: perception or truth, when both are just as dangerous.

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Have you read any of these books?
What are some books you love with LGBTQ+ representation?