Happy new year and welcome back to the Turnaround Blog! We’re finally feeling back in the swing of things, so let’s jump straight in with our quarterly queer preview. Today we’re giving you a look-see at the queer books we’ve got coming out between now and March, from photography to fantasy. Let us know what queer books you’re most excited for over on Instagram and Blue Sky, and keep your eyes peeled for our queer graphic novels post coming soon! For now, settle in to browse this winter’s finest queer reads with us.

Starting off fun and flirty with this fake dating rom com featuring a bisexual pop sensation protagonist in For One Night Only! After her recurring role in tabloid headlines, Valerie Quinn’s musical TV show is on the network chopping block. Desperate for good press, she hastily reassembles her wildly beloved pop punk band, Glitter Bats. A reunion concert could be the former lead vocalist’s ticket to a media makeover, especially if it renews public speculation around her iconic situationship with bassist Caleb Sloane. The only problem? They haven’t spoken in six years.

But when Valerie shows up at Caleb’s doorstep with that devastating smile and a plea for help, he reluctantly agrees to put on one last show. So what if the fandom assumes the two of them are back together too? They’ll play along. You know… for the press. 😉 With their futures — and the Glitter Bats — in the balance, can they survive a romantic reprise?

Winter is surely the season of the queer rom com, because coming up next is an enemies-to-lovers romance with video games at its core. Cat Li thinks she’s made it big when she lands her dream job writing love storylines for the game Compass Hollow. Then she meets her boss: the infamous Andi Zhang, who’s not only an arrogant hater of happily-ever-afters determined to keep Cat from doing her job but also impossibly, annoyingly hot.

Forced to give Cat a chance, Andi begrudgingly realises there’s more to Cat than romantic idealism and, okay, a cute smile. But admitting that would mean giving up the single-player life that has kept their heart safe for years… Can these two put aside their differences and find a way to work together before it’s game over?

The season of love continues, this time with a friends-to-lovers mlm romance set in Chicago. Hairstylist Bastian Russo has only three things to his name: a pair of 1,200 dollar shears, a Boystown studio apartment, and a list of men’s names written on his closet wall. His constant worry that he’s not good enough and his chronic inability to trust are what leaves him heartbroken time and again. 

After he adds the latest name, he turns to his best friend, Andres Wood, for solace. But instead of treating Bastian to dinner, drinks, and the usual effortless banter, Andres makes an interesting suggestion: that Bastian should get over the breakup by dating… Andres.  Now Bastian has to sort out his inadequacy and trust issues to prove he’s worthy of transitioning from Andres’ best friend to his lover. Otherwise, it’s a matter of time before one or both of them end up on Bastian’s list of Boystown Heartbreakers.

Phil SaintDenisSanchez’s debut collection self-portrait before & after my body tackles complex familial history and struggles, emerging in the rich backdrop of New Orleans, Louisiana. Through multilayered language and immersive imagery, SaintDenisSanchez interweaves political and social issues – from the lasting impacts of colonialism to environmental disaster — with intensely personal narratives of love, learning, and loss. The long, lyrical form and enrapturing poetic voice draw you in and refuse to let you go. self-portrait before & after my body maps a stunningly poignant family tree and gets at the root of the social forces that shaped its growth.

Shifting tone quite dramatically, The Empty Bowl is Rikki West’s deeply human story of seeking self-knowledge through sobriety, spirituality and science. Her tale begins with her Catholic childhood in a Chicago suburb. As a little girl, she prays for her drunk father, begging God not to send him to hell. And as a young woman studying at UC Berkeley, she gives up spiritual matters and shifts her trust to science as the only reliable truth. But something is missing for her – and when she launches her career in Silicon Valley, the drinking culture forces her to confront her own demons. Rikki charts her experience of turning towards Eastern spirituality to find her genuine self and relationship to the universe in this moving story that blends deep scientific and philosophical research with the intimacy of a personal memoir.

Our final queer romance for January is a lesbian love story for fans of Lily Lindon, Casey McQuiston and and a good Shakespearean rivalry (think Much Ado About Nothing vibes). From the moment they locked eyes in high school, Abby and Freya have been at each other’s throats. Ten years later, when Abby and Freya cross paths again, their old rivalry doesn’t take more than a few minutes to begin anew.

And now Naomi, Abby’s best friend, is falling for Freya’s producer and close pal, Will. Both women are thrilled to see their friends in a happy relationship — except they are now only a few degrees of separation from the person they claim to despise… After their encounters repeatedly devolve into warfare, Abby and Freya’s friends decide their age-old rivalry can only mean one thing: true love. Will their friends bring them together? Or will Freya’s refusal to admit who she is keep them from discovering their underlying passion?

Moving from fictional romances, to a real-life modern love story, elseship is a unique, kaleidoscopic exploration of two people caught between friendship and unrequited love. When Tree Abraham falls in love with her housemate who does not reciprocate the feeling, instead of breaking up, they keep going. This story begins where most end.

elseship deftly and courageously recounts the starts and stops of a transitioning relationship. Having recorded the experience in real time, Abraham combines personal entries with illustrations, photos, and mind maps all organised within eight ancient Greek categories of love. Countering the heteronormative canon of romantic stories, this modern take on love is gorgeously written and deeply relatable.

Darryl Cook has long reckoned his life a sweet one. He has an inheritance that spares him from work, a manageable and seemingly consequence-free drug habit, and a lovely wife called Mindy who’s generally game for anything. But after an accidental overdose and some serious over-sharing, Darryl’s world begins to crack up. Tormented by what seems to be the secret truth in sex, and less assured of that secret’s form, Darryl steps into what used to be called real life… With empathy and humour, debut author Jackie Ess crafts a meditation on marriage, manhood, dreams, sport and sobriety.

They say Mackerel Sky was founded when Captain Burrbank first saw Nimuë the Mermaid and forgot the sea. Stricken by love, he moored his tall ship and made camp on the highest cliff, hoping to forever gaze upon her beauty. That camp became a settlement, the settlement a town, the town a community both blessed and cursed by their tempestuous affair.

Three hundred years later, the legend of the Mermaid and the Captain who loved her still invigorates and haunts the inhabitants of the small Maine lobstering town. Take gruff widow Myra Kelley, who finds herself the de facto guardian of Leo Beale and knows his drunken antics are really attempts to escape an opiate-addicted mother and her boyfriends. Or Derrick Stowe, the town’s star pitcher, who wants nothing more than to read his mother’s musings on mermaids, write poetry to his secret boyfriend, and come out to his father, though he will learn how devastatingly small small towns can be.

Elegant, slippery, and provocative, Antiquity is a Lolita story by prize-winning Swedish author Hanna Johansson — a story of desire, power, obsession and observation. On a Greek island rich with ancient beauty, a lonely woman in her thirties upends the relationship between a mother and her teenage daughter.

Lust and admiration for Helena, a chic older artist, brings Antiquity‘s unnamed narrator to Ermoupoli, where Helena’s daughter, Olga, seems at first like an obstacle and a nuisance. But the unpredictable forces of ego and desire take over, leading our narrator down a more dangerous path, and causing the roles of lover and beloved, child and adult, stranger and intimate to become distorted. As the months go by, the fragile web connecting the three of them nears rupture, and the ominous consequences of their entanglement loom just beyond a summer that must end.

Set against a backdrop of bitterly partisan Facebook feuds and a Trump flag set aflame in a driveway, Louie on the Rocks follows the disintegration of the Francis family six months after the premature death of their matriarch, Helen. In his wife’s absence, retired MAGA patriarch Louie descends into an alcoholic spiral and his liberal, queer, bookseller daughter Lulu responds, in a clumsy attempt to save her father from himself, by taking him to court to seize control over his finances. Told by Louie, Lulu, and Helen — who is watching in horror from the great beyond — this is the tale of a trio with very different takes on the messy events of 2019.

A story in in praise of a woman, a fighter, a survivor from the award-winning French-Moroccan novelist known as one of the first openly gay Arab writers, and for his novels humanising North Africa’s otherwise marginalised characters — including trans and gay people in a world where being LGBTQ+ can be a dangerous act.

Three moments in the life of Malika, a Moroccan countrywoman. From 1954 to 1999. From French colonisation to the death of King Hassan II. It is her voice we hear in Abdellah Taia’s stunning new novel, translated by Emma Ramadan, who won the PEN Translation Prize. Malika’s first husband was sent by the French to fight in Indochina. In the 1960s, in Rabat, she does everything possible to prevent her daughter Khadija from becoming a maid in a rich French woman’s villa. The day before the death of Hassan II, a young homosexual thief, Jaafar, enters her home and wants to kill her.

Since the death of his brother, veteran dairy farmer George has been struggling to keep the family business afloat. His troubles only worsen when animal rights activists descend on his cowshed one morning, to film content for their social media. The fallout is unprecedented, especially as George’s youngest child appears to side with the activists. As the family navigate the real-world consequences of going viral, George’s elderly mother sleepwalks back to her youth, and a secret she has carried with her for decades one that could change everything for them all.

The Book of Joel is a captivating collection of photographs, ephemera, and posters that capture the multifaceted life and career of the 2023 Lifetime Achievement in Theatre Award, Academy Award, BAFTA Award, and Golden Globe Award winner Joel Grey. Become immersed in captivating familial snapshots from Grey’s childhood, images from early El Rancho days, and photographs from the productions of Goodtime Charley, Fiddler on the Roof, and Grey’s original Cabaret.

If you’ve got a penchant for slow-burn romantasies, The Prince’s Heart is your next mystical must-read. In the heart of Soeria, where royal bloodlines carve the paths of destiny, Prince Darien Garros, the kingdom’s beloved second son, faces the age-old clash between duty and desire. For years, Darien has dodged the court’s expectations to find a suitable match, yearning instead for a love that values the man behind the crown. His longing seems answered in Tag Leara, whose charm and genuine affection ignite a hope Darien dared not admit. A sudden tragedy propels Darien into a role he never sought, and suddenly every choice comes a price, and Darien must decide: Will he follow the stringent demands of royalty, or will he choose the perilous path of love?

Serial Killer Support Group is a queer feminist thriller and a cunning homage to women’s wrongs… When Cyra Griffin’s younger sister is murdered by a serial killer, Cyra knows better than to expect justice from the hands of the police department. Using insider information (don’t ask) Cyra infiltrates a support group for serial killers by pretending to be one herself in the hopes of finding the person who ended her sister’s life. Proving herself to them comes at a cost, but it’s one Cyra is willing to pay in the name of revenge.

A powerful follow-up to the Governor General’s Literary Award shortlisted sulphurtongue. antibody is a protest, a whisper network, a reclamation of agency, and a ritual for building a survivable world.

antibody mobilises body horror as resistance, refusing to sanitise the atrocities of sexual violence or to silence its survivors. Challenging myths of “perfect” victimhood, this collection honours the messy, rageful, queer, witchy, disabled, and kinky grief work of enduring trauma and learning to want to live.

The term “ally” is thrown around a lot, but increasingly people are questioning what it truly means to be an ally to the LGBTQIA+ community? NV Gay’s The Queer Allies Bible sets out to answer this question. A necessary book in the present climate, this is a multi-generational resource designed to educate people to be inclusive, accepting, and affirming LGBTQIA+ allies.

An antidote to the growing wave of transphobia spreading across media and legislation, Trans Kids, Our Kids is designed to be a go-to resource for trans youth, their families and allies. Jasmine Beach-Ferrara, Adam Polaski & Alexis Stratton share the stories of America’s transgender youth and their families, exploring the choices they are making to survive in today’s environment. Trans Kids, Our Kids also gives voice to the medical providers who are providing care to transgender youth, as well as the activists, teachers and faith leaders who are leading the resistance efforts.

By the mid-1980s, Holly Woodlawn, once lauded by George Cukor for her performance in the 1970 Warhol production and Paul Morrissey directed Trash, was washed up. Over. Kaput. But a chance meeting with a starry-eyed gay writer Jeff Copeland changes the course of both their lives forever. In Love You Madly, Holly Woodlawn, Copeland revisits their story and writes a stunning portrait of a trans legend who loved deeply, laughed loudly, and left mayhem in her wake.

1972. On a quiet summer night in Newcastle, Australia, two teenage girls must each make a choice: to act upon their desires or suppress them? To live an openly queer life or to try desperately not to?

Over the following three decades, these girls grow into women and live out their decisions, always almost crossing paths at pivotal moments. In an era that spans Australia’s first Mardi Gras and the AIDS pandemic, there is joy and grief and loss and desire for each of them — but will their lives ever collide? A Language of Limbs offers an intimate portrait of queer bodies, art, heartbreak, joy and the unseen connections that bind us.