10 Queer Love Stories To Read This Valentines Day
- Proud Geek
- Feb 1, 2021
- 6 min read
1. BINGO LOVE (Graphic novel)
Queer Rep: Queer Women
Bingo Love is a story of a same-sex romance that spans over 60 years. A chance meeting at church bingo in 1963 brings Hazel Johnson and Mari McCray together. Through their formative years, these two women develop feelings for each other and finally profess their love for one another.
Forced apart by their families and society, Hazel and Mari both married young men and had families. Decades later, now in their mid 60’s, Hazel and Mari are reunited again at a bingo hall. Realizing their love for each other is still alive, what these grandmothers do next takes absolute strength and courage.
From TEE FRANKLIN (NAILBITER’s “THE OUTFIT,” Love is Love) and JENN ST-ONGE (Jem & the Misfits), BINGO LOVE is a touching story of love, family, and resiliency that spans over 60 years.
Buy it HERE
2. CHECK, PLEASE! BOOK 1: HOCKEY (Graphic novel)
Queer Rep: Queer Men
Eric Bittle is a former Georgia junior figure skating champion, vlogger extraordinaire, and amateur patissier. But as accomplished as he is, nothing could prepare him for his freshman year of playing hockey at the prestigious Samwell University in Samwell, Massachusetts. It's nothing like co-ed club hockey back in the South! For one? There's checking.
Second, there is Jack - his very attractive but moody captain. A collection of the first half of the mega-popular webcomic series of the same name, Check, Please!: # Hockey is the first in a hilarious and stirring two-volume coming-of-age story about hockey, bros, and trying to find yourself during the best four years of your life.
Buy it HERE
3. DREAM DADDY DATING SIMULATOR (Graphic novel)
Queer rep: Queer Men
Oni Press presents Dream Daddy, a comics series based on the acclaimed Game Grumps visual novel video game!
Dream Daddy: A Dad Dating Simulator invites the player to Maple Bay, where they play as a single Dad new to town and eager to romance other hot Dads. The comic series tells five standalone stories, each focused on different Maple Bay Dads, their kids, and their relationships with one another. Dive into entirely new stories featuring the backstories and adventures of your favourite Dads, told by game co-creators Leighton Gray and Vernon Shaw, along with the comic industry's top indie talent like C. Spike Trotman, Josh Trujillo, and Kris Anka!
Buy it HERE
4. THE FALLING IN LOVE MONTAGE (Paperback)
Queer rep: Queer Women
Seventeen-year-old Saoirse has finished with exams and is facing a long hot summer before uni. She plans to party, get drunk, watch horror movies and forget all her troubles by kissing girls. Ever since the breakup with her ex Hannah, she's been alone and angry, dealing with the hole left in her family by her sick mother's absence.
Worse, Dad drops a bombshell: he's remarrying at the end of the summer. Enter the scene: Ruby, who might just be the prettiest girl Saoirse's ever seen. A rom-com fan and a believer in true love, Ruby challenges cynical Saoirse to try a summer romance with the serious parts left out, just like in the movies.
Buy it HERE
5. HEARTSTOPPER (Graphic novel)
Queer rep: Queer Men
An LGBTQ+ graphic novel about life, love, and everything that happens in between - for fans of The Art of Being Normal, Holly Bourne and Love, Simon. 'Absolutely delightful. Sweet, romantic, kind.
Charlie and Nick are at the same school, but they've never met ... until one day when they're made to sit together. They quickly become friends, and soon Charlie is falling hard for Nick, even though he doesn't think he has a chance. But love works in surprising ways, and Nick is more interested in Charlie than either of them realised. Heartstopper is about love, friendship, loyalty and mental illness.
It encompasses all the small stories of Nick and Charlie's lives that together make up something larger, which speaks to all of us. 'The queer graphic novel we wished we had at high school.' Gay times this is the first volume of Heartstopper, which has now been optioned for television by See-Saw Films.
Buy it HERE
6. JACK OF HEARTS AND OTHER PARTS (Paperback)
Queer rep: Queer Men
Meet Jack Rothman. He's seventeen and loves partying, makeup and boys - sometimes all at the same time. His sex life makes him the hot topic for the high school gossip machine. But who cares? Like Jack always says, 'it could be worse'.
He doesn't actually expect that to come true.
But after Jack starts writing an online sex advice column, the mysterious love letters he's been getting take a turn for the creepy. Jack's secret admirer knows everything: where he's hanging out, who he's sleeping with, who his mum is dating. They claim they love Jack, but not his unashamedly queer lifestyle. They need him to curb his sexuality, or they'll force him.
As the pressure mounts, Jack must unmask his stalker before their obsession becomes genuinely dangerous...
Buy it HERE
7. JONESY (Graphic novel)
Queer rep: Queer Women
A sarcastic teenager with the powers of cupid unleashes her preternatural matchmaking abilities on her school with hilarious and charming results. Jonesy is a self-described "cool dork" who spends her time making zines nobody reads, watching anime, and listening to riot grrrl bands and 1D simultaneously. But she has a secret nobody knows.
She has the power to make people fall in love! Anyone. With anything. She's a cupid in plaid.
With a Tumblr. There's only one catch-it doesn't work on herself. She's gonna have to find love the old-fashioned way, and in the meantime, figure out how to distract herself from the real emotions she inevitably has to face when her powers go wrong...
Written by Sam Humphries and illustrated by Caitlin Rose Boyle, this charming tale is sure to appeal to romantics and cynics alike.
Buy it HERE
8. LOVELESS (Paperback)
Queer rep: Queer & Asexual Women
Georgia has never been in love, never kissed anyone, never even had a crush - but as a fanfic-obsessed romantic she's sure she'll find her person one day. As she starts university with her best friends, Pip and Jason, in a whole new town far from home, Georgia's ready to find romance, and with her outgoing roommate on her side and a place in the Shakespeare Society, her 'teenage dream' is in sight. But when her romance plan wreaks havoc amongst her friends, Georgia ends up in her own comedy of errors, and she starts to question why love seems so easy for other people but not for her. With new terms thrown at her - asexual, aromantic - Georgia is more uncertain about her feelings than ever. Is she destined to remain loveless? Or has she been looking for the wrong thing all along? This wise, warm and witty story of identity and self-acceptance sees Alice Oseman on towering form as Georgia and her friends discover that true love isn't limited to romance
Buy it HERE
9. THE ONE HUNDRED NIGHTS OF HERO (Graphic novel)
Queer rep: Queer Women
In the tradition of The Arabian Nights, a
beautifully illustrated tapestry of folk tales and myths about the secret legacy of female storytellers in an imagined medieval world.
In the Empire of Migdal Bavel, Cherry is married to Jerome, a wicked man who makes a diabolical wager with his friend Manfred: if Manfred can seduce Cherry in one hundred nights, he can have his castle--and Cherry.
But what Jerome doesn't know is that Cherry is in love with her maid Hero. The two women hatch a plan: Hero, a member of the League of Secret Story Tellers, will distract Manfred by regaling him with a mesmerizing tale each night for 100 nights, keeping him at bay. Those tales are beautifully depicted here, touching on themes of love and betrayal and loyalty and madness.
As intricate and richly imagined as the works of Chris Ware, and leavened with a dry wit that rivals Kate Beaton's in Hark! A Vagrant, Isabel Greenberg's One Hundred Nights of Hero will capture readers' hearts and minds, taking them through a magical medieval world
Buy it HERE
10. SUPER SEXY FUN TIMES (Graphic novel)
Queer rep: Queer Men, Queer Women & Trans Men
Cartoonist Meredith McClaren (Hinges) tells five short, sexy stories featuring superheroes, supervillains, sidekicks, and the people who love them. Showing consent and character-driven erotic relationships, Super Fun Sexy Times answers the age-old question: what happens when the mask comes off?
Two sidekicks on opposite sides get stuck in an underground lab together and find a great way to pass the time. A tactician and superhero discuss their desires, limits, and kinks before their first time, and perhaps get a little too excited in the process. A pair of supervillains explore gender and sex together while growing closer in their relationship. Lesbian heroes try out a kinky roleplaying scenario and discover how to make it work for both of them. And an exhausted assassin relaxes after a long day with the kind (yet firm) attentions of his husband.
Told with care, sex-positivity, and humour, and featuring a wide variety of sexualities and bodies, Super Fun Sexy Times aims to create an erotic reading experience that lives up to its name!
Buy it HERE
Have you read any of these queer love stories? Have we missed your favourite? Let us know what your favourite queer love stories are in the comments below:
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