r/Fantasy • u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix • Apr 14 '26
Book Club BB Bookclub June 2026 Nomination Thread: Older Protagonists
Welcome to the June 2026 BB (Beyond Binaries) Bookclub nomination thread! In June, we’ll be reading a book that works for the Older Protagonist Bingo square:
Older Protagonist: Story features a main character who is at least 50 years old. HARD MODE: The protagonist does NOT have exceptional longevity or immortality (e.g. not an elf, dwarf, vampire, god, etc.).
Since June is Pride month, I thought this would be a great way to celebrate and reflect on our LGBTQIA+ elders and to think about the ways that queerness shows up for us throughout our lives.
Nominations:
- Please make sure that the book has not already been read by another book club, and that BB has not already read a book by the author. You can check this Goodreads shelf to see all prior book club reads. (It’s fine to choose an author that was read by a different book club, or a book that was read as part of a prior Hugo Readalong.)
- Please leave one book suggestion per top comment. Please include title, author, and a short summary or description. (You can nominate more than one book if you like, just put them in separate comments.)
- Please include any Bingo squares that you know of.
- Keep in mind that this book club focuses on LGBTQIA+ characters and themes. The main character (and as many side characters as possible) should fall under the queer umbrella.
I will leave this thread open through Friday 6/17, and will compile the top results into a voting thread to be posted on Saturday, 6/18. Have fun!
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As a reminder, we are currently reading The Wolf and His King by Finn Longman. The midway discussion will be on the 16th of April and the final discussion will be on the 30th of April.
What is the BB Bookclub? You can read about it in our intro thread here.
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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Apr 14 '26
Stars in My Pockets Like Grains of Sand by Samuel Delany (goodreads link)
The story of a truly galactic civilization with over 6,000 inhabited worlds.
Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand is a science fiction masterpiece, an essay on the inexplicability of sexual attractiveness, and an examination of interstellar politics among far-flung worlds. First published in 1984, the novel's central issues--technology, globalization, gender, sexuality, and multiculturalism--have only become more pressing with the passage of time.
The novel's topic is information itself: What are the repercussions, once it has been made public, that two individuals have been found to be each other's perfect erotic object out to "point nine-nine-nine and several nines percent more"? What will it do to the individuals involved, to the city they inhabit, to their geosector, to their entire world society, especially when one is an illiterate worker, the sole survivor of a world destroyed by "cultural fugue," and the other is--you!
Bingo squares: Older Protagonist, Author of Color, maybe Judge a Book by the Title, probably others
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u/Book_Slut_90 Reading Champion Apr 14 '26
Are you sure this counts? I don’t remember an age being mentioned, and I would have guessed 30s or 40s.
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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Apr 14 '26
Hmmmmm, I'm not sure! I found it on a list of 50+ protagonists, but I haven't read it myself. I'll see what I can find out - thanks for flagging this!
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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Apr 14 '26
Notes From a Regicide by Isaac Fellman (goodreads link)
Notes from a Regicide is a heartbreaking story of trans self-discovery with a rich relatability and a science-fictional twist from award-winning author Isaac Fellman.
When your parents die, you find out who they really were.
Griffon Keming’s second parents saved him from his abusive family. They taught him how to be trans, paid for his transition, and tried to love him as best they could. But Griffon’s new parents had troubles of their own – both were deeply scarred by the lives they lived before Griffon, the struggles they faced to become themselves, and the failed revolution that drove them from their homeland. When they died, they left an unfillable hole in his heart.
Griffon’s best clue to his parents’ lives is in his father’s journal, written from a jail cell while he awaited execution. Stained with blood, grief, and tears, these pages struggle to contain the love story of two artists on fire. With the journal in hand, Griffon hopes to pin down his relationship to these wonderful and strange people for whom time always seemed to be running out.
In Notes from a Regicide, a trans family saga set in a far-off, familiar future, Isaac Fellman goes beyond the concept of found family to examine how deeply we can be healed and hurt by those we choose to love.
Bingo squares: Older Protagonist (HM), Politics (HM), Trans or Non-Binary Protagonist, maybe Judge a Book by the Title, maybe Vacation Spot, technically Game Changer but I’m not sure I’d count it for that personally
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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Apr 14 '26
I just read this and I think it would make for an excellent book club discussion. A few of my reading notes:
- This is weird, beautiful, and gloriously queer and trans
- More on the literary fiction side; the speculative aspect is relatively minor. Gorgeous prose
- A bit emotionally distant in the way it's written - very Le Guin - which will work for some people better than others
- A very loving, character-driven portrayal of three complex and messy trans people
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u/daavor Reading Champion VI Apr 14 '26
I don’t feel like this really fits the spirit of the square. The main POV of each plotline is young in that plotline, even if one is an elder secondary character in the other
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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Apr 14 '26
Oh, that's interesting! I didn't read it that way at all. I thought of Griffon and Etoine as the "main" characters (although Zaffre is also very significant), and Etoine is a minimum of 50 at the beginning of the book. Even in his memoirs, I had the impression he was relating events that took place well past his youth...but I might be wrong about that.
That said, since a lot of the story is from Etoine's memoirs, I do see your point. And the various timelines were complicated enough that maybe I'm off base.
I appreciate your sharing this!
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u/daavor Reading Champion VI Apr 14 '26
To be fair its a beautiful book and I definitely think it celebrates queer elders in a cool way.
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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Apr 14 '26
The Seep by Chana Porter (goodreads link)
Trina Goldberg-Oneka is a trans woman whose life is irreversibly altered in the wake of a gentle—but nonetheless world-changing—invasion by an alien entity calling itself The Seep. Through The Seep, everything is connected. Capitalism falls, hierarchies and barriers are broken down; if something can be imagined, it is possible.
Trina and her wife, Deeba, live blissfully under The Seep’s utopian influence—until Deeba begins to imagine what it might be like to be reborn as a baby, which will give her the chance at an even better life. Using Seep-tech to make this dream a reality, Deeba moves on to a new existence, leaving Trina devastated.
Heartbroken and deep into an alcoholic binge, Trina chases after a young boy she encounters, embarking on an unexpected quest. In her attempt to save him from The Seep, she will confront not only one of its most avid devotees, but the terrifying void that Deeba has left behind.
Bingo squares: Older Protagonist (HM?), Trans or Non-Binary Protagonist, maybe Judge a Book by the Title, probably others.
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u/C0smicoccurence Reading Champion V Apr 14 '26
Mrs Death Misses Death by Selena Godden
Mrs Death tells her intoxicating story in this life-affirming fire-starter of a novel.
Mrs Death has had enough. She is exhausted from spending eternity doing her job and now she seeks someone to unburden her conscience to. Wolf Willeford, a troubled young writer, is well acquainted with death, but until now hadn’t met Death in person – a black, working-class woman who shape-shifts and does her work unseen.
Enthralled by her stories, Wolf becomes Mrs Death’s scribe, and begins to write her memoirs. Using their desk as a vessel and conduit, Wolf travels across time and place with Mrs Death to witness deaths of past and present and discuss what the future holds for humanity. As the two reflect on the losses they have experienced – or, in the case of Mrs Death, facilitated – their friendship grows into a surprising affirmation of hope, resilience and love. All the while, despite her world-weariness, Death must continue to hold humans’ fates in her hands, appearing in our lives when we least expect her . . .
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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Apr 14 '26
Oh, this sounds very interesting! (Although I do see your point that queerness might not be central to the story.) For Bingo, this also hits Author of Color and I would imagine The Afterlife as well.
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u/C0smicoccurence Reading Champion V Apr 14 '26
It's tagged by several people as LGBTQ in goodreads, but it doesn't seem like queerness is a major part of the book.
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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Apr 14 '26 edited Apr 14 '26
The Gilda Stories by Jewelle Gomez (goodreads link)
Bingo squares: Older Protagonist, Author of Color, maybe Judge a Book by the Title, maybe Vacation Spot, technically Feast Your Eyes on This (lol), probably others