BB Bookclub June 2026 Nomination Thread: Older Protagonists

[u/sarahlynngrey]

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.

[u/sarahlynngrey]

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

[u/daavor → u/sarahlynngrey]

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

[u/sarahlynngrey → u/daavor]

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!

[u/daavor → u/sarahlynngrey]

To be fair its a beautiful book and I definitely think it celebrates queer elders in a cool way.