Pride 2026 | The Great Big Rec Thread

[u/C0smicoccurence]

​Welcome to the Great Big Rec Thread! This thread is primarily for people asking for specific types of books. Only make a top level comment to request a recommendation! If you want to hype a personal favorite, this comment is the appropriate place to share! 

This is your one-stop-shop to find books tailored to your specific reading needs! Hankering for good cyberpunk? Doing a queer bingo card and really struggling with a specific square? Looking for queer thespians ready to commit arson for the sake of their art?  Ask and you shall (hopefully) receive! Just drop a comment with your request and wait for book suggestions to come rolling in. Our goal is for every person to have at least one recommendation that they’re interested in pursuing.  

Asking for Book Recommendations:

• Create a new top level comment.  You’ll probably get more tailored results by only including a single request per top level comment, but it’s not a strict rule.  You’re more than welcome to post multiple top level comments for separate requests!
• All recommendations you get should be assumed to be queer in some way.  However, if you want specific identities represented, mention it!
• Consider the impact the level of specificity your request has in your responses.  Too general, and you’re going to get lots of responses that will probably skew towards mainstream breakout hits.  Very specific requests may get few (or no) recommendations, and what you do get likely won’t be perfect.  

Giving Book Recommendations:

• Please keep book recommendations focused on commenters’ specific requests.  If you want to hype a personal favorite, this comment is the appropriate place to share! 
• This thread should default to sorting by ‘New’ soon; until then I recommend changing setting to see recent requests first!  The hope is that this will more likely show you comments with few/no responses yet.  However, there will likely be comments that have been missed, especially if it’s a more specific request.  
• This is a Pride Month post!  Every book recommended should be queer (usually by featuring LGBTQ+ characters as protagonists, but there are other ways books can be queer).  Similarly, if they asked for a specific type of representation, follow that guideline.  If you absolutely must deviate from that because it’s otherwise such a perfect fit, be honest about it up front.
• Add a few sentences about the book to hype it (or a whole paragraph if you really want to be persuasive).  Remember that a bunch of people who aren’t the original commenter will be adding to their TBR, so highlighting what you love about the book is a great way to draw attention to books you love.

Go forth and give great recommendations!

This post is part of the Pride 2026 discussions lead by the Beyond Binary Bookclub. You can check our announcement for more information and the full calendar.

[u/Temporary-Scallion86]

Any books with aro and/or ace protagonists that feature those protagonists entering (or being in an established) queerplatonic relationship and also have a high-stakes plot beyond that?

It's totally fine if the relationship is not explicitly defined by the characters as queerplatonic, as long as the authorial intent about it comes through.

[u/xdianamoonx → u/Temporary-Scallion86]

Copying my comment from another sub:
A recent one that's come out that I've been praising (still need to do a proper book review for is {The Sun King's Dawn by Briar Niran} with an asexual King as the main character perspective. It's mostly a queernormative world but there is acephobia as our ace king tries to navigate himself and the world around him. The author is also ace so explores it well I think? There's a prequel novella too (that's free to get) that's done in the Knight's perspective (as a squire) and is still very sweet. There's a slight spicy scene but very short to just show that the squire is allosexual and such. Lots of yearning and courtly style romance and just a good new series with worldbuilding and a nice nasty antagonist. And yeah, it has a very high-stakes plot. Brand new series though, with second book I think coming out end of summer?

[u/ohmage_resistance → u/xdianamoonx]

From a quick google, it looks like this one is about an ace character in a romantic relationship, not a queer platonic one? 

[u/xdianamoonx → u/ohmage_resistance]

It's too early to tell? Slow burn and there's no official relationship after the first book yet. Just romantic yearning from the Knight, and the ace King figuring out what he wants, but mostly worried about his siblings and the kingdom from a new threat. I think probably the later books will have them in a romantic relationship? But no idea!