books like things have gotten worse since we last spoke

Tenebrous – New Weird Horror is the name of Tenebrous Press’s game, and I am here for it. From elegant, lyrical books like On Fragile Waves to YA übercool The Scapegracers, there are plenty of titles to knock off whatever kinds of socks you’re wearing.įeatured Title: Folklorn (Angela Mi Young Hur) They also do periodic open calls for new authors to contribute to their short story anthologies (like the recent collection all about Baba Yaga), which is extremely cool.įeatured Title: Little Bird (Tiffany Meuret)Įrewhon – Badass books deserve badass presses, and everything about Erewhon certainly telegraphs badassery to me.

And don’t worry, if you can’t do the high hardcover prices, they offer inexpensive ebooks, too.īlack Spot Books – The devil works hard, but Black Spot works harder-seriously, look at their extensive catalog of titles. But they also have things like Floralinda and the Forty-Flight Tower, a Tamsyn Muir book not available anywhere else. A fair number of their books are fancy editions of books you already know and love, like this elegant version of The Goblin Emperor. Subterranean Press – Sub Press is my splurge press, one that produces gorgeous, high-end hardcovers in partnership with huge names in publishing as well as with critical darlings. They also do horror, but their titles tend to be more measured, eerie stories with a lot of complex themes and often with historical settings. Wise’s The Ghost Sequences, which also has a rad-as-hell cover. Undertow – I first found Undertow because they published A. įeatured Title: Murder Ballads and Other Horrific Tales (John Hornor Jacobs)

And they know their stuff-there are multiple Bram Stoker Award-winners like The Bone Weaver’s Orchard and one of my all-time faves The Rust Maidens. Not to make a point, nor as the central point, but just queer in a real way, in its bones.Journalstone – There’s some crazy stuff in Journalstone’s catalog no matter what your taste in horror is. What I love about every book on this list is that it’s queer authentically. While it isn’t a prerequisite to my reading and enjoying one, it is nice to be thought of and represented sometimes and not only find that representation in glum books about queer struggle. I will rarely find, as a bisexual woman, a well-written genre novel that understands, explores and revels in the nuances of queer characters and queer culture.

One of the Achilles heels of most genre novels in general, though? An unquestioned heteronormativity. The definitive lines of the genre novel are relaxing, a delight to tuck into whether they play into the set formats or subvert them with deftness. What a treat it is to settle into the comfort of the tropes and structures of a genre you love the whirlwind of romances, the pace of a thriller, the intrigue of a mystery. This post originally appeared in GQ India.Īh, the genre novel.

Books like things have gotten worse since we last spoke