Best Gay Novels – My Picks

      2 Comments on Best Gay Novels – My Picks

Since so many of you have asked (ha, ha), I decided this week to post what I consider the best gay novels.  Well, at least the best ones I’ve read. I recently learned that the Publishing Triangle has a list of the 100 best gay and lesbian novels, and I’d only read eight of them.  The list leans toward older and more high brow authors like Thomas Mann and Virginia Woolf so to defend myself (or more likely incriminate myself) I tend to prefer literature that’s more accessible (read: I’m a lazy reader). But I thought the list deserved a response from a semi-educated, gay-on-the-street point of view.  I couldn’t come up with 100 titles. That would be just too pretentious. And I’m not ranking the books either. That would hurt my brain too much.

Cinnamon Gardens by Shyam Selvadurai

The Irreversible Decline of Eddie Socket by John Weir

Hey Joe! by Ben Neihart

The Burning Plain by Michael Nava

Dancing on the Tisha B’Av by Lev Raphael

Saul’s Book by Paul T. Rogers

Son of a Witch by Gregory Maguire

The Buddha of Suburbia by Hanif Kureishi

The Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving

Mysterious Skin by Scott Heim

2 thoughts on “Best Gay Novels – My Picks

  1. baby J.

    hmmm – I have heard of many of these, and I know David Bowie did a song for the Buddha of Suburbia soundtrack, but the only one I’ve read is ‘Hotel New Hampshire’, -all I remember is that the brother and sister fall in love at the end. Guess I’m a lazy reader too!!

  2. andrewandrew Post author

    Baby J – I think you’d like Buddha of Suburbia. As for Hotel New Hampshire, it’s not a gay novel with a big “G,” I’d say, but besides the taboo relationship between the sister and the brother there’s another brother who turns out to be gay and I just loved the whole unconventional family thing. Thanks for stopping by!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *