The Best Queer Books of 2026, According to Barnes and Noble

Booker Prize winner Douglas Stuart delivers John of John, one of the most highly anticipated novels of the year, about a young man who returns to his home in the Hebrides islands to reckon with the tension between his family’s expectations and his own desires. —Rebecca Schinsky

Marlon James is the Man Booker Prize-winning author of A Brief History of Seven Killings. His newest novel follows eight gay men in 1980s in Kingston, Jamaica. They met while rehearsing for a play together. One night, they are the victims of a gay bashing, and one is killed. In the aftermath, some seek revenge and some try to disappear.

The reviews of this one are effusive, including from The New York Times, which says, “This masterpiece is the novel of the decade, if not the century.” —Danika Ellis

En is the empire’s magically compelled weapon. Tamol is an incompetent foot soldier, too clever, beautiful, and magically adept for her own good. When the empire sends them to retrieve infamous traitors from exile, En and Tamol fall into an unlikely infatuation… Until En discovers Tamol is one of the traitors, too. Students with dreams of a better kingdom fought, lost, and were exiled for their beliefs. In the Far Peninsula, the traitors found something dangerous that the empire will do anything to get. Now it’s up to En and Tamol to save the kingdom, even if it means working against the people in charge. —R. Nassor

The filmmaker of I Saw the TV Glow and Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma has a genre-blending, 600-page horror novel out this year! It takes place across timelines—the 1980s, 2000s, and the present—as several point of view characters get pulled into a conspiracy about a pirate TV network called Public Access Afterworld. In the current timeline, Bethany is a trans content moderator who learns about Public Access Afterworld through a series of videos from a streamer that have her searching for answers. —Danika Ellis

After ten years, July marked the end of Heartstopper, both on the page and on the screen—the Heartstopper Forever movie came out July 17th. This final volume follows Charlie’s campaign for Head Boy and Nick’s preparation for college. Everyone knows Nick and Charlie will be together forever… but how will they navigate their relationship once Nick graduates? I’m trying to be very chill about how obsessed I currently am about Heartstopper, but suffice it to say, this beautiful celebration of queer joy and community coming to an end is bittersweet. —Danika Ellis

In this sapphic YA retelling of Sleeping Beauty, a young thief goes searching for her missing sister, who went searching for the legendary sleeping princess. The two of them stumble through a portal into the princess’s subconscious and meet her alter ego, Briar Rose, who takes them on a tour of the enchanting land, along with a magical demon. —Liberty Hardy

In this queer and asexual YA novel, all Jonathan wanted was to escape his island home after high school and go to college on the mainland with his friends. But when his application is rejected, Jonathan makes an offering to the eldritch sea-god Scorpion Deep, not really expecting it to work. Whoops. Now he’s awakened an ancient evil that is out for blood, and Jonathan begins to physically change as he tries to find a way to undo the damage before he pays with his life. —Liberty Hardy

The natural world is extremely queer. Biologist Lixing Sun explores the wide range of biodiversity on Earth when it comes to reproduction, including slime molds that have dozens of proto-sexes, lizards that can change sexes depending on temperature, and birds that can reproduce asexually. On the Origin of Sex blows up the concept that sex is binary. —Danika Ellis