June is LGBTQ+ Pride Month, commemorating the 1969 Stonewall Uprising and celebrating the LGBTQ+ community. All children should feel represented in their classroom library, and it’s important to expose students to many points of view. The following is a list of titles recommended by our Collection Development experts to provide your students with a window into the LGBTQ+ perspective!

1. Ziggy, Stardust, And Me
by James Brandon

Interest level: 9-12
The year is 1973. The Watergate hearings are in full swing. The Vietnam War is still raging. And homosexuality is still officially considered a mental illness. In the midst of these trying times is sixteen-year-old Jonathan Collins, a bullied, anxious, asthmatic kid, who aside from an alcoholic father and his sympathetic neighbor and friend Starla, is completely alone. To cope, Jonathan escapes to the safe haven of his imagination, where his hero David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust guides him through the rough terrain of his life. In his alternate reality, Jonathan can be anything: a superhero, an astronaut, Ziggy Stardust, himself or completely “normal” and not a boy who likes other boys. When he completes his treatments, he will be normal—at least he hopes. But before that can happen, Web stumbles into his life. Web is everything Jonathan wishes he could be: fearless, fearsome and, most importantly, not ashamed of being gay. Web is the first person in the real world to see Jonathan completely and think he’s perfect. A poignant coming-of-age tale, Ziggy, Stardust and Me heralds the arrival of a stunning and important new voice in YA.

2. Zenobia July
by Lisa Bunker

Interest level: 5-10
The critically acclaimed author of Felix Yz crafts a bold, heartfelt story about a trans girl solving a cyber mystery and coming into her own. Zenobia July is starting a new life. She used to live in Arizona with her father; now she’s in Maine with her aunts. She used to spend most of her time behind a computer screen, improving her impressive coding and hacking skills; now she’s coming out of her shell and discovering a community of friends at Monarch Middle School. People used to tell her she was a boy; now she’s able to live openly as the girl she always knew she was. When someone anonymously posts hateful memes on her school’s website, Zenobia knows she’s the one with the abilities to solve the mystery, all while wrestling with the challenges of a new school, a new family and coming to grips with presenting her true gender for the first time. Timely and touching, Zenobia July is, at its heart, a story about finding home.

3. Bloom
by Kevin Panetta

Interest level: 9-12
Now that high school is over, Ari is dying to move to the big city with his ultra-hip band, if he can just persuade his dad to let him quit his job at their struggling family bakery. Though he loved working there as a kid, Ari cannot fathom a life wasting away over rising dough and hot ovens. But while interviewing candidates for his replacement, Ari meets Hector, an easygoing guy who loves baking as much as Ari wants to escape it. As they become closer over batches of bread, love is ready to bloom, that is, if Ari doesn’t ruin everything. Writer Kevin Panetta and artist Savanna Ganucheau concoct a delicious recipe of intricately illustrated baking scenes and blushing young love, in which the choices we make can have terrible consequences, but the people who love us can help us grow.

4. They Both Die at the End
by Adam Silvera

Interest level: 9-12
On September 5, a little after midnight, Death-Cast calls Mateo Torrez and Rufus Emeterio to give them some bad news: They’re going to die today. Mateo and Rufus are total strangers, but, for different reasons, they’re both looking to make a new friend on their End Day. The good news: There’s an app for that. It’s called the Last Friend, and through it, Rufus and Mateo are about to meet up for one last great adventure—to live a lifetime in a single day. In the tradition of Before I Fall and If I Stay, They Both Die at the End is a tour de force from acclaimed author Adam Silvera, whose debut, More Happy Than Not, the New York Times called “profound.”

5. Pride: The Story of Harvey Milk and the Rainbow Flag
by Rob Sanders

Interest level: K-3
The very first picture book about the remarkable and inspiring story of the gay pride flag! In this deeply moving and empowering true story, young readers will trace the life of the gay pride flag, from its beginnings in 1978 with social activist Harvey Milk and designer Gilbert Baker to its spanning of the globe and its role in today’s world. Award-winning author Rob Sanders’s stirring text, and acclaimed illustrator Steven Salerno’s evocative images, combine to tell this remarkable story. A story of love, hope, equality and pride.

6. Pride: The Celebration and The Struggle
by Robin Stevenson

Interest level: 4-7
This revised, updated and expanded edition of the award-winning book Pride: Celebrating Diversity & Community (2016) celebrates the LGBTQ+ community’s diversity, the incredible victories of the past fifty years and the voices of young activists. Plus it has a larger focus on activism, the need to keep fighting for equality and freedom around the world and the important role that young people are playing. The new edition has been updated and expanded to include many new proud moments and queer facts as well as a profile of LGBTQ+ refugees from Indonesia, a story about a Pride celebration in a refugee camp in Kenya and profiles of young activists, including teens from a GSA organizing Pride in Inuvik and a trans girl from Vancouver fighting for inclusion and support in schools. There is also a section on being an ally, a profile of a family with two gay dads (one of them trans) and much, much more!

7. Redwood & Ponytail
by K.A. Holt

Interest level: 5-9
Told in verse in two voices, with a chorus of fellow students, this is a story of two girls, opposites in many ways, who are drawn to each other; Kate appears to be a stereotypical cheerleader with a sleek ponytail and a perfectly polished persona, Tam is tall, athletic and frequently mistaken for a boy, but their deepening friendship inevitably changes and reveals them in ways they did not anticipate.

8. Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out
by Susan Kuklin

Interest level: 9-12
A groundbreaking work of LGBT literature takes an honest look at the life, love and struggles of transgender teens. Author and photographer Susan Kuklin met and interviewed six transgender or gender-neutral young adults and used her considerable skills to represent them thoughtfully and respectfully before, during and after their personal acknowledgment of gender preference. Portraits, family photographs and candid images grace the pages, augmenting the emotional and physical journey each youth has taken. Each honest discussion and disclosure, whether joyful or heartbreaking, is completely different from the other because of family dynamics, living situations, gender and the transition these teens make in recognition of their true selves.

9. Heather Has Two Mommies
by Leslea Newman, illustrated by Laura Cornell

Interest level: P-2
Heather loves the number two because she has two mommies, but when she realizes she doesn’t have a daddy, she learns that all families are different, and all families are special.

10. Stella Brings the Family
by Miriam B. Schiffer, illustrated by Holly Clifton Brown

Interest level: P-2
Stella’s class is having a Mother’s Day celebration, but what’s a girl with two daddies to do? It’s not that she doesn’t have someone who helps her with her homework or tucks her in at night. Stella has her Papa and Daddy who take care of her, and a whole gaggle of other loved ones who make her feel special and supported every day. She just doesn’t have a mom to invite to the party. Fortunately, Stella finds a unique solution to her party problem in this sweet story about love, acceptance and the true meaning of family.

11. Who Was Harvey Milk?
by Corinne A. Grinapol, illustrated by Gregory Copeland

Interest level: 3-7
Learn about one of the most influential leaders in the fight for gay rights. Although he started out as a teacher without aspirations to be an activist or politician, Harvey Milk found himself captivated by the history-making movements of the 1960s. He would eventually make history of his own by becoming the first openly gay elected politician in California. While in office, Harvey Milk advocated for equal rights for the gay community. Even though his life and career were cut short, Harvey is still seen by many as one of the most famous and most significantly open LGBT officials ever elected in the United States. His life and legacy continue to inspire and unite the community.

12. Kiss Number 8
by Colleen AF Venable, illustrated by Ellen T. Crenshaw

Interest level: 9-12
A layered, funny, sharp-edged story of teen sexuality and family secrets. Mads is pretty happy with her life. She goes to church with her family and minor league baseball games with her dad. She goofs off with her best friend Cat and has thus far managed to avoid getting kissed by Adam, the boy next door. It’s everything she hoped high school would be, until all of a sudden, it’s not. Her dad is hiding something big—so big it could tear her family apart. And that’s just the beginning of her problems: Mads is starting to figure out that she doesn’t want to kiss Adam—because the only person she wants to kiss is Cat. Just like that, Mads’s tidy little life has gotten messy and heartbreaking. And when your heart is broken, it takes more than an awkward, uncomfortable, tooth-clashing, friendship-ending kiss to put things right again. It takes a whole bunch of them.

13. Carry On
by Rainbow Rowell

Interest level: 9-12
Simon Snow is the worst Chosen One who’s ever been chosen. That’s what his roommate, Baz, says. And Baz might be evil and a vampire and a complete git, but he’s probably right. Half the time, Simon can’t even make his wand work, and the other half, he starts something on fire. His mentor’s avoiding him, his girlfriend broke up with him, and there’s a magic-eating monster running around, wearing Simon’s face. Baz would be having a field day with all this, if he were here—it’s their last year at the Watford School of Magicks, and Simon’s infuriating nemesis didn’t even bother to show up.

14. The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue
by Mackenzi Lee

Interest level: 9-12
An unforgettable tale of two friends on their Grand Tour of 18th-century Europe who stumble upon a magical artifact that leads them from Paris to Venice in a dangerous manhunt, fighting pirates, highwaymen and their feelings for each other along the way.

15. The Stonewall Riots: Coming Out in the Streets
by Gayle E. Pitman

Interest level: 5-12
This book is about the Stonewall Riots, a series of spontaneous, often violent demonstrations by members of the gay (LGBTQ+) community in reaction to a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. The Riots are attributed as the spark that ignited the LGBTQ+ movement. The author describes American gay history leading up to the Riots, the Riots themselves, and the aftermath and includes her interviews of people involved or witnesses, including a woman who was ten at the time. Profusely illustrated, the book includes contemporary photos, newspaper clippings, and other period objects. A timely and necessary read, The Stonewall Riots helps readers to understand the history and legacy of the LGBTQ+ movement.
Find collections that speak to the philosophy of Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop:
“Books are sometimes windows, offering views of worlds that may be real or imagined, familiar or strange. These windows are also sliding glass doors, and readers have only to walk through in imagination to become part of whatever world has been created or recreated by the author. When lighting conditions are just right, however, a window can also be a mirror. Literature transforms human experience and reflects it back to us, and in that reflection we can see our own lives and experiences as part of a larger human experience. Reading, then, becomes a means of self-affirmation, and readers often seek their mirrors in books.”
What other books with LGBTQ+ themes do your students love? Tell us in the comments below!