Bee's Books | "Books are all the same now."

"Books are all the same now."

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Wronggggggg.

Now, we can have a conversation about how publishing house conglomerates and the trend-led mass-market led by an overwhelming white, straight, etc, majority creates a homogeneity of stories...sure. We can talk about that all day long.

But if we do, we also need to talk about how consumers drive that market, and how our choices -- on social media feeds, on review platforms, at the bookstore -- make an impact on those publishing trends. That, I think, is a more interesting conversation.

Because if we put in the effort to follow book reviewers from a diversity of perspectives, to support indie and underrepresented authors, to review the books we read with critical self-reflection, to support our local book vendors, libraries, etc...then we will find a huge, wide world of weird and wonderful literature just waiting for its audience. And in doing so, we can make an impact on publishing as a whole, too.

So, here are a few unique books that I think you might love, featuring cannibalistic nuns, Faustian bargains, shape-shifting mermaids, talking animals, alternate futures, parasitic aliens, swampcore haunted cabins, cryptids, and more.

• Herculine by Grace Byron: an all Trans girls commune haunted by demons.
• The Reformatory by Tanarive Due: a segregated reform school and the evil inside.
• Wife Shaped Bodies by Laura Cranehill: the trad wives are sprouting mushrooms.
• A Dark and Drowning Tide by Allison Saft: a dark academia quest for a magic spring.
• Sky Full of Elephants by Cebo Campbell: a new world where all the white people have disappeared.
• The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones: A Blackfeet vampire seeking vengeance.
• The Starving Saints by Caitlin Starling: a medieval castle under siege and the cannibalistic fever dream that unfolds inside.
• What We Feed to the Manticore by Talia Lakshmi Kolluri: a collection of compelling short stories all told from the perspectives of animals.
• After Love by Tanya Byrne: a fantastical lesbian love story that literally transcends death itself.
• Green Fuse Burning by Tiffany Morris: a grief-stricken Indigenous artist who arrives at a cabin in a remote, swampy forest, before strange things start to happen.
• Fate's Bane by CL Clark: sword-wielding, star-crossed lovers from rival clans, inspired by Celtic folklore.
• As Many Souls as Stars by Natasha Siegel: a Faustian Bargain between a witch and a demon, and their game of cat-and-mouse that spans multiple lifetimes.
• A Feast for the Eyes by Alex Crespo: four teenagers hunting the local cryptic that feeds on secrets.
• They Bloom at Night by Trang Thanh Tran: a red algae bloom causes strange mutations in a small Louisiana town.
• The Seep by Chana Porter: a parasitic alien invasion that creates a strange utopia, and one woman's quest to stop its spread.
• The Gloaming by Kirsty Logan: a hungry sea, a family beset by grief, and a strange woman who climbs up from the water.

Happy reading!

-B

Recommendations for Readers

Queer Body Horror:

• Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon
• Hell Followed With Us by Andrew Joseph White
• Wife Shaped Bodies by Laura Cranehill
• What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher
• Providence Girls by Morgan Dante

Vengeful Vampire Romantics:

• Hungerstone by Kat Dunn
• Thirst by Marina Yuszczuk
• Immortal Dark by Tigest Girma
• A Dowry of Blood by S.T. Gibson
• Interview with the Vampire TV Series
• A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night Film

Radical Hopefulness:

• The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers
• The Parable of the Sower & The Parable of the Talents by Octavia Butler
• The Dispossessed by Ursula Le Guin
• A Psalm for the Wild-Built & A Prayer for the Crown-Shy by Becky Chambers

Very Niche Non-Fiction:

• Gathering Moss by Robin Wall Kimmerer
• Queer Palestine and the Empire of Critique by Sa’ed Atshan
• Plucked by Rebecca Herzig
• Abolish Rent by Tracy Rosenthal and Leonardo Vilchis
• Black in Blues by Imani Perry
• Rogue Sexuality in Early Modern English Literature by Ari Friedlander

Weird Genre-Benders:

• The Seep by Chana Porter
• Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield
• Severance by Ling Ma
• Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
• Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi