Beowulf for Cretins

A haunting gay love story where grief becomes devotion, memory becomes myth, and a young man must choose between the ghost of his past and the truth of who he is.

With tension and heart in equal measure, Mario Elías’s Beloved Disciples is a luminous, haunting portrait of grief, devotion, and the blurred edges of memory. In a sun-bleached Caribbean town, Simón is haunted by the ghost of his lover Albi, by the weight of family, and by a faith that no longer comforts. Once bound together by whispered prayers and saltwater kisses, Simón and Albi carved a secret world from the shadows. But when Albi dies unexpectedly, that world begins to unravel.

Now, Simón finds Albi everywhere: in the rectory where they made love, in the queer sanctuaries of their found family, in the ache of things unsaid. As his estranged Catholic mother reappears with promises and expectations, Simón is torn between the love that consumes him and the version of himself he’s been running from. Past and present bleed together, memory distorts, and reality slips into something more uncertain—more sacred.

A day-in-the-life tale laced with longing, Beloved Disciples is a fevered meditation on inheritance, identity, and the desperate need to belong. For readers of Douglas Stuart’s Shuggie Bain, Fernanda Melcho’s Hurricane Season, and André Aciman’s Call Me By Your Name, this debut hums with raw beauty and tender, ruinous love.

Two girls. One celebrity crush. And a pen pal connection that just might be the real love story.

Nineteen-year-old Jay Baker is stuck. Freshly dropped out of college and floundering in her dead-end job, she’s more familiar with fictional love than the real thing—especially when it comes to her all-consuming crush on Josh Owen, the awkwardly endearing actor from the cult zombie show Undead or Alive. Nicknamed “Unrequited Love Girl” by her coworker, Jay’s convinced romance just isn’t in the cards—until she stumbles across the fanfiction account of “MrsJoshOwen.”

Enter Amber Martin: high school senior, head-over-heels Josh Owen fangirl, and the brilliant mind behind the stories that speak straight to Jay’s heart. Trapped under the weight of her family's expectations and a boyfriend who doesn’t quite understand her, Amber isn’t sure what her future holds—except that it’s probably not what everyone else is planning for her.

When Jay and Amber begin exchanging messages, their shared obsession quickly deepens into something far more real. As they open up about their fears, dreams, and everything in between, a genuine connection blossoms—one that just might turn into the kind of love they never saw coming.

At the intersection of Fangirl and She Gets the Girl, Audrey Wilson’s Dear Unrequited Love Girl is a swoony, funny, and emotionally resonant story about growing up, coming out, and discovering your person in the most unexpected way. Perfect for fans of slow-burn romance, chaotic queer crushes, and love stories written one message at a time.

Prepare for intrigue, suspense, and unforgettable twists in this groundbreaking anthology of queer crime fiction.

In 2023, crime fiction anthologies featured 517 stories across 30 titles—but shockingly, fewer than 1 percent were penned by LGBTQ+ writers. Crime Ink: Iconic (An Anthology of Crime Fiction Inspired by Famous Queer Icons) is a resounding response to this glaring disparity, offering a vibrant collection of stories by and about queer authors and characters.

Drawing inspiration from queer icons—James Baldwin, Oscar Wilde, Candy Darling, Radclyffe Hall, Babadook, Megan Rapinoe, Laverne Cox, Dolly Parton, Vita Sackville-West, and many more—these tales span the rich spectrum of crime fiction, from cozy mysteries and whodunits to noir, psychological thrillers, and police procedurals. Each story is a testament to the depth, ingenuity, and thrilling originality of queer voices in the genre.

This anthology showcases an incredible array of talent, including New York Times Best Crime Novels of 2024 honorees Margot Douaihy, Robyn Gigl, John Copenhaver, and Katrina Carrasco; Lambda Literary winners Ann Aptaker, Greg Herren, Ann McMan, and J.M. Redmann; and other celebrated writers like Cheryl Head, Penny Mickelbury, Christa Faust, and Kelly J. Ford. But that’s not all—this collection also includes many more decorated and emerging voices, ensuring a dynamic reading experience that is as inclusive as it is entertaining.

With a foreword by Ellen Hart and an afterword by Katherine V. Forrest, two luminaries of queer crime fiction, this anthology is more than a collection of stories—it’s a movement. Bursting with intrigue, twists, and unforgettable characters, Crime Ink: Iconic is essential reading for fans of crime fiction and anyone who craves representation in the stories they love.

Lambda Literary Award-winning author, Ann Aptaker's Cantor Gold faces the questions of who are her real friends, and how far would she go to avenge their deaths.

Early November, 1958

New York City

Art thief and smuggler Cantor Gold's latest underworld caper begins when she arrives at big-time bookie Nick Fortunato's apartment to celebrate his birthday, a ritual the two friends have enjoyed for years. But Nick is missing, and there’s blood on the living room carpet. It’s not Nick’s blood, though. Nick’s death still awaits him. Despite crime lord Sig Loreale’s best plans to protect Nick, with whom Sig has financial dealings, a killer finds Nick hidden away in a cheap hotel owned by Loreale.

Among the players in this tale of friendship, betrayal, and the competition for power between the young and the aging, is the beautiful and possibly deadly Abbey O’Brien. She was Nick’s right hand in his bookie operation, and now that he’s dead, she stands to either gain big or lose even bigger.

The operatives and bettors in Nick’s bookmaking business have a stake in Nick’s death, too…and motives to either solve his murder or get him out of the way: there’s Freddie Holmes, who sizes you up before you’re allowed entry into the betting parlor; Mike Leandro, leader of the crew that takes phoned-in bets; Chickie D’Andrea, who posts the odds from every track and sporting event; Harry “Horsehide” Lanz, a major gambler and trackside aficionado; Sylvia Georgiadis, an aging grand dame of the gambling world; and others.

Assisting Cantor, as always, are her young Guy Friday Judson Zane; cabbie, sometime getaway driver and sometime friend with benefits Rosie Bliss; and Cantor’s criminal mentor Esther “Mom” Sheinbaum.

And always circling are the cops.

Kristen Zimmer, author of The Gravity Between Us, When Sparks Fly, and Forbidden Girl takes readers on an adrenalin-fueled dystopian journey into the future where a scrappy band of rebels rise up to bring down an unequal and unrelenting government.

This is your future.

The United States of America has been gone for over a century.

In its place, The Unified American Territories—a nation divided, the impoverished and the wealthy are separated by a looming steel wall. In the Northern Territories—The Vault, as it is known by its inhabitants—the government rules with an iron fist: All citizens are tested for intelligence and aptitude, thrust into compulsory higher education and saddled with insurmountable debt. All student loans are granted and controlled by a branch of the regime called The Federal Bureau of Education. Failure to repay their debt consigns borrowers to the Knowledge Reclamation Process, a mysterious government-sanctioned brainwashing program that strips them of their education with dire mental and physical side effects.

Fletcher Daniels is a recent college graduate struggling to stay ahead of her arrears. After a visit from Reclamation Agents, she knows her life is about to change for the worse. Enter Youth Opposed to Reclamation, a scrappy band of rebels who try in their own small way to bring some relief to the people of The Vault by smuggling as many potential Reclaimees to safety as possible. When Fletcher meets and falls for fellow female YOR member, Sparrow, her world is twisted away from the one she once knew even more radically. The group offers Fletcher a chance to escape her fate, but through them, she sees the promise of bringing real change to The Vault. History has taught her that even the smallest rebellions can trigger revolutions. It’s time for history to repeat itself.

A mysterious figure. A dead televangelist. A series of bizarre rituals.

Margo has spent most of her life without a family, and with a telekinetic gift she can't quite explain. Since losing her mother less than a year ago, she's felt more alone than ever. When her fiancé Sam takes her to his remote Iowa hometown to meet his family and begin planning their wedding, Margo finally begins to feel like she's home. But the feeling doesn't last long, and Margo soon feels out of place among her future in-laws. Sam's family is different from what she'd expected. Not only is their obsession with a deceased televangelist unsettling, but Margo has begun seeing a strange, mysterious figure from her past—a figure that she thought was put to rest with her mother's passing.

As Sam's family begins to take over the wedding plans, Margo tries to regain some control by turning to the town's sole wedding planner, who soon becomes her only confidant, perhaps because she reminds Margo of her former love. But the more Margo tries to distance her past from her future with Sam, the deeper his family pulls her in, forcing upon her generationally archaic traditions that border on ritualistic. As Margo unearths the family's dark web of secrets, she begins to suspect that she may have been brought here for a reason, and it may cost her her life.

In the psychologically unsettling vein of I'm Thinking of Ending Things and The Women in the Dark, combined with the socially aware suspense of Get Out, The Ever End takes elevated horror to a new level with a queer, twisted, feminist story that will keep readers guessing until the end, and stay with them long after that.