Diverse Books We Needed: A Roundtable and (Sort of) Rec List
Happy We Need Diverse Books Day! We had a chat with our rec list contributors about which books we’ve read that helped us – books with diverse representation that helped us better understand ourselves in ways we wouldn’t have if these books didn’t exist, if they’d been banned, if they hadn’t found their ways into our hands. Note that we openly acknowledge that a few of these may be “problematic” or not current (whereas others are definitely very progressive!) – some of these are books we read a long time ago, and what we needed then wouldn’t be the same as what someone would need now, and that’s okay!
Which books with representation helped you and how?
Nina Waters: Two spring to mind for me. Both of these are books I read in the mid 1990s when I was a teenager in high school.
Knight of Ghosts and Shadows by Mercedes Lackey and Ellen Guon. I didn’t particularly enjoy where this series went after book 1, but the first book introduced me to the concept I now know as “the only solution to a love triangle is poly.” I’d never really encountered polyamory before I read this book? It was delightfully refreshing for teen!me that the solution to “will he pick a relationship with the woman or the man?” wasn’t “of course he’ll pick the woman, because no stories get to be queer in the mid 1990s,” but was in fact, “¿por qué no los dos?” It was just so wonderful. They got be poly. Poly exists. I learned so much.
The Deed of Paksenarrion by Elizabeth Moon. I had so much trouble finding books with Strong Female Characters who were actually, like, the kind of person I wanted to be. Paks meant so much to me. I started doing distance walking just to emulate her. I read this as a teenager; finding out in my 30s that a lot of people headcanon Paks as asexual was also like. Damn. Young!me knew, even when I didn’t know. I had no word for this beyond, “this is a character I really like and would like to emulate,” but the pieces were all there.
Linnea Peterson: May the Best Man Win by ZR Ellor was the first book I read with autism rep that reminded me of myself. It made me feel seen in a way no book ever had, in a way I didn’t know I could be seen.
Anonymous: Sure I’ll join the party (they say, about to introduce the most depressing take you’ve ever seen). Mine is Lord of the Rings because of Frodo’s PTSD. Back when I taught primary, (tw: suicide mention) I had one of my second graders try to kill himself in my classroom. I managed to stop him and held him for an hour waiting for help. I got major PTSD from that, and seeing Frodo succeed – I mean, he saved the world!!! – and still have to leave Middle Earth because the act of saving messed him up irrevocably, yeah. I relate.
JD Rivers: Luck in the Shadows by Lynn Flewelling – It wasn’t the first queer book I had read at point but it was the first fantasy book that included (pretty much on the sidelines) a queer relationship. It hit a nerve in me.
boneturtle: I don’t know how well it holds up but for me it would be Petey by Ben Mikaelson. It was an eye opening experience to see how society treats people who are disabled, and as a young kid who was often in situations outside my control and with no one to turn to, I found a lot to relate to with the main character. It has stuck with me over the decades because it was the first book where I felt a real sense of hope and the capacity to persevere even in a situation that couldn’t be “fixed” or willed away.
Tryan A Bex: I never identified with a character with my birth name, but the first time I read a book with a character with my chosen nonbinary name it was like “hey! It’s me!” (The book was Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender)
Also, when I was studying on white privilege, The Pretty One by Keah Brown helped me see what the intersection of ableism, racism, and misogyny can look like. It was eye opening and I believe helped me to become a better person in how I interact with other people. (It was also incredibly funny at times, highly recommend.)
Shadaras: Neon Yang’s The Black Tides of Heaven is focused on a character whose gender experiences I strongly related to, which is rare because there are so many variations of nonbinary. Akeha going “idk, I guess I’ll pick [gender] because my twin is picking [gender] and I want to pick a different one to differentiate myself?” as a young person and then growing up and going “okay but I don’t really identify with this gender” and learning about nonbinary identities and claiming one for themself was delightful.
Anonymous #2: They’re hardly high art, but as an ace kid in the ’80s – ’90s the character of Jughead in the Archie comic books was a revelation to me. It’s still hard to find ace rep even today, so that was the only time I’d ever seen a character be confronted by a romance plot and respond with “no thank you.” I’d had no idea that was an option.
Shannon: Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey was the first queer-normative book I read and the heroine is bi/pan and just. Never ashamed of that. Assertive about her desires in general. And that was a big deal for me in 2003. I was young and a Very Invested Ally and couldn’t really conceive of a world that was different for queer people.
Annie on my Mind by Nancy Garden came to me around the same time and it was obviously a more grounded book but like. The idea of there being more than one girl that liked girls. In the same place. That was a big deal for me.
Tell us about the books you read that helped you better understand yourself!
