A very gay reading list
Yeah yeah, I know everyone does these. But mine is better, and let me tell you why...
Happy Pride Month, everyone!
In this house, we’ve always believed love is love and people can express their gender or sexuality however they damn well please. My kids have been going to DragCon since before they were even born (I was so pregnant I had to buy and bring my own stool to sit on when I got tired, but we went, dammit) and we’re big proponents of everything from Drag Queen Story Hour to cultivating a wide and robust library full of books that represent people of all colors, shapes, sizes, and gender identities.
That’s why I threw together this list of some of our favorite pride-related books for this week’s newsletter. These types of lists are nothing new, but I find sometimes they just include the same books we all know, or they only include books that explicitly talk about gender and sexuality. Don’t get me wrong: That’s great! We read those, and I’m including them on this list! But it’s also great to read books about silly words and sounds and characters where the books just happen to have two cool dads as the parents, or a story where a grocer the main character stops at, let’s say, uses they/them pronouns. I think that kind of stuff is just as important as the big “message books,” since it reminds kids that we see and love all kinds of people every day, and that’s the kind of representation we want in our books, too.
Anyway, without delay:
Our favorite LGBTQIA-friendly books.
Mr. Watson’s Chickens by Jarrett Dapier
A goofy little book about a same-sex couple who get one chicken that turns into two that turn into four and so on and so on. Eventually Mr. Watson has to re-home his chickens because he loves his husband more than all of their squawks, which is probably a nice lesson too.
Bathe The Cat by Alice McGinty
Another non-specifically gender related book that’s super fun to read and just happens to feature a same-sex or gender non-conforming couple. We’ve given this one a few times for birthday gifts to kids in their class that say they like cats.
The Spectacular Suit by Kat Patrick
So, this book doesn’t come right out and say anything about sexuality or gender. It’s just a cool story about a little girl who decides she wants to wear a really Bowie-like suit to her birthday party. Who knows what that means about her other than that she likes to look cool? That being said, it’s one of those weird books that gets challenged occasionally, like in Australia where a jerk politician went after the lovely Courtney Act after she read it to kids on TV. Whatever.
Bodies Are Cool by Tyler Feder
This book is on every “books for cool parents” list, and for good reason. It rips, not just because it teaches your kid (or kids) ways to talk about their body in a really frank, supportive way, but also because there are all different types of bodies in this book, including fat people, differently abled people, people with skin conditions, old people, young people, and even people who have clearly undergone top surgery. I’m not even going to get into how hard it is to find books that include characters who are fat—and I’m not even talking about just main characters. Even ancillary characters—so Bodies Are Cool gets a ringing endorsement from me on several levels.
You Need To Chill by Juno Dawson
I’ve mentioned this one in the newsletter before, I think, but it’s a very fun, chill story about how kids keep asking where the protagonist’s brother went and the protagonist thinks it’s annoying because, sheesh, they didn’t go anywhere. They’re just her sister Lil now.
Red: A Crayon’s Story by Michael Hall
One of those “moral is buried super deep” stories where kids won’t even realize it’s about something but then you can reference it down the road and they’ll understand, Red is about a red (or blue!) crayon who just doesn’t *feel* like a red crayon, even though that’s what their label says.
Julián Is a Mermaid by Jessica Love
Everyone knows about these books, but that’s for good reason. They’re fun to read, beautifully drawn, and Julián rules.
Santa’s Husband by Daniel Kibblesmith
Who says pride only happens in the summer? This one’s a Christmas classic written by an old Onion Inc. coworker of mine. The kids love it, and Santa’s husband’s name is David.
The Hips On The Drag Queen Go Swish, Swish, Swish by Lil Miss Hot Mess
My kids are maybe a touch too old for this one now, but Lil Miss Hot Mess is one of the real voices behind Drag Queen Story Hour, where they read this book a lot, so it feels like a must-buy just morally. My kids like to look at the drawings of the different faux-queens in the back and pick out their favorites. It’s never too early to learn what makes a good drag name, I say.
Pink, Blue, and You: Questions for Kids About Gender Stereotypes by Elise Gravel
We’ll buy pretty much anything Elise Gravel puts out, this included. Parts of it can feel a little too question-packed and interactive if you’re really sitting down and trying to get through all of it with your kids at once, but if it’s something you revisit or read a few pages of at time over the course of a week, I think it would really take hold.
The Fairest In The Land by Leslea Newman
This book is about two kids who want to play princess but can’t agree who gets to be the princess and who has to be the boring knight or the dragon or whatever. One of the kids who wants to be the princess happens to be a little boy, which could make this book feel a little obvious but I like how it turns the story into a lesson about not just fairness but also possibility. Like, who says there can only be one princess in a story? Who says someone has to be the bad guy? And so on. Feels very Bluey in that sense.
Worm Loves Worm by J. J. Austrian
I think this might be one of my all-time favorites. A sweet little story about two non-gendered worms who want to get married and all they go through to make it a reality, from picking bride’s bees to figuring out how to wear the rings. Everyone’s trying to wrench them into a convention the whole time, but they just love each other and that’s all that really matters.
The Pronoun Book by Chris Ayaya-Kronos
One of my friends was telling me how much they love this book last night. They have a gender nonconforming child and it made them tear up, which is pretty high praise for a board book. And that, my friends, is why it’s on the list.
From Archie To Zack by Vincent Kirsch
We don’t read our kids a ton of stories about romance or kids who fall for each other, but I’m happy to make an exception for From Archie To Zack, which is about two let’s say 10 or 11 year olds who just really identify with each other and miss each other when they’re not around. There are notes of romance but if you’re a kid you might not get that, and then you can spin the book into an additional lesson about the power of really strong, intuitive friendship.
Grandad’s Pride by Harry Woodgate
Did y’all read Grandad’s Camper, about the grandpa who had loved and lost and couldn’t bring himself to get his old VW bus back on the road? This is the sequel, which dives a little into Grandpa’s romantic past and why we actually celebrate pride. The characters actually throw a pride parade in Grandad’s little British seaside town, too, which is cute and there are lots of drawn signs for kids to read and things to look at. Plus I always like thinking about and talking about the lives of older people with kids because I think (at least in our case) it’s very easy for kids to think they’re the only people in the world with needs, wants, or relevance, so it’s nice to remind them that grown-ups were young once too.
What’s everyone doing for the 4th?
We’re thinking of traveling up the coast to Monterey Bay to go to the Aquarium and maybe a Giants game. Working on the trip now, but if anyone has any tips, tricks, or hotels that are both cool and kid-friendly, please let me know—especially if you have hook-ups, since I might try and write about this whole she-bang.
One last thing:
I know I missed a couple of weeks of this newsletter and I apologize. I don’t really have a reason. I was sick, the kids were sick, and time just got away from me to the point where Sundays came and went. I’m going to try and be better, I swear.
P.P.S.: If you’ve watched The Bear this week, check out the episodic recaps I did for Vulture.