6 books like Desert of the Heart
Olivia
“Considered one of the most subtle and beautifully written lesbian novels of the century, this 1949 classic returns to print in a Cleis Press edition. Dorothy Strachey’s classic Olivia captures the awakening passions of an English adolescent sent away for a year to a small finishing school outside Paris. The innocent but watchful Olivia develops an infatuation for her headmistress, Mlle. Julie,…
Shares: LGBTQ fiction before Stonewall, Lesbians, Identity
Strangers in paradise
Years before David met Katchoo, he was a ruthless gang member named Yousaka Takahashi who was destined to head the American Yukuza. One day, he discovered guilt and remorse, and started down the path that would make him a mild-mannered artist named David.
Shares: Lesbians, Identity, Interpersonal relations
Dusty Answer
Dusty Answer is English author Rosamond Lehmanns first novel, published in 1927. She sent it unsolicited to publishers Chatto & Windus, which agreed to publish it, saying it showed "decided quality".http://anokatony.wordpress.com/2010/09/19/rosamond-lehmann-and-the-publication-of-%E2%80%9Cdusty-answer%E2%80%9D/ anokatony.wordpress.com] It went unnoticed on initial publication but then received an…
Shares: LGBTQ fiction before Stonewall, Lesbians
Carmilla
First published as a serial in The Dark Blue (1871–72), Carmilla is narrated by a young woman preyed upon by a female vampire named Carmilla, later revealed to be Mircalla, Countess Karnstein (Carmilla is an anagram of Mircalla). The character is a prototypical example of the lesbian vampire, expressing romantic desires toward the protagonist. The novella notably never acknowledges homosexuality…
Shares: LGBTQ fiction before Stonewall, Lesbians
Tea
On a spring day in 1968, eight-year-old Isabel Gold prepares tea for her mother, certain she will drink it and recover from her mysterious sadness. But the tea remains untouched. Not long after, her mother takes her own life. Struggling to understand the ghost her mother left behind, Isabel grows up trying on new identities. Her yearning for an emotional connection finds her falling in and out of…
Shares: Lesbians, Identity
The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells
After the death of her beloved twin brother, Felix, and the break up with her long-time lover, Nathan, Greta Wells embarks on a radical psychiatric treatment to alleviate her suffocating depression. But the treatment has unexpected effects, and Greta finds herself transported to the lives she might have had if she'd been born in a different era.
Shares: Identity, Interpersonal relations