Showing titles in LGBTQ+ Studies

A groundbreaking book exploring the breadth of history of recorded music by and for the LGBT community and how those records influenced the evolution of the music we listen to today. From Sia to Elton John, from Billie Holiday to David Bowie, LGBT musicians have changed the course of modern music. But before their music - and the messages behind it - gained understanding and a place in the mainstream, how did the queer musicians of yesteryear fight to build foundations for those who would follow them?

Becoming Us is the inspiring and at times heart-breaking memoir of Jake and Hannah Graf, the UK's most visible transgender couple and family. We follow their extraordinary paths towards the 'normality' they have always longed for, as they navigate the many challenges and pitfalls along the way.

What does it look like to be hopelessly, serially, persistently, and stubbornly in love not with someone, but with longing itself? Journalist and late-in-life virgin Amanda McCracken dated over 100 men before she realized she was addicted to longing, setting her on a 10-year journey to...

Read by the author, Ellen Jones. Despite being more visible in mainstream culture than ever before, LGBTQ+ people are facing unacceptable levels of prejudice and danger – from a marked increase in homophobic and transphobic violence, to the rollback of rights around the world. In this...

Bloomsbury presents Girlfriend Material, written and read by Rosie Turner. So, it’s finally happening. The months of sapphic back-and-forth, the over-analysis of texts, the wondering is she into me or just nice? – all leading to one terrifying, thrilling moment: an IRL meeting. Is it a date?...

Brought to you by Penguin. THE MILLION COPY BESTSELLER Paul O'Grady is one of Britain's very best loved entertainers. He is known and adored by millions, whether as the creator of the acid-tongued Blonde Bombsite, Lily Savage, the presenter of the fantastically successful, award-winning Paul...

From renowned international dating coach comes a “smart, funny, classy, and practical” (Mike Sacks, editor at Vanity Fair) dating guide for men looking to gain confidence and find lasting love in the #MeToo era. Rejection. Ghosting. Not knowing how to talk to women. For many men, dating just...

We know Will as a multi-platinum recording artist, Olivier-nominee and the first winner of the Idol franchise. But his story began long before his first audition. Looking back on a world where growing up being called gay was the ultimate insult and coming out after a lifetime of hiding his sexuality, Will explores the long-lasting impact repressing his true self has had. Here you will find a friend, champion and mentor, breaking taboos with frank honesty and offering invaluable practical advice on overcoming the difficult issues too often faced within the LGBTQ+ community.

In this honest and revealing memoir, Natalie Lee digs deep into her own relationship with sex to expose the shame that many of us feel. Taking us through her journey, from traumatic beginnings to marriage, motherhood and eventually experiencing sexual freedom after divorce in her thirties, Feeling Myself is a story of learning to be your true self in a society that doesn't prioritise your pleasure. It is a book for every woman to feel empowered by and to learn the tools to experience their own emancipation too.

'Wise, thoughtful and provocative ... An important book for our times' - Róisín Ingle 'Laura is an acute, intelligent and accurate observer and this book successfully combines psychology, philosophy and modern thinking in a fresh and vibrant way' - Brian O'Connell, journalist "I have worn a...

In 1930, William Haines was Hollywood's #1 box-office draw - a talented, handsome, and wisecracking romantic lead. Off screen, however, protected by a careful collaboration between studio and press, he was openly gay with reporters and studio chiefs alike. Here is Haines's virtually unknown story - rich with detail, revelations, and scandal - about silent movies and talkies; his lover Jimmie Shields, and their fifty-year relationship.

The Marble Faun of Grey Gardens is Jerry Torre's touching and at times haunting memoir about his teenage days as caretaker of Grey Gardens, the now-celebrated mansion chronicled in the iconic documentary Grey Gardens and two feature-length films. The book, cowritten with film historian Tony Maietta, is a behind-the-scenes look at "Big Edie" and "Little Edie" and their bizarre and reclusive life of squalor amidst the tremendous wealth of East Hampton, the family bond that developed between Jerry and them, and the day everything was turned upside down forever.

From iconic musicians Tegan and Sara comes a nostalgic memoir about high school, detailing their first loves and first songs in a compelling look back at their origin story. 'Honest and hilarious, dishy and sweet, smart and self-aware and utterly charming.' Carmen Maria Machado, author of Her...

For readers of Ace and Belly of the Beast: A Black queer feminist exploration of asexuality--and an incisive interrogation of the sex-obsessed culture that invisibilizes and ignores asexual and A-spec identity. Everything you know about sex and asexuality is (probably) wrong. The notion that...

In 2016, Debbie Hayton underwent gender reassignment surgery. Fast forward to today, and Hayton's refusal to validate the standard gender identity orthodoxy has led to excommunication by the trans activist community. What happened? Transsexual Apostate weaves an intimate account of Debbie's story into a forensic critique of trans ideology. Focussing mainly on transwomen, she examines the reality of male autogynephilia and argues that the vast majority of transwomen are men with a psychological disorder that needs to be managed compassionately.

Courtney Boyer was a therapist and relationship coach who spent years teaching others how to communicate, connect, and love. But behind closed doors, her own marriage was suffocating. After years of rejection, loneliness, and shrinking herself to fit the mold of “perfect wife and mother,” she makes a bold, terrifying proposal at her seventeenth wedding anniversary: What if we opened the marriage?

This beautifully produced book contains the landmark work of the most influential lesbian photographers in the world, including Morgan Gwenwald, Della Grace, Diana Blok, Tee Corrine, Jill Posener, and Honey Lee Cottrell. Beyond the impact of the individual photographers, Bright writes about the themes that have fueled lesbian photography, including the feminist approach to the body and the lesbian relationship to popular culture.

In this quintessential work of queer theory, Jack Halberstam takes aim at the protected status of male masculinity and shows that female masculinity has offered a distinct alternative to it for well over two centuries. Demonstrating how female masculinity is not some bad imitation of virility, but a lively and dramatic staging of hybrid and minority genders, Halberstam catalogs the diversity of gender expressions among masculine women from 19th-century pre-lesbian practices to contemporary drag-king performances.

Moved to honour a form of relation often subordinated to romantic and familial ties, and to explore a part of her own history, Hélène Giannecchini pieces together an alternative genealogy of queer ancestors. In searching and sensitive prose, she sifts the past to bring existences deemed 'marginal' into communion with each other, traces of which may remain only in memory and archival fragments.

Women deserve to know more about their bodies than just what happens in service to reproduction. Not knowing how your body works makes it challenging to advocate for yourself. Consequently, many people suffer in silence thinking their bodies are uniquely broken or they turn to disreputable sources. Blood is a practical, empowering guide to what's typical, what's concerning and when to seek care - recounted with the no-nonsense expertise and frank, fearless wit that have made Dr Jen today's most trusted voice in women's health.