Rep: queer women of color trans and non-binary characters I definitely recommend this collection, though some stories are uncomfortable, all are worth reading. The collection also contains stories of privileged and unhappy New Yorkers- 'Come Back To Me', 'Meena and Aparna' and 'I can see it in you' all focus on women who seem unsatisfied with their lives.

In 'Love Song', a young girl has encounters with increasingly larger magical beings. They are both Desi, and together they build a dream city in which people they love, and people who look like them, can thrive. In 'Swandive', a nonbinary master's degree student befriends a trans scholar at an academic conference. In 'Pleasure Palace', an older Southeast Asian woman on vacation tells a rude young American man a fairy tale, which may or may not be her own tragic past as a queen in exile from her own kingdom, and the death of her female lover. My favorites were the ones in which these fantastic elements took over the whole story by the end. Almost every one contains a sci-fi or fantasy twist somewhere in it. It’s certainly not exhaustive and shouldn’t even be! Pride month can be a good time for readers to add more books to their shelves (📢 even though the support for these books should not be confined to a single month) so go ahead and check out these eleven south asian books featuring LGBT+ main characters.This is a beautiful, strange collection of short comic stories. This list is just a pea in the samosa of excellent queer titles that have already released and won the hearts of many.

Recent decades have seen some modern classics in the name of Funny Boy by Shyam Selvadurai, Yaraana: an anthology edited by Hoshang Merchant, Broken Verses by Kamila Shamsie, and Marriage of a Thousand Lies by SJ Sindu and have essentially paved a way for the newest queer books. The oldest pieces go back a long way and even during the Independence struggles -despite the uproar and an obscenity trial- Lihaaf by Ismat Chughtai, an Urdu short story in 1942 explored a begum and her lady servant’s desire for each other. There’s a long way to go in terms of systemic changes but queer literature has and will always continue to exist with pride. But a change is slowly coming with India decriminalising same-sex relationships and Bangladesh legally recognising hijras as a third, separate gender. It’s pride month! 🌈 Sexual diversity has always been a part of the south asian culture even if most of the countries that make up this region are still following the restrictive laws set up during the British colonial era.

Apsara Engine by Bishakh Kumar Som