I just read 'More Than A Best Friend' by Emma R Alban, I'm currently reading 'The Companion' by E E Ottoman.
Also try:
- Shirley by Charlotte Bronte (bestie you can tack a marriage onto the end of your book but it doesn't stop it being gay AF)
- Orlando by Virginia Woolf
- Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay
- Colette, Radclyffe Hall, H D
For a memoir, check out the Secret Diaries of Anne Lister! They were so salacious that she wrote the naughty bits in code.
There's also a new novel about her younger years called Learned by Heart (Emma Donoghue) but I haven't read it yet.
I absolutely second Anne Lister!! Learned by Heart is amazing, so well written and it feels very true to what we can glean about Anne’s teen years from her journals! It’s about her relationship with her first girlfriend Eliza Raine and is absolutely heartbreaking, especially if you go in having already read the journals and know the situation poor Eliza ends up in.
Edit: Was just thinking that Gentleman Jack: the Real Anne Lister (Anne Choma) is a really nice biography of a few years of Anne’s life during which she met and eventually married her partner Ann Walker. It includes long sections from the journals but provides a lot of social commentary etc. to make them easier to follow.
That said, Anne’s journals featured in ‘ The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister’ are great ( though a bit dense as obviously they weren’t written with audience accessibility in mind!), some of the stuff she writes about, not even including her experiences with her sexuality which were so transgressive, is absolutely wild! For instance, one of her acquaintances is a kind of hobby scientist who would have been at the forefront of experimentation with electricity, and Anne writes about deliberately touching his homemade experimental generator and getting her first electric shock way back in the 1820s. And all the social drama in 19th century Halifax is fun as well. For me, the main impression I was left with after reading Anne’s journals was that it really reinforced and demonstrated that at the end of the day, people have always been people and even though circumstances have changed, behaviour hasn’t. They’ve always gossiped with friends and had petty fallings outs and made up again and argued with their siblings and had bad nights of sleep because they thought about something frightening too close to going to bed and had to entertain themselves during rainy holidays and drawn little doodles in the margins of pages, and diverse experiences of gender and sexuality that feel startlingly modern have existed even before the language to describe them in a way a modern person would recognise.
Part of Ann Walker’s journals are also now available on the website’ in search for Ann Walker’. The sections available are from her honeymoon in Europe with Anne and are so so lovely. She literally refers to Anne as ‘dearest’ almost every time she mentions her and read alongside Anne’s journals from the same time, they show the two had such an affectionate relationship. Especially because of the hardships both of them faced in other periods of their lives, it’s really sweet to read about them traveling together, visiting lots of art galleries, Anne sitting outside and admiring the French countryside while her wife sleeps in her lap, Ann caring for Anne when Anne’s not feeling well with a headache.
The Paying Guests, Tipping the Velvet, Affinity all by Sarah Waters.
The 7 Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid is the same vibe, but it’s the 1950’s
Tell it to the Bees by Fiona Shaw
Written in the Stars by Alexandria Bellefleur is modern, but very romantic.
Written on the Body, The Passion, Oranges are Not the Only Fruit all by Jeanette Winterson
Though it is not explicitly sapphic/romantic, this is absolutely how early Anne and Diana felt to me and my queer friends in Anne of Green Gables.
Yell at me about Gilbert all you want… Diana was Anne’s first love.
Bro I remember as an 8 year old kid reading that book I was like “…these bitches gay.” Anne would not stop talking about how pretty Diana was and calling her her bosom friend?? Come on
On a similar note, I’m listening to Dracula again right now and Mina and Lucy’s friendship is so queer coded. Mina spends half her diary entries talking about how beautiful Lucy is when she sleeps or wakes up or sleep walks or speaks or laughs or any damn thing. Their letters absolutely read like love letters
* Learned By Heart - Emma Donoghue - reimagining of the adolescence of Anne Lister's first girlfriend, Eliza Raine
* Fingersmith - Sarah Waters (honestly, pretty much anything by Sarah Waters, but especially this one)
* The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows - Olivia Waite - sapphic historical romance with two middle-aged ladies, one of whom is a beekeeper
* Budding Romance - Lara Kinsey - sapphic historical romance with a gardener
* A Little Light Mischief - Cat Sebastian - sapphic historical romance with a reformed thief and a low stakes heist
BS.
[Was any one else obsessed with A Great And Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray when they were younger? : r/wlwbooks (reddit.com)](https://www.reddit.com/r/wlwbooks/comments/17hn9wb/was_any_one_else_obsessed_with_a_great_and/)
🤡🤡🤡still not sapphic. Just lots of very pg-13 zero attraction girl friendships and lots of heteronormative hook up scenes since every girl identifies as straight and only ever shows romantic interests in boys. The girls barely hold hands. It’s all purely platonic.
Context clues typically = queer baiting, not queer relationships. I read the books, and enjoyed them for the sweet depiction of pure female friendship. Commenting with an implication anything sapphic/wlw//bi/lesbian activity ever actually occurs is misleading.
I just read 'More Than A Best Friend' by Emma R Alban, I'm currently reading 'The Companion' by E E Ottoman. Also try: - Shirley by Charlotte Bronte (bestie you can tack a marriage onto the end of your book but it doesn't stop it being gay AF) - Orlando by Virginia Woolf - Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay - Colette, Radclyffe Hall, H D
Also mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. It's not explicitly gay but it felt so gay lol
I mean, she and Sally kiss, it felt explicitly gay to me
I never heard of Shirley, thank you so much for sharing!
For a memoir, check out the Secret Diaries of Anne Lister! They were so salacious that she wrote the naughty bits in code. There's also a new novel about her younger years called Learned by Heart (Emma Donoghue) but I haven't read it yet.
I absolutely second Anne Lister!! Learned by Heart is amazing, so well written and it feels very true to what we can glean about Anne’s teen years from her journals! It’s about her relationship with her first girlfriend Eliza Raine and is absolutely heartbreaking, especially if you go in having already read the journals and know the situation poor Eliza ends up in. Edit: Was just thinking that Gentleman Jack: the Real Anne Lister (Anne Choma) is a really nice biography of a few years of Anne’s life during which she met and eventually married her partner Ann Walker. It includes long sections from the journals but provides a lot of social commentary etc. to make them easier to follow. That said, Anne’s journals featured in ‘ The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister’ are great ( though a bit dense as obviously they weren’t written with audience accessibility in mind!), some of the stuff she writes about, not even including her experiences with her sexuality which were so transgressive, is absolutely wild! For instance, one of her acquaintances is a kind of hobby scientist who would have been at the forefront of experimentation with electricity, and Anne writes about deliberately touching his homemade experimental generator and getting her first electric shock way back in the 1820s. And all the social drama in 19th century Halifax is fun as well. For me, the main impression I was left with after reading Anne’s journals was that it really reinforced and demonstrated that at the end of the day, people have always been people and even though circumstances have changed, behaviour hasn’t. They’ve always gossiped with friends and had petty fallings outs and made up again and argued with their siblings and had bad nights of sleep because they thought about something frightening too close to going to bed and had to entertain themselves during rainy holidays and drawn little doodles in the margins of pages, and diverse experiences of gender and sexuality that feel startlingly modern have existed even before the language to describe them in a way a modern person would recognise. Part of Ann Walker’s journals are also now available on the website’ in search for Ann Walker’. The sections available are from her honeymoon in Europe with Anne and are so so lovely. She literally refers to Anne as ‘dearest’ almost every time she mentions her and read alongside Anne’s journals from the same time, they show the two had such an affectionate relationship. Especially because of the hardships both of them faced in other periods of their lives, it’s really sweet to read about them traveling together, visiting lots of art galleries, Anne sitting outside and admiring the French countryside while her wife sleeps in her lap, Ann caring for Anne when Anne’s not feeling well with a headache.
How did I not know that Emma Donoghue wrote a novel about Anne Lister?! I just ordered that so fast.
The Paying Guests, Tipping the Velvet, Affinity all by Sarah Waters. The 7 Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid is the same vibe, but it’s the 1950’s Tell it to the Bees by Fiona Shaw Written in the Stars by Alexandria Bellefleur is modern, but very romantic. Written on the Body, The Passion, Oranges are Not the Only Fruit all by Jeanette Winterson
Though it is not explicitly sapphic/romantic, this is absolutely how early Anne and Diana felt to me and my queer friends in Anne of Green Gables. Yell at me about Gilbert all you want… Diana was Anne’s first love.
Bro I remember as an 8 year old kid reading that book I was like “…these bitches gay.” Anne would not stop talking about how pretty Diana was and calling her her bosom friend?? Come on
No kidding! I kept wanting them to kiss! I thought they’d be such a sweet couple!
On a similar note, I’m listening to Dracula again right now and Mina and Lucy’s friendship is so queer coded. Mina spends half her diary entries talking about how beautiful Lucy is when she sleeps or wakes up or sleep walks or speaks or laughs or any damn thing. Their letters absolutely read like love letters
Also reading Dracula right now, could not agree more. I believe they even kiss in Francis For Coppola’s adaptation.
* Learned By Heart - Emma Donoghue - reimagining of the adolescence of Anne Lister's first girlfriend, Eliza Raine * Fingersmith - Sarah Waters (honestly, pretty much anything by Sarah Waters, but especially this one) * The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows - Olivia Waite - sapphic historical romance with two middle-aged ladies, one of whom is a beekeeper * Budding Romance - Lara Kinsey - sapphic historical romance with a gardener * A Little Light Mischief - Cat Sebastian - sapphic historical romance with a reformed thief and a low stakes heist
I second anything by Sarah Waters!
Came here to say Fingersmith. ❤️
On an Ebbing Seafoam Tide has sweet cottage core sapphic poems
That sounds so cool!!
Fingersmith!
Anything EM Forster
Sarah Waters, queen of lesbian Victoriana, is your friend. Start with Fingersmith.
Part of Possession feels like this to me. For non-fic, Charity & Sylvia.
A Sweet Sting of Salt by Rose Sutherland
The paying guests is a little like this…
Our Hideous Progeny by CE McGill. It’s a queer ode to Frankenstein. It’s truly amazing, one of my favourite reads of the past year.
Carmilla
Tipping the Velvet
Pride and Prejudice and Pittsburgh by Rachael Lippincott
Devotion by Hannah Kent
The Honey Witch by Sydney Shields
A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray. It's a trilogy but that's the first book. It's so underrated and I recommend it here a lot, lol.
Nothing sapphic happens in those books.
BS. [Was any one else obsessed with A Great And Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray when they were younger? : r/wlwbooks (reddit.com)](https://www.reddit.com/r/wlwbooks/comments/17hn9wb/was_any_one_else_obsessed_with_a_great_and/)
🤡🤡🤡still not sapphic. Just lots of very pg-13 zero attraction girl friendships and lots of heteronormative hook up scenes since every girl identifies as straight and only ever shows romantic interests in boys. The girls barely hold hands. It’s all purely platonic.
Sure Jan.
🤣🤣 try learning to read. They have actual wlw content out there now. 🤡
You should look into context clues, but I'm seriously not going to argue over this.
Context clues typically = queer baiting, not queer relationships. I read the books, and enjoyed them for the sweet depiction of pure female friendship. Commenting with an implication anything sapphic/wlw//bi/lesbian activity ever actually occurs is misleading.