We're here : the best queer speculative fiction 2020
(Book)

The 16 stories selected by first-time editor Payseur and guest editor C.L. Clark in this adept first volume in a planned annual series are diverse in genre, form, and character identity, but many explore similar themes of journeys, transformation, and chosen family. Some stories revolve around a character’s queer identity and related issues they face—a person decides whether to get top surgery while hiking across a nuclear wasteland, someone whose true gender expression is suppressed by familial and societal pressure escapes into an online fantasy RPG, a young finch shapeshifter defies his family with both his shapeshifting and his budding romance with another boy. In other stories, the infusion of queerness is more subtle—a young woman texts her girlfriend while her house is swallowed by a climate change-induced flood, a witch shelters two children whose recent trauma mirrors her own past, a woman undergoes a dramatic procedure that allows her to communicate with an alien species. This eclectic collection has a story to appeal to every speculative fiction reader, especially those seeking queer literature.