Contemporary LGBTQ Young Adult Literature

Contemporary LGBTQ Young Adult Literature examines cultural shifts in LGBTQ+ contemporary realistic young adult fiction published in the United States between 2000 and 2020.

The book explores vital elements of LGBTQ+ youth experience, including identity, coming out, and romantic attraction, as well as critical social facets of gender, transgender, and intersectionality. The book engages these concepts through cultural and theoretical lenses of modernism, postmodernism, and post-postmodernism. The book traces a movement away from narratives centred on individual identity formation toward stories that look outward, engaging questions of justice, social belonging, and the ethical demands placed on characters and readers alike. It situates these developments within broader literary trends, showing how contemporary YA both reflects and challenges evolving understandings of youth, agency, and the audiences for whom these books are written.

Contemporary LGBTQ Young Adult Literature is ideal for students and scholars in gender studies, sexuality studies, and children’s and young adult literature.