Here are 100 books that Tentacle fans have personally recommended if you like
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Writer and essayist Agnes Borinsky called my debut novel The Seep, “A swift shock of a novel that has shifted how I see our world.” Here are five short, urgent novels that continue to live with me in the months and years after reading them. These are some of my most beloved books, all of which happen to be under 200 pages, which ache with the inner mystery of what is hidden, and what is revealed. These books are my teachers, each a precise masterclass in world building, suspense, and purposeful storytelling. Enjoy these ‘swift shocks!’
Argentinian masterpiece written in 1956 and only recently published in English in 2016, Zama is told from the POV of a minor Spanish official colonizing Paraguay. The alienation of Don Diego de Zama reads like a horror story—taut and psychological, he’s both villain and victim of the systems he perpetuates. Zama was adapted brilliantly into a film by Lucrecia Martel in 2017, which is how I learned about the book. I expected the film to have radically adapted its source material, but what I discovered instead was a novel from the 1950s that felt incredibly fresh and modern.
First published in 1956, Zama is now universally recognized as one of the masterpieces of modern Argentine and Spanish-language literature.
Written in a style that is both precise and sumptuous, weirdly archaic and powerfully novel, Zama takes place in the last decade of the eighteenth century and describes the solitary, suspended existence of Don Diego de Zama, a highly placed servant of the Spanish crown who has been posted to Asunción, the capital of remote Paraguay. There, eaten up by pride, lust, petty grudges, and paranoid fantasies, he does as little as he possibly can while…
Writer and essayist Agnes Borinsky called my debut novel The Seep, “A swift shock of a novel that has shifted how I see our world.” Here are five short, urgent novels that continue to live with me in the months and years after reading them. These are some of my most beloved books, all of which happen to be under 200 pages, which ache with the inner mystery of what is hidden, and what is revealed. These books are my teachers, each a precise masterclass in world building, suspense, and purposeful storytelling. Enjoy these ‘swift shocks!’
The first in a series of surreal, poetic short novels, set in the fictional city of Ravicka, a “linguist-traveler” arrives during an unspecified state of emergency. Event Factory feels like a travelog of an unsettling yet beautiful dream. I return to this book often and always get something different—the events evaporate, but the details remain. You can easily enjoy Event Factory as a standalone novel. Gladman is a master. Fun fact: Dorothy, the small feminist press which publishes these books, began specifically to launch these singular novels.
“More Kafka than Kafka, Renee Gladman’s achievement ranks alongside many of Borges’ in its creation of a fantastical landscape with deep psychological impact.” —Jeff VanderMeer
A “linguist-traveler” arrives by plane to Ravicka, a city of yellow air in which an undefined crisis is causing the inhabitants to flee. Although fluent in the native language, she quickly finds herself on the outside of every experience. Things happen to her, events transpire, but it is as if the city itself, the performance of life there, eludes her. Setting out to uncover the source of the city’s erosion, she is beset by this…
Writer and essayist Agnes Borinsky called my debut novel The Seep, “A swift shock of a novel that has shifted how I see our world.” Here are five short, urgent novels that continue to live with me in the months and years after reading them. These are some of my most beloved books, all of which happen to be under 200 pages, which ache with the inner mystery of what is hidden, and what is revealed. These books are my teachers, each a precise masterclass in world building, suspense, and purposeful storytelling. Enjoy these ‘swift shocks!’
I’m also a playwright, so I really admire a full story told in propulsive first-person monologue. This novella is a confession of Father Urrutia from his deathbed, beginning with the line “I am dying now, but I still have many things to say.” As he speaks, the priest untangles the twisted, uncomfortable agreements between artists and institutions in Chile under Pinochet. I often recommend this book for people who have not yet read Bolaño and might feel intimated by the length of his major works.
As through a crack in the wall, By Night in Chile's single night-long rant provides a terrifying, clandestine view of the strange bedfellows of Church and State in Chile. This wild, eerily compact novel-Roberto Bolano's first work available in English-recounts the tale of a poor boy who wanted to be a poet, but ends up a half-hearted Jesuit priest and a conservative literary critic, a sort of lap dog to the rich and powerful cultural elite, in whose villas he encounters Pablo Neruda and Ernst Junger. Father Urrutia is offered a tour of Europe by agents of Opus Dei (to…
Writer and essayist Agnes Borinsky called my debut novel The Seep, “A swift shock of a novel that has shifted how I see our world.” Here are five short, urgent novels that continue to live with me in the months and years after reading them. These are some of my most beloved books, all of which happen to be under 200 pages, which ache with the inner mystery of what is hidden, and what is revealed. These books are my teachers, each a precise masterclass in world building, suspense, and purposeful storytelling. Enjoy these ‘swift shocks!’
In this beguiling short novel just out from Tin House, Ferrara also examines the Pinochet regime, but through the eyes of a child. 7-year-old M sells tools to hardware stores with her salesman father, slowly realizing his downtrodden place in their society, along with dark secrets about the world around her. The dance of revelations through the young narrator’s perspective is poetic and effective. I read this in an afternoon, oscillating between feeling breathless and meditative. A high wire act, to say the least.
A San Francisco Chronicle and Southwest Review Best Book of the Year and A World Literature Today Notable Translation of the Year
“A dreamscape of a book. I adored this compelling, wise, and utterly unique coming-of-age tale.” ―Tara Conklin
For seven-year-old M, the world is guided by a firm set of principles, based on her father D’s life as a traveling salesman. Enchanted by her father’s trade, M convinces him to take her along on his routes, selling hardware supplies against the backdrop of Pinochet-era Chile. As father and daughter trek from town to town in their old Renault, M’s…
I’ve adored holiday love stories ever since I was a kid watching Hallmark movies. There’s something about the magic of the holidays that makes two people falling in love even more special. That’s why I chose a contemporary holiday romance for my debut. And we see so much straight romance on TV and in bookstores, but I want to contribute to the queer community with my writing. I write a mix of sexualities;Make the Yuletide Gay features two lesbian women. All that to say, I just love queer holiday romances!
This book made me not notice the traffic on the drive to and from my day job. I love how petty Kiskeya is, especially in the first few chapters. Also, both the leads are funny in their narration. It’s great for a li’l tee-hee-hee. I also like how the characters manage to be both similar and different – there’s enough to bond over, but they aren’t duplicates or stereotypes. Plus, who’s gonna turn down a grump/sunshine-baking partners story? Not me.
"I had so much fun reading Mangos and Mistletoe and now I want everyone else to read it too. This is Adriana Herrera's first f/f romance and I hope it's not her last..." -The Lesbian Review
One is grumpy. One is sunshine. There is only one bed.
Kiskeya Burgos left the tropical beaches of the Dominican Republic with a lot to prove. As a pastry chef on the come up, when she arrives in Scotland, she has one goal in mind: win the Holiday Baking Challenge. Winning would prove to her family, her former boss, and most importantly to herself,…
I'm an Emmy Award-winning writer, wife, and adoptive mother with an unapologetic passion for Black queer stories. I'm also an artist-activist who takes great pride in producing content that sparks honest dialogue and positive change. Life's complexities energize me, and, as a queer artist of color, I'm committed to reflecting these intricacies in my work. I write, produce video, and host allyship seminars as well as art as activism workshops for LGBTQ+ youth. If you're both inspired and entertained by layered depictions of BIPOC queer culture then please check out the recs in my Queer-tastic reading list. Enjoy!
The Memory Librarian is an adaptation of Monáe's 2018 emotion picture, Dirty Computer. Told in the icon's signature Afro-futuristic fashion, this unquestionably queer AF collection of sci-fi stories describes a dystopian world where dirty computers (people who stray from societal norms) are ostracized in the worse ways imaginable. What's even scarier, while the stories take place in the future, the premise isn't that far from our present-day reality.
Books that boast BIPOC themes are being banned at a record rate. And this year alone, over 200 anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been introduced into legislation. Just as Americans have banded together around their common causes, the inhabitants in Monáe's sci-fi saga unite as chosen family. Together they navigate technology, battle memory control, explore identity, and fight for freedom in a ruthless police state.
"Everything comes full circle. And time takes care of itself. Our work is the work of…
In The Memory Librarian music, fashion, film and futurist icon Janelle Monae returns to the Afrofuturistic world of her critically acclaimed album, Dirty Computer, to explore how different threads of liberation - queerness, race, gender plurality, love - become tangled in a totalitarian landscape... and to discover costs of unravelling them.
Whoever controls our memories controls the future.
Janelle Monae and an incredible array of talented collaborating creators have written a collection of tales comprising the bold vision and powerful themes that have made Monae such a compelling and celebrated storyteller. Dirty Computer introduced a world in which thoughts -…
I am a former book editor turned writer and a lover of literature in all forms. Young adult literature will forever be my favorite. Though I’m no longer “young,” I have two teenagers who love YA as much as I do and we bond over these stories. Since one prefers contemporary & urban fantasy, and the other likes dystopian & epic fantasy, I read a lot of everything! I particularly enjoy books with characters who triumph over extreme adversity, and if you do too, then you'll like the books on this list.
This review perfectly summed
up this book but neglected to mention it has a spectacular cover, which I’ll
admit was the first thing that drew my eye. The story also features a bi-racial
main character, and since my children are multi-racial, I love seeing this
representation. Because I’m an unapologetic book nerd, I adored the many
literary references. And I always love a good road trip! All in all, this is
one character-driven YA novel you won’t want to miss.
“This debut has it all: music, books, aliens, adventure, resistance, queerness, and a bold heroine tying it all together. ”—Ms. Magazine
Can a girl who risks her life for books and an Ilori who loves pop music work together to save humanity?
When a rebel librarian meets an Ilori commander…
Two years ago, a misunderstanding between the leaders of Earth and the invading Ilori resulted in the death of one-third of the world’s population. Today, seventeen-year-old Ellie Baker survives in an Ilori-controlled center in New York City. All art, books and creative expression are illegal, but Ellie breaks the rules…
I am obsessed with books about people fighting for social justice—particularly around racism and the climate crisis (which are definitely interconnected). I have two main approaches: people with longstanding commitments to making change who take increasingly bold steps to fight for justice, and the accidental activists, who had no intention of taking on injustice, but found themselves in unexpected circumstances and rose to the occasion. I write stories about people—mostly women of color—who are part of teams and movements who fight to make the world right, and win. I think of myself as trying to create roadmaps for us to win in the fight against racism and the climate crisis in the real world.
When an unprecedented hurricane devastates the city of Houston, Noah Mishner finds shelter in the Dallas Mavericks’ basketball arena. Though he finds community among other queer refugees, Noah fears his trans and Jewish identities put him at risk with certain “capital-T” Texans. His fears take form when he starts seeing visions of his great-grandfather Abe, who fled Nazi Germany as a boy. As the climate crisis intensifies and conditions in the shelter deteriorate, Abe’s ghost grows more powerful. Ultimately, Noah must decide whether he can trust his ancestor — and what he’s willing to sacrifice in order to survive.
I love the way that this novella offers a deeply intersectional view of the climate crisis, and how critical it is to find solidarity among vulnerable populations whose vulnerability increases during disasters.
When an unprecedented hurricane devastates the city of Houston, Noah Mishner finds shelter in the Dallas Mavericks' basketball arena. Though he finds community among other queer refugees, Noah fears his trans and Jewish identities put him at risk with certain "capital-T" Texans. His fears take form when he starts seeing visions of his great-grandfather Abe, who fled Nazi Germany as a boy. As the climate crisis intensifies and conditions in the shelter deteriorate, Abe's ghost grows more powerful. Ultimately, Noah must decide whether he can trust his ancestor - and whether he's willing to sacrifice his identity and community in…
I’m a writer and musician with a background in mathematics, which is what originally led to my intrigue in cosmology. For writing speculative fiction, I’ve dug into a range of topics from quantum mechanics to cognitive theory, but spacetime had the opposite causality: my interest later spawned my writing. When I first learned about special relativity, many aspects seemed counterintuitive but were mathematically sound, leading me to obsessively read books, watch videos, and perform hours of calculations to get a feel for it. And what draws my adoration most to the cosmos is the quality it shares with dinosaurs—the more I learn, the more majestic it becomes.
I’m a big fan of genre-bending and trope manipulation, and I was completely blown away by this rare creation of a book. It’s a carefully crafted plot of time manipulation, blending science fiction, fantasy, espionage, and romance, told through letters between two rival agents in a style more akin to a war drama.
Those contrasting styles notably elevated the story for me, accenting the cybernetic future by experiencing the naturalistic one and enhancing the love story through the suspense of corporate espionage.
At no point did I feel as if either empire was the “good” or “bad” one, only that I wanted both of the protagonists to succeed, and that made my first read of this book nothing short of a page-turner.
WINNER OF The Hugo and Nebula Awards for Best Novella, the Reddit Stabby Award for Best Novella AND The British Science Fiction Association Award for Best Novella
SHORTLISTED FOR 2020 Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award The Ray Bradbury Prize Kitschies Red Tentacle Award Kitschies Inky Tentacle Brave New Words Award
'A fireworks display from two very talented storytellers' Madeline Miller, author of Circe
Co-written by two award-winning writers, This Is How You Lose the Time War is an epic love story spanning time and space.
Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It…
My first passion, as a youngster, was speculative fiction—stories and comics that set the imagination ablaze with visions of wondrous possibilities and impossibilities. Later, my experiences of being queer, transgender, and autistic led me to an academic career in which I helped create the field of Neurodiversity Studies and something called Neuroqueer Theory (which is what you get when you mix Queer Theory and neurodiversity together and shake vigorously). These days I’m back to writing fiction, including the urban fantasy webcomic Weird Luck, and I’m thrilled to find myself part of an emerging wave of neuroqueer speculative fiction. Here are some of the best so far...
Transgender anarchist author Margaret Killjoy’s collection of short speculative fiction stories,We Won’t Be Here Tomorrow, is a stark contrast to the dazzling high-tech fantasies and cinematic adventures of my first three recommendations. Most of these stories are set in disturbingly plausible and not-at-all-distant futures, and veer into the territories of dark fantasy, gritty dystopianism, and atomspheric horror. No interplanetary space opera here; Killjoy’s protagonists are earthbound, anarchistic outcasts and misfits struggling to survive on the edges of society or in society’s ruins, in worlds gone unfathomably strange. And Killjoy writes it all beautifully, with a clarity of description that often left me stunned by its simple poetic power. This one’s for you if you like your speculative fiction close to the bone.
Death cults, queer love, and the end of everything.
Spaceships, man-eating lesbian mermaids, swords, spears, demons, ghouls, thieves, hitchhikers, and life in the margins. Margaret Killjoy’s stories have appeared for years in the science fiction and fantasy magazines both major and indie. Here, we have collected the best previously published work along with brand new material. Ranging in theme and tone, these imaginative tales bring the reader on a wild and moving ride. They’ll encounter a hacker who programs drones to troll CEOs into quitting; a group of LARPers who decide to live as orcs in the burned forests of…
