LGBTQ+ Positive Chapter Books

Twelve-year-old Ivy Aberdeen’s house is destroyed by a tornado and her family of five is displaced. When her notebook, filled with secret drawings of girls holding hands has gone missing, Ivy’s drawings begin to reappear in her locker with notes from someone telling her to open up about her identity. Will Ivy find the strength and courage to follow her true feelings? 

Ever since their free-spirited mama died ten months ago, twelve-year-old Jack and her gender creative nine-year-old brother, Birdie, have been living with their fun-loving Uncle Carl, but now their conservative Uncle Patrick insists on being their guardian which forces all four of them to confront grief, prejudice, and loss, all while exploring what ‘home’ really means.” I picked this one up on a whim and, oh geez, I’m glad I did! It was such a great read!

Avery and Bet couldn’t be more different, but what they have in common is that they are both twelve years old, and are both being raised by single, gay dads. When their dads fall in love, Bett and Avery are sent, against their will, to the same sleepaway camp. Their dads hope that they will find common ground and become friends–and possibly, one day, even sisters. But things soon go off the rails for the girls (and for their dads too), and they find themselves on a summer adventure that neither of them could have predicted. 

Eleven-year-old Liv fights to change the middle school dress code requiring girls to wear a skirt and, along the way, finds the courage to tell his moms he is meant to be a boy. Technically, Olivia is not a girl, even though he was born as a girl. He’s transgender. Liv knows he was always meant to be a boy. But at Bankridge Middle School, the dress code means he can’t wear pants. Only skirts. So Operation: Pants Project begins! To Liv, this isn’t just a mission to change the policy. It’s a mission to change his life. And that’s a pretty big deal.

Mattie, a star student and passionate reader, is delighted when her English teacher announces the eighth grade will be staging Romeo and Juliet. And she is even more excited when, after a series of events, she finds herself playing Romeo, opposite Gemma Braithwaite’s Juliet. Gemma, the new girl at school, is brilliant, pretty, outgoing, and if all that wasn’t enough: British. As the cast prepares for opening night, Mattie finds herself growing increasingly attracted to Gemma and confused, since, just days before, she had found herself crushing on a boy named Elijah.

Melly only joined the school band because her best friend, Olivia, begged her to. But to her surprise, quiet Melly loves playing the drums. It’s the only time she doesn’t feel like a mouse. Now she and Olivia are about to spend the next two weeks at Camp Rockaway, jamming under the stars in the Michigan woods. But this summer brings a lot of big changes for Melly: her parents split up, her best friend ditches her, and Melly finds herself unexpectedly falling for another girl at camp. 

Grayson, a transgender twelve-year-old, learns to accept her true identity and share it with the world.

Lily Jo McGrother, born Timothy McGrother, is a girl. But being a girl is not so easy when you look like a boy. Especially when you’re in the eighth-grade. Norbert Dorfman, nicknamed Dunkin Dorfman, is bipolar and has just moved from the New Jersey town he’s called home for the past thirteen years. This would be hard enough, but the fact that he is also hiding from a painful secret makes it even worse. One summer morning, Lily Jo McGrother meets Dunkin Dorfman, and their lives forever change.

Zenobia July, an excellent coder and hacker, investigates a mystery while wrestling with the challenges of a new school, a new family, and presenting her true gender for the first time.

When people look at George, they think they see a boy. But she knows she’s not a boy. She knows she’s a girl. George thinks she’ll have to keep this a secret forever. Then her teacher announces that their class play is going to be Charlotte’s Web. George really, really, REALLY wants to play Charlotte. But the teacher says she can’t even try out for the part . . . because she’s a boy. With the help of her best friend, Kelly, George comes up with a plan. Not just so she can be Charlotte — but so everyone can know who she is, once and for all.

Eleven-year-old (nearly twelve) Celi Rivera, who is a mix of Black-Puerto Rican-Mexican Indian is uncomfortable about her approaching period, and the changes that are happening to her body; she is horrified that her mother wants to hold a traditional public moon ceremony to celebrate the occasion–until she finds out that her best friend Magda is contemplating an even more profound change of life.

When Shane, born a girl, switched schools three years ago, things really started to fall into place. Finally, he could be the boy he’s known he was since age 3, without being treated differently. Plus, now that he’s 12, he’s old enough to begin hormone therapy. When a school bully shows students an old picture of Shane dressed as a girl, however, rumors fly, and Shane worries he’ll lose everything now that his secret is out. 

Twelve-year-old Mikey believes he is quite an entrepreneur. Trying his best to take after his grandfather, Pap, Mikey finds himself suddenly thrust into the role of talent agent for a 13-year-old drag queen (Coco Caliente), a girl and her three-legged dog, an aspiring comedian, and a superhero impersonator. But Mikey is also dealing with the usual middle-school obstacles: bullying, self-discovery and self-doubt, coming out to friends, and trying not to strangle his nine-year-old sister.

Archer has four important role models in his life–his dad, his grandfather, his uncle Paul, and his favorite teacher, Mr. McLeod. When Uncle Paul and Mr. McLeod get married, Archer’s sixth-grade year becomes one he’ll never forget

When Sunny St. James receives a new heart, she decides to set off on a “New Life Plan”: 1) do awesome amazing things she could never do before; 2) find a new best friend; and 3) kiss a boy for the first time. Her “New Life Plan” seems to be racing forward, but when she meets her new best friend Quinn, Sunny questions whether she really wants to kiss a boy at all. With the reemergence of her mother, Sunny begins a journey to becoming the new Sunny St. James.

Through the lives and influences of two girls, readers come to see that love is love is love. Set against the backdrop of history and politics that surrounded gay rights in the 1970s South, this novel is a thoughtful, eye-opening look at tolerance, acceptance, and change, and will widen the hearts of all readers.

Eleven-year-old Rick Ramsey has generally gone along with everybody, just not making waves, even though he is increasingly uncomfortable with his father’s jokes about girls, and his best friend’s explicit talk about sex; but now in middle school he discovers the Rainbow Spectrum club, where kids of many genders and identities can express themselves–and maybe among them he can find new friends and discover his own identity, which may just be to opt out of sex altogether. OK, so this one hasn’t been released, yet, BUT I AM SO EXCITED FOR IT. As someone on the ace spectrum, there is just not enough asexual representation for ANY age group. I am so excited to get my hands on this one!