9 Top queer books like Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin

Cover of Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin

Giovanni’s Room

By: James Baldwin

4.33

Format: 224 pages, Paperback

Set in the contemporary Paris of American  expatraites, liasons, and violence, a young man finds  h…

"Nobody can stay in the Garden of Eden."

-James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

"Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition."

-James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

"...for nothing is more unbearable, once one has it, than freedom."

-James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

"I loved her as much as ever and I still did not know how much that was."

-James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

If you liked the queer plot in Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin , here is a list of 9 books like this:

Cover of Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion, David  Thomson

1. Play It As It Lays

By: Joan Didion , David Thomson

3.92

Format: 231 pages, Paperback

A ruthless dissection of American life in the late 1960s, Play It as It Lays captures the mood of a… read more

Similar categories in Joan Didion's Play It As It Lays book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • american
  • literature
  • fiction
  • novels
"The letter is still in my makeup box but I am careful not to read it unless I am drunk"

-Joan Didion, Play It As It Lays

"Carter and Helene still believe in cause-effect. Carter and Helene also believe that people are either sane or insane."

-Joan Didion, Play It As It Lays

"Carter and Helene still ask questions. I used to ask questions, and I got the answer: nothing. The answer is “nothing."

-Joan Didion, Play It As It Lays

"She could remember it all but none of it seemed to come to anything. She had a sense the dream had ended and she had slept on."

-Joan Didion, Play It As It Lays

Cover of The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

2. The Bluest Eye

By: Toni Morrison

4.12

Format: 216 pages, Paperback

The Bluest Eye is Toni Morrison's first novel, a book heralded for its richness of language and bol… read more

Similar categories in Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • literature
  • fiction
  • novels
"Lonely was much better than alone."

-Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye

"Maybe that was love. Choking sounds and silence."

-Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye

"She missed -- without knowing what she missed-- paints and crayons"

-Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye

"Beauty was not simply something to behold; it was something one could do."

-Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye

Cover of The Stranger by Albert Camus, 
Matthew    Ward
, Stuart Gilbert, None

3. The Stranger

By: Albert Camus , Matthew Ward , Stuart Gilbert , None

4.02

Format: 123 pages, Paperback

Published in 1942 by French author Albert Camus, The Stranger has long been considered a classic of… read more

Similar categories in Albert Camus's The Stranger book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • literature
  • fiction
  • novels
"It is better to burn than to disappear."

-Albert Camus, The Stranger

"Everything is true, and nothing is true!"

-Albert Camus, The Stranger

"After awhile you could get used to anything."

-Albert Camus, The Stranger

"To stay or to go, it amounted to the same thing."

-Albert Camus, The Stranger

Cover of White Nights by Fyodor Dostoevsky

4. White Nights

By: Fyodor Dostoevsky

4.06

Format: 82 pages, Paperback

White Nights is a short story by Fyodor Dostoevsky that was published in 1848. Set in St. Petersbur… read more

Similar categories in Fyodor Dostoevsky's White Nights book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • romance
  • classics
  • literature
  • fiction
  • novels
"E ti chiedi: “Dove sono i tuoi sogni?"

-Fyodor Dostoevsky, White Nights

"Kalbim içimde konuşurken ben susmayı beceremem."

-Fyodor Dostoevsky, White Nights

"Oh, how unbearable is a happy person sometimes!"

-Fyodor Dostoevsky, White Nights

"But how could you live and have no story to tell?"

-Fyodor Dostoevsky, White Nights

Cover of Maurice by E.M. Forster

5. Maurice

By: E.M. Forster

3.65

Format: None pages, Paperback

Set in the elegant Edwardian world of Cambridge undergraduate life, this story by a master novelist… read more

Similar categories in E.M. Forster's Maurice book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • classics
  • gay
  • lgbt
  • fiction
  • queer
Cover of Orlando by Virginia Woolf, Sandra M Gilbert

6. Orlando

By: Virginia Woolf , Sandra M Gilbert

3.87

Format: 336 pages, Paperback

Virginia Woolf's Orlando 'The longest and most charming love letter in literature', playfully const… read more

Similar categories in Virginia Woolf's Orlando book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • classics
  • lgbt
  • literature
  • fiction
  • novels
  • queer
"Life and a lover"

-Virginia Woolf, Orlando

"Thoughts are divine."

-Virginia Woolf, Orlando

"All extremes of feeling are allied with madness."

-Virginia Woolf, Orlando

"Love, the poet said, is woman's whole existence."

-Virginia Woolf, Orlando

Cover of Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin

7. Giovanni’s Room

By: James Baldwin

4.33

Format: 224 pages, Paperback

Set in the contemporary Paris of American  expatraites, liasons, and violence, a young man finds  h… read more

Similar categories in James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • romance
  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • american
  • gay
  • lgbt
  • literature
  • fiction
  • novels
  • queer
"Nobody can stay in the Garden of Eden."

-James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

"Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition."

-James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

"...for nothing is more unbearable, once one has it, than freedom."

-James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

"I loved her as much as ever and I still did not know how much that was."

-James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

Cover of The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

8. The Bell Jar

By: Sylvia Plath

4.06

Format: 294 pages, Paperback

The Bell Jar chronicles the crack-up of Esther Greenwood: brilliant, beautiful, enormously talented… read more

Similar categories in Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literature
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • novels
"I woke to the sound of rain."

-Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

"I wanted to be where nobody I knew could ever come."

-Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

"When they asked me what I wanted to be I said I didn't know."

-Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

"If you expect nothing from somebody you are never disappointed."

-Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

Cover of The Secret History by Donna Tartt

9. The Secret History

By: Donna Tartt

4.17

Format: 559 pages, Paperback

Under the influence of their charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits a… read more

Similar categories in Donna Tartt's The Secret History book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • fiction
  • novels
"It's a terrible thing, what we did,"

-Donna Tartt, The Secret History

"How quickly he fell; how soon it was over."

-Donna Tartt, The Secret History

"Forgive me, for all the things I did but mostly for the ones I did not."

-Donna Tartt, The Secret History

"I suppose the shock of recognition is one of the nastiest shocks of all."

-Donna Tartt, The Secret History

10. Sula

By: Toni Morrison

3.97

Format: None pages,

This rich and moving novel traces the lives of two black heroines from their close-knit childhood i… read more

Similar categories in Toni Morrison's Sula book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

Cover of Stoner by John  Williams, John McGahern

11. Stoner

By: John Williams , John McGahern

4.34

Format: 292 pages, Paperback

William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming famil… read more

Similar categories in John Williams's Stoner book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • american
  • literature
  • fiction
  • novels
"Annesi, hayatını sabırla kabullenmişti, katlanmak zorunda olduğu uzun bir anmışçasına."

-John Williams, Stoner

"Within a month he knew that his marriage was a failure; within a year he stopped hoping that it would improve."

-John Williams, Stoner

"But the required survey of English literature troubled and disquieted him in a way nothing had ever done before."

-John Williams, Stoner

"While they talked they remembered the years of their youth, and each thought of the other as he had been at another time."

-John Williams, Stoner

Cover of I Who Have Never Known Men by Ros Schwartz, Jacqueline Harpman

12. I Who Have Never Known Men

By: Ros Schwartz , Jacqueline Harpman

4.22

Format: 208 pages, Paperback

"As far back as I can recall, I have been in the bunker." A young woman is kept in a cage underg… read more

Similar categories in Ros Schwartz's I Who Have Never Known Men book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • fiction
  • novels
"Survival is never more than putting off the moment of death."

-Ros Schwartz, I Who Have Never Known Men

"I thought it was unfair, and then I understood that, alone and terrified, anger was my only weapon against the horror"

-Ros Schwartz, I Who Have Never Known Men

"Look at them. They’re pretending, they behave as though they still have some control over their lives and make momentous decisions about which vegetable to cook first."

-Ros Schwartz, I Who Have Never Known Men

"Only now, I tell myself that what I'd felt for her, the trust that slowly built up, the constant preference for her company and the joy each time I was reunited with her after an expedition were prob…"

-Ros Schwartz, I Who Have Never Known Men

Cover of Just Kids by Patti Smith

13. Just Kids

By: Patti Smith

4.21

Format: 262 pages, Hardcover

In Just Kids, Patti Smith's first book of prose, the legendary American artist offers a never-befor… read more

Similar categories in Patti Smith's Just Kids book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

"There's always new stuff, that's for sure."

-Patti Smith, Just Kids

"Who can know the heart of youth but youth itself?"

-Patti Smith, Just Kids

"I knew he didn't love me, but I adored him anyway."

-Patti Smith, Just Kids

"Christ was a man worthy to rebel against, for he was rebellion itself."

-Patti Smith, Just Kids

Cover of In Memoriam by Alice Winn

14. In Memoriam

By: Alice Winn

4.53

Format: 382 pages, Hardcover

A haunting, virtuosic debut novel about two young men who fall in love during a time of war. It'… read more

Similar categories in Alice Winn's In Memoriam book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • romance
  • literary fiction
  • lgbt
  • fiction
  • queer
"It’s intimate."

-Alice Winn, In Memoriam

"Call me Sidney,"

-Alice Winn, In Memoriam

"Where’s the rest of it?"

-Alice Winn, In Memoriam

"Do you believe in magic?"

-Alice Winn, In Memoriam

Cover of Swimming in the Dark by Tomasz Jedrowski

15. Swimming in the Dark

By: Tomasz Jedrowski

4.26

Format: 191 pages, Hardcover

Set in early 1980s Poland against the violent decline of communism, a tender and passionate story o… read more

Similar categories in Tomasz Jedrowski's Swimming in the Dark book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • romance
  • literary fiction
  • gay
  • lgbt
  • fiction
  • queer
"Little sparks cause fires too."

-Tomasz Jedrowski, Swimming in the Dark

"I avoided you, so that you couldn’t avoid me."

-Tomasz Jedrowski, Swimming in the Dark

"Selfish. Growing into yourself is nothing but that."

-Tomasz Jedrowski, Swimming in the Dark

"See it as a game– everyone knows the rules. And if you can’t change them, there’s no point in worrying."

-Tomasz Jedrowski, Swimming in the Dark

Cover of Young Mungo by Douglas   Stuart

16. Young Mungo

By: Douglas Stuart

4.38

Format: 390 pages, Hardcover

Growing up in a housing estate in Glasgow, Mungo and James are born under different stars--Mungo a … read more

Similar categories in Douglas Stuart's Young Mungo book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • romance
  • literary fiction
  • gay
  • lgbt
  • fiction
  • queer
"It was a nothing that felt like an everything."

-Douglas Stuart, Young Mungo

"He hadn’t known that the sky could hold so many hues – or he hadn’t paid it any mind before. Did anyone in Glasgow look up?"

-Douglas Stuart, Young Mungo

"Mungo watched as his siblings gathered up their belongings. He saw them with an unusual clarity. It was already over for them. It would never be over for him. He just had no one to tell."

-Douglas Stuart, Young Mungo

"They had crossed this line a day or two before. They had wandered from timid tenderness to affection wrapped in insults. It was a lovely place for two boys to be: honest, exciting, immature."

-Douglas Stuart, Young Mungo

Cover of Lie With Me by Philippe Besson

17. Lie With Me

By: Philippe Besson

4.26

Format: 149 pages, Hardcover

The award-winning, bestselling French novel by Philippe Besson about an affair between two teenage … read more

Similar categories in Philippe Besson's Lie With Me book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • romance
  • literary fiction
  • gay
  • lgbt
  • fiction
  • queer
"Desire does not go out like a match, it extinguishes slowly as it burns into ash."

-Philippe Besson, Lie With Me

"You get used to everything, even the defection of those you thought you were bound to forever."

-Philippe Besson, Lie With Me

"I also know how much of yourself you have to leave behind in order to look like everyone else."

-Philippe Besson, Lie With Me

"In the end, love was only possible because he saw me not as who I was, but as the person I would become."

-Philippe Besson, Lie With Me

Cover of Minor Detail by Adania Shibli

18. Minor Detail

By: Adania Shibli

4.20

Format: 144 pages, Paperback

Minor Detail begins during the summer of 1949, one year after the war that the Palestinians mourn a… read more

Similar categories in Adania Shibli's Minor Detail book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • novels
"Man, not the tank, shall prevail."

-Adania Shibli, Minor Detail

"Não há como descartar a probabilidade de uma conexão entre os dois fatos, ou alguma ligação oculta entre eles, por analogia às relações que os seres humanos encontram entre as plantas, por exemplo, q…"

-Adania Shibli, Minor Detail

"Desde que tive ciência da minha incapacidade consumada de me mover de acordo com os limites, resolvi, finalmente, permanecer dentro dos limites da minha casa, tanto quanto possível. Agora, uma vez qu…"

-Adania Shibli, Minor Detail

"Toch zijn er mensen die in die logica − dus dat je je concentreert op de meest futiele details zoals stof op een bureau of vliegenpoepjes op een schilderij − de enige manier zien om de waarheid te do…"

-Adania Shibli, Minor Detail

Cover of On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong

19. On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

By: Ocean Vuong

4.04

Format: 246 pages, Hardcover

On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when th… read more

Similar categories in Ocean Vuong's On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • literary fiction
  • lgbt
  • fiction
  • novels
  • queer
"It was beauty, I learned, that we risked ourselves for."

-Ocean Vuong, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

"To look at something is to fill your whole life with it, if only briefly."

-Ocean Vuong, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

"What were you before you met me?" "I think I was drowning" "And what are you now?" "Water"

-Ocean Vuong, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

"A page, turning, is a wing lifted with no twin, and therefore no flight. And yet we are moved."

-Ocean Vuong, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

Cover of In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado

20. In the Dream House

By: Carmen Maria Machado

4.42

Format: 251 pages, Hardcover

For years Carmen Maria Machado has struggled to articulate her experiences in an abusive same-sex r… read more

Similar categories in Carmen Maria Machado's In the Dream House book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • queer
  • lgbt
"But this story? This one's mine."

-Carmen Maria Machado, In the Dream House

"I thought you died, but writing this, I'm not sure you did."

-Carmen Maria Machado, In the Dream House

"Your heart launches itself against your rib cage like an animal."

-Carmen Maria Machado, In the Dream House

"How do you get someone you want to want you? Why did no one love you?"

-Carmen Maria Machado, In the Dream House

Cover of Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson

21. Open Water

By: Caleb Azumah Nelson

4.04

Format: 145 pages, Hardcover

Two young people meet at a pub in South East London. Both are Black British, both won scholarships … read more

Similar categories in Caleb Azumah Nelson's Open Water book and James Baldwin's Giovanni’s Room

  • romance
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • novels
"Trauma makes you considerate."

-Caleb Azumah Nelson, Open Water

"You are more than the sum of your traumas"

-Caleb Azumah Nelson, Open Water

"You do not want to die before you can live"

-Caleb Azumah Nelson, Open Water

"...love was not always synonymous with care."

-Caleb Azumah Nelson, Open Water

18 Top fiction books like Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin

Transform Your Habits

Play It As It Lays

Joan Didion , David Thomson

3.92

Transform Your Habits

The Bluest Eye

Toni Morrison

4.12

Transform Your Habits

The Stranger

Albert Camus , Matthew Ward , Stuart Gilbert , None

4.02

Transform Your Habits

White Nights

Fyodor Dostoevsky

4.06

View all the books

18 Best fiction books like The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Transform Your Habits

Wuthering Heights

Emily Brontë , Richard J. Dunn

3.89

Transform Your Habits

The Stranger

Albert Camus , Matthew Ward , Stuart Gilbert , None

4.02

Transform Your Habits

The Virgin Suicides

Jeffrey Eugenides

3.79

Transform Your Habits

White Nights

Fyodor Dostoevsky

4.06

View all the books

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