49 1980s LGBT novels

Adrenaline is the first novel written by James Robert Baker (1946–1997), an American author of sharply satirical, predominantly gay-themed transgressional fiction.

Ambidextrous: The Secret Lives of Children (1985), is a novel by the American author Felice Picano. The book is a semi-autobiographical account of the author's life growing up in the 1950s. Major themes include adolescent sexuality and coming out.

Annie On My Mind is a 1982 novel by Nancy Garden about the romantic relationship between two 17-year-old New York City girls, Annie and Liza.

Answered Prayers: The Unfinished Novel is an unfinished novel by American author Truman Capote, published posthumously in 1986 in England and 1987 in the United States.

The Arizona Kid is a 1988 novel by Ron Koertge about a summer 16-year-old Billy spends living with his gay uncle and working with race horses.

Babycakes (1984) is the fourth book in the Tales of the City series by American novelist Armistead Maupin, originally serialized in the San Francisco Chronicle.

The Beautiful Room Is Empty is a 1988 semi-autobiographical novel by Edmund White.

Blue Eyes, Black Hair is a 1986 novel by the French writer Marguerite Duras. It tells the story of a couple who meet by chance in a small vacation town. The man is homosexual and has recently fallen in love with a man with blue eyes and black hair. After meeting the woman at a cafe, he pays the woman to come to his room so that he can look at her, presumably in order to learn something about women or love.

Boy Wonder is a novel by James Robert Baker published in 1988. The novel is a mock of oral history of Los Angeles, California in which we hear the life of Hollywood avant-garde film producer Shark Trager.

A Boy's Own Story is a 1982 semi-autobiographical novel by Edmund White.

The Boys on the Rock is a short debut novel by John Fox which details the coming out and falling in love of a gay sixteen-year-old swimmer, nomine Billy Connors, who narrates the story in the first person. It is notable as perhaps the first novel ever to blend politics with the travails of a gay adolescent.

Cities of the Red Night is a 1981 novel by American author William S. Burroughs. His first full-length novel since The Wild Boys (1971), it is part of his final trilogy of novels, known as The Red Night Trilogy, followed by The Place of Dead Roads (1983) and The Western Lands (1987). The plot involves a group of radical pirates who seek the freedom to live under the articles set out by Captain James Misson. In near present day, a parallel story follows a detective searching for a lost boy, abducted for use in a sexual ritual. The cities of the title mimic and parody real places, and Burroughs makes references to the United States, Mexico, and Morocco.

The Color Purple is a 1982 epistolary novel by American author Alice Walker which won the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction. It was later adapted into a film and musical of the same name.

Dance on My Grave: a life and a death in four parts, one hundred and seventeen bits, six running reports and two press clippings, with a few jokes, a puzzle or three, some footnotes and a fiasco now and then to help the story along is a 1982 young adult novel by British author Aidan Chambers. It is the second book in the Dance Sequence series.

Duffy, is a novel by Julian Barnes writing under the pseudonym of Dan Kavanagh. It is the first of a four-novel series featuring the title character Duffy, a bisexual private detective and ex-policeman with a 'phobia of ticking watches and a penchant for Tupperware'. Originally published by Jonathan Cape in 1980, it was republished by Orion books in 2014.

Ethan of Athos is a 1986 science fiction novel by American author Lois McMaster Bujold. The title character is Dr. Ethan Urquhart, Chief of Biology at the Sevarin District Reproduction Centre on the planet Athos, who is sent to find out what happened to a shipment of vital ovarian tissue cultures. Set in the fictional universe of Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga, the novel mentions but does not feature her usual protagonist Miles Vorkosigan. To date, Bujold has never revisited the settings of Athos or Kline Station in her many subsequent novels, but the events of Ethan of Athos are later referred to indirectly in the novels Borders of Infinity (1989) and Cetaganda (1995).

Eva Luna is a novel written by Chilean novelist Isabel Allende in 1987 and translated from Spanish to English by Margaret Sayers Peden.

Fiddle City, is a novel by Julian Barnes writing under the pseudonym of Dan Kavanagh. It is the second of a four-novel series featuring Duffy, a bisexual private detective with a 'phobia of ticking watches and a penchant for Tupperware'. Originally published by Jonathan Cape in 1981, it was republished by Orion books in 2014.

Found in the Street (1986) is the twentieth novel by the American expatriate writer Patricia Highsmith, the nineteenth published under her own name. It was published in the UK in April 1986 and in the US in 1987.

Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe is a 1987 novel by Fannie Flagg. It weaves together the past and the present through the blossoming friendship between Evelyn Couch, a middle-aged housewife, and Ninny Threadgoode, an elderly woman who lives in a nursing home. Every week Evelyn visits Ninny, who tells her stories about her youth in Whistle Stop, Alabama where her sister-in-law, Idgie, and her friend, Ruth, ran a café. These stories, along with Ninny's friendship, enable Evelyn to begin a new, satisfying life while allowing the people and stories of Ninny's youth to live on. The book, which was made into a 1991 film, explores themes of family, aging, lesbianism, and the dehumanizing effects of racism on both blacks and whites.

Funeral Games is a 1981 historical novel by Mary Renault, dealing with the death of Alexander the Great and its aftermath, the gradual disintegration of his empire. It is the final book of her Alexander trilogy.

Further Tales of the City (1982) is the third book in the Tales of the City series by San Francisco novelist Armistead Maupin, originally serialized in the San Francisco Chronicle. It was adapted into the 2001 miniseries Further Tales of the City.

The Hunger (1981) is a novel by Whitley Strieber. The plot involves a beautiful and wealthy vampire named Miriam Blaylock who takes human lovers and transforms them into vampire-human hybrids.

In the Eyes of Mr Fury is a gay, coming-of-age, magic realist, mystery novel by Philip Ridley. It was Ridley's first novel to be published, previously having his novella Crocodilia released in 1988. It was also the first book published in the Penguin Books Originals list. The novel has become a cult classic and became something of an underground phenomenon when published in Russia in 2004.

Kitchen （キッチン）is a novel written by Japanese author Banana Yoshimoto (吉本ばなな）in 1988 and translated into English in 1993 by Megan Backus.

The Last Testament of Oscar Wilde is a 1983 novel by Peter Ackroyd. It won the Somerset Maugham Award in 1984.

Less Than Zero is the debut novel of Bret Easton Ellis, published in 1985. It was his first published effort, released when he was 21 years old and still a student at Bennington College. The novel was titled after the Elvis Costello song of the same name.

The Lost Language of Cranes is a novel by David Leavitt, first published in 1986. A British TV film of the novel was made in 1991. The film was released on DVD in 2009.

Magic's Pawn is a 1989 fantasy novel by Mercedes Lackey. The first of The Last Herald Mage trilogy, the book centers around a powerful Herald-Mage named Vanyel Ashkevron, who lives in the kingdom of Valdemar. In the book, Heralds are individuals with extrasensory or psychic abilities who have devoted their lives to using their abilities to help others in the kingdom of Valdemar. A small number of Heralds have mage capabilities and are called Herald-Mages.

More Tales of the City (1980) is the second book in the Tales of the City series by San Francisco novelist Armistead Maupin, originally serialized in the San Francisco Chronicle. It was adapted into the 1998 miniseries More Tales of the City.

The Mysteries of Pittsburgh is a 1988 novel by American author Michael Chabon. The story is a coming-of-age tale set during the early 1980s in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

The Object of My Affection is the debut novel of American author Stephen McCauley. It was first published in 1987, and was made into a 1998 motion picture of the same name starring Jennifer Aniston and Paul Rudd.

Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a novel by Jeanette Winterson published in 1985 by Pandora Press. It is a coming-of-age story about a lesbian girl who grows up in an English Pentecostal community. Key themes of the book include transition from youth to adulthood, complex family relationships, same-sex relationships, organised religion and the concept of faith.

The Passion is a 1987 novel by British novelist Jeannette Winterson. The novel depicts a young French soldier in the Napoleonic army during 1805 as he takes charge of Napoleon's personal larder. The novel won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize. Publication and subsequent sales of the novel allowed Winterson to stop working other jobs, and support herself as a full-time writer.

The Place of Dead Roads is a 1983 novel by William S. Burroughs, the second book of the trilogy that begins with Cities of the Red Night (1981) and concludes with The Western Lands (1987). It chronicles the story of a gay gunfighter in the American West, beginning with the gunfighter's death in 1899, incorporates contrasting themes and time travel episodes, and makes use of Burroughs’ extensive knowledge of firearms. Non-linear in construction, it makes use of vivid imagery and repetition but does not employ the famous “cut-up” method of literary collage used in his earlier novels.

Queer is an early short novel by William S. Burroughs. It is partially a sequel to his earlier novel, Junkie, which ends with the stated ambition of finding a drug called Yage. Queer, although not devoted to that quest, does include a trip to South America looking for the substance.

The Rules of Attraction is a satirical black comedy novel by Bret Easton Ellis published in 1987. The novel focuses on a handful of rowdy and often sexually promiscuous, spoiled bohemian college students at a liberal arts college in 1980s New Hampshire, primarily focusing on three of them who find themselves in a love triangle. The novel is written in first person narrative, and the story is told from the points of view of various characters.

Significant Others (1987) is the fifth book in the Tales of the City series by American novelist Armistead Maupin. It originally was serialized in the San Francisco Examiner.

The Sleeping Beauty Quartet is a series of four novels written by American author Anne Rice under the pseudonym of A. N. Roquelaure. The quartet comprises The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, Beauty's Punishment, Beauty's Release, and Beauty's Kingdom, first published individually in 1983, 1984, 1985, and 2015, respectively, in the United States. They are erotic BDSM novels set in a medieval fantasy world, loosely based on the fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty. The novels describe explicit sexual adventures of the female protagonist Beauty and the male characters Alexi, Tristan and Laurent, featuring both maledom and femdom scenarios amid vivid imageries of bisexuality, homosexuality, ephebophilia and pony play.

Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand (1984) is a science fiction novel by Samuel R. Delany. It was part of a planned duology whose second half, The Splendor and Misery of Bodies, of Cities, remains unfinished.

Sure of You (1989) is the sixth book in the Tales of the City series by San Francisco novelist Armistead Maupin. The story takes place around the eve of the 1988 presidential election in the U.S., three years after the previous book Significant Others. The book was written as the end to the Tales series and is the antithesis of the first book.

The Swimming-Pool Library is a 1988 novel by Alan Hollinghurst.

Swordspoint: A Melodrama of Manners is a 1987 LGBT fantasy novel by Ellen Kushner. It is Kushner's debut novel and is one of several books and short stories in the Riverside series. Later editions of the novel were also bundled with three short stories set in the same universe. Swordspoint has been called a defining text of the fantasy of manners subgenre; Kushner was one of the first authors to use the phrase "fantasy of manners" to describe her own and similar works.

The Temple is a semi-autobiographical novel written by Stephen Spender, sometimes labelled a bildungsroman because of its explorations of youth and first love. It was written after Spender spent his summer vacation in Germany in 1929 and recounts his experiences there. It was not completed until the early 1930s. Because of its frank depictions of homosexuality, it was not published in the UK until 1988.

Terre Haute is a 1989 novel by Will Aitken.

The Vampire Lestat (1985) is a vampire novel by American writer Anne Rice, the second in her Vampire Chronicles, following Interview with the Vampire (1976). The story is told from the point of view of the vampire Lestat de Lioncourt as narrator, while Interview is narrated by Louis de Pointe du Lac. Several events in the two books appear to contradict each other, allowing the reader to decide which version of events they believe to be accurate.

The Wasp Factory is the first novel by Scottish writer Iain Banks, published in 1984. Before the publication of The Wasp Factory, Banks had written several science fiction novels that had not been accepted for publication. Banks decided to try a more mainstream novel in the hopes that it would be more readily accepted, and wrote about a psychopathic teenager living on a remote Scottish island. According to Banks, this allowed him to treat the story as something resembling science fiction – the island could be envisaged as a planet, and Frank, the protagonist, almost as an alien. Following the success of The Wasp Factory, Banks began to write full-time.

Weetzie Bat is the debut novel of Francesca Lia Block, published by HarperCollins in 1989. It inaugurated her Dangerous Angels series for young adults.

When Gravity Fails is a cyberpunk science fiction novel by American writer George Alec Effinger, published in 1986. It was nominated for the for Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1987 and the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1988. The title is taken from "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues", a song by Bob Dylan: "When your gravity fails and negativity don't pull you through".