Twitter’s slow death has made 2023 a hard year for authors to celebrate our books, with many of us (myself included) losing our biggest platform. Meanwhile, many diverse authors are still finding the surest path to get our books out into the world is going indie. But without financial backing or publisher connections to promote our books, indie books of even the highest standard risk languishing in obscurity.
So as a queer, neurodiverse, chronically ill indie author of fantasy worlds, the logical thing was to showcase SFF worlds, diverse characters and key themes fellow authors of other worlds have written here. Most of the thirteen books in this post are first in a series, and all come with a Goodreads link to bookmark for future reading if you wish.
Cozy/ Comedy Fantasy
Dragonbirth
Genre: cozy epic fantasy set in pre-medieval times.
Cast: Asexual spectrum rep (ownvoices). and gender non-conformity.
Major themes: blind fear & hate vs. good, love and friendship in day-to-day life.
Short Blurb: in a world where dragons & their riders are feared & killed, the life of one devout village huntress is changed forever when she meets a dragon hatchling.
Series info: book 1 of 3, all out now.
Goodreads: link
Dexter & Sinister : Detecting Agents
Genre: Victorian Steampunk
Cast: includes black & queer characters, variable socio-economic backgrounds, a talking cat.
Major themes: capitalism, equality, and societal expectations.
Short Blurb: Solving crimes is hard enough with secret societies and criminal chocolatiers to contend with, but add to that Dexter the talking mechanical cat, and it’s safe to say John Sinister is not having a good day.
Series info: stand alone, out now.
Goodreads: link
Duckett & Dyer: Dicks for Hire
Genre: Scifi/ Mystery/ Comedy -recent past Earth & alternate dimensions.
Cast: bi main character.
Major themes: friendship, maturity, growing older.
Short Blurb: They’re not detectives, but they have to become detectives in order to figure out who’s telling people that they’re detectives.
Series info: book 1 of 3, all out now.
Goodreads: link
YA Fantasy
Manipulator’s War
Genre: epic, portal, YA fantasy with beginnings in Australia, but mostly set in an alternate world (Umarinaris).
Cast: nonbinary and aromantic asexual leads (ownvoices), other queer, neurodiverse and BIPOC characters.
Major themes: found family, friendship, optimism and visionary leadership vs. adversity and war.
Short Blurb: King Kyura doesn’t want to invade Tarlah. Heir Ruarnon doesn’t want their people invaded and Aussie Linh has no desire to visit another world. But this book isn’t about getting what you want, it’s about people doing their best under exceptionally challenging circumstances.
Series info: book1 of 3 (1-2 out now, 3 on pre-order till April 2024 release).
Goodreads: link
The Call of the Rift: Flight
Genre: YA fantasy alternate history set in 1600s Viking and Spanish settled Canada.
Cast: First Nations / Indigenous rep, queer rep (after book 1 including ownvoices bi rep and lesbian, gay, trans, ace/aro rep.)
Major themes: anti-colonialism, anti-racism, climate change, elemental/ nature-based magic, people’s lives diverging within parallel worlds diversity.
Short Blurb: A rebellious heroine faces a colonial world coming unstitched: in a region tainted by prejudice and on the brink of civil war, 17-year-old Kateiko has to decide what’s worth dying – or killing – for.
Series info: book 1 of 4, all out now.
Goodreads: link
Adult Dark SFF
My Lord (first in series)
Genre: gothic horror/dark fantasy-ish set in 13th century Eastern Europe in the fictional country Tristanja.
Cast: Bi & pan rep, demiro, polyam, and PTSD (ownvoices for the queer rep/polyam and PTSD).
Major themes: overcoming/healing from PTSD, rediscovering your sexual self after sexual trauma.
Short Blurb: Meya is Lord Deminas’ latest chambermaid and favourite source of blood to drink. To avoid being his next servant to vanish, she must uncover all of Castle Tristanja’s dark secrets.
Series info: 1 of 2 related books, both out now.
Goodreads: link
Everything Is Wonderful Now
Genre: dark urban fantasy set in modern times (the 90s-present years) in small American cities.
Cast: includes a trans man, mental illness/ disability and DID rep (ownvoices).
Major themes: religious trauma, reversing the light vs dark narrative (dark’s good, light’s evil), angels & demons.
Short Blurb: Follow a trans man trauma survivor from childhood to adulthood as they face not only an evil angel, but also a sinister entity in their own head.
Series info: book 1 of 2 out now.
Goodreads: link
Dead Lake (Dark Adult SFF)
Genre: Dark Paranormal Fantasy set a few 100yrs from now in a post-apocalyptic world.
Cast: includes a lesbian and many POC characters.
Major themes: simple living, with money, rulers & religion no longer tolerated.
Short Blurb: An eviction. A stolen gemstone. A hidden network. Will retrieving her precious obsidian get Tricky killed.
Series info: book 1 of 2 out now.
Goodreads: link.
YA SciFi
The Goodbye Kids
Genre: YA sci-fi Futuristic setting near future (2165)
Cast: A plus size Jewish protagonist (ownvoices).
Major themes: a morally gray hero, how where we grow up influences our choices and perspective.
Short Blurb: Jorden Lund isn’t the chosen one, he’s the guy who volunteered. His suicide mission: build a bomb, destroy a space ship and save the world. Falling in love was not part of the plan. Now completing his mission means sacrificing the girl he loves.
Series info: book 1 of 2 out now.
Goodreads: link.
Adult Fantasy /- SciFi
Gathering of Four
Genre: Scifi/Fantasy set in the US – 2,000 years from now.
Cast: Black, Latino and queer leads.
Major themes: accepting oneself/found family, bringing down corrupt govt/upsetting the status quo.
Blurb: In the distant future, the United States is long gone… the Realm stands in its place… and one peasant woman will become the catalyst for a revolution. The Serrulata Saga is a speculative dystopian sci-fi adventure you won’t want to miss.
Series info: book 1 of 5 out now.
Goodreads: link.
Kotov Syndrome
Genre: Dystopia/Sci-Fi World/Era: Near future Earth and alternate universe intersecting with it.
Cast: mental health rep (own voices), lesbian lead.
Major themes: What is a human? How much impact can one person have on the world? Bigotry & othering.
Short Blurb: Local dumpster fire has her ex come back into her life. Plot twist — the ex is an android.
Series info: book1 of 2 out now.
Goodreads: link.
The Flying Tiger: Mortal Engine
Genre: urban fantasy/Sci-Fi set in the multiverse.
Cast/ Major themes: include Dissociative Identity Disorder, Autism, kink/body positivity, and being transgender/queer by a trans, neurodivergent POC author with DID.
Short Blurb: Years after a senseless murder, an autistic transgender man and his young teen nephew hope to finally find closure. Instead they are whisked away into the vast multiverse where a mentally unstable robot is set to activate the Mortal Engine.
Series info: book 1 of 2 out now.
Goodreads: link.
A Swift Kick to the Thorax
Genre: Future, alien planet
Cast: LGBTQA+ main characters (except the gorilla, though apparently no one’s asked him 😉 ).
Major themes: good vs bad, interplanetary culture clash.
Short Blurb: When space poachers release Earth animals on an alien world, threatening a fragile new alliance, they anger the wrong people: a veterinarian, an accountant, and a furious sign-language-fluent gorilla are coming for them.
Series info: stand alone, out now.
Goodreads: link.
Related Reading
SFF Author Interviews:
Mara Lynne Johnston (Swift Kick to the Thorax -Comedy SciFi).
Debbie Iancu Hadad (The Goodbye Kids, YA SciFi)
Natalie Kelda (YA SFF)
Elise Carlson (Epic YA Fantasy)
Manipulator’s War: Origins
So happy to be among so many talented authors here! Thank you for doing this feature, I’ll have to add some of these to my TBR.
You’re welcome Shane. So will I 🙂