Being Different: Lambda Youth Speaks Out
edited by Larry Dane Brimner

Personal narratives by 15 young people complement convincing commentary at the beginning of each chapter on what it is like to be young and gay. There are chapters on sexual identity, coming out, and the pain of being gay in high school (arguably our most homophobic institution). In addition, a chapter on religion-based attitudes toward homosexuality puts anti-gay rhetoric in perspective. Most of the narratives are by 18 to 21-year-olds who look back on their high school years with some degree of equanimity. Without melodramatics, they help the author make the case that intolerance toward homosexuality hurts young people the most. The book should prove an eye-opener for anyone who works with teenagers, and it is among a handful of titles on the subject that will be helpful to them.

The Best Little Boy in the World
by John Reid

When The Best Little Boy in the World was first published in 1973, Andrew Tobias could write about what it had felt like to begin to accept his homosexuality, but he couldn't bring himself to sign his own name to the book, for fear of embarrassing his parents. And so it was "John Reid" who became a hero to the thousands of gay males who found in this memoir a mirror for their own experiences.

Although the book appears rambling at times, Tobias always has a clear sense of where he wants to take readers with the story. He treats his closeted adolescence and college years, and his stumbling first attempts at "doing a thing" with other gay men, with a self-effacing humor that exposes his pain without descending into self-pity. And if his life seems fairly ordinary, apart from the sexual awakening ... well, that was the whole point. "You like and respect us when you don't realize we're gay," he writes in a new introduction, "so now please just continue to like and respect us once you do realize. It's not that big a deal."

Children of Horizons: How Gay and Lesbian Teens are Leading a new way Out of the Closet
by Gilbert Herdt and Andrew Boxer

Horizons is a lesbian and gay social service agency in Chicago where teens gather weekly to get support and share experiences as they begin the process of coming out. This report, which draws on a two-year study of participants by an anthropologist and a developmental psychologist, tells much about the complex issues of adolescent sexuality in general, and homosexuality in particular. An important book for adolescents and those who work them.

Cleaning Closets: A Mothers Story
by Beverly Cole

A mother's emotionally honest story of her journey to acceptance of her gay son. Her focus is on both an intellectual and spiritual understanding and acceptance. The book is well written, discusses support groups and reading material that are available. Most assuredly, if every mother and family of gay children reacted with this type of commitment and love, the world would be a better place for everyone.

Coming Out to Parents: A Two-Way Survival Guide for Lesbians and Gay Men and Their Parents
by Mary V. Borhek

Listed by American Bookseller as "among the most important gay and lesbian books that should be represented in any general bookstore," Borhek's original edition of this book (1983) has also been praised as "sound, sympathetic, and helpful" (St. Luke's Journal of Theology). In this thorough revision, Borhek brings an additional decade of personal knowledge and experience to bear on the subject of coming out.

Different Daughters : A Book by Mothers of Lesbians
edited by Louise Rafkin

When Louise Rafkin came out in the mid-80's she was looking for a resource to help explain to her mother some of what being a lesbian meant, and mirror some of what her mom might be feeling about her "different" daughter. She had to create that resource, this book. Though public perceptions of lesbians have changed drastically in the last 10 years--we're out in the rock music world and professional sports and the highest levels of government--how many moms still wonder, with a wince, "Why my daughter?" The responses vary wildly showing how women of different generations react to lesbianism, the concern some mothers feel for their girls, the blame and guilt that goes both ways, and how the most unaccepting person can come around.

The Family Heart: A Memoir of When our Son Came Out
by Robb Forman Dew

Most books about parents dealing with their child's announcement of his or her homosexuality are cast as "self-help" or educational. In the absence of informed, non judgmental material, these books are important, but more personal stories are also important. In Family Heart: A Memoir of When Our Son Came Out, novelist Robb Forman Dew tells the story of what happen to her--and her family--after her son Stephen came out.

Free Your Mind : The Book for Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Youth--And Their Allies
by Ellen Bass and Kate Kaufman

In a ground breaking book that weaves together their professional experience with the lively, poignant, immediate voices of dozens of gay and lesbian youths, the authors provide an invaluable step-by-step guide to empowering gay youth to understand, accept and celebrate their sexual orientation. Photos.

Gay and Lesbian Youth
edited by Gilbert Herdt

This book describes the unique experiences of gay and lesbian youth in the growing-up process. The changes in youth in the United States is compared and contrasted with those changes elsewhere to better understand the identities, situation, and relationships of homosexual teens in many societies. Gay teenagers and their parents will better understand the similarities of the problems facing young people today. This book will help all readers understand the unique and emotion-filled world of gay and bisexual youth going through the coming-out process.

Growing up Gay, Growing Up Lesbian: A Literary Anthology
by Bennett Singer

This ambitious collection of over fifty coming of age stories pairs selections by lesbian and gay teenagers with older writers' reflections on growing up gay or lesbian. Fiction by Baldwin, Rita Mae, Leavitt and others counterpoint autobiographical essays by Lorde, Crisp, and Navratilova. Diary accounts of growing up gay in 80's and 90's complement poems and stories about how it felt in the 40's and 50's. Sobering, funny,inspiring, and ultimately affirming.

Hearing Us Out: Voices from the Gay and Lesbian Community
by Roger Sutton

Foreword by M. E. Kerr. Adults and adolescents, business people, community activists, and students all talk about their experiences as gays and lesbians. The fifteen interviews, presented as personal narratives and illustrated with black-and-white photographs, together create a portrait of a diverse community united by sexual orientation and the effects of discrimination, but as different in career choice, attitude, and lifestyle as any cross section of humanity.

In Your Face: Stories from The Lives of Queer Youth
by Mary L. Gray

In Your Face: Stories from the Lives of Queer Youth is a unique collection of real-life accounts that describe and express the hardships and triumphs of 15 lesbian, gay, and bisexual teens. This book explores the views of teens from a variety of societal contexts and experiences. The contributors' ages, backgrounds, hometowns, childhood experiences, and plans for the future are discussed to give you a deeper understanding of the challenges they face.

Joining the Tribe: Growing Up Gay and Lesbian in the 90's
by Linnea A. Due

Like a lot of forty-something gay men and lesbians, Linnea Due thought that the post-Stonewall culture, full of queer parades, films, and literature, made coming out easier for contemporary gay and lesbian teens. But being pelted and shouted at while accompanying a group of twenty-something queer activists changed her mind and led her to write this book about what it is like for queer kids to grow up these days. She traveled across the country listening to queers and lets them tell their stories in this frightening, inspiring book.

The Journey Out : A Guide for and About Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Teens
by Rachel Pollack,and Cheryl Schwartz

A calm and practical exploration of teen sexuality and the special concerns of lesbian, gay, and bisexual teens offers clear advice on such issues as homophobia and harassment, provides information on gay health and political issues, and much more.

Now That You Know : A Parents' Guide to Understanding Their Gay and Lesbian Children
by Betty Fairchild and Nancy Hayward

If the coming out process is difficult for gay people, it is often equally difficult for their parents. Confusion, anger, and fear frequently cause fathers and mothers of gay men and lesbians to disavow, strike out against, and even resent their children. For many parents, a child's coming out feels like the ultimate rejection--not only of their dreams and hopes but of their own heterosexuality. In Now That You Know: A Parent's Guide to Understanding Their Gay and Lesbian Children, Betty Fairchild and Nancy Hayward--the mothers of, respectively, a gay man and a lesbian--have charted the rough seas that almost every parent of a gay person travels.

Passages of Pride : Lesbian and Gay Youth Come of Age
by Kurt Chandle

Chandler uses real-life experiences to illuminate three phases of homosexual life: becoming aware of one's homosexuality, coming out, and becoming part of the local gay/lesbian community. He focuses on six young gays and lesbians as each goes through the various phases: for example, we learn about Derek and the "science of living in the closet" in the book's section about awareness, and about Tara's discovery that there's "nothing wrong with being queer" in the section about community.

Prayers for Bobby : A Mother's Coming to Terms With the Suicide of Her Gay Son
by Leroy Aarons

Bobby Griffith, at the age of 15, realized that he was gay and in conflict with his religious upbringing. Through Bobby's journal entries and his mother's reminiscences we learn of the emotional torment that led Bobby to take his own life. Prayers for Bobby takes readers through his mother's anguish and disbelief to her transformation from biblical literalist to enlightened parent

Revolutionary Voices
Edited by Amy Sonnie

This groundbreaking, multicultural collection of stories by the queer and young should be required reading for every jaded adult--teachers, parents, politicians--and anyone who fears for the future of our country. In fact, 22-year-old editor Amy Sonnie should run for Congress. Her introduction to this touching, funny, and sometimes sad anthology is smarter and more thoughtful than any political rhetoric this old queer has heard lately. While the work is wildly diverse (one of my favorites involves a mother who bakes a cake to help her queer daughter celebrate Ellen DeGeneres's coming-out), all of it speaks to the isolation and fear of being queer and young. A boy lies awake at night practicing to be more masculine. An intersexed gay boy comes out to his high school. A butch girl tells of years of daily bashing. Fear, though, is not the overriding emotional tone to this collection. The contributors exhibit a belief in themselves, a well-placed youthful confidence that speaks as loudly as the most poignant writing. Their determination to survive and thrive despite a homophobic society comes through loud and clear. It's the perfect antidote to adult cynicism about youth. --Jack Connolly

The Shared Heart : Portraits and Stories Celebrating Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Young People
by Adam Mastoon

Adam Mastoon's beautifully reproduced photographs of gay, lesbian, and bisexual young people are a revelation: each subject, posed yet casual, looks directly into the camera and invites us into his or her life. But the book is more than a photo gallery, and the personal statements written by each young person brings a sense of what it means to be a gay youth today. In a world in which gay teens are told that they either don't exist or should change their sexual orientation, The Shared Heart is a beacon of hope, clarity, and joy.

Straight Parents Gay Children : Keeping Families Together
by Robert A. Bernstein

A personal account by a father who discovered that his life was enriched by his daughter's homosexuality reveals his experiences with P-FLAG, an organization that helps parents understand human diversity and speak out on their children's behalf.

Two Teenagers in Twenty: Writings by Lesbian and Gay Youth
by Ann Heron

More than a decade after One Teenager in Ten, Heron asks a new generation of teens to describe first-hand what it's like to be gay or lesbian in a world that wants to ignore or condemn them. Many of the essays here are combined with some from the first book and will help ease the way for teens just now coming out, and the adults who seek to support them.

 Understanding Sexual Identity: A Book for Gay Teens and Their Friends
by Janice Rench

This book offers support for gay and lesbian teens and answers questions that many people have about sexual identity. A simple,compassionate, and factual starting point for gay teens and people who care about them. Offers a straightforward, no-nonsense approach to understanding sexuality.

Young, Gay and Proud
edited by Don Romesburg

One high school student in ten is gay. When "Young, Gay, and Proud!" first appeared in 1980, it was the first book to address the needs of this often-invisible minority. For this revised edition, Don Romesburg has reworked the book to make it newly relevant to the issues gay teens face in the mid-90's. It helps young people deal with questions like: Am I really gay? What would my friends think if I told them? Should I tell my parents? Does anybody else feel the way I do? Other sections discuss health concerns, sexuality, and other resources available to teens.

The XY Survival Guide
by Benjie Nycum

At 172 pages, The XY Survival Guide is a must-have item for anyone young and gay or questioning. Each chapter of The XY Survival Guide includes vital information including coming out, empowerment in schools; comprehensive drug and STD information, crisis advice, and more than 600 individually-verified queer youth-specific resource contacts and underage queer hangouts across North America. The XY Survival Guide provides the necessary information essential to being young and gay in the year 2000. But it's not just an essential resource, it's also funny and entertaining, with typically silly XY touches and awesome graphics. "There are lots of guides out there written for gay people, but nothing out there really addresses the needs of queer youth," explains author and editor Benjie Nycum, adding that the guide could never have been possible without its "awesome contributions" from gay youth across North America, teachers, GLSEN, ACLU, The San Francisco AIDS Foundation, The Trevor Talkline, Student Pride and others.