Fowler, Karen Joy, Pat Murphy, Debbie Norkin & Jeffrey D. Smith, Ed.    

Category: Short stories
Summary: Truthfully, the stories didn't do a lot for me in this anthology, but it is a good bit of history about how the Tiptree Award started. Joanna Russ and Suzy McKee Charnas, both out lesbians, have essays in the collection as well. Russ, in her essay, states that Tiptree/Sheldon was a lesbian, just one who'd never dared to have a love affair.

Shepherd, Joel    

Category: Bioengineering
Summary: Cassandra Kresnov is an artificial human, a super soldier who has defected from the League and who just wants to live life as a normal person in the Federation. But she's found out and gets embroiled in deadly politics. Vanessa Rice is a SWAT lieutenant who starts falling for Cassandra. Will Cassandra give women a try? Overall the book is a little amateurish. It doesn't get interesting until a good 30 pages in. It's heavy on discussions about politics and ethics and gets redundant and overbearing. The author uses a lot of present day terms and technologies which I found unconvincing on a planet in another solar system several hundred years in our future ("rock music, "phone, "mi crowave"). I suspect the editor/publisher might be new to SF. But despite these flaws, I was able to get into the story and the characters. A sequel is due out in 2007 (Breakaway), which I'll probably buy, if only to see whether or not Cassandra and Vanessa get together.

Kadrey, Richard    

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: The writing was okay, but the plot frustrated me because the main character kept doing stupid things again and again. Anyway, he's in a 3-way relationship with two women which is how the book ended up in this collection. Note: I purchased it from amazon.co.uk.

Moriarty, Chris    

Category: Science fiction
Summary: In four hundred years, how will humans, post-humans, clones, and AIs coexist? This book explores those issues and throws in a bit of spy thriller and myrmecology and terraforming and complexity theory and more. Very dense, character-driven hard science fiction. Catherine Li, the star of Spin State, is a major character in this novel as well, though not the main character.

Huff, Tanya & Alexander Potter, ed.    Lesbian Author!

Category: Military Science Fiction
Summary: A collection of short stories about women soldiers, warriors, vets, and recruits. The stories alternate between science fiction and fantasy.

Burgess, Anthony    

Category: Dystopian future
Summary: A novel about how modern Western society cycles between liberal and conservative. It starts toward the end of the "Pelaphase, a liberal period, where overpopulation is considered such a threat that homosexuality is encouraged ("It's Sapiens to be Homo"). The lead characters, however, are very straight and disgusted by the homosexuality, so this isn't really a positive portrayal.

Ruff, Matt    

Category: Literary Fiction
Summary: In some ways it's cheating to put this book on this site because it isn't really science fiction. But Ruff has written other science fiction novels and this one does have a virtual reality company in it.... But its treatment of gender is exquisite and you really should read. What is it about? Andy Gage has multiple personalities, and he has a very unique system for making his life workable. But there is a secret he has been keeping from himself, and together with Penny, another multiple, they'll discover just what that secret is.

Koch, Polly    

Category: Science fiction
Summary: If you like experimental fiction, read this. If you don't mind a book with no discernible plot, this one's for you. If you like books where in a single paragraph a character can be in two times and places with no explanation about how the two are connected or why you suddenly jumped from one to the other, you'll like this one. If you like books where the description goes on and on and on and nothing substantial ever happens, you might enjoy this. If you are like me, though, you'll hate it.

Boyd, John    

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: The invention of Vita-Lerp, a drug that not only allows parthenogenesis, but gives great orgasms as well, makes men superflous and sparks a movement to eliminate men altogether. Captain Benjamin Franklin Hansen of the US Navy finds himself promoted into the highest ranks of government as the men make plans to stop the women's crusade. Hansen must choose whether to put his faith in the loyalty of his beloved wife Helga and daughter Joan Paula, or to side with the High Command, who is so intent on victory that they would even consider nuking the United States.

Harpman, Jacqueline    

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: Forty women in a cage, underground. Guarded day and night by men who watch them with unceasing diligence, yet do not interact. The whip punishes any infraction of unwritten rules. There is no privacy. They are not allowed to touch. Or to commit suicide. They barely remember their lives before the cage, or the night they were captured. Who has imprisoned them, and why? How much time has passed? These are questions with no answers, so the women finally stop asking.

Then one day, something happens and everything changes. Or does it?

Carr, Jayge    

Category: Alien society
Summary: Delyafam is a water world, ruled by females. The Kimassu Lady has risen far in her society, despite her odd coloration. Through a male Terran, captured after violating the Inner Holy, she discovers that the Terrans, considered little more than pests by the Council, have plans to wipe out her people and take the planet for themselves. The more time she spends with the Terran, the more she realizes that her people have been shortchanging the males of her species. Ultimately, she must act to save her world from the Terran threat, and at the same time create equality between the sexes.

Tiptree, James Jr.    Lesbian Author?

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: James Tiptree, Jr was a pseudonym for Alice Sheldon. Her stories are provocative and lyrical examinations of human nature, and of the role of women in American society.

Griffith, Nicola    Lesbian Author!

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: Three stories by Nicola Griffith: "Touching Fire, "Song of Bullfrogs, Cry of Geese, and "Yaguara." Very good. All have lesbian protagonists. Published by Aqueduct Press, who specializes in feminist science fiction: http://aqueductpress.com.

Duchamp, L. Timmel    Lesbian Author!

Category: Alien invasion
Summary: The Marq’ssan come to Earth to teach humanity to change, become less violent and hierarchical. Kay Zeldin, a historian with former ties to “the Company” is recruited by her old nemesis to be one of the USA’s negotiators.

There are a lot of lesbian characters. I thought the book needed another draft or two. This is the first of five books in the Marq’ssan cycle. Available from the publisher: Aqueduct Press (http://aqueductpress.com), who specializes in feminist science fiction.

Butler, Octavia    

Category: Vampires
Summary: A novel about a woman with amnesia who discovers she is a vampire-hybrid. The story traces her discovery of her own people and a war started by other vampires who want to see her dead. Normally I don’t read vampire fiction, but Butler is such a good writer I read this anyway and was not disappointed. It’s about love, family, and prejudice. The vampires are all basically bisexual when it comes to humans.

Alguire, Judith    Lesbian Author?

Category: Far future
Summary: The Earth of the future is barely surviving, and power has migrated to the colonies. When one woman discovers that the Sun is dying, she has to fight disbelief at the highest levels of power to convince the world that Earth can be saved. Most characters are lesbians.

Spencer, Wen    

Category: Alien invasion
Summary: Another of the tales of Ukiah Oregon, with just scant mention of his lesbian mothers.

Vonarburg, Elisabeth    

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: A lesbian couple plays a minor role. A gay man has a somewhat larger role. This is a story about a woman who notices that the world is subtly different from the way she remembers it and as her life becomes increasingly strange, she tracks down the source of the changes only to discover that the world is definitely not what it seems.

Claremont, Chris    

Category: Military Science Fiction
Summary: The brass called it a by-the-book mission. Lt. Nicole Shea was too green to know that, in space, there’s no such thing.

One of the female characters had a past relationship with another woman.

Morgan, Richard    

Category: Cyber-punk
Summary: Two minor female characters, Jadwiga and Kiyoka, are lovers. The book is the third in a series about Takeshi Kovacs, former Envoy for the Protectorate, now living a life of petty crime. The first two books give some background to this one. They are Altered Carbon and Broken Angels (both 4 stars, but no lesbians). This edition of the book is only available in the UK, so if you are interested, go to amazon.co.uk to check it out. He has another book out, better than the Kovacs novels in my opinion, called Market Forces.

Grimwood, Jon Courtenay    

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: You find out at the very end that two of the main characters, Karo and Razz, were lovers. The rest of the book was a somewhat disjointed tale about the rise and fall of New Venice, a sovereign nation built on old tankers in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. I bought this at amazon.co.uk; there was no US distributer at the time.

Rosen, Selina    Lesbian Author!

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: A fun book about a loud, free-wheeling salvager who finds out she's really the Queen.

Matthews, Susan R.    Lesbian Author?

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: A novel in her Judiciary universe.

Lyons, Lynda    Lesbian Author!

Category: Near future
Summary: I was pleasantly surprised by this book. The setting is the near future, when androids are common, and some of them are out of control. The Controllers are responsible for hunting down and terminating rogue androids created by the infamous Doctor. But no one is who they seem to be....

Kress, Nancy    

Category: Science Fiction
Summary: One of the main characters, Gail, is an out lesbian. There was a lot of interesting stuff in the book, but I found it hard to really care about any of the characters.