20 of the best LGBTQIA+ works of science fiction

Ammonite (Cover image via Del Rey)

8. Ammonite

In Nicola Griffith’s Ammonite, a deadly disease has cleared the way for a planet devoid of men. See, long ago, a group of settlers made their homes on Grenchstom’s Planet (abbreviated as “GP”, which leads to the common nickname of “Jeep”). Soon enough a virus (also called “Jeep”) sweeps through the group, killing all of the men and many of the women.

The planet is quarantined and contact with the survivors is lost for many years. Observers can only tell that Jeep gives rise to a “native” population that is entirely female, almost certainly descended from the original settlers.

Much later, the Settlement and Education Councils (SEC) sends anthropologist Marghe Taishan to Jeep. She’s sent to study the native cultures that have grown during Jeep’s long quarantine. Taishan is also tasked with testing a vaccine for the Jeep virus. Along the way, she’s kidnapped, rescued, and taken into the native culture of a particular group.

Unlike our own planet, queerness is, well, not at all queer on Jeep. After all, if there is only one biological sex available on a planet, it’s difficult to make same-sex relationships into some sort of terrifying “other”.

How a planet devoid of anyone with an XY chromosome is able to reproduce forms no small mystery of the novel, either. Along with her virus research, Marghe must also learn how, exactly, the inhabitants of Jeep have been able to reproduce for generations.

Unlike other books in this list, the entire cast of Ammonite is female. While interacting with the women that populate Jeep, Marghe learns just how deeply the virus has changed them, and how she must change in return.