Celebrating Queer Bookshelves with Layla McCay

All Book Fringe events are FREE in person + online | no tickets required (but you can reserve them here to get a book/reminder of the event & help us have enough seats for everyone)

We’re kicking off this year’s Book Fringe with a celebration of the very heart of Lighthouse - the joy, comfort and inspiration that queer reading offers our community!

In The Queer Book Shelf, Layla McCay draws on her own experience as a queer reader and book club host, offering a feast of recommendations from authors, booksellers, and book lovers around the world. Throughout history and across generations, certain books have become lifelines and companions for queer people, be it memoir, crime or cowboy romance - this book is a love letter to them, and a spectacular companion in any queer person’s reading journey.

Join us as we welcome Layla to our own queer bookshelf on Nicolson Street!

This event will be 30 mins followed by audience questions and signing. Please feel free to attend any or all of these depending on your capacity!

Our speaker:

Layla McCay is the author of The Queer Bookshelf: A Reader’s Guide, a history of LGBTQ+ literature and the stories that have shaped queer lives and culture. Her previous book, Breaking the Rainbow Ceiling: How LGBTQ+ People Can Thrive and Succeed at Work, won the Axiom Gold Award. A regular contributor to the BBC and other broadcast media, she has hosted queer book clubs across the UK, US, and Japan, and writes the Substack laylamccaywrites. Born on Islay, she now lives in London with her wife. Her debut novel A Diplomat’s Guide to Book Smuggling is coming in Spring 2027.