Girls Girls Girls - Shoshana von Blanckensee

Finalist for the 2026 LAMBDA Literary AwardFinalist for the 2026 Janet Heidinger Kafka PrizeFinalist for the 2025 CALIBA Golden Poppy AwardLonglisted for the 2026 VCU Cabell First Novelist Award "Jam-packed with queer angst and queer joy . . . and a truly incredible amount of heart. I devoured this novel." —Kristen Arnett, New York Times bestselling author of Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One "A teary-eyed love letter to the San Francisco that remains and to its establishments that are long-gone. But above all [Girls Girls Girls] tenderly tells the story of a vulnerable young queer person in an unfamiliar place, just trying to create a new version of home." —San Francisco ChronicleIt’s the summer of ’96 and secret girlfriends Hannah and Sam are driving across the country from Long Beach, New York, to the fabled queer paradise of San Francisco, finally free from the stifling demands of Hannah’s devout Orthodox Jewish mother. In San Francisco, they can be a real couple, out in the open, around other queer people.But when the financial strains of West Coast living push the girls to start stripping at the Chez Paree, Hannah feels trapped. Until she meets Chris, an older butch lesbian, who is immediately taken with her. Desperate to stay in San Francisco and away from the leering men at the club, Hannah proposes an escort arrangement.As Hannah falls deeper into Chris’s world, and Sam starts to meet new queer friends, a rift forms between them. Without Sam, who is Hannah? And what does San Francisco mean to Hannah alone? An achingly tender and resonant story of survival, first love, and growing up queer in the '90s, Girls Girls Girls is a piercing exploration of the choices we make in the thrilling and often confounding search for ourselves and home.