Three Queer Books About Friendship, Loyalty, and Betrayal

What holds people together — and what breaks them apart

This week: three queer books about friendship, loyalty, and betrayal. They span decades and continents. One is a classic from Paris. One is a celebrated American novel. One is a sharp Dutch debut. Together they ask the same question in different voices: what do we owe each other? And what happens when we fail?

None of these books appear in our recent round-up on bodies, desire, and getting older. They go somewhere different — inward, toward other people, toward the cost of love.

Giovanni's Room — James Baldwin (1956, Dial Press)

David is an American in Paris. He falls in love with Giovanni, an Italian bartender. He also has a fiancée waiting in Spain. Baldwin published this novel in 1956. It was radical then. It still cuts deep now.

The story is told in retrospect. David looks back at what happened. That structure gives the book a slow, heavy dread. You know something went wrong. You read to find out how much of it was David's fault.

What makes this novel extraordinary is Baldwin's prose. Every sentence earns its place. He writes shame and desire with equal precision. The Paris setting is real — cafés, cheap hotels, the particular loneliness of being a foreigner. But the city is also a pressure cooker. There is nowhere to hide from yourself.

This is not a comfortable book. Baldwin does not let David off the hook. He does not let the reader off either. That honesty is what makes it last.

A Dutch translation exists: Giovanni's kamer, published by De Bezige Bij. Available in most Dutch bookshops and online via Bol.com and Athenaeum.

For who: Readers who want literary fiction with weight. Anyone who enjoyed Call Me by Your Name but wants something harder and more honest.

The Price of Salt — Patricia Highsmith (1952, Coward-McCann)

Therese is a young woman working at a New York department store. She meets Carol, an older woman going through a divorce. Something starts between them. Carol's estranged husband notices. Things become dangerous.

Highsmith published this novel under a pseudonym in 1952. She used her own name only decades later. The reason is obvious: this was a love story between two women with a hopeful ending. That was almost unheard of at the time.

The novel was adapted into the film Carol (2015) with Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara. The film is beautiful. But the book does something the film cannot. It lives inside Therese's head. Her longing, her uncertainty, her fear — all of it rendered in Highsmith's tight, precise prose.

Highsmith is known for thrillers. This book has thriller tension. But the threat here is not a murderer. The threat is a society that wants to take something away. That makes it feel urgent even now.

Dutch translation: Het zout der aarde (various editions). Available via Bol.com and most large bookshops.

For who: Readers who love mid-century literary fiction. Fans of the film who have not read the source material. Anyone interested in queer literary history.

De vriendschap — Maud Vanhauwaert (2022, Das Mag)

Two women have been friends for years. Then something shifts. Belgian poet and performer Maud Vanhauwaert wrote this debut novel in Dutch. It was published in 2022 by Das Mag and received strong reviews in both Belgium and the Netherlands.

Vanhauwaert writes in short, rhythmic sections. Her background as a poet is audible on every page. The language is spare but loaded. A single paragraph can hold years of history.

The book is about female friendship and the way love between women — romantic or not — is often misread or dismissed. Vanhauwaert does not explain or argue. She shows. The reader watches two people negotiate closeness, distance, and the moment when honesty becomes cruelty.

This is a quiet novel. Nothing explodes. But the tension builds steadily. By the final section, the emotional stakes feel very high.

De vriendschap has not yet been translated into English. For Dutch and Flemish readers, this is one of the stronger queer debuts of recent years.

Available via Das Mag's own webshop, Bol.com, and indie bookshops throughout the Netherlands and Belgium.

For who: Dutch-language readers who want something literary and contemporary. Readers who liked Connie Palmen's early work or Annie Ernaux's shorter novels.

What these three books share

Baldwin, Highsmith, Vanhauwaert — different eras, different countries, different styles. But all three are about the same problem. Two people get close. Closeness creates expectation. Expectation creates the possibility of failure. And failure, in these books, costs something real.

None of the three offers easy resolution. That is not a flaw. That is the point. Queer literature at its best does not ask for sympathy. It asks for attention. These three books reward it.

If you want to explore how queer stories translate to other media, our piece on Three Queer Films About Bodies, Sport and Desire offers a good companion read.