One of ELLE's Best Queer Books of 2025
"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 Chronicle
It’s the summer of ’96 and best friends (and secret girlfriends) Hannah and Sam are driving across the country from Long Beach, New York, to the fabled queer paradise of San Francisco, free from the harsh gazes of their neighbors and the stifling demands of Hannah''s devout Orthodox Jewish mother. In San Francisco, they will finally be together as a real couple, out in the open, around other queer people . . . even if the move means leaving behind Hannah’s beloved Bubbe.
When the financial strains of West Coast living push the girls to start stripping at The Chez Paree—yet another secret Hannah must keep from her family—Hannah feels trapped. Sam wants her at the club, but Hannah hates stripping nearly as much as she hates disappointing Sam. Then Hannah 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.
But as Hannah falls deeper into Chris’ 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—a space rich with queer possibility or an intimidating, unfamiliar place just as lonely as the one she’d left behind? 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.
Genre: Literary Fiction
"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 Chronicle
It’s the summer of ’96 and best friends (and secret girlfriends) Hannah and Sam are driving across the country from Long Beach, New York, to the fabled queer paradise of San Francisco, free from the harsh gazes of their neighbors and the stifling demands of Hannah''s devout Orthodox Jewish mother. In San Francisco, they will finally be together as a real couple, out in the open, around other queer people . . . even if the move means leaving behind Hannah’s beloved Bubbe.
When the financial strains of West Coast living push the girls to start stripping at The Chez Paree—yet another secret Hannah must keep from her family—Hannah feels trapped. Sam wants her at the club, but Hannah hates stripping nearly as much as she hates disappointing Sam. Then Hannah 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.
But as Hannah falls deeper into Chris’ 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—a space rich with queer possibility or an intimidating, unfamiliar place just as lonely as the one she’d left behind? 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.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Praise for this book
"A propulsive and compulsively readable debut! Girls Girls Girls is jam-packed with queer angst and queer joy, filled with a memorable cast of characters and a truly incredible amount of heart. I devoured this novel." - Kristen Arnett
"An immersive and emotional debut teeming with heart, angst, love, and self-discovery. This is a queer, touching, and charming book that makes you feel at home in 1990s San Francisco through the eyes of a messy and endearing lesbian." - Emily Austin
"Girls Girls Girls is a gorgeous, tender, and hopeful coming-of-age novel. von Blanckensee writes with wisdom and insight about self-discovery, first loves, queer community in 90s San Francisco, what it means to carve out a life for yourself, and ultimately, what and who makes a home. It's a road trip novel in the literal and metaphorical sense, a love letter to queerness, youth, and the courage it takes to leave so that one day you may return. Girls Girls Girls is a triumph, a big beating heart of a book, full of hard-fought victories. I loved every second of it." - Marisa Crane
"Girls Girls Girls is girly indeed, in the best way, as well as queer and young and retro and joyous and fraught and heartbreaking and hopeful, also in the best way. Shoshana von Blanckensee's debut is a moving coming-of-age romp about friends, families, and forgiveness, the endless ways they overlap, and all of their many wonderful, difficult, beautiful complications." - Laurie Frankel
"Shoshana von Blanckensee's first novel is luminous, insightful, tender, and hot." - Andrea Lawlor
"Finally, a novel about being queer, Jewish, and obsessed with your grandmother. Shoshana von Blanckensee's Girls Girls Girls is a tender and electric coming-of-age story. Come for the shenanigans, stay for the textured portrait of grief, desire, and the making and remaking of what it means to be family." - Ruth Madievsky
"Girls Girls Girls floored me - the nostalgic angst and agony of it, the heat and beauty and tenderness. Shoshana von Blanckensee puts it all on the page so viscerally: lust, hunger, death, sex, grief, love and every other thing a human body is and does. It's completely extraordinary." - Catherine Newman
"Girls Girls Girls is the rare many-layered coming-of-age novel that addresses lust, confusion, longing, and grief in equal measure. I wanted to live inside Shoshana von Blanckensee's vivid evocation of 1990s San Francisco queer community long after I finished reading - and I can't remember the last time I had such a big crush on a fictional character." - Amy Shearn
"Shoshana von Blanckensee has crafted a stunning debut full of heartache and hope. I loved this book." - Michelle Tea
"An immersive and emotional debut teeming with heart, angst, love, and self-discovery. This is a queer, touching, and charming book that makes you feel at home in 1990s San Francisco through the eyes of a messy and endearing lesbian." - Emily Austin
"Girls Girls Girls is a gorgeous, tender, and hopeful coming-of-age novel. von Blanckensee writes with wisdom and insight about self-discovery, first loves, queer community in 90s San Francisco, what it means to carve out a life for yourself, and ultimately, what and who makes a home. It's a road trip novel in the literal and metaphorical sense, a love letter to queerness, youth, and the courage it takes to leave so that one day you may return. Girls Girls Girls is a triumph, a big beating heart of a book, full of hard-fought victories. I loved every second of it." - Marisa Crane
"Girls Girls Girls is girly indeed, in the best way, as well as queer and young and retro and joyous and fraught and heartbreaking and hopeful, also in the best way. Shoshana von Blanckensee's debut is a moving coming-of-age romp about friends, families, and forgiveness, the endless ways they overlap, and all of their many wonderful, difficult, beautiful complications." - Laurie Frankel
"Shoshana von Blanckensee's first novel is luminous, insightful, tender, and hot." - Andrea Lawlor
"Finally, a novel about being queer, Jewish, and obsessed with your grandmother. Shoshana von Blanckensee's Girls Girls Girls is a tender and electric coming-of-age story. Come for the shenanigans, stay for the textured portrait of grief, desire, and the making and remaking of what it means to be family." - Ruth Madievsky
"Girls Girls Girls floored me - the nostalgic angst and agony of it, the heat and beauty and tenderness. Shoshana von Blanckensee puts it all on the page so viscerally: lust, hunger, death, sex, grief, love and every other thing a human body is and does. It's completely extraordinary." - Catherine Newman
"Girls Girls Girls is the rare many-layered coming-of-age novel that addresses lust, confusion, longing, and grief in equal measure. I wanted to live inside Shoshana von Blanckensee's vivid evocation of 1990s San Francisco queer community long after I finished reading - and I can't remember the last time I had such a big crush on a fictional character." - Amy Shearn
"Shoshana von Blanckensee has crafted a stunning debut full of heartache and hope. I loved this book." - Michelle Tea
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