A/S/L

A/S/L

A transformational, transformative story about video games, three queer friends, and the code(s) they learn to survive, from the winner of the Lambda Literary Award for Trans Fiction 1998: Lilith, Sash, and Abraxa are teenagers, scattered across the country but joined by the Internet as they create Saga of the Sorceress , a video game that will change everything, if only for the three of them. Eighteen years later, Saga of the Sorceress still exists only on the scattered drives of its creators. Lilith works as a loan underwriter at a rinky-dink bank in Manhattan, a trans woman in a very cis world. Sash is in Brooklyn, working as a part-time webcam dominatrix. Neither knows that the other is in New York, or that Abraxa is just across the Hudson River, sleeping on the floor of a friend’s Jersey City home after a disaster at sea. They have never met in person and have been out of touch for years, but none have forgotten the sorceress or her unfinished quest. Weaving together the technologies of two decades, and a healthy dose of magic, A/S/L is a novel that queers our notions of nostalgia, friendship, and even the possibilities of fiction itself, confirming Jeanne Thornton as one of our best and most ambitious novelists. Praise for A/S/L Named a Best Book of the Year by Vulture, Electric Lit, Kirkus Reviews , and Reactor NPR’s Books We Love 2025 ELLE Magazine’s Best Queer Books of the Year A Kirkus Reviews Editor’s Pick The Seattle Times Most Anticipated Books of the Year Lit Hub’s Most Anticipated Books of the Year Autostraddle ’s Most Anticipated Queer Books of the Month “ A/S/L captures the pulse of desire that spurs any genuine act of creation . . . The internet gets a great deal of hate these days, but Thornton’s novel is a gripping, emotional reminder of the almost-whimsical joy of being online in the ’90s.” —Isle McElroy, Vulture “Scrappy and bootstrappy, endlessly niche and DIY, the early internet was very different from the infinite scroll it has become today . . . A/S/L tells a story of delusions, obsessions and compromises, as three online childhood friends find their way and each other in a world that has changed under their feet.” —NPR’s Books We Love “Don’t let the chapters told solely through chat-room dialogue or email exchange deter you — you’ll be glad you made it to the emotional ending.” — The Cut “A hit of nostalgia that evokes the early days of gaming and the internet.” — Cosmopolitan “Like Thorton’s previous novel Summer Fun , A/S/ L is philosophically robust. Thornton asks, What does it mean for a trans woman to be good? Who benefits? What do we owe our friends? . . . And because Thorton’s imagination is delightful, there is lots of joyful discovery. And recovery. Almost anything can be a video game, Thornton reveals—real estate, running on a treadmill, sitting in silence, asking for forgiveness, setting someone free, being free.” —Electric Literature “Ambitious . . . Thornton is very good on damaged transsexual lives, on the rolling disaster set in motion, not by transition, but by the way we’re punished for it . . . A/S/L lets onto the page the everyday struggles around work, housing, social life, and mental health beyond that.” —McKenzie Wark, e-flux “Lyrical and stunning . . . A/S/L demonstrates time and time again how deft [Thornton] is at upending and changing form to match characters and themes of the moment . . . On a craft level alone, A/S/L is a masterwork, but it resonates so deeply because of its insights into the refuge online spaces and escapism offered to closeted trans people and just how gaping a void their absence creates.” —Autostraddle “Thornton’s literary powers are deep and many . . . [ A/S/L ’s] themes are timeless: Forgetting isn’t freedom, forgiveness isn’t redemption, and in life there are no resets.” —Public Books “[A] gritty love letter to queer gamers growing up in the ’90s . . . using video game mechanics as a framework for understanding our puzzling, violent, and beautiful world.” —Reactor “Thornton’s queer coming-of-age novel vividly takes readers back to a time when [the characters] were all just starting to realize what an important lifeline the internet could be for folks who felt out of place IRL and posits that perhaps the sense of optimism and wonder it imparted back then isn’t lost forever.” —The A.V. Club “When Thornton’s characters’ lives on and off screen drastically diverge, A/S/L not only satisfies nostalgia, but catapults the narrative to a whole new level . . . A/S/L cements Thornton as (dungeon) master of dynamic character-driven writing.” —The Rumpus “[ A/S/L ] draw[s] on both the melancholic and magical elements of lost connections and digital dreams . . . Bittersweet and deeply human, A/S/L affirms Thornton as one of today’s most ambitious writers in contemporary LGBTQ+ fiction.” —GAY45 “Nostalgic yet razor-sharp . . . A/S/L (that’s ‘age/sex/location’ for a