Sometimes with GLBT fiction I do feel that we are at the bottom of a big hole, (although perhaps it’s been filled in) and we are digging our way out, one inch at a time–with a teaspoon. And that’s just for general fiction. When you start going into the genres, you are lucky if you even get a spoon. Each faction of that acronym has it’s own problems, it seems.
When it comes to GLBT books for Young Adults (YA) you trip over other problems. There’s still a “moral backlash” raging in many countries about gay issues and many people still think it’s wrong for young people to be able to read books with GLBT characters.
I contacted Steve Berman, owner of Lethe Press, and author of the critically acclaimed VINTAGE
It’s interesting. Some days I would say that the major houses release more gay-themed YA books that they do adult. Certainly there are plenty
of titles out there that have “healthy” secondary characters if not primary. I always suggest to readers interested in positive LGBT-themed books that they visit the GLBT-Round Table of the American Library Association’s Rainbow List. These are recommended titles by librarians, so they’ve been vetted for quality and content. The website of the Round Table is: blogs.ala.org/glbtrt.php.
Oh, I’ll be speaking on a panel devoted to GLBT YA novels at the Midwinter meeting of the American Library Association next year.“
Thanks, Steve! I wish I lived in the USA at times. Talking of finding the secondary gay characters in books, Worth The Trip has a category seeking these characters out.
You do see gay YA characters in the mainstream, although perhaps not as many as the 
main protagonists as we should. Lynn Flewelling‘s Fantasy Saga The Nightrunner Series is the only one that really comes to mind, but I’m not at all an expert in the field. “At Swim Two Boys” definitely has teenage protagonists, but whether it would, with its literary weight, qualify as a YA book, I don’t know. I’m getting old. “They didn’t have YA when I was a lass.” Pass me the slippers and the Werther originals.
Personally, I love to read YA books–some of them, anyway. I think my library thinks I’m a bit odd, but I care not a whit. I can’t be bothered with the vampire stories, or the school stuff, but some of the fantasy is stellar, such as Phlip Reeves’s Hungry City series (which contain GLBT characters) and others which spring to mind such as Pullman’s His Dark Materials (gay angels) and the Young James Bond series. (No gay that I know of!) I don’t get these books for the gay content, but I’m always happy when I find it, because that’s what life is like, writing a book and not having any gay characters at all these days could seen as being pretty unrealistic, depending on the setting.
I contacted Hayden Thorne, author of two great GLBT YA historicals, Banshee and Icarus in Flight, and also a series of GLBT YA superhero novels, The Mask Series, and she had this to say:
Problem novels, which include coming-out stories, will always serve a very important role in the GLBT YA market. GLBT teens are coming out at a younger age now than before, and they need to see their lives reflected in these books.
That said, I think that publishers should also embrace a much broader canvas. There’s a lot that genre fiction can offer GLBT teens, the least of which is escapism. By seeing themselves the heroes of adventure stories, fantasies, or historicals, these kids can find just as much reassurance in saving the world (or exploring the world) as they can in finding the courage to come out to their peers in school.”
Thank you, Hayden.
I thoroughly agree with Hayden, that there needs to be more “just gay characters having adventures,” which echoes the thoughts of my last post, coincidentally. Genre-wide this rings true. Books like Hayden’s, or Josh Aterovis’ Killian Kendall murder mysteries. Many people still think that heterosexual people are unsafe in a room with gay people because they can’t keep their hands off anyone. Perhaps–and this is just a thought–if all gay novels concentrate on the physical side, this reinforces this idea. Yes, I know it’s stupid, we all know that; the heterosexual romances don’t say “all hets are sex mad”, but when it comes to people discussing what are to them hot button topics, rationality goes out of the window.
This is what Josh Aterovis had to say:
“Everyone’s heard about the study showing teens are coming out younger and younger these days. From my marketing efforts, I’d definitely agree with that, and that trend certainly affects the market. Everyone likes to see themselves reflected in what they are reading, so I think gay-themed YA books will always be in demand, but I think we’ll see them become
more and more mainstreamed over time.
“We’re already seeing a trend toward books where the main character just happens to be gay. The story isn’t about the protag’s struggle with his sexuality or some big coming out scene. That’s not to say that coming-out stories are no longer needed since as long as
there are gay people, we’ll still have to come out, and there are still too many kids who DO still struggle and have difficult coming out experiences, but it used to be that all gay-themed YA books centered around that and now they’ve become a sub-genre of YA books. It’s a good sign that we now have sub-genres within the gay YA spectrum.“I’ve been lucky with the way I set up the Killian Kendall series. I get the best of both worlds. Killian had his big difficult coming out, but he ages with the series, so as he matures and evolves, the later books aren’t so much about him being gay. He’s just a private eye who happens to be gay.
The reader gets to take this whole journey with him. I’ve had a lot of positive response to that.”
If you want to keep up with the news on the state of play on GLBT YA issues and books, then you can’t do any better than to add Lee Wind’s wonderful blog to your feed: “I’m Here, I’m Queer, What the Hell do I read?” is a great blog and welcomes anyone. There are some excellent links on his site leading to other GLBT YA sites.
He also has that aforementioned list of books with gay characters on his sidebar. Well worth working your way through.
When I emailed Lee, he had this to say:
“I’m really excited by the evolution I’m seeing in books for teens with Gay characters. The first books out there were the problem books, once removed (my brother’s Gay!) Then we got the coming out books, which
were more hopeful (I’m Gay and I’m going to be okay!) and now we’re starting to get some Genre books, where it’s a Gay character in an adventure of some kind, and it’s not about their being Gay (My Gay boyfriend is a ghost!). I love that there are over 200 books now with GLBTQ characters and themes – and that unlike when I was growing up, Gay Teens today can see a reflection of themselves in the books they read!”
The GLBT YA novel is definitely metamorphosing–“evolving” as Lee Wind puts it.
Of course “adult” GLBT fiction has been on this journey too, but it’s taken decades. The YA sector has had to do it in a matter of a few years. It’s progress, but there’s still so much to do.
It’s good to see more publishers getting in on this. Bandwagon? Perhaps, but sometimes Bandwagons are good things. Prizm Books started up a little while ago–an imprint of Torquere Books–and publish GLBT book for “Age 12 and up.” Lethe Press has always prided itself in having YA books in its catalogue. Are there any others?
So tell me your thoughts, gentle readers. Share your favourite YA GLBT books. If you have children, would you let your kids read them, straight or otherwise? Are kids “coming out” earlier? It seems probable, after all I was planning my wedding (on the back of a horse with me dressed as a cowboy) when I was about seven, so I’m sure this is true.
Discuss!
I think it works two ways. On the one hand there is an environment created by the media, public behaviour, books etc that encourages to kids to come out sooner. They feel it is ok to do so. This also encourages other people, media, writers to write about coming out or write that book with a character that happens to be gay so it gets more widespread. So an up ward spiral in stead of down turning one.
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Since I don’t have children I have not given it much thought about what I would do. But I do hope my kids would tell me as soon as they thought it out. It will make them feel much better.
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Heroes by Perry Moore is a nice one.
Sad to say, there’s a frightening conservative backlash against the trend of kids coming out earlier. Members of insidious groups like PFOX are starting to churn out their own books (e.g., A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality) while trying to keep affirming GLBTQ fiction and nonfiction out of school and public libraries.
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It’s probably more important than ever that good YA queer fiction is being written and published.
I’m not a huge reader of YA but I did read Vintage and my daughter (14) read it as well and we both enjoyed it. Yes, the character was gay (as was the ghost) but that wasn’t the point, who was the ghost and was he dangerous was the question. I have Hero at home but to be honest I haven’t been able to get into it. I keep bugging my daughter to read it first. I also enjoyed Without Sin by J. Thomas and would like my daughter to read that. She’s not much of a reader unfortunately. I think it must be genetic and she got her father’s genes so I keep pushing. I have a fair amount of on-line friends who are gay and she’s met many of them in real life, I talk about who’s dating and she knows I read m/m romance and yaoi (she doesn’t know the details about the explicitness obviously) and I’d like to think that even if she’s not gay I am fostering an environment where she accepts it as just another option out there for some people.
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I’m pretty sure my daughter’s straight. She’s been crushing on boys privately since third grade but if she was I think I’d be okay with that. I know her life would be more difficult because of it and that makes me sad, but it makes me sad for all kids who face that.
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I watch Glee with my daughter and a couple of shows ago the gay kid Curt came out to his Dad. It was very touching and I made the point of saying to my daughter “I hope all kids feel they can tell their parents the truth.” Hopefully she filed that away somewhere in her mind for later use. It’s a comedy show so it had a light moment, but it was still very touching. As you said, you knew when you were small and Curt’s father’s response after “Are you sure?” was “I knew when you were 3 Curt. For your birthday you asked for shoes with sensible heels.” So I do think a lot of parents know but may not want to admit.
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I don’t think e-books for YA are really a viable option. Kids don’t have the credit cards required to buy e-books and kids share books. Maybe a gay child can get a book from a friend, borrow Vintage from my daughter when they wouldn’t be able to ask their own parents to get it for them or have it in their house. So I think for the YA market “real” books are more useful in spreading the message that you’re not alone. And really, the more the better.
As I have mentioned before, I am here in Maine where we are fighting to keep same-sex marriage legal (7 days to go). The opposition’s main and only argument is that same-sex marriage will be taught in schools and they have been trotting out an array of books that they contend forced down children’s throats to “prove” their point. Many of these are younger than YA, but still very good books and worthy of a child’s time and attention. King and King by de Haan and Nijland is one that is frequently mentioned — a very sweet story about two princes who meet and fall in love. A threat to young people? I don’t buy it. Besides, once they get married they become Kings, so they really have it all!
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The top ten list of challenged books for 2008 includes two books for young people that feature gay themes: And Tango Makes Three, by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell and Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, by Sarah S. Brannen. I had a good laugh the other day — I was reading a blog and a parent was squawking that his three year old had selected “Tango” from the library. The father was shocked — SHOCKED — that his kid would pick such a book and even more shocked that the child liked it. Why not? It’s another sweet story, based on a true life incident. Naturally, the father was heading off to the library to have the book banned (good luck, buddy).
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More on topic, a current favorite of mine, which is definitely YA is Out of the Pocket by Bill Konigsberg. Yes, it is a coming-of-age/coming out story but I think the author did a terrific job with the added twist of having the protag being the HS football star. Sports are one of those hold-out closet places (although I did read the other day about an elite Irish athlete with a name I can’t spell in a sport I am not familiar with who just came out). I reviewed Konigsberg’s book at this site earlier this month.
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L
I’m with KZ. The tendency for a conservative backlash whenever something appears to be more widely accepted within society makes me very, very glad that queer teen fiction is growing in leaps and bounds.
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I think this is also assisted by the increase in the number of YAs which have secondary characters who are gay. Some may dismiss these as being too stereotypical in terms of the queer characters, but my view is that whatever helps in promoting GLBTQ themes and issues can be extraordinarily important and worthwhile in teaching about acceptance and tolerance. Lee Wind has a great list of these too on his website and some of them are the extremely popular urban fantasies that abound the YA genre today. I think of them as being part of co(n)vert ops. 😉
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On a personal note, I have to add that I am absolutely loving the growth in the market as it combines two of my great genre loves – YA and GLBTQ fiction. It is awesome. 😀
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I don’t want to take over this thread by listing all of my fave books. I’ll just say that I worked with Wave on the YA section of her Reader’s Favourite Gay Books post.
Oh – excellent, I didn’t realise the list of favourites had a YA section. I’ll check it out. I agree, I’m enjoying many of the GLBTYA particularly the fantasies.
As the mother of a 12-year old son who is already showing signs of having absorbed prejudice against GLBT people from his peers, I think it’s absolutely bloody vital that there are stories out there for teenagers which are entertaining, engaging, and just happen to feature gay characters.
There is no way on earth he’s going to read anyone’s coming out story; but give him an adventure story about an intelligent, resourceful, heroic guy (or girl) with a good sense of humour who just happens to be gay, and it might just go some way to breaking down that prejudice.
I think JKR did a great disservice by not having one gay secondary character. I don’t count Dumbledore, because she did more to reinforce the unpleasant aspects of what some straight people believe gay men to be there. Making one of the young people gay would have been bloody realistic, too, as there were so many of them.
I grew up on YA (we didn’t call it that). Judy Blume taught my generation all we knew about our bodies and sex and peer pressure. We also had _Happy Endings are all Alike_ (teen lesbians, one gets raped) and _Tunes for a Small Harmonica_ (girl mistaken for a boy and for gay, trys it)
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I am the mother of an out child, who has been out since 13, and we did the whole gaumet of teen lesbian books with her. She hated them because they were all about coming out and all about being a lesbian. There were no bisexuals in the books.
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At her request, I am still trying to plot a bi teen girl book that isn’t all about coming out, without falling into the “bi people are sluts” trap. I lack plot.
That’s very interesting, it would be great to hear more from the young people involved and hear what they want. My guess is that there’s only a limit of “problem” books that anyone can tolerate and when it comes down to it, they want simply to read about people like them, doing fun stuff. That’s what the rest of us want.
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I agree that writing bi-stories without looking unfaithful (i’m not using slutty or promiscuous as I don’t agree with either word) is a difficult thing. As a bi-sexual woman, I should, perhaps try writing more of it!!
Erastes
I’m hoping that the authors who write YA will gradually expand their repertoire and write books that are not so much “coming out” stories, but just genre fiction, with younger gay (teenage) protagonists. This way the kids will be able to see themselves in these books and being gay won’t be as much of a big deal as it is now. Of course that depends very much on whether you live in the Bible belt or in a larger, more cosmopolitan city.
Because of my ADD, I tend to read a lot more YA than adult fiction as its often shorter and a bit easier. I’ve recently read Sprout by Dale Peck which I liked very much. My favorite gay YA is The Year of Ice by Brian Malloy. It takes place during the 70’s. I also really enjoyed Steve Berman’s Vintage. I just finished The Hour Between by Sebastian Stuart, and I’m not sure if that’s marketed as YA, but the main character is a gay high school senior, and it takes place in a prep school during 1967-68. I recommend that. I’m in the middle of Jim Grimsley’s Dream Boy, and I don’t think that’s considered YA either, but again, the main character is a gay high school student. That book is so far a bit darker than a lot of YA, and like Sprout, extremely religious parents are a big part of the conflict.
A good thing, absolutely! I compare what’s out there in YA today with what I had to read as a teenager, and there’s no comparison. In the dark ages there WAS no GLBT YA. (I had to read Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex at the library… too young to check the book out. And no help there.) Yes, of course, if I had a kid s/he could read YA fic in the genre. If my younger sister was any example–Lord of the Rings at eight–they’d probably be reading YA years early.
We just had an interesting experience with the I Do, Two contributions – we got one from a young writer of 17 — no sex, more of a coming-out high-school piece. After deliberation, and with regret, we decided we couldn’t consider it because the final book will include stories with explicit sex, and the last thing the equality fight needs is the sort of lawsuit that could create. But if there’s a third volume (I’d love to think the fight for equality will be won a year from now, but I’m not delusional) I really hope she tries again.
Nod nod, in my day (croak croak, I do have a milestone birthday coming up tomorrow) they didn’t have YA at all. We whippersnappers were forced to read books with younger characters in them, such as Treasure Island and Children of the New Forest. As for gay characters fer-git it. I have to say that I was surprised when Samgee got married, though.
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Perhaps a 3rd volume could be specifically YA — stories from the perspective of the children of gay parented families. “They Did” or something like that.
Excellent column as always, Erastes. The amount of virulent opposition from the right wingnuts is frightening, and yet there is hope and the exitence of such good YA books as Vintage and The Filly and the others listed is very encouraging. In my small, Republican, Midwest town religious opposition to any kind of gay affirmation is ingrained. School libraries are not allowed to buy even innocuous kids’ books like Tango Makes Three. If The Filly was in the middle school or high school library in this town, the earth would open.
And yet there are brave publishers like Lethe and Cheyenne et al, willing to publish them. And though we’d like the kids to be able to buy the books openly in bookstores, truth is, they can’t–at least, here. Thanks to ebooks, though, maybe the kids will find it easier.
15 years ago, I wrote the first four books in a series of YA mysteries grouped under the title The Pride Pack, for Alyson. When Sasha A. sold the company soon after the series began, the new owners promptly ditched the series and most (perhaps all; I don’t recall) of the YA and children’s books. There was no one else to pick them up.
Young people lucky enough to read one of the books referenced in your column and others not mentioned, will never know just how much they owe these little publishers who operate on heart and a very thin shoestring.