Why the rise in LGBTQ+ romance novels is important

Tess, 36, said: “When I debuted in 2014 it was an enormous deal that my main character said the words “I’m bisexual” on the page because so many readers had never seen a character actually identify as bisexual.

“That debut was the only queer book my publisher had published in four years. Almost a decade later, that is not the case.

“The queer canon is flourishing—which is also why we’re facing unprecedented book bans in the US.” 

Between July 2021 and March 2022, a spate of book bans saw novels with LGBTQ+ themes removed from classrooms across America - but even that wasn’t enough to stop the number of LGBTQ+ books sold increasing year on year.

Tess said: “YA is one of the literature categories that demands the most growth from its authors because we’re writing for an ever-evolving readership.”

And as the audience of teens and the representation they want from the books they read evolves, concerns have been raised that parts of the LGBTQ+ community are still underrepresented within the romance category. 

“Transgender people - men, women and non-binary remain underrepresented,” Luc said. “I see a lot more being written, which is promising, but there’s still a lot of catching up to do.”

Luc suggested a combination of audience demand, combined with excellent writing on behalf of the authors is needed for progress to be made: “If you look at what passes for trans romance on the Amazon charts, it's all about fetishising trans people. It's quite gross, actually. 

“If people write excellent stories about trans people and find an audience for them, the mainstream will start paying attention.”

Calls have also been made for queer fiction to include more diverse representations of LGBTQ+ characters.

And that’s why Luc prides himself on writing queer romance novels with heart and soul: “I want my queer characters to be complex, but have happy endings as well,” he explained. 

“I also weaved a small amount of education into Crush. There are so few books out there that I knew I was going to get readers who had not read trans male and cis woman romance before. I wanted to put a little bit of information in there without overbearing the story.”

Whilst Tess has always felt comfortable leaving out overused plot lines often featured within the mainstream media, such as ‘discovering your sexuality’, it’s something which has taken publishers longer to accept.

“I queried queer books for six years without success because it was during the early years of queer YA, where the dominant narrative was discovering your sexuality and coming out - and that’s not what I was writing,” she explained.

Malinda Lo’s book Ash, a reworking of Cinderella which re-imagines the main character as a lesbian teenager, was one of the first and only novels to portray a sapphic relationship without a ‘coming out’ plot line when it was published in 2009.

“The market had to catch up to me and that was really frustrating to me as a writer,” Tess said. “For years I didn’t have much hope, until the market finally shifted and suddenly books like mine were getting interest.”

And when it comes to increasing diversity, for both the plot lines and characters within queer romance novels, sensitivity readers play a crucial role.

They’re employed to read through books during the editorial process and are constantly on the hunt for biases, stereotypes and potentially offensive or harmful content. If spotted, they provide feedback to the author with suggested changes.

Sensitivity reader Helen Gould has worked on nearly 200 projects.

Some books have been accused of being a “straight characterisation of queerness”, which opens up the debate: should heterosexual authors ever write LGBTQ+ characters?

“There’s more potential for heterosexual authors to get it wrong, but that doesn’t mean they can’t get it right,” Helen said.

“It doesn’t matter to me whether an author writing queer stories is queer or not, what matters more to me is whether it’s good writing and an accurate depiction. An insistence that only queer people can write queer stories suggests we can’t be understood by straight people - that’s both incorrect and harmful.

“Though it requires learning, understanding and compassion, straight people are perfectly capable of writing a good queer story.”

But Tess, who grew up and lives in rural California, believes the debate itself can become problematic: “I personally hold the opinion that policing this sort of stuff is damaging because you don’t know what’s going on in that author’s life or what their journey is with sexuality. 

“People will say you can tell a person isn’t LGBTQ+ because of how they wrote about a certain thing, as if there’s one definitive queer experience. 

“It’s not cool, because there absolutely is someone out there who really identified with the thing in the book that another person is saying is inauthentic.” 

Whilst some work is required to ensure diversity and representation for all aspects of the LGBTQ+ community within romance novels, the overall rise in LGBTQ+ fiction, whether it's written by queer or heterosexual authors, is nothing but promising - for both the mirrors and windows it provides.

Because after all, the LGBTQ+ community deserves their happily ever after too.

If you liked this post then read "Reading helped me understand my mental illness" - Mental health representation in books and why it's important or Think piece: is discrimination necessary for works of fiction? next. 

You can also find more BLOT content on our socials: Instagram, TikTok and Facebook.

Tess Sharpe

Tess grew up in rural northern California. She lives deep in the backwoods with a pack of dogs and a growing colony of formerly feral cats. She is the author of Barbed Wire Heart, the critically acclaimed YA novel Far From You and the upcoming Jurassic World prequel, The Evolution of Claire.

She is also the co-editor of Toil & Trouble, a feminist anthology about witches. Her short fiction has been featured in All Out, an anthology edited by Saundra Mitchell.

Walk into most bookshops nowadays and you’ll find a designated LGBTQ+ fiction section. The genre is more popular than ever, according to NPD BookScan sales have increased by over 740% in a five year period - and it’s the romance category in particular that’s booming.

Queer romance has become a niche category in its own right, allowing readers who may once have felt underrepresented the opportunity to see themselves, and their experiences, in the books they read.

Author of Crush, Luc Dreamer, said: “I think it would have helped me to come out sooner if there had been more mainstream books about trans and queer people out there.

“If I'd had representation and been able to see people like me when I was growing up, then I would have been a happier person. I would have felt a sense of belonging and it breaks my heart to know that people younger than me are experiencing that too.”

The 53 year-old author, from Denver, began his transition from female in male in 2021: “There were no trans male and cis woman romances out there when I started on my journey and that’s what prompted me to write Crush.”

The book is a sweet, full-bodied story about the unexpected romance between widow Mia and trans man Cal. The pair meet on a vineyard in California when Cal attempts to escape his small, transphobic hometown.

“It was written for the people who still felt underrepresented in the romance category - especially queer children who are still searching for the representation which is sometimes lacking in the mainstream,” Luc said.

And Tess Sharpe, author of Six Times We Almost Kissed (And One Time We Did), agrees that the representation provided by the increase in sales is key. 

She said: “Representation can be transformative and lifesaving, especially in teenage years. But also portraying our queer community’s intersectionality and diversity is vital.”

Between January and May 2022, sales of LGBTQ+ fiction books were up by 39% compared to the same period in 2021, according to NPD BookScan.

Tess, who herself is bisexual, only has one novel which features a heterosexual relationship at its forefront, favouring writing sapphic fiction to represent both her own identity and what she describes as the “layered complexities of female emotion.” 

She said: “Everyone deserves to be able to pick up a book and see a mirror of themselves.”

Tess Sharpe, author of Six Times We Almost Kissed (And One Time We Did).

Tess, 36, said: “When I debuted in 2014 it was an enormous deal that my main character said the words “I’m bisexual” on the page because so many readers had never seen a character actually identify as bisexual.

“That debut was the only queer book my publisher had published in four years. Almost a decade later, that is not the case.

“The queer canon is flourishing—which is also why we’re facing unprecedented book bans in the US.” 

Between July 2021 and March 2022, a spate of book bans saw novels with LGBTQ+ themes removed from classrooms across America - but even that wasn’t enough to stop the number of LGBTQ+ books sold increasing year on year.

Tess said: “YA is one of the literature categories that demands the most growth from its authors because we’re writing for an ever-evolving readership.”

And as the audience of teens and the representation they want from the books they read evolves, concerns have been raised that parts of the LGBTQ+ community are still underrepresented within the romance category. 

“Transgender people - men, women and non-binary remain underrepresented,” Luc said. “I see a lot more being written, which is promising, but there’s still a lot of catching up to do.”

Luc suggested a combination of audience demand, combined with excellent writing on behalf of the authors is needed for progress to be made: “If you look at what passes for trans romance on the Amazon charts, it's all about fetishising trans people. It's quite gross, actually. 

“If people write excellent stories about trans people and find an audience for them, the mainstream will start paying attention.”

Calls have also been made for queer fiction to include more diverse representations of LGBTQ+ characters.

And that’s why Luc prides himself on writing queer romance novels with heart and soul: “I want my queer characters to be complex, but have happy endings as well,” he explained. 

“I also weaved a small amount of education into Crush. There are so few books out there that I knew I was going to get readers who had not read trans male and cis woman romance before. I wanted to put a little bit of information in there without overbearing the story.”

Whilst Tess has always felt comfortable leaving out overused plot lines often featured within the mainstream media, such as ‘discovering your sexuality’, it’s something which has taken publishers longer to accept.

“I queried queer books for six years without success because it was during the early years of queer YA, where the dominant narrative was discovering your sexuality and coming out - and that’s not what I was writing,” she explained.

Malinda Lo’s book Ash, a reworking of Cinderella which re-imagines the main character as a lesbian teenager, was one of the first and only novels to portray a sapphic relationship without a ‘coming out’ plot line when it was published in 2009.

“The market had to catch up to me and that was really frustrating to me as a writer,” Tess said. “For years I didn’t have much hope, until the market finally shifted and suddenly books like mine were getting interest.”

And when it comes to increasing diversity, for both the plot lines and characters within queer romance novels, sensitivity readers play a crucial role.

They’re employed to read through books during the editorial process and are constantly on the hunt for biases, stereotypes and potentially offensive or harmful content. If spotted, they provide feedback to the author with suggested changes.

Sensitivity reader Helen Gould has worked on nearly 200 projects.

Some books have been accused of being a “straight characterisation of queerness”, which opens up the debate: should heterosexual authors ever write LGBTQ+ characters?

“There’s more potential for heterosexual authors to get it wrong, but that doesn’t mean they can’t get it right,” Helen said.

“It doesn’t matter to me whether an author writing queer stories is queer or not, what matters more to me is whether it’s good writing and an accurate depiction. An insistence that only queer people can write queer stories suggests we can’t be understood by straight people - that’s both incorrect and harmful.

“Though it requires learning, understanding and compassion, straight people are perfectly capable of writing a good queer story.”

But Tess, who grew up and lives in rural California, believes the debate itself can become problematic: “I personally hold the opinion that policing this sort of stuff is damaging because you don’t know what’s going on in that author’s life or what their journey is with sexuality. 

“People will say you can tell a person isn’t LGBTQ+ because of how they wrote about a certain thing, as if there’s one definitive queer experience. 

“It’s not cool, because there absolutely is someone out there who really identified with the thing in the book that another person is saying is inauthentic.” 

Whilst some work is required to ensure diversity and representation for all aspects of the LGBTQ+ community within romance novels, the overall rise in LGBTQ+ fiction, whether it's written by queer or heterosexual authors, is nothing but promising - for both the mirrors and windows it provides.

Because after all, the LGBTQ+ community deserves their happily ever after too.

If you liked this post then read "Reading helped me understand my mental illness" - Mental health representation in books and why it's important or Think piece: is discrimination necessary for works of fiction? next. 

You can also find more BLOT content on our socials: Instagram, TikTok and Facebook.

Tess Sharpe

Tess grew up in rural northern California. She lives deep in the backwoods with a pack of dogs and a growing colony of formerly feral cats. She is the author of Barbed Wire Heart, the critically acclaimed YA novel Far From You and the upcoming Jurassic World prequel, The Evolution of Claire.

She is also the co-editor of Toil & Trouble, a feminist anthology about witches. Her short fiction has been featured in All Out, an anthology edited by Saundra Mitchell.