I’m so excited to be returning to Queer the Shelves. In 2022, it was an incredibly uplifting experience. In all honesty, I’d be finding the publishing industry a little bit lonely and tough. It seemed a world away from the camaraderie and partying of the comedy circuit I’d always been more used to.
At book festivals and events populated by straight posh folks, I hadn’t always found my place. And when I did find my place (and keenest audience), it was often in a queer tent or a nerdy science tent miles away from the main festival bookshop. And, I realised, that made it way more difficult to sell copies of my books The Breakup Monologues and Is Monogamy Dead? Even the most rapturous fans didn’t always make it through the mud, rain and madness to my official book signings.
Major publishers are making strides towards representing and including queer voices. But still don’t really know how to market us or solve some of the simple logistical problems, like my example above, that facilitate inadvertent forms of discrimination.
Queer people have always cared about community. It has always been vital for our safety. We need each other. Therefore queer writers are the most precious lifeline for one another.
Queer the Shelves was the first of a series of queer-specific festivals, followed soon after by Out and Wild in Wales, that I spoke at in 2022. The level of engagement was so spectacularly different. It’s not that straight people don’t enjoy my comedy or my books. They really do. It’s just that my queer family tend to relate to, and love, my work best of all. At Out and Wild, a woman climbed into my sellout session through a window. That’s how desperately she wanted to get in.
Whilst I want to reach broad audiences, I never want to lose the deeper meaning I feel when I make a room full of queers laugh (or sometimes cry). Queer the Shelves was also the place where I first met the incredible Julie Cohen, who’s going to be coaching me during my first foray into fiction. In fact, I really shouldn’t be writing this blog at all. I should be working on the next draft of my novel for Julie. I can feel her giving me a hard stare.
Hope to create more fun, love and laughter at QTS 2024. In the meantime, you can check out The Breakup Monologues below or follow me on social media.
book events, lesbian writers, lesfic, lgbtq, lgbtq book festival, literary festival, nottingham, queer the shelves
