My letter to the Lambda Literary Foundation

. . . in response to their appalling clarification of their change in rules.

Dear Mr. Valenzuela,

"Our books are taken from the shelves of libraries all over the country and even from the website of Amazon.com this year."

Oh, the irony of this. You do realize, don't you, that a large percentage of the writers who initially spread the word to the rest of the world about Amazon's action were heterosexual authors of gay male fiction? Now you are citing that episode as a reason to exclude those very authors from your awards.

"We also took into consideration the despair of our own writers when a heterosexual writer, who has written a fine book about us, wins a Lambda Award, when one or more of our own LGBT writers may have as a Finalist a book that may be the only chance in a career at a Lambda Literary Award."

As an LGBT writer, I am deeply disappointed that the LLF believes that the only way in which LGBT writers can compete with their heterosexual peers is through affirmative action.

The LLF states that it believes that this change in rules is necessary in order to "elevate the status of openly gay, lesbian, bisexual and trans (LGBT) people throughout society." Well, the gay male novel that caused me to come out as bisexual to my mother, at age eighteen, was Isabelle Holland's "The Man Without a Face." If Ms. Holland was lesbian, she certainly wasn't openly lesbian. The authors of gay male fiction whose literary courage inspired me to be courageous enough to come out as gender-variant? Slash writers - mainly heterosexual women.

Obviously, in the eyes of the Lambda Literary Foundation, I've been following all the wrong role models.

I'm quite open about my orientation and gender identity, but I am not crushed if a heterosexual writer or a closeted LGBT writer wins an award for LGBT writing. Instead, I am heartened to know that more good LGBT literature is available. That is what I have always looked to the Lambda Literary Awards for: excellence in LGBT literature. Narrowing the field to "excellence in LGBT literature only by out-of-the-closet LGBT writers" weakens the worth of the award, in my view.

At any rate, I hope that you will make very clear in any promotional literature about this year's awards that only out-of-the-closet LGBT writers were eligible, since the awards have, until now, been broader in scope.