From October 1 – October 31, over 120 authors and readers came together to celebrate a new blog project, Queer Romance Month.

Throughout the entire month, contributors shared 3-4 essays posted daily that celebrated the many facets of queer romance fiction, and the many layers of being queer, of being an ally, of loving romance stories, and highlighting this rising supply of romance stories that represent and celebrate LGBTQIA lives and relationships.

Please go and enjoy the many wonderful and heartfelt posts and stories that share so much about love and desire, about sadness and loneliness, about separation and rejection, and about resilience and realization, hope and triumph.

(Not to mention some hilarious and fantastic posts about writing, about slash fanfiction, and about what it felt like to first discover the existence of queer romance books and their Happily Ever Afters for queer characters.)

Among the many amazing contributors, you will find posts by GRNW 2014 authors as well. Please find them listed below, but please also enjoy the Bounty that is the QRM library. It is reading not to be missed.

GRNW 2014 Authors Writing for QRM 2014

Title Hell by Astrid Amara

“So trying to find a title that’s catchy (UnderWere) , memorable (The Anus of Caesar), but not disturbing (The Anus of Caesar), captures the story (Disenchanted Angel Seeks Revenge on God), but doesn’t reveal the end (Balls No More) is a real challenge.”

Mambo Italiano and My First happy Ending by Heidi Belleau

“Mambo Italiano was my very first queer rom com. My very first queer love story. My very first queer happy ending.”

Shimmer by L.C Chase

“I don’t know how long we stood like that, gazes locked, bodies frozen, with five feet of marbled tile between us. He was the one who decided it had been long enough though.”

Love Is Love Everywhere, Everywhen, Everyhow by Kim Fielding

“Love is love, right? It’s one of the mottos of Queer Romance Month, and it’s a concept that I—and all the other authors featured this month—recognize as a basic tenet of our work. But I want to add three more words to the motto: everywhere, everywhen, everyhow.”

Well now what? by Rhys Ford

“I’d want someone—gay, straight, purple or polka-dotted—to be able to carry themselves through life without having to fight for the right to love or to live.”

9 stories and 10 links by Ginn Hale

“But we writers aren’t the only ones exploring expanding the definitions of romance. Numerous amazing creators are writing, illustrating and producing, (often completely at their own expense) brilliant web comics. And I’d like to share a few that stand out for me.”

What Organizing a Gay Wedding Taught Me About Being a Romance Writer by Nicole Kimberling

“For a lot of readers, venturing through any of the doors marked L, G, B, or T is going to be as confusing as the bride-free wedding was for my previous client. Even readers of G might never try and see what’s behind the door marked T. Does that make them bad people? Not at all. It just means they haven’t found the book that can translate the experience into terms they understand or are able to feel comfortable engaging.”

Why We Need Trans Romance by E.E. Ottoman

“I refuse to believe that I will always be alone, that being trans has doomed me to isolation and unhappiness. I refuse to raise another generation of trans children who believe that is true, that they are fundamentally unlovable because they are trans. Who live without ever seeing people like them portrayed as being in a happy, healthy relationship. Who never get to see themselves as the heroes of a story about love and being loved.”

Components of Gay Romance by Jordan Castillo Price

“I may not consider myself to be a romance writer. But whether the love interest in my stories functions as a contrast to the main character, or a liability, or an ally, I find the relationship subplot to be a critical component of the work I’ve written so far.”

Lesbian Romance — Becoming Visible with a Little Help from our (M/M) Friends by Radclyffe

“While we who write LGBTQ romance may have different audiences, we have a common theme, and what unites us is far more significant than what separates us.”

It’s All About Me by Anne Tenino

“Most of those people who’re freaking out, telling LGBTQ people that they’re going to burn in hell? They aren’t doing it to save you. They’re doing it because they’re afraid of being punished for not saying anything.”

Why Queer Romance Matters by LA Witt

“I would have given my right arm for some believable, realistic queer characters when I was a teenager. Maybe then I would have seen myself and learned that there’s nothing wrong with me. I might’ve even learned what in the world ‘bisexual’ meant before I realized it also meant ‘me’.”

And GRNW lead Tracy contributed an essay prior to QRM’s launch:

Working in your Community to get the Word Out about Queer Romance by Tracy Timmons-Gray

“You may think that building community awareness around queer romance fiction is limited to gaining social media followers or GoodReads friends, but there are actually a lot of ways to build awareness within your *real life* community as well, and in ways that can have a big impact for other local readers and writers.”

Thank you to the organizers and contributors to the Queer Romance Month project.

With still so much celebration to do, where will QRM go next? We look forward to finding out! 😀

And please share with us YOUR favorite(s) QRM posts, and what they meant to you!