On Pride

A gay endeavour.

I posted this yesterday.

Happy #PrideMonth from The Lodger, Me and Mickie James, all the staff at The Flamingo Hotel, all the visitors to Saltburn and, most importantly, You.

25 years I’ve been putting gay/queer fiction out there, being positive, vying for visibility. 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈

I didn’t have these kind of books when I was growing up. Not only that, there weren’t gay characters on the TV, around me. I felt I was the only person like me and it was shameful and I would never be able to act on any of my desires and I would die alone.

So, Pride Month. What’s it for? Just that. And if my writing is ‘for’ anything it’s ‘for’ that. It’s been an endeavour from the beginning.

The Lodger (2002). This is my most straight forward book. Gay commercial fiction. Guy meets guy. Falls in love. But it is also about gay adoption. That this gay couple may make great dads.

Me and Mickie James (2008). I wanted to write a book about a gay male couple that wasn’t about them being gay. So, they’re in a pop group. They have adventures. They go across the world. It was published by a Big 5 publisher. When it was on submission things said to my then agent. ‘Have you got another book like this?’ ‘We love it but we already have a gay author.’ ‘It’ll be a hard sell.’

Seven Nights at the Flamingo Hotel (2020). This is my honest sex disaster book. Look, I read plenty of books where characters have sex, from great writers, literary writers, and I think is that really how it is? I’ve never experienced that. So Flamingo was about what it’s really like. To be honest I don’t know still what You, the protagonist’s, sexuality is. He lurches from one inappropriate disastrous situation to another. Surely that is what life is like? Yikes.

Saltburn (2025) If Flamingo was the honest sex disaster book then Saltburn is queer joy, a reaction to the current backlash that sex and sexuality is binary/one thing only. So in Saltburn the there are men who have sex with men, and women, and mermaids, gay mermaids, characters whose sex changes on a nightly basis, from man to woman and back again. There are non-binary characters. There is an acceptance of difference and love.

So there you go.

Happy Pride.

🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈