In honor of Pride Month, I thought I’d give you a run down of all of the LGBTQA+ Characters in my novels and short stories!
Heart – Bisexual, Polyamorous
Art by @reapersun
Kalp is the alien protagonist of Triptych, and he comes from a world where there are two biological sexes (along with the standard percentage of genetic variants that produce he produce the spectrum of biological variations that occur between two biological sexes), but very little concept of gender. When he flees the destruction of his home planet – and the death of his two spouses – he finds himself on a strange restrictive planet filled with humans who have bizarre notions of who he is allowed to desire and what he should find fascinating and satisfying based on his genitals. Kalp eventually enters into a romantic and sexual relationship with two humans, over the course of the book.
Basil Grey – Bisexual, Polyamorous
Art by @reapersun
Basil Grey is a Geek Everyman with a wide-open heart from Triptych. He had never considered whether he was straight or not simply because everyone he’d ever fall in love with (or had a crush on) were female. However, he slowly falls in love with Kalp over the course of their friendship. When the alien proposes to expand his relationship with his girlfriend Gwen to include Kalp, Basil is game for giving it a try. The threesome eventually end up marrying.
Gwen Pierson – Heterosexual, Polyamorous
Art by @reapersun
Gwen Pierson is the third in the triptych of lovers from Triptych. A bit of a grump, cynical, tough, and realistic, Gwen nevertheless has a great capacity for love and genuinely revels in the powerfully memorable domestic moments that she has with her partners. She is far more reluctant to open up her relationship with Basil to include Kalp, mostly because she fears losing his friendship if the relationship doesn’t work out. She doesn’t believe in the maxim “It is better to have love and lost than never to have loved at all,” because that just sounds so painful. She’d rather stick with the safe and reliable. In the end, though, she’s happy with the development in their relationship, adores the sex, and is selfishly smug about being the wife of two big-hearted and attentive people whom she in turn loves deeply and gluttonously.
Kintyre Turn – Bisexual
Art by @inchells
Kintyre Turn is the hero of The Tales of Kintyre Turn by Elgar Reed, which is the book-within-a-book in The Accidental Turn Series. He is bold, brawny, brash, brave, and a bit of an arrogant buffon. His traveling companion and loyal scribe, Bevel Dom, has been by his side for fourteen years, and during that time Kintyre has tumbled in and out of the beds of Damsels, Princess, and Pirate Queens. These affairs were often curated by Bevel, and sometimes he even joined in. When that happened, it always sort of accidentally ended up that Bevel and Kintyre were the ones making love, and the proxy woman got up and left in an ignored huff. It took fifteen years for Kintyre to be able to work his way through the toxic masculinity he was mired in enough to realize that he actually loved Bevel, enjoyed sex with him, and wanted to be in a real and lasting, healthy relationship with his best friend. By the end of The Untold Tale, the two heroes have cleared the air and pledged their troth to one another, living opening as a couple.
Bevel Dom – Gay
Art by @inchells
The narrator of The Tales of Kintyre Turn, Bevel lives in a fantasy realm where the love between men is supposed to be brotherly, macho, and platonic. He is sixteen when he first meets Kintyre, and doesn’t understand why he is so attracted to the arrogant Lord’s son. He becomes first Kintyre’s Squire, then his Sidekick, then a fellow Knight, all the while being Kintyre’s closest friend and chronicler. Eventually he realizes that his love for Kintyre is more lustful and romantic then it’s supposed to be; he willingly sets up trysts for Kintyre (and joins in) because it’s the only time he can act on his melancholy desire. Eventually, Kintyre and Bevel work through their emotional constipation, realize their love for each other, and become as close to married as this repressed realm allows for. Bevel is blissfully happy, though he wishes they could have a child.
The Prince – Heterosexual, Transgendered
Art by @archiaart
The protagonist of my erotica novel Lips Like Ice, The Prince is an alien on the verge of sexual maturity. In his species, adolescents can choose which biological sex they want to develop as, and against all societal norms and mores, The Prince chooses to become male. This causes him no end of abuse and misgendering in the court, and leads to his father trying to bully him into becoming female by providing him with a pet that is meant to encourage his nurturing, feminine side. However, the pet is more intelligent than The Prince thought, and together they escape the court, find happiness and love, and acceptance.
Lydia – Bisexual
Art by @archiaart
Lydia is “the pet” of Lips Like Ice. She mentions her bisexuality just briefly, as she’s explaining to the Prince that on Earth, his desire to match his biological sex to his internal gender would not be so horrific and shocking. She teaches The Prince to accept himself as he is, to fight for his right to be male, and to love himself when no one else, save her, seems to love him. Eventually they escape the oppressive and bigoted court together, and have their own Happily Ever After.
The Narrator – Lesbian
Art found on Pinterest. If you know the artist, please let me know so I can credit them appropriately. I couldn’t find the credit.
The narrator of my short “The Moral of the Story” from “Wrestling With Gods” is a lesbian, and I hesitated to add her to this list because she dies. (That’s not really a spoiler.) And I didn’t want to promote one more Dead Lesbian. But she doesn’t die because she’s a lesbian, so… anyway. This is a tale of survival in a post-electronics world, where the magic has returned in order to heal the planet after humans have made the icecaps melt and wreaked environmental havoc.
I do have a lesbian romance with a Happily Ever After in the works, but it’s unfortunately not ready to be announced yet. Soon though! I hope!
The Secret Loves of Geek Girls
Not technically all mine, and not actually fiction, but this great non-fiction book is filled with confessionals, essays (like my own “How Fanfiction Made Me Gay”), funny stories, comics, and tales of women from a wide variety of sexualities, gender expressions, ages, cultures, and ethnicities.
I have other LGBTQA+ characters sprinkled throughout my short stories and forthcoming novels and screenplays, as well. Check them out, and stay turned for more project announcements.
