Michael Angel Nava is an American attorney and writer. He has worked on the staff for the California Supreme Court, and ran for a Superior Court position in 2010. He authored a ten-volume mystery series featuring Henry Rios, an openly gay protagonist who is a criminal defense lawyer. His novels have received seven Lambda Literary Awards and critical acclaim in the GLBT and Latino communities.
Aaron Krach is an American artist, writer, and journalist currently living in New York City.
Edmund Valentine White III is a gay American novelist, memoirist, playwright, biographer and essayist. He is the recipient of Lambda Literary's Visionary Award, the National Book Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award, and the PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction. France made him Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1993.
Alyson Books, formerly known as Alyson Publications, was a book publishing house which specialized in LGBT fiction and non-fiction. Former publisher Don Weise described it as "the world's oldest and largest publisher of LGBT literature" and "the home of award-winning books in the areas of memoir, history, humor, commercial fiction, mystery, and erotica, among many others".
Emanuel Xavier, is an American poet, spoken word artist, author, editor, screenwriter, and LGBTQ activist born and raised in the Bushwick area of Brooklyn. Associated with the East Village, Manhattan arts scene in New York City, he emerged from the ball culture scene to become one of the first openly gay poets from the Nuyorican movement as a successful writer and advocate for gay youth programs and Latino gay literature.
Half-Life is a debut novel by Aaron Krach. Published in 2004 by Alyson Books, the novel was nominated for a Violet Quill Award and was among the 2004 Lambda Literary Award finalists. It discusses young love, coping with death and the issues facing gay youth.
Felice Picano is an American writer, publisher, and critic who has encouraged the development of gay literature in the United States. His work is documented in many sources.
Michael Thomas Ford is an American author of primarily gay-themed literature. He is best known for his "My Queer Life" series of comedic essay collections and for his award-winning novels Last Summer, Looking for It, Full Circle, Changing Tides, and What We Remember.
Michael Lassell is an American writer, editor and poet, who is best known for his contributions to the fields of design, travel, arts, Broadway theater, and LGBT studies.
Terry Wolverton is an American novelist, memoirist, poet, and editor. Her memoir Insurgent Muse: Life and Art at the Woman's Building, published in 2002 by City Lights Books, was named one of the "Best Books of 2002" by the Los Angeles Times, and was the winner of the 2003 Publishing Triangle Judy Grahn Award, and a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award. Her novel-in-poems Embers was a finalist for the PEN USA Litfest Poetry Award and the Lambda Literary Award.
Lambda Literary Awards are awarded yearly by the United States–based Lambda Literary Foundation to published works that celebrate or explore LGBTQ themes. The awards are presented annually for books published in the previous year. The Lambda Literary Foundation states that its mission is "to celebrate LGBT literature and provide resources for writers, readers, booksellers, publishers, and librarians—the whole literary community."
Bob Smith was an American comedian and author. Born in Buffalo, New York, Smith was the first openly gay comedian to appear on The Tonight Show and the first openly gay comedian to have his own HBO half-hour comedy special. Smith, along with fellow comedians Jaffe Cohen and Danny McWilliams, formed the comedy troupe Funny Gay Males in 1988.
Scott Sherman is a U.S. writer and podcaster. His first novel, First You Fall, won the 2009 Lambda Literary Award for Best Gay Mystery. His writing has also appeared in many periodicals.
Kevin Brett Jennings is an American educator, author, and administrator. He was the assistant deputy secretary for the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools at the U.S. Department of Education from July 6, 2009 – June 2011.
Jeanne Córdova was an American writer and supporter of the lesbian and gay rights movement, founder of The Lesbian Tide, and a founder of the West Coast LGBT movement. A former Catholic nun, Córdova was a second-wave feminist lesbian activist and self-described butch.
Cheryl Burke, known professionally as Cheryl B, was an American journalist, spoken word poet, performance artist and playwright, associated with the East Village arts scene in New York City. She is best known for her autobiographical book My Awesome Place: The Autobiography of Cheryl B, which was published posthumously and was co-winner, with John Irving's novel In One Person, of the 2013 Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Literature.
Christopher Kelly is an American writer, who won the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Debut Fiction at the 20th Lambda Literary Awards in 2008 for his debut novel A Push and a Shove.
Sub Rosa is a 2010 queer novel by Canadian Amber Dawn published by Vancouver-based Arsenal Pulp Press. The novel was Dawn's debut novel, and is a work of speculative fiction that touches on topics of sex, work, imagination, and survival. It narrates the story of "Little," a teenage girl who cannot remember her real name and ends up involved in the dark world of Sub Rosa, "a fantastical underground community of sex workers", where she enters the company of ghosts, magicians, and magical Glories. Sub Rosa won the Lambda Award for Lesbian Debut Fiction in 2011.
John Morgan Wilson is an American journalist and author of crime fiction, notably the Benjamin Justice mystery novels. The books feature a reclusive ex-reporter, ruined by a Pulitzer scandal and haunted by personal loss, who operates out of West Hollywood, California, becoming enmeshed in murder investigations in and around Los Angeles.
Michael Craft Johnson, who publishes under the pen name Michael Craft, is an American author of more than 20 novels, many of which are in the mystery genre, with gay protagonists. The first installment of his Dante & Jazz mystery series, Desert Getaway, was a 2023 MWA Edgars nominee for the Lilian Jackson Braun Award. The second installment, Desert Deadline, was a Gold Winner of the IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award for LGBTQ, as was his 2019 mystery, ChoirMaster. Four of the books in his Mark Manning mystery series were finalists for the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Mystery.
