James Dawson: On LGBT Visibilty In Children's Books

As it's The Guardian children's books site's LGBT week I was asked to write something as both a member of the LGBT community and as an author whose novels feature LGBT characters. I dearly wish I was a merman, but alas I am just a gay man. The things I've just written may seem absurd when featuring mermaids, but this was very much my reality growing up in a small town in the north.

I was unaware gay people even existed and, when puberty hit, found myself more than a little lost. I so dearly wish there had been just one book with a character who was a bit like me – just a normal teenage guy who happened to be gay. I would have especially loved one whose sexuality did not define him.

Teenage readers now are comparatively lucky in that they do have role models in books by not only myself, but also much more famous authors like David Levithan, Patrick Ness and Cassandra Clare.

I'm my books, I choose to write human characters and start with the similarities before looking at the differences. We all love, hate, kiss and fight in the same way. We're all driven by the same variety of hungers. We all laugh, we all cry.

I just know that had there been a diverse range of people like me in books when I was growing up, I wouldn't have felt abnormal for all those years, which I see now, overwhelmingly, I am not. In 2014, it's my hope that all young LGBT people can see themselves in fiction and recognise there is a place for them in the world.

The gorgeous and talented James Dawson in the Guardian online.

For other articles in the Children's Books LGBT week see here.

And have a butchers at James's blog.