The Evolution of Queer Crime Fiction

An updated more permanent version of this information can be found here.

I enjoy this sub-genre because the characters are…, different! I’ll share a list of authors who have written in this area, but the immediate reason for this post is the announcement of a Mystery Writers of America webinar on the topic scheduled for Thursday evening February 9, 2023 – 7 pm EST.

If interested in this topic: Please join the MWA Midwest chapter for Queering the Crime Genre, a panel discussion with Greg Herren, John Copenhaver, JM Redmann, and Robyn Gigl! Hosted by Anne Laughlin and Meredith Doench. When: February 9 at 7:00pm Eastern.

This is not like other Zoom calls you have seen. Your camera is not on, you are not seen or heard, questions are fed through a special chatbox, if you wish to do so. That is why it is called a Zoom webinar. Not a Zoom conference call. Zoom registration will look the same. Link: https://us02web.zoom.us/…/reg…/WN_gidBMONySiynWv8inntSlw

Queer Crime Fiction Authors listed by Oline H. Cogdill

You can read her list and her authoritative commentaries in a Mystery Scene magazine article here. She describes who was “first” in various ways, and what awards some of the authors have won. What I will do is just list these queer crime fiction authors with a link to their page on StopYoureKillingMe.com

• George Baxt
• John Copenhaver
• Robert W. Fieseler (Non-fiction – True Crime)
• Katherine V. Forrest
• Joseph Hansen
• Ellen Hart Not a “cozy” fan but her first book held my attention all the way through.
• Greg Herren Fun, and a bit over the top story (based on the first in the Scotty Bradley series)
• Val McDermid

• Michael Nava I read a handful of these gay lawyer books over 15 years ago. I enjoyed the “troubled hero” character which is why I read more than one.
• Abigail Padgett
• Neil Plakcy
• J. M. Redmann
• Christopher Rice
• John Morgan Wilson
• R.D. Zimmerman

Missing from her list:

• Richard Stevenson I have read a few of his Donald Strachey PI books and hope to read more. They are set in Albany, NY where Strachey’s partner is a legislative aid to a State Senator. About a half dozen of the books were made into movies. Search Amazon Prime (“Donald Strachey”). Stevenson died in 2022 and a final book, first of an intended new series, was listed in the Washington Post‘s “Best Mysteries of 2022” – Knock Off the Hat. It takes place  in post-war Philadelphia. Clifford Waterman, dishonorably discharged from the Army for “an indecent act with a native” in Cairo, can’t go back to his job as a police detective and is struggling to make a go of it as a private investigator. I bought in on Kindle and hope to read it … soon (??)
• P. J. Vernon I read his thriller, Bath Haus – solid B+

And finally a list of 85+ Gay and Lesbian authors in the diversity index at StopYoureKillingMe.com (SYKM) It includes all of the above. Plus the good, and the junk all mixed in.

Ten important queer protagonists. Tom Ripley is #1 !! Patricia Highsmith wasn’t on the SYKM list. Queer themes run through her books.