The second International Literature Showcase of 2019 has been revealed. We asked Val McDermid’s to introduce her selection of 10 UK-based LGBTQI+ writers.

My first novel was published in 1987. It was the first British crime novel with a lesbian detective. The only route to publication was via an independent feminist publisher. Back then, there were a few radical bookshops that stocked titles like mine. But getting mainstream shops to stock it was an uphill struggle. Finding representations of queer lives took dedication and stubborn persistence.

Don’t miss Val’s conversation with Sian Cain about the writers:

Gradually, that has changed. Now our words are part of the mainstream of British literary life. LGBTQ writers are  not only published by mainstream publishers and stocked by libraries, bookshops and supermarkets; they win major prizes. For so long conspicuous by our absence, we are now conspicuous by our presence.

I wrote a lesbian heroine because I’d grown up in a time and place where there were no templates for the life I wanted to live. The queer struggle for self-definition has been pursued in no small part so that the next generation has a springboard for imagining how to live. Every literary movement requires pioneers to kick open the door a crack. Others spot the opening and push the door wider. Then, at last, there’s room for everyone to walk through and write the lives they want to write.

The ten writers featured in this showcase reveal the quality and breadth of current LGBTQ writing in Britain today. From novels to memoirs, from short stories to film scripts, from poetry to plays, their work covers a broad spectrum of form, style and content. There is, genuinely, something here for everyone.

Because these writers are writing for everyone. These are not words for a niche readership. These are not writings for a ghetto. These are the works of writers who have something to say that can be – and should be – heard by as many people as possible. Although their words will have particular resonance for some readers over others, isn’t that what good writing always does?

LGBTQ writers have forced their way out of the dark corners where we were pushed by a society that didn’t want to be reminded of our existence. Thanks to writers such as Ali Smith, Alan Hollinghurst, Russell, T Davies, Carol Ann Duffy and many more, LGBTQ writers are everywhere. And deservedly praised everywhere too. Recommended by reviewers, librarians, teachers, booksellers, reviewers and friends.

Some might say the battle is won, the war is over. But a quick scan of news headlines and social media on any given day gives the lie to that. LGBTQ people are still bullied at school and in the workplace.  We are still the targets of hate crime. In many places around the world, our very identity criminalises us.

Auden was wrong when he claimed ‘poetry makes nothing happen.’ Words do change the world, reader by reader. They open our eyes, they provoke thought, they make us uncomfortable in our entrenched positions. The work of these ten writers will do all of those things. But most of all, they will awaken in us fresh delight in the wonder of words.

Val McDermid is one of the biggest names in crime writing. Her novels have been translated into 40 languages and have sold over 16 million copies worldwide.