Gay author wins coveted award
The author of 
America’s most celebrated novel about fictional gay athletes has garnered yet another literary distinction with her first nonfiction book about real-life sports figures titled, The Lavender Locker Room: 3000 years of Great Athletes Whose Sexual Orientation Was Different.
Patricia Nell Warren
, whose 1974 landmark novel, The Front Runner, became an international bestseller and the first modern gay love story to become successful in mainstream America, has won the Independent Publisher Gold Medal this year for Best Gay/Lesbian book.
Chosen as one of the top independent tomes out of 2,690 entries from all fifty states, eight Canadian provinces, and 17 countries overseas, Warren’s winning entry is an anthology of historical essays which chronicle the lives of real gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender athletes over the past three millennia.
Among the sports figures featured in The Lavender Locker Room are golfer Babe Didrikson, boxer Wilhelm von Homburg, pilot Amelia Earhart, downhill skier Erik Schinegger, jockey John Damien, and 14th century jouster Jeanne la Pucelle, better known as Joan of Arc.
“These true, in-depth profiles span many cultures and countries and run the sexuality gamut,” explains Warren, “They focus on the personal stories of these remarkable athletes and their lasting contributions to sport itself.”
“My intent in telling these stories is to prove that athletes with different sexualities in sport did not just happen in recent times,” Warren declares, “It has been going on for centuries.”
Warren, who at age 71 will celebrate her 35th anniversary as an bestselling author next year, is pleased with this latest honor for her newest book, which recently became the top Gay History Bestseller on Amazon.com, and hopes it will continue to draw greater attention to the unknown contributions made to sports by gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered athletes.
Although she has written eight novels and four books of poetry, and has attracted an estimated thirty million readers with her diverse literary subjects ranging from gay life to Native American philosophy. However, it was Warren’s milestone novel about openly gay and lesbian athletes which made literary history three decades ago by cracking the New York Times best-seller list as “the most moving, monumental love story ever written about gay life.” Published in 21 separate editions and translated into eleven languages to date, The Front Runner has sold an estimated ten million copies, and continues to be one of the top selling gay novels worldwide.
The Independent Publisher Gold Medal is not Warren’s first literary honor. She was also nominated for the Benjamin Franklin Award this year for her sports anthology. Her other past accolades include the Gay & Lesbian Literary Hall of Fame, the National Cowboy Hall of Fame Western Heritage Award, the Lambda Literary Award, the Saints & Sinners Hall of Fame, and the Barry Goldwater Award from the Arizona Human Rights Fund.
Purchase The Lavender Locker Room
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June 13th, 2007 at 9:47 am
Wow, how did ever I miss “The Front Runner?” This is the first I’ve heard of it. Congrats to Patricia and I’ll check out The Front Runner and The Lavendar Locker Room.
June 13th, 2007 at 10:59 am
This looks like a really interesting book. There are a lot of places in the world where “gay” is not “acceptable,” and it’s important to remember how hard it is for these people.
June 14th, 2007 at 9:58 am
Sounds like a good read. It is always interesting to me that throughout history there have been so any gay and lesbian people but there are always those who act as though it is a recent epidemic or has to do with some change in our society. A book like this, or perhaps one about 3000 years of notable people with different orientations would help enlighten people.
June 14th, 2007 at 10:06 am
Letia - that’s precisely why I do the weekly “Notable Lesbians” series. To let people know we “gays” have been here for a long time and have often made notable contributions to society.