Lambda Literary Awards


Lambda Literary Awards, also known as the "Lammys", are awarded yearly by Lambda Literary to recognize the role LGBTQ+ writers play in shaping the world. The Lammys celebrate the best in LGBTQ+ literature.
The Lambda Literary Awards are the most comprehensive awards dedicated to LGBTQ literature in the U.S.:123 They recognize books published in English, available in the U.S., and covering LGBTQ+ themes in specific subject categories.:9 In addition to the primary literary awards, Lambda Literary also presents a number of special awards.
The awards began in 1989 with fourteen awards and prizes dedicated to gay and lesbian literature of different genres and styles. The Lammys have since grown to include bisexual and transgender literature as well as works dealing with themes on the broader LGBTQ+ spectrum. The Lambda Literary Awards are one of a number of LGBTQ literary awards. Other prominent awards include those by Publishing Triangle, the Stonewall Book Awards, and the Gaylactic Spectrum Awards.
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Award categories

Lambda Literary Awards are bestowed in a number of categories across genres and identities. Categories change with time, especially via combination or splitting. This is usually based on the foundation's estimate of whether a given category will receive more than 20 submissions for three years in a row. If a category receives less than ten books in a year, it will not compete, and its books may be reassigned. Categories may also be added to recognize works pertaining to more identities along the LGBTQ+ spectrum.
Winners of the Lambda Literary Awards, also known as "Lammy Awards", are announced at an award ceremony, and given trophies but no cash prize. The Lambda Literary Foundation also publishes sponsored Special Prizes, whose winners are announced close to the ceremony and offered cash prizes.

Discontinued awards

Awards are often combined with similar ones when there aren't enough recurring submissions to sustain a category, but sometimes awards are discontinued. Some categories are removed for a given year when there are too few submissions. The first Lambda Literary Awards were in twelve categories, predominantly focused on gay and lesbian literature. Many have since grown into broader categories or become inactive. There were two original prizes: Editor's Choice and Publisher Service, which have also ended.

History

L. Page "Deacon" Macubbin started the Lambda Book Report in 1987 to recognize works by LGBTQ writers, but he wanted to establish complementary awards to create further recognition. The first Lambda Literary Awards were held in 1989 for works published in 1988. There were twelve categories based on genre, subject, style, publisher, and identity, and two additional awards.:136-137 The initial awards predominantly focused on gay and lesbian literature, with many categories specifically devoted to genre work targeted at either identity.
The awards recognize books published in English and available in the U.S., so almost all finalists have been U.S. or Canadian works.:9 The awards have also required submissions to be published as printed books. This made it much less likely that self-published authors, especially those marginalized or excluded from publishing opportunities, could compete.:110
Early categories such as HIV/AIDS literature were dropped as the prominence of the AIDS crisis within the gay community waned, and categories for bisexual and transgender literature were added as the community became more inclusive. The first award for trans literature was in 1997. A bisexual category was first added in 2002 as part of the lone category for trans works, and a bisexual category returned on its own in 2006.
Until 2002, books could be nominated for an award for free, and nomination forms were shared via the Lambda Book Report, via publisher mailing lists, and at gay and lesbian bookstores. Some readers claimed this process was too much of a popularity contest or easily swayed towards works favored by literary elites, with Naiad Press sometimes blamed for having an advantage over smaller independent presses.:111-113 Nominations changed in 2003 to require a $15 fee, several book copies, and only allow submissions from publishers, authors, and people associated with a given book.:113-114
Lambda Awards have defined eligible literature as works dealing with themes of an award's identity label, rather than works written by authors whose identities match the award.:129-131 They changed this policy from 2009-2012 due to criticism that the awards weren't honoring enough LGBTQ authors, but further controversy led the foundation to revert the change and instead ensure judges identify as LGBTQ, while reserving three special prizes for authors with LGBTQ identities.:190 However, the underlying requirements for the new prizes excluded bisexual and trans people. By 2013, the judging panels and leadership of the awards had also grown more diverse, across intersections including gender, race, ability, age, job, and location, than in previous years.
By 2012, submissions had grown to a record of 600 works from 250 publishers. The program grew to 22 awards in 2013, and 26 in 2026. The awards have retained many categories specifically for gay and lesbian literature, but slowly added more categories that are identity-neutral within the bounds of the LGBT, or later LGBTQ and LGBTQ+ spectrums.:138 For instance, in 2018, a few awards and prizes specified that they were open to LGBTQ works, while others were listed under LGBT or more specific identities.:21 there had been no identity-based award categories involving race, and the only intersectional category was Spirituality.:146 A special prize, the Randall Kenan Prize for Black LGBTQ Fiction, was given annually from 2021 to 2025.
, submissions for Lambda Awards may be made without supplying paper copies of the work, but the foundation states this may hurt the book's advancement through rounds of judging. However, some books submitted this way have made it to the finalist round.

Notable winners

Repeat winners in a category

Ellen Hart has won five awards in the Lesbian Mystery category, the most by any single author, and is one of only three writers to have won the award more than once. Similarly, Michael Nava has won five awards in the Gay Mystery category, the most by any single author, and is one of only four writers to have won the award more than once. Marshall Thornton is the only author in the gay mystery category to have won twice for two different series.
Alison Bechdel has won four awards in the Humor category, the most by any single author, and is one of five writers to have won the award more than once. The Humor category has been discontinued.
Nicola Griffith and Melissa Scott have each won four awards in the Scifi/Fantasy/Horror category, and are two of six writers to have won the SFFH award more than once.
Sarah Waters has won three awards in the Lesbian Fiction category, for Tipping the Velvet, Fingersmith, and The Night Watch in, and is one of only three writers to have won the Lesbian Fiction award more than once.
Mark Doty and Adrienne Rich have each won three awards in the Poetry category, and are two of seven poets to have won the award more than once
Richard Labonté, Radclyffe, and Tristan Taormino have each won two awards in the Erotica category, each winning once before the category was split into Gay and Lesbian subdivisions, and each winning their second after the category was split.
Karin Kallmaker and Michael Thomas Ford have each won two awards in the Romance category, each winning one before the category was split into Gay and Lesbian subdivisions – Kallmaker with Maybe Next Time and Ford with Last Summer, but in 2004 – and each winning their second after the category was split – Ford with Changing Tides in 2008 and Kallmaer with The Kiss That Counted in 2009.
Colm Tóibín is the only writer to have won two awards in the Gay Fiction category for The Master in 2004 and for The Empty Family in 2011.
Paul Monette is the only writer to have won two awards in the Gay Non-Fiction category, for Borrowed Time in 1989 and for Becoming a Man in 1993.

Repeat winners across categories

Lillian Faderman is the only writer to have won awards in seven different categories, having received:
  • The Editor's Choice Award for Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers in 1992
  • The Fiction Anthology Award for Chloe Plus Olivia in 1995
  • The Lesbian Studies Award for To Believe in Women in 2000
  • The Autobiography/Memoir Award for Naked in the Promised Land in 2004
  • The LGBT Arts & Culture award for Gay L.A.: A History of Sexual Outlaws, Power Politics and Lipstick Lesbians in 2007
  • The LGBT Non-Fiction award for Gay L.A.: A History of Sexual Outlaws, Power Politics and Lipstick Lesbians in 2007
  • The Pioneer Award in 2013.
Several authors have won awards in three different categories:
Several other writers have won awards in more than one category in different years and for different works:

Winners of multiple awards in a year

Several writers have won awards in more than one category in the same year for the same work :
Several writers have won awards in more than one category in the same year for different works:

Adaptations

Numerous Lambda Award-winning works have been adapted for film and television:

Awards by year

The Lambda Literary Awards are presented each year to honor works of literature published in the previous year; accordingly, the first awards ceremony may be described in different sources as either the 1989 awards or the 1988 awards. Submissions are usually open from September-November for titles published in the same year. Finalists will be announced in the spring; and winners will be announced in the fall. For Special Prizes, submissions have opened in March of the award year, for titles published the year before, but in 2026 submissions ran from January to February.
CeremonyYear of presentationYear of publication
1st Lambda Literary Awards19891988
2nd Lambda Literary Awards19901989
3rd Lambda Literary Awards19911990
4th Lambda Literary Awards19921991
5th Lambda Literary Awards19931992
6th Lambda Literary Awards19941993
7th Lambda Literary Awards19951994
8th Lambda Literary Awards19961995
9th Lambda Literary Awards19971996
10th Lambda Literary Awards19981997
11th Lambda Literary Awards19991998
12th Lambda Literary Awards20001999
13th Lambda Literary Awards20012000
14th Lambda Literary Awards20022001
15th Lambda Literary Awards20032002
16th Lambda Literary Awards20042003
17th Lambda Literary Awards20052004
18th Lambda Literary Awards20062005
19th Lambda Literary Awards20072006
20th Lambda Literary Awards20082007
21st Lambda Literary Awards20092008
22nd Lambda Literary Awards20102009
23rd Lambda Literary Awards20112010
24th Lambda Literary Awards20122011
25th Lambda Literary Awards20132012
26th Lambda Literary Awards20142013
27th Lambda Literary Awards20152014
28th Lambda Literary Awards20162015
29th Lambda Literary Awards20172016
30th Lambda Literary Awards20182017
31st Lambda Literary Awards20192018
32nd Lambda Literary Awards20202019
33rd Lambda Literary Awards20212020
34th Lambda Literary Awards20222021
35th Lambda Literary Awards20232022
36th Lambda Literary Awards20242023
37th Lambda Literary Awards20252024

Controversies

Bisexual community and ''Bi Any Other Name''

In 1992, despite requests from the bisexual community for a more appropriate and inclusive category, the groundbreaking bisexual anthology Bi Any Other Name: Bisexual People Speak Out by Loraine Hutchins and Lani Kaʻahumanu was forced to compete, and lost, in the category "Lesbian Anthology". Additionally, in 2005, Directed by Desire: Collected Poems, a posthumous collection of the bisexual Jamaican-American writer June Jordan's work, competed in the category "Lesbian Poetry".
Led by BiNet USA, and assisted by other bisexual organizations including the American Institute of Bisexuality, BiPOL, and Bialogue, the bisexual community launched a multi-year struggle that eventually culminated in 2006 with the addition of a Bisexual category. Sheela Lambert was one of these activists: when the Bisexual category grew, then shrank, by 2012, Lambert launched the Bisexual Book Awards to offer more opportunities for the recognition of bisexual literature.

Transgender community and ''The Man Who Would Be Queen''

In 2004, the book The Man Who Would Be Queen: The Science of Gender-Bending and Transsexualism by the highly controversial researcher J. Michael Bailey was announced as a finalist in the Transgender category of the 2003 Awards.
Transgender people immediately protested the nomination and gathered thousands of petition signatures in opposition within a few days. After the petition, the Foundation's judges examined the book more closely, decided that they considered it transphobic and removed it from their list of finalists. Within a year the executive director who had initially approved of the book's inclusion resigned. Executive director Charles Flowers later stated that "the Bailey incident revealed flaws in our awards nomination process, which I have completely overhauled since becoming the foundation's executive director in January 2006."