Interviewer (I): Your book How To Be a Happy Lesbian: A Coming Out Guide has been a tremendous success. Did you have any idea it would be so well-received?

Tracey Stevens (TS): I knew there was a real need out there for this kind of book, but I had no idea I’d be getting such wonderful reviews and e-mails from places like Pakistan, and Iran, and Africa.

I: What made you decide to write the book?

TS: I had written several novels, and I had tried to include helpful information and get points across in them in a fictional way, but then my mentor, Patricia Nell Warren, said, "Why don’t you write a nonfiction book about how to be a healthy lesbian to get your message across?"

I: Warren is a fiction writer. . .

TS: That’s right. She’s been hugely successful with her novels since back in the ’70s, beginning with The Front Runner. I have to give her a tremendous amount of credit for not only encouraging me to write the coming out guide, but also for her support. She is a very giving person, which isn’t always the case with authors who’ve had as much success as she has.

I: She’s certainly complimentary in her comments on your book cover. She says "This (book) could be called The Lesbian Encyclopedia...." So you’ve included a lot more than just tips on "coming out" in it.

TS: I spent over a year doing research for the book, and I just found so much information I thought would be helpful. I wanted to include as much as I could, in addition to writing about my own experiences. Patricia encouraged me to share information about my own life with readers, too, and I did. I didn’t want it to be a dry "clinical" book.

I: Was it difficult to divulge that very personal information?

TS: I fought it for a long time. I guess I didn’t want to expose myself in that way. To actually write about myself was sort of scary.

I: You’d be, in essence, "coming out" yourself.

TS: Well, I had been out for years, but not in print like that to the world.

I: How did you overcome your fear?

TS: I started thinking about what kind of nonfiction book I would have wanted when I was coming out, and I thought about what I could do that would really help a lot of people. I realized that just by sharing my own personal experiences, sort of like a "big sister," I could reach a lot of women who are going through what I went through. . . What most lesbians probably go through at some point.

I also asked my partner, Kathy Wunder, if she would be willing to write some chapters from her perspective as a professional counselor, which she did. She wrote the chapters on communications (in relationships) and on counseling. A lot of women when they first come out have no support system and end up going into therapy— I did— and I wanted them to know what to expect.

I: What is Kathy’s background?

TS: She’s a licensed professional counselor; she’s been working in the mental health field for twelve years. We’ve gotten great feedback on her chapters. She even included information for therapists who may want to work with gay people but haven’t had much experience with them.

I: I know you turned 40 just a few weeks after finishing the book. How long had you known you were gay?

TS: Well, I had known since I was very young, but I actually put a label on it at 15.

I: So you’d been "out" yourself for 25 years when you wrote the coming out guide?

TS: I’d been out to my friends and people close to me since I was about 18; but I had been out to people at work—and employers—for 7 or 8 years.

I: And did you encounter problems in the "working world?" Were you ever discriminated against because you are a lesbian?

TS: Oh, yes. I was fired several times when my employers found out I was gay. With one where I had worked for three years— I was head buyer for a store in Florida— I was up for a promotion and they fired me when they found out I was gay. Later, I made sure that my employers knew ahead of time, before I ever took a job, and that they were OK with it.

I: I imagine it’s hard to counsel your readers to come out when you know they may face the same kinds of problems.

TS: In the book I don’t "tell" women to come out. That’s a decision they have to make on their own, weighing whether it’s harder to live a lie than face these issues. My goal with the book is to help women who do come out to find support, to steer them toward finding it and to living a happy life in spite of the problems.

I: Who did you have in mind as your "target audience" as you were writing the book?

TS: Originally I was thinking about older women who were having problems in their sex life, but then as it grew into this coming out guide, I was thinking more about the 16- to 25-year-old range. Now a lot of the reviewers have said it’s helpful for all ages, for women in and out of the closet. My guess is a lot of different age women are buying it. But I don’t have any way to track that.

You know, at first I was going to just write a sex guide.

I: A book on how to have satisfying lesbian sex?

TS: Well. . .Sort of a "how to make love to a woman" handbook. I had a background of sexual abuse and I’d been struggling with issues surrounding sex for years because of it. So when I was younger I read everything I could get my hands on—about sexuality—to try to understand what happened to me. In the process I learned a lot about technique. You know, if you go to an incest group you’ll find out that a lot of these women are "good at sex." We’ve been driven to know more about it to try to make sense out of what happened to us.

Anyway, I wanted to help women come to grips with their own sexuality and help them deal with problems I’d worked through. But then, as I started doing research for the book I realized there was so much more information I could share with readers. So the book grew. For example, I have a section on famous gay women. We need role models. I had no idea until I got into the research how many famous people are—or were— gay or lesbian. I thought it would empower people to know about them; it empowered me.

I: You included a big section on movies as well. Why?

TS: Movies are such a huge thing in our lives, and we look for role models in movies. When I did research I found that there were mostly negative images of gays and lesbians in Hollywood movies. It was really disturbing. For years we were portrayed as drug addicts and criminals and perverts. And we died at the end every time. Often it was: Lesbian attacks straight woman and then pays for it with her life!

Fortunately, that’s beginning to change; it’s getting better. I list more than 50 movies in the book, along with short reviews, that are available on video now; a lot of them are very good.

I: When you finished the book did you approach traditional publishers with it?

TS: I did, but I wasn’t surprised that they didn’t want to publish it. Before I ever wrote the coming out guide, I’d written several novels with lesbian characters. For ten years, I’d tried to get them published but was turned down.

I: Do you think it was the gay subject matter?

TS: Sometimes yes, but not always. I found that the smaller publishers who didn’t object to the subject matter were struggling financially and were just afraid to take a chance on a new writer. I did get very positive feedback from several of the women’s publishing companies; they were just scared to take the risk for financial reasons. But most of the big houses, the "big boys," were just saying "no way."

I: Because of the subject matter?

TS: Right. I went through those years of rejections feeling really defeated but I didn’t want to totally give up. Then when I came into contact with Patricia Nell Warren, she encouraged me to start my own publishing company. She had bought back the rights to her books from the big publisher she was with originally, and she started Wildcat Press, her own company. She said, "Tracey, publish your own books. You have no control over your own work when someone else is handling it."

I: So you launched Amazing Dreams Publishing.

TS: Yes, and it was tough. I was a full-time graphic designer at a book distributor, and between my job and the publishing company, I was working 60- to 80-hour weeks. Fortunately, now I work totally for myself.

I: Writing and running the publishing company?

TS: And Amazing Dreams Design. I’m a graphic designer and book designer. So, you know, when Patricia said I should publish my books myself, it made sense. I had the background to do it.

I: This all sounds too good. . . Is there a downside anywhere? For instance, have you gotten any hate mail about the book?

TS: The feedback has been positive. I’ve gotten lots of personal e-mails from women thanking me and telling me how the book has helped them in some way.

I: You offer the coming out guide as a free e-book on your web site now. Any regrets about that now that the book is selling well?

TS: Not at all. I decided to offer the coming out guide as a free download for women who are uncomfortable, or scared, to go in a bookstore and buy it. There are also young women who don’t have access to a charge card to purchase the book on the internet, and there are women living in countries where being lesbian could be fatal. I really feel that this book needs to be free for any woman in the world who needs it. I should mention that the "how to make love" section is not in the free download. I didn’t want 10-year-olds getting it. It’s not pornographic, but it’s also not something a child needs to read.

I’ve been told that e-books don’t do that well, but since we have been offering the free download, we had more than 500 downloads from women all over the world. I thought that was amazing! The free download is located in the coming out section of the site. When I have someone tell me in Iran that they are glad we are here, because they could be killed for coming out as a lesbian in their country, it makes me know that I am finally doing what I am supposed to on the earth. The internet is an amazing tool, helping people to reach out when they need to feel support or find information to help them in their lives.

I: I understand that you’ve done a spin-off book that includes just the sex tips.

TS: Yes, not long after the coming out guide was published I produced a second smaller book called Lesbian Sex Tips: A Guide for Anyone Who Wants To Bring Pleasure to the Woman She (Or He) Loves. I rewrote the material for men and women because I’ve met a lot of straight women who are dissatisfied with their sex life, and a lot of men who say they have no idea how to please a woman. They don’t know anything about a woman’s body.

I guess because I’m a lesbian a number of men have felt safe asking me about this. Men have actually asked me, "How do you do it?" And they’ve asked me for tips on how to satisfy a woman. So it’s really written for straight and gay people. And it’s not just a "how to do it" handbook. There’s a section on safer sex, which is so important today with AIDS and the high number of cases of STDs (sexually transmitted diseases) in both the straight and gay populations. We included Kathy’s chapters on therapy and communication in relationships, too.

I: And you aren’t offering it as a free download?

TS: No, for the same reasons the material on sexuality is cut out of the free download on the coming out guide. But anyone who wants the sex tips guide can order it in soft cover from amazon.com. They can also order it off my website—amazingdreamspublishing.com— in soft cover and soon as a downloadable e-book.

I: I noticed on your website that you’re also offering free e-cards for women. What made you decide to do that?

TS: I’m sure you’ve heard straight people complain about not being able to find good greeting cards. Well, you can imagine how hard it is for gay people. I got the idea to offer a line of e-cards for lesbians when I couldn’t find a decent card to send my girlfriend on our anniversary. I wanted to send her an e-card at work and there was nothing appropriate out there. The only ones I found were pornographic. There was a real need to have decent cards for women.

I started out with cards I designed, but now I’ve opened a new site called lesbianecard.com. I'm in the process of creating a whole line of e-cards that will feature the work of other artists. Each artist will have ten to fifteen cards of their work, a web page about them and how they create their art, and a link to their own site if they have one. The first fifteen artists get a free year on the e-card site.

I: So there will be a charge for artists after the first fifteen?

TS: Yes, a nominal one. Just because it takes several hours to set up the web pages, and we also have to pay for our yearly hosting fee, which goes up the more space we use. The fee to have an artist's designs set up will be under $10.00 a month, which makes it less than $120.00 to have a year's worth of advertising of the art work.

I: Do you have to be a lesbian artist to get in on the deal?

TS: No. Anyone can join. I want it to be a community for open-minded artists. The only requirement is that the artist can not be homophobic, and we will not feature artwork that is pornographic.

I: How many people are using the ecard site?

TS: The first month lesbianecard.com was online, we had over 11,000 hits to it! Now we get over 500,000 hits a month! Lots of people use it. Straight men are even using the site to send cards to their wives and girlfriends.

I: What other products or services does Amazing Dreams Publishing offer?

TS: For now it’s the ecards, my books, and we have an online Yahoo support group for women who are coming out. We have members from all over the world. In the future, as we grow, I’m hoping to be able to publish other quality books by women. We’re not quite ready for that step at this point. But I do help authors who want to self-publish. I steer them to good editors and my company Amazing Dreams Design can typeset their books and design their covers. Print on demand, POD, is a great way for them to go if they want to get their books out there, if they’ve been turned down by traditional publishers.

I: You seem to have mapped out your company’s future. . . What about personal goals?

TS: My dream since I was very young has been to create a community where women can live together and work together in a safe haven. So my biggest goal is to have a large tract of land somewhere here in the mountains of North Carolina where Kathy and I can have a conference center that offers all kinds of workshops and seminars. . . Writing conferences, relationship seminars—Kathy can offer counseling services. Another thing: I’m very much into horses; I’ve had horses all my life, and at some point I want to incorporate my knowledge of horses and provide therapeutic programs for people who’ve been abused.

I: Therapeutic how?

TS: When I was little the only thing that saved my life was my horse. I was a small person who was able to ride on a very large, powerful animal. He gave me so much strength that I made it through those years of being abused. When I was on him, I felt safe.

Children who’re abused, especially physically or sexually, feel out of control of their environment—which they are. But if you put a child like that with a horse in a ring and they control that huge animal’s movements—and they learn to communicate with horses on that level—it’s an amazing and profound thing that happens. The experience is incredibly helpful in building these kids’ self-esteem. Horses are great therapists.

I: Sounds like you’re going to be busy—writing, running a publishing company, a graphic design business, a retreat center, a therapeutic horse program. . .

TS: I know I’ll be juggling a lot for a while, but if building the community pans out, I will probably scale down the graphic design business. I think my real purpose in life is to help people. I think I experienced abuse as a child so that I could eventually help other people who’ve gone through it. I think that’s why I’m here.

And I know I won’t stop writing. We’re bringing out two of my novels over the next year—Chalice of the Goddess, a romance set in England in the 1300s, and a thriller/serial killer book, Above Faith and Beyond Fear. Kathy and I are also working on another self-help book on lesbian relationships.

I: And are the main characters in the novels lesbians?

TS: Of course!

***

Interviewer Bio:

Susan Snowden is a professional journalist and book editor based in western North Carolina. During her career she has interviewed numerous authors, including Tennessee Williams, James Dickey, Olive Ann Burns, William Price Fox, Dr. Lee Salk, and others.

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