Nothing like a slap in the face...

To wake you up in the morning.

AKA, Jessewave's response to my email from last night, in which I expressed my anger and disappointment over her refusal to offer a free copy of Flawless because it features a trans* hero...



"So trans* men aren't real men? Uh, wow. That's about a hundred shades of offensive." (Me)

"Here's the thing -- you went all the way from Lynn saying that we don't post trans* books as free books on the site, to your statement above. While we welcome authors and I promote most of them, this site is primarily for readers and about 95% of the readers have told me over and over what they want to see on the site. The site policy is stated on the right hand sidebar. You may not agree with it but this is the policy here and has been for years.

We also no longer post bisexual books as free books because the last time we did, the winner refused the book. I suppose you find that offensive too. Oh, we also don't post lesbian books or M/M/F menage books as free books.

I have been insulted by a lot of your colleagues in various blog posts, as late as last year, because of this policy, but since my partners and I pay the hosting and associated costs for running the site, which runs into hundreds of dollars annually, with no offset by advertising revenue, and spend a lot of our personal time every day maintaining the site, time we could spend on other activities that make money, no one else can dictate what we post here. You may want to check the larger epublishers to see how many of them offer trans* and bi romances, before you throw insults around.

I have trans* friends whose opinions are important to me and they have no problem with this policy. You write what you want, which is your prerogative. Perhaps you could grant us the same courtesy to post what our readers want."

Of course I grant you that same courtesy, Wave. I'm not disputing your right to post whatever the hell you like. So your stated policy is to exclude books featuring trans* (or bisexual) characters - hey, fine. Doesn't mean I have to like it or support it.

That said, I honestly cannot believe you're trying to play the "I have trans* friends" card. Well, I have trans* friends too - in fact, one of them is my life partner. I'm well-acquainted with the bigotry, hatred and suspicion trans* folk face on a daily basis, and your policy of exclusion only helps to perpetuate this vicious cycle.

But obviously the most important thing here is that I've trampled on your right to be an intolerant bigot. Sorry about that!

Edited to add: If you'd like to read Flawless, you can find it here:

Amazon, Nook, Kobo, All Romance ebooks or directly from Riptide Publishing.