Publisher’s Weekly just published an entry from writers Rachel Manija Brown and Sherwood Smith.  The article discusses how an agent asked them to remove the gay character from their story in order for it to be published.

This is not the first time writers have been asked to change the sexuality of a character in order for a book to be published.  Earlier in the year Jessica Verday removed her story from an anthology because she was told the story, which featured two boys in love, would have to be switch to a boy/girl relationship.

From Publisher’s Weekly:

Our novel, Stranger, has five viewpoint characters; one, Yuki Nakamura, is gay and has a boyfriend. Yuki’s romance, like the heterosexual ones in the novel, involves nothing more explicit than kissing.

An agent from a major agency, one which represents a bestselling YA novels in the same genre as ours, called us.  The agent offered to sign us on the condition that we make the gay character straight, or else remove his viewpoint and all references to his sexual orientation. {MORE}

Do you think the publishing industry is closed minded when it comes to gay characters in books? How many books do you know of that are “mainstream” and feature a gay character? I know of only a few and I read a lot of books.