Event Info
Age Restriction : STRICTLY 12+ years
Running Time: Doors open at 6.30 pm, with the author's talks starting from 7 pm. Each author will read from and give talks on their books and take audience questions. You will also have the opportunity to buy signed copies of the books. Approx finish 9.30 pm
Queer Lit Quarterly is an evening of book talks and book signing hosted by Gayberystwyth Books with the support of Aberration Cymru. This is an opportunity to meet queer authors and researchers and publishers, who will read from their books, speak about their motivation and the writing process and take questions from the audience, finishing the evening with a panel discussion. You will have the option to meet the authors, purchase their books and have them signed by the authors.
ROSIE WILBY
Rosie Wilby is an award-winning comedian, author, speaker, journalist and broadcaster. Her nonfiction books The Breakup Monologues, accompanied by a podcast of the same name, and Is Monogamy Dead?, longlisted for the Polari First Book Prize, combine humour, heartache and science to take a very queer look at the psychology of relationships. She’s now working on a debut novel based on her experiences of working as a queer woman in the comedy industry.
The Breakup Monologues: The Unexpected Joy of Heartbreak
(Bloomsbury Publishing, January 2023)
In 2011, comedian and podcaster Rosie as dumped by email... though she did feel a little better about it after correcting her ex's spelling and punctuation. Obsessing about breakups ever since, she embarked on a quest to investigate, understand and conquer the psychology of heartbreak. This book is a love letter to her breakups, a celebration of what they have taught her peppered with anecdotes from illustrious friends and interviews with relationship therapists, scientists and sociologists about separating in the modern age of ghosting, breadcrumbing and conscious uncoupling. Mixing humour, memoir and science, she attempts to assimilate their advice and ideas in order to not break up with Girlfriend, her partner of nearly three years. Will this self-confessed serial monogamist, and breakup addict, finally settle down?
J.S. STRANGE
J. S. Strange lives in Wales surrounded by books, and his three cats. With an interest in the occult, the esoteric, and the paranormal, J. S. Strange often finds himself waiting for Halloween, or thinking how he can make his home more supernatural. Author of The Boyfriend Academy, J. S. Strange is also working on murder mysteries with gay male leads.
The Boyfriend Academy
(One More Chapter, April 2026)
Ganymede’s is no ordinary boarding school. Behind its spiral towers and manicured lawns, boys are forged into the men society demands – strong, obedient, perfect. Graduate, and the world is yours: a home, a career, a wife. But fail… and you’re no longer useful to society.
For Dylan Cecil it should be simple: keep his head down, survive graduation, and earn his place. But when his friend, Blake, disappears, Dylan can’t silence the questions gnawing at him, even as whispers of danger shadow the school’s gilded halls.
As June’s trials close in – eight tests that will decide who is worthy of manhood – Dylan is haunted by Blake’s absence and drawn to Roman Edwards, a boy as magnetic as he is unknowable.
In a world rebuilt on order and obedience, Dylan must decide: will he become the man the academy wants – or the man he really is?
SACHA COWARD
Sacha Coward has worked in museums and heritage for over ten years. For the past three years, he has been freelancing as a historian, public speaker, tour guide and researcher. He has run LGBTQ+ focused tours for museums, cemeteries, archives and cities around the world. Sacha is passionate about queer history, mythology, folklore and storytelling in all their many forms. Queer As folklore is his first book.
Queer as folklore: The hidden queer history of myths and monsters
(Manchester University Press, November 2025)
A celebration of queer history like you've never seen it before.
Queer as folklore travels across centuries and continents to reveal the unsung heroes and villains of storytelling, magic and fantasy. Featuring images from archives, galleries and museums around the world, each chapter investigates the queer history of different mythic and folkloric characters, both old and new.
Leaving no headstone unturned, Sacha Coward takes you on a wild ride through the night from ancient Greece to the main stage of RuPaul's Drag Race, visiting cross-dressing pirates, radical fairies and the graves of the 'queerly departed' along the way. Queer communities have often sought refuge in the shadows and created safe spaces in underworlds. But these forgotten narratives tell stories of resilience that deserve to be heard.
Join any Pride march and you will see a glorious display of papier-mâché unicorn heads, drag queens in mermaid tails and more fairy wings than you can shake a trident at. These are not just accessories: they are queer symbols with historic roots. To truly understand who queer people are today, we must confront the twisted tales of the past.
MALCOLM PRINCE
For twenty years, Malcolm Prince was Paul O’Grady’s radio producer at the BBC where they worked together on feature documentaries, seasonal specials, and Paul’s popular Sunday afternoon Radio 2 show, which ran for fourteen years. He was the launch producer of Elaine Paige on Sunday, Alan Carr and Melanie Sykes’ Saturday Escape, and for a decade, he produced Graham Norton’s hugely successful Saturday morning programme (all Radio 2). His landmark series have included a history of British television with Michael Grade, David Puttnam’s Century of Cinema, and an eight-part celebration of musical theatre hosted by Julia McKenzie and Siân Phillips. He left the BBC in 2022. He contributed to ITV’s For The Love of Paul O’Grady in 2023, and Channel 4’s ABBA: 50 Years of Pop in 2024. He lives in Kent and continues to produce occasional programmes for Boom Radio.
Paul O’Grady – Not The Same Without You: The Man. The Magic. The Friendship
(HarperCollins, November 2025)
‘Paul was the nation’s best friend. And mine too. He was a talented and complicated individual, an incredible and mercurial man. So much of the radio magic he created has vanished into the airwaves, but thanks to HarperCollins, and with the support of his daughter and many of Paul’s close friends and colleagues, I’ve had the opportunity to chronicle the twenty hilarious and dramatic years we spent together. It’s been a privilege to bring his remarkable story up to date and, just like Paul O’Grady, this book is heartfelt, candid and even has a little bit of bite.’-Malcolm Prince
In this deeply personal and revealing biography, Paul’s long time collaborator Malcolm Prince draws on two decades of friendship — and hours of private recordings — to tell the story of the man behind the icon: the sharp-witted, fiercely loyal, irrepressibly funny, and deeply private individual, known to his close friends as ‘Savage’ — and to the public, in various guises, as the prime time TV star, the nation’s dog-loving agony uncle, and a Sunday afternoon radio companion. Malcolm revisits the stages Paul made his own, from the Royal Vauxhall Tavern to the London Palladium; the moments that shaped him; and draws on brand-new interviews with the people who knew him best, including his daughter and grandchildren.
This is a portrait not just of a gifted entertainer, but of a complex, fiercely loyal, and endlessly curious man, reflecting on a friendship built on shared laughter, private rants, righteous fury, long phone calls, and a healthy dose of gossip — and on a professional legacy that still feels astonishing in its range and resonance.
Packed with warmth, humour and never-before-heard stories, NOT THE SAME WITHOUT YOU captures the full measure of a man who defied convention, challenged institutions, made mischief — and made us all feel like we were his best pal.
This event is partially funded by the Literature Wales ‘Inspiring Communities Fund’. We thank them for their ongoing support.
Access Needs: Please contact us to book if you have any access needs that will require suitable seating or if you need a designated wheelchair space.
