An alarmist post by an author who hopes he’s wrong

Earlier this month, I returned to speak at my high school. There were the obvious changes, like the new buildings and staff, and the smaller, quieter changes, like the beat-up copy of Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe on a kid’s desk. I asked if he was reading it. Someone else answered for him. “We all are.”

The book so many of my queer friends cherish was being studied as a class text.

The closest I came to studying queer works as a teenager in the early 2000s was Shakespeare, and while reading ‘Sonnet 20’ didn’t inspire me to burst out of the closet, it did allow me to consider that being an author and being gay weren’t mutually exclusive.

My high school has come so far. We have all come so far.

It’s difficult to look at what’s happening in the United States at the moment and not feel just the slightest bit smug. Laws restricting drag performers. Books pulled from library shelves. Penguin Random House and others (including David Levithan) suing Florida’s Escambia County School Board for restricting books about “race, racism and LGBTQ identities”.

But while every attempt to use the legal system to “protect” kids from queerness seems to falter in Australia, the movement is here and the movement is ugly. There’s Katherine Deves and the media’s fascination with her ill-informed bile. There’s the spate of drag storytime events that have been cancelled in response to intimidation and threats of violence.

Katherine’s frankly had enough attention, so let’s talk drag storytime. In a covidy world, libraries often struggle to attract patrons for events. Kids enjoy sparkly costumes. By fostering a love of reading in sparkly costumes, drag queens can diversify their income streams. It’s all win, no downside. But the drag storytimes get cancelled. And those that do go ahead must at great cost and inconvenience. Manly Library hosted a storytime during World Pride, and for participants’ safety, the library was closed and there was a heavy security presence.

In Australia. Not the United States.

Every cancelled event, every inconvenienced library branch, is a win for a small, vocal minority who are bitter nobody shares their fringe fears.

We can pat ourselves on the back for not having politicised school boards in Australia, but we’re fools if we think there aren’t other ways to affect which books are shelved in libraries and which books make reading lists. This year, I have had teacher-librarians lament the trouble one parent can cause in a school.

A proficient teacher-librarian will build a collection that features books that speak to current teenagers’ experiences. Given changes in publishing, and the fact that queer teenagers exist, new release books feature more LGBTQIA+ content and characters than ever before. They are not tomes dedicated to the conversion of the masses. They are simply reflections of the world.

At some schools, usually religiously affiliated, if one parent complains, it can’t be swatted away by the teacher-librarian in charge of the collection, the expert. No, it must be escalated. It becomes the concern of the higher-ups. One parent’s objection to positive LGBTQIA+ representation is weighted as more important than the feelings of those parents who want their kids and teens to see the world as it exists in the fiction they read, and the needs of the kids and teens who might be questioning their own identity.

And these are schools with conservative shelving practices to begin with. Queer content in the senior section, no matter the target audience. But the complainers aren’t satisfied. If there is any queer content in the library their child frequents, then their child’s heterosexuality is at risk.

I’m speaking at these schools, and at times, I wonder if my fears are overblown. But then I receive the occasional email about an upcoming visit, where I’m cautioned against promoting books as school processes dictate that key staff must read books before presentations. Much like shelving queer content in the senior section, no matter the target audience, this fails to recognise the numerous professionals who work on every single book published for and marketed towards children in Australia.

The consequences of negative attitudes towards queer YA in schools would be far reaching. In terms of sales, international titles dominate YA. Australian publishers rely on the schools market. If a book can’t be stocked in most libraries, or studied in classes, because of its content, then the prospect of publishing that book becomes less enticing. And then we’re back to where we were a decade ago, when publishers questioned the inclusion of queer characters. In the years since, we have nurtured some incredible local queer talent writing vital fiction — Alison Evans, Gary Lonesborough, Erin Gough, and the list is growing … We can’t go backwards.

I worry we might.

I hope this post is just alarmist nonsense. I hope I’m wrong. But on the off chance I’m not, if you’re a parent or a teen, and you want queer content in your library (and given publishing trends, that basically means you want books published since 2014), then you have to speak up and be as vocal about the positive as one parent might be about the negative.

I don’t want books like Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe to disappear off students’ desks. If I had read that book in Year Nine, I doubt I would have spent so many years hating myself.

TOUR: We Could Be Something

We Could Be Something is in stores, which means I’m visiting your city, tossing books at unsuspecting passersby. If you’re worried you’ll miss me, here’s where I’ll be in the coming weeks. Also, Booktopia currently has a limited supply of signed copies available for purchase.

May 25: Sydney Writers Festival: We Could Be Something (NSW)

A mystery author will join Will Kostakis in conversation, discussing his latest novel. Will speaks about writing an emotional rollercoaster and the two young men at its heart, each on a journey of discovery that converges on the same street in Darlinghurst. It’s part coming-out story, part falling-in-love story, part relationship breakdown story, part extended Greek family story.

Where: Marrickville Library, Marrickville
When: Thursday May 25, 6pm

This event is free. Bookings essential

May 27: Sydney Writers Festival: This Is Now (NSW)

What’s it like to be a young adult today? Is the increased interest in uncensored, contemporary teen stories on TV (think Sex Education, Euphoria or Heartbreak High) narrowing or widening our perception of teenagers, and how can YA books fill in any gaps? Tegan Bennett Daylight (Royals), Will Kostakis (We Could Be Something), Shirley Le (Funny Ethnics), and Gary Lonesborough (The Boy from the Mish) contemplate what the universal challenges teenagers face are and what is unique to our current world with its societal, cultural and environmental shifts. Hosted by Felicity Castagna (Girls In Boys’ Cars).

Where: Carriageworks Track 12, Eveleigh
When: Saturday May 27, 4pm

Bookings essential

May 30: HSC Seminar: Creative Writing (NSW)

Join us at Wollongong Library for a creative writing workshop with award-winning author, Will Kostakis. This seminar will provide practical and achievable advice for developing your creative writing skills for all HSC English courses. From writing engaging short stories to mastering character voice, it will make the writing and editing process more approachable and less intimidating.

Where: Wollongong Library, Wollongong
When: Tuesday May 30, 5pm

This event is free. Bookings essential

A family affair

I’m seventeen. I barrel down the staircase and burst into the kitchen, short of breath. Mum has friends over (I don’t remember who, sorry). She asks what’s wrong.

“Nothing, I… got an email.” I’ve read it four times. Still doesn’t feel real. “Someone wants to publish me.”

“Are you sure you haven’t read it wrong?”

She thinks it’s a hoax. She insists she meet the publisher. She tells my soon-to-be editor that she has another son who can write them a book too, if they’d like … I recoil. I’m inches from my dream, and Mum’s mumming all over the place.

The book deal happens.

My author journey is all propulsion. Past rejections. Past that first book nobody likes. Past how publishers treat you when nobody likes your first book. Past the editorial concerns about gay characters that you carry as a knot in your stomach until you come out. Past the brouhaha that happens after you come out. Past the next book. And the next. And the next.

We Could Be Something starts as a memoir. It’s a handbrake, a chance to consider all the experiences that have made me. And then I do the thing I’m not supposed to. I start a new Word document. I take pieces from the memoir and rearrange them, remix them, and make something fictional from them.

It’s a lot of things, a story about the changing shape of the queer experience, the changing shape of being Greek-Australian; a story about falling in and out of love, and ultimately, a story about family.

It’s a story written by a guy who’s accompanied by his mother to a publishing meeting at seventeen, whose thunder is stolen by his grandmother at Sydney Writer’s Festival at twenty-three, and who, at thirty-three, knows he only got past the rejections, the first book nobody liked, and the rest of the nonsense, because his family pushed him.

We Could Be Something by Will Kostakis

Harvey’s dads are splitting up. It’s been on the cards for a while, but it’s still sudden. Woken-by-his-father-to-catch-a-red-eye sudden. For the foreseeable future, he’s living on top of a cafe with the extended Greek family he barely knows.

Sotiris is on the up. He’s achieved his dream, a novel released at seventeen. It isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and then a cute, wise-cracking bookseller named Jem upends his life.

Harvey’s and Sotiris’s stories converge on the same street in Darlinghurst, in this beautifully heartfelt novel about how our dreams shape us, and what they cost us.

An emotional rollercoaster of a novel about two young men — part coming-out story, part falling-in-love story, part falling-apart story.

“The enormous heart of We Could Be Something beats with a rare, thrilling authenticity. Every funny, smart, tough word of it rings true. I loved this book.” Patrick Ness, bestselling author of A Monster Calls and the Chaos Walking series

“Vivid and exquisitely written… Kostakis weaves a sparkling tale of hardship, heartbreak, identity and the universal struggle of finding your footing in the world.” Brenton Cullen, BOOKS+PUBLISHING

“There is no doubt that Will Kostakis is one of Australia’s leading writers for young adults — and this is, I think, his best work to date.” Paul Macdonald, THE CHILDREN’S BOOKSHOP

“The storytelling has the degree of complexity and maturity you’d expect in an adult literary novel… We Could Be Something is a truly special novel, exploring Greek culture, queerness, the writing industry, but most importantly family and the love that binds it.” Joe Murray, READINGS

COVER REVEAL: We Could Be Something

We Could Be Something is coming on May 2. That means, one, it’s up for pre-order now, and two, I’m no longer at risk of leaking the gorgeous cover designed by Astred Hicks, because it’s all over the internet. Have a look!

See? All over the internet. Can’t scroll an inch without—

Okay, let’s not piss everybody off w—

What’s the novel about? Well, the blurb is still TBC, but basically:

Harvey’s dads are splitting up. It’s been on the cards for a while, but it’s still sudden. Woken-by-his-father-to-catch-a-red-eye sudden. For the foreseeable future, he’s living on top of a cafe with the extended Greek family he barely knows.

Sotiris is on the up. He’s achieved his dream, a novel released at seventeen. It isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and then a cute, wise-cracking bookseller named Jem upends his life.

Harvey’s and Sotiris’s stories converge on the same street in Darlinghurst, in this beautifully heartfelt novel about how our dreams shape us, and what they cost us.

An emotional rollercoaster of a novel about two young men — part coming-out story, part falling-in-love story, part falling-apart story.

“The enormous heart of We Could Be Something beats with a rare, thrilling authenticity. Every funny, smart, tough word of it rings true. I loved this book.” Patrick Ness, bestselling author of A Monster Calls and the Chaos Walking series

Secure your copy here.

On dreams and new books

Allen & Unwin rejected my first novel when I was 16. I still have the letter somewhere. It was printed on fancy paper, almost like cardboard, but that wasn’t what made it worth keeping. After dozens of rejections, theirs was the first one that was kind.

They put care into each word and offered quality constructive feedback when they really didn’t have to. That letter held pride of place in my desk drawer, and whenever my dream felt way out of reach, I returned to it. The next time I sent Loathing Lola out, a publisher said yes.

I’m still so grateful for that letter, and it seems significant that they’ll be publishing my sixth novel. It’s about Greek families and messy, wonderful dreams. It’s out next year. It’s We Could Be Something.

An emotional rollercoaster of a novel: part-coming out story, part falling-in-love story, part relationship break-down story, and part extended-family story, I’ve never felt this way about a book before.

This is the one. Coming in May 2023 unless I botch my deadlines.