Sweeter Voices Still: An LGBTQ Anthology from Middle America

A groundbreaking nonfiction collection about queer life in the Midwest. A marvelous ode to humanity and its passions. –Little Village

The middle of America the Midwest, Appalachia, the Rust Belt, the Great Plains, the Upper South is a queer place, and it always has been. The queer people of its cities, farms, and suburbs can’t be reduced to just blue dots within red states. Every story about a kid from Iowa who steps off the bus in Manhattan, ready to finally live, is a story about a kid who was already living in Iowa. Sweeter Voices Still is a collection full of stories about that kid, written by people just like them.

This collection, edited by Ryan Schuessler (The St. Louis Anthology) and Kevin Whiteneir, Jr., features queer voices you might recognize established and successful writers and thinkers like Aaron Foley and Jeffery Bean and others you might not. You’ll find sex, love, and heartbreak and all the other beings we meet along the way: trees, deer, cicadas, sturgeon. Most of all, you’ll find real people.

Perfect for anyone looking for fully realized stories about the nuanced, joyous complexity of queer identity in the Midwest.