erastes

I've just fired off a letter of complaint to EPIC about their award categories. I don't know if they have been the same every year, but I only noticed them this year because, for the first time, I was eligible to enter.

However - reading the categorisations, there's no way I could enter as they stand.  They are categorising "romance" as: A story that takes one central, monogamous, romantic relationship between a man and woman from its inception to its happy, satisfying conclusion

Then as you read down the list, one (one being me) finds that one can't put one's gay historical romance into Historical Romance or Erotic Romance or Erotic Romance Historical Fiction because those categories say that they follow: "the basic tenants (sic) of genre romance" - so see above.

There's one - ONE! - GLBT category which lumps everything else together. Not does this not only skew perception that they consider GLBTQ romances can't "actually" BE romances but it's ludicrous. Utterly ludicrous.  So Age of Sail has to compete with shapeshifters and fairies and ghosts and criminals and contemporary and... well - you get the gist. I have suggested, politely, that they might reconsider in light of the way some people might consider it homophobic.  I doubt that it'll make any difference, but it made me feel a little better.

Romance Writers of America attempted to define romance in this way - last year? Year before? And there was an enormous kerfuffle about it - why are we going backwards with this?  I would have thought that ebooks, by their very nature were more liberal? Or am I missing something?

Then may I add "monogamous"? WTF?  Where do people who are writing love triangles go - if they aren't erotic?