Gay and lesbian fiction for young adults: a survey of holdings in Canadian public libraries

The purpose of this study was to determine if young adults, or others interested in literature for teens, have access through public libraries to novels with homosexual content. A random sample of 40 English language young adult novels with gay/lesbian content was checked against the holdings of 40 medium and large Canadian public libraries having remotely accessible catalogs. The average number of titles held by all libraries was 16.2 (40.4 percent). There was no significant relationship found between library size and number of titles held (r = 0.302; CV_{0.05 (38)} = 0.311). The results of this study suggest that, while some libraries seem to be doing a good job of providing these potentially controversial titles, others are not. Suggestions for further research are included.