Queer Book Swap this Sunday

Everyone needs to feel like they belong, creating and fostering a sense of community is crucial for everyone, especially those of the LGBTQ community who might not have a great relationship with their biological family but have found chosen family in friends and those they meet. But how does one foster that sense of community? One way to build and strengthen your sense of community and belonging is by attending events and putting yourself out there. This Sunday at Noon the Penelope Coffee Bar will be hosting a queer book swap open to the public.

“Join us for a fabulous in-person event at Penelope Coffee Bar in Denver, CO! Bring your favorite LGBTQ+ books and swap them with fellow bookworms. Connect with like-minded individuals, discover new reads, and share your love for queer literature. Don’t miss out on this exciting opportunity to expand your book collection and make new friends. See you there!” The Queer Book Swap tells.

OFM recently had the opportunity to sit down with Rowen Blackwood, event organizer, and ask them about their experience orchestrating the book swap 

So Rowen, how did this all get started?

 I’ve started this book swap event because I have a bit of a background in event planning and I’m new to Colorado so I wanted to kind of test the waters with the scene out here and see what people would be interested in a little queer community event like this. I first saw a couple of posts on Lex and possibly a Facebook group where people were like ‘Oh I have extra books to give out if anybody wants to take their pick’ or like ‘Does anybody have extra books’ and that kind of stuff, and I also was like I don’t need books but I really always want more books and I also have a few queer fiction books that I’ve been holding on to for a while waiting to give away in an online giveaway or at an event or something and so the idea just sparked from there. I tried to gauge interest first before putting the effort in, and it really turned around quickly from the spark of an idea to launching it and now we’re less than a week away and have fully booked our capacity.

Tell us about the inspiration for hosting a queer book exchange? 

So I actually run a nonprofit in the making called Respect All Love, its an LGBTQ+ arts activism organization, so we have two branches of the artistic side and the other side is what I’m for now calling everyday activism, basically making it as accessible as possible for anyone to partake. I just moved here a few months ago and I just also finished my master’s degree a few months ago, life has gotten hectic so I’ve been planning the Colorado launch for it which is hopefully coming up in the next few months from now so that part of my reasoning for this too, like market research, I’ve been trying to feel by going to events and now by planning this one myself of like the queer scene, the music scene, the art scene, and now the book scene apparently, so yea getting the amount of traction that this already has within in like a couple of days has been really exciting and it makes me feel more confident when I get to the relaunch of respect all love in this new state that it will be met with that excitement.

Can you talk about the importance of having events like this? What does it mean to you personally?

I was thinking with a lot of queer events there’s a lot of barriers that come up, in the past, I tried to volunteer as a young kid and there was always an age barrier, and with queer events, like if it is at a club or at a bar, I was always too young.- and I’ve talked to a lot of queer people who feel the same way, we just want to hang out at a queer coffee shop and even then it’s like if you go to a restaurant or something it’s like you have to buy something, and so that can be a barrier as well financially or like the drink minimums at some of these shows, and accessibility as well. All of those barriers are important to me and I try to break down as many as possible when I host events now and become more and more aware as I go, like I don’t know everything, I don’t have everyone’s experience but I have experienced some of those barriers myself, and so with events like these, I want it to be really easy to just show up. For the book swap in particular, you don’t have to bring books you can show up and be a person and look at them, just come and meet people that are your vibe. The deal we have with Penelope Coffee Bar, they have been amazing and they’re giving us a 10% discount for anyone who shows up to our event, but you’re not required to buy anything either so it’s kind of a win-win situation. They reserved a community table for us so we have plenty of space and won’t feel like we’re taking up room from other people or showing up and there might not be enough space for us, its all reserved, it’s ready to go, just show up meet people, talk about books, there’s no extra nonsense.

What can attendees participating in the event anticipate it looking like? 

Just show up as you are, look for rainbows, and my beautifully printed sign of the queer book swap. we’ll have the table laid out with everybody’s books and you can kind of walk by the table, you can stop and talk to people about the books, there’s really no expectation to hang around and meet everybody but that’s absolutely an option so it’s very casual, very approachable and its kind of like a tabling set up with a bunch of people.

What has been the most exciting part of planning the event so far?

It was like the smoothest event process I’ve ever done, it kind of blew my mind. It went from the spark of an idea one night, to I posted on Lex and then the Denver Queer Exchange Facebook group just to gauge interest, and then like by the next day I had over 100 likes and reactions and over 20 something comments and I was like ‘ this is crazy’ and people were suggesting venues because I mentioned possibly having it at a local cafe but I hadn’t decided yet and then before I knew it I had the venue locked and the date, the time, everything within 24 hours of having the idea of maybe I’ll do this thing suddenly it was happening and it was launched and official and then in the next 24 hours I had said with matt and the Penelope Coffee Bar like lets do a capacity of 25 to fit the space appropriately and so that second day we had gotten 21/25 RSVP’s and then the last few trickled in.

Was there anything that surprised you with getting such an immediate response to the event?

I think I’ve noticed a lot of people kind of knowing what they want but are afraid to initiate, that’s come up a lot with just making new queer friends in the area as well as events like this, they’ll express the need like people posting ‘Oh I have books to give away but maybe you can let me know and I’ll just be here’ or like ‘i’d love these kinds of friends but message me first’ that kind of energy has been popping up a lot and I totally relate to that personally, I am much more confident when I am in event planning mode, it’s kind of helped me switched because I was getting kind of stuck in that again but then seeing it pop up over and over again I was like ok I can actually do the other side of this and I get back into a leadership role and connect with myself that way and now other people. So yea I think there is definitely a need for this, people are just shy and that’s ok.

Those interested in attending future LGBTQ community events similar to this one can look for updates on the Respect All Love website HERE