I am coeditor, with the lovely Chloe Brushwood Rose, of the anthology And Baby Makes More: Known Donors, Queer Parents and Our Unexpected Families, published by Insomniac Press in 2009. Check it out — especially if you or some queers you know are considering making a baby and wondering where to get the goods. Or if you’ve been asked to donate said goods. You can read the introduction and first chapter here. And excerpts from each essay here.

A quirky, funny, and occasionally heartbreaking collection of personal essays, And Baby Makes More offers an intimate and unprecedented look at the relative risks and unexpected rewards of queer, do-it-yourself baby-making, and the ways in which families are re-made in the process. 

What happens when would-be dyke moms or gay dads ask a friend or acquaintance to donate sperm or an egg, or to act as a surrogate? When a “single dyke” is vehemently not a “single mom” and a “sperm donor” not a “donor dad”? When a trans mom-to-be donates her (carefully banked) sperm to her friends? What’s at stake for non-biological parents when a donor is also part of the picture? What happens if things get ugly? What happens when we take risks we never imagined – and, in so doing, create and name new ways of being family, for better or for worse?

While in many cases these are stories of finding (or not finding) the “right” biological stuff for baby-making, they are also stories that powerfully call on us to reconceive of family beyond biology.

The contributors—donors, biological and non-bio queer parents, and their children—offer provocative, nuanced insights into what it means to be or use a known donor and how queer families are being reconceived to include new roles, new rules, and, kinship ties that transcend biology. This is the go-to book for potential LGBTQ parents, their donors, family members, and friends.

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