Authors
’Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo’ Author Taylor Jenkins Reid Opens Up About Her Bisexuality
“I was being told that I didn’t know myself, but I did.”
Readers everywhere know that Taylor Jenkins Reid, author of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Daisy Jones & The Six, and other bestselling novels, is a force to be reckoned with. Praised for her “complex protagonists,” “utterly distinctive voice,” and “entrancing” novels, Reid stands at the forefront of this generation of fiction authors.
While her 2017 historical queer romance, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, was pivotal to her rise to literary fame, the novel was met with criticism from some readers who didn’t think Reid was the appropriate author to write a queer love story, given that she is married to a man.
Reid set the record straight in a candid interview with Time. Regarding her sexuality, the author shared: “It has been hard at times to see people dismiss me as a straight woman, but I also didn’t tell them the whole story.” The author is ready to clearly define her sexuality as bisexual.
Reid fell in love with a woman in her early 20s, but she wasn’t ready to address her bisexuality publicly at the time. “This was the late ’90s, so nobody was talking about bisexuality. And if they were, it was to make fun of people,” she explained. “The messages about bisexuality were you just want attention or it was a stop on the way to gayville. I found that very painful, because I was being told that I didn’t know myself, but I did.”
While Reid is admittedly a private person, who originally chose to “let people assume what they were going to assume,” she is certain that her upcoming novel, Atmosphere: A Love Story, will rekindle questions about her sexuality. With the support of her husband, Alex Jenkins Reid, who helped her “get the book to be as romantic and beautiful as it could be,” Reid is proud to embrace this side of her identity. “My attraction to women is a room in the house that is my identity—Alex understood this book was about me spending time in that room,” she said.
The author recognizes the privilege of being a queer woman in a heteronormative relationship. “How do I talk about who I really am with full deference to the life experiences of other people?” she pointed out. Ultimately concluding, “I can talk about who I am, and then people can think about that whatever they want.”
In the same vein, Reid discussed some of the criticism she received following her most recent publication, Carrie Soto Is Back. As a white author who penned a Latina main character, she stated, “I was being told was I don’t have the range necessary to pull off what I’m trying to pull off.” Going forward, she confirmed that when it comes to identity, she’ll be sticking to what she has personally experienced.
Atmosphere: A Love Story by Taylor Jenkins Reid hits shelves on June 3, 2025.
