The Bilerico Project | Daily experiments in LGBTQ

We have a very special giveaway today that will warm the cockles of the grinchiest heart. Two winners will get their very own copies of The Letter Q: Queer Writers' Notes To Their Younger Selves and an It Gets Better t-shirt courtesy of Scholastic.

They sent me a preview copy of the tome and let me tell you, my first thought as I read through it was "I wish they'd asked me to contribute!" This book is so fantastic I couldn't put it down. All of your favorite queer writers are in this book and the personal tone of all of the letters will show you their personalities and lives unlike you've ever seen before.

In this anthology, sixty-four award-winning authors and illustrators such as Michael Cunningham, Amy Bloom, Jacqueline, Woodson, Terrence McNally, Gregory Maguire, David Levithan, and Armistead Maupin, make imaginative journeys into their pasts, telling their younger selves what they would have liked to know then about their lives as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender people. Through stories, in pictures, with bracing honesty, these are words of love, messages of understanding, reasons to hold on for the better future ahead. They will tell you things about your favorite authors that you never knew before. And they will tell you about yourself.

So how can you win your own copy? Leave us a letter to your younger self in the comments section. That's it. The full rules and a video preview of the book are after the break.

The Not-So-Fine Rules You Should Know

When you enter, if you leave the box checked to post your comment on your Facebook page, anyone who comments on your wall in that thread with their own letter will also be entered to win. Imagine the fun if your friend actually wins the contest thanks to your introduction to Bilerico! (Please don't go sock your friend in the jaw and demand the books if that happens. That wouldn't be nice at all.)

• Contest ends on Friday, May 25 at midnight Eastern time. Winners will be announced on Saturday May 26. If the prize remains unclaimed by Saturday, June 2, a new winner will be picked.
• Winner will be picked arbitrarily by me. Methods of picking a winner could include any of these: most liked, most original letter, number of replies, if you make me cry, or I'll just scroll the screen up and down and randomly pick somebody. (The last one is the most likely.)
• You do not have to purchase anything to win.
• We won't add you to any mailing lists or sell your mailing address to make money either.
• We'll even pay to ship you the prize instead of sending it COD. (That's how generous we are.)
• Current contributors are ineligible to win a prize. You can still comment and join the discussion since it allows your Facebook friends to easily enter tho!
• Only one entry per person. Don't get greedy. (You know we'll do another contest soon.)