Interview: L.C. Rosen Talks Queer Romance and His Spooky YA Hit “You’ve Goth My Heart”

“What’s romance without a little risk?” L.C. Rosen teases in his signature witty way—a question that feels as much a challenge to his readers as it does a mission statement for his latest YA novel, You’ve Goth My Heart (out since September 9). Known for his celebrated works like Camp and Emmett, Rosen returns this spooky season with a darkly funny, eerily romantic tale that blends mistaken identity, digital intimacy, and goth aesthetics into a love story that is as haunting as it is heartfelt. In true Rosen fashion, it’s a story that balances fear and joy, proving that falling in love—especially as a queer teen—is both exhilarating and terrifying.

Set against the small-town chaos of Sleepy Hollow’s Halloween celebrations, You’ve Goth My Heart introduces readers to Gray, a self-aware and anxious teen whose summer takes a thrilling turn after a wrong-number text opens the door to romance, mystery, and danger. With a closeted ex in the background, a new goth rival for attention, and whispers of a serial killer stalking local gay teens, Gray’s journey is equal parts suspense and swoon-worthy romance. Through laughs, chills, and heartfelt moments, L.C. Rosen delivers a story that captures the queer teen experience with humor, nuance, and authenticity.

At CelebMix, I had the chance to sit down with Lev Rosen and dive into the inspirations behind You’ve Goth My Heart—from the accidental-connection romance at its core, to the playful yet haunting Halloween backdrop, and the modern anxieties and thrills of digital intimacy. We also explored his approach to breaking stereotypes in queer literature, navigating the publishing world, and giving teen readers characters who feel real, messy, and utterly lovable.

Read on as Rosen opens up about storytelling, love, and the risks that make both unforgettable.

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“You’ve Goth My Heart” blends goth culture, mistaken identity, and queer romance with both humor and suspense. I’m curious—what was the initial spark for the story? Was it the title, the tone, or a character you just couldn’t shake?

Hi! It started as a joke, honestly. The original title was You’ve Goth Mail. I had known I wanted to do a pagan book—and maybe a goth book—for ages, but I didn’t have an idea of what that would be until I made that joke, and then a whole concept poured into my brain.

Were there particular films, stories, or cultural influences that shaped this novel? How did you reimagine them to create something relevant for today’s YA readers?

Well, obviously, You’ve Got Mail was a big influence—as were all its predecessors, going back to the original Hungarian play Parfumerie, and adaptations like The Shop Around the Corner. My favorite, though, is the musical She Loves Me, which I used as a model for this one—taking the side characters and general vibe and making it modern and queer.

That honestly wasn’t that hard; people today talk on social media all the time, and on the apps it’s often anonymous—or at least, we all know someone could be catfishing us at any time. People fall in love anyway. I love that about people—how even when they’re super skeptical, they can still fall in love. That’s timeless, but the internet part of it is still pretty new.

Speaking of modern twists, Gray’s story begins with a wrong-number text, capturing modern intimacy. What drew you to explore that premise, and how did you ensure the on-screen romance felt emotionally grounded and believable?

I knew that for the story to work, we had to open with them falling in love, so the opening section is entirely their texts over the summer. That was, I think, a big gamble. But I needed to show this very specific kind of relationship—and even if a lot of us are familiar with how it might feel, it still needed a lot of grounding to make the rest of the book work. I was also really lucky that my publisher was open to the idea of a visual sort of framing for the texts—art on the page that really makes it clear this is texting, separate from real life. A virtual honeymoon phase.

As for why I wanted to explore it—well, the idea, as I said, came first. But we all talk this way now. We text, and, like I said, we fall in love with strangers. Isn’t that fun? Isn’t it also insanely dangerous?

And that brings us to Gray himself—he’s self-aware, anxious, funny, and quietly brave. How did you find his voice, and were there aspects of his insecurities or quirks that resonated with you personally?

In my rom-coms (and one anti-rom, still-com), I try to play with the queer male stereotypes that were sort of thrust at me in youth. Jack is a slutty femme punk type, Randy is an annoying theater kid, and Emmett is a condescending prep. But Gray is the stereotype I actually sort of was—the angry goth (though I was also deeply condescending). It’s always fun and hard to take these less sympathetic archetypes and make them feel worthy of love, but Gray was a struggle because he’s so defensive, angry, and kind of lost.

It also felt true to what I know teens today must be dealing with—the pandemic, climate change [and] war. I feel pretty lost and angry myself. But as a teen? Trying to imagine their future today? That’s going to make you angry. So a lot of it came from that.

Shifting a bit to the book’s tone, “You’ve Goth My Heart” manages to be spooky, funny, suspenseful, and romantic all at once. How did you balance these tonal shifts while preserving the emotional core? What guided your approach to creating such a vivid, goth-meets-small-town Halloween world?

I have my editor to thank for a lot of that tonal equilibrium. There were versions that were much darker—possibly too dark for a book that ostensibly is a romance with a happy ending. The serial killer plotline has been changed a lot. But I tried to bring in this sense of dark humor that really linked things together, and this belief that, while the world might be terrible at times, that doesn’t mean you don’t find beauty in it. That was what I kept aiming for: the beauty.

Your work often mixes humor, heart, and darker themes while centering queer adolescence. How do you approach portraying these emotional stakes in a way that feels both honest and accessible to YA readers?

It comes down to remembering that your characters are real people, giving them a lot of depth and contradictions. I think of Walt Whitman a lot—this idea that each of us is a universe. We have all these things in us—humor, heart, darkness—and as a teen, they’re even closer to the surface. Just remember that, and everything else falls into place.

Were there particular scenes or characters in “You’ve Goth My Heart” that you especially enjoyed writing—or moments that challenged you creatively? How did you navigate those challenges?

I had so much fun coming up with the Halloween houses and the whole Halloween Graveyard Fair. I’ve been to events like that, but being able to create my own—without any budget limitations—was a lot of fun. As for challenges, I think it was hard to write the closeted ex plotline. That was rough, and I hope very honest. But again, to get through it, I just tried to keep my characters’ humanity in mind and let them be angry at each other, or give each other grace, at different moments.

Authentic queer representation has always been a cornerstone of your storytelling. Across your career, how has your approach to YA evolved, particularly in today’s expanding but still scrutinized publishing landscape?

Well, like I said, I’ve been trying to take on these various stereotypes in my comedies. Then I have my YA adventures, like the Tennessee Russo series, which are also very queer. I think I’ve just approached each book as its own thing, not in relation to the book world. Doing that, I think, just leads to disappointment and missed marks. I focus on my characters and what I want the book to be. People are going to scrutinize as much as they want, no matter what. Write the book for you—or for younger you, as I do with these.

Looking at your work pace, 2025 alone saw three very different releases. How do you juggle such varied worlds while keeping each story distinct? And when you step away from writing, how do you unwind and recharge?

Well, it’s important to note that the business of publishing moves slowly. Books, even when finished, are still at least a year out from publication, and sometimes they’re delayed by outside forces, as happened with one of these. So it’s not like I wrote all of these in one year, or that I wrote none of them this year—while they’re coming out fast and hard, they weren’t written that way.

With all my books, I get into writing them by absorbing outside media: watching movies that have the vibe I want, listening to playlists, going to art exhibitions or galleries, and consulting research books, fiction, or art books that inspire me and get me into the headspace for the story I want to tell.

As for unwinding and recharging—I’ll let you know once I’ve accomplished that.

Thinking about the bigger picture, which trends or themes in YA fiction excite you most right now? Where do you hope queer literature will evolve next, and are there particular stories you wish more writers would tackle?

I’d love to see more historical queer YA. I’m seeing some, and it’s all excellent, but really well-researched, non-speculative queer YA feels like something a lot of publishers aren’t taking a risk on. I also feel like queer YA has to engage with queerness itself a little more. We used to have all these coming-out stories—it felt like the only story we were allowed for a while—and now we have all these romances. And there are a lot of people out there saying things like, “It’s a rom-com where the characters happen to be gay.” I cannot express how much I hate ‘happen to’ in that context.

Especially today, the idea that engaging with your queerness—or the way the world views your queerness—is somehow bad, or makes you someone whose “being gay is their whole personality,” is something I come across and think is insanely wrong. The act of falling in love as a queer person in a world where people actively do not want you to is an inherently political act, and shying away from that will not make it less political or protect you from those people.

On the flip side, I also appreciate that maybe we need aspirational worlds where it really doesn’t matter—comfort stories to keep us going—and I don’t begrudge anyone that. I just think publishers see queerness, especially in YA, as that comfort story and are afraid of actually engaging with queerness. That bothers me. And I still won’t read anything where the marketing materials say someone “happens to be gay.” But that’s my personal thing; I know. I’ve seen that phrase too much as an insult to other stories—I can’t unsee that.

Finally, if Gray could send one last text to his mystery stranger—something that captures what he’s learned about love and fear—what might it say?

“Hope is goth.”

Grab your copy of You’ve Goth My Heart today!

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