The 5th Lambda Literary Awards were held in 1993 to honour works of LGBT literature published in 1992.
Special awards
edit| Category | Winner |
|---|---|
| Editor's Choice | Richard Mohr, Gay Ideas |
| Publisher Service | Craig Rodwell, Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop |
Nominees and winners
edit| Category | Author | Title | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|
| Children's/Young Adult | Penny Raife Durant | When Heroes Die | Winner |
| Joan Alden and Catherine Hopkins | A Boy’s Best Friend | Finalist | |
| Bette Greene | Drowning of Stephan Jones | Finalist | |
| Johnny Valentine and Lynette Schmidt | The Daddy Machine | Finalist | |
| Johnny Valentine and Lynette Schmidt | The Day They Put a Tax on Rainbows | Finalist | |
| Gay Anthology | John Preston (ed.) | A Member of the Family | Winner |
| Dennis Cooper | Discontents | Finalist | |
| John Preston | Flesh and the Word | Finalist | |
| Assotto Saint | Here to Dare | Finalist | |
| George Stambolian | Men on Men 4 | Finalist | |
| Gay Fiction | Randall Kenan | Let the Dead Bury Their Dead | Winner |
| Christopher Bram | Almost History | Finalist | |
| Bo Huston | Dream Life | Finalist | |
| Jaime Manrique | Latin Moon in Manhattan | Finalist | |
| Lev Raphael | Winter Eyes | Finalist | |
| Gay Mystery | Michael Nava | The Hidden Law | Winner |
| Steve Johnson | Final Atonement | Finalist | |
| Grant Michaels | Love You to Death | Finalist | |
| Richard Stevenson | Third Man Out | Finalist | |
| Larry Townsend | One for the Master, Two for the Fool | Finalist | |
| Gay Non-Fiction | Paul Monette | Becoming a Man | Winner |
| John D'Emilio | Making Trouble | Finalist | |
| Allen Ellenzweig | Homoerotic Photograph | Finalist | |
| Eric Marcus | Making History: The Struggle for Gay and Lesbian Equal Rights, 1945-1990 | Finalist | |
| Darrell Yates Rist | Heartlands | Finalist | |
| Gay Poetry | Edward Field | Counting Myself Lucky | Winner |
| Tim Dlugos | Strong Place | Finalist | |
| Thom Gunn | The Man with Night Sweats | Finalist | |
| Essex Hemphill | Ceremonies | Finalist | |
| Rudy Kikel | Long Division | Finalist | |
| Gay science fiction, fantasy or horror | Maureen F. McHugh | China Mountain Zhang | Winner |
| Poppy Z. Brite | Lost Souls | Finalist | |
| Lewis Gannett | The Living One | Finalist | |
| Anne Rice | The Tale of the Body Thief | Finalist | |
| Thomas T. Thomas | Cry Gender | Finalist | |
| Humor | Alison Bechdel | Dykes to Watch Out For: The Sequel | Winner |
| Jane Caminos | That’s Ms. Bulldyke to You, Charlie | Finalist | |
| Rupert Kinnard | BB and the Diva | Finalist | |
| Andrea Natalie | The Night Audrey’s Vibrator Spoke | Finalist | |
| Eric Orner | The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green | Finalist | |
| Lesbian Anthology | Joan Nestle | The Persistent Desire | Winner |
| Tee Corinne | Poetry of Sex | Finalist | |
| Katherine V. Forrest and Barbara Grier | Erotic Naiad | Finalist | |
| Anne MacKay | Wolf Girls at Vassar | Finalist | |
| Anita L. Pace | Write from the Heart | Finalist | |
| Lesbian Fiction | Judith Katz | Running Fiercely Toward a High Thin Sound | Winner |
| Carol Anshaw | Aquamarine | Finalist | |
| Madelyn Arnold | On Ships at Sea | Finalist | |
| Rebecca Brown | Terrible Girls | Finalist | |
| Sarah Schulman | Empathy | Finalist | |
| Lesbian Mystery | Jaye Maiman | Crazy for Loving | Winner |
| Elizabeth Pincus | Two-Bit Tango | Winner | |
| Nikki Baker | Lavender House Murder | Finalist | |
| Ellen Hart | Stage Fright | Finalist | |
| J.M. Redmann | Deaths of Jocasta | Finalist | |
| Lesbian Non-Fiction | Blanche Wiesen Cook | Eleanor Roosevelt | Winner |
| Jeanne DuPrau | The Earth House | Finalist | |
| Carol Givens and L. Diane Fortier | Practicing Eternity | Finalist | |
| Joan Nestle | Persistent Desire | Finalist | |
| Robert A. Schanke | Shattered Applause | Finalist | |
| Lesbian Poetry | Audre Lorde | Undersong | Winner |
| Lori Anderson | Cultivating Excess | Finalist | |
| Nancy Boutilier | According to Her Contours | Finalist | |
| Diane Stein | Lady Sun, Lady Moon | Finalist | |
| Terry Wolverton | Black Slip | Finalist | |
| Lesbian science fiction, fantasy or horror | Nicola Griffith | Ammonite | Winner |
| Judith Katz | Running Fiercely Toward a High Thin Sound | Finalist | |
| Severna Park | Speaking Dreams | Finalist | |
| Melissa Scott | Dreamships | Finalist | |
| Jean Stewart | Return to Isis | Finalist | |
| Small Press | David Wojnarowicz | Memories That Smell Like Gasoline | Winner |
| Natalie Barney | A Perilous Advantage | Finalist | |
| Jyl Lynn Felman | Hot Chicken Wings | Finalist | |
| Michael Rumaker | To Kill a Cardinal | Finalist | |
| Assotto Saint | Here to Dare | Finalist |