Not intended to launch an entire lesbian fiction genre, it was a story about women during wartime, some of whom happened to be romantically involved with other women. Women's Barracks, though, resonated with men and women alike—both straight and gay. In its first year, the book sold over 1 million copies and allowed Gold Medal Books to... well, strike gold.

Women’s Barracks also caught the attention of the government, unfortunately, and was singled out by the Gathings Committee as an example of how the paperback industry was subverting the morals of America. The threat of fines and incarceration made the paperback industry skittish about publishing anything that could be considered “indecent” and before long, a sort of self-censorship was in full swing.  

Many stories featuring characters that lived their lives outside the rules of the prevailing morality of the times soon became dark and punishing, as there could be no happy endings for those who defied convention. Still, the lesbian pulp fiction novels were enormously popular and soon paperback publishers—beginning with Gold Medal—realized sales would skyrocket if they moved from reprints to “paperback originals.”

This move toward of the publication of original fiction by paperback companies created an immediate and strong demand for writers and provided unprecedented opportunities for women writers in particular. While it is true that some of the lesbian pulp fiction novels during the 1950s were written by men using female pseudonyms, a good number were written by women, many of whom were lesbians themselves. (Patricia Highsmith and Marijane Meaker top this list.) And although they were still required to write within the prescribed moral guidelines set by their editors, quite a few were able to portray the lesbian lives of their characters with a significant degree of honesty and compassion. The Golden Age of Lesbian Pulp Fiction had arrived.