This is why women read gay erotic stories

The world of romance novels is big, loud, colorful and open to everyone, be it woman, man, teenager or mature adult. In some ways, the romance genre could be compared to the old porn saying: 'If you can think of it, there's a novel about it.'
For most of my life, reading romance novels was some kind of forbidden pleasure that I wouldn't talk about, hiding books beneath my bed, in cupboards and later in kindle categories my friends didn't bother to look into ('German classic literature' proved its usefulness many times over).
Only when I started writing erotic novels myself, I finally came to the realization that romance is actually the most popular genre out there. I also realized that I had a hankering for gay romance that bordered on odd.

What reasons could a heterosexual lady have to prefer reading about two men (or more) in love to reading about a man and a woman, or two women?

1. It's hard to find heterosexual romance novels with creative interactions and non-standard relationships.

I'm not saying that there aren't any romance novels with dominant female protagonists, but they are few and far in between and most of them still end with her giving in to him and falling in stereotypical love (thanks to Kristin Miller for already putting this together so nicely). As much as a lady likes to be swept off her feet by the love of her life, if she wants to do the mental swiping, it's pretty hard to find a matching story. Which brings us to the next, important point...

2. You can always choose your flavor with gay romance.

This has nothing to do with genre and everything with the two (or more) main characters. A female reader has no hang-ups, personal experience or other influencing backgrounds when it comes to male-on-male-action. We do not feel as involved, as vulnerable, as set in a role, when reading gay erotic stories, which means we can actually pick which of the characters we'd like to 'feel' while reading.
Author James Buchanan was interviewed on this topic, so please feel free to read the transcript for a more detailed analysis.

3. To women, it's just wonderfully kinky.

You know what you probably won't say at the next family dinner? "I read this great gay erotic fiction last night!" Okay, to be fair, some of us might actually say that, but I tried it once and got confused glances and a nervous "that's nice, honey," as an answer.
But when we womenfolk are alone, what's more wonderful than a good, long dive into the dark depths of lust? Homosexuality still has this touch of forbidden desire, especially if you yourself aren't homosexual, and contrary to popular belief, it's actually quite thrilling for me as a woman to think about all those kinky things 'the others' might do in the security of their own beds.

So, what makes you choose gay romance/erotica over heterosexual stories? Please comment and share, I'd love to read your thoughts!