Monstrous Women

[rachelmanija]

I will be attending Sirens again this year, and am thinking of panels to propose. This year's theme is monsters, and as the con is about women in fantasy, that would be female monsters.

Last year, there was only one panel with an explicit LGBTQ focus, and practically the entire con attempted to pile into it, forcing it to shut some out for lack of space and leaving the poor people doing the panels scheduled opposite to speak to nearly-empty rooms. It seems clear that there is enormous interest in the topic, and the con could easily support several more panels on the theme. If you're considering attending Sirens (by far my favorite con I've attended in the last five years or so), please consider proposing something along those lines. (The overall con theme is "women in fantasy," so monsters are not essential.)

However, the obvious panel would be LGBTQ monsters, particularly female and female-identified ones. I am thinking of proposing this, taking a wide view of "monster" - some monsters are literal, some more ambiguous, and sometimes the identity or orientation itself is condemned as monstrous.

Can you suggest fiction or even folklore featuring such "monsters?" So far I've thought of the lesbian vampires in The Gilda Diaries, Micah in Liar, and Mystique in The X-Men. I'm OK with spoilers in comments, so long as they're marked on the subject headers. (So beware spoilers in comments!)

Comments

[vom-marlowe.livejournal.com]

Yes, unfortunately, her retelling of Snow White has the wicked queen kill Snow White after sex (another bisexual = killer, sigh).

[tool-of-satan.livejournal.com]

Huh. I don't recall that story. In the Snow White retelling I recall ("Red as Blood") the queen is good and Snow White (Bianca) is alive at the end.

[vom-marlowe.livejournal.com]

Maybe it was Sleeping Beauty?

What I remember is this white, white house. And the woman (the killer), gets this young beauty from...somewhere? I thought it was some kind circus-like place, but you know how vivid but vague Lee stories get. Anyway, she dresses her up in this closet, and is obsessed, but eventually kills her and buries her in the backyard. There's flowers at some point, and the killer is married, and I think (but I could be misremembering) that the young woman is her husband's mistress and/or she's an artist. Ringing any bells?

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

I remember that story! It's in one of the Windling/Datlow retold fairytale volumes. It's not "Red as Blood."

The girl is a circus performer who reminds the wife of her husband's ex-wife's imaginary daughter. (Yes, really. It makes more sense in context.)

You know... I love Tanith Lee's over-the-top lushness, but she can have some seriously sketchy subtexts. (In this case, not even -sub.)

[vom-marlowe.livejournal.com]

YES. I used to eat those Datlow/Windling volumes like candy.

I knew there was more going on with that relationship, I just couldn't put my finger on it. It was, weirdly, a gorgeous story! And I loved it! But.....

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

In Sirens, she has a story called "Wolfed," equally gorgeous, in which an old woman, a young woman, and a man who likes to cross-dress live happily ever after. ;)

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

For any of you who like queer eroticized fairy-tale retellings, I cannot say enough good things about Patrick Califia's short story "Blood and Silver", which has Little Red Riding Hood as a werewolf lesbian dominatrix. That probably sounds almost jokey from such a nutshell description, but so long as you aren't put off by the BDSM content it's really quite moving and romantic; totally Better Than It Sounds. (It can be found in two of his anthologies, No Mercy and Blood and Silver; Califia's also written several short pieces, most of them interlinked, about gay/lesbian/bi vampires, and one full-length novel, Mortal Companion, involving two of the recurring vampire characters.)

[chomiji]

Definitely not "Red as Blood" - as tool_of_satan says, the good/evil axis is swapped in that, and Bianca gets a chance to more or less start over.

The Sleeping Beauty one isn't like that either. I don't recognize your summary, I'm afraid. Her version of Rapunzel, "The Golden Rope," starts out a little like that, but that's not how it ends. (This writeup has extensive summaries of each of the stories in the collection Red as Blood. Spoilers galore ... .)