A Quokka Dreeds its Weird

Please rec me some how-to books on sex. Please read my criteria carefully!

1. I am looking for ALL of the following: general how-to books on sex that are queer/trans-centric or queer/trans-inclusive, AND books that are aimed at specific audiences like gay, lesbian, transmasc, autistic, disabled, genderfluid, etc, while still at least acknowledging the existence of other groups.

2. I am not looking for academic books. These books should be aimed at a general audience of people who are looking for sex ed.

3. The more recent or recently updated, the better. Please don't rec something published in 1990 and never updated unless it's REALLY great and does not feel dated.

Please feel free to pass this on!

If you read this book, please consider reviewing it on Amazon. We currently have ZERO reviews. Comment with your email and preferred format if you'd like a free review copy.

It's selling nicely but reviews would help that - and remember, all the money goes to OutRight!

Reviews for His Magical Pet would be awesome too but at least it has some as opposed to NONE.

If you're wondering why only Her Magical Pet has a paperback edition, it's because I am now on my eighth go-round with Amazon trying to get them to approve it. It isn't any sort of content-related thing, it's just Amazon being Amazon and finding new and bizarre technical rules I've broken - all of which also apply to Her. Anyway, it is forthcoming. Eventually. Probably.

Her Magical Pet

His Magical Pet

It's that time again! I'm putting together two anthologies to benefit OutRight Action International. Feel free to let your friends or f-list know.

Guidelines

Stories must feature two male-identifying or two female-identifying people in a romantic relationship, which can either be established or occur during the story. Sex, explicit or otherwise, is fine but not required. The romance must end happily.

The story must be urban, contemporary, or paranormal fantasy. That is, it must be set in some version of our world rather than a completely different one like Middle Earth.

The story must involve a pet. The pet can be magical (flying kitten, baaaaby griffin, dragon, etc) or real-world. If the pet is a normal pet, other elements of the story must involve fantasy, such as a magical amulet, wizards, shifters, etc.

The pet cannot die. There can be no animal harm in the story, with the following exceptions: it can be mentioned that baby animals were orphaned, and sick or injured animals can be rescued. No heavy focus on details of pet illness or injury. For instance, finding and adopting a flying kitten with an injured wing is fine, but no gory details of the injury.

No references to current politicians or coronavirus. No cops. (Civilians solving crimes is fine.) No heavy focus on depressing topics such as bigotry, climate change, sexual abuse, etc.

Stories must be a minimum of 3000 words. There is no maximum wordcount.

Deadline: October 1.

Publication date: October 15.

Terms: All profits from the anthology will be donated in perpetuity to OutRight Action International. Stories must be exclusive to the anthology for three months from the publication date. After that, you may reprint and/or resell them anywhere you like.

Contact: Rachel Manija Brown at Rphoenix2@gmail.com. Please contact me before you write the story with a brief outline (a few sentences is fine) so I can get an idea of who's writing for which one and how to contact you, and to let you know if your story proposal fits the guidelines.

Ash: A Secret History appears to be the faux history of Ash, a medieval woman who lead a mercenary company, in the form of a translation of a manuscript written shortly after her death, complete with a framing device of emails from its modern translator to his editor. It is that, but it’s also much stranger than just that. Don’t skip the emails, they’re not window dressing but essential.

The weirdness seeps in early on, with a version of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” whose lyrics suggest an entirely different religious tradition. Ash hears a voice in her head which she interprets as that of a saint, but it's also referred to as a “tactical machine” or even “tactical computer.” The translator has a footnote with the original text to explain how he got that translation, along with a note that it obviously must really mean something else. What in the world is going on here?

Along with Shadows of the Apt, this gets my vote as one of the greatest giant fantasy epics that most people haven’t even heard of, let alone read. Ash is complete in four volumes, which were released all at once as it was written as a single gigantic novel. I recently re-read it, and went to see if there was an e-version partway through so I didn’t have to lug around four fat volumes. There is and it’s only $3.99 for the entire thing, which is why I decided to write about it.

Ash is definitely not for everyone. It’s both deeply weird and extremely dark. Eight-year-old Ash is raped (non-graphically, but…) on page one, then manages to kill the men who raped her. That sets the tone for the rest of the book. On a grimdark scale, it’s darker than Shadows of the Apt, but less dark than Gentle’s own Ancient Light - not “rocks fall, everybody dies,” but “rocks fall, a lot of people die. And also shit themselves. And do horrible things.”

Most of the characters are objectively terrible but I found a lot of them compelling and even likable despite that. My favorite is the most important queer female character. (There’s several, as well as important male characters). Also the adorable pet rats, who have a higher survival rate than the human characters.

There’s a very interesting central theme in Ash about the erasure and interpretation of history, particularly in regard to women. Ash is extremely unusual within the context of her time, as the female leader of a mercenary company, but less unusual as a woman involved in war as an active participant rather than a victim. That’s a part of history that tends to be erased or elided. Women in support roles (for instance, washerwomen) are not counted as part of the army, while men in similar noncombatant roles are. Exceptional men are lauded as such, while exceptional women are either erased or held up as proof that they are an exception and should not be viewed as proof of what women can do.

Here’s an example from the real world. I’ve read a lot of first-person accounts and histories of the war which is variously known as the First War of Indian Independence, the Indian Rebellion of 1857, and the Sepoy Mutiny. (That by itself an example of what I mean by erasure and interpretation of history.)

One of its leaders in the fight against the British forces was an Indian queen, Rani Lakshmibai, who was killed in battle. Multiple accounts attest that not only did she personally fight in combat, but so did other women. However, Indian accounts tend to say “There were women in the army, including as gunners,” and “the Rani was found dead along with two women in her personal guard,” while British accounts tend to say “So many men were killed that sometimes women were seen doing tasks such as assisting the gunners,” and “the Rani was found dead along with two of her handmaidens. All three were disguised as men.”

How are they getting such different narratives from the same set of facts? Multiple groups of people saw women involved in combat, wearing the same uniforms as the men. One set of people concluded that the women were actually handmaidens or other civilians and were in disguise. Another concluded that they were female soldiers in uniform, doing the things that soldiers do. Those are vastly different stories, suggesting vastly different things about the military culture of Jhansi.

Ash delves into that sort of thing from all sorts of different angles. It's an incredibly immersive experience if you’re up for it. I spent a couple days nearly entire devoted to re-reading the series, and I had a great time. The worldbuilding and story are fascinating, and the sff elements are really cool.

Warnings for rape, child abuse, misogyny, very graphic violence, homophobia (on the part of the characters, not the author), racial slurs, animal harm, and more.

Please no comments along the lines of "There's enough bad stuff in reality that I have no need or desire to read about it in fiction." That's a totally valid point of view, but seeing that comment every time I post on darker works makes me hesitate to post on them, and I'm trying to post more in general.

Ash: A Secret History

The person putting this together hit me up for a copy of my book Stranger, and I liked the idea so much that I offered to pass it on to you. It's a pop-up library and drop-in center for queer-identifying people, especially young people. Still in early stages (you'll see on the website that the buttons aren't all active) but I had a fairly long convo with her over messenger and it seems legit.

Email Lacy Laird at renegadelibraries@gmail.com if you have either copies of your own books with LGBTQ characters, or new/perfect condition books or graphic novels by others that you'd like to donate.

This happened a while ago, but I was so distracted by health issues that I am pretty sure I never announced it. Well-- it did!

The Rainbow Book List Committee proudly announces the 2016 Rainbow List. The Rainbow List is a bibliography of books with significant gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, or queer/questioning content, and which are aimed at youth, birth through age 18. The Rainbow List also includes genres I don't read, like picture books, but if you have small children, that would be an excellent resource.

The Rainbow Book List

If anyone happens to know whoever puts those together, you might alert them that the sequel, to Stranger, Hostage, 1) exists, 2) continues (but does not conclude, there are four books total) Yuki and Paco's epic love affair, 3) has many more LGBTQ characters, both major and minor. I am pretty sure that the majority of the people who read Stranger have no idea that Hostage was ever published, so this isn't "You must love my book," it's "FYI, this book exists and you can read it if you want".

Again due to health, I have probably read less in the last year than in any year of my life since I learned how, so I have read very few of the other books on that list. I look forward to reading at least some, and I invite you all to give it a browse. Lots of excellent-sounding books on it. These particularly intrigue me:

*Selznick, Brian. The Marvels. In black-and-white pencil illustrations, Selznick depicts three generations of actors descending from the sole survivor of a legendary shipwreck. As that story closes, another unfolds in prose as young Joseph discovers his connection to the actors and his family history, and he embraces his uncle’s life story as it affects and changes his own.

McCarry, Sarah. About a Girl: A Novel. Astronomy buff Tally plans to go to college, solve the mysteries of the universe, and win a Nobel Prize along the way. When love complicates her friendship with the boy next door, Tally veers off on a quest to uncover her own mysterious origins. Astronomy meets mythology in a magical realist twist, and Tally’s questions get lost in the arms of a beautiful woman determined to forget her own past.

Wilke, Daria. Playing a Part. Tr. by Marian Schwartz. This import—the first teen book translated from Russian—follows Grisha’s coming-of-age in a Moscow puppet theater, as he reels from the impending departure of his beloved gay mentor Sam and the looming heart operation of his best friend Sashok.

*Tamaki, Jillian. SuperMutant Magic Academy. At this boarding school for paranormal teenagers the student body is a wild mix, from witches and shapeshifters to jocks and performance artists. Hilarity ensues.

Has anyone read any books from the list? Got any recs?

An unusually interesting interview up at Gay YA. Sherwood, Lyda Morehouse, and I interviewed each other on queer representation in media, gender in fiction, and the comic books that shaped us. Contains discussion of the affair Storm had in Japan with a female thief in that one issue of the X-Men.

Also, if any of you are in or near San Diego, Sherwood and I will be signing at the Mysterious Galaxy holiday party on Saturday, December 13, 3:00 PM.

Due to the upcoming release of Stranger, I am doing some interviews in which I will be asked how or if things have changed in terms of LGBT characters in YA novels. I am armed, of course, with the most recent statistics. (Summary: representation has increased from 0.6% of all YA novels to 2%. However, most of those books are put out by LGBTQ-specialty small presses, and the percentage of LGBTQ characters in YA novels from American large presses has actually gone down.)

However, I spent the intervening years mostly focused on grad school, and so am not caught up on recent books. Are there any YA novels that have come out since 2010 with LGBTQ characters that I should check out or at least be aware of? What about self-published books? Any prominent LGBTQ teenage characters in non-book media (comics, movies, etc?)

Any changes in your own personal experience? For example, I have noticed that just in my circle of friends/acquaintances, kids seem to be coming out younger (13-15, as opposed to 18-20) and with less or no negative reactions from others. Obviously, these are kids from liberal families in LA. But I always knew liberals in LA, and I did not encounter any kids coming out at age 13 until about five years ago. Ditto straight teenage boys wearing gay rights buttons.

Note: This is a list of all novels which fit the criteria described below. It does not express opinions on the quality, authenticity, or positivity of the portrayals of the characters in the books. Please use your own judgment in deciding which books you wish to read or buy.

I have not read all these books! Commentary on the ones I have read reflects my opinions on the books as literature. Title links go to Amazon, and some descriptions were taken from Amazon.

These were the criteria used to compile the list: 1) The book must be science fiction or fantasy or otherwise not realism, and must have been published, either originally in reprint, as YA (Vanyel was never published as YA), 2) It must contain at least one major LGBTQ character who is clearly identified as such within the book itself. (Dumbledore is not; neither are Tom and Carl), 3) Major is defined as having a POV and/or a storyline of their own and/or lots of page-time. 4) In most cases, it must be published by a mainstream or small-press publisher in the USA.

Books in which the protagonist is LGBTQ are marked with a star.

I made this list because less than one percent of all YA novels published in the USA within the last ten years have any LGBTQ characters at all, even minor supporting ones. Of those few novels, most are mainstream literature, not sf or fantasy.

I have not specified the authors' sexual orientation or gender identity. This list is about characters rather than authors, and I don't know how all the authors identify.

( Check out the list! )

Hale’s portal fantasy The Rifter was one of my favorite books that I read this year. (I know, I have read very little this year. But it would have been one of my favorites no matter how many books I read.)

Wicked Gentlemen lacks the intensity and the epic quality of The Rifter, but has its own charms. In steampunk-ish world where the descendants of demons are an oppressed minority, Inquisition Captain Harper walks into the office of a down-on-his-luck demon detective, Belimai Sykes, to get some help with a murder case.

If that sounds like the opening to a noir, it’s because it has many of the elements of one: the teeming city, the straightlaced cop with a secret, the underworld into which the detective must descend, the narrator whose cynicism hides a tarnished and bitter idealism, the mystery whose solution reveals the social malaise at the heart of society, the sexual charge between detective and client.

But it’s a noir in which the femme homme fatale is the detective rather than the client, the romance is between two men, and the barriers between the haves and the have-nots include actual biological differences: not only to the demons have special powers (which mostly don’t do them any good) but the light of the human side of the city hurts their eyes, and the air of the demon side burns human skin.

It’s also more optimistic than most noir. The establishment may be corrupt, but it’s not such a dog-eat-dog world on an individual level. Many of the characters are quite likable. I was really rooting for the cop/criminal romance to succeed. It’s more a fantasy with a romantic angle than a romance in a fantasy world, but the romance was very well-done. (A one-night stand that becomes more.) It’s surprisingly sweet.

As in The Rifter, female characters are secondary but all have their own agendas and motivations. The language gives the cynical rhythms of noir a sensual lushness. Try the first page and see how you like it.

I should probably mention that one of the main characters is a drug addict. It’s a fantasy drug, and the reason he’s an addict involves the nature of the world and is crucial to the plot. Still, FYI.

Wicked Gentlemen