Just 5 More Things

5 related things about a topic.

[everydaymoebius]

[lizclimo]

Happy Halloween from Bear & Rabbit! Don’t forget to pick up a copy of their new book, BEST BEAR EVER  

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YA Books With Queer Girls

This maaay be stemming from anger, as all my best ideas are, but I figured it might help someone find a really awesome book, and so I shall be your unofficial librarian for a sec. 

I can vouch for all of these books; yes, some are better than others (I mean, yes, Of Fire and Stars has an overly simple plot), but they are all very much enjoyable, especially if you’re not in constantly book-reviewer mode like I am whenever I read. 

Also, I’m focusing this specially on books with queer girls, because I feel like YA has a bit of a problem with wlw. They tend to fly majorly under the radar, while books like Simon Vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda and Carry On get majorly hyped. Don’t get me wrong, I love both those books to bits, but still. I want to read all the books about girls who love girls. 

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Radio Silence by Alice Oseman: I need to put on of my all-time fav books here, first, don’t I? But, seriously, this book is fucking fantastic, and I love it to bits. It’s got all the amazing things: podcasts, nerdy people being nerdy, geeking out over sci-fi, it’s fantastic. Bisexual female MC/narrator + demisexual male MC + gay male side character + gay female minor character. 

When The Moon Was Ours by Anna-Marie McLemore: Guys. GUYS. This book is gorgeous. One of the most beautiful books I’ve read in a long time. Anna-Marie McLemore is already one of my top ten favorite writers and she’s only written two books, and this…I love this book and I want everyone to read this amazing book SO JUST GO READ IT, OKAY? AND it’s about QPOC, AND it very much respects and embraces true magical realism, AND the author is literally the sweetest person ever. Queer female MC + trans male MC.

Labyrinth Lost by Zoraida Cordova: This book is like a mix of Alice in Wonderland and a crazy fever dream. BUT IN A GOOD WAY. And can I mention the worldbuilding??? I’m in love with it. Bisexual female MC + queer female MC

Everything Leads to You by Nina Lacour: THIS BOOK IS FREAKIN’ ADORABLE. I mean, it’s about romance and movies and mysteries and it has a beautifully built slowburn romance and everyone is adorable and the romance is adorable and just ALL THE YES. Gay female MC + Gay female MC

Tash Hearts Tolstoy by Kathryn Ormsbee: This book is all about the internet! I mean, if you exist on a creative plain of the internet, you’ll see yourself in this book. PLUS all the amazing and totally important conversations about asexuality. Asexual romantic female MC.

Little & Lion by Brandy Colbert: I am SO ANGRY about how much this book has flown under the radar, because it’s amazing and so important and it addresses so many amazing things, and I just…Brandy Colbert writes the most fantastically realistic, flawed characters and I love it. Bisexual female MC + queer female side character.

Of Fire and Stars by Audrey Coulthurst: I need to mention the cover of this book, first, because OH THE GORGEOUSNESS. Also, can I say NON-HOMOPHOBIC FANTASY WORLD??? Gay female MC + gay female MC

Lumberjanes by Noelle Stevenson, Grace Ellis, Shannon Watters, and Brooke A. Allen: I shriek about this graphic novel/s every single time someone asks for a comic recommendation. It’s ridiculous in the best way and lighthearted and has the most lovable characters and can I mention the cast is ENTIRELY FEMALE? Gay female MC + Gay female MC + Trans female MC

As I Descended by Robin Talley: Gay modern day Macbeth retelling with ghosts. Want to hear that again? LESBIAN MACBETH. WHY HAVEN’T YOU READ THIS ALREADY? Gay female MC + Gay female MC

10 Things I Can See From Here by Carrie Mac: Okay, yes, this book has an awful cover but don’t let that sway you because I love this book to pieces. For one, it’s set in Vancouver, and I love Vancouver, and also it has probably one of the most realistic portrayals of anxiety I’ve ever read, AND THAT ANXIETY DOESN’T GET CURED WITH ROMANCE. Gay female MC + Gay female side character

The Cursed Queen by Sarah Fine: Okay, yes, this is a sequel, but I had to add it to the list because I’m in love with this series and this world and I LOVE IT SO MUCH. It’s gloriously stabby. Bisexual female MC + queer female MC

Queens of Geek by Jen Wilde: This book is a love letter to fandom and nerd culture and everything, AND I LOVE IT TO PIECES. I’m so, so happy this book is getting so much hype because it stands up to the hype and crushes it and I just love it, okay?? Also, I love all the characters. ALL OF THEM. They’re so fantastically written and adorable and I REALLY, REALLY LOVE THEM. Bisexual female MC + Queer female side character.

Get It Together, Delilah/The Flywheel by Erin Gough: It’s set in a bakery/cafe, which is enough to get my heart beating, but this book is just straight-up adorable. Also, if you don’t think I’m making panna cotta gelato the first chance I get YOU ARE SADLY MISTAKEN. Gay female MC + Gay female MC.

BONUS: These books don’t have queer girls as MCs, but they do have queer girls and are just overall fantastic. The Upside of Unrequited has a sideplot about the MC’s gay sister and her pansexual girlfriend, plus the most adorable moms in YA, The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue has a female character whom I’m like 99% sure is asexual, A Tyranny of Petticoats has a couple of stories that are about queer girls, as does Meet Cute. 

Also, did I miss any important books??? Tell me if I did because I want to know about ALL THE BOOKS with queer girls. 

[wwprice1]

The real stars of Black Panther. Gorgeous work by Jen Bartel!

[fyblackwomenart]

Okoye by Messiah972

[lizclimo]

works for me 

[lizclimo]

To everyone hurting, and everyone helping.

Click for ways you can help people during Hurricane Harvey & the flooding in South Asia  

[steampunktendencies]

Top Hat Name Chart

[chibird]

With every struggle, you learn more and more, and you become better prepared to take on the next challenges that come your way!

[incidentalcomics]

The Cannon of Literature (for The Southampton Review)

Posters of this and many fine literary comics are available at my shop. They make great gifts for teachers, librarians, and your book-obsessed friends and family.

My first book, The Shape of Ideas, is now available for pre-order! 

[did-you-know]

Pom pom crabs and sea anemones have their own tiny cheer squads. The crabs wave the stinging anemones around to defend themselves against predators, while the anemones collect food particles they can feast on after sharing with their crab besties. Source

[explore-blog]

E.B. White, writing half a century ago, on weapons, justice, and what it really takes to live in a peaceful world – beautiful read, strikingly pertinent to our predicament of gun control. 

[ldemers77]

Things I love: My bookshelves

Things I do not love: Dusting my bookshelves

[malindalo]

In the Club

The first gay club I went to was a small, dark bar on the plains of Colorado, the summer after my first year in college. I went with my childhood best friend, because we’d both spent the last year discovering that our sexual orientations weren’t as straight as we’d thought.

I don’t remember the name of the club. I do remember feeling like I was stepping into a new world, one that was both terrifying and exhilarating. I didn’t know anyone there except for my friend. I’m pretty sure I was the only Asian American there. I’m sure that I stuck out like a sore thumb. But that was also the first time I realized there is a place for people like me. However naive and inexperienced I might have been, I also felt welcomed.

I went to other gay clubs. There was ManRay in Cambridge, Massachusetts, another dark box of a club between Harvard and MIT, where I went with my college friends. They had a special queer night every Thanksgiving, and after college in our early twenties, we’d load up on turkey and stuffing, and then dance it off at ManRay, which happened to be literally next door to my friend’s apartment.

There were bigger clubs, too. In San Francisco in the late ’90s and early 2000s, there was Club Q, a gigantic warehouse of a club somewhere in SoMa where queer go-go dancers twisted on platforms above the heaving dance floor. Hundreds of women shimmied beneath the colored lights, and when I pushed through the sweaty crowd I felt totally insignificant and yet completely seen: terrified of being overlooked, hopeful of being looked over.

I’ve been to Girl Bar in Los Angeles, Candy Bar in London, El Rio and the Cat Club in San Francisco. I’ve been to Pride parties in New York City where I felt like a smalltown loser but wouldn’t have missed those parties for the world. I’ve been to Dinah Shore and MichFest and women’s weekends in sleepy Guerneville, California. All these clubs — all these dance parties for queer women — they showed me that there are thousands of us out there, and we are all searching for connection with each other, always seeking love and hoping for acceptance.

When I was a kid and we went on family vacations, no matter what city we went to, my parents always wanted to go to Chinatown. I remember, when I was a frustrated teen, thinking that this was the stupidest thing ever. Every Chinatown was the same: crowded, stinking of strange herbs and fish guts, the sidewalks thronged with cheap imports, the restaurants loud with Chinese speakers all seeming to yell over each other. I didn’t understand, when my parents took me to all these Chinatowns — in San Francisco, in Boston, in New York, in Toronto — that they were seeking a place where they felt at home. In Chinatown, we were like everyone around us. In Chinatown, my parents spoke the language.

As a lesbian adult, that’s what going to queer bars and clubs meant to me. They were spaces where I spoke the language. I was accepted as family. They were places of joy; they were places of freedom. They were crucibles of emotion — pulsing, music-filled rooms where we were encouraged to feel everything. They were spaces full of drama, rooms ripe with possibility. For many people in the gay community, gay clubs are our living rooms and our sanctuaries; they are the places we meet the people we love, and the spaces where we find ourselves.

The terrorist attack at the Pulse club in Orlando today has left me heartbroken for so many reasons. I hurt for the victims and their families. I hurt for my LGBTQ family, which has had one of our most precious places invaded by hatred. The fact that this attack took place during Pride month is not an accident. It is a direct attack on our freedom to be ourselves.

I don’t go to many gay clubs anymore. Like many people, after I got married, I moved on from those electric spaces; I created a more private living room with my wife and our families. But I still remember those clubs for the joy they brought me, and the freedom they taught me. These spaces are crucial for our LGBTQ community. It’s no accident that one of the foundational events in the gay rights movement took place at the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar. And I know that despite the horrific nature of today’s attack, it will not stop us from being proud of who we are. My heart goes out to all LGBTQ people today. I am with you. I am you.

from In the Club

[lizclimo]

all my love

[fiercereadsya]

Disney Developing ‘Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant’ Movie

Disney has acquired the feature film rights to Tony Cliff’s graphic novel series “Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant.” The studio is developing a live-action film with Roy Le…

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Episode 47: Genesis