Saying that, for instance, an author cannot possibly be telling the truth about having been dropped from their publisher for writing the latter on the basis that the former existed misunderstands the nuances of how societal homophobia operates. This is a subskeet.
Complicating this further is that "queer material" covers a range of different things. Write a secondary-world fantasy in which some characters are casually queer? That will get pushback, but probably nowhere near as much as an overtly political work about the AIDS pandemic.
(Talk to people who were actually there in the industry at the time & they'll tell you the truth: fantasy cultures were already a pretty queer bunch, *and* it was genuinely difficult to get queer material distributed.)
Fantasy studies seems stuck in a deadlock where ppl either claim that b/c there was homophobia in the '80s-'90s publishing industry there were no gay books, *or* that b/c there were gay books there was no homophobia.
Both assume gay ppl need the permission of the dominant culture to live our lives.
I wonder how much of this also dovetails with current discussions of "cinematic" narration in prose fiction & how that may find purchase with audiences weaned on visual media. Thinking in particular about stuff Lincoln Michel has written about this.
The time is NOW. Valenziaga will fall.
Category is: Science-Fantasy EXTRAVAGANZA! Think Drag Race meets a gay Game of Thrones meets Chronicles of Amber.
High drama and high CAMP!
Spread the word! RT, tell your friends, shout it from the rooftops!
BACK THE BOOK TODAY!
#booksky
bit.ly/3OIVfNs
The same way you don't want people bombing you and your loved ones is the same exact thing that other people feel where they live.
Labour is trying to create a permanent underclass who can be treated like dirt and live in permanent bureaucratic limbo.
As Tony Benn said. The way they treat people like this is the way they would treat all of us if they could get away with it.
Surprise! The transphobic obsession of the ruling and media classes aren’t held by voters
My review of QUEER APPROACHES TO TOLKIEN (ed. Robin Anne Reid, Christopher Vaccaro, & Stephen Yandell) is out in the open-access Journal of Tolkien Research.
I had a lot of thoughts on this book, mostly very positive! Thankful to Douglas A. Anderson for commissioning this. tinyurl.com/ezbhcxn7
My review of QUEER APPROACHES TO TOLKIEN (ed. Robin Anne Reid, Christopher Vaccaro, & Stephen Yandell) is out in the open-access Journal of Tolkien Research.
I had a lot of thoughts on this book, mostly very positive! Thankful to Douglas A. Anderson for commissioning this. tinyurl.com/ezbhcxn7
Excitingly, it’s worth noting that The Unbroken ebook is on sale for $2.99 in the US! Maybe in other places, too. And while yes, that means it is on sale at Amazon, it is also on sale at bookshop.org! So if you haven’t started the trilogy that includes straps, threesomes, and crumbling empires…well!
As a multiple language speaker it's also frustrating to see people using AI for translation because the English speaking world tends to treat translators like workers for hire instead of co authors of text and this feels like more of it. Translation at the literary level is creative work.
(2/?)
In fact, let’s do this. Comment with what you’re looking for and I’ll try to recommend a read from a Palestinian author for you from my reading list. I’ll do my best to find you a match.
Authors like Clark, Caldwell, Wilson, Chandrasekera, Hopkinson, etc. dismantle sexual taboos b/c they're invested in dismantling the racial-imperial systems they're enmeshed in. They write in & about contexts that often can't afford to differentiate b/w problematic & unproblematic queers.
It would be interesting to dive further into the reasons for this shift. One possible explanation is post-AIDS anxiety (Flight from Nevèrÿon got Delany dropped from his U.S. publisher). Notably the authors who do still write in that mode are ones w/ explicitly intersectional concerns.
This would have been unheard of to fantasy authors of the '60s, '70s, & '80s (Le Guin, Delany, Lynn, Duane, Butler, early Marks) who deliberately set out to challenge preconceptions of sexual morality. Their intent is not necessarily to endorse particular practices, but to provoke thought.
Partly also influenced by this @clclark.bsky.social essay - as Clark notes we're in a moment where depictions of queerness are evaluated based on how flattering they are to the reader's preconceived sensibilities, often implicitly reasserting heteronormative morality. reactormag.com/everyones-in...
B/c I'm reading THE DANCERS OF ARUN at the moment, it occurs to me that one way to narrate a history of queerness in fantasy could be one in which earlier works that use fantasy to probe at sexual stigmas & taboos on a broad societal scale give way to a modern emphasis on individual validation.
Owen Pallett (2024)
Dead Can Dance (2022)
Björk (2019)
Perfume Genius & Julianna Barwick (2017)
Julianna Barwick (2011)
In this week’s @strangehorizons.bsky.social, one of my favourite pieces I’ve edited this year — on orientalism from Star Trek to Game of Thrones.
Photon Torpedoes Break the Space Muqarnas: SFF Audiovisuals and Anti-Muslim Violence,” by Tanvir Ahmed —
strangehorizons.com/wordpress/no...
Today's Love Letter is a stunning meditation on birdwatching and the loss of a friendship, from the one and only @amalelmohtar.com
stone-soup.ghost.io/love-letter-...
took this stance real early on, have been paying close attention, and i have yet to see a single thing that manages to challenge that opinion even a little bit, rather than solidifying it into diamond-hard conviction
The UK prefers racism over prosperity as Brexit proved
![Orville Peck - Dead of Night [OFFICIAL VIDEO]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:smmc7qgewrfeuc3fjf2d6j7y/bafkreiatpc7jzcmtiyccthtglphq26ux5a6qncslmqow2bmfg4uzqm53gy)
Call and Response Fun Fact Countdown! 10!
We open with “Femme and Sundance,” queer hustlers turned bank robbers with magical complications.
Fun Fact: the diner in the opening, mean patrons, nasty bathroom, and all resembles a real one in Nebraska.
Song pairing: m.youtube.com/watch?v=q3es...
All of the stories in this collection are, well, fantastic but my personal favourites were "The Beekeeper's Garden", "The Calcified Heart of St Ignace Battiste", & "Canst Thou Draw Out the Leviathan".
Cover of Christopher Caldwell's CALL AND RESPONSE: the title appears in ornate black letters against a swirling light blue, orange, and red background.
19. CALL AND RESPONSE (Christopher Caldwell, 2025)
I found myself lingering over each sentence of these stories, organised as paired dyads in a nested structure. With gorgeous prose, Chris's stories probe at the complex ways Black people & queer people respond to impermanence in a hostile world.
Cover of Christopher Caldwell's CALL AND RESPONSE: the title appears in ornate black letters against a swirling light blue, orange, and red background.
19. CALL AND RESPONSE (Christopher Caldwell, 2025)
I found myself lingering over each sentence of these stories, organised as paired dyads in a nested structure. With gorgeous prose, Chris's stories probe at the complex ways Black people & queer people respond to impermanence in a hostile world.
FYI, folks. There is a link to the signing page at the top of the linked letter.
Ideally somebody who is not me would've written a book about this already that I could just gesture at in a handwave-y fashion, but nobody seems to have done this, hence ... elephant in the room.