Superpowered Love News!
October 28, 2013
All manner of Superpowered Love news here today, y'all. I am excite!
ITEM #1:
Losing Better is going to print! Gosh, it'll look so pretty up there next to the Equilibrium/Riot Boy omni and Nobody's Hero. Obviously there will be a giveaway to celebrate when it happens, but for now, let's just admire how pretty Gabriel and Andrew are, shall we?
Thanks be to PL Nunn, amiright?
Yyyeah. All their animosity and stress and cold-electric love, coming soon to a bookshelf near you.
ITEM #2:
New Superpowered Love in the works, and this one has never before been mentioned! The working title is In Distress. It is tentatively scheduled for early spring as part of a larger themed event at Loose Id, but obviously there's some stuff to be shifted around when we're this far out, right?
Like Riot Boy, In Distress will deal with the perils of falling for a superpowered boy from a sleeper perspective--aka, no powers, yourself. Indeed, never even heard of powers. There's adventure and excitement that drop the hero, Eddie Kim, in waaaaay over his head right from the beginning... even if he doesn't know it.
And, at least in this draft, it begins with a house fire and rescue. This may change drastically between now and then, but here's a snippet of my WiP just to introduce you to Eddie. Who is kind of a little weirdo. Hopefully in a likable way!:
When Gloria showed me the apartment, she said, "Eddie, sweetie, we're re-doing the whole kitchen, don't even sweat it, okay?"
And I said, "The whole kitchen? Oh no. No, no, no, you have got to let me keep that old stove. It's adorable." Lots of italics, just like that, because Gloria's just one of those people who inspires other people to talk with italics in random places.
So maybe I'll just blame the fire on italics. Because that stove, oh my God, I don't know what even happened, but it set some shit on fire about six months later. And there I was, sleeping like a cliché-baby on my little futon, probably dreaming about that guy who plays Jon Snow in Game of Thrones. About him crawling up that giant ice wall with my thighs wrapped around his waist, saving me from the attacking Wildlings. Me shifting my hips (gotta keep warm on the Wall somehow) and whispering into his ear, "Faster, baby, winter is coming."
I have weird dreams sometimes.
The point is that I probably would've died if someone hadn't grabbed my arms and hauled me to my feet. Which I also thought was a dream--but no. The first thing I noticed was that the hands pulling me around were large and gloved--and freezing cold even through the leather. Or maybe I was just hot, because I was sweating and having trouble breathing--but then I shivered violently.
"You're okay--just come with me," said the voice attached to the hands.
My feet slipped on inexplicable ice. The strong, gloved hands steadied me, and the voice said, "Shit, sorry." Then my feet were wet, but it wasn't so slippery, and I could walk.
And some guy in a black hoodie and leather gloves was leading me out of my smoke-filled apartment in the middle of the night. As we turned into the hallway, flame flicked up at the end. He held out a gloved hand. By the firelight, I saw frost spread in a flash over the wall and floor, snuffing out the flames.
I shivered again and decided I was still dreaming. And if I took this guy's hood off, it was clearly going to be Jon Snow. Maybe I should jump on his back?
And that's all I have for today. Back to work making Eddie my damsel in distress. Or... maybe he's the hero after all. Dun dun DUNNNN!
Return from GRL + Reviews
October 22, 2013
Phewwww what a weekend! Hello to everyone I got to meet at GRL in Atlanta this weekend--and man, there are so many people I MISSED there and that makes me sad. Next time I will be better connected, I swear!
Still, it was epic fun. How many conventions can say they're that friendly, open, and full of strippers?
Wait.
For anyone who wasn't able to come this year, I highly recommend this Authors at GayRomLit share their favorite con moments story. Esp Anne Tenino's $40 Story. Which had me almost in tears in the Rathskellar bar later that night. But it was a glorious long weekend celebrating what we love best--with a side order of unabashed nerdery that makes everything just perfect for me.
Also I managed to wear heels for three nights in a row and not hurt myself. Go me!
Now service shall return to normal. Once I get over my con crud and/or whatever weird allergy issues I was having last week piling on. In the meantime, here are some really fabulous reviews for Re-Entry Burn I've posted to random social media, but not the blog. The horror!
Malory is the main personality here and we get to know him intimately. He evolves from a whiney, hard done by, but hard to love character into one who is thoughtful, hopeful and has a sharp self awareness, without losing the edginess that makes him interesting.
I really appreciate her thoughts on making the transition from Riot Boy, with Brady as a hero, to Re-Entry Burn, with Malory, the former villain, as a hero. Very cool stuff, so check it out, and thanks, Raine.
How I love these people and their stories. I find them downright irresistible in voice and personality.
This review just about made me cry, seriously. Melanie chose some passages to illustrate her insightful points, both about Mal and Theo and the themes in the book in general--which I'll talk about here soon individually, but range from rehabilitation to isolation and all manner of things in between.
That's it for me from now, back to work! Possibly tomorrow I will have some interesting news in Superpowered Love things, too... :D
Angry Bi Kid Approved Comics: Young Avengers
September 23, 2013
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Warning: This blog post contains spoilers for Young Avengers v2 #s 8 and 9.
You know, I've had a half-written review of Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie's Young Avengers v2 for this blog sitting here for, no kidding, three months now. Or since my last comic book update post happened. But this summer has been completely ridic (not in a good way), so nothing that was meant to get done got done. Anyhow, McKelvie is my favorite artist working right now in comics--I know, I say this like every day, but still--and Gillen, man, even when he gets crap editorially dictated to him, he manages to make the writing shine. These guys. These guys.
So today is Bi Visibility Day + Celebrate Bisexuality Day and I'm an Angry Bi Kid™, as you may have noticed. Possibly. So I'm gonna use this opportunity to talk about one of the coolest recent bisexual happenings in popular fiction and why it was awesome. And it just happens to be from Young Avengers, so I'm just gonna scrap that half-review and focus on this one reason why it is my favorite comic right now. And on its way to the all-time greats list, probably.
Skip this paragraph if you don't care about the background: David Alleyne, aka Prodigy, is a Marvel mutant--X-Men affiliated... on and off--who had the ability to telepathically absorb knowledge, skills, abilities, and (awkwardly enough, sometimes) memories from the people around him. I say this in past-tense because he was depowered on the travesty that was M-Day, but for convoluted reasons he regained the stuff he'd absorbed before then and still has it. He's with the Young Avengers in this arc, trying to rescue a friend.
Some of you may be aware that one of the most talked of couples in the Marvelverse are Billy and Teddy, or Wiccan and Hulking, who are adorably angsty right now.
And in the end of issue #8 David kissed Teddy. Much to Teddy's surprise and David's embarrassment, but you can read to find out all that awesome. My point is that this, from #9, is a great but simply written and drawn explanation/analogy:
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No, it's cool, you can click them to make them bigger and read. I'll wait. Because lemme tell you, I am feeling David pretty hard right now. (Also haha "the wiki has since been updated" ♥)
And yeah, I know, I didn't need that last bit in there, but Teddy and Billy's constant Game of Thrones references kill me so. You know. Had to be done.
Now, I've seen people complain that this makes it sound like David's powers "made him gay". I cannot tell you how angry that makes me on multiple levels without sputtering and spewing obscenity that would rival even my most foulmouthed character (looking at you, Malory--another Angry Bi Kid™, wahey, I see a pattern). I will simply--and calmly!!1!11!one!--point out that it is willfully removing the entire context in order to present something very positive--both for the character and for bisexual readers, who do not get enough of this at all ever--as negative for absolutely no good reason. Except to complain about the book.
It also makes me angry for the same reasons of erasure and dismissiveness the concept of 'Gay For You' in romance often makes me angry, but that's an old rant, I know, I'll stop.
Here are Kieron Gillen's author notes on the issue, containing his thoughts on how and why he went about David putting it precisely like this, which I won't rehash. If you don't wanna read the rest, scroll down to where he starts taking about "Page 5".
So that, basically.
Okay, so all that said, how fucking rad is this? God, I wish so hard that Marvel had been producing things like this when I was a kid, but I can't even be upset because I'm just so glad it exists now. Like emotionally moved to the tearing-up hand-flapping stage that this exists in a popular mainstream comic. I felt much the same way about Julie Power in Avengers Academy (which I talked about here before after it happened because yay bi-girl!), but I'm giving this one its own post because 1. the day and 2. I promised to talk YA ages ago.
Anyhow, Young Avengers #10, which will finish out this super-intense (oh god, my feels) arc, goes on sale in comic shops and the Marvel app this Wednesday the 25th Sept. And the trade of the first arc is already available. Can you jump into it right at #1 of this volume/with that TPB if you haven't read the stuff that happened before? Probably. It'd be better if you started from the beginning, yeah, but I think people with a passing familiarity with the Avengers could figure it out. There's always wikipedia.
Plus, come on. It's so pretty.
And that's all from your friendly neighborhood queer comic pusher on Bi Visibilty Day 2013. Woohoo!
Plus, come on. It's so pretty.
And that's all from your friendly neighborhood queer comic pusher on Bi Visibilty Day 2013. Woohoo!
5 Fun Facts
September 11, 2013
Today it's time for fun facts about "Willoughby Spit", the freebie short that comes between Riot Boy and Re-entry Burn, for those who'd like to know just what Brady and Etienne have been up to. It takes place while Brady and his band Willoughby Spit are recording their first EP--to take on tour with them. Probably.
If you're seeing this on a feed, like Goodreads or something, it'll look a lot better if you click through to the blog, since this is image/video heavy, as posts go.
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| Willoughby Spit EP cover Download the book and get a pdf of the cover art, front and back! |
Fun Fact #1: Brady and Et live in my best friend's house in Pittsburgh. It's true, my best friend since I was six (see also: the dedication to Equilibrium) lives in precisely the house Brady describes, in precisely the location he describes--well, as much as he does describe it, since I'm not trying to advertise my best friend's address. That'd be awkward.
I grew up about a half hour (depending on traffic) outside of Pittsburgh, so it was really My First City. I miss it a lot.
Fun Fact #2: "I Like Fucking" is Brady's favorite Bikini Kill song.
It is amazing. Riot grrrls ♥
And Melissa, who gets roped into singing it (because a dude singing it just doesn't work, come on)... it's kinda her theme song.
Fun Fact #3: The line 'an unhealthy thirst darkens my veins', which Brady assures Tyler "was written by a horny sixteen-year-old French boy in 1872" is from my favorite Rimbaud poem, "Song of the Highest Tower". Actually it's not just my favorite Rimbaud poem, it's probably my favorite poem full stop.
Fun Fact #4: As for the rest of the EP's track listing, Brady wrote "Freezer Burn" about Mal, "Bookshop Boy" about Etienne, and "Liar" for certain politicians.
Fun Fact #5: This one is for Jess, who asked about George a week or two ago. George the Fox, whom Brady puts on his amp before every rehearsal and/or show, is real. This is him:
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| Poor George has a rough time of it in "Willoughby Spit". Tyler, why you gotta be so mean? :( |
Brady picked him up after he left home the third time (because how could he not? Look at that face!)--the time that stuck, and he figured that made him good luck.
I put him in both Riot Boy and "Willoughby Spit" as an oblique reference to Nicky Wire of the Manic Street Preachers. Those jerks (aka my favorite band ever--also Malory's, but that's another post) didn't come to the US and play a show for ten years. I'm not exaggerating, it was literally ten years. Then, finally, I think it was after Send Away the Tigers (ETA: Nope, sorry, the Journal for Plague Lovers cover is right there on stage behind Nicky in the pic below. Ha!), they appeared, and Irene--yes she of Superpowered Science--got us tickets to see them in New York.
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| Most people go to New York to see Broadway shows. I go for random bands, apparently. I don't even know. |
So when they came out on stage, my teenage years flashed before my eyes, obviously. But also, Nicky Wire, fabulous bass player and all around source of awesome frocks, boas, and accessories, set up some little stuffed animals on his amp.
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| Okay it's a crappy picture from the cell I had like 5 years ago, but you can still kinda see them behind Nicky there. Also his signature mic draped in boas and pretty things. Nicky ♥ |
And I thought: holy fuck, that's perfect. I don't know why he did it, or if he does it at every show, or what. But I had Brady do it in, um, homage, I guess, to one of my favorite bass players. Because Brady totally would.
Also, the Manics still haven't been back since. Sigh.
Bonus music:
Buzzcocks - "Raison D'etre". If you've read the story, you know why!
And that's all she wrote!
"Willoughby Spit" cropped up on B&N too recently, so here's the list of ways to get it, for the curious. Please mind the warnings within, though:
My Box.net folder (separate zip files for mobi, epub, pdf, and htm--take whatever you like!)
Smashwords (all eBook formats)
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