The Worlds We Create (Real And Fiction)

Posted on June 15, 2013 by Random Jordan

So its been a while since I managed to get anything up on here, unfortunately. But on the up side, I am working on a few writing projects that I plan on unveiling over the next week, including a fairy tale and mythology anthology (with a kickstarter) and the rough drafts of the first chaptersof my next two books (one of which is a YA).

Until then though, I actually wanted to talk about my first book, The Real Folktale Blues. I never mentioned that it was now free for the time being, until I hear from Harper Voyager on whether or not they are going to pick up my series. You can find it on Smashwords free as a digital copy, unfortunately I can’t do physical copies for free due to publishing costs, but I don’t mind that, because honestly the only people have really bought physical copies are myself and people I know personally and like two other people who I don’t know at all.

Still it made me think recently about whether I wanted to actually go through with filing my book with the United States Copyright. I’ve already marked it as being copywritten, because it is, but if I ever had to prove that in court I’d be screwed. Not that I ever will need to prove that, because honestly if you can take my stories and make them your own and make it successful enough that it becomes an issue then fuck, you win.

But I was reading some things on Ksenia Anske’s blog about copyright and that she was going with a creative commons that let people use and manipulate her work in any way so long as it wasn’t then commercialized and as long as she was cited for the idea coming from her. Which is an awesome concept, and something I would totally consider, if it wasn’t for the fact that I’m mostly looking toward traditional publishing directions (and at the same time not really). This means that if I went the same route, my books would literally be unsellable because you can’t make money off of creative common things. Ksenia Anske manages to get around this by asking for donations from her MASSIVE reader following. And she lives off of that. And honestly I’d be okay with that direction too, giving people my books for free, self publishing and asking for money. Hell, Amanda Palmer had recently done a Tedtalk on that; we should be asking for money from our fans, rather than demanding it!

The issue is, where do you start with that kind of thing? Ksenia already had this huge twitter following before she fully invested in writing her first book, she had tons of people willing to essentially invest in her in the same way crowdfunding worked. For someone like me though, who barely talks to a soul and occasionally interacts with a few people here and there on social media, going that route for me would get me in tough shit fast. And I just got out of all the tough shit.

That’s okay though. Because no matter what I eventually run with, which will probably come down to whether or not Harper Voyager actually wants to take a chance on me, I’ll still continue writing, I’ll still continue releasing my stories, even if they are free, and I never make a dime off them. Believe or not, I actually haven’t made a cent off of The Real Folktale Blues. I’ve given it away, and let people have fun with it, and I’ve actually spent tons of money on it that was my spending money. In a way, writing these books is more of my hobby than my job now, and if I can keep it at my books being free and taking longer to get around to writing, would it be better to keep it my hobby, and survive with a different job?

I’m not sure. I’d rather write what I want and have fun with my novels for my living, but it wasn’t until a couple of reviews and emails I had gotten from readers of my first book. Like… it’s so weird thinking that I have readers… me? It’s just kind of… wow. And not just people who are like… this was terrible, I’m glad I didn’t pay for it. It’s been positive, really positive. I enjoyed writing the book, and it showed with the people who have read the book, enjoying reading it. And honestly… I couldn’t ask for anything better than that.

Who knows later down the line, things will always change, maybe I’ll get a deal with someone, maybe I’ll just keep releasing these on my own and hell, running a kickstarter for it would be interesting. I mean, if I kickstart an entire series of nine books, which I have the first book done, and the second one well on the way, would that crowdfunding method really be any different from what Ksenia is doing? That might be an option I might really consider. I’ll have to hype it up before I run with it, but it’d be interesting to see.

Anyway, back to my readers though. I recently had one person email me and I wanted to share their emails because… this is honestly what every writer wants to see when they have written a book. If every writer could ever get even just one review for each book they wrote, this would be it:

Hey,

I have just finished reading “beyond ever after” and I had the need to track you down and thank you. I rarely if ever leave reviews despite being an avid reader but I am making an exception in this case to tell you what a wonderful read this book was. The plot is extremely well done, the characters are so well developed and I loved the humor! I have been searching for a good sci-fi/ fantasy lesbian book since forever and almost despaired of ever finding one until I stumbled on this gem. So thank you

And thank you for making it easy to obtain. I am one of the unlucky people who live in a country where being gay is against the law (yes sadly these still exist), so having access to such a good quality book online is quite the treat.

I’m surprised you weren’t aware people would like it that much. I even got that feeling, don’t know how to really describe it, you know the one you get after reading a good book that has a universe of its own… where you feel for a couple of days after that you’re still partially living in that universe. Wow 9 more books! I have so much to look forward to!

As for living for a country where being gay is illegal, it sucks. Being homophobic is actually the accepted norm. Things are changing, but too slowly.But it is still much better than the surrounding countries. Weirdly, it felt relieving to hear someone totally unrelated condemn it.

I wish you all the best in your book series getting picked up. You truly deserve it.

Please don t stop writing!

Now, under normal circumstances I would have mentioned the person who had sent these multiple emails to me, but due to keeping anonymity for this person who could very well be persecuted with a death sentence or any number of terrible things for simply having my book, I am all over making sure to protect this person’s freedom to go anonymous.

It’s because of things like this that create the very reason I write my stories. Continually I’m learning to express more and more diversity and variance with my characters and plots and I can’t say my writing is brilliant or that my stories NEED to be heard, because one: my writing is terrible, but I’m learning. And two: These aren’t my stories. I write these stories so that there can be a story out there for everyone to feel exactly like this person does. So that they have a story to go to and see that not everything is terrible, not everyone feels the same way as so many people around them do. These aren’t my stories. They are everyone else’s.

And thinking about that, only makes me wonder whether I should actually follow through with going toward a creative commons licensing and start doing the same thing as Ksenia Anske. It’d let me share even more stories and it would let me share them for free, for everyone, and for anyone to get access to them. I mean, that’s the same reason I’m interested in a big publisher picking up my book, so that everyone can get them, but through a big publisher the reach may be further, but it won’t touch the people who can’t afford these things or in the case of the reader above… can’t even buy these things or else they would be killed.

This is same reason Sarah Diemer had mentioned that the majority of people who buy her novels and sustain her are straight people, despite all of her works having gay characters as the main ones, if not all of them. Why? Because the people who want to read gay young adult books can’t always buy them, or even be associated with them. There are still people in America and even the UK today that are punished and persecuted for being gay, and if you’re seen with a book that is clearly a ‘gay’ book you are screwed in that sense.

And it’s a horrible notion to think of, but it is so true. If I’m writing stories directed toward all the ‘outliers’ in the world, how would they be able to get a hold of my book, when my book could literally be banned from that country or that home.

In the same vein, if my books somehow fell into the mainstream like with Harper Voyager picking this up, then would I be helping those people in the outlier areas? Would I be showing that characters that are gay, or trans, or racially different can get along, be friends, have good lives, and deal with all the same fucked up shit that everyone deals with in our lives, would that make a difference?

Fuck, I hope so. I used to say fiction is actually a large portion of what decides people’s knowledge and actions in the real world, especially fiction from a young age, like young adult literature. Don’t believe me? There was one book that incited a Philippine revolution, another (the bible) that has been the go-to literature to wave away human rights from anyone that wasn’t straight, white, male and Christian. Want more? How about the book that led to the persecution of thousands of people as witches and how you kill them.

Sure, you could argue that all of those books weren’t technically fiction, but most of them were about history (or what people consider history) and there is always some fiction when history is written. And I didn’t even touch on facts like how J.K. Rowlings books led to many Christians finally realizing it was okay to read a book about fictional magic, you wouldn’t burn for it. Then she went and tossed em a screw ball by saying the major, awesome mentor through the whole series was actually gay. Which was probably the biggest fuck you in mainstream media that still makes me laugh. And you know what, I’d love to do the same thing. No, I would want to do more than that. Because as long as my books aren’t able to be part of the mainstream then neither will being gay, or gender-non-conforming or whatever race you may be.

They will always be on the outlier, just like my stories. And I want to change that.

Finally, a note for the person above and all those who might fall in the same situation:

I love you. And no matter who you are, I will always love you, and I will always continue to write. Always continue to provide the stories that I know people out there want to read. But most of all, I hope the world changes. I hope the hate runs dry, and I wish so much for people to be able to just be people. No matter who they love, what they look like, or how they act. We are all people, and nothing can take that away from you, despite so many people thinking they can.

So keep loving, keep reading, and keep living. Because just by you being alive and living your life to the fullest, you destroy the power anyone else can have over you. Believe in yourself, and believe that no matter what, I love you. All of you. And best of, the reason I love Love so much… it is one of the few things that doesn’t deplete the more you give it away.

Love,

Jordan

Why I Will Never Pass (By Choice)

Posted on June 8, 2013 by Random Jordan

I feel like I still surprise people regularly when they ask ‘So when are you transitioning?’, probably because it seems like an odd question to me. I mean, here are am, sitting in a tank top that clearly shows what boobs I have, wearing size six jeans, talking about how I’m a girl in essence and yet I’m still asked when I’m transitioning. As if I’m already not?

There’s a lot of concern around this kind of thing. How many people do you know who say they could totally spot a transwoman easily? Chances are, they can in some cases. Usually transwomen that are just starting their physical transition and even up to a year into it can still in some cases look predominately male-ish (mostly the face because that’s how we generally judge gender). But this is because we as a society actually place more stress on masculine features, this is why you never hear about transmen having as much of an issue with ‘passing’ because it doesn’t really take that much.

For a transman, once you’ve been on hormones for a bit, you could go walking around with your boobs hanging out, but because you’ve got a beard and a deep voice, people will just think you are a dude. Now that is for transmen who have been on hormones, and even then sometimes they still get shit about it, because of those who kind of have the nasally or squeaky voice instead of a deep one (which is a VERY common occurrence), but when you’ve been hormones long enough, eventually you do pass for women and men. (with concerns to age and facial hair still).

But what about the people who aren’t women and men? There isn’t a concept of ‘passing’ for them because there is no ‘normal’ for people who are somewhere in between. We will always be gendered one way or the other, no matter what. I could be the butchest gal in town and still consistently be gendered male, or worse when you’re really feminine for a guy, but not gay, and you still get ‘fag’ yelled at you out the window of passing cars. I know, because I’ve experienced both of these.

So when people ask me, when I’m transitioning, I really can’t help but laugh. I have been transitioning, for years at this point. The problem is, my goal isn’t to be FEMALE or MALE. My goal is androgyny, so I can be female or male when I want. But this is an issue for everyone else. Being one and the other or neither isn’t an option. Plus, most people don’t really understand the concept of transition.

Transition is change. We do it every day, and usually, we do it without conscious thought to it. That’s the big difference between transition and change. A transition is something we want to do, a conscious thought is put toward the kind of change we want. The thing is, we change not just physically everyday.

I’ve already been transitioning, because I’ve been mentally and emotionally transitioning for years. Preparing myself for the mentality of the things I have to understand and embrace. Which is a whole bunch of jargon for saying that I had to be sure of myself that I wanted to consciously go through the process of being androgynous, in mind, body and more. It’s funny I say that, consider I have been androgynous for years in personality, but not much else. Which is why when I say my essence is female it’s something I have to say, because everyone assumes my essence is male, and because I have so much of the male aspect showing I over compensate by trying to affirm only the female aspect for the things that can’t be seen.

And this is why so many trans people actually feel like they have a ‘after transition or post transition’ period. They feel like they have finished. And really they have. They finished the transition, but that doesn’t mean they won’t still change and learn and grow, but there won’t be any conscious thought to it. And that’s disappointing. Which is probably why I’ll never finish transition. Or more specifically, I won’t ever ‘pass’.

Oh sure, there will be times that people will undyingly believe I’m fully female. And then other times people will think I couldn’t be anything but male. But there will also be times that I’ll have facial hair while otherwise completely ‘passing’ as female, or keep a deep voice despite looking female. Or maybe I’ll put my hair in pig tails while looking male.

Why would I do this? That’s actually the easy part. And I think the best way to explain it is through a story.

I once knew someone I was in the crazy house with. They asked me if I was female, why didn’t I wear female clothes, or make-up, or grow out my hair.

I asked them. How am I not already wearing female clothes? Don’t females wear jeans? T-shirts? Does make-up define what a woman is supposed to be? Long hair? Are these all things that women are supposed to be? Because if so, then maybe you should look in the mirror.

She wore pants, a t-shirt, even a hoodie, no make-up, and her hair was recently cut to nearly the scalp. And she laughed. Because for years she had been told exactly what a female was supposed to be, and continually defied it. And here I was, a person desperately trying to have people acknowledge my female side and yet I refused to not be myself. Wearing those things don’t define me, but not wearing those things don’t keep me from being who I am.

I’ll continue to be who I am no matter what, and maybe I’m stubborn, or I don’t know what I am talking about. But I feel like one of the major reasons women (like the womyn festival) have such major issues with transwomen is because the transwomen they are aware of simply embrace the beauty culture that most of these women have gone to great lengths to reject because it was something built by men, and here were these people who masqueraded as men for years suddenly embracing that beauty culture and changing to women.

And that sucks. For everyone involved.

That’s why, despite the looks, despite the fact that often times I might look like a man in a skirt, or a woman with a beard and unshaved legs, I won’t pass. But I won’t pass, because I choose to not pass. Because I don’t need to. Because I am exactly who I am, and embracing beauty, or the gender mentality of what I am supposed to look like is something I’ve been fighting my whole life. And just for the sake of being able to pass as female sometimes I’m not just gonna give into wearing make-up and being a girly girl. Because that’s bullshit. It’s not me, and just because it’s not me, it doesn’t make me any less of a girl. It doesn’t make me more of one either.

It just makes me a person. A person standing here, rejecting the social stigmas that are trying to be forced down my throat. And believe it or not, trans people have developed one of those social stigmas… and it’s called ‘passing’. And I reject that too.

Why I Will Always Love Illyana Rasputin

Posted on June 6, 2013 by Random Jordan

There is, no matter what, one character in all of comics that will never compete with any other characters for my heart. That is Illyana Rasputin or Magik or Darkchylde or Snowflake or her hundreds of other aliases. Sure, I do like plenty of other characters like Xi’an or Zatanna, but Illyana is not only me, she is my perfect story. And for me, it all comes down to stories.

You see Illyana is this sweet and innocent little girl when it all starts, who often never realized when she was causing trouble for everyone around her. She was in essence a very stupid kid, but with a lot of potential in her already. This follows my childhood background where I often put others at risk, though not my brother, but friends and family always got in trouble because of me. I’ve caused a lot of pain to people, much of which I’m not aware of.

For Illyana, her brother jumped in front of a tractor to save her, and then even went after her to save her in multiple different universes. And that was just the beginning.

Now from there Illyana is stolen away by demons to another dimension, where she is raised by people trying to help her and some trying to use her. This represents a really strong case for a lot of abuse by peers and adults of all types but with gentle urging that Illyana was still able to at least experience some of the beauty humanity had too over in such a hellish dimension (ironically by some not-so-human beings).

Because of this, she learns at a young age that she has a power deep inside her, a power born by the damage some of the people had caused her but still innately part of her. This sits well once again with my life as I was often bullied at a young age, suffered an era where I was pulled away from the only family member I consistently interacted with (my mother instead of brother) and proceeded to discover that I had a lot of power in my reactions and actions, but most of all my words and thoughts. It was after discovering this dark and good power in me that I looked to applying it in a manner that was all my own. I didn’t create a soulsword though, instead I manifested my persona, the first of many which would continue to grow on me in much the same way the soul armor grew on Illyana, even at times when I didn’t want it to.

With my first persona crafted, I could become anyone and I did. I took on one persona and overthrew the school bully, resulting in my month detention for standing up for myself and other kids. Much in the same way Illyana proceeded to use her sword to slay Belasco and take over Limbo. The next persona I took on at a new school, experiencing my first strong relationship with a girl and my first romance falls almost perfectly in line with Illyana then being brought to Xavier’s school where she’s new and keeps to herself, but ends up bonding rather well with one person… Kitty Pryde. Although the two don’t end up romantically involved with even a kiss, there was a lot of undertones that fall along the same line as the whole ‘college girl roommates’ kind of thing often getting marked up to experimental lesbianism. They were roommates and really close friends (though romantic was still possible), which still fits with my comparison as that girl was the only person I bonded with and strongly and we were classmates and deskmates (that school shared giant desks with two seats).

Unfortunately my time with ‘Kitty’ didn’t last quite as long as Illyana managed to get, and I was moving away once again. Which I could probably ramble on for hours about how the uncontrollable teleportation that Illyana possessed was incredibly metaphoric of the constant moving of my life, in fact I could probably make everything about Illyana a direct fictional metaphor for my life, which is why I’ll just move on to when Illyana is ‘killed’ and ‘reborn’ as a baby once more.

This can be accounted to a significant point in my life as well. I attempted suicide multiple times, most of the time by doing reckless things, but finally it got to a point where I just ran away from my life and embraced the fact that I needed to do things for myself and take control of my destiny rather than let it be controlled by everyone else. I was reborn from this decision. It will always be a defining moment in my life that I will forever be happy to have happened. I was reborn much like Illyana emerged from her soul armor as a child once more.

This rebirth didn’t last, in fact it died quickly because with that rebirth I tried to forget all who I was and become someone else, someone I thought I was supposed to be. Again, I hurt a lot of people around that time. And eventually this ‘persona’ of me died and I embraced a new one and then another new one, much like Illyana dying to the legacy virus and being reborn a few times until finally the most recent incarnation emerged. The final me that realized I’m an incredibly messed up and terrible person and I know it.

This is what makes Illyana so much of my heart. She’s a brat as a kid, learns her power and potential young, wields that power both in good and bad ways, then tries to forget herself, before emerging with the acceptance that she is both a terribly dark person and one who has a heart of gold. Illyana is the fusion of good and evil that not only I am, but everyone is. We are all fucked up people, and Illyana Rasputin is the queen of not just getting through life fucked up, but turning that brokenness into a strength.

Illyana Rasputin and her quest for revenge made me want to do so much more with my life. Illyana and her fall so far into the darkness and chaos and destruction that there was NEVER anyway of getting back out of it. So what does she do? She takes up all that darkness and burns it up inside her, using it as her power to keep on going. Illyana and her simple words that mean so very much to me:

“Everyone wants to come home. Even the worst of us.”

“You want to be Happy again? You want to live again? You need to learn to forget.”

It’s thanks to Illyana that I’ve embraced my life. It’s because of her that I can honestly say that I am alive today to be writing these books and words. A fictional character had that much of an impact on my life. She may be fictional, like many of the characters I make, but that doesn’t make them or her any less real.

It’s because of Illyana that I want to write a story for everyone. I want everyone to have a character that they can look to and go… that’s me. That’s my life. That is who I am. That is my story.

So thank you Illyana Rasputin. There is no way I can express how much love I have for you.

Which is why you’ll always just remain in my heart, right along the ‘Kitty’ I will never have, just like you.

Book Review – Moon Called

Posted on June 4, 2013 by Random Jordan

Disclaimer: As with all my reviews there is the possibility of spoilers, though I work my hardest to avoid them when I can.

You Can’t Get Me Out of My Skin

I’ve had a crazy stint of Urban Fantasy lately, and after reviewing a smaller time series with an Elemental main character, I really wanted to get around to the Mercy Thompson series too. Unfortunately I’ve only gotten through the first book, but it is a start at least. So I figured it would be useful to throw up my thoughts on the Mercy series first book before I get around to the others. (which at some point I will eventually).

I went into this series knowing little more than ‘it is about a coyote shapeshifter mechanic’. Seriously, and originally I wanted to get the third book I think it was, because I liked the cover on it better than the first one. But someone convinced me I should start with the first one, since I have a nasty habit of starting in the middle of a series and never going back.

So let’s begin with Mercy. She is what is known as a skinwalker, though everyone seems to know what a skinwalker is, except her (including me). She works on the cars of vampires, after taking over her garage from a fairy, and lives near a werewolf alpha. So as could be expected, somehow she ends up getting roped into quite some ridiculous situations, including some people trying to kill her and needing her garage cleaned up by a witch. But it isn’t all bad, before long Mercy is brought back to her old roots with the werewolf pack she grew up with and gets caught up in trying to help a lot of people even though she really didn’t need to.

And this is just about as general as I could get with it. Eventually she does fight some big baddie and puts an end to a plot for werewolf pack domination (not quite world domination, but close). Overall, Mercy was a well done character and interesting, I was a little disappointed in one major area with werewolves being largely just as sexist and misogynistic of a society as humans are, and that Mercy even still gives into this area (despite protesting against it with her words). But it’s at least still something that is acknowledged by the character, but I feel showing her giving into that submissive quality she is ‘supposed’ to possess wasn’t exactly an awesome thing.

Still, it’s only one major thing in the first book of a series, which I can honestly understand a lot about the first book not always being what you want it to be, which is generally why when I start a series I will actually start further along than the first book (I had planned to read the second book first). But it was still a decent one to read and it had a good flowing plot and plenty of fun characters. In fact there was some degrees of diversity with a few gay characters (though once again suffer from a very… heteronormative werewolf society).

Overall, this is a book I’d definitely recommend to anyone interested in Urban Fantasy, it manages to be just different enough with a character not focused on a job around snooping on people like many other Urban Fantasies do, and even defies the gender norms in multiple ways like being a mechanic. Together with a well done plot, that uses the damsel in distress trope unfortunately at one point (at least a wife didn’t die). It’s a good solid beginning for a series that I’d love to see more of, and I really hope to see the heteronormative, misogynistic werewolf society broken down for once instead of Mercy just becoming the ‘mate’ of one of the men.

As for my imps, three of them stuck around for this one, totally getting sucked up into the action and the third one especially liked the vampire scenes. My fourth imp stuck around for some of it and flitted away for others, but mostly enjoyed it and so I wouldn’t let him get away with trying to be half again. My fifth imp didn’t put up with any of it really, as she felt there could have been more diversity and it’s definitely not a book for everyone.

Four out of Five Imps

Painful Poetry

Posted on June 2, 2013 by Random Jordan

I’m not one to often spout poetry, but I’ve done it a few times and usually it’s all in the moment stuff. This one in particular was less poetry and more of just me trying to express the words with the right flow and timing and stress of the rhythm, which I guess is technically poetry? I debated publishing this one, but after seeing it again I realized there wasn’t anything specific in it that I would feel necessary to censor or anything. In fact I’d release the whole piece if it wasn’t for certain parts of it being incredibly personal to more than just me, because I feel there’s a lot of good words to be said in it, but publishing stuff on the internet is permanent for the most part and some times you pick.

So here are parts of two pieces that I liked, though when I had written them, I didn’t quite read them. Then again, I wasn’t doing much reading of anything at the time.

———————————————————-

You took the one thing from me I thought I couldn’t lose.

My memories of us.

Now I question every little thing.

The one relationship I thought had meaning

was really just an empty shell.

What does that say about me?

I can’t do this.

I can’t.

I see you and me in everything

I can’t watch a show, I can’t write.

I try to drown myself away with anything

But I’m left in tears.

I didn’t want to say this to you.

I didn’t want to burden you with this.

Because it’s cruel.

I don’t know what to do.

I’ve cried every morning for the past week.

And it just gets harder the more you tell me.

I thought I would get to keep the memories

But that is not true either.

I’m sorry.

I can’t.

I wish I could just hate you for it.

I wish.

But its only pain and tears.

Eventually they’ll die away.

I watched something yesterday

It mentioned grief

It said:

The worst state of being

is remembering the future,

particularly the one you’ll never have.

I try to forget it.

But it won’t leave me.

I just don’t know.

What happened to the cabin?

What happened to that future?

—————————————————–

And sure, we don’t always know when we love.

That’s because love is not a thing we do

Or that happens to us.

It’s a state of being.

You don’t KNOW when you love.

You FEEL when you love.

Too many people

Use their heads

And not their heart

When it comes to that.

You say you can’t love me like I needed,

But what does that even mean?

How was your love not what I needed?

How can it be so devastating to me when it wasn’t what I needed?

Don’t tear yourself down.

And don’t think less of yourself.

You are a wonderful person,

You don’t deserve to be hated.

You don’t deserve someone who isn’t making you happy.

You deserve happiness.

You deserve a good life.

You deserve the world.

And some day you’ll get it.

Book Review – Sappho’s Fables

Posted on June 1, 2013 by Random Jordan

Disclaimer: As with all my reviews there is the possibility of spoilers, though I work my hardest to avoid them when I can.

I Wish Sappho Wrote Fables

I really do wish Sappho wrote fables… or anything that actually survived entirely in tact. But I have to say I still always love when I can find more queer fairy tales. So it probably isn’t any surprise that this was the first set of stories by Elora Bishop (Sarah Diemer) that I ever actually read, and the same reason I read more of her stuff.

Sappho’s Fables is actually three novella length stories put together, and all of them take classic and well-known fairy tales and give them a non-modern, still fantasy-based spin. Particularly, the stories are: Snow White, Rapunzel, and Hansel and Gretel. You can actually get them each separately, and they are part of a series Elora and her wife Jennifer Diemer are doing to reinvent classic fairy tales for Lesbians (I really, really can’t wait to read the Red Riding Hood one, considering I have a lesbian red riding hood of my own).

So because they are three different stories (and not a mass group of them like an anthology), I’ll assess them separately, and I might even be able to convince my imps to do the same. No promises.

The first story is Seven and is a Snow White story written by Jennifer Diemer. This story was probably the most stellar of the collection and has some of the most unusual and interesting takes on the step mother and seven ‘dwarves’. The story itself actually follows the ‘step mother’, after she was forced to marry a man in another country. She arrives to discover her husband practices alchemy and has some strange rituals like wanting to share an apple with her every night before bed. She also discovers that she now has a step daughter, who happens to practice magic.

The story unfolds into a plot of immortality (a unique take on the Eternal Beauty and Fairest of them all mentality of the original tale), and you discover the man the ‘step mother’ married actually had six other wives before her, and all of them are no in a hut in a special type of forest that sometimes the snowy step daughter visits. You also discover there is a pact between the man and Neve (step daughter) that gets broken because Neve finally had the courage to step into dangerous matters to help Catalina (step mother).

Overall, the unique takes on this continually redone tale and an interesting and appropriate ending for both the romance and overall story, makes this one quite fun and I didn’t even mention the romance that occurred between Neve and Catalina (who are actually right around the same age, as appropriate to the original Snow White). It’s worth the read for anyone interested in fairy tales and it was fascinating and fun to read, I only wish there were more from Jennifer besides the Project Unicorn stuff.

The second story is a tale of Rapunzel, titled Braided, which makes me think of Tangled even though they are completely different stories. I’m still not quite sure if I liked this one or the one from “Kissing the Witch” better, but I think that’s because the good elements they both have are completely different too.

This Rapunzel story follows a girl bound to a tree (Zelda) and the girl who brings her food and keeps Zelda’s long hair clean (Gray), even though she doesn’t actually need to do this. The premise behind it is that Gray is actually supposed to be the one tied to the tree, so she feels guilty and continually thinks of Zelda and how she could free her. In a way she’s kind of consumed with it and Zelda, whom she’s been in love with since she knew her practically. So she actually started even dreaming of freeing Zelda, which is where the connection to the turnip comes in and the tower.

You were probably thinking where the tower comes in, considering Rapunzel is classified as a ‘Maiden in the Tower’ Fairy tale. Well, through some special dream magic from a special world they enter a dream realm and one girl frees the other from a tower before they continue on their adventure to repair the tree and make it so neither of them are bound to anything or anyone but each other.

Overall, I like that Sarah (err Elora) took some different approaches to the rapunzel story, with some dream elements that were exciting and it wasn’t just ‘Lesbian Rapunzel’ which is an important distinction, because if all you do is take an original story already done and change something like the sexuality and sex of some of the characters you still end up getting the same story. It made the story more of its own and less of just a retelling. I absolutely loved the dream portion of this story and it was decently paced with a selection of characters that were fun to learn about and explore what they were going through.

Finally we have the Hansel and Gretel story, known as Crumbs, and I think this one was actually the weakest of the collection, mostly because the unique world created for this story was a bit harder for me to personally get into. That doesn’t stop it from being a decent story with some interesting points though, especially since it still follows the classification decently despite no witches being involved.

The premise behind this one is that there is a terrible zombie-like plague ravaging the world and two parents decide to give up on the world and leave their kids behind in their house, while they take a ride with a bunch of people who are infected with this virus. Meanwhile, the kids decide to leave their safe cottage and take bikes in the woods while being chased by monsters. They manage to make it to the hut that looks like it is made of candy and sweets and are found by another brother and sister.

This is where the story really begins, particularly the dark romance area. Also I have to give a bonus to the story as I was actually expecting the brother and sister in the hut to have been the people who started the virus, or some kind of witches that were eating the people or something, but it went in a completely different direction.

Overall, the romance between the two girls was a bit generic and the brother characters were more just filler characters that served the purpose of plot for trying to break up the two girls and show the sympathy and compassion of the girls, but otherwise there wasn’t much to either (which I’m not gonna blame since this usually happens to women characters more often). It wasn’t a terrible story, but there were a lot of areas that I felt could have been so much more for such an interesting twist to the original. Plus I really like witches, so I was slightly disappointed at not seeing one.

Putting all these tales together, this was still a solid selection of stories and quite fun to read and imagine in particular. If I had to rank them then Seven would be first with Crumbs being at the weakest level. As for my imps? Three of them were all over all these stories, getting lost in them and everything. The fourth loved the first two stories but kept nagging me on the last one. And my fifth imp was stubborn and only stuck around for the first story because her attention span was just gone after that.

So all my imps agree, everyone should at least read Seven, while Braided should be left to those who love fairy tales and dream stories, and finally Crumbs which fits more for the people who like zombie or dark stories with romance elements thrown in.

Crumbs – Three out of Five Imps

Braided – Four out of Five Imps

Seven – Five out of Five Imps

Book Review – TWIXT

Posted on May 30, 2013 by Random Jordan

Disclaimer: As with all my reviews there is the possibility of spoilers, though I work my hardest to avoid them when I can.

No Touching My Hair

I went into TWIXT not knowing a thing about it, other than I assumed it would have a Lesbian protagonist (based on the author). This level of knowledge about the book is actually almost how the protagonists go into the world of Twixt, except they didn’t even have assumptions, because they started with no memories.

TWIXT (I don’t know if all caps is necessary, so it’s happening) is the story of a group of people mysteriously appearing in a city, while being hunted by demonic looking creatures and with no memories of their lives previously. At least until they take a drug that is literally sticking the quills of the feathers from the demonic birds into their bodies.

Much like the characters are, you are thrust into this world instantly with the main character waking up and being attacked by a creature. Well the creature actually attacks the person who woke her up, Charlie, who grabs her and drags her back to the safe house away from the birds.

Over the course of the adventure you discover more and more about each of the main characters, Charlie and Lottie, as well as the world that is TWIXT. I’d rather not give away much of it since I feel this book relies on a lot of thriller type elements to keep pace and talking about those here would ruin that for people who haven’t read it. I will say that some areas were predictable, like who Charlie was; while others were cool realizations like what the demonic creatures were.

I really enjoyed the slow-paced and increasing romance between the two main characters, which you could tell was going to occur from young in the book. But it grows slowly and not from the obvious ‘I hate you’ and ‘Now I love you’ kind of thing too many romances stories do. Also I loved the concept of their name picking and each of them using half of the same name (Charlotte), it was truly a brilliant and uniquely romantic idea.

Most of all though, I have to express how well this story can serve for a trans individual in the romantic department. Around the time when Lottie discovers who she is, she is at first reluctant to tell Charlie (the person interested in her and who she likes), but is eventually glad you does, because Charlie accepts her as she is and even has some thoughts on explaining that Lottie had always been the person she is now, even in the past with some careful observations.

That kind of moment is incredibly effective for someone like my self who has literally dealt with romantic ties right around the times of transitioning and still going through with telling the people you are interested in. I’m not sure the author is even aware of how well this shows the romance side for a trans individual (especially one that isn’t fully transitioned or will always be between genders). It can be a scary experience to reveal yourself to the world, especially when many are met with a lot of fear in return. And this book managed to show both sides of that fear rather well.

That moment is one I can always connect to, and I’m sure there are many non-trans reasons others could connect to that, because having someone accept you for who you are is something everyone would and should want.

With that said, the ending didn’t have quite as much power, in fact it felt rushed and ended with a brisk note. But the more I stewed on the ending, the more I could at least recognize the poetics of that chosen end. I still felt like it left things literally and figuratively hanging in the air, which does frustrate me when a book isn’t marked for a series and is likely to be stand alone. I want to feel like the experience is complete and something felt a little missing.

Overall, the story was unique and interesting, and that’s coming from someone who is normally bored by the average romance story. The thrills can really get you going, and all wrapped into a bit of mystery and romance with a dash of darkness. I definitely suggest this one for anyone interested in romance, and you’ll even enjoy the mystery of a well-crafted (you have no idea how ironic that is) fictional world.

All but one of my imps were all over this story, and the last one was flip-flopping because of the ending, which is why I’m just going to count her, since I don’t let my imps go halfway in anything.

Five out of Five Little Imps

R A N D O M J O R D A N

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The Worlds We Create (Real And Fiction)

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Book Review – Moon Called

Painful Poetry

Book Review – Sappho’s Fables

Book Review – TWIXT

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