Our updated Tumblr URL name reflect the steps we’re taking toward our official name change on July 1, 2018. We will also be releasing a new mission statement, and transitioning to our new website URL. Here’s a snippet of what one of our moderators and community members, Court Alison, has to say:
“…As a person who is both non binary and autistic, I am really excited about this change. It re-affirms our commitment to the work we do and the community we serve. I didn’t have the names to put to my feelings and experiences when I was growing up. It was really challenging not knowing what made me, me.
As a young adult, with relief and pride I realized that I am autistic. Soon after, I learned what it means to be non binary. That happily fit perfectly too. It is my personal hope that the name change will ensure autistic non binary and transgender women of all ages will come to us for support and resources.
Not only does our name change express the ongoing inclusive nature of our work, but also that of the members of the community we serve. The name change is demonstrative of our commitment to inclusivity. This announcement is the first in the steps we are taking towards our legal name change.”
I despise doing posts where I ask for help, but here we are.
About two years ago I started a new creator owned project. It began as a spin-off of Princeless, but the reality is this – Raven The Pirate Princess is its own thing altogether. I knew this from the first issue and if you’ve been reading, so have you.
Sure, the first few issues of Raven: Pirate Princess had that heroic lady feminist banter for which Princeless has become known both among its fans and detractors. I mean, Raven had this scene:
and issue 1 had this scene:
But perhaps much more importantly, the first issue of Raven had this:
but that wasn’t where that ended. This is a book about a community of diverse queer women actively claiming their place in the world and taking what’s theirs. It’s about Raven, who is desperately in love with her childhood best friend Ximena
It’s about Ximena, a girl who was held captive for years by a pirate king who pretended to be her liberator. Who fell in love with the pirate’s daughter, only to be left behind by that father when she outlived her value.
About Sunshine, the thief that chose the wrong target and ended up falling in love with a woman already hopelessly in love with somebody else.
It’s about Katie, the bisexual second in command who’s motivated by honor…and occasionally beating the snot out of a dude or two
Oh and in case I forgot to mention, Katie is also incredibly muscular:
And Jayla, the asexual science genius who’s tired of being treated like a little sister
and Cid, the deaf engineer who quietly keeps the ship running
and of course, these two:
The socially awkward poet and the angry sword fighter who couldn’t stand her who have somehow become these two:
But here’s the thing: this comic is failing. It has a very dedicated and exuberant but at this point SMALL fanbase. Today I had a hard conversation with Action Lab about the reality of the numbers on this book versus what it costs to produce this book and, suffice it to say, Action Lab isn’t ready to cancel the book, but they aren’t ready to greenlight year 3 either. After Year 2 #13, Raven is set to go on the shelf until numbers can support continuing it.
This is where I need your help
If you care about this book full of queer pirate ladies and you want it to continue, we need to find a way to spread the word about it. We don’t need to sell single issues (it would be nice) but ultimately we need the trades sales that back up the continuation of this big YA Pirate/Revenge/Adventure/Romance thing.
In fact, if you’ve already purchased volumes 1-4, volume 5 is available for preorder there right now!
Maybe you’ve bought all the issues already. Thank you! If you still want to support Raven, you can review the books on Amazon or other retailers, you can share, reblog or retweet this post. You can tell a friend about the book!
If you have a comics review site or, say, a blog where you talk about LGBT media, contact me for review links or interviews. Please, help us save our ship.
This is possibly one of the best comic series I have ever had the privilege to read.
If you haven’t, you should go pick it up.
If you have read it, please tell ALL your friends and leave some reviews.
And I’m not just saying all of this because I want Katie to benchpress me.
Raven the Pirate Princess is AMAZING.
Seriously. This is one of my must-read comics for queer ladies. I’ve already done a powerpoint thingy about how much I love it here, but if you’re not getting it, you need to be. It is everything you ever wanted and more. Seriously I’m calling my local comic shop today because I didn’t realize the 4th volume with out and I need it in my life ASAP.
[…] he and she were creek beds, quiet when they were full and quiet
when they were dry. but when they were half-full, wearing a coat of
shallow water, the current bumped over the rocks and valleys in the
creek beds, wearing down the earth. giving someone else a little of who
they were hurt more than giving up none or all of it.
The transwoman they had on the show was also an AIDS activist, and had AIDS herself… *and* in a time when there was MUCH greater social stigma around the disease. Lucy had her on, and kissed her on screen…during a time when people were still afraid of getting AIDS from kissing or from toilet seats.
They also had Alexis Arquette as a character on the show in a later season.
I love all the reblog facts!!!
The episode is 2×11, “Here She Comes Miss Amphipolis,” and the actress was Karen Dior.
It’s HEEEEEERE! My new book is live. It’s a Regency romance! With lesbians! Perfect for light weekend reading!
I am DOPILY EXCITED to share this with you. It’s a long time coming. Also, I love the cover.
This is the book I reblogged about last week that people were interested in – the ebook is now out! (The print book takes longer.)
The Covert Captain
Nathaniel Fleming, veteran of Waterloo, falls in love with his Major’s spinster sister, Harriet. But Nathaniel is not what he seems, and before the wedding, the truth will out…
Eleanor Charlotte Fleming, forgotten daughter of a minor baronet, stakes her life on a deception and makes her name—if not her fortune—on the battlefield. Her war at an end, she returns to England as Captain Nathaniel Fleming and wants nothing more than peace, quiet, and the company of horses. Instead, Captain Fleming meets Harriet. Harriet has averted the calamity of matrimony for a decade, cares little for the cut of her gowns, and is really rather clever. Falling in love is not a turn of the cards either of them expected. Harriet accepts Captain Fleming, but will she accept Eleanor? Along the way, there are ballrooms, stillrooms, mollyhouses, society intrigue, and sundering circumstance.
I haven’t read it in final form yet (I’m off to buy it in a moment) but I got to read some of the initial draft a while ago, and I really enjoyed it. I can safely vouch for the quality of its prose! 🙂
So, pretty much, don’t read this? I started out reading it and thought, wow, this has not aged well, and then I read the verso, which said the date of publication was… four years ago. Which was pretty much when my internal voice went, ‘Oh… no. This is going to get worse, isn’t it?’. Spolier: it did.
Did not finish. Really exclusionary of pretty much anyone but cis gay males, pretty much every quote on bisexuality is about not liking labels or actually identifying as something OTHER than bi, either because of being being mislabeled or discriminated against (page 27-28), gender essentialist ‘lesbians like vaginas’ ‘gay men like… big hairy men with big willies’ ‘penis? check! …gay men are.. male’(page 51), ‘lesbians like vaginas’ (page 67), transphobic (so many pages), ‘intersex is not so much an identity, as you can’t really choose it’ (page 37), conflates homophobia and transphobia as basically the same thing without mentioning the transphobia rampant in the broader queer community (pages 72-92). Noped out after genuine anti-semitism on page 111 ‘Not being funny, but these guys (Jewish people) kinda started it’ (about religious homophobia).
To eliminate any confusion bout the author’s name, the author came out as transgender after publication, so the first name on the cover is one that shares the initial J with the author’s preferred name, Juno. My reaction to discovering this development was thinking that I really hope Juno works through the utterly pervasive transphobia that is inescapable in this work. Carrying that is toxic. But the fact that the author has come out as transgender doesn’t make this work any less transphobic. In fact, it’s worse, because it makes it harder to argue the damage this book can do when it’s coming from a now-out transgender person, something I will be doing with my library system shortly.
In summary – this book would have been revolutionary ten or fifteen years ago, because nothing like this existed. It still would have been toxic. Time and correct terminology has moved on, but at its core, this would have always been a work that placed more emphasis on trying to be crude and cool to appeal to young people, which is a tragic mistake. Anything that tries this hard is never going to be cool in the eyes of a teenager. Add to that the spadefuls of misinformation, glossing over of history and hate crimes, erasure, exclusion, and casual super gross misogyny for the sake of jokes (‘Lesbians like vaginas. They don’t even want blokes watching. I KNOW, how INCONSIDERATE.’ – page 67), and this is a book that doesn’t even come close to matching the promise of its beautiful, bold, inclusive, balanced cover.
Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda Special Edition Hardcover. All covered in clear plastic and ready for reading. Now I just need The Upside of Unrequited and Leah on the Offbeat!
knitting in the dark 