Fan Fiction: By Us, For Us
by Kayla Ancrum
As the days blur together and book shipping times get longer, people are beginning to reinvest their time in fan fiction. The art form is hardly without prejudice. Even mentioning it here might elicit some wincing or an eye roll or two. Most of the serious fiction writers I’ve met view it with disdain: a 7/11 lunch of doritos, arizona tea and beef jerky to their white wine and salmon with a salad on the side. Several authors I know personally, who honed their skills in the fan fiction trenches, recall their time there with a blush and embarrassed chuckle. An artform mostly built brick by brick by women, people of color and the LGBTQIAP+ community and we… cringe at it. We drag out the gritty parts for national amusement every few months and have journalists that know very little about the history of certain tropes present it to their audiences unanalyzed. We dig up the awkwardness of someone just starting to explore the art of writing and we hold it up to the light for mockery. We take something made through for love, for free, and we wince at the lack of capital involved as a driving force in its creation. I’m hardly the first person to write about the importance and impact of fan fiction. Or to mention its very interesting marginalized writing demographic. But in this moment of increased consumption, I feel like it is important to reopen some discussions about it.
We are in an interesting age of resurgence of mass produced LGBTQIAP+ media. As you all know, progress isn’t linear and its a bit too early to boast that “Things have permanently changed”, but currently we’re doing a lot better than we were just ten years ago. It’s recent enough for me and many other LGBTQIAP+ YA authors to vividly remember the time before these changes. It has also existed briefly enough that we can dubiously envision a time in our future without it. The maintenance of a place where marginalized communities can create and share artwork is vital, and has always been a part of LGBTQIAP+ culture. Fan fiction, small indie publishers and self publishing communities have been supporting marginalized writing for almost a century and show very little sign of being eroded by the shifting tides of public moral opinion or whims of mass production. Fan fiction in particular, is the cheapest and lowest risk form of community building within this art form. It is not a mistake or coincidence that nearly all of the mainstream published authors who admit to their past participation in fan fiction culture are women, people of color and LGBTQIAP+ people. Groups that have been historically underserved by mainstream media. Fan fiction isn’t a stepping stone to “real writing” or a place where people write weird NSFW. It’s a hurricane shelter: A place we can play in on an average day, and the most important place for our survival when the weather begins to look dangerous.
It’s important to note several things about fan fiction: In spite of its association with NSFW content and uncomfortable NSFW tropes, every major fandom (from film franchises to major network TV, American cartoons to Anime, comic books and full length novels) produces rated T+ fanfiction at a rate of a minimum of 10 to 1 of the production of explicit content. Meaning, the majority of fan fiction is “General” fan fiction without any NSFW content. It kind of makes you wonder a bit why content created by largely marginalized communities is associated with hypersexuality. The second largest outsider prejudice regarding fan fiction is the quality. A majority of the time when fan fiction is undergoing major public scrutiny, the samples picked are chosen from novice writers for the purpose of ridicule. However, all major hosting sites allow basic filtration and rearrangement of works by “kudos” or “comments”. Meaning: fan fiction is one of the only places in which media quality ranking is governed by popularity in an environment without marketing. So, in comparison with mass media (which can elevate product by pure marketing exposure, while some higher quality product languishes for lack of marketing budget) fan fiction can be filtered such that only stories that the target community actually values rise to the top. Which not only makes it easier for talented marginalized writers to get their work in front of other marginalized readers who are hungry for representation. But also creates an environment where marginalized writers, who are only beginning to hone their skills, can track their skill progress in an environment where failure only means low reader-count. Not lost money and fumbled professional opportunities. Which for marginalized people, are often singular or rare.
Another feature that fanfiction archive, ArchiveofourOwn, has that is particularly important is the ability to filter for certain terms. In our world where marginalization intersects, having the ability to find content that includes multiple marginalizations is a revelation that is deeply underappreciated. Being able to find content that centers extremely underserved but common marginalizations such as chronic illness, in a story with LGBTQIAP+ characters, while also being able to remove triggers that make you uncomfortable such as homophobia, coming out, or unrequited love is a revelation. In an environment where mass marketed content is barely scratching the surface of acceptable portrayals of certain topics, having the ability to access content like this easily and for free—created by us and for us–is also a revelation. Now, fan fiction isn’t created in a void. It’s not created without prejudices, or even without demographic slant such as severe preference for M/M content, and content without POC. However, the ability for marginalized people to find content that caters directly to their needs is readily available here in a way that is far beyond any other archive of media that currently exists. So even though the content we create is still subject to our own social prejudices, there is simultaneously more content about marginalized people, and it is easier for marginalized people to find that content. While ALSO protecting themselves from traumatic themes if necessary.
I was asked to write a guest blog post here to share a moment of “Bookish Joy” about books connecting people across space and time. I chose to write about fan fiction because it provides for us when no one else would. It exists beyond the grasp of gatekeepers, persists in spite of mockery and grows in spite of lack of capital. It’s a connection directly between people with nothing in between them but the love of stories. It is a form of art that feels both public and private, a community engaging with shared interest through mutual creation. Fan fiction is not a book, but it doesn’t have to be. It’s a hurricane shelter, and I’m grateful that it’s here.
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K. Ancrum, is the author of the award winning thriller THE WICKER KING, the brilliant lesbian romance THE WEIGHT OF THE STARS and the upcoming Peter Pan thriller DARLING. K. is a Chicago native passionate about diveristy and representation in young adult fiction. She currently writes most of her work in the lush gardens of the Chicago Art Institute.
Celebrating Queer Joy through Stories
by Auriane Desombre
In my sophomore year of college, one of my best friends made me watch Avatar: The Last Airbender. I didn’t think I would like it, but he basically tied me to a chair and forced me to watch, and, a handful of episodes in, I was proved extremely wrong. I loved it. So much so that, when we’d watched all three seasons of Avatar, we kept right on going into Legend of Korra, the sequel show. The last season of Korra was still airing when we started, and I caught up in time to watch the finale live. It was the only episode of the Avatar universe that I watched in real time. It was also the episode that made me finally realize I’m gay.
So that’s how a children’s show airing on Nickelodeon literally changed my life. It wasn’t the only hint, of course, but the gentle joyousness with which Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko portrayed two women holding hands resonated with me in a way that finally made me confront the significance of the way it made me feel. Because of Korra, the moment I came out to myself was a joyous one, a peaceful and happy one, and watching the light-filled last few moments of the show with my best friend in my messy dorm room kitchen is one of my favorite memories.
I knew, when I started drafting what is now my YA debut that stories of queer joy are important. I Think I Love You wasn’t my first manuscript, but it was my first attempt at writing a queer love story. (In the years before Korra, my self-described writer brand was “strong female friendships in which the girls forgo their male romantic interests to focus on their friendship with each other because they are such very good friends.” Like I said, the show’s finale was not the first hint). I wrote between grading papers my first year teaching, and though I flailed my way to the end of a draft that didn’t quite have a plot yet, I found what I wanted to live at the heart of the story: decisively queer happiness and love.
I added a plot in revisions — a film festival over the course of which Emma and Sophia see their artistic rivalry turn into an unexpected romance — because it turns out that a book can’t sustain itself on banter alone (not that this will stop me from trying). As I did, I kept that joy at the forefront of my mind, and it seeped into the story in ways I hadn’t expected when I first started out. The short film Emma works on throughout the book is a queer rom com, and it’s through working on her project that she finds the strength to take the next steps in her journey. As I explored Emma’s relationship with her art, the film competition element of the plot became a celebration of the process of creating joyous queer stories, and their importance to their audiences and creators alike.
Moments of queer joy have defined my debut journey as much as they do the book itself. I’ll never forget the first moment I saw my cover, in which Jeff Östberg brilliantly captures the book’s celebration of queer love. Seeing the visibly and joyously gay design that represents my story has been one of the most moving experiences of this journey so far (I may have cried at my desk at work when I first opened the email).
The most important milestones have been the moments where I found my queer bookish community. From entering Pitch Wars to joining The New School’s Writing for Children and Young Adults 2020 cohort to, more recently, connecting with my fellow 2021 debut group, I have found other queer writers to lean on and cheer on throughout our writing journeys.
After this year’s more remote Pride, when we can’t all come together physically, I’ve been leaning on stories of queer joy more than ever. Though I’m spending pride month in my apartment, I have fresh new copies of some of my most anticipated LGBT reads, and I find myself more grateful than ever for the queer writing community and the joy they’ve created in their stories.
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Auriane is the author of I Think I Love You, and works as a middle school teacher and freelance editor. She holds an MA in English Literature and an MFA in Creative Writing for Children & Young Adults. She lives in Los Angeles with her dog, Sammy, who is a certified bad boy.
Auriane is represented by Penny Moore of Aevitas Creative Management.
We Are Connected
by Adib Khorram
Queer bookish joy. That brief seemed like an easy one at first. There’s lots of moments of queer bookish joy! I love joy! I love books! I’m queer! This was supposed to be easy!
But I forgot. The quarantimes make everything hard. There are days when I feel almost normal. When I can follow a routine that’s not too far removed from what life was like before. And then there are days when I can’t motivate myself to do anything. When I sit on the couch and play too much Animal Crossing (gotta get those bells!).
So, maybe this is harder than I thought. But just because joy is hard to find doesn’t mean it’s not out there. And one of the things that’s been bringing me joy lately is, ironically, something I’m not ready to talk about yet. It’s something I’ve been working on with my twin, Natalie C. Parker.
You may be asking, wait, really? Adib Khorram and Natalie C. Parker are twins?
The answer is, yes. Definitely. No further comment. Don’t worry about it.
So though I can’t talk about what we’re working on, I can talk about some of my most joyful moments in our twinship.
One of those moments is an afternoon we spent at a hotel bar in New Orleans after our flights home got delayed. We sat together talking about how much we both loved Star Trek and how awesome it would be if we could write young adult Star Trek novels. We talked about my excitement for Star Trek: Discovery, which was on hiatus between its first and second seasons at the time. Natalie hadn’t seen it yet, but when I told her there were on-screen, canonical queer characters, she was ecstatic.
To see queer characters in a property you love—what’s more joyful than that?
We didn’t just talk about Star Trek, though. We talked about growing up queer in parts of the US that haven’t always made that an easy thing to be. We talked about navigating publishing publishing as a queer author. At the time, my debut was still two months away, as was Natalie’s third novel, the extremely epic SEAFIRE. I shared my fears and worries; she shared her wisdom and advice and passion for making books for young readers where queer kids get to be the heroes. Get to experience joy. Get to exist.
Since then, I’ve gotten to connect with a more extensive network of queer authors. I’ve made friends that are lifelong. I’ve been lifted up and supported when life has let me down. I’ve given the best advice I can to queer authors who are coming up behind me—often the same advice given to me by Natalie or her wife, my twin-in-law Tessa Gratton. I’ve made brunch and invited Natalie and Tessa over to finally binge-watch Star Trek: Discovery! (And what a joy that was!)
Queer people build communities. They find families. And that holds true in the book world, too. So even when I’m having a bad day, even when the quarantimes seem endless, what brings me joy is this: we are connected. And we’re going to keep going.
And my twin is just a FaceTime away when I need to scream about Star Trek!
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ADIB KHORRAM is the author of DARIUS THE GREAT IS NOT OKAY, which earned the William C. Morris Debut Award, the Asian/Pacific American Award for Young Adult Literature, and a Boston Globe–Horn Book Honor, as well as a multitude of other honors and accolades. His next book, DARIUS THE GREAT DESERVES BETTER, will be released August 25, 2020, and his debut picture book, SEVEN SPECIAL SOMETHINGS: A NOWRUZ STORY will be released spring 2021. When he isn’t writing, you can find him fixing other people’s PowerPoints, learning to do a Lutz jump, practicing his handstands, or steeping a cup of oolong. He lives in Kansas City, Missouri, where people don’t usually talk about themselves in the third person.You can find him on Twitter (@adibkhorram), Instagram (@adibkhorram), or on the web at adibkhorram.com.
Love, Respect, and Celebration: The Legacy of Queer Literature
Caleb Roehrig has written several YA novels starring queer characters, including mystery, heist, and vampire novels. Buy them from one of the author’s favorite indies, Literati Bookstore or The Book Cellar!
by Caleb Roehrig
In 2011, three and a half years before I wrote the manuscript that would become my debut novel, my husband and I put all of our belongings into storage and we moved to Helsinki, Finland. It was a world away from everything we knew, in an unfamiliar country where we didn’t speak the language, and where we had only two friends—a gay couple, maybe fifteen years older than us, who lived a couple hours outside the city.
On a weekend we spent at their home in the Lakes region, one of them handed us a copy of Tales of the City, by Armistead Maupin. He insisted that we had to read it—that every queer person should read it. His words were, “I didn’t know what it meant to be gay until I read this book.”
As statements go, it was pretty grand, and I dismissed it as hyperbole. Like most queer people, my self-discovery had been hard-fought and hard-won—truths sifted from the dross of cruel stereotypes and social stigma, using a decoder I’d had to build myself. I was an adult, an out gay man who’d just gotten married (in Vermont, because my then-home state of California had stripped that right from us in 2008, and the Obergefell decision was still years away.) What could I possibly learn about “being gay” from a book that was written in the seventies?
The answer, as it turned out, was: a lot. A lot.
Tales of the City isn’t a guidebook or a memoir, but something much better: a vibrant, subversive, and joyous Pride parade through San Francisco’s countercultural heyday. (Nota bene: it’s not meant for young readers, and won’t be suitable for everyone. There’s a lot of adult content, and the terminology and conceptualization of various sexual and gender modalities reflect the understanding of the era in which it was created.)
I knew what it meant to carve out an identity in a void of positive representation; I knew what it meant to declare myself a queer person as an act of defiance, and what it meant to slough off shame and self-loathing, to decide I was good enough to love. But something I never knew was how queerness itself could be a source of joy.
Growing up, we weren’t taught a single thing in school about queer people, their contribution to science and culture, their fight for justice. Stonewall, Marsha P. Johnson, Christine Jorgensen, Harvey Milk…they are bedrock elements of LGBTQ+ history, and I only first heard of them in my early twenties. (Well, Milk I had heard about in high school—but only as a footnote to a lesson on the “Twinkie defense” in a class on US law. I’m not sure my teacher even mentioned that he was gay.)
When Maupin first started writing Tales of the City, it was before Milk’s assassination, and before the advent of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Originally published as a serial in the San Francisco Chronicle, it was a story about…well, it’s hard to boil down, because it subverted genres with gleeful abandon, but at its core? It was a saga about found family, as a motley crew of social castaways gradually fell in love—with the city, with themselves, and with each other.
At every turn, the story confronts what it means to be different, and what it means to find joy and beauty in being different. What if, the book asks, instead of letting a bunch of boring, cisgender heterosexuals tell you what society is supposed to be like, you made those decisions for yourself? The characters in Tales don’t just accept their queerness, or live it in defiance—they revel in it. Freed from the shackles of social norms, and unconstrained by self-conscious self-loathing, they live bold, quirky lives that suit them. Relationships are open, sexuality is fluid, gender isn’t fixed…and with every step taken into new territory, the characters are like Alice exploring Wonderland, awed and delighted by the endless possibilities, the endless beauty.
In refusing to acknowledge society’s speed limit, they achieve unimaginable velocity.
I had plenty of queer friends, of course, but never in my life had I seen queerness presented this way: like a glorious party, where it can be everybody’s birthday at the same time, if we just say so. Never had I seen the interconnectedness of queer culture expressed with such fondness, passion, and fitting irreverence. Never had I truly considered that pride didn’t have to be an act of defiance, a boxing match against the shadows, but simply an act of love.
Finally, I understood the meat of my friend’s statement, that he didn’t know what it meant to be gay until he read Tales of the City—because I felt it, too. I’d wasted so much time struggling to act like straight men, trying to prove how heteronormative I could be, in order to gain acceptance and approval. What if, I at last had to ask myself, I just decided to believe that “not fitting in” was the best thing that ever happened to me?
When I think of “queer, bookish joy,” I think about this friend of ours passing down his love of Armistead Maupin to us—and how significant it is for queer people to share art that matters to them, particularly across generational lines. So much of our history has been lost, because the people documenting the past have ignored us; so much of our joy has been redacted, omitted, or transmuted into pain for the sake of making our existence easier to understand in the context of a society that treats being different as automatically suspicious and not entirely acceptable.
As a writer of books for young readers, I’m in a position to share my knowledge and experience with a new generation; I have the opportunity to take all the lessons I’ve learned—the ones that were hard-fought, and the ones that were gifted to me—and pass them along to today’s queer youth. It is my immense privilege to pay it forward, to hand over the torch of love, respect, and celebration, so someone else can carry it.
I can’t think of a more meaningful legacy than that.
—
Caleb Roehrig grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and after living in Chicago, Los Angeles, Helsinki, and Los Angeles (again,) he has returned to Chicago. In the name of earning a paycheck, he has: hung around a frozen cornfield in his underwear, partied with an actual rock-star, chatted with a scandal-plagued politician, and been menaced by a disgruntled ostrich.
We Can Be Heroes
The Summer of Everything is out, Sep. 8th!
This Summer, YA Pride has been running a pre-order campaign for three upcoming books by queer Black authors. The Summer of Everything is one of those books! We’re at 11 pre-orders for it now, and would love to get to 25– just 14 away!
If you pre-order the book and tweet or email us proof of purchase (contact@yapride.org), we will add it to the count!
by Julian Winters
Growing up, I struggled with reading. I simply couldn’t get into the books assigned to me in class and rarely read anything outside of what was required to pass a class. The main reason I found it difficult to immerse myself in any book is I couldn’t find any characters that represented me: a geeky, Black, gay kid.
Let me rephrase that: I did find characters that represented me, it’s just that their storylines always ended in three ways: (A) the character was a cut-and-paste stereotype that only existed in the background of the main character’s journey; (B) the character suffered some form of trauma that again only furthered the main character’s journey; (C) the character died. If I was lucky, I’d get all three in one book!
Where was the joy? Where were the happy endings for these characters?
It wasn’t until I was older that this narrative began to change. That’s okay. I survived high school. And all those books I read fueled my fire to write my own stories; to provide my own characters with that happy ending they deserved. But the teen-Julian living inside of me still craved the representation he was denied, so, in my late-twenties, I began a quest to read more current young adult novels.
Openly Straight by Bill Konigsberg (Arthur A. Levine, 2013)
Enter Bill Konigsberg.
It was 2015, my brain was slowly stringing together ideas for my first YA novel, and I’d just devoured Benjamin Alire Sáenz’s masterful Aristotle and Dante Discovers the Secrets of the Universe. While wiping away those ugly tears the last half of that book provided, I browsed through the “If you liked this book, you might also like…” section of my Kindle, as one does at 2 AM. I stumbled upon Konigsberg’s Openly Straight, read the synopsis, and couldn’t believe it.
A whole book about a teen, who’s been openly out since the 8th grade, now trying to live a “normal” life in a new city, a new school where he’s not only known by one label: The Gay Kid.
As someone who came out to his friend group in an awkward, clumsy way, I related hardcore to the main character, Rafe. Everyone in my life kind of shrugged and accepted my sexuality. I know I was fortunate, but I was also given a new label: “The Gay Friend.” It wasn’t in a malicious thing, at least not to my friends, but it eliminated some of the other parts I loved about myself. Instead of being just the Funny Friend or the One Who Knows the Most Random Movie/TV Trivia Facts, I got all the questions related to being a stereotypical gay person.
I had become that character in all the books I hated growing up.
I dove into Openly Straight and refused to come up for air.
It was hilarious. It was heartfelt. Rafe’s journey was so authentic and relevant and hopeful, even when the book ended in a way I didn’t expect it to. I instantly re-read it. And then, in 2016, Konigsberg did it again with Honestly Ben, a book that I stayed up until 4 AM to read and cry over and feel as if teen-Julian had been vindicated.
And it felt so good to read these stories from an author who is a member of the LGBTQIA+ community. Someone who knew what it meant to be queer—the struggles along with the joys and pride.
I couldn’t stop shouting about how these books made me feel on social media. To my utter joy, there were hundreds of other people who felt the same. Readers, my age and younger, who felt seen between those pages.
In 2019, Bill Konigsberg gave the world The Music of What Happens, another book with queer main characters who had happy moments and struggles that didn’t end in death, that I felt in deep my bones. 2019 was also the year I attended my second YALLWEST in Santa Monica, California, as a published author. It was less than six months before my next YA novel, How to Be Remy Cameron, was to be released. I’d be lying if I said Imposter Syndrome had taken over my world.
My second book is all about labels and how they affect us. The main character is geeky, Black, and gay. To be honest, growing up without characters like Remy, without positive representation, made me second-, third-, and fourth guess whether I could tell this story. Whether the world even wanted Remy’s story.
Once again, enter Bill Konigsberg, who was also attending YALLWEST that year.
As a bookish nerd—and maybe a bit of an excited fan—I knew Bill would be there. I’d packed my copy of The Music of What Happens. I was armed with questions. I was ready to geek out at his signing event.
That is, until I got into line and proceeded to tremble nervously while waiting my turn to meet him.
In true Fanboy Julian Winters form, I stumbled while talking to him. I smiled way too hard. I got emotional. I thanked him repeatedly for the books he’d written. For two minutes, I couldn’t shut up.
But guess what? That didn’t matter.
Bill recognized me. He knew of my first book, Running with Lions. After signing The Music of What Happens, he asked if I could grab a copy of my book (because he couldn’t leave from his signing table) so I could sign it for him. Once again, I couldn’t believe it. I also couldn’t run fast enough back to my corner of the festival to grab a copy of Lions and run back to the autograph zone.
I signed a copy of a book that I wrote for Bill Konigsberg. He asked to take a selfie with me. He gave me a hug.
The world gives us a million and one reasons why not to meet your heroes. It tarnishes the fantasy! They’re never like we expect them to be! You shouldn’t have heroes! They’re just people!
Okay, that last part is very accurate. They’re human. But, sometimes, your heroes are the ones that remind you that you’re a hero too. Maybe you haven’t accomplished as much as they have, but that doesn’t mean you’re any less of an inspiration for the next person.
Bill posted on social media about meeting me.
Before I left from his table, he told me to e-mail him. He wanted to blurb my second book when it was ready. He thanked me for writing my stories just as I’d thanked him.
For the rest of the day, I was walking on clouds.
I didn’t just meet an author that day. I met someone who’s continuously fought for books and representation for LGBTQIA+ teens. Someone who has openly fought against homophobia online and during events. Someone who offers mentorships to upcoming LGBTQIA+ authors wanting to tell their stories. Someone who has written countless books that queer readers, young and old, not only relate to, but have needed for too long.
Someone who knows how important it is to be proud of who you are.
And guess what? He loved my second book. He helped me find the confidence I needed to know I could definitely tell Remy’s story… and the world would want to read it.
Sometimes, it truly is wonderful to meet your heroes. I did. As I wrote this, I was overcome with that queer joy I thought I’d lost somewhere this year.
I’d missed it.
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Julian Winters is a best-selling author of young adult novels Running With Lions and How to Be Remy Cameron (Duet Books). Running With Lions is the recipient of an IBPA Benjamin Franklin Gold Award. How to Be Remy Cameron received a starred review from School Library Journal and was named a Junior Library Guild selection. Julian currently lives outside of Atlanta where he can be found reading, being a self-proclaimed comic book geek, or watching the only two sports he can follow—volleyball and soccer. His novel, The Summer of Everything, will be released in August 2020.