Review: Gracefully Grayson by Ami Polonsky
Happy Release day to Ami Polonksy! Gracefully Grayson, a middle-grade book about a transgender girl is out on shelves today. Find it in a local bookstore (this may entail badgering them to order it) or buy it online! Make sure to give the author a follow on Twitter as well, and wish her a happy release day!
by Nadia
“I feel like I’m covered in a layer of ice that is starting to melt. I can practically feel it loosening around me.”
GRACEFULLY GRAYSON is a story about a transgender girl. Grayson Sender is a 12-year-old, a sixth grader, and a girl that everyone else perceives as a boy. She lost her parents at a young age, and she’s currently living with her aunt, uncle, and two cousins. When a new student arrives in Grayson’s class this sets in motion a series of changes in our protagonist that make her question herself and the life around her….
Gracefully Grayson by Amy Polonsky (Disney Hyperion, 2014) Out in stores now!
When I think about describing GRACEFULLY GRAYSON, a few words come to mind:
QUIET: It’s a “quiet” book. You could argue that not much happens, but I feel like that’s perfect in this case. We spend a great deal of time in Grayson’s head, and you feel like you are right there with her. You can’t help but care and cheer for her all the way through.
AWAKENING: If I could rename this book I’d call it Grayson’s Awakening. It might be super cheesy, but I think the word “awakening” perfectly captures the essence of the book. We have the story of a girl who’s a ghost (has been for a while), and she’s finally becoming more apparent to others now, her image less dim, more real.
COMING OF AGE: I don’t want to say this actually is a coming-of-age story—after all, the age of the protagonist does not lend itself to the definition—but it feels like one. From the very beginning you learn that Grayson has been shut down for a while now, and in the course of the book we follow Grayson along while she finds the courage to finally be the person she has always known she is. So the novel deals with her family and school life (they are part of her after all), but it’s about her opening up slowly to the world around her and learning to be true to herself once again.
“It’s hard to breathe and my heart is thumping, and, all of a sudden, I’m worried that it might explode from all these years of wishing. I’m worried that it might explode into a million tiny pieces, and then I’ll be gone—invisible again.”
I like that the book is about Grayson becoming more comfortable with who she is, and that we get a few glimpses of what’s to come, that moment when you finally know who you are and you start trying to figure out how to present yourself to the world around you. For example, toward the end Grayson starts wondering which bathroom she should use. And while the subject of her preferred pronouns is not addressed, it feels like if the book had kept going it would have been talked about. So by the end of the book Grayson is starting to live like herself, and the author leaves the door open for what’s to come (how amazing would it be to have a series about Grayson growing up?!).
Some other aspects I love about the book: what we find out about Grayson’s parents before they died and how this influences her decisions, the role theater/drama has, the friends Grayson makes, and the metaphors of light/dark the author uses (which I’m not telling you about so you can experience them when you read it, ha).
Now, obviously not everything is perfect, and I do have a few critiques:
Some secondary characters weren’t developed enough. *POSSIBLE SPOILERS* For example, you have Grayson’s transphobic aunt, but the story never gets past her offensive comments and actions. Nor is there a real resolution with the conflicts Grayson has with her cousin Jack. I really wish there had been more than that for us to read about. *POSSIBLE SPOILERS*
I also thought the ending, although it was obviously left open, was lacking and felt a bit abrupt. I was hoping the book would end with a BANG, but it ended quietly. And in a way it makes sense because if it had ended with everything solved, it would have been unrealistic and I would have felt cheated because after all life is not wrapped up in a neat little bow. So in a way it fits because Grayson is still growing up, and she has a long way to go; just like everyone else around her, Grayson is learning to live…so yeah, it couldn’t have ended with everything tied. But I still think it wrapped up too quickly. *SPOILERS* I wanted more of a conclusion with Aunt Sally and Jack, and a “longer” goodbye with Grayson’s teacher. All of a sudden the play happened, and there was the end.*SPOILERS*
All in all, GRACEFULLY GRAYSON is an emotional book that’s completely worth the read. You get to follow Grayson Sender while she climbs those little steps to the stairs of her true self. Her journey rings authentic, and while at times it feels sad and lonely, Polonsky manages to give Grayson and the reader a balance with little dashes of hope shining through.
“Well, I think to be brave, you have to be scared at the same time. To be brave means there’s something important you have to do and you’re scared, but you do it anyway.”
GRACEFULLY GRAYSON dips its toes into the pool of trans lit for kids, but beware, that doesn’t make it any less important or powerful. I’m glad it exists, and I’m happy of the message it sends to queer kids out there, that no matter what happens they are wonderful and absolutely deserving of happiness and of the freedom of being their true selves; cliché or not, the world sure needs it and I hope there’s more like it to come.
Thank you Ami Polonsky for introducing us to the lovely Grayson Sender and her story.
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Nadia spends most of her day tweeting and daydreaming. Lover of books, comics, dogs and chinese food. Find her on twitter @heartless_tree.
Liraz’s Asexual Armor: Second-Guessing AceAro Representation in YA
Asexual Awareness Week has ended, but Aromantic Awareness Week has just begun! We were not aware of it until a couple days ago so do not have a separate series (though many of the posts from last week touch on it). But we’re thrilled to present this fabulous guest post from Sarah (who is also helping to run LauraLamFans)! Minor spoilers for Dreams of Gods and Monsters by Laini Taylor.
by Sarah
When I re-immersed myself in reading YA books freshman year of college, I knew I was asexual, but I was still content to turn to popular romance-heavy young adult books purely for escapism. I wasn’t actively looking for queer representation, yet when I picked up the Daughter of Smoke and Bone books, by Laini Taylor, I thought I had found representation in an unexpected place.
In the second book, Days of Blood and Starlight, a side character, Liraz was described as asexual. This was very exciting for me; I had never seen my sexuality in a book before. I had never really seen the term “asexual” used in this way outside of online fandom and queer communities. From that point forward in the book, I paid extra attention to Liraz and her story.
Originally just a side character, Liraz became a significant player in the books, and in my heart. She was a complex character – a fierce warrior, yet brittle and uncertain beneath a mask of icy ferocity. She cared incredibly deeply for her two brothers. Liraz was already so many things I admire in a character that being asexual was practically an added bonus.
In the book, the only times Liraz refers to her own sexuality is to acknowledge its absence, and her siblings agree that the idea of her being sexual is unimaginable. Though both of them have had sexual relationships, Liraz has never expressed any desire to explore that with anyone. Liraz harbors a great fear of intimacy, and an acute protectiveness towards fellow female soldiers who are being forced to sleep with the men in power.
Not only did Liraz read as asexual, she also seemed decidedly aromatic. Numerous times, she expresses incomprehension of the concept or romantic love. She feared that her inability to relate to these feelings would leave her all alone; that her brothers would value their romantic partners over their love for her and leave her behind. In a story so full of epic and fast-moving romances, a character who didn’t want or need to be in a romantic relationship was refreshing. When I finished reading Days of Blood and Starlight, I praised Laini Taylor, expressing my excitement that – whether it was intentional or not – she had written an incredible asexual and aromantic character.
When the third and final book, Dreams of Gods and Monsters, was released, I devoured it immediately. I loved Liraz’s character development throughout the final book, the way she overcame her grief and pain to grow into a powerful force for of truth and justice. She learned to open her heart to laughter and friendship and mercy; to embrace her own vulnerabilities. I wasn’t so sure I loved the way she had been written into a romantic relationship with another character, Ziri.
The text maintained that Liraz had never previously looked at a man or a woman in “that way,” that the very thought of a relationship like that terrified her. Yet, after the exchange of only a few conversations and meaningful glances with Ziri, she is curious to find herself relating to the longing and fear she had witnessed in her brothers relationships.
Although I loved Ziri independently as a character, I didn’t like the idea that Liraz should fall in love with him just because he saved her life. Why should romance magically heal her in ways that other relationships couldn’t? I was so incredibly disappointed that this character ended up in a romantic relationship after never expressing any romantic inclinations, and being so strongly opposed to the idea.
Though I was bitter at first, the situation became an opportunity for me to re-evaluate the subtleties of what it means for someone to be asexual and what it means to be aromantic. Asexual people and aromantic people can still date; many still want to do sexual and romantic things. Many people live in the gray areas, experiencing romantic or sexual attraction occasionally or only in certain situations. Sexuality is fluid and people’s romantic and sexual orientations can change over time.
Rereading the book, I’ve found that Liraz and Ziri never truly express anything sexual. Beyond a bit of blushing and admiring each other’s appearances, there is some hand-holding, but no kissing. I’ve come to accept Liraz as asexual, sex-repulsed, and gray-romantic, and prefer to think of her relationship with Ziri as purely non-sexual and queerplatonic.
Additionally, this situation with Liraz helped me to recognize and articulate some of the overarching issues with finding asexual characters in literature. It’s hard enough to recognize, define, and understand asexuality within one’s own life. In the asexual community, we often struggle to define what sexual attraction even means – what it looks and feels like – because we don’t experience it ourselves.
Applying this frame of reference to fictional characters is its own challenge. Authors don’t distinguish between romantic, sexual, and other types of attraction the way people on the asexual spectrum have learned to. When the word “asexual” is used in a book – like in the case of Liraz – I’m not sure if the author is really referring to the orientation, or if they are simply using it as a convenient throwaway adjective. Additionally, many YA books are indirect in the way they way they talk about sex and sexuality, in order to keep the material “appropriate” for young adults.
Although having these dialogues about potentially asexual characters can be exciting and constructive, it would be so much better to have actual explicit representation. And though the gray/demi areas of asexuality are important – and true to real people’s life experiences – I’d love to see more characters who remain asexual and/or romantic throughout the entire story. I want to see the entire asexual spectrum represented in books!
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Sarah is asexual and queer. A college student living in Oregon, she studies graphic design and women, gender, & sexuality studies. She spends her not-so-free time reading YA books and watching too much tv. Visit her personal blog at idenythisreality.tumblr.com, especially if you want to jam about queer headcanons and fan creativity.
Straight is Not My Default: Understanding Katniss Everdeen as an Ace Aro
For Asexual Awareness Week we reached out to bloggers who identify somewhere on the asexual spectrum to write posts related to asexuality and YA. We’re happy to bring you the third post in this series! Check back every day this week for more posts from other great guest bloggers.
by Nakia
I was seventeen when I read Mockingjay.
I’d read the first two books in The Hunger Games series less than a year earlier, a recommendation from my contemporary literature teacher who convinced me that it was worth my time if only because the protagonist was a woman of color. All the English teachers I had in high school knew that I craved young adult books with diverse characters and complex stories, and The Hunger Games met my interests perfectly. I bought the entire series the day Mockingjay came out and read it from start to finish during orientation week for my first year of college.
Of the new friends I made during that first week, I was the only person who had read the series and hadn’t hated the last book. I’d had issues that I wasn’t quite able to explain, but none of them had to do with the major complaints that I heard over which characters were killed and how they died, over the terrible pacing in the last few chapters, over the fact that Katniss ended up with Peeta. I had never shipped Katniss with Gale so the fact she and Peeta got married wasn’t upsetting to me. What was upsetting was the fact that she and Peeta had children.
From the first chapter of The Hunger Games, Katniss talks about the fact that she didn’t want children. It’s repeated multiple times in each book and she never shows any doubt towards her lack of desire to have kids, even if she lived in a world where having kids was a safe thing to do. And yet, fifteen years after the Games are over she agrees to have children for Peeta’s sake. It made me uncomfortable because while part of me thought that it was just her way of showing how much she loved him, couldn’t he have shown her how much he loved her by not begging her to have kids?
At this point I still wanted children, but I understood a lot of the reasons people had for not having kids. In time I understood that Katniss having children played into heteronormativity, which insists that being a cisgender, heteromantic and heterosexual individual who complies with all societally determined gender roles is the correct way to be. Everything else is wrong. Because she was physically able to bear children she was expected to, and that seemed – and is – completely unfair.
I reread The Hunger Games series at age nineteen in anticipation for the first movie.
During my reread I noticed that Katniss doesn’t express the standard feelings of confusion that most young adult heroines feel in regards to her ‘romantic’ interests in the books. In the vast majority of young adult fiction that I’d read that involved love triangles, the character in the middle has feelings for both potential partners and is stuck figuring who they care about more. And while there is a fair amount of trying to understand their feelings for the other partners, there’s never anything to indicate that the character feeling desire is unexpected or unusual for them.
It wasn’t something I’d noticed or thought very much about during my initial reading because I felt that she had more important issues on hand than what her feelings for Gale and Peeta were. However, I also hadn’t thought about how uncommon it is to see a fictional character without sexual or romantic feelings. Even with the young adult stories I’d read previously in the back of my mind, it didn’t completely hit me the first time around that one of the reasons I related to Katniss so well was because she wasn’t preoccupied with those relationship desires that were so frequently assumed to exist in everyone. At no point in time did Katniss see herself as weird for her lack of desire – it was simply a fact of her life that other people felt things she didn’t feel and she’s okay with that. The confusion that Katniss feels in connection to relationships is always in regards to the development of unusual feelings instead of in her lack of them, and in navigating how to pretend to be someone she’s not.
For all non-straight orientations, the redefining of personal relationships against what heteronormativity insists relationships should be is important in the journey to self-acceptance. People who identify as both heterosexual and heteromantic don’t have to worry about the societal expectations for their relationships in the way that individuals of all other orientations do, and while that’s sometimes more obvious for people who are attracted to the “incorrect” gender or genders, people who do not experience attraction at all do have to figure out what types of relationships are of greatest priority to them. For Katniss, it’s always her relationship with Prim, who was referenced in the first book as “the only person in the world I’m certain I love.” This familial bond is always more important to her than potential romantic or sexual bonds. Even if that relationship is ignored, Katniss prioritized friendship over the relationships Gale and Peeta wanted to have with her. A lack of desire for those types of relationships caused by a general lack of attraction is an issue that asexual and aromantic people frequently run into, so learning to understand what’s personally important in relationships and what types of relationships are wanted is extremely important.
At age twenty-one, I found my sexual orientation shifting.
I’d gone several years feeling secure in my identity as a panromantic demisexual, but it was becoming clearer and clearer to me that I no longer experienced romantic attraction and that I doubted I’d ever feel sexual attraction again. Eventually I found new words that fit me, but not after a cycle of questioning and confusion, especially since the change in my orientation was directly related to trauma. And it was hard to accept that who I am now is not exactly who I was before, even though who I was before has a great impact on my identity now. But my orientation now is valid, just like the orientation I had two years ago was valid then.
Katniss went the opposite route in regards to an orientation change – but that doesn’t negate or erase her status as a character in the aromantic and asexual spectrums. There are three points in the books where Katniss feels anything that can be understood as sexual desire in the series: during one kiss in the cave in book one, during a kiss on the beach in book two, and after the war is over and she’s started recovering in book three. As her feelings develop for both Peeta and Gale through the series, it’s still with the knowledge that romantic feelings are not the norm for her. This indicates her presence on the greyer areas of the asexual and aromantic spectrums but that doesn’t suddenly mean she’s alloromantic and allosexual.
Representation and diversity in young adult literature is necessary. I started actively searching for books with LGBTQIA+ characters when I first started questioning my orientation and as I went from struggling to acceptance, the types of books I needed shifted. I went from reading books solely about white gay men to reading every book with an LGBTQIA+ person of color I could find. Finding people with similar experiences and backgrounds is crucial in helping people feel like they belong, especially when they’re part of marginalized groups. At this point I haven’t read other books with asexual or aromantic characters yet, but I know as we’re recognized more and more by the LGBTQIA+ community there will be more works published and more things to choose from. Having Katniss Everdeen represent my communities is an important start and while many people might argue that she doesn’t count as canon representation because her orientations weren’t explicitly defined in the books, she’s consistently helped me feel not so abnormal.
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Nakiya is a black, queer, greyromantic and asexual college student who currently lives in the Pacific Northwest. When she’s avoiding grad school preparation she can be found on Tumblr at lemonyandbeatrice where she blogs about diversity in media, asexuality, trauma, and mental illness. Oh, and lots of Marvel.
Reading Without Role Models: Asexual Awareness Week Day #3
For Asexual Awareness Week we reached out to bloggers who identify somewhere on the asexual spectrum to write posts related to asexuality and YA. We’re happy to bring you the third post in this series! Check back every day this week for more posts from other great guest bloggers.
by Em Murphy
When I realized I was asexual, everything made a lot more sense. I was in my last year of college and when I finally acknowledged that I wasn’t attracted to anyone, it made me a lot more comfortable with myself and with how I interacted with other people. It helped me realize how my expectations regarding my relationships with other people didn’t always match what was actually happening, or what I had hoped would be happening.
Growing up, I read constantly. I read all kinds of books, but my favorites focused on interpersonal interaction and relationships. Sometimes I read books about characters older than me, and I took a lot of my social cues and expectations about what was to come from them. After all, if it was in a book, it must be true, or at least close enough, and I could expect that similar events might happen to me. A lot of the young adult books I was reading involved romantic plot lines, often a slow burn over the course of the novel ending with some sort of denouement at the end, like a dramatic kiss or lots of making out or more.
As much as I liked the slow burn, the building attraction, and the intensity of feelings, I could never really get on board with the making out at the end. When anything beyond kissing happened, on- or off-screen, I lost interest and felt detached from the story. I didn’t know why I felt that way, why I could be so invested and feel the same tingly feelings in my stomach when the protagonist of a book talked about the object of their affection, but suddenly lose interest when anything went beyond emotional attraction. The butterflies of early attraction, of interest before Anything Happened were very familiar to me, but the other feelings? The pants-feelings about other people? I couldn’t understand them at all, but I thought I should.
This feeling carried over into my real-life interactions, when I felt very emotionally attached to and invested in people, but completely disinterested sexually. I had crushes on people, I wanted to spend all my time with them, I wanted to hang out and hold hands and giggle with them. I didn’t mind kissing, sometimes, because it was kind of like holding hands and giggling, sometimes, but I felt sick to my stomach when it went beyond that. I couldn’t explain why, though, because I thought I was supposed to feel a certain way and I didn’t. Normal people wanted to do more than kissing, and I didn’t. For a while I wrote it off as being immature, or not ready for things, or just assumed that I was dating jerks and that I wasn’t attracted to them because of that.
When I somehow came across asexuality online, though, everything made sense. I understood why I felt some—but definitely not all—of the butterflies I had been reading about. All of the books I had read growing up, all of the models on the library shelf in front of me, involved straight couples with very heterosexual interests and behaviors, and I couldn’t relate to it all. But it turned out that not everyone feels that way! That not everyone experiences sexual attraction! That I wasn’t the only person who felt tingly in the stomach about people and nothing more, and that that was actually how I felt! By the time I realized this about myself—that I am, in fact, asexual—I had gotten pretty far into my own head about what was wrong with me, why I didn’t feel like everyone else. Knowing that other people also didn’t feel sexual attraction changed how I understood myself and let me be more forgiving of myself, especially regarding my interactions with people I was interested in or who were interested in me. I didn’t feel like I was doing everything wrong anymore. It was a relief.
I think that reading about different kinds of attraction could have really made an impact in terms of how I processed my feelings and desires. If I had read books when I was younger that portrayed characters that weren’t sexually attracted to anyone, I might have been more frank with myself about what I felt, I might have been more able to see what was actually going on in my head. If I had read books with asexual characters in them, I would have saved myself a lot of worry and anxiety. If there were more books with asexual characters, maybe more people would know what I mean when I say I’m asexual and wouldn’t think I was just making it up. As it is now, I’m glad that asexual visibility is increasing and that more people know what it is and are writing about it.
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Em Murphy likes mountains, card games, and people not making assumptions about her sexuality. She would love to talk with you more about being ace. You can reach her at esnmurphy@gmail.com.
A Journey of Discovery: Asexuality and Fanfiction
For Asexual Awareness Week we reached out to bloggers who identify somewhere on the asexual spectrum to write posts related to asexuality and YA. We’re happy to bring you the second post in this series! Check back every day this week for more posts from other great guest bloggers. If you missed the first one, here it is!
Warning: This post contains slightly mature content. It may be inappropriate for young audiences.
by Dragon A
I discovered my asexuality through fanfiction. Put like that, it sounds slightly ridiculous. However, if I was not such an avid reader of fanfic I’m pretty sure I would still be completely in the dark about that aspect of myself.
I’ve been unabashedly bisexual since I was fourteen, changed my terminology to pansexual some time later, and became a cheerful adventurer in the world of kink as soon as I was allowed into clubs. I got used to dealing with the bullshit that comes with being in a mixed-orientation-but-outwardly-perceived-as-gay relationship (Can I watch? What will you do if you want children? Who’s the man? Surely if you’re both women and you’re together, then she’s gay not bi? What’s pansexual?).
So, when I first read a well-written Sherlock fanfiction in which Sherlock is asexual and in a functioning relationship with John where they trade experiment time for sex, I couldn’t figure out why it made me feel so strange. I was completely shaken, and ended up snuggling with my partner for hours while trying to verbalise exactly what it was that had thrown me so badly; I couldn’t.
The next day I went back on archiveofourown.org and carried on reading. I added “asexual” to the search tags and suddenly found a variety of fanfiction with asexual characters. The ones that really held my attention were the ones in which the asexual character was in a relationship.
All these little lights were going off in my head and I kept thinking things like: “This can work? Relationships like this can work? Other people feel attraction without the sex bit? Oh shit, is this why my previous relationships fell apart? How do I talk to my partner about this?”
My partner was completely chill. She gave me a slightly disbelieving look and said: “I thought you knew that you went through long phases of asexuality at fairly regular intervals.” I spluttered at her a bit, and managed to calm down.
Thing is, I was terrified. I absolutely hate having unknown bits of my personality leap out at me; it’s something that I sort of expect to happen sometimes, but I was very confident about my sexuality. So this whole thing threw me completely off kilter and I panicked and convinced myself that nothing was ever going to be the same.
Part of what was throwing me for a loop was that I was in a relationship and totally in love with my partner (still am, for the record). I knew this was something I needed to figure out, but I was also scared that it would fuck up our relationship.
As far as I could see there was no roadmap for having a relationship when one of us is always interested in sex and the other one goes through long periods of actual revulsion at the very thought of it. (Although to make things more complicated, it’s the thought of me being involved that makes the revulsion happen. I will happily read porn while in an asexual phase and enjoy it, but no no no to touching! There’s a word I use for this, which is autochorisexualism. Yay words.)
I couldn’t find role models. The problem that I had trying to find mainstream representations of asexuality was that, even when I did find them, the characters were generally portrayed as also being aromantic; obviously there are asexual aromantic people—I’m not one of them. Or, their sexuality was stable and they were asexual 100% of the time; again, I couldn’t relate. I am on the asexual scale, but it’s pretty fluid. Sometimes sex is great (read: fantastic), but often I’d rather have naked cuddles, read together, or get tied up (which for me is an intimate yum thing that does not translate to sex).
So I went back to fanfiction. I also spent a lot of time talking with my partner, but I really needed a frame of reference to bounce myself off before I could have a coherent conversation. Fanfiction gave me this. I have lost track of the times that I have ended up happily sobbing because some wondrous fan wrote a character in which I could recognise myself.
I read enormous amounts of MCU and Sherlock fanfiction; Phil Coulson became one of my favourite characters (alright, he was already a favourite) because people just seemed to be able to write him as asexual in a really sensitive way. Whenever I found a story that I particularly related to, there would be this physical sensation of lightness in my chest because it was such a relief knowing that I wasn’t alone and I wasn’t going through this alone. Reading the comments sections on these stories was pretty enlightening too—I couldn’t have talked openly about my sexuality at the time, because it was too confusing. Talking about the sexuality of characters in stories provided a safe way of discussing a somewhat scary subject.
What is interesting is that, before my fanfiction-spurred revelation, I knew what asexuality was; I had heard of it, I had a distant friend who identified as asexual. I just never thought of applying the term to myself because I could not see how it related to my life.
What I needed was characters I could relate to, who I got to see in action, living their lives and experiencing conflicting emotions and building relationships in a variety of ways. It’s much easier to relate in a profound manner, to feel a sense of recognition, when faced with a complicated and human-seeming character than when faced with a dictionary definition.
There are some really awful representations of asexuality in fanfiction (The “I’m asexual for everyone except you baby” trope is very frustrating); most of it seems to be friendly ignorance rather than anything else. More than half a year after coming across that Sherlock fanfiction, I still mostly feel as if I am stumbling about in the dark and wondering if I’ve left Legos on the floor. My partner is endlessly supportive, and my friends are a bunch of fabulous nerds who have helped me coin the term “Dragon” to describe my sexuality (it’s easier to say than “Panromantic/pansexual with strong asexual tendencies and autochorisexualism, also demisexual/romantic, sapiosexual/romantic, mildly genderqueer with polyamorous tendencies; originally came out as bi”).
It’s because of all this support that I feel able to keep exploring myself, but the place that I’ve found to do that is fanfiction. I would love to see more complicated, real representations of asexuality in mainstream media. I’d love to just pick up a book and feel that thrill of recognition when I meet a character. For the moment, though, whenever I feel wobbly about myself, I run off to the internet to read fanfiction because even if the characters are superheroes or ex-military doctors, they are written in a way that makes me feel reassured and among friends. And that is something that everyone deserves to feel.
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I can’t actually find the fanfiction I read that set everything rolling, but here are links to some of the fics I read while I was desperately searching for a frame of reference: be warned, they contain mature content!
Little and Broken, But Still Good (has an epic poly relationship that includes two asexual characters, two bisexual characters, and one straight one)
all different names for the same thing (asexual Captain America)
The Marvel Fractions (mixed orientation relationship, very interesting to read if you’re figuring out your sexuality, but be warned that there are enormous emotional rollercoasters)
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Dragon A, 23-year-old nerdy nerd. Loves reading and writing, grew up listening to a weird mixture of Nirvana and Ani diFranco. Collected all the Discworld novels as a life goal and is now a little aimless. Lives with two cats, a dog, some chickens, and a luscious partner in a slowly crumbling house. Dragon A has a shared blog here: https://sexualitydragon.wordpress.com/