Queer Fiction - Blog Posts

I read a short horror story collection written by lgbtq+ authors, and by god was most of it shit, but that will not, and cannot stop me from making my dollar do double duty for the pursuit of progress. Buy books by and about trans people! Look into publishing houses which are invested in telling LGBTQ stories, and by god stop buying media that gives money to holocaust deniers.

Despite everything, it's still me.

Hi, I'm sanmeikitten. I'm a former psychology student from Parts Unknown. Eons ago, I fell to earth and landed in someone's backyard where I attempted to establish a base to conquer this desolate planet, but was unfortunately mistaken for a toaster. At some point I became quantum entangled with an angel, collapsed into a tesseract, and now communicate with three-dimensional space through an Owl House fanfic. I write a lot. Most of it is meaningless, but a lot of it will make you cry. Here's my pitch for the fic: This is the ongoing Owl House fanfic that I came out of a 21 year fanfiction retirement to write! Mature rated for an overall serious approach to trauma and mental health, with an emphasis on learning to live with mental health challenges through the support of community and found family. Everybody needs hugs; everybody gets hugs. You don't necessarily have to be familiar with the franchise to read it (I wrote it as if to a brand new audience), but you'll get more references and allusions if you are. And it's incredibly queer. https://archiveofourown.org/works/55091485/

Paul Atreides is canonically nonbinary.

Seriously.

The first time I read Dune I thought-

“Frank Herbert is doing a great job explaining gender variance in science fiction in a time when they did not have the modern vocabulary for gender expression.”

Paul is his father’s son and his mother’s daughter. He’s quite literally bred to have access to knowledge and power only accessible to men or women.

RIP Paul you would have loved ‘I am not a woman, I’m a god’ by Halsey.

YEAHHHHHH HAPPY PRIDE YA'LL!!!!

(currently reading 2 queer graphic novels at once, in the first one, the protag is openly lesbian with a gf and her friend is in a gay relationship, and in the second one there is a gnc protag and a pan or polysexual protag, with an absolutely AMAZING WONDERFUL GREAT transmasc commander/general who binds and is trying to find hormones)

So i'm having a great time.

Happy Pride Month!!!

I cannot say how much i fucking love these books. I read them when I was still pretty clueless about queer things, still thinking i was “straight”, and i found many things fascinating about the worldbuilding and the characters. And now, years later, I’ll be laying in my bed trying to sleep and then suddenly I’m throwing my covers back like “YOU MEAN THAT WAS T4T????????” “Wait was that ASEXUAL REPRESENTATION OR AM I HALLUCINATING???????????”

I’d like to go back in time and hold little me’s head like “baby. You’re a faggot. There’s a reason you like this book and it ain’t just the dragons”

Oh and also! How could i forget! The third book in the series was literally the first book I ever read in English, bc it hadn’t been translated into my native language yet, and i was NOT GOING TO WAIT YEARS TO READ IT TF???? Literally i went

“Have I read a book in english before?”

“No.”

“How long is this one?”

“…640 pages.”

“……….Fuck it we ball.”

Man i gotta reread them it’s been too long.

Okay I said I'd make a more expansive post about this so here it is.

If you like high fantasy, check out A Chorus of Dragons by Jenn Lyons.

It's got

magic

dragons

demons

gods that aren't gods

a main character throuple

platonic marriage

distinct characters of various ages

just general diversity

the most incomprehensible family trees

sassy footnotes

and more!

There are five books and the worldbuilding is so neatly woven into the story so as not to overwhelm the reader. I was learning neat facts about the world even in the last book.

The overarching plot is a bit complicated to explain, but it's basically "Ancient mage with an ego has secret plans centuries in the making and must be stopped, but in the meantime there are demons wrecking havoc, terrible shitheads vying for political power, shapeshifters with dubious morals, revenge schemes, slavery, a god of annihilation that has slowly been consuming the sun, and so much family drama."

The five books are:

The Ruin of Kings (aka will someone please tell Kihrin what's going on)

The Name of All Things (aka the adventures of Janel and Qown, a horsegirl and her emotional support atheist priest)

The Memory of Souls (aka Oh My God)

The House of Always (aka Group Therapy tries to stop the apocolapyse)

The Discord of Gods (aka wtf is even going on--OH)

So in conclusion:

great characters, great pacing, great worldbuilding, great antagonists

Meet Miss Fortune

Race: High Half-Elf

Gender: Non-binary

Real name: ??? They’ll tell Astarion eventually

Birthday: Elesias 30

Class: Arcane trickster rogue

Background: Entertainer

Alignment: Chaotic neutral

Voice: 6

Scent: Sandalwood, vanilla, and jasmine

Favorite food: strawberries

(Accidental) aesthetic inspiration: When making Miss Fortune in Baldur’s Gate 3, the options limited me from perfectly matching the image in my head so I went for something as close as possible to my idea of a beautiful masculine-leaning person. It wasn’t until I showed my spouse and bff that they both pointed out I’d basically made half-elf Chris Motionless from Motionless in White. Oops? 😅

Backstory: Miss Fortune is one my favorite DnD characters I’ve ever played. They were a smart, sassy, and chaotic spy master who had a hand in every secret, scandal, and plot. They were the life of every party, their melodic laughter filling whatever room they were in. As a drag queen they trampled over gender norms and played a pivotal role in helping me realize that I am also non-binary - so Miss Fortune will always occupy a special place in my heart 💛🤍💜🖤. So of COURSE when I was making my first bg3 character I had to make them!

The Baldur’s Gate 3/fanfic version of Miss Fortune starts out significantly more traumatized. They grew up as a pretty bird in a bird cage with clipped wings until finally leaving their old life behind two moons (months) before getting abducted by mind flayers. “The Embrace of Love and Death” will reveal more specifics about their backstory as they get to know and trust Astarion. The parallels in Miss Fortune and Astarion’s backstories are completely coincidental! I knew nothing about Astarion going into the game, and when I created Miss Fortune I 💯 intended to romance everyone’s favorite muscle mama, Karlach. But Astarion landed a crit sneak attack on Miss Fortune’s (and my) heart and the rest was history.

Follow along with Miss Fortune’s story and healing journey with Astarion on AO3:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64221298?view_full_work=true