LGBTQ+ Creators to Follow - For Pride & Beyond
/by Cameron Brown
I am beginning this blog post laying next to my partner in an apartment we haven’t finished moving into yet. At the end of the bed is an Escher-esque tangle of bags and luggage. Similar piles cover the couch (freshly unboxed and assembled) and living room floor, climbing up the walls like a mutated vine. Between pandemic anxiety, moving anxiety, and the practical necessities of shoving two apartments into one via the medium of a single mid-sized car and lots of sweat, Pride has, mostly, been a small recognition between us, our friends, and the woman in our new neighborhood who caught sight of my partner’s Pride tank top while we parked and enthusiastically waved, pointed, thumbs-upped, and hand-hearted with enough energy to leap over a tall building.
But now here we are at the end of Pride. We may watch Luca over dinner later (it’s not technically gay, but everyone says it is, and we all offer sacrifice to that accursed Mouse on occasion). We will definitely watch the new season premiere of Dimension 20, which promises to be full of queer magic. And then tomorrow will come and we will still have boxes to unpack and shelves to build and a whole world and internet full of queer people living, studying, making art, and changing the world in new and unexpected ways.
That’s part of how I stay grounded throughout the year—following the work of people in the community, supporting what I can and seeing Pride in their growth and success. Here at the end of the month, I’ve made a list of some of my favorite people and works to recommend. Some of them you’ve probably already heard of, but you never know who will find them for the first time, and, sometimes, popular things are worth the love.
Shing Yin Khor (@sawdustbear)
Shing Yin Khor is, in their own words, “a cartoonist and experience designer making work about Americana, feelings, new rituals, and strange beasts.” Their most recent work, the graphic novel The Legend of Auntie Po, is set in 1885, several years after the passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act, and tells the story of Mei, a 13-year-old immigrant working in a logging camp and reinventing tales of Paul Bunyan as the legend of Auntie Po, a Chinese matriarch. It released June 15 and ranks high on my list of things to read as soon as time allows! Khor’s other works include a graphic novel travel memoir, The American Dream?, and work on keepsake games, which they describe as “games that produce beautiful, memorable physical artifacts through the gameplay process.” Their most recent offering? The solo game A Mending, which uses sewing, embroidery, and mapmaking to craft a narrative. You can find this game (Coming Soon!) on their website, along with art prints, zines and more. Go explore!
Rivers Solomon (@cyborgyndroid)
Rivers Solomon is the author of brilliant fiction exploring queer identities, race, and the violence of racism and colonialism. The Deep, inspired by a song of the same title from rap group clipping, tells the story of the water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slave women thrown overboard. It handles themes and intersections of memory, community, legacy, and generational pain with a honed knife and a precise grip. The Deep was one of the first books I read at the beginning of the pandemic year; it sat with me through the tumult of the year and I still think about it. Faer work also includes An Unkindness of Ghosts and faer newest novel, Sorrowland, as well as short fiction and nonfiction. You can find faer website here!
Hugh Ryan (@Hugh_Ryan)
Hugh Ryan is a historian and writer, with a number of great Twitter threads. I discovered Ryan through his book When Brooklyn Was Queer, which scratched my persistent itch for queer history while also releasing in the planning stages of my move to the big city. The stars appropriately aligned, When Brooklyn Was Queer became part of my preparations, some self-assigned homework that gave context not just to my new home, but to the story of queer history in America. Ryan’s next book, set to come out next spring, is called The Prison on Christopher Street, a queer history of the Women’s House of Detention in Greenwich Village, and I’ll be plucking it off the shelves before the pages have a chance to settle. Read more on his website and check out his Twitter for more history and recommendations!
Emily Tesh (@emilytesh_uk)
Emily Tesh is the author of the Greenhollow Duology, a pair of novellas detailing the history and nature of the Wild Man, the Green Man of the Wood, the protector and wanderer of the primeval forest that stretches well beyond the recognizable borders of any single modern forest. The duology, opening with Silver in the Wood and ending in Drowned Country, conjures monsters and humanity, lost and reclaimed, with immense heart. The romance of Tobias, the Man of the Wood, and Henry Silver, the researcher determined to find him, gives us both. Tesh’s debut novel, a “dark queer space opera” titled Some Desperate Glory, drops next year.
Charles Payseur (@ClowderofTwo)
Charles Payseur is a sci-fiction and fantasy short fiction reviewer extraordinaire. His Quick Sip Reviews blog offers an incredible, thoughtful weekly round-up of stories for anyone needing a guide to sift through the vast treasure trove that SFF writers produce. Payseur himself is a skilled writer with fiction published online and in various anthologies. If you have the means to support his Patreon, you can see all of his work, plus bonus goodies such as the Sip of the Week, where he goes deep into a couple of his favorite stories of the week, regular reviews of Goosebumps books, and serialized stories. Perilous Knights, his Arthuriana series that is both steampunk and steamy, wrapped up in 2019, but is well worth the price of entry. Keep in mind that it’s definitely Not Safe For Work, so if you want to try something a bit tamer, consider Undercurrents, which you can read from Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
And for a couple more quick follows:
JP Brammer (@jpbrammer) is a writer and illustrator whose advice newsletter (and just-released memoir), ¡Hola Papi!, will have you laughing, crying, and feeling very seen. Sign up for the newsletter and buy the book (and some nice art) here.
Anthony Oliveira (@meakoopa) combines my love of religion aesthetics and queerness in an academic, pop cultural phantasmagoria. Come for his contributions to queer Marvel superheroics, stay for the Paradise Lost analysis and queer Jesus fanfic.
Neon Hemlock Press (@neonhemlock) is a queer speculative fiction zine, novella, and anthology publisher. They put great work out into the world, much of it dark and fighting for a better world. Take a gander at their upcoming anthology, Unfettered Hexes.
In a very different vein, I am very excited to see the finished product of the upcoming graphic novel Croc & Roll, about a rock band of queer crocodilians looking to hit it big in love and music, from the team of Hamish Steele, Ayoola Solarin, and George Williams. It’s a limited run, and preorders only last for two weeks, so if it tickles your fancy, go ahead and rock out!