#which is something flat women characters never get : accurate portrayals

[fishing-lesbian-catgirl]

Imagining a titty mousepad of Ranni but the boob part isn’t actually a cushion it’s flat and offers no wrist support

[manstrans]

I just read every free episode of Finding Camillia so you don't have to and uh. Oof. So I'm gonna write about it

The basic synopsis is this:

The king had an affair on the queen with a servant. They fired the servant for giving birth to her daughter who looks just like the king. When the daughter was 12 years old the queen kidnapped her and forced her to present as a boy for political reasons. It turns out the prince was sick and if anything were to happen they needed another heir. There's a 4 year time skip and she decides she's going to get her old life as a girl back no matter what.

There are quite a few problems with it, intended or not, and I want to explain why they're problems so no one accidentally internalizes them

1. The biggest problem is the main plot point, a girl being forced to present as a boy for political reasons (she's even coerced into it). It's entirely possible it's a coincidence, but it does bare an awfully similar appearance to the way terfs and radfems see trans men and transmascs. That we're either defenseless little girls forced into being something we're not and abused, or the heartless abuser forcing the defenseless little girls into something they're not. This story feels too much like a terf's view of the world for me to be comfortable

2. I really don't like the portrayal of binding and I'm worried that a young trans kid could read this and think it's accurate. The first time she's shown binding it's with bandages, which could be dangerous to portray given that there are bandages that can constrict breathing if used for binding. Later on she used what is explicitly a corset, which is not a binder. Generally, corsets will do the opposite of binding. She also describes it as suffocating, and while yes binders can be uncomfortable if yours is suffocating you it is too small and you NEED to get a bigger one. A binder alone should NOT make you feel like you can't breathe. To add salt to the wound her chest is shown to be perfectly flat without the binder/corset. Why even have it then? Why give the impression that you need to bind even with the flattest of chests? If you feel that binding is more trouble than it's worth or not helpful for you, you don't need to. Please don't feel pressured to do something you're not comfortable with!

3. The portayal of passing. Every time she goes somewhere new every single character feels the need to call her feminine and undermine her presentation as a man. 4 years of presenting as a man and not a single person doesn't think she might be a woman. I know in the story she is a woman, but in real life there are cis men who are small or have feminine traits. This just enforces "You'll never pass, everyone can tell you're not REALLY a man. Everyone can tell your body is that of a female!" This is a line of thinking that hurts all trans people as well as women of color. It's bio essentialism, that if your body doesn't meet the personal standards of some random person then you're not REALLY this gender and they can tell. They can't and they'll never be able to! It can be hard for lots of trans people to pass as their gender 100% of the time but it's clear that this was only written in for the drama.

4. Mismisgendering (for lack of a better word)? When people call her Camillia instead of Camillius she gets legitimately upset and corrects them. Something that happens over and over again, sometimes several times in a row. The worst part isn't that she's being 'misgendered', I mean it's something that happens in real life, it's that they're right when they do it. Portraying the ignorance of the name and gender someone wants you to refer to them as even when they seem very genuinely upset when you don't as being correct has a lot of harmful implications and hopefully I don't need to explain why!

5. Other implications through language. I don't know if this comic was originally written in English or another language, if maybe some of these lines are a problem of translation specifically, but the implications are still there. "You don't deserve to cry." "Women have been easy targets all throughout history." "Groomed into a talent so rarely found among the rotten nobility." "This place is not suitable for a defenseless girl such as herself." "All men are animals, Camellia." "Hah! He's truly an embarrassment to us real men." All of these are word for word from the comic. A lot of them have very obvious connotations, but if you didn't catch all of them I can't blame you since these stereotypes aren't very common knowledge. A lot of these play right into the lie that we're just poor little girls being coerced into pretending to be men. There are quite a few quotes about how defenseless and small she is, but I also want to point out the specific word 'Groomed' they used. That she was Groomed into this. Because we're either seen as little girls being groomed or the ones doing the grooming. And my expectations have yet to be subverted.

I can't tell you not to read this comic, I'd be a hypocrite if I did! But please be aware of all the stereotypes and if you can please try to keep them from spreading. I've gotten ads for this comic before so it's possible it's reached a lot of people but I really have no idea how many have seen it. I just don't want these things to become even more mainstream than they already are and I really don't want trans kids to internalize these messages

[thetearlingqueen]

Rowland Finn as a Villian

I have read some criticism of how Rowland Finn was written as a villain, that he was lacking depth and motivation and that he falls flat and is disappointing as the “big bad”.  And while I think this is a valid criticism and I think it’s more than fair to think that I’d like to offer my thoughts on his character and his role as a villain.  Rowland Finn has blurry motivations, he isn’t as well developed as I know myself would have liked and I think we the readers are ultimately left with more questions than answers by the end of the series. I think for a lot of us this was frustrating but this is exactly why I like Rowland Finn as a Villian. Because he is all these things, not because it makes him a different type of Villian but it makes him that much more relevant to us, the readers and therefore at least for myself- more terrifying.  Rowland Finn clearly mirrors a type of real-life “villain” we face today in first world countries. He is to me, the mass shooter, the spree killer the political terrorist that we face far too often. His mindset clearly mimics the mindsets of the young men who commit these acts of violence, and the frustrating parts of his character are the same things we find frustrating as we try to figure out why these spree killings happen in the wake of tragedy. 

Long post broke down into chunks under the cut

Sense of Superiority:

Rowland Finn is bright and gifted as a child, he shows a lot of potentials but pretty early on we see how he views the other children, as beneath him. We know from Kate that this never changes, it grows stronger. He thinks of himself as above everyone else, smarter than everyone else. In this small culture he lives in he feels like he is different, special and cannot or perhaps refuses to relate to his peers. I often see him referred to as a spoiled brat (which yeah) and that’s why he isn’t a good villain. But his spoiled superior mentality to me makes him more of a villain. These are the traits we see in the likes of Elliot Rogers, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. We now know that the narrative of the beaten and bullied losers getting revenge is false, all three of these men had a sense of superiority. They were entitled to better and they were above everyone else, yes even Dylan and Eric. In fact, it is more accurate to say that they were bullies, rather than the bullied. They just weren’t popular bullies. 

Misogyny :

Rowland Finn also displays his views on women, which are misogynistic. He plays with their emotions, knowing he’s desired he enjoys not giving them his full attention. And when they fight over him, I think he probably finds it amusing. But of course, when he wants his sexual needs met he takes advantage of their interest in him. He uses them when he wants to, and disregards them whenever he feels. I think it’s fair to say he regards women as sexual objects. If this isn’t the case then I think he’d fall into the group of people who classifies women into two strict groups, “good women” and “whores”. Whether he sees all women as objects or he sees them in two distinct groups this is a view shared by many serial killers and spree killers. A very black and white view of women is pretty standard for the type of people I feel Row represents.  

Home Life:

His home life is not picture-perfect, but it isn’t terrible either. His father is present in his life and his mother clearly has social and/or mental health issues. She’s desperate, obsessive and overbearing. But she isn’t evil, nor is she to blame for his actions. Toxic? Probably but many people have much more trying home lives and childhoods. I don’t think any family is perfect but that being said people survive much worse and they go on to thrive later in life. A lot of the serial killers of the 60′s and 70′s describe having overbearing mothers and sometimes even blame this for the later actions. While I don’t think this is an excuse at all it is interesting to note, and a very obvious parallel to our reality. He’s angry and upset about his home life, irritated with his mother but instead of trying to improve his family relationship by reaching out to his father, half brother and mother he would rather let these issues fester and grow. To him it is easier to detest his family and resent them instead of realizing family isn't easy, love is difficult, relationships are difficult. Family relationships are no exception, he isn’t in an overly abusive household where this wouldn’t be an option. My interpretation is that he wants them to fix it, not himself. He shouldn’t have to, because it’s not his fault and he is well, himself. 

Blurry Motivations:

Rowland never outright says why he does what he does, nor is it perfectly clear to the readers. And again I think this is frustrating for us as the readers but is all too common with real life crimes and mass killings. I think it’s extremely frustrating when we see serial killers and spree shooters describe their crimes after they have been apprehended and they say things such as “I don’t know why, I just did it,” or “I just wanted to do it,” and that’s the closest we get to an answer. In some cases these are obvious lies to cover up premeditation but not always. We have cases where it seems like people who just seem to lose it and decide they want to hurt people and maybe that will make it better or gratify something within them. I think of Brenda Ann Spencer who only said: “I don’t like Mondays” after opening fire at an elementary school. She had been suffering abuse but it wasn’t her abuser she attacked she lashed out at people she didn’t even know and children.  We have cases where spree killers describe feeling like being in a trance but cannot come up with a logical explanation or excuse for why they wanted to do that. It’s frustrating for us as a society, we want to find a reason for everything and figure everything out, because not knowing is so scary. And I think Rowland Finn’s blurry messy motivations are similar to this. 

A Modern Villian:

Rowland Finn represents a growingly dangerous type of killer in our society, at least here in the USA. Angry young men who feel entitled to better despite not trying to improve themselves or the world around them. They want to be above the rest of us, incels, mass shooters, serial killers all have these characteristics. And the mass shootings caused by these skewed disturbing views seem to be getting more and more frequent and “random”, to the point where even shopping at a Walmart can make you a target for an angry entitled incel or revenge thirsty young man who feels we have withheld from him the life he deserves. And the rest of us, with empathy and reason, are not real people we are objects to blame for these young men not getting the lives they want. And then we are further blamed for not helping enough when these people, like Row Finn refuse to help themselves. I think Rowland Finn despite the flaws in his portrayal and the frustrating questions he raises is a good representation of the type of villain that is becoming most relevant and to me, most terrifying. He represents a modern villian. 

What do you think of Row Finn? Do you like him? Hate him? How about how he is written? I’d love to hear your thoughts, do you agree or disagree with my own thoughts on him? let me know and stay safe. 

[neriad13]

Best of the Best - Media Consumed 2018

Books - Fiction

The Lies of Locke Lamora - Scott Lynch

I devoured the entire series in a series of months this year and what I’m about to say holds true for all of them (probably more than for the latter two than the first)...but I have a particular soft spot for the plot twists and humor of the beginning. So, it’s my choice for the year, though it is representing the series as a whole.

This is the series that showed me what inclusive fantasy can be like. It’s a story predominantly about straight white dudes written by a straight white dude (a comfort zone I am struggling to break out of) and yet, it is one that purposefully skirts the tropes of the genre and plays with them in such a way that it makes the world feel welcoming to a reader who is neither straight nor male. There’s lesbian pirates, multiple queer characters, copious well-written women and non-white characters as major players in the narrative. This was a book that gave me hope and help as I struggled to bust out of my old patterns of thinking and writing. And yet, it was familiar enough that it was enough of a comfort zone to retreat to in times when I needed to seek comfort in fiction.

And it’s so much good fun. Half a year later and I’m still cracking up at “Nice bird, asshole.”

Books - Nonfiction

Dictator Style - Peter York

This book was weirdly heart-wrenching. There’s something so melancholy and strange about surveying the living spaces of these paragons of human misery and trying to figure out what they were thinking through medium of their wallpaper choices. That, and the knowledge that even the seemingly all powerful are far more tacky and slipshod than commonly believed, stuck with me.

Fic

Batya - Valya

I didn’t read a whole heck of a lot of fic this year and only counted those that were above a 30k word count. There were plenty of short fics that I loved, but alas, I did not write them down. Goals for next year!

So, Batya, BioShock fic - AU in which Ryan discovers Jack far earlier than intended and decides to adopt him as his son. Once this fic gets going, it’s intense. And sad. And beautiful, all of which apply heavily to the relationship between Jack and Kyle. The final scene between them is pure poetry and had me thinking of them dancing as Rapture fell apart around them for days afterward.

Film

I saw so many hecking good movies this year. I’m just barely able to pare it down to a top three.

Black Panther - Ryan Coogler

This movie was exhilarating. The design, the energy, the acting, the humor, the primal drama of two types of activism duking it out in the bowels of the earth...I walked out of the theater in a daze, hardly believing that I’d seen what I had.

When Marnie Was There - Hiromasa Yonebayashi

This movie contains the most accurate portrayal of social anxiety I have ever seen in fiction, period. It hit especially close to home for me, as this year was the one in which I faced and struggled with my own lifelong anxiety. I watched it wondering how on earth filmmakers half a world away got the details of my own childhood down so precisely on film. When the credits hit and “Fine On the Outside” played, I bawled at my computer screen.

Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse - Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman

This movie was a staggering technological accomplishment. It pushed the boundaries of animation and filmmaking in ways I have flat-out never seen before. It was joyful, it was dramatic, it was tragic, it was gorgeous. It was a celebration of everything animation is capable of. And the fact that a brown kid is at the center of it?

Stunning.

Comics - Webcomics

Alethia - Kristina Stipetic

This is beautiful world in which the characters are forced to make terrible choices, as the main character struggles to find the meaning in such things.

Also, it’s all lesbian robots. The artist drew the comic specifically because she wanted more women in fiction that she could relate to. It’s a fascinating, meditative piece of work.

Comics - Fiction

Akira - Katsuhiro Otomo

This manga is a masterpiece of destruction and resurgence. The art is stunning, the characters are charming and the action is absolutely unbeatable.

But my favorite section was the one which focuses on Chiyoko - an unapologetically masculine woman with an arsenal of heavy weapons - while she’s on desperate rescue mission in hostile territory. My eyes were glued to the page as she blew away her foes and struggled against them in turn, her plight given the gravity and intensity that is so rarely bestowed on female action heroes.

For that alone - best fiction comic of the year.

Comics - Nonfiction

Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo and Me - Ellen Forney

I read so many fantastic comic memoirs this year. It was difficult to choose from among them - almost all of them were highlighted as among my favorites of the year. But there’s something about a seasoned artist drawing and talking about her own battles with mental illness after a long (and ongoing) war that stood out to me.

It’s a tale of seemingly endless medication adjustment, therapy and the breaking down of personal stigmas surrounding mental illness and the drugs used to treat it. Though I don’t share the artist’s diagnosis, it was a book that gave me confidence in choices about the treatment of my own mental illness.

Shows

A Series of Unfortunate Events S2 - Barry Sonnenfeld, Bo Welch, Mark Palansky, Allan Arkush, Loni Peristere, Liza Johnson, Jonathan Teplitzky

What can I say about something that is perfect? Every joke hits. Every bit of wordplay makes me burst out laughing. The absurdity and surreality of the situations are a sight to behold. The acting is phenomenal. The writing improves upon the books in every possible way. And in all of this, not an inch of the story’s darkness is ever given up.

Games

This was the year I played the first Fallout (the ending destroyed me), That Dragon, Cancer (very much hit home), 1979 Revolution: Black Friday (can you make a historical game that both teaches, entertains and reveals the human cost of a complex conflict? Yes. Yes, you can.) Pillars of Eternity (A well-written Atheist in my video game? It’s more likely than you think.) and Tales From the Borderlands (the humor! The art! The voice cast! The rock-solid writing!). All of them were top contenders and yet...there was really only one choice for me.

Papo and Yo - Vander Caballero

This is a game about the relationship between a boy and his alcoholic father. It is heavily based on the lead developer’s own experiences. It’s a fraught relationship - torn between the sober moments when the hero’s father loves him, protects him, takes care of him, plays with him - and the moments when drinking turns him into a monster of rage.

The hero sets out to find a cure for his father’s addiction and after great trial discovers…

*spoilers, though the answer is probably pretty obvious, though no less painful for its obviousness*

...that no such cure exists and that the only thing he can do is let him go.

I sobbed uncontrollably at the ending of this game and sniffled long after. The message stuck with me months after I’d played it.

All of the hurt, confusion, anger and grief of letting go of my own toxic person - there it had been, on the screen right in front of me. This game helped me come to peace with that decision in my own life and for that, I am astounded and humbled by the simple artistry of this game. If you have your own toxic person in your life - be the problem alcohol, religious fundamentalism, intolerance or any other form of abuse - play this game and know that it’s okay to leave them behind. 

[shamelessnerd]

First Cosplay Experience

SO! It’s taken me too long to do this, but.... here we go.

On November 9th of this year, it was announced that Gail Simone (one of my favorite writers, mainly because of the awesome goodness and miraculous character save she did for Huntress after years of other writers slowly driving the character into the ground would be at the New Jersey Comic Expo.

I.

Freaked.

Out.

Such little warning and it just so happened that an online friend called Cali lives about 5 minutes away from the expo center. Cali was more than happy to let me crash on her couch and we’d go to the expo together. I was thrilled.

And then I despaired.

My cosplay was nowhere NEAR ready for this. Ever since a drastic turn of events in my life in late April of this year (greatly inspired by Huntress herself), I have been on something of a personal crusade -- to make the most accurate, badass, awesome and amazing Huntress cosplay the world has ever seen. I declared to everyone that I would construct this most true-to-character portrayal, I would live off myfitnesspal and I would appear before Simone and get on bent knee asking her to campaign for the return of the REAL Huntress. The Helena Rosa Bertinelli that had such a dramatic change on my life, who was unlike any other character -- fierce, independent, fearless, funny, and passionate as hell. I wanted to show that people out there still remember Helena, that she is still deeply loved, and that she is, above all, sorely missed. I wanted everyone to remember who Huntress is, what she is, and stand defiant in all attempts to consign her to forgotten archives.

I vowed I would do this.

And here I faced my last opportunity to see Gail in person and I thought for sure that I would not be ready. My representation would fall flat. The impact of the meaning, of appearing as the deadly vigilante (not a sexy portrayal, though she is that too -- but I wanted badass armor) as true-to-life as could be, would be too little for what I hoped to achieve.

But then I had an idea. And, hilariously, this idea came from a kind of little-known comic called Gotham City Garage. Basically, this is what would happen if Mad Max tangled with the DC universe, giving characters fast motorcycles and lots of leather and tattoos and absurd amounts of studs. A little mental checklist informed me that I had most of the materials on hand already. So I set to work.

A leather jacket and purple t-shirt (from the Salvation Army), a fake tattoo, and a lot of help from my friend and her husband to make the armored bracers, I had a costume. We walked in like badasses. We weren’t there for 3 minutes before a vendor asked for our picture.

DREAM TEAM RIGHT THERE, BABY! #RedHunt 

I. Felt. AWESOME. I felt like I was Huntress! And let me tell you -- that feeling was addicting. I never wanted it to end. According to my friend, I walked in there like I wanted to kick teeth in and that’s pretty much how I felt. Like a badass.

And of course, I got to see Gail.

(That’s the smirk that says, “Please fight back. I love it when they fight back.”)

So, full disclosure here.

I SWORE to myself that I would not cry and gush when I met her. I wouldn’t. I. Would. Not. I would be dignified and composed and erudite. I would say everything I wanted with precision and eloquence and I would convey just how deeply her contribution to Huntress had influenced me and saved me from an abusive relationship. I saw it play out in my mind a thousand times. It would be profound and serious and meaningful.

I breathed deeply. I mentally chanted, “You are Huntress, she doesn’t cry. You’re a badass. Huntress doesn’t let anyone see her weaknesses. You are Huntress. Now make her proud, dammit.”

I stepped up to the booth.

My friend (who had gotten a gift for me signed by Gail at New York Comic Con weeks prior) introduced me.

Gail looked at me. She had this expectant look, a friendly smile.

I took a breath and....

I started freaking crying.

Chernobyl melted down more gracefully than I did.

I got ticked off at myself, actually, because I SWORE this wouldn’t happen. Hoping to distract myself from the critical meltdown that was going full steam ahead, I tried to squeak out my speech I had written prior.

I think I got out a fifth of it.

My mind has kinda blacked out the memory of what happened. Out of self defense, I think. I wasn’t mortified. I was soooo past mortified. But I had to go through, because know what? I’m passionate about this. Huntress means a HELL of a lot to me and I had to say something to make sure someone knew, that they truly Heard The Voice Of The Fans. Not just for me but for others I know love Helena Bertinelli, such as @purpleladyofthenight and @thelastofthebertinellis and so many many others out there that have yet to be found or heard. I (stupidly) had decided I’d be at least one voice for Helena’s fans, someone who is crazy and idiotic enough to walk up to a famous writer and say, ‘Hey, we really love this character, mind undoing this injustice and bringing her back?’ No one asked me to do it, not everyone is gonna want the same writer, but I just had this idea (and I still do) that at least the message is heard. That it might get passed on up the chain. Someone noticed. And maybe that’ll give us some hope to getting her back.

Except I was nowhere NEAR as composed and erudite as I wanted to be. Not. One. Bit. I babbled. I gushed. I gushed like the damn Niagara falls during snowmelt times. (I hail from the land of Michigan, I know these things.) I was actually afraid the Pros-Aide stick the mask onto my face might get compromised from my stupidly crying idiot tears. And I think my friends ushered me away before I could gush TOO much. Damage control and all that.

Like I said, I really cannot recall a lot of it. I think back and get choked up. It’s all a blur muddled with a faint tinge of horror and embarrassment. I don’t pry too deeply. I think my brain is protecting me and I’ve read enough comics to now that can be an immense blessing. I am Genre Savvy. Cannot fool this chick!

But yes, horror and gushing aside, it was wonderful! ^_^ She’s a lovely person and DEEPLY forgiving of my determined attempts to wear my pants on my head or something. I did get her to sign my Wonder Woman journal and it’s something of a mission of mine to gather the signatures of the artists and writers I simply adore. (Nicola Scott and Matthew Clark’s names are proudly inscribed on the inside cover.) 

It’s really a whole new experience when you cosplay at a con. I’d been to a few of them, but never in character. There’s this... I dunno. VIP feel, I suppose, but that could’ve just been me. I loved getting stopped for pictures! I think we were stopped about 6 or 7 times for pictures and I loved each and every one! KNOW THIS: I want everyone reading this to swear, “I, who am about to go to a con, will not hesitate to ask a cosplayer for pictures, because that is why they do it and it makes them feel awesome.”

Good. Now I expect ya’ll to abide by that.

Amusingly, I heard someone say, ‘Oh look, it’s Batgirl!’ I turned around to see a dad pointing at me and talking to his young daughter. I cheerfully said, ‘Nah, not anymore. I had the gig for a while but I don’t need the Bat or the symbol to do what I want. What has to be done.”

The guy just looked at me and said after a minute, “Oh! Huntress!”

I felt AWESOME.

Perhaps the most memorable moment is when a teeny widdle Wonder Woman (probably 6 years old??) wanted to take a picture with me and Red Hood, but was too shy to ask. Her father did on her behalf and I was thrilled. She had a little stuffed monkey toy and I, channeling Huntress ENTIRELY, asked the monkey’s name. He didn’t have one yet because she just won him at a booth, so I suggested Minksy. (I swear to god I do not know where that name came from.) This was acceptable. Then we posed for a picture.

So somewhere out there is a stuffed monkey doll owned by a Wonder Woman that was named Minksy by Huntress. Real life stories here alone, peeps.

You can check out another group picture of myself, my friend Cali and her hubby on Dinner And A Podcast over here: https://www.instagram.com/p/Bbr7giAFN1O/ The trivia questions weren’t really trivia. They just asked the real name of the character you were cosplaying as and I, being a DEVOTED Helena Bertinelli fan, said Helena Rosa Bertinelli.

The guy was stumped as to what to ask next. He scrambled for a JLU question which I answered no problem and got a free comic. Woot!

I’ve been unable to find any further images of the expo, sadly, but it was amazing. I never wanted to stop being Huntress and I’m sure as hell gonna do it again! 

~COSPLAY STUFF BELOW~

Just a bit of info on the Bikerpunk!Huntress cosplay I whipped together with cheap deals and a lot of help from my friends!

1. The boots are Volatile Combat Boots for women, available on Amazon for about $58. I do recommend you get a half size up. I usually wear 8 to 8.5 and I got a size 9 to accommodate for my insoles. They fit beautifully! I had to get these puppies because any good Huntress pic shows she don’t screw around with no damn high heels. She wears big, bad, stompy combat boots to deal damage. These boots fit the bill and they’ll be great for many other cosplays as well.

2. The leather belt is from Cabela’s. I painted it purple using Angelus Leather Paint. It’s very dark here because the belt itself was dark brown originally, but it really shows beautifully in the light.

3. The belt pouches are lifted directly from the tutorial from furiescosplay for the Batgirl belt. These are just phone cases I got from the Dollar store, painted purple, and slipped on. Done.

4. The GORGEOUS Huntress mask I’m wearing is from TigerStoneFX. I used Pros-Aide adhesive to keep it snug. However, there’s some finagling with the strap that I have to do to make sure it fits really good and snug.

5. On my blog you can find a short video tutorial on Batgirl bracers. These are essentially how we made mine as well.

6. The fake tattoo. WHY the fake tattoo? Glad you asked! It’s because Huntress has a cross motif (we all know this) that’s formed by the white stripes down the front of her uniform and across the hem of her cape that crosses her chest. However, considering how tattered my shirt was for that BikerPunk (tm) feel, there wasn’t really... space to get that cross shape. So I had a lightbulb moment. Let’s make a fake tattoo!

I put my graphic designer skills to use, found an image I liked, outlined it to a vector image, blew it up to fit on an 11 x 17 paper, and then spent about two hours cutting out every little detail with my Xacto knife. Then, with some help of my friend and rather inconveniently placed papercut, put the stencil on me and started coloring in with a black Sharpie. Rub on some baby powder, LIGHTLY spritz with hair spray, you got a fake tattoo. It fit the biker-y feel (and Gotham City Garage has a very similar thing with Nightwing so I didn’t feel bad about it at all) and got the cross image in, too! 

7. Make up I’m still working on. But for any aspiring Huntress cosplayers out there, I recommend the lipstick color Amethyst by Nyx Cosmetics. Make sure you get the lipstick AND the lipliner! It lasted all day and I even had trouble getting it to come off in the shower! The other color I had toyed with getting, Oh, Just Put It On is actually an extremely dark shade of purple, nearly black. So unless that’s the palette you want, use Amethyst. It’s also a helluva lot more affordable than Kaoir (the only other lipstick seller I could find with such a vibrant purple) and I can attest to its staying power.

8. The gloves were also Salvation Army finds. I cut off the fingers (and had to use a teensy dab of E-6000 at all the seams to seal them off because the stitching was unravelling -- oops!) and also painted them with the Angelus Leather Dye. That stuff goes a long way and gets great color in just a few coats.

So that’s it. My First Big Adventure in Cosplay! It only gets bigger and better from here, right? Wish me luck and remember -- don’t get stuck on the details. Just GO for it!

[mermaidsirennikita]

Book Roundup -- March 2017

The Gilded Cage by Vic James.  2/5.  This book really bothered me, because it started out strong.  Essentially, it’s a dystopian/urban fantasy story in which the UK is run by the Equals, who are Skilled--magically empowered.  Those without powers are required to put in ten years of slavery, though once they’re eighteen they get to choose when they do their years.  Luke is sent to what’s basically a workhouse, whereas his sister Abi and the rest of their family is sent to work relatively cushy jobs at the manor home of one of the ruling families.  This was all very interesting, except Luke’s storyline rapidly became a typical rebel against the machine dystopian story, while Abi was discovering the secrets of this fucked up family--until she fell in love with the Boring Brother.  Nope.  Nah.  There were a million viewpoints as well, and ultimately too many cliches.

Daughter of the Pirate King by Tricia Levenseller.  1/5.  I feel bad about giving this a bad rating because its cover is adorable and the author seems nice.   But I can’t pull punches with this one.  Basically, this is about Alosa, the titular daughter of the pirate king who lets herself get kidnapped by lesser pirates in order to steal a map.  The idea sounds like fun fare, and I wasn’t looking for anything super historically accurate or intellectual.  I was expecting something POTC-esque.  But like... Elizabeth Swann at least cared about functionality.  Within the first thirty pages, Alosa had gone on and on about her clothes and her need for corsets and I was like listen girl I’ve worn corsets you’re not swashbuckling in that shit???  Like I’m all for weaponized femininity but no???  The whole thing read as parody or satire, which I’m cool with too, BUT IT WASN’T FUNNY.  Every bit of dialogue was flat and delivered in a straightforward manner.  Alosa’s inner monologue was boring and every other paragraph felt like an info dump.  Just no.

Beautiful Broken Girls by Kim Savage.  2/5.  After sisters Mira and Francesca commit suicide together, Mira’s one-time love Ben begins finding notes left in the seven places where they touched.  In doing so, he’ll discover why the girls killed themselves.  This book gets points for the writing style, which was evocative and lovely.  It also has an interesting focus on Catholic ritual, especially stigmata.  But honestly, it was just a downer throughout.  It’s not that you expect a happy, upbeat book when you’re reading something about teenage suicide (don’t do it!).  However, The Virgin Suicides tackled the same subject matter with an air of mystery and depth.  These characters all seemed shallow and boring.  The book also deals with the issue of pedophilia rather poorly, in my view.  It romanticizes the survivor as “damaged” and “broken”, and it’s just... not well done.  Good idea, poor execution.

The Beast is an Animal by Peternelle van Arsdale.  2/5.  Essentially, this is the story of Alys, who, after an encounter with the soul-eating twins outside her village, feels connected to them as she grows up.  The soul-eaters are feared by her village, as is the terrifying Beast.  After discovering that she has certain powers, Alys must balance her village’s fear of witchcraft with her own desire to get to the bottom of the twins’--and the Beast’s--origins.  I felt zero connection to this story, which disappointed me greatly because the first few pages were so compelling.  I just didn’t care about Alys--I wanted to know more about the twins.  The prose was lovely, but everything was far too internalized for me.  I’m sure some people would love this, though!

Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town by Jon Krakauer.  4/5.  Clearly, I was going through a reading slump.  Therefore, I picked up something completely different.  Krakauer is a very good writer; but I’m not going to lie, I was worried about this.  I’m always hesitant when men choose to write about the sexual assault of women--it can be botched very quickly.  Krakauer, towards the end of the book, owns up to his own privilege and ignorance, which I appreciated. He approaches the topic with sensitivity; he interviews the rapists when possible; but he doesn’t pretend that he isn’t biased, and here that is good.  Krakauer believes in these women, he supports these women--whether or not their rapists were found guilty in court.  This is extremely difficult to read and quite graphic, but worth the time.  A revealing look at rape culture in America.

Long May She Reign by Rhiannon Thomas.  3/5.  This tells the story of Freya, twenty-third in line to the throne when most of the royal court--including everyone in line ahead of her--is poisoned at the king’s birthday celebration.  Suddenly queen, Freya must not only deal with adjusting to a role she thought she’d never have, but the issue of who assassinated so many nobles, and what they’ll do next.  This book had a great premise; it approached relationships in a different way that I suspect will appeal to readers tired of romance; and it gave us a likable protagonist.  But I think it just read too young for me.  Freya is interested in science, which means that she spends much of the book trying to solve the murders like she’s a cross between a mad scientist and a detective.  I was more interested in the courtly goings-on, and that side of things didn’t ring true for me.  But it wasn’t bad.  We just didn’t gel.

Hunted by Meagan Spooner.  4/5.  This Beauty and the Beast retelling is peppered with Russian folkore, and gives us our Beauty in Yeva, a young huntress whose father goes missing in the woods.  Upon discovering his body, she is taken captive by the Beast he was tracking, and finds herself imprisoned.  I could say more but it would spoil a lot; this story is definitely very much a fairy tale take on BatB.  Retellings have been hot for the past couple of years, and it was nice to see one that more along the lines of Robin McKinley than Sarah J. Maas, though both have their places.  Spooner’s writing is lovely and lyrical--and she tackles some of the darker aspects of the original fairy tale sensitively.  (Yes, she confronts the Stockholm Syndrome issue.)  It may not reinvent the wheel, but it’s engaging and well-written, with a smart heroine and a legitimately scary beast.

What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty.  4/5.  After hitting her head a the gym, Alice loses the past ten years of her memory.  She thinks that she’s twenty-nine, happily married, with her first baby on the way.  In fact, she’s thirty-nine, about to be divorced, and a mother of three.  Not only is her relationship with her husband Nick terrible; she’s also barely speaking to her sister Elisabeth and barely recognizes herself.  Moriarty has a great way of being both entertaining and kind of good at navigating the human psyche.  Her characters are all flawed, all realistic--Alice and Nick’s issues are real ones, and they aren’t easily fixed.  Not gonna lie, as someone who recently watched her parents go through a hideous divorce, this was difficult to read at times.  But I was also pulling for Alice and everyone she loved to make something good of their lives, because they were endearing, they were people you wanted to see happy.  Moriarty is good at slowly unfolding reveals as well, and I didn’t expect one issue in Alice and Nick’s marriage to be what it was--but it was much more nuanced than what I’d been assuming.  At times this got a little corny, of course, and it’s not quite as edgy as Big Little Lies.  But I really enjoyed it.

The Second Mrs. Hockaday by Susan Rivers.  3/5.  Seventeen-year-old Placidia marries thirty-two-year-old Confederate Major Gryffth Hockaday right after meeting him; she’s somehow compelled by him, and he needs a mother for his infant son following the death of his first wife.  The pair spend two nights together, during which they quickly fall in love--only for Hockaday to be called back to war.  After over two years’ absence, he returns to find Placidia much changed, and rumor has it that she both bore and killed an illegitimate child while he was gone.  The book is in the format of letters and Placidia’s diary entries, slowly telling the story of what actually happened while Hockaday was away.  The morality here is very gray and nuanced; in many ways, what actually ended up happening was more mature than what I expected. (Although one aspect of the story--a crucial aspect--I found so obvious that the reveal wasn’t even really a reveal, and that was... disappointing, not gonna lie.)  While it’s definitely a compelling read, I had to dock it from four to three stars because I felt like Rivers gave a pretty dated portrayal of slave-master relations in the book.  It felt very “Gone with the Wind”.  Placidia owned these people, but the realities of that were kind of glossed over, and some moments felt very “happy slave” to me.  It’s worth the read for the mystery, but other aspects could have been much better.

The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides.  4/5.  After thirteen-year-old Cecilia Lisbon commits suicide, her four sisters become gradually more sheltered by their parents, leading to eventual disaster. The events are narrated--rather creepily--by a chorus of neighborhood boys obsessed with the Lisbon sisters.  This story is probably familiar to you; but if you haven’t seen the movie yet, read the book first.  Both are great, but the movie is actually very faithful to the plot and feeling of the book, so I feel like I lost something by seeing it first.  Like, definitely see it, it’s a great movie.  Just read this first.  Eugenides gets the weird, obsessive natures of teen boys so well--and the Lisbon girls just kind of destroyed me.

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote.  4/5.  In 1959, four members of the Clutter family were brutally murdered in Holcomb, a small Texas town.  Deciding to try out a new style of creative non-fiction, Truman Capote traveled to Holcomb, getting to know who the Clutters were, the investigators, and most importantly, the murderers--Perry Smith and Dick Hickock.  Capote’s following of the case and the eventual captures of Smith and Hickock would become “In Cold Blood”.  This book is honestly more disturbing than I thought it would be.  I’m into true crime, but something about the way Capote writes just hammers home exactly how chilling these murders were.  At the same time, it’s clear that he had a lot of sympathy for the devil--specifically, Perry Smith.  Part of what makes this book so fascinating Capote himself and the way he chooses to portray things. 

A Year Of Ravens by Stephanie Dray, Kate Quinn, S.J.A. Turney, Vicky Alvear Schecter, Russell Whitfield, and E. Knight.  4/5.  This collaborative novel tells seven separate stories, all surrounding Boudica and her rebellion.  From Roman soldiers to druids, a variety of different perspectives are given, shedding light on the grayness of the rebellion.  I can’t really call this an anthology, because everything is connected and works very well together.  The only one of these authors that I consistently read is Kate Quinn (her entry to the novel is one of my favorites, of course) but everyone did at the very least a decent job.  The only story I didn’t connect with is Russell Whitfield’s story of Agricola, a Roman tribune--but that’s not his fault, and it didn’t take away from my enjoyment of the novel as a whole.  Kate Quinn’s The Warrior is super interesting, focusing on an aging champion of Boudica’s and a Roman woman he took as a slave during the rebellion; E. Knight’s The Daughters is just heartbreaking and excellent, telling the dual perspectives of Boudica’s daughters; and Stephanie Dray’s The Queen is also especially memorable in that it tells the story of Cartimandua, a client queen with a story very parallel to Boudica’s.  As a whole, I definitely recommend checking this out if you want some fast-paced, surprisingly intelligent historical fiction.

A Song of War by Kate Quinn, Christian Cameron, Libbie Hawker, Vicky Alvear Schecter, Russell Whitfield, Stephanie Thornton, and S.J.A. Turney.  4/5.  Another collaborative novel by the same team (give or take a few members), this tells the story of the Trojan War, from Paris and Helen’s elopement to the fall of Troy.  Again, it’s in seven parts, told from the perspectives of everyone from Odysseus to Cassandra and Philoctetes, avoiding some of the more traditional viewpoints of Hector, Paris, Helen, and Achilles.  In some ways, I found this story more engaging than that of “A Year of Ravens”.  Maybe it’s just because I’m more interested in the Greeks than the Britons, but there was something about this book that was so... tragic.  Without beating you over the head with sadness.  It was very gripping, but there was a sense of doom throughout each story.  For the most part, I found it to be pretty evenly split between the views of the Trojans and their allies and the Achaeans.  With a couple exceptions--Paris and Helen are portrayed in a really unflattering light.  I see why, and Helen had enough pathos where I... got it.  (She was Helen by the way of Cersei, in my opinion.)  But the characterization of Paris bothered me.  It seemed pretty shallow, and honestly I’m kind of tired of Paris being portrayed in a straightforward, cowardly manner. His backstory lends itself to some really interesting issues, and I feel like the traditional “ugh Paris stealing women and shooting people with arrows nOT FIGHITNG LIKE  A MAN” reeks of toxic masculinity.  On the other hand, Achilles, who usually is either glorified to hell or trashed, gets a really nuanced depiction here.  I kind of just wanted everyone to get that, and for the most part a lot of people did; so the whole “pretty snakelike girly man archer Paris” thing really stood out as weaker characterization.  He doesn’t have to be great, but like... I don’t know, isn’t there something compelling about someone who’d be smart enough to take everyone out via arrows but dumb enough to start a war over Helen?  Just my take.  With all that being said, I still really enjoyed the book and recommend it to anyone who’s interested in the Trojan War and fast-paced historical fiction.

The Confessions of Young Nero by Margaret George.  1/5.  This is the fictionalized beginning of Nero’s life, from his first memory to his second marriage--and it’s actually going to continue with a sequel, which needless to say I will not be reading.  Honestly, I think I’m done with Margaret George.  I love her “Memoirs of Cleopatra” and really like “Helen of Troy”.  But I couldn’t stand this book.  I won’t pretend to be an expert on Nero, and maybe he wasn’t as bad as he’s cracked up to be...  But I’m also pretty sure that he wasn’t the constant victim George presents in this book.  At like, three, this kid is critiquing the political moves and morality of Messalina.  (Who is presented in a stereotypical manner, as is Agrippina the Younger.)  He’s never the one at fault; people always do things without his permission, especially if they’re female.  (Excepting his lover, Acte, who I assume was an original character?)  The thing is that as this is a fictional autobiography, Nero not being aware of his own faults makes sense, especially if he’s mad.  But George does the same thing here that she did with her “The Autobiography of Henry VIII”--except she might take it further here, it’s been a while since I’ve read the older book.  Even when we see the perspectives of others, they’re just like “poor Nero, being led astray by X vile woman”.  And I just...  He’s the fucking emperor, let’s get real about how much responsibility he may or may not have had.  It was boring at some points and offensive at others, and honestly, I’m kind of disturbed by how eager George is to leap to the defense of powerful men who victimized and killed the less privileged.

Love and Gelato by Jenna Evans Welch.  2/5.  Upon the death of her mother, teenage Lina is sent to Florence, Italy, to live with Howard--the father she’s never before met.  Soon after her arrival, she not only meets a boy--the charming Ren--but is given her mother’s journal, which should answer the questions of what happened prior to Lina’s conception, and why her mother never told her about Howard.  Basically, I expected a fun, beachy read from this.  The author apparently spent her high school years in Florence, which to me added a certain level of authenticity--in theory.  Maybe her Florence was different from mine; but nothing about this fault authentic.  Especially the part in which Howard took Lina to a pizzeria right outside the Duomo.  I don’t buy a guy who’s lived in Florence for nearly two decades giving a girl her first pizza at the Duomo.  I went to a pizzeria outside the Duomo once and literally had pizza in Piazza del Duomo again.  Aside from that snobby little gripe, I found Lina pretty irritating--yes, she was going through a lot, but she seemed to be super dismissive of the experience of living in Florence--and I guessed the twist like...  Thirty pages in?  Maybe others would enjoy this, but it’s not for me.

Book of the Month: A Year of Ravens.

[wrathful-women-warriors-blog]

Blog 5: Harassment

What these game developers seem to not understand is by making all these girl characters appear over sexualized, they’re indirectly harming the self-esteems of the malleable girls who play their games. (DISCLAIMER: I am referring to a certain group of people who fall under the categories about to be spoken of. Not all female/ male gamers are like this, but some good chunks are which is why this needs to be spoken about). It’s obvious that in one way they do so is by creating a world where every female has the “perfect body” and is beautiful, these girls with less than solid self-esteems will compare themselves to these fictional women and see that there’s something not adding up. They might question why their hair isn’t as long and shiny, or their breasts as big and bouncy, or their stomachs and flat and toned, or why they can’t their real life prince charming. There are definitely girls out there like myself who aren’t as susceptible to such images, but for those who are, it’s a tragic day when they begin to believe they’re not good enough because Mileena from Mortal Kombat over there has unnaturally large breasts with a body builder’s body.  The worst part is that it also influences the male audience too. Constantly seeing the sexism in the portrayal of female characters starts to resonate with their malleable minds, causing them to think that Mileena over there is what their real life counterparts are supposed to look like. It’s pathetic really. Especially when they begin to think it’s okay to harass female gamers playing the same game in one of two ways. They either learn from the hypermasculinized male characters they play as and suddenly think they’re the same being; taking whatever testosterone lacking rage they have and direct it to undeserving female gamers by barking derogatory comments. Some classics include, “Go make me a sandwich”, “You belong in the kitchen”, “This is a boy’s game; get out of here”. I am aware of how foolish this sounds, but  this isn’t made up stereotypical content that fits this blog, these are actual words from the foolish brains who believe in such hateful comments that I personally, along with countless other female gamers have experienced. The other route to harassment boys take are that of learning from the over sexualized female characters. These people think that’s what real female gamers want and / or have, causing them to bark sexual comments. It is truly one of the grimiest things I’ve ever experienced.  I’ve been told that I’m only playing this game because I’m an attention w***e and I should go back to the kitchen while simultaneously being told that I must be super attractive since I’m a girl playing a video game and because of that they want to have sex with me. I have never met these people before. They don’t know anything about me yet keep commenting all these repulsive remarks at me (and that was the censored version). How does someone do that to anyone, let alone someone they don’t even know? It’s disgusting. Here’s one on the thousands of videos you can find that accurately represents just a sliver of the sexist comments female gamers receive on a daily basis. It’s the way these game developers are creating their characters that is giving these males the false belief that they have any right to treat their female counterparts (who may even be better at the game than themselves) any lesser than what they hold themselves up to be.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5n0MOAfelSI&ab_channel=nweatherservice