16 Favs of 2016

In real life, 2016 was kind of hard, in books and movies 2016 was awesome! So here is my list of my 16 favorite things from 2016 in no particular order.

1.Harry Potter and the Cursed Child  I loved reading a new Harry Potter book after years of thinking the journey was over. Actually celebrating the midnight release with friends of mine was an added bonus experience that left me really happy.

2.Miraculous Ladybug; my friend Rachelle showed me this neat French-Korean cartoon known as Miraculous Ladybug and I like it. It does follow some cheesy predictable story lines and it obviously isn’t meant to be seen by an adult like me. But it’s a fun neat show and it looks amazing.

3.Suicide Squad; I know it’s not amazing, but it’s so much better than Batman vs Superman. I think my reason for liking it alot was because I went in with low expectations to the movie and was delighted to see how campy and weird everything turned out to be. Everything was good except for Jared Leto Joker.

4. Star Wars Ahsoka I’ve mentioned that Ahsoka Tano is awesome and reading her book was a great experience to bridge the events of Clone Wars/Revenge of the Sith and Star Wars Rebels/Rogue One. Speaking of which

5. Rogue One A Star Wars Story, this movie awesome. It was a good balance between drama, comedy, and brought us to a point of view that hasn’t really been seen in the Star Wars universe.

6.The Cancellation of Disney Infinity; I realize how awful this sounds and I was really sad when I realized I’d never get my Hera or Belle/Emma Watson Disney Infinity figures, but financially this was great news to hear.

7. Ghostbusters, I liked it, just forgot to review it. It was fun, quirky, no there was no “woo feminism” message. It was a Ghostbusters movie and I liked it.

8. The Little Prince film, it was good and very thoughtful. Plenty of beautiful visuals to see, and it’s for viewing on Netflix.

9. Voltron, yes ANOTHER Voltron series, it is also on Netflix, just don’t accidentally marathon on it.

10. Stranger Things, lots of delicious 80’s references in it, very well written with lots of questions unanswered in the best way possible, also available on Netflix.

11.  Sailor Moon Crystal Season 3; ok technically this is tv and I know for a fact that unless I’m reviewing episodes weekly, reviewing tv shows lowers the property value. But I got into art and drawing because of Sailor Moon so seeing the third arc adapted into anime and to have such a beautiful job done with it too.

12. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was a wonderful movie experience, and this is coming from someone who wasn’t as fond of the Harry Potter movies in comparison to the books. I also happen to like that the good people of Hot Topic have made making a Newt Scamander cosplay costume very easy.

13. The books and authors I discovered because of my friend Sam and the event Texas Teen Book Festival. I haven’t been able to finish up my list, but with this new year I sincerely hope to. Also meeting Cody Wagner, he’s very neat (kind of dreamy) and yes this is another encouragement to buy and read The Gay Teen’s Guide to Defeating a Siren.

14. Zootopia, it was a neat movie that was fun.

15. When Marnie was There, this, like all other Studio Ghibli movies was a beautiful movie. Not just beautiful to look at, but the mystery of the story and the exploration of different types of love and how strong the emotion is makes it worth watching and enjoying. Yes I realize this film was released in 2015, but the dub wasn’t released until 2016.

16. Being told there’s a tomorrow; alot of shitty things have happened in 2016, but thanks to strong words and messages from various people, some of them being Youtubers, some of them being actors and actresses, some of them being singers and song writers, and many of them being authors telling us that there is a tomorrow and we if someone lets shitty things get to them then the shit wins. So fans are encouraged to follow in the examples of all the fiction that has been read and all the awesome people who have a stronger voice saying no to the not so happy parts of 2016.

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“I Drowned in Moonlight Strangled by my Own Bra”

I didn’t want to do a blog post on Carrie Fisher, I didn’t want to be a public mourner, I was and am scared people will say “you’re just doing a blog post for the sake of page views”. The truth is though, I really am sad about Carrie Fisher passing away.

I met her once by chance at a convention (Dallas Fan Expo 2015); I didn’t realize who she was at the time because it was Sunday the last day of the con, my feet were exhausted, I spent a little over 300$ in three days for the first time in my life, I had just seen my former boyfriend for the first time in two years so I wasn’t in the most logical thinking mode. She was disguised with large sunglasses and a hat and I didn’t know she was short in person. I told her that her pup Gary Fisher was one of the cutest dogs every, she said thank you, and I walked away barely realizing who she was and saying to myself “shit I missed out on a free selfie with a celebrity!”

Because of this encounter, and because of four of my friends I gave being a Star Wars fan another shot. And I was happy to add this world to the number of worlds I enjoyed so much.

I could go on about my usual “woo feminism” antics that I normally do on this blog, but I’ll go on about something else. Carrie Fisher suffered from bipolar disorder, but rather than suffer from it, she learned to conquer it and let many people who live with mental health issues that there is nothing to be ashamed of. Something I wish I had known as a teenager who suffered from anxiety attacks and didn’t know who to talk to about them, or that my condition even had a name, or that it could have been treated beyond being told “it’s all in your head.”

She was awesome, witty, she had brains that came along with that pretty face and didn’t give two shits about losing her youth, beauty and gaining weight as she got older. She was someone who gained the ability to make peace with her past and embraced the future without fear and in place of that fear, joy and eagerness to see what tomorrow had to offer.

Yes I will mourn her both as Carrie Fisher and as General Leia Skywalker, but with this sadness I see a goal and a woman to look up to, who despite being born into wealth had her own life struggles and conquered them with wit and intelligence.

Thank you Carrie, even though things seem dark, scary, and sad, learning about you and your life gave me, and hopefully others something to look forward to in life and hope that our own mental struggles can be conquered (with little dogs too).

The Green Aesop

In celebration of my degree in Environmental Science I figured I’d dedicate a whole blog post to The Green Aesop. The Green Aesop is a trope that has to do with the environment. Said tvshow, movie, book, or any form of entertainment will have a message concerning the environment and how it must be protected. Most of the time it doesn’t quite work out so well; while it is easy to point fingers and say “hey this is bad for our earth, let’s create a story with a lesson,” it’s hard to make it entertaining, likable, and not frak up the message (let alone be accurate in staying true to your message).

It would be too easy and too lengthy to say “these movies/books/tv shows that try to preach about being environmentally friendly suck and are awful for this reason,” so I’m going to list a few forms of media that do a decent job of keeping the environmentally friendly message. Here is a list of shitty movies/tv episodes/seasons that are just awful. Ferngully 1 and 2 (the later does educate children a little more about how circuses mistreat animals though), The Lorax (2012 film), The Day After Tomorrow, season five of The Winx Club, and Power Rangers Wild Force (kudos for being balsy enough to kill off a kid on screen though). I’d include Epic on this list, but I haven’t seen it so I can’t exactly pass judgment on it properly.

Captain Planet

Let’s get the biggest green cartoon out of the way; Captain Planet was created by Ted Turner from Turner broadcasting and featured five teenagers with the powers of Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, and Heart. These powers were given to them by Gaia the spirit of earth, and they were all different nationalities (with one of them from the Soviet Union of all places). I will admit it’s kind of hard to not want to mock the show for taking it’s save the earth message and shoving it down your throat, even as an adult.

The series was smarter and more thoughtful than viewers gave it credit for covering topics that had to do with the extinction of an entire species in a bad future, basic human rights and needs, nukes, and just about any environment message you can think of. They even have an episode concerning over population advising all the kids watching to limit themselves to having two children.

There were a few good episodes though; the extinct species as mentioned above had to deal with a future where all gorillas just died. I caught it by chance as a kid and it was fairly meaningful to me then and still is. The possibility of existing in a future where my child asks me “what happened to all the ____” is a pretty depressing thought. There’s also an episode where the subject of technology is addressed; Dr.Blight, one of the major villains, switches bodies with the physical god Gaia because she’s a mad scientist and why not. While Dr.Blight is causing all kinds of chaos through the form of natural disasters, Gaia spends the episode trying to figure out a way to convince the planateers that her body has been stolen. It is through this experience that Gaia learns that technology can be used to help reduce and clean up pollution.

In terms of characters, three fifth’s of the planateers are pretty dull and only seem to have personalities once in a blue moon. Wheeler (who the hell names their kid Wheeler?) and Mati have the most personality with the former being a total douchebag who needs to learn a lesson most of the time and the latter being the heart of the group and the key power to forming Captain Planet. Captain Planet himself is a half naked blue man with a green mullet who makes puns while doing the dirty work for the planateers when things get a little too tough for them to handle. Gaia is their mentor and is kind of dull. All their villains are kind of weird, but they seem to fall under “let’s pollute this shit for the evuls!” and “let’s save millions by polluting in this area!” and crazy ass Dr.Blight.

The show was pretty well animated though, action packed enough to keep kids fairly entertained. The story itself can range between too cheesy, too preachy, and actually entertaining.

Humans are Not so Bad

In alot of these shows there is some emphasis from the side of the animals/nature that humans are to blame for any environmental issue and don’t care to fix the problem. In the 1939 animated feature Peace on Earth, all humans are dead and cute woodland creatures have rebuilt society on their graves. The short functions more as a warning about what war can do to our species and how we can easily be the cause of our own demise with war obviously being the main source of pollution with just a sprinkle of propaganda for Christianity. This short was created between World War I and II and could be relevant today, but someone would be offended about that little sprinkle of Christianity in there (nothing against any other religion or atheism, but seriously this modern day society would literally cry over spilled milk, being offended by that statement is proof that I am correct).

However, there are some films that show humans not being such bad people. Once Upon a Forest is one of these movies that shows that although humans are responsible for a gas leak in a forest killing some of the population, including the parents from one of the protagonists (and they stay dead too), humans did put the effort into cleaning up the mess caused by the gas leak.

The Simpsons Movie (and probably some of the 600+ episodes), does feature the citizens of Springfield put an effort to clean up their pollution thanks to one of Lisa’s more successful warnings. Some episodes do involve animal rights and it’s a fifty/fifty chance at the outcome to what happens.

As mentioned above with Captain Planet the planateers do have their elemental powers, but rather than use violence to solve anything (the most violent they got was maybe melting a door down), they provided solutions to problems presented to them. It was their job to solve the actual problem rather than kick the ass of the villain of that particular week.

Corporations (Wall-E vs The Lorax)

It’s funny how two films on complete opposite sides of good and awful sort of have the same message. Before I go on, the book of The Lorax and the first cartoon are actually really good. The 2012 film should have everyone involved with writing banished from civilization.

What Wall-E and The Lorax have in common is that all the problems are caused by big business with Wall-E literally causing the end of the world and The Lorax just having a ecosystem just totally destroyed.

I think what makes Wall-E the better film is that the primary story is a love story between two robots. True there are heavy references to the Bible (Eva is the name of Eve in some countries and one of the few named humans is Mary). The fact Earth got messed up is background noise and when the humans return to earth, rather than regret coming back to the planet, they fix things up using science and technology (and are even successful at it too.)

The problem with the Lorax film is that it doesn’t give a flying fuck about the original message. If you want a more detailed reasoning for this belief, please click the link above to a woman who reviewed and compared the book and film of The Lorax, I swear it’s just coincidental that we share many of the same views on the topic of the film. Just to list a few issues, many of the important scenes of the book are glossed over during the How Bad can I Be musical number, the film cares more on developing the character of the Onceler, the film is constantly saying “big business bad!” and we’re supposed to believe it, Zac Efron having a crush on Taylor Swift, and the fact someone thought it was a good idea to turn forest creatures into clones of the god damned minions!

The book version of The Lorax is of course darker with the Onceler giving a warning to an unnamed boy about how he destroyed the land by not listening to The Lorax. When the topic of business is brought up, the Onceler does defend himself (admitting in a ‘I don’t care’ way) he tells the Lorax that if he were to close up shop, he’d have to lay off countless workers. The book also does not have a happy ending with Dr.Seuss choosing to end the book open ended.

We Dun Fraked Up

Similar to Peace on Earth there are some sources of media where things are too messed up to recover from, a bad example being The Day After Tomorrow insisting that all of this crazy weather will pop up out of nowhere (mass extinction and an ice age don’t work like that). A good example of this would be the series finale to the Jim Henson sitcom Dinosaurs.

What starts off as accidentally destroying a habitat for native bugs for semi big business, the lead character Earl accidentally causes the end of the world with nukes, volcanoes. It’s the darkest episode of the series where the last few moments feature the Dinosaur family slowly being trapped in their home by a combination of ash and snow with Baby asking what’s going to happen to everyone. Earl say’s he doesn’t know, but is hopeful they will survive this predicament. Sadly it is heavily hinted that things will not get better and that the family, friends, and many others will perish during the events of mass extinction.

Earth Maiden Arjuna and X/1999

This thirteen episode anime Earth Maiden Arjuna is sort of like Captain Planet meets Sailor Moon, minus the fun parts of Sailor Moon, and going to dark places Captain Planet was not willing to go. After dying a teenage girl named Juna is offered the chance to return to life after being given a future of current and future travesties to befall the earth. Juna becomes a magical guardian of Earth. Topics of climate change and humanity is brought up, and in the trailer for this anime it’s even mentioned that humans are just temporary parts of life on earth and will one day die with the earth living on without humanity.

X/1999 is the total opposite of Captain Planet with Earth being a living entity and having the Dragons of Earth act to destroy humanity for the sake of Earth living on because humans have caused so much pollution and waste. To counter this, the Dragons of Heaven counter attack the Dragons of Earth and argue that humanity can change it’s ways and that it is possible for earth and humanity to co-exist and recover. Instead of concentrating on “hey let’s recycle these coke bottles because it allows us to reuse them in a new way” X/1999 focuses more on the humanity part of the subject with the members of the dragons of heaven being from various faith backgrounds and life backgrounds giving reasons on why human life is worth saving to the dragons of earth.

Studio Ghibli

Studio Ghibli is an animation company out of Japan that makes amazing movies, sometimes with an environmental message subtle (like pulling a bike out of a polluted river in Spirited Away) to being the main theme of the story (Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind and Princess Mononoke). The studio may be successful in these endeavors because both the message and the story are taken into consideration and are properly prioritized without one overtaking the other.

Instead of repeating the same story over and over, different approaches are made to each story. Nausicaa has more to do with survival in a world where a toxic jungle is slowly spreading over the land and giant bugs run around. The movie is based off a manga and covers the first two volumes with interesting views. Princess Mononoke has more to do with the expansion industrialization causing the destruction of nature and finding a balance between humanity and nature.

Honorable Mentions

Before I finish this up, I’d like to have some honorable mentions on tv episodes and books that did a decent job with an environmental message; the Futurama movie Into the Wild Green Yonder, The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe from Doctor Who, Extras by Scott Westerfeld, Zanzibar from Rocko’s Modern Life, and episode 23 of Animaniacs.

How do you write a good Green Aesop

I don’t know; it’s a topic where one has to intake many sides to a conflict humanity faces to fully understand, and then actually make it entertaining. I can say that keeping things fairly real and honest is a good approach. Sure songs about wanting a tree to live, cute critters running around, and using magic for the sake of sparing the feelings of a child sounds like a good idea, but it’s not a good thing to say. It is the responsibility of humanity to monitor the current situation we are in, educate ourselves on what other people on this planet are facing, find out WHY big business is considered a villain in all of this and how to reduce the waste we produce, how to to re-use as much as we can, and how to recycle things we don’t use. (oh gosh I have no idea if my professors would frown upon this or love it.)

Rogue One A Star Wars Story Review

Finally got around to seeing Rogue One a Star Wars Story, the reason why it took me a while to see it is because I had a final last Thursday and received my diploma last Friday thus making me a college graduate. Before I continue on with the review just let me say I am now a very relieved person to have finished such a long journey in my life. Okay on with the review.

As someone who returned to the Star Wars fandom and franchise a year ago I was excited about Rogue One, but knew what to expect. Despite the fears of many fans of the original Star Wars universe this new universe under Disney is not lighter and softer, and Rogue One is by far one of the darkest parts of the new Star Wars canon. Rogue One takes place from a new point of view in the Star Wars universe; with the original trilogy concentrating primarily on Luke, Leia, Han Solo, and their allies we didn’t see much of the actual rebellion. The prequel trilogy showed us the descent of Anakin Skywalker from Jedi prodigy to Darth Vader. Clone Wars showed the many adventures of the Jedi and Clones during the Clone Wars along with actual political stuff and the side effects of war on a person’s psychological life (poor Barriss and Ahsoka…) and Rebels showed us what it was like to be a civilian during the strong days of Empire. Rogue One shows us an actual war; no lightsabers, no cute woodland critters to help you out, just lazers, blasters, and people dying.

Spoilers from this point onward

So things are pretty dark in Rogue One, those familiar with the tv show Star Wars Rebels should know what to expect, also take into consideration the fact this is the first time we ever hear of any of these characters for the first time to know their final fates. Speaking of Star Wars Rebels, I was very happy to see The Ghost and Chopper hanging out and that Hera Syndulla has been promoted to general in the rebel alliance. I had theorized Rogue One would be a ‘series finale’ of sorts to Star Wars Rebels in the sense that it was the last story of the rebels before the first real victory for the rebel alliance with the destruction of the death star.

I thought the film itself was interesting; it showed that in this new canon there were people outside of the Jedi and Sith who did believe in the force and had a form of organized religion with it using the characters Chirrut Imwe and Baze Malbus to show devout practitioners of the religion (Chirrut) and those who had fallen from the faith (Baze), but stick around because they’re bffs with the religious friend. It kind of confirms a theory I’ve had that all characters in the Star Wars universe are connected through the force, but don’t have to be jedi or sith to have the force work through them with Chirrut relying both on his heightened senses and the force to guide him despite being blind.

There are also our two main protagonists Jyn Erso and Cassian Andor; there was some controversy among fans that Disney was using Star Wars to promote a new wave of feminism since once again the hero is a heroin for this new Star Wars film; perhaps they are, but I’d like to point out Disney has had live action films prior to the purchasing of Star Wars that were gender neutral with female leads (it hasn’t been that long since Tomorrowland). And to those who are complaining, you had Luke and Han be the heroes for the first three movies, Anakin Angst through the second trilogy, and Clone Wars  and Rebels were/are totally badass with both genders.

Otherwise I feel Jyn was a flat character at times with her biggest characterization being that she loves and misses her dad. Nothing wrong with that, I’m just showing mercy because I’m really close with my dad too. I do like her development from someone who wanted to be left alone to someone who led a small team of volunteer rebels in a suicide mission to steal the death star plans and jumpstarts the first victory of the rebellion.

Cassian was a child soldier turned adult who brought up other things never mentioned in previous Star Wars media. The rebels did get it’s hand dirty; while on Star Wars Rebels the goal of the beginning stages of the rebellion was to aid those in need, Cassian admits to assassinating members of the empire and that the rebellion has done it’s fair share of evil deeds.

I’m actually really happy there was no romance between Jyn and Cassian, granted one can’t help but enjoy seeing Diego Luna in that imperial uniform. Towards the end of the film there is a hint at something, but I won’t spoil that for you all.

Speaking of the end of the film, didn’t see that coming! Also kudos to Disney for doing a great job with cgi.

I give Rogue One A Star Wars Story four Chopper cameos out of five.

 

 

My Problem With “Coming Out” Stories

I’ve said many times that I am not fond of coming out stories. They aren’t bad stories, and when I was younger I read a few of them and enjoyed them. I understand why lgbt youth would like these stories because it gives them something to relate to. Having a secret that must be kept out of fear of alienation from loved ones and peers is a big deal and can end with family and loved ones accepting you as you are, learning to love your difference, or downright throwing you out of the house.

Good Golly, This Shit Again?

It makes sense to me that whenever the main protagonist in mainstream media is gay that this is the primary conflict of the story since it allows readers/watchers who aren’t part of the lgbt community to get an idea of what it is like to be in the shoes of someone who isn’t straight.

However this brings the problem that I have mentioned and danced around in many blog posts/essays. It becomes a gimmick; while lgbt fiction and culture can still have a coming out part of a story, it wouldn’t take up the whole story or series. It would be one portion the protagonists life, then the protagonist will move on and do other things. In mainstream media outside of the lgbt category this is not the case.

An example I will use is the movie Gay Best Friend; I watched it on Netflix, thought it was hilarious, and I was pleased that the movie went deeper than what I expected out of a teen comedy. There was still the main conflict of coming out of the closet and how that action had waves of chain reactions because the main protagonist was accidentally and unwillingly outed as gay. Although the main protagonist does claim get over the fact his peers know he is gay, it is the primary source of conflict between him and those responsible for his outing towards the end of the second act and even after is only fully resolved at the end of the film.

The Proper Way to Handle a Coming out Story (your mileage may vary)

I feel this type of story works out better on tv rather than movies or books; my two main examples will be the shows Ugly Betty and Glee. On Ugly Betty there were quite a few lgbt characters on the show; Marc St.James, Justin Suarez, Alexis Mead (behold a trans character no one made a big deal about in the year 2006!), and a few more. At the time of it’s premier only Marc and his love interests could officially be slated as gay since it was still a taboo for someone as young as Justin’s character to be officially stated as gay so the topic of his sexuality was danced around, but never confirmed until season 4. My guess is since Justin was in highschool things became more fair game for the character.

At first Justin states he isn’t gay with Marc (he’s kind of his mentor and a close friend despite being much older than Justin) understanding Justin’s situation and being patient with Justin as he talked about his feelings towards both genders and his friendships with characters that are barely ever mentioned. When it was announced Ugly Betty was cancelled it was pretty obvious the writers decided to stop giving shits about people in the audience getting offended and had Justin make out with a boy. Bonus points for everyone in Justin’s family knowing the whole time and very excitedly willingly to throw him a coming out party (even Marc is happy to see the Suarez family is so loving of Justin and proud of him despite being pissed off with them more or less wanting Justin to confirm his sexuality).

With Glee, we had Kurt, goodness he is gayer than Christmas. He was sarcastic, wore clothes that ranged from cool to ‘wha’ regularly and had an easier time “coming out” on television thanks to Ugly Betty. While Glee did premier during the last season of Ugly Betty, the later show did lay some groundwork that would make things Glee did easier to do on tv (do you REALLY think Glee would/could have had Kurt and Blaine’s intense makeout session had Justin and Austin not had theirs one year before?)

I admit there were times I found Kurt very annoying primarily because at the start of the show he was more or less the gay stereotype that viewers are supposed to see and say “oh, they’re gay! I didn’t have to think about it.” His coming out to his dad in the first season was very touching though. With Kurt’s dad behaving very loving unconditionally towards his son from that point onward to the end of the series even sticking up for Kurt when Kurt was doing something inappropriate (not cool pushing yourself on Finn when he has politely stated he is not gay and not interested countless times, thank goodness that gets addressed too.)

Like in Gay Best Friend there are waves of side affects that result in Kurt coming out of the closet that lead to bullying, harassment, and other characters growing and developing complete with Kurt more or less ditching the gay stereotype he started out as by the end of the series.

There’s also the character Santana’s own coming out story that started out as a throwaway gag of her having sex with her best friend. Not much detail is given concerning how her parents react outside of “yeah, they’re cool with it,” but she was outed by accident and things more or less go ok for her outside of her grandmother having very strict religious beliefs that “girls belong with boys, not other girls”.

I’d like to make special mention to the ABC Family show Greek; I didn’t see much of it (I just didn’t care to watch it) but there was a gay character with no gay traits who did have a very well handled coming out arc and developed past coming out from that point on. Feel free to correct me on this internet.

Other Media

My reasoning for saying television is the best way to have a coming out story is because it allows the character to stay in main focus and have the coming out arc then move past said arc and grow as a character without said conflict being the whole purpose of the character.

While this is possible in books, I have read few mainstream books where the main protagonist is gay, comes out, and does something other than come out as gay. Movies are even harder because more than likely you only have ninety to a hundred and twenty minutes of story to go through and having the protagonist “come out” can take up more time than expected with the possibility that said action can become the main conflict of a movie.

I’ve reviewed the books The Gay Teen’s Guide to Defeating a Siren and Will Grayson Will Grayson and I was very happy with how it was handled. In Will Grayson Will Grayson ‘coming out’ as an arc is treated like taking off a bandaid, quick. It allowed Will to move beyond that conflict and for other conflicts to be explored concerning love and relationships in terms of romance, friendship, and agape.

As I said in my review of The Gay Teen’s Guide to Defeating a Siren after the main character is outed as gay and goes to sanctuary prep and neat shenanigans happen from that point on. Although I dreaded the coming out portion it was there as the main plot point to set the story in motion and yes echos are felt from the protagonist coming out as gay.

 

If You’re so Knowledgeable then Why Don’t YOU do a Coming Out Story?

I have said previously that the book I am working on right now will not have a coming out plot. In the process of writing this blog post I have realized that really is an asshole thing of me to say I won’t do a coming out story. No I won’t add a coming out part to the story I am working on, but that doesn’t mean I will never do a coming out story.

Maybe later on I will find a way for myself to write a story where coming out is just one event in a protagonist’s tale and move on past it with the character able to grow beyond that event.

Once again please look up and purchase The Gay Teen’s Guide to Defeating a Siren, it is a great story, I have met the author and have had fun facebook conversations with him.