Singular Justice

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The Good and the Bad of LGBT Representation in TV and Film

As of May 2019, there are seventy-one countries that outlaw same-sex relations . Twenty-seven nations grant rights to individuals of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, and Queer, or LGTBQ community . In June 2019, the American non-profit organization Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, or GLAAD, published a survey that showed that, despite the idea that the younger generations of America are more progressive, younger people are becoming less accepting of LGBTQ individuals and lifestyles . Could more representation of these individuals help with acceptance? At least one historical fantasy author, Katlyn Gonzalez , says that it could. According to her the impact of seeing positive, well-rounded representations of queer characters is that “people will be more willing to accept them. It's hard to accept the things you don't understand. If it's something you see often enough it becomes normalized.” As a pan woman, Gonzalez says that “really

Review On: Foundation's Edge (Foundation #4) by Isaac Asimov

Foundation's Edge by Isaac Asimov My rating: 3 of 5 stars Firstly, as something of a disclaimer, I never read Foundation , or Foundation and Empire , or Second Foundation . I suppose the book prepared me for that because it opens with a prologue that talks about the fall of the Galactic Empire and how Hari Seldon orchestrated the establishment of the First Foundation, focusing o technological advancement and overall physical science and the shadowy psychic Second Foundation and the former's imperialistic conquest and the history of the story, so I am able to understand the book by itself. We have Golan Trevize, who believes that because things are running so smoothly according to the Seldon Plan, in an of itself one complex long game plan to reduce the human misery that Seldon predicted between the fall of one empire and the start of another, that another group must be running the show. While he thinks it's the Second Foundation, the Second Foundation, specifically Sto

Review On: The Summer Children (The Collector, #3) by Dot Hutchison

The Summer Children by Dot Hutchison My rating: 4 of 5 stars The Summer Children is the third installment in Dot Hutchinson's " Collector Trilogy ", though apparently, the author has decided to turn it into a series with a fourth book . Cool. I wondered after The Gardener what there was left to tell and Hutchinson gave us Priya Sravasti's story, intermingled with the sour Agent Eddison who we met from the first novel and appearances from Inara and Bliss, connecting the three girls through their shared trauma. Instead of introducing yet another damaged heroine, The Summer Children explores the story of an established character, Mercedes Ramirez, an agent working with Eddison and Victor Hanoverian who was, well, present in The Butterfly Garden. We aren't told much about her character then beyond the sad smile she gives Inara, hinting at her own trauma. The Summer Children delivered on that hint, by having Mercedes at the center of a case involving a serial kil

Review On: Dark Ages: Ravnos (Dark Ages Clan Novel, #6) by Sarah Roark

Dark Ages: Ravnos by Sarah Roark My rating: 3 of 5 stars Dark Ages: Ravnos begins where young Zoe's story left off in Dark Ages: Setite . Her sire was horrifically murdered by the Church and neither Andreas nor Meribah, the two she had grown closest to beyond Gregory, will aid or support her in her revenge. So she goes off to claim it for herself. Like the VTM: Victorian Age Trilogy , a lot of the story takes place from the perspective of a fledgling vampire. While I've read about 20 of these VTM books, my first introduction to the franchise was through the game VTM: Bloodlines , where you played as a baby vamp. As such, I definitely feel a deeper connection to neonates like Regina Blake and Zoe. Of course, that could be because, unlike older vampires like Lucita , Zoe has a strong tie to her humanity. While the characters of the preceding novel, Lasombra, felt rather hollow beyond their machinations, Zoe's conflict feels more real and more personal. She lost someon

Review On: Evil Earths

Evil Earths by Brian W. Aldiss My rating: 3 of 5 stars Evil Earths is an anthology that belonged to my Dad and one I found stored in the garage during my moving process, the copy so old the front and back covers were missing as well as anything past the latter half of William Tenn's "Down Among the Dead". As such I can only review some of the stories here, starting with Chad Oliver's and Charles Beaumont's "The Last Word." The story starts with a, uh, physicist? calmly noting his time machine has sent him so far into the future he found himself as the Last Man in the World, so he decides to go back so far he finds himself as the First Man in the World. The creation of humanity is apparently theorized here as having something to do with Martians, green men who leave him with a fifties housewife in an android body as a reward for him fixing their ship. Yep, a man helps some other dudes out and they actually reward him with a woman. With whom he has a

Creators on LGBTQ Representation

Fantasy author Neil Gaiman once said in his lecture “Why Our Future Depends on Libraries, Reading and Daydreaming” delivered for The Reading Agency “You learn that everyone else out there is a me, as well. You’re being someone else.” By consuming stories about “everyone else” readers, viewers, gamers and anybody who engages any type of fiction, they have the potential to cultivate empathy for these other people. According to Gaiman, “Empathy is a tool for building people into groups, for allowing us to function as more than self-obsessed individuals.” This is one of the primary reasons the representation of marginalized groups like the queer community is so important. Beyond allowing for the fostering of empathy in audiences, these portrayals also give readers and viewers a way to see themselves in fiction , which provides an avenue through which to connect to characters on a personal level. Through comic book anthologies like Crush: First Love, New Talent , this representation