Transfixed is a trans and genderqueer erotic comics anthology that collects over 200 pages of brand-new stories, all exploring the fantastical worlds of fairy tales!
Title: Taproot
Creators: Format: EBook Print
Color: Color
Romanceiness: Romantic Elements
Heat: PG13
Tags: paranormal gay queer fantasy
Creators: Format: EBook Print
Color: Color
Romanceiness: Romantic Elements
Heat: PG13
Tags: paranormal gay queer fantasy
Where to Buy or Read:
Buy it at your local shop!
Synopsis from the Creator:
Blue is having a hard time moving on. He’s in love with his best friend. He’s also dead. Luckily, Hamal can see ghosts, leaving Blue free to haunt him to his heart’s content. But something eerie is happening in town, leaving the local afterlife unsettled, and when Blue realizes Hamal’s strange ability may be putting him in danger, Blue has to find a way to protect him, even if it means… leaving him.
Love In Panels' Review:
This review is a bit late, since the 6 year old living in this household stole my copy of TAPROOT and ran off with it for a week. When I finally snagged it back and immersed myself in the beautiful, eerie world that Keezy Young created, I completely understood the 6 year old's urge to read it over and over.
Pitched as "a story about a gardener and a ghost," TAPROOT is part love story, part ghost story, part spooky fantasy. If, like me, you don't love horror but do love Halloween, this book is perfect for the season. There's a lot of eeriness to be had, particularly when Blue (the ghostie) starts being pulled through the veil. Said eeriness is balanced with beautiful verdant plant imagery and a sweet love story that transcends the limits of space and physical vitality. Without giving a spoiler, I'll warn romance readers that the HEA isn't what you probably expect/hope for in a romance.
You'll notice that I let my 6 year old read it - it's definitely something you can give to kids to read. There's a kiss, there's a bit of spooky, and some peril at one point, but it's very cute and the ghosties are kids and teens.
As for the art, you can get a pretty clear idea of Keezy Young's style based on the cover. The book is in color, with a palette of greens and browns and a muted blue that suit the book's themes of nature and life. It's a style that will either appeal to readers or be sort of "meh," and I think I fit into the latter category. The story, however, resonated with me enough that I eventually settled into the art style and ended up loving the book as a whole.
I've been a big fan of First Second since I started reading getting really into comics, so I'm thrilled to read this piece of news.
Faith Erin Hicks pairs a socially awkward hockey girl with an outgoing, confident drama boy in her latest YA graphic novel. Alix loves hockey, but her teammates... not so much. Team Captain Lindsay is a bully and none of the other girls stand up for Alix for fear of Lindsay turning on them next. Classic toxic high school behavior. One day something in Alix flips and she punches Lindsay. She's horrified by her behavior and, most of all, the fact that she didn't seem to be in control of herself at all.
The Princess and the Grilled Cheese Sandwich is almost exactly what the cover suggests: a whimsical queer romance with lots of cheese.
While everyone else was busy theorizing about Alexander Hamilton and John Laurens, Josh Trujillo and Levi Hastings were captivated by the story of Baron von Steuben, a Prussian military strategist--and kind of a con man, tbh--who played a pivotal role in the American Revolutionary War. Washington's Gay General: The Legends and Loves of Baron von Steuben is the expansion of Trujillo's much shorter comic at The Nib and is a much more thorough biography supplemented with author commentary, historical context and the inclusion of other figures of the time.
Thanks to Shop Your Shelves, I finally read Life of Melody, by Mari Costa. It's everything I hoped it would be.
Way back in 2018, I wrote a post about Merfolk in Romance and included what was then a webtoon publishing on Tapas, The Sea in You. Five years later--dang, I've been at this for a while--Iron Circus is publishing it in all its sapphic underwater glory! This full-color book is out in March, 2023.
When folks come to me looking for high quality erotic comics (this is more frequent than you might think), I almost always point them toward Iron Circus Comics' Smut Peddler series. These are giant collections of just-long-enough comics full of consent and joy, pining and hope, diverse bodies and identities and more. They're often weird, unique or thought-provoking. In all, they're good smutty fun.
Money Shot is a classic case of an entertaining premise falling apart after the first few issues. Without doing any research, I suspect that the creative team had planned out one arc and then the series was successful enough that they got more issues and just flailed about for a while. All that said, the first trade is very funny and appropriately porny.
Sigh. Chef's Kiss is pretty to look at (art below) but it's really shallowly developed. The opening scenes consist of Ben moving in with three roommates shortly after graduating from college. He applies to and interviews for lots of writing and editing jobs before stumbling upon a job opening at a nearby vegetarian restaurant. Thus begins a drawn out plot in which Ben has to cook three existing dishes and develop one new one for the restaurant and get approval of the chef's pig, Watson.
