0Comment
Sep02
It has been the most trying two months of my life, this year. I haven’t been posting or Tweeting too much because I never know if our son will read my posts, and it’s our wish to keep him safe. Not a great idea to convey bad news to a young soldier on the field of combat in Afghanistan, so the news creeps from the shadowed, cobwebby corners after all is said and done, and hopefully happily resolved.
On August 24th I lost one of my best friends, a woman my partner and I knew for almost 20 years, whom our son knew as Aunt Kathy. She’d been having a series of strokes, and one afternoon in June she fell to another and was rushed to the hospital. In the emergency room she had the final one, and coded. Kathy went into a coma from which she never recovered. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Aug30
Prism Comics Queer Press Grant Deadline is September 15
on August 30th, 2010Posted In: news
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading ...
PRISM COMICS QUEER PRESS GRANT DEADLINE IS SEPTEMBER 15TH
SAN FRANCISCO, CA—Prism Comics is proud to announce that submissions are still being accepted for the 2010 Prism Comics Queer Press Grant, with a deadline of September 15th, 2010. The QPG was established by Prism to assist in the publication and promotion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender comics.
“The Queer Press Grant continues to be one of the most significant grants dedicated to supporting independent comic books,” says Justin Hall, Prism’s Talent Relations Chair. “The Grant is given to a cartoonist, comics writer/artist or team working on a project with LGBT characters or themes, to assist them in publishing a new project or expanding an existing one. Since 2005, the annual Grant has provided recipients with a substantial sum of money, which has varied according to our fundraising efforts; for the past two years, we have awarded $2000, our highest Grant amount, and hope to continue to increase the amount with the generosity of our donors. ” ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Jul11
Rainbow Reviews: House of the Muses 1
on July 11th, 2010Posted In: news
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...House of Muses Book 1: The Phokaian by Pam Harrison
Lesbian Book Reviews » Comics, Lesbian Book Reviews » Historical
TITLE: House of Muses Book 1: The PhokaianAUTHOR: Pam Harrison
ISBN: 978-0-9816-5000-5
PUBLISHER: Sword & Labrys Productions
READ THIS BOOK
RATING: 
Review by ChrisP
28 views
BOOK BLURB:
Mnasidika of Sparta, adopted into the house of Athenaios, witnesses the goings on at a Symposium welcoming Peisandros, Athenaios’ banished nephew, back into the family as a business partner. The welcome turns sour when Peisandros hints that his uncle is instead the responsible party for the murder that got him banished from Athens, and only welcomes him home now to ease his guilt. Athenaios and Isthia’s plans for Dika’s marriage are threatened when she meets the lovely Timas of Phokaia, an unexpected guest at the Symposium.
BOOK REVIEW:
Harrison has presented a tale of historical fiction. The story begins in ancient Greece when Sapphos was writing her Ennead. Mnasidika, Dika, as she is nicknamed in the book, is the author of a poem found among Sapphos’ work. According to the introduction, the work is destroyed by the church for its immoral content. The poem is about an immortal love between two women. Harrison uses that premise to weave the plot in this 9 part graphic novel.
“The Phokaian” is the first in the 9 part series. Harrison introduces Dika as the principle character and the Phokaian, Timas, is introduced in this book. Through a series of flashbacks and memories, Dika deals with a promised betrothal with a business associate of Athenaois, Dika’s guardian. She meets Timas during a business visit from another associate of Athenois, all this while dealing with her preference for female lovers and despising the male candidate, Euripates. Her slave, Niobi, is a foil for more of her discoveries detailed in several pages of monologue relating the experiences that made Dika what she is today.
The society depicted here demonstrates many relevant issues for teens and twenties today, some of interest to students of Ancient Greek history. There is open slavery, sexuality and homosexuality. However, the characters deal with the same issues of abandonment, self-respect and self-esteem that a modern western teenager would deal with (Dika is almost 15 years of age in the story).
Read the rest of this review at this link.
Jul03
Pam Harrison Interviews Co-Winners of the 2010 Prism Comics Queer Press Grant
on July 3rd, 2010Posted In: news
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...
Ed Luce, left, and Eric Orner, winners of the 2010 Prism Comics Queer Press Grant
Wuvable Oaf, copyright Ed Luce
San Francisco, CA—At WonderCon 2010, Prism Comics announced the recipients of this year’s Queer Press Grant: It’s A Tie! The grant is being awarded to both Ed Luce for his submission, Wuvable Oaf and to Eric Orner for his submission, Storybox. Prism Comics, which supports LGBT comics, creators, issues and readers, established the Queer Press Grant to encourage the publication of LGBT themed comics.
“The extremely high quality of submissions this year resulted in a vote so close, it came down to an exact tie,” said Justin Hall, Prism’s Talent
Relations Chair and previous Queer Press Grant winner for Glamazonia, “with Eric Orner, an old-time pro in the world of queer comics, taking his work in a new and fascinating direction, and Ed Luce, one of the brightest new lights in queer indie comics, having made a big splash in only a couple of years on the scene.”
Read more!
Pam Harrison Interviews Co-Winners of the 2010 Prism Comics Queer Press Grant.
Ed Luce, left, and Eric Orner, winners of the 2010 Prism
Comics Queer Press Grant
San Francisco, CA—At WonderCon 2010, Prism Comics announced the recipients of this year’s Queer Press Grant: It’s A Tie! The grant is being awarded to both Ed Luce for his submission, Wuvable Oaf and to Eric Orner for his submission, Storybox. Prism Comics, which supports LGBT comics, creators, issues and readers, established the Queer Press Grant to encourage the publication of LGBT themed comics.
“The extremely high quality of submissions this year resulted in a vote so close, it came down to an exact tie,” said Justin Hall, Prism’s Talent Relations Chair and previous Queer Press Grant winner for Glamazonia, “with Eric Orner, an old-time pro in the world of queer comics, taking his work in a new and fascinating direction, and Ed Luce, one of the brightest new lights in queer indie comics, having made a big splash in only a couple of years on the scene.”
Eric Orner is a cartoonist, illustrator and animation artist. His comic strip, The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green, one o
Jul01
Couture Shock: Aftermath of the Wonder Woman Makeover
on July 1st, 2010Posted In: news
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...
Wonder Woman #600, Courtesy DC Comics
I was just as surprised as everyone else was. Wonder Woman was getting a complete overhaul. My God, how could they? I’d been reading Wonder Woman since I was a small child–I even remember the shortlived “Mod” phase! Some of my cousins loaned them to me in 1970 after I’d started reading Supergirl, and my first thought was, ugh, those clothes….
I had my share of misgivings, but some opinions on this event were downright nasty. Some of the comments were fun:
“When did Wonder Woman join the X-Men??”
“Fact: New Wonder Woman costume redesign comes complete with Ace of Base discography.”
“It won’t last, so I won’t sweat it.”
“Oh, I detest it. Evenmoreso, the attempt to ‘Dark & Gritty’ her up. They keep trying it and it keeps failing.”
“Hotter if you ask me but I suffer from testosterone poisoning…”
Wonder Woman’s costume IS so infused into our understanding of the identity of the character, as Jim Lee mentions later, that it was amazing how passionate some of the comments could be.
I followed a number of the comment boards all day and heard numerous complaints about the costume change. Some thought it was downright unpatriotic–but of all the complaints, I noticed one thing…not one of the complainers had bought a copy or read the book yet. Nope, not one. I thought it cute when I noticed a couple of the artists (yes, I know who you are) dropping onto the boards…
Read More: Couture Shock: Aftermath of the Wonder Woman Makeover.
Jun29
Wonder Woman Redefined: New Costume, New Mythos
on June 29th, 2010Posted In: news
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...
New Wonder Woman costume, designed by Jim Lee
DC Universe – The Source
The costume ties into an alternative history for the character devised by J. Michael Straczynski, the new writer of the series, and into a quest by DC to shine a critical and creative spotlight on the heroine, who stands with Superman and Batman in its primary triumvirate of superstars, despite her series’s modest sales.
In the reimagining of her story, Wonder Woman, instead of growing up on Paradise Island with her mother, Queen Hippolyta, and her Amazon sisters, is smuggled out as a baby when unknown forces destroy her home and slaughter its inhabitants.
Mr. Straczynski, who created the television show “Babylon 5” and wrote the screenplay for “Changeling” in 2008, starring Angelina Jolie, said in an e-mail message that he wanted to address “the wardrobe issue” as soon as he took the job.
“She’s been locked into pretty much the exact same outfit since her debut in 1941,” Mr. Straczynski wrote. “If you’re going to make a statement about bringing Wonder Woman into the 21st century, you need to be bold and you need to make it visual. I wanted to toughen her up, and give her a modern sensibility.”
He added, “What woman only wears only one outfit for 60-plus years?”
Read More:
Wonder Woman Redefined: New Costume, New Mythos.
Jun16
We’ve Come A Long Way, Baby – Uncanny Valley and Other Learning Curves
on June 16th, 2010Posted In: news
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...Yep, once upon a time I had the audacity to challenge the boundaries of the forbidden Poser comics laws and create a CGI/3D illustrated series. To quote myself from a recent Sketch Maven interview, “…in 2007 [it] was not only unheard of for a professional comic, it was considered “cheating”, “lazy”, “untalented” and just downright uncool by many in the independent comics field. These comments, however, only comprised about 2% of the reviews and reactions my series received. Had it been worse, I might have tucked my tail and quit.
Very early reactions to my work were like “Oh, it makes my eyes bleed”, and “this looks like a new version of the Sims”. I checked out the work of other early CGI artists out there and found it substandard compared to mine, so these comments made me pretty mad. I bit the bullet and set out to self-publish.”
Somewhere during that formative time popped up a review at Uncanny Valley – Television Tropes and Idioms that took a long look at a failure to create realism in numerous media, and House of the Muses #1 took a bullet in that review, too:
 |
|---|
Alex’s audio round-up
Thu, Sep 17, 2009
Books, Comics and cartoons, Film, TV and radio, Interviews, Podcast
It’s Thursday and its time for Alex Fitch to update us to the next batch of upcoming shows he’s involved with; as ever for more details and links to podcasts of previous shows check the Panel Borders site:
Strip!: In the company of women, tonight at 5pm on Resonance FM, podcast afterwards at Panel Borders
Continuing “women in comics” month on the show – we have two interviews with creators whose comics are set in worlds featuring primarily female characters. Alex Fitch talks to Pam Harrison, the Queer Press Award winning creator of “House of the Muses – the latter days of Sappho of Lesbos” while (Eagle Award winner) Tom Humberstone talks to Pia Guerra, artist of “Y: The Last Man” who won the 2008 Eisner Award and 2006 Joe Shuster Award for her work on the title.
(cover to the first issue of House of the Muses – the latter days of Sappho of Lesbos by and (c) Pam Harrison) Read more….
Jun12
Thursday, June 12, 2008
House of the Muses: The Latter Days of Sappho of Lesbos, vol #2 – The Quality of Hatred
By Pam Harrison
Pam’s lesbian historical romance saga, “House of the Muses: The Latter Days of Sappho of Lesbos” continues with Vol. 2 – The Quality of Hatred.
Dika has been viciously attacked. But despite the threats against her life and those she cares for, Dika finds herself drawn headlong into a deadly conspiracy that threatens everything she holds dear.
Check out this page view of the 3-D action:
|
||
Monday, May 12, 2008
House of the Muses: The Latter Days of Sappho of Lesbos, vol #1 – The Phokaian
By Pam Harrison
3-D graphics, lesbian romance and political intrigue all add up to make this projected six volume historical graphic novel really unique.
Volume #1 – The Phokaian introduces us to Dika, a Spartan female slave who comes to Lesbos, is adopted by an upper class family and betrothed to a man. But Dika falls for the beautiful Timas of Phokaia instead, and has plans to make the woman her own.
Check out the art!
|
||