paperback, 128 pages
English language
Published July 2, 2019 by Nightboat Books.
A beloved fable-manifesto from the 1970s queer counterculture. The Faggots and Their Friends Between Revolutions, written by Larry Mitchell with illustrations by Ned Asta, takes place in a brutal empire in decline, where the faggots and their friends are surviving the ways and the world of men.
it is a very fun and interesting reading. it is a playful joy to read it and you can easily do it in one session. it also really inspired me narratively because both storytelling and the language are uniquely queer. i would love to find more quirky speculative fiction like this.
What a cheeky, whimsical little book! I can barely put my thoughts into a coherent review but I just adored every bit of it - including the format, full of beautiful illustrations and flashy titles, all little gifts and surprises as you read on.
This book is described as part manifesto, part fable, and it is indeed a very accurate description. In its conception, the author intended it to be a children's book and it shows - in the best of ways! It talks about the wretched system we live in and all the humans that find themselves in it, using beautiful aphorisms and metaphors. More specifically, it talks about the system of men, and the wide array of creatures that survive (or thrive!) in the cracks and nooks and crannies of this system.
Just such a clever, light, and lovely book. The introduction gives it some context as well …
What a cheeky, whimsical little book! I can barely put my thoughts into a coherent review but I just adored every bit of it - including the format, full of beautiful illustrations and flashy titles, all little gifts and surprises as you read on.
This book is described as part manifesto, part fable, and it is indeed a very accurate description. In its conception, the author intended it to be a children's book and it shows - in the best of ways! It talks about the wretched system we live in and all the humans that find themselves in it, using beautiful aphorisms and metaphors. More specifically, it talks about the system of men, and the wide array of creatures that survive (or thrive!) in the cracks and nooks and crannies of this system.
Just such a clever, light, and lovely book. The introduction gives it some context as well - and I believe the context might be just as important as the book itself. Larry Mitchell was a gay man who founded a queer commune and who truly strived for a queer lifestyle, way beyond his sexuality. He questioned and resisted the system, wanting no part in it. He built a life based on solidarity, care, friendships, softness, love - and rejected the assimilation of his kind into mainstream ways of living. This book tells his story and his friends' and his community's stories and it's such a lovely exercise of escapism into a queer utopia that I myself dream of, and hope to create one day. It's been decided: this will be the constitution of my future queer cottagecore commune!
