Ranger Kote

If you hold a small animal, any animal, and it starts to wiggle or push away from you put it down. Don’t just laugh. Don’t hold it tighter. Unless you have a good reason for holding it put it down.

I constantly have to tell children to put my chihuahua down and leave her alone when she wiggles. That’s okay. Children are stupid and don’t know anything about anything yet. We’ve all been there.

Adults have no excuse.

When you see a chihuahua like this you should not be thinking “demon dog” you should be looking at the owner and thinking “What did you do to this poor animal?” or alternatively if they got it from another person “What did that person do to this poor animals?” If a dog gets like this, any dog, the owner fucked up, not the dog. That is learned behavior. Those are extremely scared, uncomfortable dogs who have been mistreated. And by that I don’t mean beaten.

When people say “Treat a small dog like a big dog” that doesn’t just mean train and socialize it. It also means “Don’t do anything that would make a bigger dog bite your face off”.

Respect it’s signals. Let it know that it’s okay for people to hold and pet it by leaving it alone when it says “No more”. This can include wiggling, walking away from you, not responding when you touch it and looking at you in a way that shows the white in it’s eyes. It’s not hard to decode.

Only if you ignore signals like this will it start to show teeth and growl, and you have no right to get upset if it bites you after this. That’s on you. And eventually biting will be it’s first response because it has learned that the more subtle signals doesn’t work.

If it’s not your dog let it instigate contact with you. If it’s your dog respect it and you’ll find that it becomes much more tolerate of you and others handling it. Yes, if you try to clip its nails or something else it doesn’t want to do it might scream bloody murder, but it won’t bite because it knows this only happens sometimes and it’ll be over soon.

People have gotten so used to this idea that dogs have to be robots who should put up with everything we do to them and that’s really fucked up. They’re allowed to tell you no if there’s no reason for you to do it. It shouldn’t be forced to be held by you just because you want to hold it.

Hold it against its will to get vaccinated/groomed/other important things? Yes. Hold it against its will because you want to pet it? Big no. And of course teaching them tricks and commands are a must, but that’s not forcing them to do things. That’s teaching them that if they do the thing something good happens.

Of course animals are different. If people (me included) offer my shih tzu some food he will often show his teeth and it’s totally understandable that people get scared, but he’s not doing it to show aggression, he’s doing it because he doesn’t like to get food on his lips. How are people supposed to know that? I sure as hell didn’t the first time he did it, and it’s the right reaction for people to pull their hand back. Then I, the owner, can tell them not to worry, he’s just weird about food on his face.

And some dogs are more standoffish and take longer to warm up to people, and some trust you right away.

My point being, just assume every dog in the world show the same signals until the owner tells you otherwise.

I’ve said before that my chihuahua doesn’t like small children and avoids them at all costs because they do all the things I just told you not to do. She loves older children and adults though, and loves to be held even by complete strangers and is quick to roll up and snooze in the lap of any guest even if she has never met them before (trust me, no matter who you are, if you came to my home she would be sitting in your lap right now wagging her little tail wanting nothing but love from you), which is also why I panic when adults doesn’t respect her signals and try to force her to stay with them because Aw she’s so tiny and cute.

Gentle Reader, today I tackle my failings for you.

Miss Gail where are your Ace or Grey or Demi or Other Queer Characters?

How about a disabled characters? 

What about Pan or Poly? 

How about…?

I’m doing my best but even I can’t catch them all, as it were.

I will keep writing lots of queer characters, I promise, but in the meantime…

Here’s a sample some fun romantic or sexy (not too serious) books with main characters that straddle the divides that I do not – so to speak. Oh and happy endings. ALWAYS.

I’m specifically going for a lighter tone, since that’s what I like to read (although a few of these are a touch dark they always end happily). For Your Enjoyment!

Contemporary

The Trouble with Tony by Eli Easton (demi, gay)

For Better or Worse by R. Cooper (grey, gay)

Squared Away by Annabeth Albert (ace, gay)

Upside Down by N.R. Walker (ace/ace, gay) (Jay’s Review)

Under His Stiletto by KA Merikan (crossdresser BDSM gay)

Only See You by JD Chambers (nonbinary/they)

Tea by Matthew J. Metzger (disability, self esteem body pos, gay) (Jay’s Review)

The Mating of Michael by Eli Easton (physically disabled, sexwork, gay)

Honeymoon for One by Keira Andrews (hearing impaired, May/December, gay)

A Touch of Love by Sheryl Lister (hearing loss, het)

The Blinding Light by Renae Kaye (blind, gay)

Mud & Lace by Jay Northcote (discovery bi meets discovery gender fluid)

Historical

Unmasked by the Marquess by Cat Sebastian (gender fluid)

The Doctor’s Discretion by EE Ottoman (bit of everything)

Fantasy/PNR/UF

Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey (political fantasy, BDSM, pan, opoly) trigger warnings, rape & abuse

Bearly A Lady by Cassandra Khaw (paranormal, bi)

Sea Lover by J.K. Pendragon (trans meets merman)

A Dance of Water and Air by Antonia Aquilante (trans, demi, fantasy) (my review)

Truth in the Dark by Amy Lane (fairy tale, disfigurement, gay) trigger warning, rape (my review)

A Knight of Ghosts and Shadows by Mercedes Lackey (urban fantasy, sweet, bi, poly) off screen triggers, no digital edition (my review)

My Man Godric and A Little Familiar by R Cooper (paranormal romance & fantasy, cross dressing, gender fluid, ) lots of Cooper’s stuff could appear in this blog post

Won’t Someone Think of the Children!?

It Feels Good to Be Yourself: A Book About Gender Identity by Theresa Thorn (children’s picture book)

Having Her Back by Ann Gallagher (YA sweet romance, trans) A sweet first love YA about a boy whose best friend cuts him off unexpectedly for years, and when they meet again that friend is now a girl. They fall in love. It’s adorable and complex and gentle but also quintessentially YA in that it is the adults who often make mistakes, and the kids must learn to see their parents as fallible. No major triggers and yet it deals deftly with some very complex issues.

Dreadnaught by April Daniels (YA) Superhero featuring a trans main character. Everyone keeps telling me how brilliant it is and the reviews confirm.

Not Your Sidekick and other books in CB Lee’s series (YA queer superheroes), own voices author

When the Moon Was Ours by Anna-Marie McLemore (YA) This is a fantastical atmospheric fable featuring varied sexual identity, own voices author.

Since I read a lot of gay romance, and I vetted these myself, you can tell my recommendations are skewed. Please feel free to submit your own in comments but remember I’m PICKY. I don’t read: Hero’s Journey, rape, abusive/stalker Alphas, explicit violence, sad endings, etc…

RESOURCES!

Articles

The Vorkosigan Saga: Conflicting Views of Disability

15 Trans, Nonbinary, and Gender Non-Conforming Writers to Support

A lovely resource on Asexuality

Random: A transgender cow, incongruous crustaceans and a boar-dog: the surprising tale of reconstructing a Byzantine mosaic floor

Lesbian & Bi Literature Blog

Reading Lists

Here’s a sortable LGBTQ reading list

LGBTQ+ Books That Actually Have a Happy Ending

Trans Lesbian Books Goodreads List

A few WLW poly options

Queer Women in Mixed-Gender Romance

An Alphabet Guide to Queer Superheroes and Supervillains

12 Exceptional Comics About Trans and Genderqueer People

15 Must-Read Queer YA Fantasy Books

YA Pride website

The Lesbrary (mostly lesbian book lists and reviews)

Joyfully Jay (mostly gay romance reviews)

Resource Books

Science Fiction and Fantasy from Transgender Writers by Cat Fitzpatrick

Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History by Sofia Samatar

Tales of Queer Women and Magic anthology

Reading Glasses: 84 – Our Fav Trans Authors (podcast)

Finally I am going to throw this AMAZING movie into the mix. I just love it so much…

Boy Meets Girl is a sweet charming contemporary romance, adorable and fun and so lovely. And yes one of the characters is trans but that’s only part of it. If you hesitate about anything around trans identity, please watch this movie.

Honestly it’s so good, it will leave you with warm fuzzies, I promise.

Yours, bathed in alternatives,

Miss Gail

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‘Ulf’  derives from the Old Norse word for “wolf” (úlfr). Saldalius is Latin for “true wolf”.

So we’ve literally got Mr. Wolf Wolf from Messrs. Wolf, Wolf, Wrendofflip, and Wolf fighting Randolph Lyall, whose first name derives from the Old Norse “ Rannúlfr” which literally breaks down to shield + wolf, and his last name “Lyall” also means wolf. 

So basically the fight in Blameless was Professor Wolf Wolf vs. Mr. Wolf Wolf and Professor Wolf Wolf only won because his Alpha, Lord Wolf Wolf of Woolsey (Conall meaning strong wolf and Maccon meaning son of a wolf), came to fuck Mr. Wolf Wolf’s shit up in a drunken backyard brawl.