No news report this week. I’ll trust that you’re dialed into Anime News Network for updates from NYCC related to anime, Comics Beat for Comics News generally and Deb Aoki and Brigid Alverson for manga-focused news. Free of having to cover anything Naruto-related at New York Comic Con, I was able to spend my time talking to people on the floor about stuff I care about.

My first impression of NYCC this year is that it’s stopped trying to be San Diego Comic Con lite. There were, of course, media interests, but the floor and the panels were focused on comics, manga/anime and games, with a very strong showing from prose publishers, many of whom have begun publishing graphic novels as well.  There were tons of small comics presses, the artist alley was jammed with artists doing their own work, some of whom are also well-known for work with larger publishers. Much less fanart than in previous years, and I wouldn’t be sad to see it eradicated from the artist’s alley completely.

For the first time since NYCC started, the con was very close to what I wanted it to be. San Diego can have the movie studios – New York is about publishing. I wasn’t the only one who commented on this – several folks noted that New York was the heart of publishing in America, and they were pleased to see a renewed focus on comics at NYCC. No, it’s not dealer after dealer of older comics, it’s creator after creator of new content.

Anime and manga had very respectable representation, with Viz, Funimation, Kodansha, Vertical and Yen (as part of Hachette Press) on the floor. Viz was killing it with Sailor Moon goods and Naruto-creator Kishimoto-sensei as a Special Guest and they were pushing Yo-kai Watch to kids.

I spoke with Robert McGuire of One Peace Books (the folks who brought you Takeshi Ikeda’s Whispered Words.) We spoke of walruses and kings, but one of the many things we discussed was the difficulty of publishing Yuri. And I wanted to expound upon that for you all a little. Fifteen years ago, the “difficulty” in publishing Yuri was that there wasn’t much to choose from. Now, the market has broadened, and in doing so, has become infinitely more complex. (In fact, the other most repeated comment I heard this weekend was, almost verbatim every time “People just do not realize how complicated publishing is.)  Before I continue, I’ll ask you a question: What do you think is the most complicated part of publishing a Japanese manga in English? Answer in the comments.

Now, there are many more Yuri manga to choose from. But if a publisher won’t talk with you, you will have no access to those titles. Some publishers only go through an agent, some only work with one American company exclusively. For instance, in most cases, any work published by Hakusensha ends up being Viz or nothing. If Viz doesn’t want it, no one else can get it. Although, that may be changing in days to come. As Robert put it, “There’s what you want…and what you can get.” And, even a company actively looking for Yuri will want to weigh the potential salesworthiness of any given title.  A title that will appeal to otaku, say Sakura Trick, is probably not going to have much appeal to adults who are not otaku. And there are very real age of consent issues that have to be addressed if you want bookstores and libraries to be able to have it on shelves.

So, something like Sasamekikoto works to hit Yuri otaku, younger women, lesbians and you get decent sales. Something like Yuri Kuma Arashi is probably going to be of interest to otaku only. It’s not an impossible choice, but it has to be a conscious one – we’re going for *this* audience, so the sales might be low, but we want to get this book out. And this is the very first year I have had publishers say to me that they can make that decision. They have enough that sells well generally to put out things that are a little more niche. This is a tremendous sea change. Five years ago no one had any wiggle room, now they do and companies working in the fringey areas are doing well enough that they can expand.

After having this same conversation with three different manga publishers, I started saying that I started ALC 10 years too early. Which I knew would be the case. Right from the beginning I said that I would lay the foundation for the audience and someone else would make the money.

But let me end this with something hopeful: I spoke with 3 publishers who are looking to expand their Yuri holdings. I can tell you, the future looks bright for us in this regard and I will of course let you know as soon as anything breaks.

One of my absolutely favorite moments of the con was coming across Pierrick Collinet and Elisa Charretier, the creators of IDW’s The Infinite Loop.  (I reviewed the first 4 issues .) Two of the most pleasant people I have ever met. Absolutely lovely. It’s a pleasure and a little nerve-wracking to meet someone about whose work you’ve written a review. Pierrick commented that they had read the Okazu review. ^_^; Elisa is working on a new series, Windhaven, by George R.R. Martin and Lisa Tuttle. Pierrick is pitching several new works, and they look fantastic. I can’t wait to see more from the both of them. And thanks to both of them for their time.

In the artist’s alley I managed to get a copy of Valor, by Isabelle Melancon and Megan Leavy-Heaton. And I caught up with the most awesome and talented Sanya Anwar, whose 1001 series was the star of my last TCAF visit. We spoke of her upcoming piece in the anthology The Secret Lives of Geek Girls. (I can’t wait for this!)

And I finally had a chance to tell Amy Reeder how much I enjoy her work (hey…I get to be a fan girl too)  and how much I’m looking forward to Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, her upcoming project.

Alex Cox from the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund says that school challenges are up all over the country. CBLDF is doing it’s best to keep up with them. I asked him why he thought challenges were increasing, was it the increase in diversity and representation in graphic novels. He said it was probably that librarians and teachers were more onboard with GNs and their inclusion in schoolwork, which means that more parents were aware of them. Also he pointed out the brand new disturbing trend of college students challenging graphic novels in class curricula. As always I will suggest that, if you have a few dollars, you consider donating to the CBLDF, they are doing important work representing people’s right to read what they want.

I spoke briefly with Anne Ishii of Gay Manga (Massive) who was selling at the Geeks Out space.  She’s a very cool and grounded person and I’ll have more to tell you about her in Part 2.

And Tara at the Prism Comics/NorthwestPress booth was very positive about the turnout they were getting.

Of course I hit up a bunch of our friendly vendors. Bill from Anime Castle and Su from Sci-Fi Continuum continue to offer cool toys, books and goods for reasonable prices. It’s always good to catch up with them. I don’t know what other press folks do, but I get a lot of hugs at cons. ^_^

My final stop of the day was to speak with N. Steven Harris about his comics, Brotherhood of the Fringe and Ajala, both of which look absolutely gorgeous.

Ajala won the 2014 Glyph Award for Best Female Character. I’m looking forward to making time to read it.

Which brings me to my conclusion on Day 1. Comics is no longer what it used to be. And thank heavens for that! Not only was the diversity of nearly everything at NYCC ubiquitous and immersive, with the most amazing mix of fans and creators I have ever seen, but even beyond merely comics. Fandom has owed itself, and learned to love itself fully, in all its sizes and shapes and colors and sexualities, levels of ability or neurotypicality. I have never once in my entire life of congoing ever seen a more joyful acceptance of every fucking thing fandom is. Even the big companies are starting to recognize that diversity isn’t one black guy on the team, but if you look away from the big companies for a second, you’ll see everyone represented somewhere. Comics is more innovative, lively, creative and diverse than I have ever seen and you don’t have to look all that far to see it anymore. If this is the shape of things to come, comics has got a lot to look forward to.

Check back for Day 2 report, and some more opining about Yuri!

The Panel schedule is up for New York Comic Con (October 8-11), and they’ve added a handful of LGBTQ topics to the schedule this year. I’ll be on the Friday Gay Manga Panel with moderator Deb Aoki, Christopher Butcher and Anne Ishii. It’s going to be an amazing conversation, so I hope you’ll join us!

Thu. Oct. 8
5:15 – 6:15 pm New York TimesOUT presents LGBT in Comics
Location: Room 1A21

Fri. Oct. 9
12:30 – 1:30 pm Gay Manga, Yaoi, and Yuri: LGBTQ Fantasy vs. Reality in Manga 
Location: Room 1A05

4:00 – 5:00 pm End Bullying: Becoming a Superhero IRL 
Location: Room 1A21Sat.

Saturday, Oct. 10
1:30 – 2:30 pm Prism Comics Presents: Autobiography in Queer Comics 
Location: Room 1A01Sun.

Sunday, Oct. 11
2:30 – 3:30 pm Culturally Queer: The Explosion of LGBTQ Representation in Mainstream Comics & Pop Culture 
Location: Room 1A24

I will definitely be at Comic Con Friday, and probably Thursday, as well. The weekend is still up in the air.

LGBTQ Exhibitors will include:

GeeksOUT  – Tbl. 15751

NorthwestPress & Prism Comics – Tble 1483

As more content/exhibitors are announced, I’ll populate this list, so bookmark it!

I normally don’t do event announcements this far out, but I want to give you lots of time to make your plans.  I certainly intend to be there. ^_^

Geeks OUT Announces the Return of Flame Con to Brooklyn, NY For August 2016

The Second Annual LGBTQ+ Comic Con Promises A Bigger, Expanded Celebration of Queer Pop Culture

New York – August 25, 2015 – Geeks OUT is excited to announce the return of FLAME CON, New York City’s premier LGBTQ+ Comic Con!  FLAME CON 2: 2 FIERCE 2 FABULOUS will heat up Brooklyn again in 2016, expanding to two days — Saturday, August 20th and Sunday, August 21st at the Brooklyn Bridge Marriott.

First held in June of 2015, FLAME CON brought together the queer fan community on an unprecedented scale. Drawing over 2,200 visitors to the one-day convention, FLAME CON was the largest queer-focused pop culture expo ever held in New York. Over one hundred creators and media favorites exhibited their talents, while fans and attendees brought fantastic energy to the event, all eager to be part of a comic convention catering especially to queer tastes in comics, games, books, art, and entertainment.  In New York City, #FlameCon trended on Twitter for five solid hours, and the event received glowing reviews from io9, The Mary Sue, Comic Book Resources, and more, all applauding the tremendous convergence of diversity, positivity and creativity.

FLAME CON 2 will expand to a larger venue, adding a second day to accommodate more exciting guests, more outrageous performances, more engaging panel discussions, and of course, more fantastic cosplay!

Special guests already on the FLAME CON 2 roster include:

Cecil Baldwin, voice of the hit podcast Welcome to Night Vale

Marguerite Bennett, writer of A-Force, Years of Future Past, Bombshells, Batgirl, and Batman and more

Terry Blas, creator of the You Say Latino mini comic, the Briar Hollow webcomic, and cover artist on Bravest Warriors, Regular Show, The Amazing World of Gumball and Adventure Time

Aimee Fleck, Lumberjanes artist, Adventure Time: Banana Guard Academy cover artist, and creator of the fashion comic Damn, Girl That Style Is Fat

Phil Jimenez, superstar writer-artist on Wonder Woman, Justice League, New X-Men, Fairest, The Invisibles, and numerous other comics

Jay Justice, costumer, cosplayer, gamer, writer, actress and activist

James Tynion IV, writer of Constantine: The Hellblazer, The Woods, and Mimetic

Kevin Wada, comics couture sensation and cover illustrator on She-Hulk and Catwoman

Max Wittert, fashion illustrator and creator of the comic Skinny Girls, as well as the hit webcomic Jean & Scott featured in All-New X-Men

Jennie Wood, creator of the graphic novel series Flutter and the YA novel A Boy Like Me

FLAME CON 2 is also proud to announce the return of Presenting Sponsor: Atari® featuring their first LGBTQ themed mobile game, Pridefest™!

FLAME CON 2 tickets are now available at https://geeks-out.ticketbud.com/flamecon. Additional exhibitor information will be announced later this year, with special guests, exclusive content offerings and fun updates available by following @flamecon on Twitter, and on Facebook at facebook.com/flamecon.

It was my sincere pleasure to be able to attend FLAMECON 2015, the inaugural year for another queer Comics-focused event in New York City, after Queer & Comics last month. (West Coast folks, you’re not being left out – The Queer Comics Expo is being held on June 20 in San Francisco! Let me know how that goes.)

FLAMECON was the brain child of Geeks OUT! an LGBTQ comics group based in New York City, which has been expanding it scope and reach since it’s early days as a group of folks banding together to get a table at New York Comic-Con. ^_^

I met this delightful woman upon coming out of the subway. She said to someone else that it wasn’t really cosplay.

The event was held in the Grand Prospect Hall, which was amazing in its own right.

When I came in, the ballroom was to my left, and the greenhouse to the right. Flamey, the con mascot greeted us as we entered.

The greenhouse held some of the larger press companies, including sponsor Northwest Press, Riptide Publishing, which was recommended to me, and I hope to take a look at their work in the future. Right from the first, I could see this con was going to be special. Everyone’s energy was high, and the level of social skills was, also. Most vendors were quite chatty and I was able to  have actual conversations with most folks, rather than just the “hi, howya doing?” vendor speak or the no-looking-up-artist-non-speak.

There were corporate vendors, among the tables.

Philadelphia’s LGBTQ anime/manga con, Nijicon, had a booth. I’m hoping I can help with adding some Yuri to their programming. ^_^ October, 24-25, 2015, Greater Philadelphia Expo Center – Oaks,PA.

And Bara manga was represented by Tagame Gengoroh’s Massive! Collection.

Then, back into the hallway, where they had set up a cafe.

But it was when I entered the ballroom that I realized how *amazing* the building was.

Once I recovered from the gilded-lily-ness of it all, I finally started walking around. First up, the stunning Jennifer Camper (co-founder of Queer & Comics) and Texta Queen, one of the folks on my “Wet and Sticky” panel at Queer & Comics. Jennifer is upbeat about the success of Q&C and hopes to do another in 2017 in San Francisco. I managed to incorporate some of the utterly fab watercolors on the wall behind them.

Next up, it was my pleasure to meet Jill Pantozzi, editor-in-chief of The Mary Sue.

We had a terrific conversation. When speaking of TMS’s decision to not promote HBO’s Game of Thrones anymore, Jill said something like, it suddenly came to them that they could do that thing. And I was completely understanding, because when you work in a niche, you want to be comprehensive for that niche, but sometimes it’s just not worth the emotional toll. (Not unlike my reasoning for not buying or reviewing hentai Yuri collections. They aren’t good and no one cares, and it makes me sad to have to read them at all.) Jill and the rest of the crew at TMS are heroes of mine. I’m hoping to have an interview with them in days to come. ^_^

My first purchase was this one-shot side story from ongoing series Node, by David Rondellini. It was excellent, and I’ll be looking for more.

I spent a lot of time talking to the creators – everyone was, as I say, extremely friendly – and there weren’t that many folks I knew already, which was amazing. Lots of new faces. I did run into old friends like Hiroki Otsuka and Carlo Quispe, and was able to meet the artist for my friend Alex Woolfson’s series The Young Protectors, Adam DeKraker – who was fantastic, and delightful.  Molly Ostertag and I kvelled about Feral from Strong Female Protagonist, and I bought a totally NSFW lesbian short from her, based in the same historical period as her Khutulun, the Wrestler Princess called Queens of the Steppe.

And then I got to meet an old friend for the first time! Elizabeth F. is a long-time Okazu commenter, YNN Correspondent and, I like to think, a friend. ^_^ I got hugs! I love meeting you folks in person.

Then it was about time to do something that for me is unheard of…talk to a gaming company. I had an invitation from Atari to see a prototype of their upcoming release Pridefest. Like everyone my age, I grew up with Atari, so was very interested in what they had to say. I carefully disclaimed that I don’t game (although even I played Pong back in the day,) but the guys at the Atari booth were incredibly cheerful and upbeat as they talked about Pridefest. Since it hasn’t released yet, I don’t know what I’m allowed to say about it, except I will say this – it’s a “social game” (like Farmville) and it’ll be as diverse and inclusive in as many ways as possible. The actual game is a sim world situation, which allows you to launch pride parades in your city as you build it. The game itself is charming and I’m hoping to have more for you as it gets closer to launch. After the demo, they asked me a bunch of questions on camera and I pulled out the stops with advice about diversity, and social gaming, the market, community management, virality and sustainability. I don’t game, but I know gamers and community management. ^_^ Thanks to Atari and I’m glad to see you back in the game…as it were. ^_^

The room we were in was hosting GaymerX2, the second LGBTQ gaming convention. GX3 is being held in San Jose in December.

Another game designer I spoke with was Choice of Games, which are customizable text stories where your choices will actually alter the narrative. I’m thinking some of you VN fans might find this interesting.

Here is more ballroom porn. Because it was lovely and crazy.

I loved this room.

Last, but in no way least, I was able to meet up with another old friend, Niki Smith, whose story Your Hair, is still one of my favorite piece in any of our Yuri Monogatari series (and which is now available on Comixology!) Niki’s been moving from success to success and I’m so pleased for her.

I walked around once more, picked up a few things, spoke to a lot of folks and suddenly realized the one thing that was missing – lesbian comics. There were a fair number of female attendees and sellers, but it seemed that the majority of the female comic artists were drawing queer-gender-fluid or just gay guy stuff. There was a post-Yaoi anthology, (a surprisingly clever concept, worth a look!) and girls dressing as guys and having sex, comics on transfolks, drag and crossplay. So there was quite a variety overall. But when I got home and emptied my bag, I had bought 1 lesbian comic. Next Flamecon, we need more lesbian comics, ‘kay? On the plus side there was almost all original work, very little parody and most of that erred on the smart side. ^_^

Overall, FLAMECON was a lot of fun and is a great initial event. I think there is a lot of room to grow the LGBTQ comics market and you’ll excuse me for playing favorites, but I can’t think of a better city on earth to do that in than New York City. Here’s to FLAMECON 2 and more lesbian comics. ^_^

Flame-Con, NYC’s First Queer Comic Con is happening today at the Grand Prospect Ballroom in Brooklyn, (which itself is an old drag queen of a building.)

It appears at a glance that Flame-Con has done a reasonable job of encouraging diversity in it’s guest lineup and I hope that I’m not wrong about that. But I’m not really there for the guests. I’m there for the exhibitors. I’m hoping like hell this will be the LGBTQ small press and self-published comic fest I’ve wanted to attend my whole adult life. A quick glance at the exhibitor list tells me I may very well get my wish. ^_^

The most exciting thing about today is that this will be the second Queer-focused comic events I’ll have attended in 2015. How amazing is that!?

On Sunday, I will be visiting AnimeNEXT, which is being held  in Somerset, NJ at the Garden State Exhibit Center. I was on the board of directors a while back for AnimeNEXT, and have seen it be run by many different chairs and I think the current set of organizers and senior staff is the best they have ever had.

2015 will be the last time AnimeNEXT is held in central New Jersey. They”ll be moving to Atlantic City for 2016, which is very exciting. Sucks for me, as Somerset is short ride from here, but yay for them. This means they’ll be growing into a space that will allow for 30K or more, putting them among the top tier cons in the country.

I’ll be presenting a workshop “Crowdfunding For Fun and Profit” on Sunday, June 14, at 12:30 in Panel Rm 4. We’ll talk about what works, what doesn’t, what you can expect and what you might not expect! I hope you can join me.

As an aside, I went to post the logo here and went “D’oh”! Dear Anime Cons, clubs, groups, fans – do not use the “rising sun” Japanese flag. It is emblematic of terrible things, and it may engender bad feelings especially among non-Japanese Asian guests…and anyone who knows history. (Kind of like trying to incorporate a swastika…it may look striking, but gives off bad signals.)

Also on Sunday, June 14, on the other side of the planet (so this evening my time,) Girls Love Fest returns to the Tokyo area, twinned with Ai Fest, once more.

You can find the Participating Circle List here. I’m kind of impressed, that among the Love Live!, and KanColle doujinshi, so many of the circles are listing themselves as doing original work. And there’s at least one each of  Yuri Kuma Arashi and Akuma no Riddle listed, so those might be fun.

Also fun, Takemiya Jin-sensei announces that she’ll be at GLF, and will also be doing a special autograph signing session…not in the circle space, but in a special guest booth. That’s fantastic! You go Takemiya-sensei!

So grab up your business cards and put on your walking shoes…we have a busy weekend ahead.