Me Time
Days of Awe
Shana tova (a good year) for those starting out 5786 or just beginning the school year or some other kind of new start. I lived in the Boston area for many years and, because of the many universities and colleges in the area, September always felt like a new year was starting.
These 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur (the stay-all-day-in-synagogue-and-fast day), are called the Days of Awe, when Jews reflect back on moments when we missed the mark, and ask for forgiveness from those we may have wronged or at least with whom we've not been our best selves. It's an intense opportunity to do better.
In other news, Jenny and I spent a lovely weekend in Bethlehem, PA at Sayre Mansion for the Sapphyre sapphic author event. Along with Karen Richard and Betsy Carswell, I staffed the GCLS outreach table. Our most popular takeaway item was a new sticker that says SPPHC: Sapphic Without AI. Be on the lookout for those at a book event near you!
Sapphic Lit and Other Book Stuff
Sapph-Lit: How Nina Haines Built a Global Sapphic Book Club -
In the first week of Sapph-Lit, 500 members signed up. Today, the Sapph-Lit Discord server has nearly 2,000 members across 4 continents. Multiple channels give the writing specialized spaces for discussion, like crafting, reading recommendations, librarians, writers, ga(y)ming, as well as regional chats for folks to connect locally. “We moved from Geneva to Discord to keep our reach international, and for all ages 16 and up. We create these spaces to ensure that people can read age-appropriate books, as well as an 18+ channel.”
What Makes a Bad Book Cover — And How to Avoid One as an Indie Author | by Kayla Hicks | Authors Corner | Jul, 2025 | Medium
how you can avoid these mistakes while still staying true to your brand and budget
What Does It Mean to Have a Compelling Voice in Your Story? | Jane Friedman
One reason voice is such a tricky concept to grasp is that it’s used to refer to three different elements of storytelling: character voice, narrative voice, and author voice—and they can often overlap.
Writing 101: How to Find & Write Your Character’s Voice - WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®
Hopefully these strategies will help you uncover your character’s voice and write it in such a way that readers will be hearing it long after the story is finished.
Write Where You Know | Jane Friedman
when deciding on the setting for your novel, is it better to choose a real place or create a fictional town, city, or even country?
George Takei to Lead Banned Books Week 2025 | GLAAD
Iris Mogul has been named Banned Books Week Honorary Chair. Mogul is a teen who started a banned books club in her community in Florida, after the state implemented laws that resulted in the removal of hundreds of books about race, history, and sexuality from schools. Mogul continued her advocacy work as a student leader in the National Coalition Against Censorship’s Student Advocates for Speech and received an honorable mention from the Miami Herald Silver Knight Awards in May 2025.
Activists protest book bans in front of New York Public Library
“Our intellectual freedom and our right to access perspectives and experiences that are not the same as our own is really important,” said Anne Maguire, a longtime LGBTQ activist and founding member of the Lesbian Avengers, who created the banned books brigade.
We are officially re-opening applications for fall and winter presenters and would LOVE to hear your ideas. If you are an expert on writing craft, publishing, or even a topic related to midlife wellness and creativity, we want to hear from you.
Amazon Adds Benetech Accessible Metadata to E-books
Millions of readers with disabilities can now easily identify accessible e-books on Amazon, thanks to new accessibility metadata displays for titles that meet Benetech's Global Certified Accessible (GCA) standards.
ALLi Author Income Survey 2025
he 2025 Author Income Survey from the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi). Your answers help us to map the real-world economics of today’s indie author.
News For A Challenging Time
Court Rules Against Arts Endowment on Trump’s ‘Gender Ideology’ Order - The New York Times
In the ruling, Judge William E. Smith, a senior district judge who was appointed by President George W. Bush, noted that the 1965 law creating the endowment had included provisions ensuring that all grants be awarded, as the court put it, “on talent alone, irrespective of the artists’ viewpoints or the messages conveyed in their works.” The new regulations, he said, ran afoul of that goal.
Florida restaurant finds a defiant way to bring rainbows back after state’s crosswalk ban - Queerty
Se7en Bites in Orlando’s Milk District hosted a defiant art event. More than 49 artists gathered to repaint 49 parking spaces. Each artist used rainbow and Pride flags as inspiration, turning the parking lot into a vivid display honoring the LGBTQ+ community and commemorating the 49 lives lost at Pulse.
EXCLUSIVE: Trump admin blocks $1.25 million in LGBTQ, DEI grants, which may violate federal law
In Washington, D.C., the Preservation League was awarded $75,000 to document LGBTQ+ historic resources in the city. In Providence, R.I., the Preservation Society was slated for $74,692 to conduct an LGBTQ+ survey and prepare a National Register nomination. And in New York, the Fund for the City of New York, Inc., was awarded $32,000 to nominate the residence of Bayard Rustin — the iconic civil rights and LGBTQ activist — as a National Historic Landmark.
If these congressionally appropriated funds are not dispersed by Sept. 30 — the end of the fiscal year — the move would appear to violate the Impoundment Control Act of 1974.
Lesbian Couple Wins Landmark Parental Rights Case In Hong Kong - GO Magazine
A judge ruled that both women must be recognized as parents of their son, calling the government’s exclusion harmful to the child’s dignity and rights.
JoJo Siwa Says LGBTQ+ Community Bullied Her After Dating Chris Hughes: I See Them Flip Me Off | Them
The criticisms of Siwa have been multifold. Some found issue with her “fuck the L” statement, taken in concert with her subsequent positioning as an apparent “tradwife” (her cover of “Betty Davis Eyes” was a large point of contention). Others felt abandoned and betrayed by someone they had looked up to as an important point of lesbian representation. Siwa addressed only the latter criticisms, saying that she and Fletcher had been able to bond and support one another as they had been the subject of similar critique.
Culture and Joy
Second annual Cherry Grove Weekend of Women slated for Oct. 3-5
The Cherry Grove Weekend of Women’s website emphasizes inclusion, stating that it welcomes “all humans who identify as women and all allies who ardently believe that women deserve the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness — regardless of race, religion, and economic status.”
Morgan is one of eight members of the team working to produce the weekend, which includes more than a dozen events spread out across the three days.
Two Decades of Queer Parenting Visibility—A Conversation With Dana Rudolph - GO Magazine
Her Mombian database, now nearing two thousand titles, is searchable by grade levels and topics. It’s an accessible tool for parents, educators, and librarians alike. And it reflects not only an increase in quantity but also in quality.
"Radical Family" Shares Stories of an Earlier Generation of Lesbian Moms - Mombian
In a powerful new collection of nine personal essays, lesbian parents who raised children in the 1980s, ’90s, and early 2000s share the stories of forming and sustaining their families.
A Gay Recap of the 2025 WNBA Season | Autostraddle
So with the playoffs on the horizon, I thought I’d take a moment to highlight the highs and lows of our gay WNBA faves from the 2025 regular season.
Lesbians Are an Essential Part of Basketball History | Autostraddle
Everyone Watches Dyke Sports: Queer Histories of New York Liberty Basketball examines how deeply intertwined queer identity, fandom, and community are within the culture of women’s sports. What began as a collaboration with the New York Liberty — featured initially at the team’s annual Pride game — has since expanded into an exhibition now on display at The Center. Curated by a group of Liberty fans at the Lesbian Herstory Archives, the exhibition foregrounds the voices, memories, and artifacts that made Liberty games a hub for lesbian life in the city.
How the Star WNBA Couple Natasha Cloud and Isabelle Harrison Spend Their Day Off - The New York Times
Natasha Cloud and Isabelle Harrison, New York Liberty teammates, have different approaches to practice, but they share a bowl of pho and a love of TikTok.
These Videos Of Brandi Carlile’s Surprise Drop-In At Karaoke Night Are Queer Perfection - GO Magazine
at The Lipstick Lounge in Nashville, where the Grammy-winning singer surprised the crowd with an impromptu set that has since gone viral on TikTok
Mae Martin Dove Deep Into the World of Cults to Create ‘Wayward’ | Them
The creator and star of the new Netflix series opens up about shifting from comedy to thriller.
TIFF 2025: Jodie Foster Speaks French, Impregnates a Woman in ‘A Private Life’
Foster plays Dr. Lilian Steiner, an American psychiatrist whose life and practice have long been in Paris. When her patient of nine years (Virginie Efira) suddenly dies by suicide, she begins to suspect the true cause might be murder. Her time playing detective leads her to reconnect with her ex-husband, confront a fractured relationship with her son, aaaand to a hypnotist who suggests Lilian and her patient were lovers in a past life, Lilian impregnated her, and then the patient died tragically in Nazi-occupied France.
WATCH: A timely rallying cry for marriage equality, 'Julian' is both empowering & heartbreaking - Queerty
In 2017, one Belgian couple set out to prove that point and bring awareness to the fact that there were still well over 150 countries where their love, the union didn’t exist in the eyes of the law.
That year, artist Fleur Pierets and her partner Julian Bloom began “22: The Project,” which would see the two women traveling the world and getting married in each of the 22 countries that would allow them (at the time).
10 Unexpected Queer Girl Moments in Scary Movies | Autostraddle
movies with subtle or maybe lesser known queer girl moments? These scenes are not necessarily all good or all bad, but they sprinkle a little LGBT crouton packet onto a scary movie salad. Some of them are blink-and-you’ll-miss-it Easter eggs, some are casual one-liners, and some are full-on sapphic puzzles.
Reneé Rapp on her unapologetically queer new album ‘Bite Me’: “Everything I make is gay” - Queerty
This time around, I knew what I wanted. I wasn’t making [this album] to impress anyone else. I made it to impress myself.
A Different Kind of Pride: Honoring Barbara Jordan’s Quiet Truth | by Ezra Kidowski | Prism & Pen | Jun, 2025 | Medium
And for over twenty years, she shared her life with another woman.
That detail is rarely mentioned in the textbooks. It’s softened, blurred, hidden in the footnotes. But this Pride Month, it belongs at the forefront.
Catching Up with Kathy Kozachenko, the Ann Arbor Trailblazer Who Became America's First Openly Lesbian Elected Official
Now living in Pittsburgh and working on her memoir, this pioneering figure in Michigan's LGBTQ+ heritage recently shared her groundbreaking story with Pride Source — from her early activism through her historic election and her perspective on today's political challenges facing the queer community.
78 Years Of Lesbian Magazines Keeping Our Queer Legacy Alive | Autostraddle
This list is by no means comprehensive. There are hundreds more, undoubtedly, but I was looking to provide an overview of what was out there while hitting most of the major ones. It’s also specific to United States publications
Step back into the ’90s with Videoland, a queer love letter to the video store era - News Is Out
The six-part series follows 17-year-old Hayley (Emmanuelle Mattana), a video store employee in the late ‘90s, awkwardly navigating her sexual identity through the queer films she discovers on VHS. With help from her quirky and supportive best friend Tanya (Chi Nguyen), Hayley makes her way down a list of classic queer films like Personal Best, Desert Hearts, The Watermelon Woman and more, while trying to work up the courage to talk (and flirt back) with regular customer Jennifer (Tahlee Fereday). She even daydreams herself into the Doc Martens of Corky from Bound in a particularly charming mid-series moment.
Alice Austen photo collection reunited with LGBTQ+ landmark after 80 years - News Is Out
Austen’s legacy has gained long-overdue recognition in recent years, including the designation of her Staten Island home as a national LGBTQ+ historic site.
Helpful Tools
Here's What You Should Know About Uber's 'Women Preferences' Option
There may be times when a woman is not available, but turning on this setting will increase the likelihood that the user will receive a female driver. Women drivers will also be an option for riders requesting a trip on demand. The app will show the expected wait time for a female driver, allowing riders to switch to a male driver if there's a long wait and they're in a rush. The option is also available when women reserve a ride in advance.
A Terrific Quote
Daily Inspiration | Inspiring Quotes
The choice to love is the choice to connect — to find ourselves in the other.