SeaHeart

(This was originally written for The Sorcery of Love, so I refer to myself as Elora herein. <3)

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Happy, happy Valentine's Day! <3

We've waited forever to announce this--we wanted to wait until today, V-Day, because WE LIKE SPECIAL THINGS TO HAPPEN ON SPECIAL DAYS. ;D

You know that I'm Elora Bishop--that I write magical lesbian love stories (and lesbian YA love stories as another name), but you might not know that my wife, Jennifer Diemer, is also a writer. A supremely talented one at that (which, I realize you'll have to take with a grain of salt since she's my wife, and you know how very much I love her, but really--WAIT UNTIL YOU SEE)--she has a degree in creative writing (graduating at the head of her class, of course--she's a perfectionist!), is a world-class editor, and an amazing, amazing storyteller. We've had quite a few writing projects together that were just for us, or that we haven't OFFICIALLY announced to the world yet, but one of our oldest ones was an old zine online (sadly, defunct for years now!) that we put up in 2004/2005, called Inamorata. It was a compendium of fairy tales, retold as lesbian. It was one of my favorite things that we've ever shared together. <3

But my wife Jenn and I have been retelling fairy tales as lesbian for far longer than that--as long as we've been writing. Fairy tales are part and parcel of who we are--they're in our blood. We were married in fairy wings, have bits of fairy tales tattooed on our skin, and we even take very old, unloved fairy tale books and re-envision them as wearable art. Fairy tales are utterly essential to who we are as people, and who we are as a wife and wife duo. <3

The thing is, that--though we love fairy tales deeply--something has always felt...off for us, in the fairy tale world. You know--the fact that there were no women like us: ladies who love other ladies.

So, like any authors would do...we set about and changed that. And we want to do it again. <3

There are very, very, very few lesbian retellings of fairy tales. Most of them are erotica--which, there is ALWAYS a place for erotica, but I also believe that there is a place for creative, literary re-envisionings of all of the major fairy tales (and some that most people have forgotten about!) that are NOT erotica, but are, rather, stories about women who love other women, who are courageous, who kicks ass, who wear their crowns tilted sideways, who have daring adventures and magical encounters and who fall madly and completely in love and get their fairy tale endings.

And so, Jenn and I are pleased to present a series of novellas entitled Sappho's Fables. We have taken all of the most well known fairy tales, some from long ago that we already retold, some that we are redoing all over again, and releasing them individually as eBooks for each novella, and then volumes of collected novellas that will also be available in print. The first three stories that we chose are:

Snow White


Hansel and Gretel


Rapunzel


They will be gathered in the volume available in both print and eReader versions entitled Sappho's Fables, Volume 1!


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You might be saying--Elora, my favorite fairy tale isn't in the first volume! No despairing! :) Here is a projected list of the upcoming volumes. Though these are subject to change, we're pretty set on all of them. No, unfortunately, I don't have dates on any of these releases! You can either add this blog to your RSS, or add me on Facebook or on Twitter--I promise that when we get closer to actual dates, I will let you know! <3

Sappho's Fables, Volume 2:

Follow the Wolf (Red Riding Hood) -- Elora
Shimmer (Rumpelstiltskin) -- Elora
Thirteen (Twelve Dancing Princesses) -- Jenn

Sappho's Fables, Volume 3:

Heart of Snow (The Snow Queen) -- Jenn
Kiss the Frog (The Frog Prince) -- Elora
Sea Change (The Little Mermaid) -- Elora

Sappho's Fables, Volume 4:

Ember (Cinderella) -- Elora
The Sleeping City (Sleeping Beauty) -- Jenn
The Prince and the Pea (The Princess and the Pea) -- Jenn

Sappho's Fables, Volume 5:

Thorn (Beauty and the Beast) -- Jenn
Kitten Heels (Puss in Boots) -- Elora
Wingless (The Wild Swans) -- Elora

ALSO, after the above volumes are released, we have a very special short story collection entitled Snow White Loves Rose Red--it will be the last volume in the series, and cover some of our very favorite fairy tales--the lesser known ones that are still beautiful. Details on that coming soon! <3

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What can you expect from these stories? These are not your typical fairy tales. Expect some more traditional retellings, but also post-apocalyptic fairy tales, biopunk, steampunk, mythicpunk, paranormal, science fiction...we had two driving goals in these releases: put out oustanding lesbian literature, and also very, very original retellings. We can not WAIT to share them with you. <3

So yes! We are SO EXCITED to be releasing these so soon! Details to follow! <3 <3 <3