Larre Bildeston

Queer Liberation Library Fiction and nonfiction featuring asexual voices.

The list of ace books is slowly growing--many of them indie--here is the collection at QLL, non-fiction & fiction.

Although regular libraries don't typically keep asexual collections, just looking through the QLL list is a good page to check if you're interested in the A of LGBTQIA+.

The Space Ace of Mangleby Flat An asexual and aromantic love story On paper, things look fine. Sam Dennon recently inherited significant wealth from his uncle. As a respected architect, Sam spends his days thinking about the family...

To US readers who'd enjoy a slightly foreign setting, listen free at your excellent Queer Liberation Library, accessed via the Libby (Overdrive) app.

The Space Ace of Mangleby Flat is an #asexual contemporary realistic queer love story set in #Australia and #AoNZ

And is on sale this week at Libro in the Read Indie Sale. 🌈📚

Credits don't expire at Libro, and another thing I've noticed, indie authors get higher royalties.

eat a brick, Uta!

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Put phone down and read book. Phone is too sad.

My dentist told me the pure of heart don’t need to floss

we need to address the end of good-paying jobs for melancholics, like lighthouse keeper or fire tower watchers

My extra radical far loony left position is that no one should ever be allowed to make a profit from academic publishing. It is a public good. See also: education, healthcare (on a good day, public transport…)

The two paths meme, with one road leading to a lovely castle and a nice life, the other to a castle of doom. An autism researcher stands in the foreground, having spent their whole life researching autism for some reason. The path to happiness: Okay, this describes me, actually. The path to doom: Autism has lost all meaning! Political context: The latest nonsense by Uta Frith, covered by all the newspaper. This is funny to some people because we spend our lives learning about Autism and then realise why. It will not be relatable to other people, who believe this meme is an attempt at armchair diagnosis. It's not.

Did you ask if they got through their pandemic toilet paper yet?

I also find the 'podcasts are in direct competition with non fiction' statement interesting, because I think part of what's going on there is that podcasts are often just summarising other people's books (and some are better at providing their receipts or directly calling out said books than others)

The thing that determines how active you’re able to be w/ disability is what type & how severe it is. It’s not your determination, your mindset, your personality. Any suggestion otherwise is how we are socialized to blame people for their circumstances & deprive them of help. #MECFS #LongCovid

I still wouldn't tell a kid that.

It's a real dilemma when you know a friend (or family member) is Autistic but you also know they are not ready to hear it, based on other things they say about Autism.

Probably not.

Also what a terrible thing to tell a kid.

Pretty much everyone I've ever been close to is Autistic or ADHD or AuDHD.

Hindsight is an interesting thing. No one had identity labels until recently, but I've been just as capable as my own kid of picking it... somehow. Even without the concept and language.

Anyway. Autistic people recognise each other and ourselves.

My kid isn't 'gifted'. He's a regular Autistic kid--reflective, observant, looking for his crew.

There's this infantilising idea that Autistic people aren't equipped to understand ourselves and others.

We do it from EARLY CHILDHOOD ffs.

Also interesting: I shortened the story but he got one kid "wrong".

But I knew their mother. This kid was later assessed by the specialist psychologist, but unable to get a diagnosis due to family breakup causing trauma.

Got diagnosed later. My 8 year old knew it; psychologist had to wait.

Sure. The teacher was aghast because she had told my kid the exact same thing I had. "You're not the only one here with Aspergers."

My kid was VERY proud and happy. He would not stop talking about it lol.

So their (absolutely lovely) teacher thought she had started something she hadn't meant to.

It's hermeneutical injustice, is what it is.

It's one thing to not have a name for your neurotype--when no one else around you does, either. But this behaviour reminds me of the mid 20th century when male doctors told husbands that their wives were 'hysterical', without telling the wives.

They're now 17, 18. I'd like to know, too.

Despite once being full of energy, my kid has missed out on his entire high school education due to MEcfs and is no longer in contact with any of these kids, as the vast majority of teenagers are not the best at keeping severely disabled peers in mind.

I'm quietly glad and proud that my kid, even at 8, was able to pick his neurokin.

Not only that, I am in strong favour of letting kids know who they are. It's not fair to tell everyone else but the person involved, even if that kid is 8.

Way better to learn yourself young than when a teenager.

This little girl had been told she has "anxiety" but her parents had chosen not to tell her about the autism. She was upset.

But... my kid's official diagnosis was actually "Aspergers" and she thought my kid was calling her an ass-burger.

Once learning she was Autistic, not an insult, she was ok.

Long story short, we told our 8-year-old immediately. I also said, "It's not that rare. There will be five or six other Autistic kids in your class."

So he went to school and named them.

Their teacher was aghast. He was right. Got every single one.

But one of the kids hadn't herself been told.

But, perfectionism is also a trauma response so there’s that similarity.

Interesting q: How would an Autistic adult communicate if there’d been only the neurotypical levels of misunderstanding during early years, without punishment & ostracisation?

It’s possible we’d keep even more detail lol

Neurotypical style: concise, non detailed, sitting in a kind of mid range.

If we deviate from that we come across to them as condescending (they know this!!) or rabidly obsessive, worse, even lying (“liars overexplain”).

So autistics must code switch.

That doesn’t sound like perfectionism to me.

Interesting thoughts, thank you.

I share your doubt about whether perfectionism is the best way to describe this. When talking to other Autistics, it can be adaptive. Miscommunication happens between Autistic interlocutors just as often as between neurotypes if we adopt a neurotypical style.

Honestly, “sweat” pants makes them sound grosser than they are. It’s like calling trainers “sweat shoes”.

Where I come from they’re “track” pants. That is hugely different. Instead of lying on the couch sweating we are powering round an Olympic track.

Driving has gotten *significantly* worse since covid began, and I think it’s a combination of factors.

1) people got out of the habit and a lot of us never went back to commuting

2) literal covid brain damage

3) people decided in those years we are no longer a society