Tales of the Queendoms - New Book Release!

My latest book, Tales of the Queendoms, has just been released! It's a short story collection set in the Queendoms Series universe.

Visit my writing blog, Atypical Romance, for more information:

Tales of the Queendoms - Now Available

The Queendoms Series - Now Available on Kindle Unlimited

Just a quick announcement for those who read my books... My seven-novel Queendoms Series is now available on Kindle Unlimited.

Kindle Unlimited is a subscription service run by Amazon in English-speaking countries. For $9.99/month, you can read all the novels, novellas, short stories, etc., that are available on Kindle Unlimited. It's a great deal and sometimes they offer a 30-day free trial, so you may want to check it out.

Here's the link to the series page on Amazon:

The Queendoms Series

The Story of This Blog

As this blog approaches its 500th post, in its fourteenth year, I thought I’d look back on how it got started and talk a little about why I’m still doing it.

By the time I started this blog in 2009, I’d been an anime fan for about four years and had been working as an editor in the industry for nearly three years. I needed an outlet for my passion for anime and blogging felt like the way to go.

The name Neo-Shonen Fujoshi had a specific origin. Well, the fujoshi part was my idea - not a stretch since that was obviously what I was and am - but the “neo-shonen” part might require some explication.

I say more about this in my 2009 post Neo-Shonen Fujoshi Speaks! – but that year I went to Otakon and attended a fascinating panel by Daryl Surat, a longtime anime journalist and podcaster. (His blog, now a podcast, is still going: Anime World Order.)

The panel was called “Kenshiro to Kenshin: The Neo-Shonen Revolution.” Surat talked about how shonen anime used to be ultraviolence fests featuring grotesquely muscle-bound heroes like Go Nagai’s Violence Jack:

But then the tide turned, and less beefy, prettier-faced shonen heroes like Rurouni Kenshin became popular.

If the point was to broaden the audience for shonen to include women and girls - well, it worked. And so that’s how this blog came to be named. I’m a fujoshi who’s into the “neo-shonen” heroes - not those other guys. ;-)

The early years of this blog were a mish-mash of serious posts about being an editor in the industry, anime and manga reviews, musings on anime and manga as art forms, gushy posts about Japanese seiyuu, my fiction writing, etc. I grouped posts under tags such as Daily Dose of Kawaii and Incongruous Things.

Incongruous Things was an especially fun group of posts. It included the “A Very Handsome... Voice Actor” category that presented photos of attractive seiyuu. Other posts were of the “One of These Things Is Not Like the Other” variety and other such silliness.

(By the way, in putting this post together, I noticed that dead You Tube links abound in these ancient posts, lol... just so you know before you take a look at them.)

I lost any sense of being age-appropriate as far as my own age was concerned. For me, it was like being transported from middle age back to my teen years. I was giddy with delight over this utterly amazing and new (to me) entertainment medium I’d discovered and it showed in my posts.

But then, even this Blogger template that I still use is a throwback. If you were reading blogs fifteen years ago, you undoubtedly saw this template often (I think the template name is “Simple” or something like that). Every other blog in the late 2000s/early 2010s used this template since Google’s Blogger (then called Blogspot) was one of the earliest free blogging platforms. I would probably switch this template out for something newer, but I fear my blog infrastructure would implode if I tried to change anything about it at this point.

My original thought was to make this a serious industry person blog, but that went out the window early on... I was just having too much fun. ;-)

Then something happened. I became more serious about my fiction writing, particularly The Queendoms Series, a seven-novel series that I started writing in 2014. At the same time (perhaps related?) I began to feel a little burned out on anime. I’d been an intense fan for ten years, worked in the industry, gone to dozens of anime conventions across the U.S., and suddenly... the steam went out of everything.

From 2015 to 2017 I only managed to upload a handful of posts. I still watched anime and read manga, but I was consumed with getting The Queendoms Series books off the ground.

I was still working on the Queendoms books in 2018 when I began to miss posting here. Since then I’ve posted at least once a month, a schedule I know that I can maintain considering my various commitments.

I think I’ll conclude the story of this blog in a Q & A format.

Q: Does anyone actually read this blog? There aren’t any comments.

A: This blog still has a few readers, going by the feedburner count and blog traffic stats. I don’t count the random days when there are 500 “views” for no reason, as the round (and high) number tells me that it's a Russian bot doing its job.

When I began writing this blog in June 2009, I deliberately left Google’s indexing option unchecked. What this means is that my blog posts have never been indexed so that they can show up in Google searches.

I did this for a few reasons. Blogging was somewhat new then, and as I’ve said before I didn’t grow up with the internet, so I was wary of being too public with anything that I wrote. Also, I originally intended this to be an industry blog, so I didn’t really want anyone in the world to be able to stumble across it in a simple search.

Fourteen years on, I still feel the same way, though I obviously would’ve had many more readers through the years if I’d had my posts indexed for search. I do have my blog listed in my writer's/editor’s bio at some publisher websites and a few other places, which is generally how new readers find me. It’s kind of nice. You only get here if you were already familiar with my work in some way and followed a link here.

As for comments, there are hundreds. I lost most of my readers during that 2015-2017 period when the blog was on life support with only a post or two being uploaded per year. Since then, I’ve contemplated turning the comment function off entirely. If I do that, all previous comments will disappear, as Blogger - for some reason - hides all extant comments upon the disabling of the comment function. So if you have a burning desire to read comments from the early years of this blog, you might want to do it soon. ;-)

Q: If you don’t have many readers these days, why continue?

A: Because I enjoy it.

Q: Any regrets?

A: Yes, about the spelling of the blog’s name.

I named this blog before I studied Japanese with any seriousness. If I’d known about the long “o,” I would have used shounen instead of shonen.

Other than that - no regrets. =D

New Book Release and A Few Words About The Queendoms Series

I have a writing blog called atypical romance. There is basically zero crossover between the audience for that blog and this anime blog, and for that reason I seldom talk about my fiction books here at Neo-Shonen Fujoshi.

I’d like to make an exception to that today. On October 4, I released To the Farthest Shore, the final book in The Queendoms Series, a series I’ve been writing since 2013. This seven-book novel series holds special meaning for me, for reasons that I’ll explain in a moment.

The Queendoms Series begins with Rebellion.

Four hundred years from now - it’s a woman’s world.

After nuclear fallout, environmental damage and World War III left the world’s population decimated... the area formerly known as Northern California became a safe zone for people from all the nations of the earth.

More women survived than men, and the new civilization structured itself into queendoms. The queendoms shun technology and restrict the activities of men. Violence is forbidden, and a simple agrarian way of life ensures humanity’s survival.

In the Queendom of Califia, brash and outspoken Anming Lee argues for men’s rights while the polite but equally stubborn Kellen Cassidy opposes him. Their mothers Chen and Kieren share the same views as their sons, and are at constant odds on the Ruling Council.

The council is being torn apart and the High Councilor decides there’s only one way to resolve the deadlock: to have Anming and Kellen be bonded in marriage!

Through the years as I’ve worked on my writing craft, I’ve made some discoveries about myself as a writer. One is that I don’t have it in me to write completely light-hearted stories. I can write humorous scenes, but eventually the story as a whole will turn serious.

So The Queendoms Series takes on a more serious tone starting with the second book, The Hunt, where Anming takes Kellen with him on the annual buffalo hunt. The hunt is where Anming feels the most alive, as he’s away from the female-dominated village with all its rules and in the company of men who think the same way he does. We see the worst of Anming in this book, as his character flaws are on full display: arrogance, roughness, insensitivity. Kellen bears the brunt of it, and the couple goes through an extremely traumatic experience towards the end of the book that threatens to end their relationship. This is eventually dealt with and resolved in The Califia Trilogy’s third book, Queen of Califia.

Second Bond is the fourth book. It’s the pivot book in the series, and the events that take place in it lead in to the final three books, Homestead, Sanctuary, and To the Farthest Shore, a.k.a. The Queendoms Trilogy.

I first envisioned Second Bond to be a sort of happily ever after wrap-up to the series, but in the midst of writing the first draft, I came to understand that I’d left out a whole side to the story that really needed to be explored. In the first novel trilogy, there was an uprising of certain men against the female-dominated queendoms civilization. The rebellion turns out to be something different than what it seemed on the surface. But I realized that the real threat to a matriarchal society would come from men using what they’ve always used to control women: violence.

With Second Bond, the final arc of the series begins. Califia, the Kashaya Sky, Madrona, and Rio face their greatest threat, as men’s rights extremists attack the four queendoms using various means.

Of necessity, some of the scenes in these books were hard for me to write and they’re also hard to read. But they were required for the story, and though a part of me didn’t want to go there, I knew I had to.

In sum, The Queendoms Series was a part of my life and my inner creative world for eight years. In that span of time I came to understand why the characters, setting, and premise attracted me so.

I grew up watching British historical dramas on Masterpiece Theater and reading Lord of the Rings. The rustic village settings and royal castles sparked my early writer’s imagination. But I was a Japanese-American girl growing up in urban California in the late 20th century, so it was hard to see myself as a character in those stories.

Still, those images stayed with me. Other interests entered my life, such as what is known today as m/m or mm romance (male-male romance). This niche didn’t even have a name when I first became enamored with it in my twenties. Today, gay romance is one of romance’s most popular sub-genres.

Likewise, the idea of multicultural romance stories – much less multicultural and gay – was unheard of thirty or even twenty years ago, really.

And so it’s not surprising that The Queendoms Series takes place in a post-apocalyptic Northern California with society re-establishing itself as royal matriarchies, and that the four main characters, as well as most of the supporting characters, are multicultural. The protagonist, Anming Lee, is half-white and half-Chinese; his bond mate Kellen Cassidy is white with a Scandinavian and Irish background; Tavon Alexander is black; and Ryn Chan, later known as Ryosuke of the Kashaya Sky, is Japanese.

Similarly, the Queendom of Califia is ruled by Queen Jacintha, who is black. She later marries Eduardo Avila who becomes Prince Eduardo. The ruling family of the Queendom of the Kashaya Sky is of Japanese origin, the House of Shiranui. The Queendom of Madrona throughout its history has been ruled by families of English, French and German origins. And finally, the Rio Queendom in the delta is presided over by a queen of Hispanic and nativelander origins (nativelander being my term in the series for the indigenous/original peoples of the land).

Why was this important to me? I grew up not seeing myself anywhere in any of the entertainment I consumed. The idea of “representation” as such didn’t exist at that time. I grew up feeling invisible in my own country.

Thus, my fantasy landscape – more properly, science fiction landscape, since it’s post-apocalyptic – is this post-racial Northern California where nobody cares about race anymore because they’ve all had to work together in order to survive. Where the Japanese-descended Queen Reika rules her queendom by the sea in the former town of Mendocino, and where the heroes and villains can be any race or gender.

The Queendoms Series is where a number of my interests cross paths: male-female relations, feminism, m/m romance… even California, the state of my birth where I have lived for nearly all my life. I love California, particularly the wine country, which is why I placed Califia in Sebastopol near Santa Rosa and Madrona just south of Napa. These are the landscapes that have always inspired me.

If you are intrigued enough to give The Queendoms Series a try, the first novel, Rebellion, is only 99 cents at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Kobo Books.

And if you have friends that you think might enjoy the books, I’d also appreciate it if you could recommend the series to them. :-)

Sanctuary - New Release

Sanctuary, the sixth book in The Queendoms Series, has now been released!

For more information, visit my writing blog:

https://atypicalromance.blogspot.com/2020/11/sanctuary-now-available.html

Homestead - New Release

Homestead, the first book in The Queendoms Trilogy, has been released and is available for sale at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo Books.

It is the fifth novel in The Queendoms Series that begins with The Califia Trilogy (Rebellion, The Hunt, Queen of Califia) and Second Bond.

For more information, please visit my writing blog:

atypical romance

Nine Years Later

You may have noticed something. This blog is alive again.

I took a break from anime to focus on my fiction writing. I had to balance this with work and the rest of my life, and something had to go, or at least be minimized.

I continued to watch series that I’d watched earlier seasons of like Naruto Shippuuden/Boruto, but I didn’t have time to pick up new series or keep up with industry news. In short, it was like a leave of absence.

The energy around anime had shifted for me, and in the opening that resulted, I found an intense desire emerging to write The Queendoms Series, a set of seven novels including The Califia Trilogy and Second Bond. Moving away from anime gave me the space and time to write the books.

Things have happened since then that have shifted the energy back. As you might remember, I used to freelance as a translation rewriter and editor for manga and anime-related novels. The industry crashed with Borders Books closing and the financial recession, though for some years after that I continued to edit for Digital Manga, Inc.

All the other publishers I’d freelanced for—Tokyopop, Broccoli Books, Aurora Publishing and Bandai Entertainment—went out of business, or at least their North American publishing divisions did. For a while, the publishing side of anime and manga was pretty dead.

Around the time I stopped working in the industry, something came along that started a revitalization of anime and manga’s popularity: Attack on Titan.

Attack on Titan’s debut reenergized the industry. The manga aisle at Barnes & Noble had begun to dwindle in the late 2000s: now suddenly, manga books were increasing on the shelves instead of decreasing.

Today, in 2018, the manga aisle at Barnes & Noble is a permanent fixture. And the entire aisle is manga books, instead of being shared with graphic novels like before.

While I was away writing my own fiction, I’d neglected to follow what was going on in the industry.

When I finally looked, earlier this year, I saw an industry that was thriving and whole, one that had grown bigger, and was in no danger of fading away as before.

At the same time, I released Second Bond. Four of the seven books in The Queendoms Series are now done and published. I know the momentum will continue and I’ll finish the remaining three novels in the next few years.

With that reassurance, I realized there was a hole in my life.

An anime-shaped hole. ;-)

This blog is back, and I am back, because I missed anime. I missed it as a daily part of my life. I’ve spent a lot of time writing fiction these past few years, and I’ll continue to do so because I have stories to tell and because I love writing. But I have a natural need for entertainment and relaxation like anyone, and nothing has ever filled that need for me as well as anime.

I am also returning to the freelance work I enjoyed doing before. Recently I was the proofreader for two J-Novel Club books, Amagi Brilliant Park, Vol. 1 and Last and First Idol, Vol. 1. I hope to continue working for J-Novel Club, and I’ve begun to seek work from other publishers again.

Nine years ago, I started this blog intending it to be an industry blog. I was in the thick of editing light novels in the Code Geass and Eureka Seven and Gundam 00 franchises for Bandai, and working as the copy editor on over 40 manga books for Tokyopop, and editing yaoi novels and Hideyuki Kikuchi horror novels for Digital Manga, Inc. I went to conventions all the time, and read and commented on many people’s blogs. I was active in fandom.

When I saw the industry falter in the wake of the recession and piracy/torrenting, I wrote a series of posts about Supporting the Industry. I was really passionate about keeping the industry alive.

Now the industry is strong and healthy. So what is Neo-Shonen Fujoshi going to be about, moving forward?

The thing is—this blog was never quite the industry blog I’d meant it to be. It’s always been a mélange of my thoughts about the industry, series reviews, and ephemera about all things Japanese. The posts here have ranged from serious essays on defending fan fiction, to interviews with industry people like Austin Osueke of EigoManga and Vy Nguyen of Tokyopop, and gushy posts about seiyuu and J-pop music and yaoi and all the other wonders that came wrapped up in the gift that was anime.

When I discovered anime, it touched every part of me: as a writer/artist striving to produce my own works, as a Japanese-American mostly unfamiliar with my own heritage.

It literally changed my life. It broadened my horizons as an artist, it inspired me as a writer, it sparked a fascination with the culture and language of my ancestors. I’ve completed two years of college-level Japanese language classes now, and my studies continue, particularly in reading Japanese. I aim to live in Japan and study Japanese more intensively someday. I would never have that ambition, were it not for anime.

I expect this blog, going forward, will be similar to its old self, but less frequently updated due to my schedule and possibly less focused on the fandom aspects of anime, since I’m older now and coming at this from a different perspective than before.

So the neo Neo-Shonen Fujoshi begins. Thanks for noticing. ;-)