Confessions of a Former Teen Superhero (A gay YA coming of age novel)

Confessions of a Former Teen Superhero (A gay YA coming of age novel)
Author: Keith Hartman
Publisher: Keith Hartman
Total Pages: 186
Release: 2024-10-22
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

It’s not easy being invulnerable. Back in high school, Josh was secretly the famous superhero KID QUASAR! But he was so busy saving the world that he never had a chance to make any friends. Let alone a boyfriend. So now Josh is living in his mom’s basement, struggling to get his first real job after nearly failing out of college. Because it’s hard to be an A-student when alien arms dealers decide to attack Cleveland in the middle of your sociology final. And as his mom keeps pointing out, being a superhero doesn’t actually pay anything. Worse, Josh isn’t even a big-name superhero anymore. Some showoff named Comet Boy came along, rescued a few celebrities, and became a social media darling. And suddenly, nobody cares about Kid Quasar. Like so many young guys, Josh is feeling lost. He can’t be the person that he was back in high school. But he can’t figure out what comes next. And even though he has this one amazing thing that makes him special, there’s no way for him to make a living at it. He’s a misfit who can’t find a place for himself in the world. And then Josh meets Rick, the guy who might change everything. There’s just one BIG problem . . . • Gay Coming of Age Superhero Story •

Draw the Line

Draw the Line
Author: Laurent Linn
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 440
Release: 2016-05-17
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
ISBN: 1481452827

After a hate crime occurs in his small Texas town, Adrian Piper must discover his own power, decide how to use it, and know where to draw the line in this “powerful debut” novel (Publishers Weekly, starred review) exquisitely illustrated by the author. Adrian Piper is used to blending into the background. He may be a talented artist, a sci-fi geek, and gay, but at his Texas high school those traits would only bring him the worst kind of attention. In fact, the only place he feels free to express himself is at his drawing table, crafting a secret world through his own Renaissance-art-inspired superhero, Graphite. But in real life, when a shocking hate crime flips his world upside down, Adrian must decide what kind of person he wants to be. Maybe it’s time to not be so invisible after all—no matter how dangerous the risk.

Confessions of a Former Teen Superhero

Confessions of a Former Teen Superhero
Author: Keith Hartman
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2023
Genre: College students
ISBN:

"It's not easy being invulnerable. Back in high school, Josh was secretly the famous superhero KID QUASAR! But he was so busy saving the world that he never had a chance to make any friends. Let alone a boyfriend. So now Josh is living in his mom's basement, struggling to get his first real job after nearly failing out of college. Because it's hard to be an A-student when alien arms dealers decide to attack Cleveland in the middle of your sociology final. And as his mom keeps pointing out, being a superhero doesn't actually pay anything. Worse, Josh isn't even a big-name superhero anymore. Some showoff named Comet Boy came along, rescued a few celebrities, and became a social media darling. And suddenly, nobody cares about Kid Quasar. Like so many young guys, Josh is feeling lost. He can't be the person that he was back in high school. But he can't figure out what comes next. And even though he has this one amazing thing that makes him special, there's no way for him to make a living at it. He's a misfit who can't find a place for himself in the world. And then Josh meets Rick, the guy who might change everything. There's just one BIG problem..."--Back cover.

The Gumshoe, the Witch, and the Virtual Corpse (Noir Dystopian Hard Science Fiction Mystery with a Wisecracking Gay Detective and his Wiccan Partner)

The Gumshoe, the Witch, and the Virtual Corpse (Noir Dystopian Hard Science Fiction Mystery with a Wisecracking Gay Detective and his Wiccan Partner)
Author: Keith Hartman
Publisher: Pyramid Press
Total Pages: 659
Release: 2024-09-26
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

In a near-future America on the verge of civil war, a gay detective investigates ritual killings, conspiracies, and what might be black magic. In the summer of 2045, Atlanta is a city on the verge of panic. A killer is stalking her people, leaving behind eerily beautiful crime scenes painted with occult symbols. Is he an insane artist, carving his work out of flesh and blood? A satanic sorcerer, hoping to bring about the end of days? Or a political operative, trying to terrify the electorate into voting for his party? A handful of people have the pieces to the puzzle, but they are scattered through the city’s subcultures: A wisecracking gay detective hunting for his kidnapped partner. A black cop, trying to use high-tech forensics to solve crimes that seem to be right out of the Middle Ages. A Wiccan journalist who employs search engines and scrying spells with equal skill. A televangelist with an eye on the White House, and the Christian rock star who wants to take him down. A transgender Cherokee shaman trying to right a wrong from the 1800s. And Benji, the fourteen-year-old boy at the center of it all. Who thinks that his biggest problem is what will happen when his strict Baptist parents find out that his new girlfriend is a witch. Together, they might be able to stop what’s coming. If they can stay alive long enough to find each other. - Winner of two Spectrum Awards for LGBT-themed science fiction. - - A double finalist for the Lambda Literary Awards in the Mystery and Speculative Fiction categories - "There's a great SF premise here...the writing is tight, the drama tense." -- Locus "Hartman's character's are smart. His world-building is broad, convincing, and exciting: his choice of detail is exquisite. Compelling and engrossing, this book grabbed me and didn't let me go until long after the end." -- Nina Kiriki Hoffman, winner of the Nebula and Bram Stoker Awards. "Like his hero, loved his plot, and envied his style." --Mike Resnick, five-time winner of the Hugo Award.

Confessions of a D-List Supervillain

Confessions of a D-List Supervillain
Author: Jim Bernheimer
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2011-04-10
Genre: Good and evil
ISBN: 9781461084747

Follows the exploits of Mechani-Cal, a down on his luck armored villain.

Ziggy, Stardust and Me

Ziggy, Stardust and Me
Author: James Brandon
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 385
Release: 2022-09-13
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
ISBN: 0525517669

In this tender-hearted debut, set against the tumultuous backdrop of life in 1973, when homosexuality is still considered a mental illness, two boys defy all the odds and fall in love. Now in paperback. The year is 1973. The Watergate hearings are in full swing. The Vietnam War is still raging. And homosexuality is still officially considered a mental illness. In the midst of these trying times is sixteen-year-old Jonathan Collins, a bullied, anxious, asthmatic kid, who aside from an alcoholic father and his sympathetic neighbor and friend Starla, is completely alone. To cope, Jonathan escapes to the safe haven of his imagination, where his hero David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust and dead relatives, including his mother, guide him through the rough terrain of his life. In his alternate reality, Jonathan can be anything: a superhero, an astronaut, Ziggy Stardust, himself, or completely "normal" and not a boy who likes other boys. When he completes his treatments, he will be normal—at least he hopes. But before that can happen, Web stumbles into his life. Web is everything Jonathan wishes he could be: fearless, fearsome and, most importantly, not ashamed of being gay. Jonathan doesn't want to like brooding Web, who has secrets all his own. Jonathan wants nothing more than to be "fixed" once and for all. But he's drawn to Web anyway. Web is the first person in the real world to see Jonathan completely and think he's perfect. Web is a kind of escape Jonathan has never known. For the first time in his life, he may finally feel free enough to love and accept himself as he is.

The Buried Sky (Post-Apocalyptic Survival Sci Fi Action Thriller)

The Buried Sky (Post-Apocalyptic Survival Sci Fi Action Thriller)
Author: Keith Hartman
Publisher: Keith Hartman
Total Pages: 92
Release: 2011-04-23
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

Coming of age after the end of the world. The Bunker was humanity’s last hope. An underground town, sealed away from the radiation that killed everything on the surface. A lifeboat, with its own water and power and hydroponic farms to see us through the long nuclear winter. But radiation isn’t the only thing that can kill you, and life in the Bunker has its own dangers. There are a half dozen factions that rule this town, and it’s a bad idea to get on the wrong side of any of them. I’m one of the Brats, the kids who were born in this place and have never seen the open sky. But I’ve never fit in with the rest of them. I’m not one of the Cools, or the Geeks, or the Chosen. I’m just the weird boy who sits in the library, reading stories about the world that’s gone. But still, this is my home, too. And now it’s dying. The Bunker is failing. One by one, the lights are going out, and the farms are going dark. Soon there won’t be enough food to go around. And the factions are already starting to turn on each other. Sometimes it takes an outsider to see what’s really going on. Somebody with nothing to lose. So if anyone is gonna save this place, I guess it will have to be me. • Post-apocalyptic new adult dystopian science fiction noir mystery with occasional sex loosely based on Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. Read at your own risk. •

Furious

Furious
Author: Jill Wolfson
Publisher: Macmillan
Total Pages: 337
Release: 2013-04-16
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 0805082832

After becoming the Furies of Greek mythology, three angry high school girls take revenge on everyone who deserves it, in this new novel by the author of "What I Call Life."

Hero

Hero
Author: Perry Moore
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 434
Release: 2008
Genre: Family secrets
ISBN: 055255586X

Thom Creed, the gay son of a disowned superhero, finds that he, too, has special powers and is asked to join the very League that rejected his father, and it is there that Thom finds other misfits whom he can finally trust.

Fun Home

Fun Home
Author: Alison Bechdel
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Total Pages: 250
Release: 2007
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9780618871711

A fresh and brilliantly told memoir from a cult favorite comic artist, marked by gothic twists, a family funeral home, sexual angst, and great books. This breakout book by Alison Bechdel is a darkly funny family tale, pitch-perfectly illustrated with Bechdel's sweetly gothic drawings. Like Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, it's a story exhilaratingly suited to graphic memoir form. Meet Alison's father, a historic preservation expert and obsessive restorer of the family's Victorian home, a third-generation funeral home director, a high school English teacher, an icily distant parent, and a closeted homosexual who, as it turns out, is involved with his male students and a family babysitter. Through narrative that is alternately heartbreaking and fiercely funny, we are drawn into a daughter's complex yearning for her father. And yet, apart from assigned stints dusting caskets at the family-owned "fun home," as Alison and her brothers call it, the relationship achieves its most intimate expression through the shared code of books. When Alison comes out as homosexual herself in late adolescense, the denouement is swift, graphic -- and redemptive.