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A review by vagaybond
Sword Dance by A.J. Demas
4.0
I feel so impressed by the representation of Verazda. He feels like the kind of historical-inspired nonbinary rep I'm trying to teach people about on the ScriptLGBT blog when I can. There's thought and consideration to topics like worrying about being a chaser (not in that wording) and idk, the nuances of gender, a bit.
That said, it feels like every time I come across trans characters in fiction, they have a history with being sex slaves. If we're being realistic, the majority of trans people I know personally (including me) do have some kind of sexual trauma. But this particular trope is becoming a bit of a pattern in fiction.
Not saying this book did anything bad, just that the pattern of this being the case for the majority of all trans characters written is alarming.
The disability rep is good.
The sex scenes felt really well done for both trans and disability stuff.
I think I'm not rating it 5 stars because while it's a really good book, and definitely the kind of representation I crave, because:
- I just had a hard time keeping track of names and such. That's more a Me Problem but it felt like there were a number of people with A names? The personalities of the characters mixed with the context made it easy enough to differentiate
- I feel like there was other stuff that just kind of didn't hit as powerfully as it could have. It felt like most of the conflicts in the plot were easily combatible with strategy and cunning. Like if this were D&D, it's like they kept rolling between 16-20 on a D20. It's nice but it didn't feel as rewarding, idk
That said, it feels like every time I come across trans characters in fiction, they have a history with being sex slaves. If we're being realistic, the majority of trans people I know personally (including me) do have some kind of sexual trauma. But this particular trope is becoming a bit of a pattern in fiction.
Not saying this book did anything bad, just that the pattern of this being the case for the majority of all trans characters written is alarming.
The disability rep is good.
The sex scenes felt really well done for both trans and disability stuff.
I think I'm not rating it 5 stars because while it's a really good book, and definitely the kind of representation I crave, because:
- I just had a hard time keeping track of names and such. That's more a Me Problem but it felt like there were a number of people with A names? The personalities of the characters mixed with the context made it easy enough to differentiate
- I feel like there was other stuff that just kind of didn't hit as powerfully as it could have. It felt like most of the conflicts in the plot were easily combatible with strategy and cunning. Like if this were D&D, it's like they kept rolling between 16-20 on a D20. It's nice but it didn't feel as rewarding, idk