Charlie Jane Anders's Blog, page 6

San Francisco's Next Election Is a Referendum on Billionaires

Before we get started, hi! This is a free newsletter, but I really appreciate your support as a trans author and organizer. I have a new novel coming out in August 2025 called Lessons in Magic and Disaster. It’s about a witch who’s trying to finish her literature PhD — but then she decides to teach her mother how to do magic, because her mother has been hiding from the world for seven years after some really bad stuff happened. And it’s got a lot of stuff about eighteenth century literature, inc...

They Can't Get Rid Of Us — Our Parties Are Too Good

Hey, this is a free newsletter — but if you would like to support me, please pre-order my novel Lessons in Magic and Disaster (August 2025). A young trans woman teaches her lesbian mom how to cast spells, while also discovering the scandalous secrets of a mysterious novel from 1749. You can order a signed, personalized copy from Green Apple Books. (Please write personalization requests under “additional information.”) I put so much of my heart into this book, I cannot wait for you to read it.

I ...

Where do genres come from?

We spend a lot of time discussing how genres work, where to draw the lines between genres, and which tropes and motifs are essential to a particular genre. But I haven't seen as much chatter about where genres come from and why they exist. If anything, I usually see people saying things like, "Genres are marketing categories.” Which is true, as far as it goes — except that it doesn't address why those marketing categories matter, or why they're so effective. So here's my working theory for why ...

I'm Obsessed With This Cute Time Travel Show

One thing I appreciate about Netflix is the wealth of Brazilian TV shows and movies — this was super useful when I was learning Brazilian Portuguese. But also, some of my favorite genre shows lately are coming out of Brazil and kind of going under the radar in the United States. One of my favorite Brazilian SF/fantasy shows released its third and final season a couple weeks ago, and I was so happy to get one more chance to bask in its queer brilliance.

In Back to 15 (De Volta Aos 15), Anita is ...

One More Vital Reason Why Community Gives Me Hope

A week or so ago, I was the closing speaker at the final XOXO Fest in Portland, which was a huge honor. I was asked to come talk about reasons to have hope for the future, and in particular the ways that community gives me hope — which is obviously a topic very close to my heart.

Last week, I shared some stuff I had cut out of the talk — but now, here’s the actual text of the talk I gave, along with a few of my slides. (Making slides is hard! Who knew?)

Hi! I wrote a book a few years ago called ...

Here's Why You Suck At Predicting the Future

This past weekend, I was super honored to give the closing talk at XOXO, a wonderful festival in Portland OR that was happening for the very last time. I was so grateful to Andy Baio, Andy McMillan and Chloë Miller for having me, and so thrilled to hang out with so many brilliant creators and thinkers. It was a total blast. 

I'll be turning my talk into a newsletter in a week or two — but for now, here's some stuff I wrote which didn't make it into the talk purely for length reasons...

The way ...

10 Literary Books That Made Me a Better Science Fiction Writer

I love literary fiction, whether it’s grand pomo experiments or a totally grounded personal stories about one family. I’ve been reading literary writing my whole life — I was an English major for two years before I jumped ship to Asian Studies in college. And I’ve learned a ton from writing literary fiction, contributing stories to places like Tin House, Conjunctions, ZYZZYVA, F(r)iction and the recent novel-in-stories Fourteen Days.

As I wrote a while back, the appearance of literary merit mea...

Why I Go To Conventions

While I was at Worldcon last weekend, Emily Wilson (writer for New Scientist and author of the Sumerians trilogy) asked me why I go to conventions. This seemed like a really good question that deserved a thoughtful response, so with Emily's permission, I decided to answer it in this week's newsletter. (And just FYI, this will be another short one, because I'm dealing with post-con exhaustion and I'm still traveling for another few days.)

I love conventions for so many reasons, but a lot of it b...

Another Way To Think About "Conflict" and "Stakes" In Your Fiction

Last week, I was an instructor at the Lambda Literary Workshop, and it was an utter privilege to get to work with some brilliant writers whose bravely inventive writing gave me a new faith in the future of queer speculative fiction. 

While I was at the workshop, I gave a craft talk about "queering conflict and stakes" in fiction-writing. And since I'm still in the middle of traveling, on my way to Worldcon in Glasgow, I'm turning that talk into this week's newsletter.

First of all, I have to sta...

I Love It When a Plan Doesn't Come Together

This is going to be a short newsletter. I’m afraid things are going to be a bit spotty for the next couple weeks: I'm an instructor at the Lambda Literary Workshop, which is a huge honor, and then I'm off to Worldcon in Glasgow. I promise the newsletter will return to its regular verbosity and frequency in mid-August. 

Recently I watched the Prime Video show My Lady Jane, which I enjoyed a lot despite occasionally finding the tweeness of the voiceover narration a bit overwhelming. Without givin...