Hello!

[Emily]

Hi! My name is Em and I am a 22 year old nonbinary bisexual college student at Cal State San Marcos. I used to live in the Philly area and attend Millersville University before I followed my family and moved from Pennsylvania to California. I use they/them pronouns. I have two dogs and I love reading anything and everything. I am a literature major with the intent of teaching high school. I've recently read a comic anthology titled Love is Love that was made for the Pulse Orlando victims. It was a very powerful and moving piece. I've also read Blue is The Warmest Color in anticipation to set aside time to watch the film. This was also amazing and made me cry at the end. I'm super friendly and would love to hear any book recommendations!!

[Bill, Moderator]

Welcome Em! We seem to rate books similarly :-) You have a very interesting mix of books on your shelves, from classic classics to graphic novels. Do you cover the latter in your Lit classes?

[Emily]

Well for the start of my career, we did a lot of covering on the classics, then I had the privilege of taking courses with professors who saw the value of graphic novels as a teaching method. It was super helpful and validating, since as a kid, I mostly read graphic novels and avoided the books they required us to read in high school.

[Sarah]

Em wrote: "Well for the start of my career, we did a lot of covering on the classics, then I had the privilege of taking courses with professors who saw the value of graphic novels as a teaching method. It wa..."

It makes me so happy to hear this. Graphic novels are the best. And if Roxane Gay is writing comics, to me that's solid proof that the dividing line between literary fiction and graphic novels/comics is not so important.

[Bill, Moderator]

Sarah wrote: "...It makes me so happy to hear this. Graphic novels are the best. ..."

I completely agree. I've been trying to come up with an alternative for 'Literary Fiction', since it seems to mean fiction that the pundits approve of. Any suggestions?

[Sarah]

Bill wrote: "I've been trying to come up with an alternative for 'Literary Fiction', since it seems to mean fiction that the pundits approve of. Any suggestions?"

Personally, I call my novel "contemporary fiction" since it has a contemporary setting, but isn't a romance or thriller or any other well defined genre. My publisher seems to be okay with that so far.
(edit: punctuation)

[Greg]

Welcome Em! I live in California as well.

[Brittni]

Awesome! How do you like California? I'm from Texas. Do you have any book recommendations?