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Mews and Clues
This May, IDW will release a brand new card game for young mystery fans called Purrrlock Holmes — Furriarty’s Trail (created by Stephen Sauer and illustrated by Jacqui Davis). Here’s what they say: “Furriarty is terrorizing London and he must be stopped before he completes his plans and escapes! As a newly inducted Inspector at Scotland Pound, it’s up to you to bust members of Furriarty’s gang in order to get closer to the bewhiskered baddie that’s been bullying all of Baker Street. Get ready detective, this case is officially afoot (or a paw, if you will).” What they’re not saying is: What’s the connection (if any) between this and the Purrlock Holmes series of young-reader mystery novels by Betty Sleep? You’ll know when we do! Here’s more about the game from TGN.
image c. 2017 IDW Publishing
TigerTails Radio Season 10 Episode 13
Old Fangs
Here's an older artsy film about a young wolf confronting his father after many years. Sometimes family is never an easy thing. (I think I'm just in an artsy and pretensions mood today ... it may be the rain.)
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Get freaky at Dante’s InFURno – the Burning Man theme camp for sex-positive furries.
Burning Man in photos. (Reuters/Jim Urquhart)
Burning Man is the annual, radical art festival in Nevada. It draws creative people of all stripes to a temporary city in the desert for anything-goes social experimenting. It’s been there since 1990 (the year of ConFurence 1 – maybe we can call them subcultures of a shared zeitgeist.) It fertilizes the roots of some of Furry’s most exciting activity. It’s one of those Furry Illuminati connections that casual members may not know. (There’s no Wikifur page for Burning Man).
Furries at Burning Man 16: Dante's Infurno, Relay hawks Camp Fur snowcones, awesome Furryburner art created in camp. pic.twitter.com/YeZeYjuCvx
— Vox Fox (@minstrelbill) September 7, 2016Find the Burner/Furry connection in my interview with Neonbunny. He founded the festival’s Camp Fur. Those carroty roots grew into his series of dance parties in the San Francisco Bay Area, which led him to found Frolic party in 2010. That spawned a mini-movement of furry dances across North America.
See Camp Fur and what it’s for at Furryburners.com:
If you thought I was joking about conspiracy – this goes all the way up to the president. Burner luminary Lindz was invited to the White House to show his anthropomorphic robot, Russell the Electric Giraffe. The national news didn’t tell it, but that was a furry shaking hands with President Obama.
I’m happy to introduce their fellow rock star, a dragon from Vancouver. Thanks to Asunyra for talking with Dogpatch Press!
For Asunyra, the roots grew in a slightly different shape. He’s a tech entrepreneur by occupation. For passion, he leads his own Burning Man camp, and promotes sex-positivity in furry. Get a taste of it when he throws “Trippy Cuddle Parties” at cons.
Cons bring furries together, but things can only go so far at hotels. Watch how far things go when furries have unlimited freedom in the desert. (Have you ever seen a vibrating dragon-dildo chandelier?) – Patch
Asunyra talks about his ambitious theme camp, “Dante’s Infurno.”
(Asunyra:) Here’s a bunch of photos of the camp from various events and the whole build process. These two are probably the best photos of the structure. (Photos by Luke.Me.Up). I’ll tell you the general story of how it came to be.
Our background
My partner Lummox and I have been each active with Burning Man for 10 or 15 years, and in the furry community about as long. We’ve done a lot of big builds for Burning Man in the form of art cars (like venusravertrap.com), local fundraiser parties, theme camps etc – and on the furry side, we’ve hosted our trippy cuddle parties at maybe a dozen or more cons over the years.
Halfway home from #fc2016. Thanks to everyone that came by or helped with the Trippy Furry Cuddle Party room! pic.twitter.com/ATXcBufhB8
— Asunyra (@asunyra) January 20, 2016For the past few years, we’ve also hosted sex-positive house parties for the local furry and burner communities, with anywhere from 70 to 200 people in attendance. We’ve carefully maintained a good safe environment, emphasizing enthusiastic consent, proper communication of boundaries and have put a lot of effort into making sure the guests are all people that we can trust and vouch for.
Here’s what one of the spaces looks like:
(Read more – The Furry House – a base for creativity and community. – Patch)
For work, Lummox is an industrial millwright and public sculpture artist, and I’m a tech entrepreneur in the telecommunications industry.
Why Dante’s was created
In 2015, Lummox was taking the year off from Burning Man and I wanted to bring our furry party experience there, so we spent a month or so building a custom insulated 280 sq ft air-conditioned structure (the “cuddle yurt”) that inside was all cushions and trippy decorations. This would serve just like our room parties as a sex positive space for fursuiters, furries and fur-curious folks of playa to cuddle and play.
As I was going solo, my intention was to join an existing camp rather than start a new one. But after a lot of discussion online, I discovered that established furry theme camps were very against sex being publicly associated with furries, out of concern for the image of the fandom. Uncle Kage’s principles were referenced as an excuse to hide and shame the sexual side of the fandom, and it was made clear that my space was not welcome. At the last minute, I found a small furry camp out in the suburbs that would accommodate me and decided to go for it anyways.
It took two days of driving from Vancouver, and four days of work onsite to put the structure together by myself, but I had a great time doing it and met a lot of very supportive folks in the process (like Amenophis, Duke, Zarafa, and Ashke). I also brought our Venus Raver Trap remote controlled armchair drone, and controlled it from inside the cuddle yurt. (Photo):
Back home safely from Burning Man. Hardest working year yet for me but super rewarding. Met so many awesome people! pic.twitter.com/08ucZt7nGI
— Asunyra (@asunyra) September 9, 2015Being out in the suburbs meant that few people could find it, but all in, it was one of my best years at Burning Man and it gave me a ton of enthusiasm to come back bigger and better.
The build process
In February 2016, Lummox and I decided that Burning Man could really use a standalone sex-positive furry camp, and we were up for the challenge of doing it. Lummox always wanted to build an homage to the strip club from Beetlejuice and we figured why not use this as an excuse, so Dante’s InFURno was born. A raunchy over-the-top strip club would be a fun way to showcase the sexual side of furry to the folks of Burning Man.
We started by digging out some fibreglass I-beams that he had, built the floor layout, support posts, upper and lower walls, and giant signs. The whole thing had to come apart to fit on a 16′ tandem axle trailer (ikea flat pack style), so we made all the major structure bolt together and the non structural panels click in with door hinges and hitch pins. Lummox did all the structural layout and design, the two of us spent almost all of our spring and summer weekends on construction, and some of our local friends helped with painting. One of our local furry artist friends generously designed the big dragon head for us and helped us find a way to get it printed and cut from plywood.
I think this photo kinda captures our build style best – we just kept holding up a screenshot from the movie and kinda winging it.
There’s horror themed bars, and clown themed bars, but no Furry bars in the world that I know of yet – thanks to Asunyra for dreaming one. – Patch
Last year’s events
Our very first public build of Dante’s was at the Seattle regional burn, Critical Northwest in 2016. Rummy and Yotice joined us with their Coyote Garden art piece, and the four of us put everything together over two 12 hour build days. The space was a huge hit, busy all night every night. Rummy donated an old CRT television with built-in VCR that we hung from the ceiling of the dome and used to play 8-hour tapes of furry porn, and Lummox would stand on the top floor balcony and remote control the Raver Trap armchair in front of camp for hours every night. Despite getting rained out the night before teardown, we had no major snags and everyone had a great time.
Two weeks later we brought Dante’s to our local Vancouver BC Burning Man regional, Burn in the Forest. We were placed in the “red light district” in the spot that had previously been the main orgy space, so the vibe there was definitely a lot more open sex. We also had a bigger sound system and great DJ performances, so it was kept very busy. At one point one of our campmates – exhausted from set up – had fallen asleep in the middle of the cuddle pit, only to get woken up and bolt upright to find several couples enthusiastically having sex all around him.
At both of these events, Dante’s was really appreciated – but it wasn’t really that furry, as the few of us running the camp were pretty much the only furs there. It was at Burning Man that the place really came into its own as a furry theme camp. There, we teamed up with Varka (co-founder of Bad Dragon)- who made a vibrating dragon dick chandelier, and Dave the Dinosaur, a dirty insult-spewing dinosaur-shaped vending machine that dispensed free tiny dicks all week.
Thanks to help from FUR, we were placed right near their camp, on a prominent busy street corner right near the centre of Black Rock City. Lots of people would come back and bring their friends to show them the space, the dick chandelier, or to get accosted by Dave.
We had the cuddle yurt in full operation all week, and it worked great. Daytime it was used mostly by the general public to hide in the air conditioning from the heat, and at night it was usually full of cuddly furries and curious non-furries. At one point some of us were interviewed in Dante’s for a podcast. (In this one I’m Saffron, the name of the fursuit I was in.)
“I have been waiting for this moment for years. I finally sat down with the wonderful people from the Fur community and got to learn all about their wonderful intricate and complex world that is like a Russian doll when you start to peel back the fur.
Dante’s Inferno is a camp for Furries (which was one of 5 Fur camps) built by two super MacGyvers from Vancouver that featured a giant chandelier in the center of the room lit up by 10 fantasy dildos representing every kind of dragon, unicorn, and tentacle dick a furry heart could desire. (Dragon dicks have SCALES!)” (-Zoe Nightingale)
I’ll take the cutie on the right. – Patch
This year
We’ve already started planning this year’s events, and our telegram group is busy with tons of exciting project ideas. We’ll be bringing Dante’s to Burn in the Forest again, and also to Burning Man. Because of how popular it was last year, we’ll be going from 4-6 campmates to almost 20 at each event – which means more volunteer hands for setup, teardown and shifts running the space, so it should be a much bigger and smoother operation.
Lummox and I have bought an old 30’ city bus, and are converting it to be our new towing rig for the Dante’s trailer. We’re covering it in almost 3000 watts of solar panels so that we can run most of our camp without generator power this year. We’re also building a “ghetto” streetscape to extend off the Dante’s frontage with a boarded up pet shop, cash for gold pawn shop, maybe a passed out furry hobo mannequin. Plans are to have a new bar, new sound equipment, and bigger DJ lineup.
I’m pretty passionate about this project (and about promoting sex-positivity in furry in general), so I’m really excited to share!
Steal Snacks and Look Good Doing It
That’s the official slogan of Trash Panda. They’re a new clothing company started by a pair of fans from Southern California. They state their philosophy like this: “Whether it’s rolling that critical hit, landing that hit on someone’s face, or simply eating that last slice of pizza, or sitting down for a long session of talking and video games you should enjoy what you look like. Live on the outside.” That’s fannish. To that end they have a growing line of nerdy-themed t-shirts, several of which feature anthropomorphic designs. Visit their shop on-line to see what they have so far. And of course they’ll be adding more.
image c. 2017 Trash Panda
Episode 341 - 101010101
Milow – Howling At The Moon
A Glimpse of Anthropomorphic Literature, ed. AnthroAquatic – book review by Fred Patten.
Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.
A Glimpse of Anthropomorphic Literature, AnthroAquatic, ed.
Plainfield, CT, Goal Publications, November 2016, trade paperback $10.00 (153 pages).
A Glimpse of Anthropomorphic Literature was originally a three-issue online magazine of 45 to 50 pages each, published in January, March, and August 2016. This small (5 x 0.3 x 8 inches), slim volume collects all three issues into one handy paper edition, minus the advertisements.
The contents are published as they appeared in the magazine issues; mostly a mixture of short stories and reviews. The book’s most serious lack is a combined table of contents. There are 14 short stories and 11 reviews (also an interview with S. Andrew Swann, and an analysis of Felix Salten’s 1923 novel Bambi: A Life in the Woods as an example for the furry writer; both by Donald Jacob Uitvlugt). The reader is forced to hunt through the whole book to find anything.
The short stories are all under ten pages each. Most are whimsical fantasies. Two, “The Mouse Who Was Born a Bear” and “Sheeperfly’s Lullaby”, both by Mary E. Lowd, are on the ALAA’s 2016 Recommended List of furry short fiction of the year worth reading. Notable others include “Catching the Thief” by Amy Fontaine, “Sheets and Covers” by Ocean Tigrox, “The Charitable Pact of a Soft-hearted Fool” by Slip-Wolf, “Beast” by Frances Pauli, and “Promises to Keep” by Renee Carter Hall.
The brevity and whimsicality of the fiction, plus its interruption by so many book reviews, makes A Glimpse of Anthropomorphic Fiction (cover by Aisha Robinson) an intellectual trifle, the literary equivalent of a box of chocolates. Is it worth reading? Very much so, but you will want to read it in short bursts, two or three stories and a review or two at a time, rather than all at once.
This has been a short review of a short book of short stories.
Full disclosure: I am the writer of three of the reviews in it.
-Fred Patten
Thrust! Parry! Crochet!
The artist Cielo Pinawin is crafter who chrochets fuzzy character dolls, and she sells them on line as CrochetGiftsbyCielo. She specializes in Pokemon characters, but lately she’s branched out into other anime critters and even the Ninja Turtles. All of her creations are hand-made and customized when you order them. Visit her Etsy Store to see what she’s done so far.
image c. 2017 by Cielo Pinawin
Trailer: Night In The Woods
New stylish furry video game hit this week from from Infinite Fall. This one is on Steam as I type this. "NIGHT IN THE WOODS is an adventure game focused on exploration, story, and character, featuring dozens of characters to meet and lots to do across a lush, vibrant world."
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Last Dance of the Phoenix, by James R. Lane – book review by Fred Patten.
Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.
Last Dance of the Phoenix, by James R. Lane
Raleigh, NC, Lulu Press, August 2016, trade paperback $14.99 (254 pages), Kindle $2.51.
This s-f novel is set in the near future. Thomas Barnes has an Artificial Intelligence in his home, but he also wears a dark blue NRA ball cap, eats at a McDonald’s, drives on Florida’s Highway I-95, drinks Gatorade, and is familiar with the TV program Final Jeopardy.
Two years previously, Earth was discovered by aliens (in flying saucers) and welcomed into the galactic community. The four spacegoing species of aliens that humans meet just happen to look like anthropomorphic foxes, cheetahs, otters, and rabbits.
Convenient? Maybe too convenient? Barnes thinks so.
“No bug-eyed monsters, no giant slugs, spiders, dragons, demons, birds – nothing else. Aliens that didn’t seem so alien after all, apparently guaranteed not to terribly upset ape-based humanity’s rabid xenophobia. To me and a lot of others it just seemed too damned pat. Somebody – or something – had to have engineered all this. Cute.” (p. 10)
Barnes has just returned to Jacksonville, Florida from traveling to the Yularian (fox) home world after having been rejuvenated. This was an experiment. The (expensive) Yularian rejuvenation process is well-known to them, but nobody was sure whether it would work on humans, so they selected Barnes to be their guinea pig. They chose him because he was famous (a very popular science-fiction author whose stories included friendly aliens) and now about to die of old age. He went to their planet in one of their FTL ships, and was returned to Jacksonville’s new spaceport when it seems to be a success.
Barnes is supposed to have the Yularian elderly doctor who supervised his rejuvenation come to Earth with him, to spend three months making sure his rejuvenation remains successful. Instead he is met by L’raan, a pretty (if you like foxes) young vixen who is one of Dr. N’looma’s graduate students. A last-minute family emergency has prevented Dr. N’looma from coming to Earth, and L’raan has been chosen to replace her. Barnes quickly figures out that all the other Yularians on the project refused to come to Earth, and L’raan, the juniormost, was stuck with it. She also seems to be horribly sick. The two are assured by the Yularian embassy that it’s the affects of FTL travel and that she’ll recover in a couple of days. Barnes suspects that she’s been poisoned – and that whoever is trying to kill her will also kill him to make it look like the rejuvenation process went wrong.
What follows is a James Bond scenario with Barnes as the invincible agent and L’raan as the beautiful (but furry) girl whom he protects.
“‘The first thing is, what information you know about me isn’t all that wrong,’ I stated, ‘but there are a few key elements missing.’
‘Like me,’ Art said, smiling. ‘Tom’s novels are quite popular with a lot of scientists and government officials, and over the years he made a number of, shall we say, ‘influential’ friends and contacts in some fairly important agencies, including those agencies that don’t have publicly-known names. After your people contacted humanity and eventually made us the rejuvenation offer, some of us in a few of those agencies feared that something unpleasant might be in the plans before all of this was over.’” (pgs. 71-72)
Barnes has been a secret agent for the U.S. government all along. It’s also how he could recognize that L’raan had been poisoned instead of just being sick. He deduces that her poisoners are other foxes in the nearby Yularian embassy, so he’s prepared when his home is attacked at night by alien assassin drones. L’raan, who feels betrayed by her own people, confirms that they are Yularian military technology. Barnes calls in Art Goldman and his military research team; they report what’s happening to the U.S. government; and Barnes and L’raan are invited to help the government investigate what’s going on.
A comic inconvenience is that the Yularian scientists enhanced and altered Barnes’ sense of smell when they rejuvenated him. L’raan happens to be going through one of her periods of heat. Normally this wouldn’t be noticed by humans except as a slightly increased vulpine muskiness. But to Barnes, L’raan may look sexy (if you’re into foxes) but she stinks to high heaven!
Are the assassins who are after Barnes and L’raan from the Yularian government, or from a faction within it that their government is innocent of? Or have some of the local Yularians sold out to either the Dralorians (otters), the Eelon (cheetahs), or the Ar’kaa (rabbits)? Is it an anti-human secret society that is against just Barnes and the Yularians who work with him, or do the villains have a larger and more ominous goal?
“‘Ambassador D’naad,’ I began, ‘my friends here and I, along with certain high-ranking governmental and military officials here on Earth, are convinced that this…campaign…against us is not the work of one person, or even a small group of people. What we first thought to be a possible political ploy or power struggle is now, we feel, something more akin to a move toward genocide, of who and by whom we don’t yet know. […] But I can tell you with certainty that we need your help. Hopefully we still have time to defuse the situation, but that time is no doubt growing short, and we’re certain it will eventually run out.’” (p. 133)
As matters grow more dramatic, Tom and representatives of all four aliens are invited as guests to the Paws’N’Claws furry convention, and are publicly attacked there by the mysterious enemy who doesn’t care how many fursuiters are collateral victims.
Who is the enemy of the humans? The foxes? The cheetahs? The otters? The rabbits? Or – something else?
Last Dance of the Phoenix (cover by Eugene Arenhaus) is a blend of current military technology (Art calls an Army AH-64A Apache battle helicopter to land on Tom’s lawn) and futuristic alien science (the spaceships, the FTL drive, the rejuvenation process, the Yularian interstellar videophone). It feels like there’s a bit of Mary Sue here – “James R. Lane is a retired Florida photojournalist” and obviously a s-f writer, who is probably ripe for rejuvenation – but on the whole, this is a (slightly wordy) clever near-future espionage-action thriller featuring a young-again hero that furry fans will really identify with, and villains whose identities you are almost guaranteed to not guess in advance.
Hero Hadrasaur
And the winner for the longest comic book title we’ve found recently goes to… Space Parasaurolophus, a full-color science fiction comic written, illustrated, and self-published by Leonardo Pertuzzatti. That very hadrasaur was captured by an alien race called the Lev’rram and given both sentience and an arsenal of fancy gadgets. All of which our hero uses to try and defend the Earth from the Werthams: A much more evil alien race, who wiped out the dinosaurs and now have their eyes set on humanity. Visit the creator’s web site to find out more.
image c. 2017 by Leo
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Rock Dog: “Glorious” music video
Bonus video for today! Have a Rock Dog music video. OMFG! So Cute! [1] [1] https://furry.today/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Untitled-1-13.jpg
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FA 059 Handling Arguments at Conventions - Why is NYC so riddled with STIs? What is the best way to yell at someone at a convention? How do you inspire optimism in dating when enthusiasm dies? All this, and more, on this week's Feral Attraction
Hello Everyone!
We open this week's show with a discussion on STIs in New York City. Over the past three decades STIs have been on the rise while funding has remained stagnant. We look at factors as to why and ask the ultimate question: why is sexual health not considered to be recession proof?
Our main topic is on handling arguments at conventions. We discuss the common arguments, causes for arguments, and ways to avoid arguing with loved ones at conventions. We also approach the topic of former lovers, jilted exes, and friends who might have issues with you and how to handle confrontation (or even break ups) while at one of the most public of venues we as a fandom encounter.
We close out this week's show with a question on how to handle rejection. In a search for Mister Right, how can you handle being told no repeatedly or being matched with guys that just are not compatible? Should the expectations be adjusted, or is it perhaps too narrow a net is being cast? We discuss realism, optimism, and pessimism and how to appropriately set expectations.
For more information, including a list of topics, see our Show Notes for this episode.
Thanks and, as always, be well!
FA 059 Handling Arguments at Conventions - Why is NYC so riddled with STIs? What is the best way to yell at someone at a convention? How do you inspire optimism in dating when enthusiasm dies? All this, and more, on this week's Feral Attraction
The Return of Teddy Ruxpin
Thanks to Changa Lion over at Furry.Today, we discovered the return of Teddy Ruxpin, the animatronic talking-bear story-telling sensation from the 1980’s. [See what we mean?] This latest version [distributed by Wicked Cool Toys] features a newly-designed Teddy with LCD animated eyes, plus Bluetooth connecting the bear to interactive read-along stories for laptops and other devices. Check out the newest advertisement on YouTube to see what all the fuss is about.
image c. 2017 Wicked Cool Toys
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Book of the Month: Dogs of War
February 2017’s Book of the Month is Dogs of War, edited by Fred Patten.
Men have made war for gold, for land, and to put others in chains for millennia. No invention or philosophy has changed that, not gunpowder, not airplanes, not democracy, or even splitting the atom. Whatever the era, whatever the weapon, man has made war on his neighbors. The nature of conflict never changes, because human nature has not changed.
But how might that change if it were no longer just humanity going to war—if animal instincts, strengths and skill were to join the battlefield?
Dogs of War is an anthology exploring what warfare looks like when the combatants are no longer fully human. It contains twenty-three stories about how war changes when those who do the fighting have changed, and how much it stays just the same.
Dogs of War contains the following short stories:
- “Nosy and Wolf,” Ken MacGregor
- “After Their Kind,” Taylor Harbin
- “Succession,” Devin Hallsworth
- “Two If By Sea,” Field T. Mouse
- “The Queens’ Confederate Space Marines,” Elizabeth McCoy
- “The Loving Children,” Bill McCormick
- “Strike, But Hear Me,” Jefferson P. Swycaffer
- “End of Ages,” BanWynn Oakshadow
- “Shells On the Beach,” Tom Mullins
- “Cross of Valor Reception for the Raccoon, Tanner Williams, Declassified Transcript,” John Kulp
- “Last Man Standing,” Frances Pauli
- “Hunter’s Fall,” Angela Oliver
- “Old Regimes,” Gullwulf
- “The Shrine War,” Alan Loewen
- “The Monster in the Mist,” Madison Keller
- “Wolves in Winter,” Searska GreyRaven
- “The Third Variety,” Rob Baird
- “The Best and Worst of Worlds,” Mary E. Lowd
- “Tooth, Claw and Fang,” Stephen Coghlan
- “Sacrifice,” J.N. Wolfe
- “War of Attrition,” Lisa Timpf
- “Fathers to Sons,” MikasiWolf
- “Hoodies and Horses,” Michael D. Winkle
Dogs of War is available now in print from FurPlanet.
A Decade of Gold: A retrospective of the works of Kyell Gold, by Thurston Howl.
Thanks to Howl, of Thurston Howl Publications, for his guest post. I’m told it was approved by Kyell. Enjoy.
Few authors have captivated the mainstream furry audience as famously as Kyell Gold. From his 2004 short story publication, “The Prisoner’s Release” to his upcoming novella, The Time He Desires (Dec 2016), Gold’s works have been award-winning pieces of fiction that have even attracted the attention of non-furry readers. Throughout the past twelve years, Gold has gone through a multitude of genres and such unique characters. Below, I hope to detail many of his milestones over the past almost-decade as well as provide a primer on Gold’s work.
Gold’s debut to fiction was his Renaissance-era novel series set in the fictional universe of Argaea. While it technically started with his “The Prisoner’s Release,” which was published in Heat #1, it later became a novel series, starting with Volle (2005). The series follows a red fox, titularly named Volle, as he undergoes a spy mission, pretending to be a lord of a small area participating in negotiations in the kingdom’s political mecca. The catch is that Volle is a hypersexual fox who struggles to keep his sex life separate from his political life, neither of which allow him to use his true identity. This series is a prime example of how Gold can meld genres. In this case, historical fiction meets homosexual furry erotic romance in a way that is both believable and evocative. The Argaea series has received stellar reviews and widespread reception. So far, the Argaea series includes the following titles: Volle, Pendant of Fortune (2006), The Prisoner’s Release and Other Stories (2007), Shadows of the Father (2010), and Weasel Presents (2011). While not all of these stories follow Volle, they are all set in the same universe. All except for Weasel Presents (which was published by Furplanet Productions) were published by Sofawolf Press, with Sara Palmer being the primary illustrator for most of these.
The next milestone in Gold’s career has been his young adult furry novel Waterways (2008). Based on a previous short story he had written, the novel follows a young otter who has grown up in a conservative, religious household, only to find out in his teens that he is attracted to a male fox from a different school. Although this is a coming-out tale, it’s anything but unoriginal. Gold breaks the story down into three parts: coming out to oneself, coming out to family, and coming out to the general public. The otter Kory deals with tremendous intersectionalities throughout his journey: homelessness, poverty, religious differences, physical abuse, and, of course, relationship trouble. Quite different from that Argaea series, Waterways is set in an entirely modern context, and it deals with current social issues. In this book, Gold makes very strong political and social claims, setting him apart as a very polemical writer, and not just an entertaining one. This sets him apart from other LGBT fiction writers, as he demonstrates he is able to be completely serious with his fiction, using a gay couple to reflect on current issues through their connections with others who are suffering, rather than making the gay couple a symbol for all current issues. This novel was his debut to modern fiction in the fandom, and I know I have taught this book twice: once in a college composition class, and once as a guest lecturer at Middle Tennessee State University for an LGBT literature course—and yes, the book was required for purchase at the university bookstore.
However, Gold’s biggest claim to fame was his next novel series, set in the Forester Universe. The first book, Out of Position (2009), follows football athlete Devlin Miski and his unintentional romance with English major Lee Farrel. While Dev struggles to fight his homosexual feelings toward Lee, the fox Lee tries to advocate for equal rights, often at a risk to Dev’s career. Yet, the two complement each other and help each other to grow, both in their professions and in their personal lives. This series concluded early in 2016 with the book Over Time, the fifth installment. This time, Gold’s secondary genre is sports fiction. And many furries, myself included, despite our aversion to sports, have found ourselves enraptured by the species-based intricacies of Gold’s football. We stand in the crowd, cheering with Lee. We root for our own athletes. Still on sale sporadically, but I have seen athletic jerseys for sale based on Gold’s fictional teams. If Waterways showed Gold’s political side, this series shows his activist side. Personally, I have read most of the major award-winning mainstream LGBT fiction, and none of it has captured the political situation of LGBT people and potential solutions as thoughtfully and as evocatively as Gold has in this series.
His last major milestone has been his Dangerous Spirits series, which started with the 2012 book Green Fairy. This series is much more experimental, emulating the shifting voices and perspectives in postmodernist novel Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. This series starts with the 1901 Moulin Rouge, as well as modern times. The books progress into the late 1800s Russia and the early 20th century in New Orleans. This series is not as erotic or as adult as his earlier works, yet it still deals heavily with LGBT contemporary issues and ways to deal with them. Like his other works, it creates a very believable world that is a safe space for LGBT readers, letting them know they are not alone and that it’s important to keep fighting.
Over the past twelve years, Gold has written numerous other pieces as well, including In the Doghouse of Justice (2011) and The Silver Circle (2012). Gold also edited a 2009 anthology based on the Ten Commandments, aptly called X. Along with multiple short stories in Heat and Fang, he also had an essay published in the 2015 nonfiction study on furries, Furries Among Us. In this, he wrote about his views on furry erotica: where it has been, where it is, and how it will likely continue. His other nonfiction includes a comic, drawn by Keovi, in Erika Moen’s Oh Joy Sex Toy; and a piece on the furry fandom in Uncanny Magazine in 2016.
I have had the opportunity to work with Gold on numerous occasions: from an interview I conducted for my class lecture to editing his essay for Furries Among Us. And I have always been delighted with his attention to the craft of writing and his dedication to the furry fandom. He has been an influential figure in the furry writing community as a driving force for slice-of-life fiction and using furry fiction to make social commentary. Now that we are in the start of a second decade since his first major publication, I am confident that I speak for the furry community in general when I say that we look forward to the next ten years of Gold’s fiction. He has inspired both readers and writers.
Ever onward, fellow furs.
– Howl