Indie comics for all ages!
We’re absolutely over the moon for ‘Lemonade Summer’ by Gabi Mendez to be nominated as a finalist for the Small to Mid-Size Press category for the PRISM Awards for Excellence in LGBTQ comics! We’re in such amazing company as fellow finalist Stage Dreams by Melanie Gillman and winner Trans Girls Hit The Town by Emma Jayne!
See all the winners, finalists, and judges for the 2020 PRISM AWARDS here!
Emma Nichols of Book Riot featured “Lemonade Summer” by Gabi Mendez is featured as one of Book Riot’s summery reading recommendations, along with some amaaaaazing artists and books that we’re starry eyed over!
Lemonade Summer by Gabi Mendez
Like most of the titles on this list, Lemonade Summer is all about growing up and figuring out who you are. Unlike the other titles, it’s a collection of seven different stories, each about LGBTQ and nonbinary kids exploring their identities and having fun in the sun. Featuring witches and pirates alongside college kids and derby girls, there is a story in here for everyone. Gabi Mendez wrote this collection to encourage and support readers of all-ages, no matter their gender or sexuality. "
Kendrah Villiesse writes about the importance of representation for young readers, featuring ‘Lemonade Summer’ by Gabi Mendez! Read full article here.
““It is important for kids to see themselves in books, [to] see themselves having adventures that aren’t necessarily related to their identity but confirm it and celebrate it,” Mendez said. “My story is not being told, so I can’t relate, or you are forced to relate to whatever the norm is that isn’t you.” ”
“I have had many experiences with younger kids who have these thoughts ingrained into them,” Lugtu said. “My students who are girls or people of color will create [comics of] superheroes or princesses and will create them as white. That it is natural, something that is normalized by the media we look at.”
“Liv Hanson, content curator for youth at Chicago Public Library, said representation within the LGBTQ community has gotten better in young adult books, but there is still room for progress.
“There are kids who are LGBTQ, and it is important for them to see other kids who are like them,” Hanson said. “For kids who don’t fall into that spectrum, it is important for empathy and for understanding.”
James Hampton of Rogue’s Portal (now Geek’d Out) interviewed ‘Lemonade Summer’ creator Gabi Mendez! See the full interview here.
“RP: What inspired you to focus on queer stories for kids? What do you hope to accomplish with this book?
Gabi: GM: I think representation is very important. The LGBTQ stories that reach major media honestly tend to be tragedies, and the stories for queer youth tend to be about the struggle of being closeted and coming out. This is absolutely a reality most of us go through, but while I don’t want to shy away from those narratives, I think we deserve more. Queer kids deserve to see themselves as pirates, as witches, as the kids we were just trying to navigate adolescence with the happy endings we seek.”
Alex Deuben of Spash Pages chatted with Gabi Mendez about her Lemonade Summer! Read the whole interview here.
Alex: How did you come to comics?
Gabi: I’ve always been making comics, I think. Back in elementary school it was little hand-stapled hamtaro fan comics I’d give out to friends, in middle school it was very manga-phase love story business, and in high school my friends and I would make characters and I’d draw little slice-of-life comics about them on folded notebook paper, passing them like notes. It was in college that I realized I could actually be doing this professionally!
"Circling back to the Ladydrawers, my top selection from CAKE is a comic by Finnish creator Hanna-Pirita Lehkonen, translated into English as Short Gay Stories. It's an essential queer comic that traces their journey of being nonbinary and demisexual. With grace and humor, Lehkonen's story is told through seemingly unrelated superhero, fantasy, and genre vignettes. One after another, they lovingly illustrate (and color) some of the finest comics work I've seen in a long time."
"Cow House Press’ first book is full of stories and individual illustrations that cover a variety of tones – Rivven Prink contributed well-inked, ominous moths, whereas A. Cris Valles and Daimon Hampton contributed pieces that are respectively joyful and delightfully angsty – that show off their horror chops, but also hint at the range of which they are capable."
"The stories mostly defy conventional narrative, making it less a comic to read, and more a comic to feel, not unlike the comics equivalent of a mix tape. It follows the "show more, tell less" school of comics that calls to mind the best of wordless underground comics. There are elements of absurdist humor to offset the anxiety, which give the read a unique gothic charm."
