Breaking the Glass Slipper: Women in science fiction, fantasy, and horror

How feminist are the Disney princesses? Have we seen a positive trend in the modern examples? What else does Disney need to do to create positive role models for children?

2017 is set to be a big year for Laura Lam. With two new books, the final in her Micah Grey trilogy, Masquerade, and the second in the Pacifica series, Shattered Minds, as well as a short story included in the anthology Nasty Women, she’s definitely one to look out for. If you’ve not come across her books […] The post Laura Lam on exploring the queer experience in SFF first appeared on Breaking th...

With the final book in her Micah Grey series out this month, Laura Lam talks to Lucy about exploring the queer experience in her writing.

Please note that this episode may contain content that could upset some listeners. Audience discretion is advised. Late in 2016 I stumbled across a post on Tor.com entitled ‘Do Better: Sexual violence in SFF‘ by Sarah Gailey and I knew I had to interview her for Breaking the Glass Slipper. I wasn’t disappointed. My chat with […] The post Sarah Gailey on sexual violence in SFF first appeared on Bre...

*Trigger warning: This episode contains discussions of sexual violence that may upset some listeners. Genre fiction is, by definition, limitless in its possibilities. Writers could create any world they want... so why do they so often create fictional worlds where sexual violence, particularly against women, is commonplace?

This week, Charlotte interviews horror writer Alison Littlewood, whose debut novel A Cold Season made a splash when it was first released, making the Richard and Judy Book Club. Since then, she’s published another seven books, including two short story collections. While her writing predominantly falls into the category of horror, Alison is not averse to trying […] The post Interview with Alison L...

Charlotte interviews horror writer Alison Littlewood about how she became a writer, her love of fairytales and the importance of a really good editor.

Science fiction writer Kameron Hurley is the latest victim to naively offer to be interviewed by me. Already well-known for her award-winning essay ‘We Have Always Fought’, several successful series (including God’s War, Worldbreaker Saga, and Bel Dame Apocrypha), and the badass essay collection The Geek Feminist Revolution, her latest book, a standalone space opera, […] The post Kameron Hurley on...

Megan interviews two-time Hugo award winning science fiction writer Kameron Hurley.

Love triangles are as a common as mud when it comes to fiction. Is your story lacking tension? Throw in a love triangle! Do you want to hook in a teenage audience? Throw in a love triangle? Want some audience titillation?! … You get the idea. But love triangles can be done well, at least, […] The post Love triangles first appeared on Breaking the Glass Slipper .

Megan, Lucy, and Charlotte discuss love triangles in SFFH fiction: from the popular one girl, two guy version to the 'two person' love triangle.

Portal fantasy has long been a popular subgenre of fantasy, from classics such as The Chronicles of Narnia to Alice in Wonderland and newer interpretations like Lev Grossman’s The Magicians. One of my favourite novels published last year was Foz Meadows’ YA portal fantasy, An Accident of Stars. The novel played to many of the conventional tropes while also offering […] The post Foz Meadows on port...

Megan interviews genderqueer fantasy author, Foz Meadows, on portal fantasy, its tropes, and how the subgenre can be used to address gender issues.

It is the holiday season and everyone is thinking about presents. Don’t lie, you know you are. You’ve been making a list (even if only in your head) of presents you’d like to receive and trying to work out what your loved ones would like. So, in the spirit of this time of year, we […] The post The 2017 speculative fiction prospectus first appeared on Breaking the Glass Slipper .

In our final episode of 2016, we ask agents, editors, and reviewers what they'd like to see in SFFH books in 2017, with comments from Anne Perry, Penny Reeve, Bella Pagan, Ed Wilson, Hal Duncan, Amanda Rutter, Gillian Redfearn, Sandra Sawicka, Alison Littlewood, and LaChouett.

While we may wish we only appreciated science fiction, fantasy, or horror that presented ideas of gender equality, we’d be lying if we tried to make that claim. There are plenty of books, films, tv shows out there that would make our favourites list that – if we were being honest with ourselves – do […] The post Guilty pleasures first appeared on Breaking the Glass Slipper .

While we might encourage the appreciation of stories that promote gender equality, we admit that there are plenty of lesser tales we enjoy. Whether we never saw their problematic nature when we first read the book or watched the film or whether we can appreciate other aspects of the story despite its flaws, we explore some of our favourite and most embarrassing guilty pleasures and ask if it is ok...

It should come as no surprise to regular listeners of Breaking the Glass Slipper that we take issue with female characters being included in a narrative purely to act as a love interest. Unfortunately, it happens all too often. The conversation has flared up again around the plethora of superhero/comic book films where this problem happens […] The post Unnecessary romance and token love interests...

Charlotte, Lucy, and Megan discuss the frequency with which we see female characters added to a story who have no other purpose than to be the love interest. While this does also sometimes occur with male characters, given that good female characters are hard to come by, this is a problem worth talking about.

While Megan was sunning it up in Australia, Charlotte and Lucy interviewed on of Breaking the Glass Slipper’s favourite people: Emma Newman. Emma is a woman of many talents, including being a fabulous writer, outspoken feminist, snazzy dresser, hilarious podcaster, and audiobook narrator extraordinaire. Is there anything she can’t do?! A relative rarity amongst genre writers, Emma writes […] The p...

Lucy and Charlotte interview writer, podcaster, and audiobook narrator Emma Newman, covering topics such as worldbuilding, inequality in SFF, and what we can do to change the gender narrative.

The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet has been one of my favourite reads this year. If you enjoy science fiction and haven’t made time to read it yet… what are you waiting for? If you want to read my full (spoiler free) review, head over to Pop Verse. Becky Chambers did not have […] The post Interview with Becky Chambers first appeared on Breaking the Glass Slipper .

In today's episode, Megan chats to Becky Chambers, author of The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet and A Closed and Common Orbit, about using Kickstarter, self-publishing, the importance of beta readers, being nominated for a Clarke Award, writing humour into science fiction, sticking to science within the realm of possibility, and diversity in SFF.

The new Ghostbusters film is not alone, almost every week we hear of a new franchise reboot or cult film remake with a gender-swapped cast. From turning Splash into the tale of a merman to an Ocean’s Eleven reboot with a full cast of women, it appears as though Hollywood is tackling its diversity problems the way it handles everything […] The post Gender swapping first appeared on Breaking the Gla...

Megan Leigh, Charlotte Bond, and Lucy Hounsom discuss the new trend in gender swapped reboots and what implications this has for gender equality in the film industry. While we here at Breaking the Glass Slipper appreciate any efforts being made towards equal gender representation on our screens, is gender swapping really the best way to go about it? What about original screenwriting to feature wom...