Announcing the second annual Illthdar fundraiser!
Attention fantasy book fans! Some of you may remember how we raised money for Gendered Intelligence last year in response to JK Rowling's transphobic comments. Well this year we're going to be doing another one.
From the 1st of June until the end of August, 2021, I will donate all of the royalties from every Illthdar: Guardians of Las sold to Archive Of Our Own!
Better known by the community as ao3, Archive Of Our Own is a nonprofit organisation that provides a free platform for budding authors to host both original and fan fiction.
This is a hard truth: in certain genres, it is statistically challenging for minority groups to have real representation. Authors of colour, authors with disabilities, lgbtqai+ authors, women authors, etc. all struggle to be seen and promoted. Mainstream media outlets underrepresent the same minority groups in books, or fail to represent them well. This is changing, but progress is slow, one way people in these marginalised communities build their fan bases and fight the system stacked against them is by creating fan fiction and original content on ao3. Their service is vital to preparing the writers of the future, today.
And I speak to this through personal experience, because were it not for fan fiction, I wouldn't be self published. I wouldn't have been able to hone my skills, or develope my voice as an author. I understand deeply how frustrating it is to look a rows of books and struggle to find the one token author that knows my experience, or even writes people like me in a way that isn't a backhanded insult to my culture. Places like ao3 help writers like my younger self build confidence and courage to tell the stories you are desperate to read and that's why I'm proud to select them as the recipient of this campaign.
The paperback edition of Illthdar: Guardians of Las is available online through multiple places, however for those fans who are already in love with the series, through feedaread, you can also buy the hardcover edition.
If you cannot afford to buy a book in the coming months, but would like to make a donation to ao3, please do so via their umbrella organisation, link below:
Now, I have set myself a personal goal to sell 50 copies of Illthdar: Guardians of Las. So, for each book sold to reach this quota, I will donate an additional £1.00 to ao3. £50 is up for grabs, people, give ao3 my money!
I've been asked what people can do if they want to help but can't afford to donate or buy a book right now. The answer: reblog and signal boost! Tag your friends, tag your family, share it on other media platforms, sing the praises of AO3 and encourage others to do so as well.
Much as liking this is nice, spreading the word will get the message out there, and that's where real impact happens.
