Cosmic Cheeto Podstack 3: Eve Gleichman and Laura Blackett on "Trust and Safety"

In which the long-suffering transmasc chicken farmer gets the last laugh

Hi gay! Since we’re now eleven days into June and I’ve done nothing to publicly celebrate PrIDe MoNth™ and its (supposed) celebration of me, you’re probably wondering why. It’s a good question, to which my answer will come as all good answers do: slowly and unpredictably, in the form of a handful of essays to be published across a variety of platforms in the next 4-6 months. Sorry in advance, gay!

But here’s what I do celebrate, dear subscriber: queer and trans joy and excellence in all its forms! Wherever queer and trans people are being hilariously funny, trenchant and insightful and compassionate, celebrating themselves and the many denizens of the world both alike and unlike them, I will be there to shine a spotlight on that and shout, “Hello! Yes! We love to see it!”

And speaking of queer excellence, podstack #3 is a truly fun conversation about one of my favorite novels of the year so far: Trust and Safety by Eve Gleichman and Laura Blackett. This book was a total riot — a spare-no-(non-)man satire of millennial sexual politics, Tech Broadly Writ, and the bedeviling economy of fantasy and desire that is the hyperreal world of social media. It features one of my favorite truck rides in recent fiction (think 19th century bad boy aristocrat meets unattainable Carhartt butch) and raises some very valuable questions about the feasibility of a Woodsy Queer Utopia, the (im)possibility of knowing exactly what you want, and the ethics — spoiler alert! — of turning your kink into an app.

I hope you’ll enjoy this great conversation I had with Eve and Laura and order Trust and Safety ASAP!