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Books-of-Aenya

Nick Alimonos [Author]
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Is a naked heroine sexist? 

-----

I can already hear the detractors, the angry feminists calling me out as a sexist. Their argument, I imagine, will go something like this,

Thelana is the lead heroine in Nick Alimonos' fantasy epic, "Ages of Aenya," and she has everything we love to see in a female character: strength, intelligence, and she can dish out punishment good as her male companion. She even passes the Bechdel test! So why am I up in arms about Thelana? Well, when it comes to hyper-sexualizing women, this author's hit rock bottom. We're not talking chainmail bikinis or skintight tights here either, because with this super hero, there is no costume. You read that right. She is utterly, unapologetically, naked. If "Aenya" was some kind of erotica, I might give it a pass. But no, this is serious fantasy, straight out of Westeros and Middle Earth. So, as a woman reader, I am left scratching my head, wanting to scream, 'Put some clothes on for god's sake!' The author even has the audacity to call himself a feminist. He defends himself by pointing out, "Hey, look, the guy is naked too!" But this critic isn't fooled. Thelana exists to tickle the author's fancy and titillate male (immature) readers.


---Angryfeminist.com



While I have yet to find an angry mob outside my office door, I suspect that, as Thelana grows in popularity, it's only a matter of time. The thing is, feminists have a lot to be angry about. We still live in a largely male dominated society. We have yet to see a female president (go Hillary!), and if we're lucky, we'll have our first woman on paper currency, the $10 bill. Despite such signposts of inequality, women have made huge strides in this country, and most Americans now agree women deserve to vote, to decide what they can do with their bodies, and to get paid the same for the same work. Modern sexism is much more subtle, and in raising two daughters, I see it all the time. The hero in any video game/book/TV show/movie is almost always male. When a woman does take center stage, they are more often treated as eye candy. The message this sends is clear: 1) Women are of lesser importance and 2) A woman's most important quality is beauty. 

To contrast this message, I tell my kids what I would if I had boys, "#1 thing in life is knowledge and compassion." Being a father to two awesome girls, fairness and equality matter a lot to me. I want them to grow up feeling invincible, like they could go to Mars if they wanted. I direct them to strong heroines like Lisa Simpson and Hermione Granger. When it comes to my own writing, I am conscious of inequality, and would hate to contribute to the problem. Unfortunately, Thelana draws out the sexists like flies. Most guys never bother to look beyond the flesh, to read the accompanying story that defines the character. On DeviantArt, Thelana gets lost amid the countless soft core images, those devoid of any life or personality. Much of this could be remedied by simply giving her something to wear, leather armor perhaps, but this is where I part ways with most feminists, because we should never define a woman by the clothes she is wearing or not wearing; and more to the point, we should not make women responsible for the way men treat them.

A girl in a mini-skirt is not "asking for it," and she certainly isn't looking to be raped. This centuries' old taboo, regarding females and clothing, goes hand in hand with sexism, and absolves men of any wrong-doing. False modesty and shame is imposed upon women by the world's worst sex offenders, from Saudi Arabia to Afghanistan. Nudity, in and of itself, is neither pro nor anti women. A nude portrait can be liberating and empowering, or it can be humiliating and degrading. Like sexual consent, choice is everything. A woman stripped of her clothes is a victim. A stripper who loves what she does is not. Either way, it is the men typically calling the shots, the men who produce porn, watch porn, and, paradoxically, create the society in which women who engage in it are ostracized. If you're a woman, it's a no-win situation. Women learn from an early age to kowtow to men's desires, but that it is taboo to express their own. 

This double standard extends to how male and female heroes are regarded by some feminists (Cracked.com/Upworthy). Superman and Batman, in their skin-tight outfits, represent the male ideal, but Wonder Woman in her bikini bottom is somehow "objectified." Even Namor and Conan, who wear even less, do not represent equal treatment. Why? Because male superheroes are a projection of male fantasies, what men wish they could look like, or so the argument goes. But there are a number of problems with this theory. Firstly, it supposes that a majority of Superman fans are envying his looks, but as a reader of the comic since childhood, such a thing never crossed my mind. Sure, he's nice to look at, but what appeals to me most, and what I think appeals to most every male, are his powers. And really, who doesn't wish they could fly? Secondly, this argument supposes women do not have similar projection fantasies, that female readers never imagine themselves with a goddess-like physique, like Wonder Woman or Power Girl. Of course, given how my daughters love to dress up, and adding to that the glut of supermodels in magazines like Cosmopolitan, I think it is more common for girls to look at other girls for this very reason. Lastly, this theory implies women do not enjoy sex, or looking at male bodies, or that they have no interest in expressing their own sexuality. Not surprisingly, it is typically the male feminists making these assertions.


More clothes = More empowering?

In 1972, writer Samual Delany changed Wonder Woman into a more "modest" outfit, which he believed was the feminist thing to do. That was, until women's rights pioneer Gloria Steinem got involved, stating how much she hated that the traditional costume was taken away. Wonder Woman has long stood for female empowerment. We should not suggest that she cannot, or should not, expose her thighs, or that by doing so she is somehow diminished. We would never call Tarzan a whore for wearing only a loincloth, or say that James Bond is objectifying himself for exuding male sexuality. Male heroes are curiously exempt from any such moral judgments. While it is true that men enjoy looking at women, it is also true that women sometimes enjoy it when men look at them. Why else do women purchase sexy outfits? Mini-skirts? Thong bikinis? (OK, sometimes, it just feels good to be loose). But if no woman ever wished to be looked at, they would voluntarily don burqas, but it is always the men forcing them to do so. Female sexuality has long intimidated men and there is a storied history of patriarchal societies trying to repress it. In Egypt and throughout Subsaharan Africa, vaginal mutilation is a common practice, to diminish desire and enjoyment of sex. But to deny a woman's sexuality, whether physically or socially, is to deny her personhood.

What matters in feminism is choice and who is doing the choosing. I am not suggesting women should be nude, or sexy, only that the women who make that choice, and believe me there are those that do (they're called nudists!), need not be objectified or labeled. Thelana may be naked, but it is only because she chooses to be so, refusing to be repressed, or be defined by others. When, in Ages of Aenya, some men mistake her lack of apparel for vulnerability, it does not end well for them. By breaking with traditions of false modesty, in choosing to forgo the trappings that clothing represents, Thelana empowers herself, and it is a power that can never be stripped away, humiliated, or degraded.


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Are you a great artist? Do you want to make between $200-$500? Would you like to contribute your talents to a unique and exciting fantasy world that has been slowly building over the past decade and a half? Well now is your chance! By close of 2015, I will be hard at work on a new book campaign, for both "Ages of Aenya" and "The Princess of Aenya," through popular social media sites like Facebook and YouTube "book trailers" to brick and mortar book signings. But I am going to need a lot of great new artwork. This is what I am looking for:

1.) A wide-shot landscape of Xandr and Thelana, standing atop the fallen idol of Sargonus, in action poses fighting off merquid. If you don't know who Xandr and Thelana are, just check out my gallery!

2.) A wide-shot landscape, set at night in the clouds, with lightning flashing in the background, and Thelana leaping into the air, sword ready to thrust, down toward a giant bird.

3.) A medium-shot of Xandr, in an action pose, burying a rusty ax into the head of the Septheran (snake man) prince.  

4.) A portrait of Horde, a Lovecraftian, "Hulk" like cyborg.

5.) Whatever inspires you, based in the Aenya universe.
 

Want to learn more? Shoot me an e-mail at Nick Alimonos with a link to your gallery!

Thanks,
Nick 

Also, be sure to check out my official author site The Writer's Disease and book site The World of Aenya.
 
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The art on this page is inspired and dedicated to the Aenya fantasy series. Since 2003, artists from around the world have contributed their talents to visualizing the people and vistas that populate the Aenya novels. 

There is only so much a writer can achieve with words. Images have the power to evoke thoughts and feelings, to inspire and to transport, in ways that even the best of literature fails to achieve. Which is why I am truly humbled by those artists who have set aside their egos and their own projects to reach out and meld minds with me. Their contributions have helped me to make something greater than any one person. I am honored to include the custom figures/sculpts of friend and fan David Pasco, who beautifully captures the monsters and characters of Aenya and forces me to think about them in ways that have only made them more real. In the realms of ink, paint and digital, I am grateful for the talents of John T' Lustachowski, Billy Tacket, Gene Espy, Julia Bax (Brazil), Evan Kyrou (Greece), Alexey Lipatov (Ukraine) and Frans Mensink (Netherlands). The collaboration between the literary and the visual is a thing of beauty, a synergy that has given rise to many of our most beloved stories. What would Conan be, conceived by Robert Howard, without the fanciful illustrations of Frank Frazetta? Or the beloved Marvel universe, imagined by Stan Lee, without the magic of Jack Kirby's pencils?

This gallery continues to grow, and I am excited to collaborate with great artists in the future, to sharing Aenya with the world.

Sincerely,
Nick Alimonos 


To learn more about Aenya, please visit: World of Aenya

To learn more about the author, you can go to: The Writer's Disease

Like "Ages of Aenya" on Facebook! World of Aenya on Facebook

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Naturism

4 min read

Naturism is one of my great passions. Since both of my parents are of Spartan descent, my summers were spent on the beaches of the Greek isles, where not having a bathing suit was never a problem. But I also learned to appreciate the human form in Classical and Renaissance art, in the depictions of gods and heroes so common in our culture, in paintings of Achilles at Troy and in statues like Michelangelo's David. As a writer, I am continually fascinated by literature with nudist or naked heroes, like Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan and Robert Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land, or any fantasy paperback illustrated by Frank Frazetta. Growing up, I never understood America's obsession with sex and, paradoxically, its Puritanical attitude toward the human body.

As Americans, we live in an insane world, where you can legally carry and conceal a gun, but risk imprisonment should anyone see your genitals. We live in a world where, under the banner of free speech, YouTube permits the hateful Mohammed video which offended and outraged billions of Muslims throughout the world, but Facebook censors a mother breastfeeding; we live in a world where "Mature" video games like Grand Theft Auto entertains children with fantasies of murdering innocents, while a game showing a nipple earns a much stricter "Adult" rating; we live in a world where the Westboro Baptist Church can rally at a gay soldier's funeral with signs that read "God Hates Fags" as police stand idly by, but should a man or woman show up in nothing but the body we are all born into, they would promptly be arrested for "indecency".

I reject the notion that men and women cannot live in sight of one another without clothes. I reject the belief that bodies are inherently sexual and must be hidden from view. And I know, with certainty, that nudity is not harmful to children---in fact, quite the opposite is true---shaming our kids, making them believe that their bodies are sinful, harms their self-esteem and their sense of identity. Sex is an important part of who we are, but it isn't what we are.

If the naturist lifestyle has taught me anything, it's that clothing is unnecessary, a matter of social conditioning, a force of habit. People were never meant to wear clothes. We are born far more beautiful than we can ever hope to become in clothes; and we can experience so much more of the world, so much more intimately, with our bare bodies than we ever could otherwise. For tens of thousands, if not more than a hundred thousand years, we were oblivious to our nakedness. After the Ice Age, we adopted textiles to retain heat, but at some point in our history, an invention of necessity became a global neurosis, a hatred for our own bodies. But if we look at ourselves openly and accept who we are as a species, if we recognize that we are inseparable from nature, we might learn to see the divine in humanity. I am not suggesting that throwing away our clothes can solve society's ills. But if we are free to live in the skin we are born into, to live without shame or judgment, without primitive and outdated taboos, might this world not become a better place?



Thankfully, the Internet is quickly bringing about an age of tolerance, as people on blogs and in forums are learning to express alternative ways of thinking. For the first time in history, once isolated cultures are becoming part of a global village. It is only a matter of time before the absurdity of naked shame becomes evident to all. Only when we recognize our shared humanity can we hope to overcome the definitions that divide us. 

For me, naturism means much more than living without clothes. It is a spiritual philosophy I live by, a reverence for nature and for life, a kind of pantheism, if you will. It gives me a sense of awe, for our species and for our place in the universe.
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Internet land exploded recently when a Bungie employee (makers of Halo) in an interview described the design for a new Metal Gear Solid character as "disgusting". I remember being a huge fan of Hideo Kojima's work after I played his first game on the original Playstation. I was especially enamored by the many philosophical concepts he tackles in his series, things you don't typically find in a stealth/action game. While Kojima's name will likely never be brought up in any Philosophy 101 course, it's nice to know that games can deal with more grown-up fare from time to time. Now it seems Kojima's name has become synonymous with sexism and everything wrong with our male-dominated society. While I consider myself a feminist to some degree, I do get defensive when certain women go into rage mode regarding scantily clad characters. With regards to income inequalities, intrusive medical mandates and our overall beauty obsessed magazine culture, sexism is a continuing problem in our society, and yes, popular media tends to fuel this problem. But any discussion regarding depictions of women in the media should be focused on "objectification" meaning "to make an object" or to "dehumanize". While sexy images, particularly those in smut magazines like Playboy, Penthouse and Hustler do objectify women (Penthouse is particularly bad, calling their centerfolds "pets") it isn't the nudity itself that is the problem, otherwise, feminists would also have to complain about the Venus de Milo or Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. 

Conversely, a female character can be fully dressed and be objectified. I sometimes finds things sexist that most people do not even notice. Am I the only one, for instance, who felt that the real hero in Harry Potter was Hermione? The author is a woman, oddly enough, so you cannot blame her for intentional sexism, not consciously anyway, but still, Hermione is the real hero of that franchise; Harry just bumbles along and everyone calls him the "chosen one". Being the father of two daughters, I encounter sexism in video games all the time. Whenever I pick up a Wii title for my 9 year old, the first question she asks is, "Is there a girl in it? Can I play a girl?" It saddens me when I have to say, "Sorry." It's also frustrating having to explain why in Super Mario Bros. Wii andWii U, you can play as Mario, Luigi, and two male Toads (count them, two) but no Princess Peach or even Toadette. There is a very subtle message here: girls are helpless victims and must wait to be rescued by a male figure. Super Princess Peach aside (and even in that Gameboy exclusive, her chief ability is crying), I'll take a bikini clad warrior who kicks butt any day.

Point is, a scantily clad or nude female character is not inherently sexist and a fully dressed character certainly can be. Naturally, sex sells, and feminists can cry foul for a million years and never change the fact that men enjoy looking at women, more so sans apparel. This is design by evolution. But desire for sex does not fall exclusively into the male or female domain (see Fifty Shades of Grey). Rather, lust is just one of many emotional facets that makes us human. The problem derives when eliciting desire becomes a female character's only quality (I am looking at you, Red Sonja). In this case, the character does become, in the eyes of male viewers, an object, which is admittedly disgusting and degrading. So is Hideo Kojima's character, Quiet, unrealistic? You bet! Ridiculous? Definitely! Representative of an unfair double-standard? Probably. Sexist? Not so fast . . .

Take Thelana. This girl could be deemed the very epitome of sexism, and yet, she is anything but an object in Ages of Aenya. In this character we have the whole gamut of human emotion, from fear, sorrow and pride to love, jealousy and compassion. She is courageous, intelligent, and every bit as capable as any male hero. She is a farmer, a warrior and a thief. Incidentally, she never uses sex as a tool, and beauty is not her "primary virtue" as feminist Susan J. Douglas might argue, but rather, climbing and archery. We even get to know Thelana's father, mother, and eleven siblings by name. The only thing that really sets her apart from most female characters: she's nude most of the time, as in no clothes whatsoever. Why? Why couldn't she be all those things and keep her clothes on for heaven's sake? Two reasons  1) Nudity is beautiful and the heroic nude is a tradition that dates back to Ancient Greece, and  2) More importantly, Thelana is a naturist (as is the author) and if you've never experienced the joy and connectedness that comes from experiencing nature in the buff, you cannot really comment on it, which is why many of my female naturist friends identify with Thelana, because they are neither whores, strippers, or objects of male desire. And before any feminist gets all up in arms about double standards, Xandr, the male hero, is just as naked just as often, because there really is a double standard when it comes to male vs. female nudity.

As ridiculous as Hideo Kojima's new heroine appears, let's not rush to judgment here. Let's play the game and see what this character is all about, while keeping in mind that the most insidious form of sexism is more often found in places where it has the most damaging influence, in the minds of young girls, particularly with the dearth of role-models for young girls in video games.
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Featured

Thelana: Feminist Icon? by Books-of-Aenya, journal

Promotional Art Needed! by Books-of-Aenya, journal

Welcome to Aenya! by Books-of-Aenya, journal

Naturism by Books-of-Aenya, journal

Sexist Characters? Kojima's Quiet and Thelana by Books-of-Aenya, journal

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