A room of one's own
Can fiction create its own space within the pages of the LGBT press?
By Eleanor Brown

Managing editor Lisa Neff wondered about publishing fiction in her weekly Chicago Free Press when some readers had a hard time distinguishing it from fact. "I'd receive invitations from readers who wanted to date the main character.

"That's one problem with running fiction in a non-fiction news publication."

The Free Press ran serial fiction from its very first issue, in August 1999, written by humorist Michael "Boomer" Beaumier and filled with local references. The column ran half a page (between 500 to 800 words), and readers enjoyed it, recalled Neff. It managed to be political without being dull or preachy: "It tackled everything, drag, drugs, pride, politics, affairs, sex, romance, body image..." The column ended eventually, but Neff said she would like to test out the idea again.


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ok... a little fluff...but it made me get my air guitar out and practice.. OK!!


Much Ado About Nothing  
Grasping for thin air and the title
  At the air guitar championship in Berlin, contestants duke it out to see who's best a stroking imaginary instruments. The winner will represent Germany at the world championships in Finland.
Fighting for world peace


Before the show, competition organizer Friedericke van Meer is being chased down by microphone brandishing journalists. Six months ago, the transsexual founded the German Air Guitar Federation with a group of friends. "I just randomly came across the World Association's Web site and was really impressed with what I saw there, especially that air guitar is, in part, a service for world peace," she explains. "I was also very interested in the mix between seriousness and self-irony. I've never found that kind of mix anywhere else."