Knee Deep in Maasive Tits

Welcome to Season 2!! In this episode, Cady and Sharilyn journey into the realm of fantasy. Together, they unpack its origins, representation, and how gender bias has shaped the genre. They tackle the Bechdel Test and shine a light on why romance deserves more respect in fantasy storytelling.

The conversation celebrates under-recognized voices, highlighting the importance of diversity, strong female characters, and inclusive narratives. Along the way, Cady and Sharilyn share their own childhood and young adult favorites, reflecting on how those stories shaped their identities. They also explore the transformative role of fan fiction and small creators in pushing the genre forward.

Of course, it wouldn’t be Knee Deep without some giggles. The gworls get delightfully silly with a juicy (and mildly unhinged) “hear me out.”

Find our book list below!

Queer + BIPOC Authors:

• Iron Widow Xiran Jay Zhao
• Daughter of the Moon Goddess Sue Lynn Tan
• Earthsea Ursula K. Le Guin

Cady & Sharilyn’s Faves:

• Throne of Glass Sarah J. Maas
• A Discovery of Witches Deborah Harkness
• Percy Jackson & the Olympians (series) Rick Riordan
• Protector of the Small (series) Tamora Pierce

Childhood Nostalgia:

• Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi
• A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray
• Vampire Kisses by Ellen Schreiber
• Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick
• Blue Bloods by Melissa de la Cruz
• Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter (series) by Laurell K. Hamilton 
• Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead 

Follow Us:

• Instagram: @KneeDeepPodcast
• TikTok: @KneeDeepPodcast
• Cady: @ageofsexploration
• Sharilyn: @queerwomenspoetrycollective

Support Us on Patreon:

Help us keep the conversation going by supporting us on Patreon! 🖤 

Send Us Your Questions or Comments:

We love hearing from you! Got a question or a topic you’d like us to cover? Email us at kneedeepodcastmailbag@gmail.com

Thanks for tuning in, and don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review!

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

Cady Moore (00:00)
look, I have the cutest little witchy gray hair just sticking up out of my curls. My crone era is coming. I'm pretty excited about it. Yeah.

Sharilyn Wester (00:03)
Aww, that's really cute.

It's your crone era? Yeah, I caught I caught a gray hair the other day. And I'm feeling pretty okay about it.

Cady Moore (00:39)
Well, everybody, welcome to Knee Deep in the Passenger Seat, the podcast where we take the scenic route.

Sharilyn Wester (00:39)
Yeah.

Season two.

Cady Moore (00:46)
through sex, dating, relationships, non-monogamy, queer culture, and all the spicy stuff in between. My name is Cady

Sharilyn Wester (00:52)
I'm Sharilyn as you can probably tell because I'm really excited and I'm yelling ⁓ and That's this is season two welcome. We are so excited to be starting back up again We've acquired some help ⁓ And yeah another season where we are here to bring you unfiltered conversations with sillies and love and a little bit of chaos

And so if it's navigating like love, non-monogamy, unpacking identity, diving headfirst into hyper fixations, which this episode is kind of all about, we have your back seat that is.

Cady Moore (01:19)
Yeah, always.

Cady Moore (01:31)
Hi y'all, Cady here. So excited to welcome you to season two of Knee Deep in the Passenger Seat. Before we dive into this episode, we just wanted to give you a quick content warning that we are going to be discussing sexual assault, specifically in the context of the genre of fantasy. If you want to skip that part, you can jump ahead to the chapter where we talk about the dismissal of women-centric fantasy. That's right around the like 27, 28 minute mark.

I can't remember how many other asides we're recording, but if you skip ahead, that should get you there. So look at the chapter markers.

Cady Moore (02:07)
I'm so excited to be here y'all ⁓ for season two little intro about like who we are I know we talked about what we do but my name is Cady I am an AASECT certified sex educator that means that I did a lot of work to have an association full of middle-aged white people tell me I'm good enough ⁓ but

I, yeah, I'm a sex educator that specializes in whatever my hyper fixation of the moment is, and then that gets to stay as a specialty. And so I don't actually have a niche besides probably like queer sex ed and non-monogamy are two things that are really important to me. I am based in Sacramento, California. I'm a proud snake MILF to a ball python named Lilith. And I love nerdy shit and painting and plants and

Sharilyn Wester (02:30)
Yeah.

Cady Moore (02:59)
never leaving my house now that I'm moved in and so happy. So that's me.

Sharilyn Wester (03:04)
I'm

so how and so cozy and so cozy. I love that. I am Sharilyn I am a student of social work. I am an artist. I am a writer. I am a lover of fantasy and also books and reading and art and all of the good cozy things. I'm a mom of two.

Cady Moore (03:07)
So cozy.

Sharilyn Wester (03:30)
⁓ also non-monogamous and we are here because we share a partner and, more importantly than that, we share a friendship that is more important than partnership will ever be. Anyway.

Cady Moore (03:43)
thought you were gonna

say and more importantly we share a brain cell!

Sharilyn Wester (03:50)
Also that, yeah, honestly shipping is just getting crazy having to send it back and forth. I mean, truly we do. It's like, it's so funny. I remember distinctly our shared partner at one point had said something and you and I did the exact same stim at the exact same time. And he just in complete just giving up was just like, you guys are the same person. And we're like, we know we're just the same person, different fonts.

Cady Moore (03:56)
It is.

There's nothing I can do about it.

Yeah, exactly.

Sharilyn Wester (04:18)
Yeah, exactly.

Although I know that no one can see it, but I'm kind of rocking Cady's hair today, which is always short and curly and like so fun and cute. And I'm just trying to channel that you can I'm in a full fantasy get up if you haven't guessed today's episode yet. But ⁓

Cady Moore (04:28)
You're so cute.

Yeah, I was just gonna say, was like, wait,

we talk about what we're wearing? Because you're so cute. Like the minute I got on with Sharilyn, I was like, ⁓ wow, he's so beautiful. She's a fairy princess. ⁓

Sharilyn Wester (04:40)
The mounds are heaving.

Thanks.

I have a short curly green wig with like a little like bejeweled crown. ⁓ And I'm wearing a corset that I usually wear to Renfair that is just falling apart. The boning is coming out of it, but it's okay. And then I'm wearing like a ⁓ flowy, just like little gown kind of thing. And so I've been wanting to...

Cady Moore (05:08)
And the girls are looking phenomenal.

Sharilyn Wester (05:11)
The girls are heaving. The bosom is mountainous and quaking in this corset. So you but you guys have to pay for our Patreon to see. then Cady, share, share, share with us what you are wearing, which is so cute.

Cady Moore (05:24)
$5 a month. That's it. That's all it costs.

Yeah,

so, and this is kind of a spoiler alert. Our next question and how we like to open every

is "What's in your passenger seat today?" And I had something really sweet written out and what's in my passenger seat today is Taylor Swift's new album. ⁓ My shirt that I'm wearing is really sweet. My childhood best friend's husband got it for me.

and it says Taylor Moon and it's the Sailor Moon as Taylor Swift and it's really cute. ⁓ And it's like the closest thing that I had energy to do today for fantasy themed. was like, well, Sailor Moon is on my list of things to talk about today. So ⁓ that's what I'm wearing and

I will briefly share what I had actually written for my What's in Your Passenger seat. One of my long time partners, like he was the first person I went on a date

Sharilyn Wester (06:16)
Yes.

Cady Moore (06:23)
when

⁓ My spouse and I opened up our relationship back in 2019 ⁓ First person I went on a date with, well not the first date I went on, I got stood up on my first date that I went on but that's for another conversation. Which like crazy that people are standing people up still like what is happening? But not the point ⁓ and like we just we had a very a roller coaster of a relationship that honestly

Sharilyn Wester (06:42)
today.

Cady Moore (06:50)
I would be down to talk about in a different episode with more, with permission from him. But ⁓ we have put a lot of work into navigating what our relationship looks like over the last five years. And it has turned into a really beautiful like friendship. And I'm so delighted. And so he has a new partner that he was really excited to introduce to us. And so we all went to the Giants game on Sunday and it was just like very cute. And it was really fun to be like deep in my compersion.

Sharilyn Wester (06:55)
Mm-hmm.

Cady Moore (07:20)
Cady here as a quick refresher in case you forgot, compersion is the feeling of joy, happiness or pleasure that you experience when your partner is happy or having a good experience with someone else. We are going be doing a non-monogamy episode early on in the season, so very excited to ⁓ help you brush up on your skills and your glossary, but just in case you forgot what the definition of compersion is.

Cady Moore (07:44)
So that's what's in my passenger seat today, but

also K-Pop Demon Hunters lives rent-free in my head constantly. ⁓ My stim has been various different songs from the show and if you haven't watched it, you need to watch it. So those are the three things in my passenger seat today. Dude, so hot.

Sharilyn Wester (07:47)
Yeah.

⁓ Mm-hmm.

It's so hot. I love that. First

of all, I think a lot of people didn't realize that it would be such a good show. Like not only is the animation incredible, but the music is great and it's like a little romantic, but like it's about like sisterhood and like authenticity and generational trauma. And it really is so good. If you guys haven't checked it out, it's not just for kids. Although my kids love it and we

Cady Moore (08:19)
hehe

Mm-hmm.

it's no, it's phenomenal.

Sharilyn Wester (08:32)
We blast in that, let me tell you. Absolutely.

Cady Moore (08:35)
⁓ dude, it's so

good. Well I love that the, I mean not really spoiler alert y'all, but slight spoiler alert I guess. I love that the prime, like as a neurodivergent kiddo, like as someone who was diagnosed with ADHD when I was a baby, ⁓ I felt so deeply connected to, honestly to all of the characters because it really centers around

this feeling, a pressure to hide who you are in order to be more acceptable and more easy to love. And it's this whole message that like loving all parts of you, even the parts that are quote unquote less lovable is the key to saving the world, which I just, think is just such a beautiful message for us all to get in a time when so much of the messaging we're getting all the time is about putting your best face forward on social media and like having this like cute,

Sharilyn Wester (09:07)
⁓

I agree.

Cady Moore (09:30)
whimsical life, which like I'm all for whimsy, but like, I don't know. It just, feels like a really needed message right now. but yeah, but not to, so I don't want to tangent too far. Sharilyn, what's in your passenger seat today?

Sharilyn Wester (09:38)
Absolutely.

I love that.

Man, I'm kind of all over the place because I still feel like I'm pumping my breaks from this summer in which I was just so busy and traveling a lot and came back and it's like right back to school for the kids. I am in the process of starting a new semester shortly for the latter half of my undergrad for social work. I have been

kind of consumed by D &D the last like month or two. That was my cat that just jumped up. I have recently started DMing and I also am gonna be jumping into as a player, ⁓ a new campaign with like a new group of folks, which is exciting. And I'm really wanting to like learn from a DM who is really experienced and that was kind of my motivation.

Cady Moore (10:20)
You

Sharilyn Wester (10:39)
⁓ But that has kind of been like taking over, which has been so fun and it's so apt that our episode is about fantasy when in preparation, you know, six months ago, seven months ago when I was constructing this campaign and I was doing a lot of writing and I was kind of ⁓ exploring all of the different forms of fantasy media that I love.

in order to figure out how I best want to approach this and what do I love about fantasy and what do I want to include, it's kind of like reignited this passion in me of like writing and creating ⁓ in written form in a way that I just, in a muscle I have an exercise. So I've been really happy and feeling really fulfilled and it's been really fun. And I think

I think it's nice to have some form of creative outlet in which you can see in veritable measures how much progress you're doing or how successful you're being and to get that feedback. like, for anyone who hasn't played D &D, I mean, it really is just storytelling and make believe with your friends. Like you can't really win D &D. It's about

Cady Moore (11:42)
Thank you.

Sharilyn Wester (11:54)
What do you want to inhabit for a couple hours every week or every couple weeks? Or what is the story that you find compelling or interesting? And when you're faced with choices in this made up world, how do you proceed? And so a lot of the forms of media we're gonna be talking today include that. ⁓ And I should add that it's a special nod to women in fantasy and queers in fantasy.

⁓ because as we know, and we'll get into, we're just not platformed and historically have not been platformed in the way that we want. And then the way that we feel we should be, ⁓ which ⁓ kind of brings us into our first topic, Cady, if you want to take it away.

Cady Moore (12:39)
Yeah, absolutely. So ⁓ for those of y'all who are new to the podcast, what Sharilyn and I do is we usually have like an overarching theme that we break down into a couple of different topics, but mostly we just yap about a subject that we're both interested in. So ⁓ we are talking today about fantasy and like the fantasy genre. And as two people who love fantasy,

we are going to share with y'all the things that we love about it, the things that we don't love.

And so we are kind of, we wanted to open with acknowledging how the origins of modern

have been extremely problematic. Like fantasy as a genre has been built on by the works of cis white Western men, ⁓ usually with like medieval Europe aesthetics with these like very, ⁓

Sharilyn Wester (13:19)
Yeah

Cady Moore (13:34)
Christian allegories of good versus evil and martyrs and who is good and bad a lot of patriarchal norms that were definitely like that's what we're gonna dive into most here. ⁓ But it really centered cis het white men and excluded or stereotyped other peoples and it absolutely ignored global folklore and myths and it did a very good job of painting to be the bad guys, ⁓ beings and people

who were just very obviously not white. One of the examples we have here is orcs. I know that that's a, Sharilyn, that's a you addition to these notes. So do you wanna talk about the mistreatment of orcs in modern fantasy?

Sharilyn Wester (14:16)
Yeah.

Absolutely.

Yeah, and I'm so glad we're talking about it I do feel like there has been more discourse around it around like the representation of gore of orcs of goblins even ⁓ and for me in exploring what I wanted to do with

D &D campaign and like really trying to make sure that it is I'm creating my own fantasy world that I want

⁓ a lot of stereotypes of orcs have been historically, aligned with how folks view Black folks. mean, you have this fantasy race who are considered, you know, these large and lumbering and they're considered, you know, stupid or less civilized or more barbaric. And in many ways reflects a lot of the, ⁓ stereotypes that white folks have imparted onto Black folks.

And it just gets kind of tired having orcs be these like lumbering, violent, you know, idiots. Like it's kind of just not creative anymore. It's, you know, I think the thing about fantasy is that it's in a world where you can make anything happen. Why would you continue putting these, like these representations on this race without really considering it? And so one thing I've been trying to do in my campaign is like,

The orcs are very like genteel people. They typically live in the mountains in my campaign and they are craftsmen and they know how to tools to make beautiful things from stone and these incredible crafts and have this relationship to the land that ⁓ not many people have or have explored. so, ⁓

That is kind of a way in which I have chosen to approach fantasy and that I've seen fantasy fail to represent everyone.

Cady Moore (16:15)
So one thing that we don't talk about in this episode, but I really wanted to make sure we touched on, is the recent shift in Dungeons and Dragons that has been made from using the term race to using the term species. While race was a part of the game's vocabulary since the 1970s, it carried a lot of baggage, both in the way that it reinforced these outdated ideas of biological determinism and how it echoed real world systems of oppression. By contrast,

Species is a more neutral and biologically accurate term for describing fantasy peoples such as dwarves, elves, or dragonborn. This change isn't just about semantics, it reflects a broader cultural shift in the tabletop community towards inclusivity, which we're going to talk about later in this episode, and away from these unintentional parallels that have harmful racial stereotypes. For many players, this move to species emphasizes the way that D &D is about storytelling and imagination.

not about coding moral or intellectual traits onto categories that mirror human racial constructs. It's a reminder that language in games can evolve and that updates like this can really open the door for more thoughtful and expansive play.

Sharilyn Wester (17:25)
Cady, I don't know if you have any examples yourself of representation.

Cady Moore (17:28)
⁓

Could you say that your focus is a redemption orc?

Sharilyn Wester (17:40)
really good. There's a redemption orc. want, I want, I want the orc. No, that was so good though. I love that. You can tell you Narv just had, I love that so much. A redemption orc is so good. That was really good. We need to write that down.

Cady Moore (17:40)
Got him! Got him!

Punster

I'm so proud of myself. I'm so proud. Can't wait to text the Polycule

group chat about that. Well, I

Sharilyn Wester (17:59)
I

Cady Moore (18:00)
to, you you mentioned goblins and ⁓ we're gonna kind of, we're gonna dive into, well, we're not actually diving into J.K. Rowling that much because we don't wanna waste air time on her. But ⁓ the way that goblins are represented in the Harry Potter novels are,

like full of Jewish stereotypes and anti-semitic tropes like the goblins have big noses and they are greedy and they protect the banks and it's just like it's just so boring i'm so fucking bored ⁓ and there's a lot of tropes that i'm that i'm that i'm bored by and

Sharilyn Wester (18:32)
Yeah. Bored.

Cady Moore (18:39)
we technically on our on our map here we were gonna talk about sci-fi versus fantasy but i think

Speaking of bored tropes, ⁓ I wanna jump to talking about the Bechdel test. Is that something that you're open to, Sharilyn?

Sharilyn Wester (18:56)
Yeah, absolutely.

Cady Moore (18:57)
⁓ the Bechdel test, if you are not familiar, is named after Alison Bechdel, who basically this is a test for fiction and for media. Two named women, so in order to pass the Bechdel test, you have to have two named women.

talking to each other about something other than a man. And most classic fantasy fails. ⁓ They fail the Bechdel test. And so we've got a list here of the popular fantasy books and shows that pass, fail, or borderline the Bechdel test. So I thought

could go back and forth doing passes and fails. So Sharilyn do want to start with our first?

Sharilyn Wester (19:42)
Yeah.

Cady Moore (19:43)
of the Bechtel test?

Sharilyn Wester (19:44)
Yeah, so our first pass is a very common series now within the fantasy genre, particularly with women, particularly with queers. And that's I mean, you won't be surprised by this. It's a the ACOTAR series, specifically A Court of Mist and Fury. ⁓ You have characters like Feyre and Mor like Morrigan and and all the and Amren and

⁓ All of these really rich characters who talk to each other about their lives,

their histories and their stories and the tragedies that come from those. Not just love interests. So the ACOTAR series is a great ⁓ one, especially when you get into some of later books. No spoilers, but girl power. What about you?

Cady Moore (20:26)
Yeah.

Yeah, hell yeah.

Well, and I feel like beyond that, I would, and I'm actually rereading ACOTAR right now, there is actually very little conversation about the males. Like it is very rare that two women are talking about males and men, and that's just really refreshing. When I was looking up Bechdel test fails, I was actually really surprised by this one.

Sharilyn Wester (20:51)
Yeah.

Cady Moore (20:59)
⁓ But as soon as I read it, was like, yep, that checks out. But Harry Potter actually fails the Bechdel test because ⁓ Hermione is the example because she mostly talks to other men. There are no meaningful female to female conversations that happen between, at least between Hermione and other characters. ⁓ I have not reread the Harry Potter series and will not be rereading the Harry Potter series anytime soon. So if you have corrections on this.

happy to take them, also like, don't be defending J.K. Rowling right now.

Sharilyn Wester (21:34)
Yeah, we out of out of

the things to defend. It's not JK. It's okay that she failed the Bechdel test. She failed the good person test in general. So that's more important. Yeah.

Cady Moore (21:42)
She really did. ⁓

for the sake of not spending this whole time talking about the Bechtel test, I'm gonna use another pretty mainstream example of a pass. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. So Katniss talks to other women, including her sister Prim and her friend Rue about rebellion and survival. Yes, a lot of the dialogue is with Peeta and or Gale.

but she does have relationships with other women that are not about men. So the Hunger Games is an example of a great pass.

Sharilyn Wester (22:17)
Right.

significant thing that I think we need to point out is a lot of people to know this Lord of the Rings does not pass the Bechdel test. Arwen and Eowyn

Cady Moore (22:28)
Mm-hmm.

Sharilyn Wester (22:30)
don't meet. ⁓ Few women actually speak to each other like Galadriel. She speaks to the fellowship. ⁓ Arwen is very close with her father Elrond. Eowyn is surrounded by men. And I think overall,

The thing that I noticed in looking at all of the passes and all the fails, all of the passes are books written by women.

Cady Moore (22:54)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Sharilyn Wester (22:56)
So

when we're talking about the importance of the Bechdel test, it's fantasy books written by women involve women to a point that their interactions are not just about romance. They're not just figures to reflect romantic intentions towards the main character or further his plot. They are centered around women and women-to-women interactions and therefore reflect reality within a fantasy scope. Most of all of our fails

including J.K. Rowling, ⁓ as the exception, are written by men. The Hobbit trilogy, Lord of the Rings, Eragon ⁓ all of these very significant ⁓ books in fantasy literature are written by men and vastly exclude women.

Cady Moore (23:31)
Mm-hmm.

Um, but one person that we are not

Sharilyn Wester (23:44)
Yeah.

Cady Moore (23:47)
talking about in the Bechdel test is someone who I have a pretty significant beef with and that is our guy George RR Martin. ⁓ And it's funny because like, I mean, I don't know if funny is the word, but I really loved Game of Thrones. I really, I really deeply enjoyed watching it. I have no interest in reading the books and we're going to talk about gatekeeping in fantasy, but like, fuck people who think that you're not actually a fan of something if you haven't read the books.

Sharilyn Wester (23:57)
Yeah.

Cady Moore (24:16)
Because part of why I am not interested in reading the books is because of how common

his use of rape as a plot device and as a shortcut for character development. And the fact that when he's been called out on it, he has defended it as like historical realism. I'm doing air quotes because he's writing about a fantasy world in which dragons exist, but somehow the historical realism that's important to him is rape. And it just like...

Sharilyn Wester (24:25)
Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah.

Cady Moore (24:44)
It really pisses me off. Like it reduces a very real experience for a lot of women into this trope that is used. And so I have no interest in reading these books.

Sharilyn Wester (24:47)
Yeah.

I'm tired of it. I'm tired of it being used as a plot device or a way to ⁓ introduce complexity or complex feelings into women's life. Like we feel things deeply and tragically and in a complex way without having to be subjected to ⁓ violence from men.

Cady Moore (24:59)
Yeah.

Yeah,

Sharilyn Wester (25:15)
exactly.

Cady Moore (25:15)
and I think

that there are so many other ways to... ⁓ And I think this leads to an even bigger conversation because I think even in ACOTAR there's a lot of references to it and there's a lot of nods to it and threats of it without it actually being depicted. And I don't want to tangent too far, but I'm almost curious of is even...

the like hint of it, the implication of it even necessary. It's like, couldn't we have come up with other things to threaten people with? I don't know. It just, it feels and maybe this is naive of me to be like, well, no, let's just, but we're literally talking about fantasy worlds. Like we're creating fantasy worlds. And I think that leads to like a bigger conversation. ⁓ Not just about the use of sexual assault and rape, but also bigger conversation around like,

Sharilyn Wester (25:49)
Absolutely.

Yeah.

Yes.

Cady Moore (26:11)
what type of worlds are we trying to build here? And when we talk about fantasy, like, and this is, I'm kind of skipping ahead to where we're gonna talk about some of our favorite fantasy series, but like, when I look at all of my favorite fantasy series from growing up, all of them were based around a world that was better than the one that we are in, a world that is more just.

Sharilyn Wester (26:33)
Right.

Cady Moore (26:34)
where people care about each other and where there are these strong defenders protecting the people who cannot be defended. I mean, one of my favorite series is literally called the Protector of the Small. so when we talk about

Sharilyn Wester (26:46)
Yeah.

Cady Moore (26:48)
fantasy worlds we're building, it's like with ACOTAR Rhysand is this, like he's painted and he is this like very honorable male who will defend anyone. And it's like, okay, so if this is the world we're building, like why do we even have to hint

at the existence of these terrible things. And I don't know, maybe that's just me being me.

Sharilyn Wester (27:07)
Right, right.

No, and I agree. And I think ⁓ onto our next point of like romance tied into classic fantasy, when we're talking in fantasy about women's experience,

like either we get to be supporting characters to these men who these horrible things don't happen to, or we are existing as women and all of these horrible things historically happened to us in every universe in

Cady Moore (27:18)
Okay.

Sharilyn Wester (27:32)
whatever and ⁓ we're we're we're tired of it can you hear it we're god damn tired of it we're fucking tired of it god damn it like you're telling me we live in a there's a fantasy world where there is magic and ⁓ and a man who is going to assault me i can't blast his head apart are you kidding me they don't have bear mace in Prythian what anyway sorry i'm i'm getting really i'm getting really heated

Cady Moore (27:36)
We're tired! Hear hear!

I need bear spray

for Tamlin

Sharilyn Wester (28:02)
Yeah, bear spray for Cassian. That man is a bear. But yeah, anyway, but ⁓ I think what I'm trying to get at is like, we're subjected not only to these romantic tropes where we're expected to be counterparts to men, but if we are existing on our own, we are these like vessels for trauma. And I'm tired of it. And even the stories that do successfully

Cady Moore (28:08)
⁓

Mhm.

Sharilyn Wester (28:32)
⁓ do romance, know, like Throne of Glass or in a lot of ways, know, ACOTAR some of these other ones depending on ⁓ your taste, but ⁓ they are still even considered less serious or less literary or less valid. ⁓ You know, on our partner's Discord, I made this channel called ⁓ Maasive Tits after Sarah J. Mass, who is the author of Throne of Glass and ACOTAR

Cady Moore (28:46)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Sharilyn Wester (28:59)
And someone had jumped in and was like, is this like a, this is like a book channel or whatever. I was like, it's specifically for Sarah J. Maas works where there's a lot of fans in here. And he's like, ⁓ so you, it's about like smut and stuff. Gotcha. And I was like, actually, no, no. And this is something that I have experienced a lot in, in a lot of people like eye rolling and you're just reading smut again.

Cady Moore (29:13)
Yeah.

Sharilyn Wester (29:26)
specifically with the ACOTAR books, which do feature sex like many other fantasy books, that because it is written by women and because it appeals to women, it is seen as lesser than and it is

Cady Moore (29:31)
Mm-hmm.

Sharilyn Wester (29:37)
as fluff or, um, unserious or, um, not high literature or, or, or well written literature in fantasy, which I've ranted enough. Cady, why don't you take it away? I'm literally sweating right now.

Cady Moore (29:51)
I just think well

because this is I mean this is why we this is how we got to wanting to do this episode was because Sharilyn and I got into a conversation about how fucking frustrating it is as two people who are lovers of fantasy we are lovers of D &D we are lovers of Baldur's Gate we are gamers like go back and listen to her like

Sharilyn Wester (30:11)
We love literature. Yeah.

Cady Moore (30:14)
just the amount of sexism that we have both experienced and that is just rampant in these communities is so frustrating. like, please rant away. But what it comes down to is that romance heavy stories are considered less serious or less literary or less valuable because of gender bias. Since romance is written by and for women mostly, it is devalued.

and it is compared to more serious genres that are like these war epics and political thrillers. And it's like, the emotional stakes in quote, romantasy novels and the deep intimacy and relationships are just as valid and are just as complex as the political intrigue and battles. how are we somehow looking at the like relational importance of political intrigue and not thinking about

the relational intensity in intimacy and in emotionally intimate relationships. And it just like, it pisses me off. And to be quite honest, it takes like, when we talk about the male loneliness epidemic, well, yeah, because you're not in the books that you're reading, you are not being modeled intimate relationships between men. Like, this is not just a patriarchal issue that impacts women. It also fucks up how men view relationships.

I had this conversation with a friend of mine who is writing a fantasy novel specifically because he is frustrated that there aren't enough fantasy novels out there or fantasy

in which there are intimate relationships between men. And I think that's one of the things that we get to see so much in ACOTAR and in ⁓ Throne of Glass. Like we get to see

the bonds between men. And I think that having that emotional intimacy is valuable and it's valuable not just as a plot device, it's valuable for our wellbeing as human beings. ⁓ yeah, just like don't be jerks. And I think that that gets me like.

Sharilyn Wester (32:12)
Mm-hmm.

Absolutely. Yeah, don't be fucking jerks. And also,

why are men so threatened by books in which women's pleasure is centered? Why even even if it is a quote unquote, smutty book, who cares? Like, if someone wants to read about sex in which the woman is being worshipped and adored and whatever, why?

Cady Moore (32:29)
Mmm.

and in charge.

Sharilyn Wester (32:41)
And in charge, why is that so such a point to be humiliated over as women when men have probably watched the worst kinds of porn out there, which like, get your rocks off, that's fine, that's what it's for. But then don't come in and come into our avenue of accessing pleasure that is safe for us and is not for the male gaze like much of porn is. And then say, you are lesser than, that is less valid, that is less realistic.

When you should be questioned, why are you so threatened by literature that prioritizes a woman's being in romantic settings? And why are you so threatened by smut in which a woman's pleasure is being front and center? And it is not about men's pleasure. So all of that to say is that there is so much gatekeeping around what fantasy should look like, which is ridiculous in narrative settings where anything could happen.

Cady Moore (33:23)
Mm-hmm.

Sharilyn Wester (33:38)
You know what I mean? So.

Cady Moore (33:38)
Yep. These are literally

fantasy worlds. Anything can happen. What are you so threatened by? And I mean, when we look at it from a sociological standpoint, and to be clear, am like, this is just pure conjecture. I have not done any research on this, but now I want to. ⁓ The reason that this gatekeeping exists is because we're talking about a like subset of humans who have felt othered in many ways and have felt like we're talking about nerds.

and they have felt threatened and they have felt less than and they have felt like they finally found their place to feel safe and now these girls are ruining it and it's like, homie, chill the fuck out. Like we have been harmed by the exact same system that harmed you and we actually have less power than you do. So like let us in.

Sharilyn Wester (34:20)
There's room for everyone.

yeah and and yeah

Also, historically, there have been many women fantasy authors, and we'll get into that, Ursula K. Le Guin, Octavia Butler. ⁓ There have been female fantasy writers, but they have not gotten their flowers or the attention because it's been such a gate-kept genre, which is just crazy to me. as we know, sexism is everywhere, unfortunately, and we are here to talk about it.

Cady Moore (34:33)
Let's do it.

Yeah.

It's great.

to talk about

it.

Sharilyn Wester (35:02)
Should we go into a little

break and then come back?

Cady Moore (35:05)
Yeah, let's take a quick break. I'm gonna go pee and get some water. Yee-haw, seester BRB.

Sharilyn Wester (35:09)
I'm gonna plug in my computer.

Okay, see

you in a minute.

Cady Moore (35:22)
All right, welcome back everybody from our very abrupt bathroom break. ⁓ So before we dive into talking more about these under-celebrated voices and inclusivity, I feel compelled to say that

Sharilyn Wester (35:30)
Yes.

Cady Moore (35:42)
I have not read a lot of these authors and that is mostly because of my own ADHD brain. Like I very rarely over the last couple of years have read any new content. I have read what I know because it has been comfortable. And I'm finding now that I am settling into my own home and my nervous system is more regulated that I'm definitely feeling more adventurous and excited to kind of break out of.

my norm. I have a whole playlist saved on TikTok of books that I'm really excited to read. ⁓ But Sharilyn is going to be kind of driving the boat for this part of the conversation. And I'm really excited to learn and I'm stoked to be like diving back into more, more diverse fantasy. mean, I will say that two series, two new series that I did read.

Sharilyn Wester (36:22)
cats.

Cady Moore (36:37)
that I found really really interesting were ⁓ I read the Iron Widow I guess it's there's technically three and I have some I have some thought have you read Iron Widow Sharilyn?

Sharilyn Wester (36:49)
I have not. No, Iron Widow.

Cady Moore (36:51)
Okay, it is, it's interesting.

⁓ I read

because I read it for Poly Book Club because there's a throuple in the book. And I definitely have like, it is very strong female character energy. ⁓ And also there's a lot of like hate and rage, which is not a

Sharilyn Wester (37:00)
Ooh!

Cady Moore (37:12)
⁓ not an emotion that I am super comfortable with for myself. So it was definitely interesting and I've read a lot of different Reddit threads. I would love to hear other people's thoughts on Iron Widow. ⁓ I also read Daughter of the Moon Goddess, which was based in Chinese folklore and it was phenomenal. It was so beautiful and like the imagery in it was just like, really got me. ⁓ so that's, those are my two contributions. Now Sharilyn, I'm gonna let you.

Sharilyn Wester (37:37)
huh.

Cady Moore (37:40)
and let you take it away.

Sharilyn Wester (37:42)
Yeah. So when we're talking about like under celebrated voices and obviously representation, we've talked about some of the ways in which we don't like women and queer folks represented in modern fantasy. I think even historically, there have been some great fantasies that have been very philosophical in nature or featured women in a more promising light.

an author I really love, a classic author is, Ursula K. Le Guin. She wrote Tales of Earthsea. She wrote a bunch of really great ones. Studio Ghibli actually produced a movie of Tales of Earthsea, which is cool. ⁓ there's all, yes, yeah. And it's, it's really, really well done. And, ⁓ there's also a short story by Ursula that I read called The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, which is incredible.

Cady Moore (38:19)
do not know that.

Sharilyn Wester (38:33)
And it's the story of like, if you have a very, ⁓ edinic society, like an Eden, like a perfect society, but it's predicated on the idea that there's one child who has to suffer in order for everyone to have peace and have this great life. Like, is that right? And all these people know of this. And so you have to read it. It's a short story. It's really quick. You can find it for free online. Definitely give it a read. ⁓

Cady Moore (38:52)
oof

Sharilyn Wester (39:00)
Rings of Power, incredible. One thing that we're seeing in a lot of fantasy shows and series now is diversity. Even going back, you know, 20 years, 25 years to The Lord of the Rings, I mean, you have

no people of color in that trilogy, essentially. And nowadays, even in the reboot like Rings of Power, which is the prequel to that about Galadriel and Sauron and all of that, we are now having people of color represented.

One fantasy series that actually is classified as a fantasy called Bridgerton ⁓ also has diverse casting because of that element.

Cady Moore (39:36)
That's a fantasy!

Sharilyn Wester (39:38)
Yeah, they consider it fantasy because it's not historically accurate. Obviously, there's people of color, there's queer folks in it. But Shonda Rhimes created that as a fantasy within a fantasy genre, essentially, which is really cool.

Cady Moore (39:51)
I didn't know that.

Sharilyn Wester (39:52)
Yes.

Cady Moore (39:54)
Okay, so of course I had to get nerdy with it and do some research and Bridgerton is considered romantic fantasy. It is considered alternative history, a type of speculative fiction, which speculative fiction is actually the umbrella term that covers fantasy, science fiction, horror, and even some dystopian or magical realist writing. It's the type of fiction that asks us these what if questions. What if magic were real? What if technology surpassed us?

What if society crumbled and rebuilt itself differently? Fantasy fits very neatly inside this umbrella, but while speculative fiction is broad and boundary blurring, high fantasy, which is most of what we're talking about today, tends to be more narrowly focused on secondary worlds, mythic structures, and epic quests. So in other words, all high fantasy is speculative fiction, but not all speculative fiction is fantasy. And our focus today is mostly on fantasy.

Sharilyn Wester (40:50)
And then you get a lot of other fantasy realms like the the tabletop role playing game realm, like Critical Role. You have Dimension 20.

who feature queer characters, neurodivergent characters, people of color, and create these very rich worlds in which diversity exists and women can just exist and queer folks can just exist. And I think part of the reason we're starting to see a shift in the genre towards that, mean, honestly is funding. You have a lot of these very, ⁓

pivotal and iconic pillars of fantasy like Dune like The Lord of the Rings series and the Hobbit Like a lot of these very classic books That have featured mostly men as the male protagonists very few women not necessarily diversity and now there is such a call for this and such an acknowledgement within the genre of

a limited scope of representation, that these things are actually being funded. There's a reason why a lot of women go to KU, Kindle Unlimited, to access representational fantasy or fantasy that focuses on women or women's experience or women's pleasure. And that's because a lot of these authors write these, these are just regular people, and ⁓ can put them on a platform that they can actually get traction and find their community to read them.

a lot of these larger publishers may not necessarily fund these things.

Cady Moore (42:22)
And what you immediately reminded me of is, and this is a huge fucking tangent that we don't need to go down, but I'm thinking about fan fiction and how much fan fiction has been written intentionally to take these stories that we grew up with, that we love, and make them more queer and make them more inclusive and make them less ableist. Like to take what already exists and turn it into

Sharilyn Wester (42:32)
Yes!

Exactly.

Cady Moore (42:50)
Okay, but what if I were here? What if people who were like me fit into this world? Or not what if, but like how do they fit into this world? ⁓ And I love that. And I'm sure that, like, I don't know off the top of my head, but like how much of mainstream fantasy at this point, like mainstream indie book tok fantasy started as fan fiction? Like I'm curious, because I know Twilight.

Sharilyn Wester (42:55)
Absolutely.

How?

Absolutely. I'm literally reading a book

right now that was based on that. Like based on a trope. Like I think it's called the Love Hypothesis and it was originally a fan fiction, Rey ⁓ and Kylo fan fiction that was adapted into like another story. You know, you have 50 Shades of Grey which was inspired by Twilight, which was inspired by X, which was inspired by X.

Cady Moore (43:21)
Mm-hmm.

i love it

Yeah.

Sharilyn Wester (43:41)
And it's like all these new life cycles that inspire new authors and writers and creators take a little bit of what was enjoyable before and like continually fix it and continually add onto it and make it better. And that's why, you know, when it comes to funding and stuff like that, yeah, like fan fiction is so pivotal because fan fiction has literally inspired huge projects. Do you know what I mean? And so, ⁓

Cady Moore (44:08)
Mm-hmm.

Sharilyn Wester (44:10)
these small communities like

Cady Moore (44:10)
We'll put it aside here.

Sharilyn Wester (44:11)
Booktok and Reddit and Kindle Unlimited and forums where these ideas are shared or these pieces are shared, it really is the small creators who help drive change in the industry, which I think is just amazing.

Cady Moore (44:28)
Mm-hmm.

I absolutely agree. I think we should, ⁓ well, we will definitely in the show notes, we'll put some recommendations. If you follow us on Instagram at knee deep podcast, please, like when we post this episode, throw your recommendations in the comments, like let's shout out all of our favorite creators. Before we transition into Sharilyn and I sharing about our

Sharilyn Wester (44:48)
No!

Cady Moore (44:54)
personal fantasy loves, are going to take another quick break and then we're going to come back and we're going to yap about ourselves, which is what we do best.

Cady Moore (45:07)
So before we go on break, feels important to note that we have left out one towering figure in speculative literature, and that is Octavia E. Butler. We left her out not because her work is any less influential or important, but because our focus in this episode has been mostly on high fantasy rather than science fiction. Octavia Butler was the first black woman to gain major recognition in sci-fi. She is a MacArthur Genius Award winner, and she's a writer who wove themes of race.

power, survival, and humanity into every story that she told. Her novels like Kindred and the Parable series don't just imagine futures, they interrogate our present and our past. So even though she sits more squarely in science fiction than in high fantasy, her influence echoes across genres, and many fantasy writers and readers trace their ideas about identity, community, and world building back to Octavia Butler. In short, even though she does not appear in this particular conversation, she is essential to understanding

the broader landscape of speculative storytelling.

Cady Moore (46:16)
Welcome back everybody. So before we head into Sillies Sharilyn and I are going to do a little bit of a popcorn back and forth about some of our favorite fantasy series. ⁓ Most of mine are from like childhood and young adulthood, but I will open with an adult Cady favorite. So my favorite fantasy series, well, I don't know of all time,

It's a tie between this one and the one I'm gonna share after this one. ⁓ But it's like up there. And Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas. I read A Court of Thorn and Roses first and then read Throne of Glass and like from literally book one I was just completely sold. ⁓ I love the ways in which the characters love and interact with each other.

I love these strong social justice themes of building a better world and a world where we have more buy-in and more equality. ⁓ Manon Blackbeak lives rent-free in my head every day. just, I love that bitch. I don't wanna give too many spoilers, so I'll just leave it there. But yeah, so opening with Throne of Glass, which I know is a shared love. ⁓ So Sharilyn, if you have anything to add about Throne of Glass before you share yours, feel free.

Sharilyn Wester (47:31)
Yes. Yes.

No, so Throne of Glass is also my favorite. I have a huge tattoo on my thigh from the book series and I love the ensemble. Like I love how each character is unique and how the story is woven together. But what I particularly love about that series is I'm a sucker for like politics and how politics ⁓ enforce plot. And the characters are simply reflections of that plot in different ways.

Cady Moore (47:57)
Mmm.

Mmm.

Mmm.

Sharilyn Wester (48:05)
And so,

you know, I've taken a lot in my D &D campaign from my inspirations from Throne of Glass of like, you have these large political powers, like, yeah, you can have all the fire magic, all the ice magic, all the shadow magic, all the whatever magic in the world, but you can't necessarily out magic a system designed on repressing you, ⁓ as is like our society. So I love Throne of Glass for that. ⁓

One of my pivotal ones from childhood that still remains is Studio Ghibli films, know, Kiki's Delivery Service. And ⁓ this is another really great example of fantasy done where women are not just romantic sexual objects, they are people. Miyazaki very infrequently makes his characters look sexy or appealing. If you take Chihiro's journey through Spirited Away, if you take Kiki's journey in Kiki's Delivery Service, it is about

Cady Moore (48:35)
Hmm.

Sharilyn Wester (48:59)
personal growth and the journey that happens there. ⁓ Howl's Moving Castle even? Sophie really goes on a journey

Cady Moore (49:00)
Mm-hmm.

Sharilyn Wester (49:06)
romance is secondary. So I would say Studio Ghibli is one of mine.

Cady Moore (49:11)
Hell yeah. Well, and it's funny because I did not watch Studio Ghibli movies until like really recently. And they have become such a source of comfort. find them, I grew up as a Disney kid and part of that is because I'm a theater kid and I love singing and I love musicals and Disney had more musicals. But like when I think about the...

Sharilyn Wester (49:20)
Yeah.

Cady Moore (49:38)
more like kind of old school Disney movies that I watched. I'm like, oh, if I had gotten the messaging from that you get from Studio Ghibli I think maybe I would have, I think just the way that women and and love is treated. I'm like, huh. Yeah. But speaking of love. So this is like my childhood. This

Sharilyn Wester (49:55)
Yeah, absolutely.

Cady Moore (50:06)
I don't know y'all, this is like one of my top 10, this is my Roman Empire, low key. ⁓ So Tamora Pierce, the Tortal Universe. ⁓ I mean, the books are from the 80s and the early 90s. I read them, I got the box set of the first three quartets, well, first two quartets for Hanukkah when I was like 11. ⁓ And just like...

Each quartet, it all takes place in the same universe and each quartet has a different strong female lead that strongly passes the Bechdel test. Romance is definitely there, but it is very much a subplot and as a romantic, it was nice to have that, ⁓ but also have the primary thing be these women who were overcoming

world that was not designed for them. I mean the first book is literally all about a girl who trades places with her twin and goes to become a knight and hides that she's a girl and then becomes the first lady knight in hundreds of years. And it's just like it's so fucking badass and when I I reread them fairly recently just as like a comfort this winter and as I was reading it I was like god no wonder I turned into the person that I am. Like when these

Sharilyn Wester (51:08)
I love that.

Yeah.

Cady Moore (51:22)
when these were the female characters that were my role models, like someone who literally called herself the protector of the small because she thought that it was her job to protect the people who couldn't protect themselves against the powers that be, which was mostly men. And I just, I'm like, oh, so they are definitely YA. I would say they are age appropriate for like 11 to 12 with like parents reading along.

Sharilyn Wester (51:40)
Mhm.

Cady Moore (51:52)
But also like I read them alone when I was 11 and 12 and turned out fine. I turned out a sex educator, so let that be. But I think it turned out fine. You know?

Sharilyn Wester (51:56)
Mm-hmm. Yeah

Yeah, absolutely.

And I think that at that formative age, it's so nice to have like those representations. Like, you know, for me, I read the Percy Jackson series. I was a huge mythology nerd. love Greek mythology. And so Percy Jackson was a series ⁓ that I loved. I loved Annabeth in that series. you know, no spoilers. was just, she's the daughter of Athena. It's about this camp with all these half-bloods of these, like, these demigods, essentially. Their parents are all these Greek gods. And Percy,

is his father's Poseidon. He's one of the big three. There's Poseidon, Hades, and Zeus as we know. ⁓ And it's about them navigating through these like classic Greek monsters, but it's like set in modern day. And that was really fun. It was really fun to see just like girls being badass, doing badass things. And which I always yearned for. I always wanted that representation. mean, for so long, I worshiped.

Eowyn as a character in Lord of the Rings because that was all I had for this girl who wanted to break norms and wanted to fight for those she loved and wanted to do combat and didn't just want to you know, she says the things she fears most in life is a cage, you know, and so that was really formidable to me. Um, Avatar the Last Airbender was a big one. Hunger Games I got into in the latter half of my teen years. Um,

Cady Moore (53:00)
Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Mmm.

Sharilyn Wester (53:24)
And, you know, as an adult now, ⁓ Discovery of Witches, I really love. It's kind of dark academia. It's an older, you know, woman. I say, quote unquote, older because a lot of fantasy books take place with, you know, 19 year olds, 20 year olds. Right. She is she is a doctor of. ⁓ Right. Right. And it's like totally OK that there is some. But again, in the name of diversity, the main character, Diana Bishop, is a witch.

Cady Moore (53:29)
Yeah, mm-hmm.

They're like 19. They're like, I'm sick of 19 year old protagonists! I want someone my age!

Sharilyn Wester (53:52)
She meets a vampire and they are both professors and like doctors and are into literature. Not only is it a great series and the recent book just came out like last year that I haven't got to, but it's a great series produced on the BBC of a show. Very good. And again, romance is involved and I love it. And again, romance is not a bad thing to involve in works. Like, let me just say that again, if you like romantic books, if you like books with sex, that's okay.

It is also okay that exists in fantasy and there's nothing wrong with that. So like, yes, if we're looking for good fantasy with good romance,

hell yeah, that's okay. You're okay.

Cady Moore (54:27)
Well, I think that's

a good segue for my next one. Sailor Moon. Like, I grew up loving Sailor Moon because I loved this person who got to simultaneously be cute and baby and grumpy and like all the things, like I identify so hard with that feeling of like, I'm just a girl. I'm literally just a girl. And then also like,

Sharilyn Wester (54:34)
Yes, same.

I'm just a girl!

Cady Moore (54:54)
I have this incredible power to save the world. ⁓ And also a really hot boyfriend. Yeah, meatball head. And it just.

Sharilyn Wester (54:58)
Yeah, I'm just a meatball head. Yes, I just really have a boyfriend

who's loved me in every lifetime.

Cady Moore (55:07)
Right, which I'm like, yeah, who doesn't want that? I And then my next one is is a is a deep cut like I don't I Don't know that I've ever met anybody that's read these but the Great and Terrible Beauty series It's YA, but it's like it's also dark academia it's Victorian England and There's there's a girl with epilepsy who has fits and so she has to like

Sharilyn Wester (55:10)
Yes.

Love.

Cady Moore (55:33)
hide that in order to fight. It's so fucking good. It's like there's three friends and they each hold these like three very kind of stereotypical tropes in their relationship. ⁓ one of them has clairvoyant powers and they end up finding a way to basically go to this other world that it turns out is run by a big spooky ⁓ baddie, Circe which I I thought about it when you're talking about Percy Jackson and ⁓

Sharilyn Wester (55:59)
OOF

Cady Moore (56:02)
Greek mythology, I'm like, yeah, Circe's the bad guy. ⁓ But spoiler alert, sorry. But like so good, very dark, ⁓ very intense, and just like, yeah man, I don't know. I was, ⁓ I still have my original copies of those books, like on my shelf.

Sharilyn Wester (56:06)
Yeah!

Yeah.

Those

YA books, I remember in like, out of starvation for, you know, female centered books, I remember being like a preteen teen and devouring those YA books that were coming out like Twilight, there was Shatter Me, there was Hush Hush, there was ⁓ Marked or whatever, School of Night, ⁓ all of those books that had some kind of fantasy and were involving like girls.

Some of them were not really great, but it was like my only outlet for it. And so I went hard So if you guys remember any of those like YA books, oh my god Please share the ones that you were super into and like first introduced you to romance or like maybe touched on sex But not really because they were YA the YA Like like genteel books to like monster fucking books pipeline. Let me know if you're on that with me Let me let me know. I just need to know I'm not alone

Cady Moore (56:49)
Yeah

⁓

I literally, so I looked up so that I would like help myself remember because I was I was hugely obsessed with vampires. So like obviously Twilight was on there, but I looked up 2000s YA vampire books so that I could remember and like some of the some of these books and I distinctly remember being 13 and being like, yeah, my favorite book is Vampire Kisses by Ellen Schreiber, which like that was like what that is not your favorite book. You just read it and you really like it.

Sharilyn Wester (57:20)
Me too.

Cady Moore (57:40)
Blue Bloods by Melissa De La Cruz. I just for fun, I copied. Okay, I copied the synopsis for both of those books from Goodreads, which like I know fucking Amazon but can I just read the book description for Vampire Kisses?

Sharilyn Wester (57:45)
I loved Blue Bloods!

Read it. Please! I forgot about

Blue Bloods, my sister loved that. Yeah, she was really into Gossip Girl, so that was like perfect.

Cady Moore (58:00)
Okay. ⁓

okay. Well, so I was gonna read vampire kisses, but I can also do blue bloods.

How do you do vampire chases first? Okay. In her small town, dubbed Dullesville, 16 year old Raven, a vampire crazed goth girl, hello, do we see the parallels, ⁓ is an outcast, but not for long. The intriguing and rumored to be haunted mansion on top of Benson Hill has stood vacant and boarded up for years. That is, until its mysteriously strange new occupants move in. Who are these creepy people?

Sharilyn Wester (58:08)
or both. Do both.

Yeah

Cady Moore (58:34)
especially the handsome, dark, and elusive Alexander Sterling. Or rather, what are they? Could the Trown Prattle actually ring true? Are they vampires? Raven, who secretly covets a vampire kiss, both at the risk of her own mortality and Alexander's loving trust, is dying to uncover the truth.

Sharilyn Wester (58:38)
worse. Not, not Alex.

RAVEN!

⁓

my goodness gracious. That is so good.

Cady Moore (59:00)
I want to reread it. I want to reread it. And

the Blue Bloods actually, lowkey is very cool ⁓ because basically the whole plot line is that when the Mayflower came over, some of the pilgrims were actually vampires and these vampires became ⁓ like these powerful, wealthy, influential people because they had centuries to accrue power. And so the blue bloods of American society.

Sharilyn Wester (59:17)
Woo!

Cady Moore (59:28)
are actually vampires and it's got the private school, like it's dark academia, ⁓ like loner outcast, like it's really good, it's a good one. ⁓

Sharilyn Wester (59:30)
I remember that, yeah.

Yeah, I really

loved the Vampire Academy series, which was very similar in that like, which rich those vampires there is Dom Piere. I ate that shit up. I anything with vampires, like once I read Twilight, I was like, I was probably a terrifying teen, like dragging my parents to the bookstore to buy God knows what I remember when I 16. Actually, I got into a book series called the Anita Blake series. And they are

Cady Moore (59:46)
Mm-hmm.

Sharilyn Wester (1:00:08)
RAUNCHY and I remember just reading them on family vacation and it was my first introduction to like fantasy and sex and it like wasn't well written. If you've read them, if you know, you know. ⁓ It starts off with like ⁓ there's vampires and supernatural creatures and all of that and then quickly turns into smut and like succubus and it's poly and it's CRAZY! Some of this stuff was-

Cady Moore (1:00:32)
One more series!

Sharilyn Wester (1:00:35)
It's called the Anita Blake series. It's by Laura K. Hamilton. And it is... It's... God, if you've read them, please try and help me out here. True Blood! I loved True Blood. Yes, I read the Sookie Stackhouse series as well. Yeah, when I was a teen. ⁓ my God.

Cady Moore (1:00:44)
Wow, I'm remembering True Blood. I read True Blood. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. Wow. And it's so funny because like when I look back, like my

vampire fascination started so fucking young. Like I read this like children's book, The Bailey School Kids was the the series. And like the first book was vampires don't wear polka dots. And it's all about this school where they keep getting these like weird teachers who are actually monsters.

Sharilyn Wester (1:01:00)
Mine started early too.

Cady Moore (1:01:12)
And I'm like, so like, I've been obsessed with vampire since I was a small child, like reading Bunnicula. Like, like what the fuck? No wonder we are the way we are. Okay, let's take another quick break and then let's go into Sillies

Sharilyn Wester (1:01:17)
same. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, my god, I'm so excited for this.

Cady Moore (1:01:30)
Welcome back to Knee Deep in the Passenger Seat.

Sharilyn Wester (1:01:32)
Hello!

Cady Moore (1:01:38)
So obviously we did not actually go and take a break, but you can if you want to. I decided to leave our beep boops in there because it's our podcast and I think it's funny as hell.

Cady Moore (1:01:49)
We are about to take off into silly land. This is always the last segment of the pod ⁓ and it's our favorite. I mean, I like all of it, but I love sillies. So we've got a couple of questions queued up here.

Sharilyn Wester (1:01:54)
Yes.

get a little silly. Yeah.

Yes.

Um, one of these questions, which I know is probably burning for all of you, um, is what are our Hear Me Out fantasy characters? What are the characters that if you told your friend, yeah, I wanna, I wanna, wanna, I wanna fuck that. I wanna fuck that. Would you have to say Hear Me Out and you have to explain it? Um, it's funny cause now that I'm looking at, there are some similarities for both of us on some of them. I also wrote a couple down.

⁓ on an app and I'll go ahead and start with mine.

My first one is Shrek. He loves his woman. He is a homeowner. He knows property rights. ⁓ He saved the kingdom. He defied a ⁓ toxic short king. ⁓ And he's just so down, bad and feral for his baddie who he loves in all forms.

Cady Moore (1:02:40)
Dude! Yeah?

Yeah?

you know what honestly excellent choice i lowkey feel like i want to go from like least unhinged to most unhinged but then i realized that like most of mine are unhinged so um well i will go with like the slightly less unhinged um Gimli from Lord of the Rings like he's so loyal and he is so like

Sharilyn Wester (1:03:00)
And I bet he has a hog on him. Thank you.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Cady Moore (1:03:26)
I love a short king, like I really do. And like there's something about the like tall woman, short man trope that just like really does something to me. And I just like, I don't know, I feel like he'd be, I feel like he would be a very generous lover. So Gimli is my first one.

Sharilyn Wester (1:03:33)
Yeah.

like that like you like a man that you can ⁓ throw around in the bedroom just toss around a dwarf.

Gimli is a great answer and I never expected that, but yeah, mean, incredible. ⁓ On the short king thing, which this is gonna bounce back and forth, I'd say Mr. Tumnus, only as James McAvoy.

Cady Moore (1:03:56)
Thank you. I was pretty proud of that one.

Dude.

Okay. Great choice. Honestly. We love James McAvoy. How does that work though?

Sharilyn Wester (1:04:07)
Yeah. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Yeah. And his slutty little

scarf. You know what? I haven't thought about that too much, but I think we would figure it out. I think we figure it Anatomically, we would make it work.

Cady Moore (1:04:22)
So speaking of

how would that work, actually so many of mine are how would that work. I'm like which one do I start with? I'm gonna say Sgaeyl and Tairn from 4th Wing. I wanna threesome with Sgaeyl and Tairn. They talk about their sex being so hot and so intense and I'm like wait but I want it. Let me in babe.

Sharilyn Wester (1:04:36)
Bye.

Can you tell us what species they are, Cady, for anyone who doesn't know?

Cady Moore (1:04:53)
they're dragons.

Sgaeyl and Tairn are dragons.

Sharilyn Wester (1:04:57)
There are those huge dragons by the way.

Cady Moore (1:05:00)
I feel like I'd have to like, I don't

know, I'd have to be a dragon, but whatever. ⁓

Sharilyn Wester (1:05:05)
In the same vein of that, I put the Balrog, if he could just fucking cool it. ⁓ He has a little whip! He has a little whip! He loves to live in a big hole! He's really angry! The Balrog. Under Moria. Yes.

Cady Moore (1:05:14)
Dude, yeah!

I'm here for it. I'm

here for it. ⁓ Okay, so then my, this is so funny. My next one is ⁓ Tamlin in beast form. Like only in beast form because he's got his like weird antlers and his claws and shit. And I'm like, I just low key feel like I'm honestly, I'm picturing beast from being the beast and I don't like Tamlin as a person. So him as in beast form.

Sharilyn Wester (1:05:27)
This is so funny.

Yes.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. one of mine is the Loch Ness Monster. I... I love Scottish men. What's a Scottish water dragon creature? You know? Hey, guys, bad dragons exist for a reason. If you know what a bad dragon is, we're not off base with this. We're not crazy, okay? There's a whole business made around women's pleasure objects that resemble this stuff. And I might just go on there after this. Ugh.

Cady Moore (1:06:17)
literally just gonna say I was like ⁓

I haven't checked their website in a while I wonder if they've got any new good stuff ⁓ okay

Sharilyn Wester (1:06:21)
⁓ Yes, yes, so I would say the

Loch Ness Monster.

Cady Moore (1:06:28)
Okay, my next one. The House of Wind.

From A Court of Silver Flames So for those of you who haven't read the series, The House of Wind is a house, it's a palace. But it's magic and it gives you whatever you ask for. And I'm such a fucking Taurus I'm like, yeah, give me my chocolate cake and a bath. Like, yes. And I just feel like it would take really good care of me.

Sharilyn Wester (1:06:36)
YEAH! YEAH!

It's like the Weasley's house!

Yeah!

Yeah, I feel like the Weasley's house is similar in Harry Potter where it's like a sentient magical being. Yeah, would... ⁓ You know, I wouldn't fuck a landlord, but I would fuck a house. Okay. ⁓ I would say my next one, not super surprising if you've seen Rings of Power Season 2, I would fuck Sauron, but only in... As... Spoilers, if you haven't seen Rings of Power, if you haven't read Lord of the Rings, you don't know.

Cady Moore (1:07:11)
Yeah, I don't think I'm to to do it right now.

Thank

Sharilyn Wester (1:07:32)
⁓ only as Hallbrand, which Hallbrand isn't actually in like the books, ⁓ Sauron, Charlie Vickers who plays Sauron. Whew, him as Hallbrand, not as Annatar, because when he, when he takes the form of Annatar, he has his fuck ass wig and this, ooh, like concealer. That's two shades too light that I don't like. But as Hallbrand, ⁓ my God, I would be his dark queen in a second. Like, I don't know. If you've seen it, if you, you know, you know, he's hot.

Cady Moore (1:07:49)
you

If you know,

know. Okay, I'm actually adding, I'm replacing one. And let's save our shared one for last. But my next one is also Sarah J Maas. So I just changed it. I have too much Sarah J Maas in here. Dorian as a woman. When Dorian shapeshifts into a witch, would, 10 out of 10.

Sharilyn Wester (1:08:03)
If you know, know.

Yes.

Yeah. Mm hmm.

Cady Moore (1:08:30)
10 out of 10 I want to go.

Sharilyn Wester (1:08:30)
Mm hmm. And when he looks down, he's like, well, I think she's pretty enough. So funny.

Cady Moore (1:08:36)
Yeah,

maybe I'm sure she's pretty enough. Okay, let's each do one more and then we'll do our shared one.

Sharilyn Wester (1:08:40)
Yeah, absolutely.

Okay, yes, I would say now that I think about it, I'm like looking at my list. Bowser, he wants Peach's puss so badly. He is obsessed with her. He wants her in every castle of his. I don't know if he can take his shell off, but I'm interested in what's under there because other than that, he just has a sexless mound.

Cady Moore (1:08:52)
No

Sharilyn Wester (1:09:09)
but he's kind of angry, but he's obsessed with his femme queen who's just a little spacey and gets lost a lot. And I like that passion.

Cady Moore (1:09:21)
my god, I love this. So for further context, we both wrote these down so we could technically see each other and Sharilyn just keeps whipping some out that are not on her list and it's so funny. ⁓ Okay, my last one, my last one because I technically have two more but I'm not gonna do another Sarah J. Mass one. My last one is King Triton. ⁓ Like just like big like Daddy And like even though I did not like his acting, the live action Little Mermaid,

Sharilyn Wester (1:09:22)
Yeah.

I'm whipping it out.

God,

Cady Moore (1:09:50)
⁓ Javier Bardem as King Triton? Daddy Like just yes.

Sharilyn Wester (1:09:56)
So hot. And if

anyone's curious on how anatomically that works, I suggest you go watch the movie The Shape of Water because there's a mermaid man in that who had a sexless mound and something opens up and comes out and anyway, I'm gonna let me just get my fan out here. And I do have to say we had a shared one, which I don't think is super as unhinged as some of these like fucking a house or a Balrog, but it's Eris from ACOTAR.

Cady Moore (1:10:10)
Yep.

Sharilyn Wester (1:10:25)
He's, you know, quote unquote evil. I don't believe he is. think he has, he has good intentions that we are yet to discover in upcoming books, but for sure, Eris from ACOTAR. ⁓

Cady Moore (1:10:26)
and it's...

Well, it's funny because this came about because, again, I'm rereading the series and so was in book two, so Mist and Fury, and I texted Sharilyn and I was like, ⁓ so I'm kind of into Eris, and she was like, girl, he's on my Hear Me Out, and I was like, ⁓ perfect, great.

Sharilyn Wester (1:10:49)
I know. my gosh.

Yes. my god. Yeah, my ginger king who's like cruel and whatever. I think there's more to him. On to our next thing. Which fantasy creature would be the worst roommate?

Cady Moore (1:11:00)
Yeah.

You stole mine, so you go for it. Now, I mine, but this was exactly what I would have put. So you put yours.

Sharilyn Wester (1:11:10)
Yeah.

Yeah, I put Moaning Myrtle. Shut the hell up. Like, if your whole thing is like moaning, okay, like, are we gonna have a moan off? I can be moaning Sharilyn like, I don't need to hear you wailing all hours or what, like, shut up. Shut up. I don't need a roommate whose literal name is Moaning Myrtle. Like, and also like weird to have that in like, in a book about like a student's school. Like, you couldn't have named her Wailing Wanda?

Cady Moore (1:11:26)
Shut up!

Sharilyn Wester (1:11:39)
Moaning Myrtle? JK, what the fuck are you on? Anyway. Anyway.

Cady Moore (1:11:43)
now we know.

So yeah, I absolutely would have put Moaning Myrtle. Like she is the WOAT But I put the Mad Hatter. So many parties, like all the time, and never cleans up from them, is never on time to anything, can't answer a fucking question to save his life. I would be so over it. I'd be so annoyed. Done. D.O.N.E.

Sharilyn Wester (1:11:49)
Yes.

Mm hmm. Yeah. Also, he essentially

has has the fantasy version of a fedora because that fuck ass hat needs to go. The mad hatter shut up. Yeah, no, absolutely.

Cady Moore (1:12:10)
Yeah. Yeah. No, absolutely not. ⁓

all right. So what is the most impractical fantasy weapon?

Sharilyn Wester (1:12:22)
I love your answer for this. I'm gonna answer mine. ⁓ One fantasy series I've actually really been loving, it's an anime, it's called Free Ren. If you're into D &D, watch Free Ren, it's so good. It's cool, because it takes place after the party has gone on their big quest, and it's basically like what happens after, and it follows this immortal elf called Free Ren, and how she learns how to be around humans, and all the quests she goes, and she loves to find spells. But in Free Ren,

⁓ the most impractical fantasy weapon is a staff. Your staff can fucking break and then you are out, your big stick that's huge. I mean, we see it in smaller versions in wands, you know, like the Elder Wand in Harry Potter snaps, Ron's wand snaps, ⁓ Fern from Freerun, staff explodes, Gandalf's staff broke in the movie trilogy, not in the books, but the Witch King of Angmar blasted his shit apart. He rocked his shit.

Cady Moore (1:12:53)
Yeah.

Sharilyn Wester (1:13:18)
And then you have no staff. if your weapon is a stick, ⁓ yes, it can do cool magical things, but stick break, stick break, if not

So maybe get some steel on you. I don't know. Roll hot. Get, get a fucking shotgun.

Cady Moore (1:13:30)
step one. When I read those I was like

When I read yours, I was like, yeah, wands. Wands are so fucking stupid. Like, they're so dumb. What? So dumb. But yeah.

Sharilyn Wester (1:13:40)
It's so stupid! They crack! Like, if you're telling

me if the Witch King of Angmar blasted Gandalf's shit apart and he didn't pull out a sawed-off shotgun and just fucking rocked his shit, it would have been over a lot faster. Like, come on now. Anyway, what about yours? I'm getting really riled up. I need to calm down.

Cady Moore (1:13:59)
I've put,

you're doing amazing. I've put anything you can throw. when I, and this is based mostly on my experience in Baldur's Gate, but like, when, when Karlach throws shit, you have to go pick them up. And like, yeah, I guess you can have like, kind of an unlimited arsenal, but like not really. my, you know, one of my current hyperfixations is K-pop Demon Hunters and Zoey is my favorite. But she has her little throwing things and I'm like,

Sharilyn Wester (1:14:06)
GET OFF!

Cady Moore (1:14:29)
How do those come back? How do those come back? And I mean, I get it, it's fantasy. So like, maybe it's magic. I don't know. But like, I don't see it come back. We don't watch it. And I don't like suspending disbelief more than I have to.

Sharilyn Wester (1:14:29)
Throwing Stars! Yeah!

Yeah. And you see this.

And you see that in Avatar with Sokka and his boomerang. Sometimes, like, if he throws his boomerang, goes, you're not getting it back. What the hell?

Cady Moore (1:14:45)
On that

Yep, and I'm just like

why? So anything you throw, it seems very impractical. mean, yeah.

Sharilyn Wester (1:14:53)
Yeah. Speaking of mishaps,

what do you feel like or what minor characters from a fantasy story do you think need their own trilogy that like, yes, this was good. And I actually want more of that.

Cady Moore (1:15:07)
Morrigan for sure. Morrigan from ACOTAR. She's like, there's so much more. And I think, mean, obviously we're not done with ACOTAR. So like, we don't know. We're probably going to get more, more. ⁓ But I just think she's so fucking cool. And I want to, I want more.

Sharilyn Wester (1:15:09)
Yeah, a guitar. Yep.

Yeah!

I know. Yeah. So I love Luna Lovegood. I love a spacey bitch, but I do not want JK to produce anything else that will be consumed. But I would say Luna Lovegood fanfics for sure. ⁓ Also Arwen from Lord of the Rings. Arwen is, I think, like at least 3000 years old at the time Lord of the Rings takes place. And you catch her at the end of her life when she gives up ⁓ her inner light.

Cady Moore (1:15:36)
Yeah.

Hmm.

No

Sharilyn Wester (1:15:55)
her ageless immortality to be with Aragorn. I would love to know more about her life ⁓ before. I would love to know about her life with her father. I'd love to know about her life ⁓ with Aragorn. ⁓ You know, we got more of Galadriel in the Rings of Power. The Rings of Power really focuses on Galadriel's story, which is so badass and so cool and it's really great. But I would love more on Arwen. I love her so much. I love her deeply.

Cady Moore (1:16:19)
Yeah.

Well, and I want, I would love to see her pass the Bechdel test, you know.

Sharilyn Wester (1:16:24)
Yeah, absolutely. Because

I think she would have something to say, you know, living in the fantasy world that she grew up in with a father Elrond and with the constraints placed upon her. Fuck yeah, I want to hear more from her. But sadly Tolkien's dead.

Cady Moore (1:16:37)
Yeah, absolutely. I'm ⁓

gonna actually add to this. Who's the girl with the pink hair in fourth wing again? Imogen.

Sharilyn Wester (1:16:50)
Imogen.

Cady Moore (1:16:52)
I feel like Imogen would also be an interesting person to have a spin-off trilogy about. Because obviously her character arc is pretty good, but I just like... She's just cool. She's badass. And I'm like, I don't want my badass bitch shit.

Sharilyn Wester (1:16:57)
Mhm.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

And like we talked about with ACOTAR not not ending yet, so we don't know, but I I would love to hear more about Gwyn. Gwyn is a character introduced in the last ACOTAR book that was released and I she's had such an interesting story. And I would just love to have a trilogy just on Gwyn because I think she's really fucking cool. And she was

Cady Moore (1:17:16)
YEAH!

Yeah, I

made a D &D character and a Baldur's Gate character of her. Like she's one of my favorite characters. I love her. Yeah, she's good shit. Hell yeah. Well, everybody, that is all we have for y'all today. We will throw in the show notes some of our inclusive fantasy recommendations.

Sharilyn Wester (1:17:34)
I love that! ⁓ that's so cool! Yes! Yes, we love! Ugh!

Yeah.

Cady Moore (1:17:54)
We love chatting with y'all, so please feel free to reach out. ⁓ You can find us on Instagram @KneeDeepPodcast email KneeDeepPodcastMailbag@gmail.com. If you loved what you heard today, don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you at your podcasts. And feel free to slide into our DMs and tell us your thoughts, questions, suggestions. We are very excited for season two. We've got some great shit coming up. ⁓ And yeah.

Sharilyn Wester (1:17:58)
Mm-hmm.

Yes!

We have really good shit.

Cady Moore (1:18:23)
We're just, we love you. We're so glad to be back.

Sharilyn Wester (1:18:25)
We

love you guys! Thanks for listening!

Cady Moore (1:18:29)
Woohoo! Bye-bye!