A aromantic prince has been turned into a frog

It's a curse only true love can break

So he spends months trying to fall in love, trying to stop being who he is because god dammit he's not a frog either!

After yet another unsuccessful date, he begins to despair for his future which is looking more amphibious by the minute.

A loud noise disturbs his brooding as something comes crashing through the undergrowth. He's barely gotten his little froggy feet underneath him before a tiny (but still quite big if you're a frog!) hand is scooping him into the air.

A little kid sees the frog on the grass.

They grab it before he has the chance to protest and kiss him square on his slimy little head.

He transforms back into a very confused human.

No, this is not a Renesme moment, gross. Not romantic love or even friendship, just the blind joy of a kid who thinks frogs are super cool. The child loves every amphibian she's ever set eyes on, but that doesn't make it any less real. And she grows up to be a biologist who studies frogs, because of course she does. The prince pays her tuition as thanks for returning him to his proper form. She was like 4 years old at the time and doesn't even remember the frog incident - there's just some random rich dude paying for her college because of something she doesn't remember, but she's not complaining because grad school is expensive as heck.

Marvel character Gwendolyn “Gwen” Poole aka Gwenpool has been confirmed aromantic and asexual!

Gwenpool will come to terms with her sexuality in next week’s issue of Love Unlimited: Gwenpool, her current series which is made by an acespec creative team.

Acespec creators Jeremy Whitley @jeremywhitley, Bailie Rosenlund @bailiesartblog, Kelly Fitzpatrick, Alanna Smith @alannawrites and Kaitlyn Lindtvedt discuss Gwenpool’s asexuality and aromanticism in this new interview for Marvel.

It’s a really great interview, highly recommend reading it!

“Acespec people aren’t often shown in media and when they are, it’s often shown as a trope of being a broken thing that needs fixing. The more diversity and stories we can tell, the better.” -Kelly Fitzpatrick

Love Unlimited: Gwenpool is available now from Marvel Unlimited. The concluding issue of this 6 part limited series will be out next week.

Check out this reading list for Gwenpool if you’d like to read more of her comics!

Gwenpool is the second Marvel character to be confirmed asexual this year, although she will be the first to have her asexuality shown on-page.

Morgan Red was confirmed asexual back in March and his asexuality will be addressed in New Mutants Lethal Legion #5, out in July.

You know how I know media literacy is dead?

Because I know that in if in seasons 2 of Hazbin Hotel, Alastor looked at the camera directly and said "I am Aromantic Asexual, I have no attraction to anyone of any gender, sexual or otherwise. I will literally kill you if you try to hit on me." And people will still somehow say that it's not enough evidence.

Like why does Alastor have to say the words with his mouth for ya'll to believe it?? Ya'll are pretty confident that Angel Dust is gay and he's never said it directly (at least from my knowledge). Were none of ya'll taught context clues in school???

We really need to bring back the "why are the curtains blue" discussion...

She’s my homeboy, she’s my rotten solider.

verity willis 💫

she’s just so aro

loki: agent of asgard

my turtle ships!

i headcanon rise mikey as aromantic because i am mikey and i am aromantic<33

💙 GLADIOLUS by hilarions

💙 GLADIOLUS

by hilarions

M, 4k, Wangxian

Summary: “I like you so much it’s insane,” he says. “You’re so good. You’re my favourite. You’re the best, Lan Zhan.” His voice recedes, turns smaller and smaller, and Lan Wangji’s skin prickles with the terrible realisation that this doubt of his has hurt Wei Wuxian. “So don’t go around thinking I don’t love you.” Kay's comments: This is THE story when it comes to aromantic Wei Wuxian and his relationship with Lan Wangji. It's so beautifully done and I adore it. The way it explains their love for each other and their relationship and deals with Lan Wangji's insecurities in this regard is actually genius and it can be totally read as canon compliant. Highly recommend! Excerpt: It’s not that Wei Wuxian doesn’t love him, Lan Wangji realises in that moment, the gentle inevitability of dawn. It isn’t even that Wei Wuxian doesn’t love him more than anything else. It’s simply that, if Lan Wangji is a compass always seeking him, then Wei Ying is simply the North Star. It’s just that, for all that Lan Wangji followed him, Wei Ying might never have gone looking. It’s only that, of all the countless people in the world who are magnetised to his charm, Lan Wangji was the one persistent enough to reach him, and touch him, and know him. Of course, Wei Wuxian loves him. But he has never had to be in love with Lan Wangji. With anyone. And if Lan Wangji had never known Wei Ying so comprehensively, he thinks with a strange curiosity for the nature of his heart that Wei Ying would never have been in love, with anyone, ever. He still isn’t. Not in the way that Lan Wangji is in love with him.

pov lan wangji, post-canon, canon compliant, aromantic character, aromantic wei wuxian, insecurity, communication, light angst, established relationship

~*~

(Please REBLOG as a signal boost for this hard-working author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

Japan just blessed us with another aromantic! Asano Tomoko, 1 of the 2 leads in Konya Sukiyaki Dayo. I love that it wasn’t just a one and done mention either, she’s brought it up multiple times in just the first 2 eps alone!

Billie from Billie Bust-Up is nonbinary and aroace!

Cool video recommendation

Celebrate Aromantic Awareness Week with Our 8 Favorite Books with Aro Characters!

To celebrate #aromanticawarenessweek, we asked our contributors (some of whom chose to remain anonymous) to recommend their favorite books with aromantic characters (some explicit, some implied).

Here are our 8 favorites!

Loveless by Alice Oseman This is the funny, honest, messy, completely relatable story of Georgia, who doesn’t understand why she can’t crush and kiss and make out like her friends do. She’s surrounded by the narrative that dating + sex = love. It’s not until she gets to college that she discovers the A range of the LGBTQIA+ spectrum — coming to understand herself as asexual/aromantic. Disrupting the narrative that she’s been told since birth isn’t easy — there are many mistakes along the way to inviting people into a newly found articulation of an always-known part of your identity. But Georgia’s determined to get her life right, with the help of (and despite the major drama of) her friends.

Commit to the Kick by Tris Lawrence For eighteen years, Alaric has lived under the cloying politics of family and his Clan community. His freshman year is supposed to be a chance to explore a world where Clan and his shapeshifting Talent isn’t central to his life. But when his inner bear bursts forth during his first football game, endangering those around him, Alaric realizes that it’s not so easy to ignore his past, or his own internalized anger. In his quest for anger management, Alaric begins to train in taekwondo, and makes new friends in both sports. He finds that he is creating his own small community, where Clan, Mages, other Talents, and even humans come together and build their own found family. When Alaric receives news that something has happened to his brother Orson, he must return and deal with his Clan and his place in their world. He discovers that old prejudices are still strong between Clan and Mage communities, but that both may be in danger from a creature long thought to be only a legend. Alaric must figure out how to move forward and prevent a war and protect both his home and newly built communities, his found family with him every step of the way.

The Graverobbers’ Chronicles by Xu Lei Uncle Three loves good food, good booze, good card games, and bad women–and he’s never found a grave he wouldn’t rob. He can’t help it – it’s in his blood – grave robbing has been the family business for centuries. So when his bookseller nephew comes to him with a map to an ancient tomb, Uncle Three sets off to find it, in the company of some grave-robbing colleagues, his nerdy nephew, and a strange poker-faced guy that nobody can quite figure out. Uncle Three knows that the grave he seeks will lead him and his companions to “another kind of world,” but not even he could ever imagine what they are about to find. Lost in a labyrinthine cavern that is full of dead bodies, Uncle Three and his comrades fight for their lives as they come up against vampires, corpse-eating bugs, and blood zombies.

The Devil’s Luck by L. S. Baird Years ago, a foolish wastrel once played a hand of cards with the devil… and lost. Now Frey has inherited his uncle’s double curse: the Devil’s claim written on his body in crimson letters, and the impossibly good luck that comes with it. Death is Frey’s only escape from his destiny, but not even Etienne, an expert assassin from the Order of the Crimson Seal, can defeat Frey’s luck alone. And when Etienne finds himself growing too fond of his victim, he doesn’t know if Frey’s good nature or the luck is to blame. However, Etienne will give his all to preventing the Archdemon’s return, even if his all includes wearing a corset, and killing a friend.

All Systems Red by Martha Wells In a corporate-dominated spacefaring future, planetary missions must be approved and supplied by the Company. Exploratory teams are accompanied by Company-supplied security androids, for their own safety. But in a society where contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder, safety isn’t a primary concern. On a distant planet, a team of scientists are conducting surface tests, shadowed by their Company-supplied ‘droid – a self-aware SecUnit that has hacked its own governor module, and refers to itself (though never out loud) as “Murderbot.” Scornful of humans, all it really wants is to be left alone long enough to figure out who it is. But when a neighboring mission goes dark, it’s up to the scientists and their Murderbot to get to the truth.

In Good Company by Nicola Kapron Haruki no longer remembered what had been going through his head the first time he’d killed. All he recalled was the sight of those he’d once loved with all the helpless force of a scared, scarred child covered in red and utterly still. He hadn’t felt grief or triumph when he realized they weren’t struggling anymore. He’d just felt— Empty. Better to be hollow than to despair.

Kaikeyi by Vaishnavi Patel I was born on the full moon under an auspicious constellation, the holiest of positions–much good it did me. So begins Kaikeyi’s story. The only daughter of the kingdom of Kekaya, she is raised on legends of the gods: how they churned the vast ocean to obtain the nectar of immortality, how they vanquish evil and ensure the land of Bharat prospers, and how they offer powerful boons to the devout and the wise. Yet she watches as her father unceremoniously banishes her mother, listens as her own worth is reduced to how great a marriage alliance she can secure. And when she calls upon the gods for help, they never seem to hear. Desperate for some measure of independence, she turns to the texts she once read with her mother and discovers a magic that is hers alone. With this power, Kaikeyi transforms herself from an overlooked princess into a warrior, diplomat, and most favored queen, determined to carve a better world for herself and the women around her. But as the evil from her childhood tales threatens the cosmic order, the path she has forged clashes with the destiny the gods have chosen for her family. Kaikeyi must decide if resistance is worth the destruction it will wreak–and what legacy she intends to leave behind.

Firebreak by Nicole Kornher-Stace New Liberty City, 2134. Two corporations have replaced the US, splitting the country’s remaining forty-five states (five have been submerged under the ocean) between them: Stellaxis Innovations and Greenleaf. There are nine supercities within the continental US, and New Liberty City is the only amalgamated city split between the two megacorps, and thus at a perpetual state of civil war as the feeds broadcast the atrocities committed by each side. Here, Mallory streams Stellaxis’s wargame, SecOps on BestLife, spending more time jacked in than in the world just to eke out a hardscrabble living from tips. When a chance encounter with one of the game’s rare super-soldiers leads to a side job for Mal–looking to link an actual missing girl to one of the SecOps characters. Mal’s sudden burst in online fame rivals her deepening fear of what she is uncovering about BestLife’s developer, and puts her in the kind of danger she’s only experienced through her avatar.

Recommendations contributed by Nina Waters, softestpunk, Adrian Harley, and others.

Also: did you know? Duck Prints Press’s owner, Nina Waters, is aro! We’re an aro-owned company!

Who we are: Duck Prints Press LLC is an independent publisher based in New York State. Our founding vision is to help fanfiction authors navigate the complex process of bringing their original works from first draft to print, culminating in publishing their work under our imprint. We are particularly dedicated to working with queer authors and publishing stories featuring characters from across the LGBTQIA+ spectrum. Love what we do? Want to make sure you don’t miss the announcement for future giveaways? Sign up for our monthly newsletter and get previews, behind-the-scenes information, coupons, and more! Want to support the Press, read about us behind-the-scenes, learn about what’s coming down the pipeline, get exclusive teasers, and claim free stories? Back us on Patreon or ko-fi monthly!

i was gonna wait to share these until arospec awareness week but i’ve been in alloro spaces for too long and wanted to share my recent art of my aro ocs to shake the bad vibes off!! im gonna do a little bit of infodumping abt them below >:)

the first drawing is of tatum (left) and dylan (right)! they are QPPs! :] tatum (she/her) is aroallo, grayro, and polyam! she’s also in a romantic relationship with another character. she loves being out in nature and has lots of hobbies like gardening, photography, and foraging! she’s big on appreciating the small things and prefers to be in quiet, peaceful areas. dylan (they/them) is aroqueer and genderqueer, and loves vulture culture and anything to do with bugs (beetles are their favorite)! they like sketching and being competitive (although sometimes they take it a little too far lol), and they take awhile to be comfortable around others.

i don’t have their backgrounds completely fleshed out, but i like to think since she was young tatum never got the big deal abt romantic relationships (while she’s in one now, she doesn’t view it as inherently superior to other relationship types) and didn’t buy into amatonormative ideas. dylan, on the other hand, tried to be in a romantic relationship which failed, and they fell victim to some amatonoramtive ideas until they met tatum! tatum taught them about aromanticism and generally made them a lot more comfortable with themself and their identity. sooner or later the both of them realized they wanted to be QPPs and they now call each other their zucchinis! <2

the second drawing is of mistletoe (he/him)! he’s frayromantic, homosexual, and non partnering! he has a group of friends, one of whom he has a fwb situation with. he can act arrogant sometimes but he means well. he’s actually a big softy but tries to act cool (he doesn’t like people treating him like he’s weak or “lesser” for being a rabbit, so he thinks he has to make up for it by acting tougher sometimes). while being aro, he actually loves flirting with people, he treats it like a game haha. although as soon as the flirting advances to something more, he gets freaked out and repulsed. and ironically, being frayromantic, on the rare occasions he does experience romantic attraction, he loses his entire ability to flirt due to nerves.

thanks for reading!!! i love these guys sm :]

I think the reason people don’t really make a big deal about shipping aro/ace characters is because people don’t care because it’s not representative of them (I don’t know how to put that nicely but I tried)

the thing I don’t understand is why can’t they ship platonically??? Why does everything have to be romantic or sexual. I just don’t understand it

I agree, I think a lot of people don't care about aroace identities because they can't relate to the experience (and because a shocking amount of people think that they're "basically straight" so they're not worth talking about.) So when they see a character who canonically doesn't like sex/romance they can't wrap their head around it because they love sex/romance.

People also can't ship platonically because so many people put romantic and sexual relationships on pedestals. They see romance and sex as something extraordinary, a life changing experience even. It's why we make fun of people for being virgins even though virginity is a social construct. It's why there is an extreme social pressure to get married because the fear of being alone is drilled into peoples heads from a young age. So, when there is a person, real or otherwise, that completely ignores these things, society freaks out because we've been taught that romance and sex is what makes you human.

It's why the idea of Rosie and Alastor in a queer platonic relationship isn't as valued as the idea of them secretly being lovers. Because unless a platonic relationship is the only type of relationship you want, romance and sex will aways trump it. It's always seen as the pinnacle of relationships regardless of how deep the platonic relationship the two characters already have is.

Okay so, since I didn't post any art on Aro Week (though I will be finishing the drawing I was doing), I'm gonna do some (very late) aro character text posting, talking about their identities.

Ft. a couple new characters and some new versions of old characters that I haven't reintroduced yet. Also including their ages to show the variety there.

--

Lev (he/him; early to mid 40s): bi aroace; sex-averse, but fine with romance; has flirted with people, gone on dates, kissed, etc; not opposed to eventually having a life partner.

Miguel (he/him; early to mid 50s): aroace; indifferent to both romance and sex; got married in his early 20s and had a kid with his wife, but they later divorced on good terms and are still friends; has since remained single.

Rufus (he/him; mid to late 50s): gay demiromantic ace; if he didn't have a partner, he was open to going on dates with people he wasn't attracted to if they seemed like they could be compatible; in present day he's married and has kids.

Howie (he/him; 16 y/o): poly aroacespec; unsure what kind of partnership he wants, is open to experimenting.

Angelo (he/him; 16 y/o): gay demirose (demi aroace); unsure what kind of partnership he wants, is open to experimenting.

Willow (they/them, he/him; 15-16 y/o): aro(spec) lesbian; romance-favorable; open to dating.

Zain (he/him; mid 20s): aromantic and either allosexual or acespec (but not strictly ace); friends, roommates and possibly fwbs with Harley.

Harley (they/them, ze/zir; mid 20s): aromantic bisexual, possibly non-partnering; friends, roommates and possibly fwbs with Zain.

Bridget (she/her; 50s): aromantic, doesn't really use other labels; romance-indifferent; close friends, roommates and sometimes fwbs with Darya.

Darya (she/her; 50s): pan grayromantic allosexual; romance-indifferent; close friends, roommates and sometimes fwbs with Bridget.

Debora (she/her; early 20s): lesbian oriented aroace; romance-averse but sex-indifferent; in a QPR with Erica.

Erica (she/her; early 20s): aromantic omnisexual; romance-indifferent; in a QPR with Debi.

Tristen (she/her; 30s): caedaroace; averse to both romance and sex; the only one on this list who is aspec due to trauma.

Aro rep in my books:

Take Me to Your Nerdy Leader (Bowden Anime Club): main character Paige is alloaro. A coming of age YA novel about friends, first times, anime, finding your confidence, and art.

Strange Worlds (Jensen in the Multiverse): The main character is aroace. He vaguely thinks about it in book 1 (where he learns about the identity) and confirms it in book 2. There’s other aro and ace characters. A portal fantasy: Jensen used to be a thief. Now he’s on a quest to save the multiverse from the evil Overlord.

Ancient Magic (Gray Stone Witches): Side character turned main character, Rachel, is alloaro and bisexual. This is confirmed in book 2. In book 3 and onwards she has her own POV. An urban fantasy novel about college witches who struggle to survive in a dangerous magical world while an enemy lurks in the shadows.

Luvian Code: main character, self-love Cupid, Theodosius is aromantic. A cozy urban fantasy novella about him reluctantly mentoring a fledgling Cupid, Kai, and teaching him the equality of the seven loves.