Read Your Mind: Maia Kobabe & Shelby Criswell

Wednesday, February 23rd @ 12:30pm

Read Your Mind is a monthly, virtual series focusing on teen mental health & wellness. Featuring YA authors and community health experts, we hope to explore complex and common health concerns through the vehicle of Teen books. 

In February we will host authors Maia Kobabe and Shelby Criswell to discuss how queerness & gender identity impact teen mental health, through the lens of their graphic novels Gender Queer and Queer As All Get Out. Maia and Shelby will be interviewed by youth from our community guest organization MaineTransNet.

The recording of this program will be up on the LPL Facebook and YouTube pages shortly.

About the Authors:

Maia Kobabe is a nonbinary, queer author and illustrator from the Bay Area, California. Eir first full length book, GENDER QUEER: A MEMOIR, was published in May 2019. Maia’s short comics have been published by The New Yorker, The Nib, The Washington Post and in many print anthologies including THE SECRET LOVES OF GEEKS, FASTER THAN LIGHT Y’ALL, GOTHIC TALES OF HAUNTED LOVE, ADVANCED DEATH SAVES, BE GAY, DO COMICS and THE MOST IMPORTANT COMIC BOOK ON EARTH. Before setting out to work freelance full-time, e worked for over ten years in libraries. Eir work is heavily influenced by fairy tales, homesickness, and the search for identity.

Shelby Criswell (They/Them) is a genderqueer comic artist and graphic designer from San Antonio, Texas. They are known for their work in THE NIB, BE GAY DO COMICS, TERMINAL PUNKS, SWEATY PALMS II, and their latest debut graphic novel, QUEER AS ALL GET OUT. When they are not creating, Shelby enjoys going on biketours, finding hidden walking paths, playing banjo, and brewing a good cup of coffee.

About the Community Organizations:

MaineTransNet is a community based organization led by transgender people for transgender people. We provide peer-to-peer support groups, social and community events, advocacy for the transgender community across Maine, and transgender cultural competency training for medical, mental health, and social service providers. We engage transgender people and our allies across Maine in the practice of community building and organizing for mutual liberation.