Frogs go through puberty in a wiggy, woggy way – which makes them a great animal to be around when you’re trans. This personal essay explores delayed adolescence set in the South Branch Campground of Baxter State Park.
In a near future, a group of trans community organizers have established a network to bring young people to places where they can have safe access to their gender identity. Mira, a teenage girl from Pierre, SD, gets a ride from Nat, a veteran organizer, to a private school in Massachusetts.
To print the zine, I made some rubber stamp prints inspired by my sister Hope. Each copy is hand-bound with embroidery thread and has a one-of-a-kind cover.
“In this well-contained road story, steady sources of kindness offset the discomfort of a young person journeying far beyond their hostile point of origin. The narrative gracefully portrays the awkwardness in their displacement and thrill felt in rapidly establishing new reference points for them to build off from as their world expands. Deliberate subversion of power structures and the careful guidance evident in the relocation network recalls the scrappy web of resources overlaying an assortment of radical libraries, infoshops, cooperative houses, DIY venues, Food Not Bombs chapters and other countercultural stops which dotted the US several decades ago, prior to the wonderless charting and overall refinement of social connections by our more widespread incorporation of the internet. The avenues here are not synonymous, and that lack of explicit association with any activist tradition reads as a strength, in that the excitement felt by the teenage Mira easily carries onto the reader through a gentle reminder that our lives may also be redefined as we face the unknown, with meaningful connections and weight to the manner in which we approach them.” – Matt from ABRAXAS, Portland ME
“This story gives a bright YES to the question of trans thriving under the bleak shadow of these times. Against the state-by-state criminalization of trans existence that leaves wide swaths of the country uninhabitable for trans youth, A Future offers the open arms and deep-rooted personal histories of trans community like a home-made feast shared with friends, and shows how, by acting where we stand and imagining a livable version of the present, we can not only ensure survival, but open up entire worlds.” – Jacob Fricke, Hello Hello Books, Rockland ME
Other Zines
GLITCHING LIBERATION: a leftist analysis of The Matrix: Resurrections (2022)
I love the Matrix franchise and especially loved the fourth and newest installation of the series. This zine is a general analysis from an anarchist perspective. I wrote it before I had read any Marxist theory, lol.
The zine includes discussion questions to be used in groups, as well as recommendations for further reading.
A fanzine about Car Seat Headrest. A snapshot from a glow up. A love letter to a good barista job. My first zine!
I don’t really sell this one from my webstore, but I often have it available at craft fairs! If you really want to read it, you can email me at acamillehoward@gmail.com and we’ll work something out.
to see some of my bylines, poems, and other published writings, click here.
RADIO + PODCASTS
THE ANGLERFISH is an experimental audio zine that features stories produced by Jules Bradley, Carly Peruccio, Anna Van Dine, and Phoebe Little. I’m incredibly grateful to these creative people for their willingness to participate in such an imperfect project.
In August of 2021, I produced this story about Queerly ME (formerly known as Queers of Greater Portland) for Maine Public Radio News.
While I was at the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies, I made this story about Portland, ME’s changing downtown, and the local Ween cover band.
Also at Salt, I produced this project about the Mid-Coast Solid Waste Transfer Station (the dump!). It’s called Trash Nerds.
FILMS
My thesis film for my undergraduate degree, YVONNE’S KITCHEN, is a documentary short film that I made with Yvonne and Kevin Hylton. Yvonne lives with Parkinson’s disease, and wanted my help telling some of her story. The film mostly explores aspects of her lifestyle that help her take care of her body – and also features their sweet romance.
The other film I made during my senior year of college was THE BOLD COAST. It’s about two people who are best friends, and when one of them decides to become a mermaid, the other struggles to build a new life without their friend as a part of their day to day. We made this film in three days, and everyone who participated put their best foot forward to help make the movie way more than it could have been without them.
I’m a writer and zinemaker! I’ve also made radio, films, and some visual art.
My work focuses on gender, queer coming of age, nature, music, and grief.
As a teen, I was fortunate to be mentored by some of the best filmmakers in Maine. I studied filmmaking at the Rochester Institute of Technology, and radio storytelling at the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies. I’ve supported artists as an employee at non-profits, including the Camden International Film Festival and Maine Media Workshops + College.
I tend bar at SPACE in Portland, ME, and I have a leopard gecko named Nero.
a.c. howard 