Y’know, one of those funny things about doing this job right is that we’ve gotta make sure we announce disclaimers when we’re covering things that our contributors might be involved with. Sometimes that’s thorny, but sometimes it’s really cool. Today’s one of the latter, as we have the pleasure of revealing the cover to Pillow Talk, written by our very own Stephanie Cooke!
When college freshman Grace Mendes reluctantly attends her first pillow fight match, she falls in love with the surprisingly gritty sport. Despite her usually shy, introverted, and reserved nature, Grace decides to try out for the Pillow Fight Federation (PFF), a locally famous league of fighters with larger-than-life personas like Pain Eyre, Miss Fortune, and champion Kat Atonic. They may battle with pillows, but there is nothing soft about these fighters. The first and only rule to pillow fighting is that the pillow needs to be the first point of contact; after that, everything else goes.
Grace struggles with deep-seeded body image issues, so she is especially shocked when she makes the competitive league and is welcomed into the fold of close knit, confident fighters. As her first official fight performing as newly crafted alter ego/ring persona Cinderhella looms on the horizon, the real battle taking place is between Grace and her growing insecurities. What if people laugh or make fun of her? Why did she think she could pillow fight in the first place when she doesn’t look like your “typical” athlete? Turns out, no one is laughing when Cinderhella dominates her first match in the ring. And as her alter ego rises through the ranks of the PFF, gaining traction and online fame (and online trolls), can Grace use the spotlight to become an icon for not just others, but most importantly, for herself?
Pillow Talk is an inclusive, high-octane, outrageously fun graphic novel that aims a punch at the impossibly high standards set for women in sports (and otherwise) and champions the power of finding a team that will, quite literally, fight for you. A knock-out!
Heck of a concept, right? Wait until you hear what inspired Stephanie to write it:
“Several years back, I was asked to participate in a Pillow Fight League exhibition match for the BBC. They were in town filming a show that featured local events and wanted to see the league in action. A good friend of mine happened to be the president of the league at the time and asked if I’d be interested. Having done NO RESEARCH WHATSOEVER, I heard “pillow fight” and thought, SURE! WHY NOT?!
Little did I know that the event would be a lot grittier than I anticipated as I watched a petite young woman tackle a grown man to the ground with a pillow, and quickly learned the rules of the sport—the first of which is anything goes, as long as the pillow is the first point of contact. Making the whole thing much more like WWE or roller derby than what someone might think of when “pillow fight” comes to mind. The night would end with me in the ER trying to explain to a nurse that I thought I broke my ankle in an extreme pillow fight.
After that, I joked around with some friends that it would be a blast to turn the experience into a story and have a group of women join this league and reclaim the sexualized “sexy” pillow fight as they beat the snot out of each other…but with pillows as the first point of contact. Once I said it, I couldn’t stop thinking about it and put together a pitch for PILLOW TALK.”
Pillow Talk is available through booksellers everywhere from April 30th, 2024!
