Nerd

Maya Phillips grew up on Saturday-morning cartoons with her comic-book-loving father, and Nerd traces how that early love expanded into a lifelong immersion in Star Wars, anime, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Harry Potter, Doctor Who, and fan fiction communities. Blending personal memoir with cultural criticism, she writes candidly about what these fandoms gave her and where they failed to make room for people like her.

The essays move between celebration and critique, treating fandom as both a genuine source of joy and a lens for examining race, sexuality, and belonging in American pop culture.