Elin Gregory

My guest today is Patricia Marie Budd, Canadian born and bred, educator and author, who is here today to celebrate her latest release, Hadrian’s Lover, a powerful novel about a dystopian future where sexual orientation is legislated and people who don’t conform are persecuted.

Welcome, Patricia.

###

Can you tell me a little about yourself? For instance, do you have to have a day job as well as being a writer?

I live and work in northern Alberta Canada where I am teach high school English and run a writer’s guild after school for teenagers who love to write. 

When you aren’t writing, is there any other creative activity you enjoy? Have you ever written about it?

I love to read. I deem that act very creative as my mind merges with the writer’s characters and I become the people I read about. My first protagonist, John Connolley from A New Dawn Rising was a big reader. I also studied mime when I was younger and my students still get me to act like a Gorilla for them. I have performed this silly Gorilla routine (stolen from – and nowhere near as good as – Shields and Yarnell) every year seven times a year for over twenty-one years. When I wrote Hell Hounds of the High School I made the English teacher in that book a mime turned educator like myself and wrote her doing the Gorilla as a gift to my students. I love to cook so Katherine from A New Dawn Rising is an exceptional cook. I played basketball when I was younger (but I was never any good at it) so Todd Middleton (and his father) played basketball.

What are you reading? Fiction or non-fiction? Can you recommend something that you wished you’d written yourself?

Currently I am re-reading Anna Karina by Leo Tolstoy. He is an amazing writer. I’ve read War and Peace Twice, as well. I love Charles Dickens’ work, Jane Austen, Wilke Collins, George Elliot and William Shakespeare. Ken Follett is one of my more modern favourites, especially his Pillars of the Earth! I love Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time Series, and his historical fiction. I am a huge fan of James Clavell and love teaching his novel King Rat. If I could recommend but one of these works – yikes, that is a tough call – but, since it is also the one I wish I had written then that book would be Romola by George Elliot! I was completely daunted by the opening chapters of this novel. I remember having to reread the first ten chapters before I could fully understand the logic of her writing and begin to make headway in understanding plot and character flow. This was such a reading challenge for me that when I finally got the sense of what was happening and to whom I was so thrilled that the novel has become one of the loves of my life! There is nothing better than overcoming what at first seemed like an insurmountable obstacle.

In that crucial inspiration stage of a new story which comes first? Plot, situation or character?

Character. Everything begins and ends with character for me. I write about people not events. Events occur because people act. Action is critical because someone is committing the act. Setting serves the character; plot occurs because the character wants or needs something and must act to obtain it. All my work is character driven.

Do your characters arrive fully fledged and ready to fly or do they develop as you work with them?

My characters begin as individuals I have only just met. He (or she) is striking, fascinating and I want to get to know him (or her). In that sense they are fully fleshed out I just don’t know it yet as I have yet to build a relationship. The writing process is that relationship growth.

Do you have a crisp mental picture of them or are they more a thought and a feeling than an image?

Tough question. Yes and no. I can usually describe a character’s physical appearance early on in the writing process but that may change after I get to know the indicidual better. My characters are feelings they way someone I love is a feeling but as concrete in my mind as the people in my life are concrete in the flesh.

Is there any genre you would love to write, ditto one you would avoid like a rattlesnake?

I love writing historical fiction. My novel writing career began with A New Dawn Rising, set in 1809 near Savannah Georgia. I loved the challenge of creating characters of a different era, a world I have never lived in and can only know through imagination and education. The research was fascinating. Ironically, this is also what I loved about writing Hadrian’s Lover a work set in the future. Again, I will never live in the time my novel is set but I enjoyed creating this potential future and doing the research necessary to help me postulate and create a future setting on this planet. 

 I honestly don’t know what genre I’d avoid. I see all of my books as having a romance edge as writing about people means writing about feelings and love often comes into the picture. But I don’t think I’d ever write a full out romance. Still, never say never as life is a constant flux. I may change my mind down the road.

What inspired you to write a story with such a strong theme as Hadrian’s Lover?

Hadrian’s Lover came to me in a nightmare. I remember waking up in a sweat, utterly terrified. I had dreamt that I was living in a society that hated heterosexuals and was hiding my true identify just to fit in. When I awoke I immediately expressed my relief over it having just been a dream and that everything was normal and okay. That was when I realized that everything wasn’t normal and okay, leastwise not for my LGBT* students.

Since my second year of teaching students have been coming out to me. I am seen as a safe zone, someone they can talk to about who they are without judgment. I love all my students and just knowing that so many teens suffer, actually live their day-to-day lives in the horror that I experienced from one short dream, inspired me to write this book. I choose to write about straight men living in a gay world as my observations show that gay men suffer from extreme abuses. I do not wish to underscore the suffering of lesbians but my observations have shown men to be very hard upon gay men. From my perspective I have observed that coming out and living an open gay life in the high school is slightly easier for lesbians than it is for gay men.

 I have turned the table on our cultural and religious attitudes towards the LGBT community making heterosexuality abhorrent. It is my hope that Hadrian’s Lover will provide my readers a vicarious understanding of the abuses we heap on our LGBT mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles.

Villains are incredibly important in fiction since they challenge the main protagonists and give them something to contend with beyond the tension of a developing relationship. The cruel sea. The serial killer. The bigoted society. What sort of villains do you prize?

I prize the villain who is human, the man (or woman) who acts because he or she truly believes what he is doing is right, just, necessary. These characters are complex, very real and terrifying. They frighten me because it is an axiom in our society that one should act on their beliefs regardless of what others think – and yet, what if those actions are harmful? What if what I truly believe is right is actually wrong? What if my views say gay men are disgusting, horrid creatures that deserve to die. What if my views are that all Jewish people are the cause of all our woes and should be exterminated? What if my views are that all Tutsis are cockroaches and be chopped to death with machetes? You see, these people act fully aware of their crimes but do not view them as crimes. Ironically, they see wanton murder as a benefit to mankind. They also frighten me because the very opposite side of that coin is to act knowing you are right regardless of public opinion even if it means fighting a war to stop men like Hitler and war means death – the death of soldiers and the death of innocents. It is the human paradox – the human conundrum where the villain is the hero and the hero the villain.

Could we please have an excerpt of something?

 How long of an excerpt would you like? Something risky? 

Salve!

Masturbation Rules

HNN—Melissa Eagleton Reporting

Earlier this week, we had quite the heated debate over the topic for tonight’s Salve! In all honesty, I was at first uncomfortable about discussing such an issue so openly on air. I suggested this topic be best left to the education system to deal with. Hadrian’s Sex Education Curriculum is one of the finest worldwide. However, my producer pointed out, quite correctly, that this topic is not something meant only for our children. Parents, too, need some coaching—not in terms of “how to”; most of us can figure that out quite nicely on our own—but rather in terms of how to talk to our children about this issue. So today’s topic is masturbation and what to do if you accidentally walk in on your child—doing—ahem—pleasuring him—or herself privately.

Often when a parent accidently walks in on his or her child masturbating, the moment becomes one filled with consternation and embarrassment for both parties. What is really important in this situation is not to allow our initial emotional reaction to take precedence. Allowing discomfiture and disquiet to dictate the now critical discussion, or worse yet, to allow these emotions to avoid the issue all together, is not instrumental in helping your child develop a healthy attitude toward his or her body and the act of masturbation. Clearly this is an act everyone has committed once or twice, perhaps many times over. The old religious myth fanatics used to scare their sons’ hands away from their penises. “You’ll go blind” is, as my producer succinctly put it, “hooey.” Therefore, the question begging to be asked is: Why do some parents still react badly upon the discovery of their child’s masturbatory acts? When we respond unfavorably to such a natural instinct, we are perpetuating the folly that masturbating is sinful. Again, to quote my producer, “That very notion is absurd.” As the parents of Hadrian’s children, we need to remind ourselves that masturbation does not hurt anyone! On the other hand, it is actually beneficial to both body and spirit. Masturbation is a great stress reliever, and the release of sexual tension is something every single human body demands.

In fact, masturbation is a great sexual alternative for our youth. The startling rate at which our teens become sexually active suggests the need for proactive measures. What better pro-active measure than masturbation? It allows your son or daughter to release built-up sexual tension without sexual bonding and forming of intense relationships prior to being emotionally ready. For, as we all know, the body is often ready for sexual release long before the average person is emotionally ready for a serious relationship.

Still, it is important that your child understand how masturbation, colloquially referred to as “petting the kitty” or “lengthening the leather,” is a very private act and not one to be shared with others—and no doubt, many a parent has been embarrassed by the accidental discovery of his or her child’s private affairs. But it is critical you step past these uncomfortable feelings—wait out enough time to allow the embarrassment to abate, and then discuss the issue with your teen. This is critical. Children of Hadrian should never feel wrong for committing such a natural, useful act. Murad Nasser, Hadrian’s top medical practitioner, recommends that we orgasm at least once a day, even if one does not have a sexual partner. Masturbation, he says, is a necessary act, possibly even vital to maintaining good physical and emotional health.

In fact, parents, don’t wait for that accidental moment; be pro-active. Sit your son or daughter down today and hold a frank discussion about this matter. Let your child know that it is okay to masturbate—just remember, it is a very private act that should never be expressed in public. As well as ensuring your child understands and accepts masturbation as a natural act, make sure he or she knows masturbation is something best done alone.

Vale!

###

Author Bio:

Patricia Marie Budd was born and raised in Saskatchewan, Canada. She lived in Japan where Patricia taught English as a Foreign Language for two years. In her early twenties she studied mime in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and then later in life renewed her interest in physical theatre by studying with Phillip Gaulier in London, England in 96/97. Her current residence is in Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada where she has been teaching High School English since 1991. Her extra-curricular involvement includes running a writer’s guild for young adults.

 For Patricia writing is a passion. She has been writing since early childhood when, in grade five, she wrote a short play and performed it for her peers. The controversial quality of her writing was evident even then as her teacher shut the show down. Much of Patricia’s writing has been theatrical in nature, having a one act play produced in The Rhubarb Festival’s Special Event in 1984. She has also participated in a number of playwriting labs under the tutelage of Sharon Pollock. In 1998 she was a part of the Alberta Playwriting Committee. In 2003 Patricia’s play The Aging Philosopher received honorable mention at the Alberta Playwright’s Network Playwriting competition.

 Patricia’s first novel A New Dawn Rising is set near Savannah, Georgia in the early 1800’s. John Connolly, a white man born into slavery, struggles to purchase his freedom. Hell Hounds of High School, released in 2011, is set in northern Alberta, Canada where veteran teachers battle with new millennium students. Her soon to be released third novel, Hadrian’s Lover is set in a future dystopia where heterosexuality is illegal.

 For more information about Patricia Marie Budd’s work please refer to her web site: www.patriciamariebudd.com.

https://www.facebook.com/HadriansLover

https://twitter.com/pmbudd

http://hellhoundsofhighschool.authorsxpress.com/

“Oh season of mellow mists and fruitfulness!” as the poet said.

Or, as we say more frequently round here, “Oh, bollocks, it’s raining again!”.

Autumn is here – Fall, if you live across the pond – and I think it’s a good time to count the summer blessings before girding our loins for the winter blight. The “Fall Into Romance” blog hop from TRR is a grand way to do this because it allows me to pay tribute to one of the excellent books that have made this somewhat difficult summer bearable.

Here’s my choice:

Junk by Josephine Myles

Letting go is the first step to healing…or bringing it all crashing down.

The Bristol Collection, Book 1

When an avalanche of books cuts off access to his living room, university librarian Jasper Richardson can no longer ignore the truth. His ever-growing piles of books, magazines and newspapers can no longer be classified as a “collection”. It’s a hoard, and he needs professional help.

Professional clutter clearer and counselor Lewis Miller thinks he’s seen it all, but even he has to admit he’s shocked. Not so much by the state of Jasper’s house, but by the level of attraction he still feels for the sexy bookworm he remembers from school.

What a shame that Lewis’s ethical code forbids relationships with clients. As Jasper makes slow but steady progress, though, the magnetic pull between them is so strong even Lewis is having trouble convincing himself it’s a temporary emotional attachment arising from the therapeutic process.

Jasper longs to prove to Lewis that this is the real deal. But first he’ll have to lay bare the root of his hoarding problem…and reveal the dark secret hidden behind his walls of books.

~
This is a delicious read on many levels. For a start I could very much identify with Jasper’s plight. I come from a family that finds it very hard to throw anything useful away, especially books, so our level of clutter is what most people would find completely unacceptable. [However, it’s noticeable that those folks with the lovely tidy minimalistic houses are often on my doorstep asking for help with school projects or the right type of fuse wire or a corset bone or two and some fossils or a book about the battle of Blenheim or ‘have you got any chain mail’.] Poor Jasper can’t say no when an unloved book says “Take me home” and has reached the point where he has rooms he can no longer enter due to book avalanches. He needs help and lovely Lewis, with the assistance of his in yer face sister, Carole, is just the guy to provide it.
Lewis has his own problems, not least one of the funniest families I’ve ever enjoyed reading. Lewis’s Mum and Dad are brilliant and his family life is one to make me curl up in embarrassment while hooting with laughter.
There are moments of pure comedy, potential danger – did you know people regularly get buried alive by their hoards? – fabulous secondary characters, genuine pathos and Big Secrets.

Comment to win a copy of Junk in the format of your choice – don’t forget to leave your email address. If the winner doesn’t want to read Junk I’ll provide an alternative but you’ll be missing out.

Once you’ve commented, click on the button below and it will take you to the next blog on the hop.

We are all familiar with bog hops. Normally they are in celebration of something fun – a holiday season, or a type of fiction, or a type of character. But this week – Sunday 8th September to Saturday 14th September is Suicide Prevention Week and I am taking part in a bog hop to inform, educate and raise awareness of the risk faced by young people and, sadly, in particular young LGBT people.

 Some figures – these are for the UK but they are just as scary everywhere else:

In the United Kingdom 12 young men kill themselves each week.

57% of gay/bisexual boys have seriously contemplated taking their own lives.

16% of gay/bisexual boys have attempted to take their own lives [3 times the percentage of straight kids].

20% of lesbians have attempted to take their own lives [4 times the percentage of straight kids].

Bullying at school and at home leading to depression, loss of friends and support groups, substance abuse as a substitute for affection, fear of being rejected by family, fears of rejection justified, homelessness,  all these contribute to these horrifying statistics.

There are places one can go for help, The Samaritans, for instance, but it is reported that 60% of suicidal young men state they would not seek help and 67% say they feel there is nowhere that can offer them the emotional support they need.

That so many people are driven to despair simply because of who they are is tragic. Despite legislation that has improved equality and given some redress against harassment or discrimination, our LGBT citizens have to face it everyday in small unkindnesses that build up and up to an unmanageable burden.

What can we do – we ordinary people without medical qualifications or psychological degrees? What can we do if we don’t know anyone we suspect of being in such a state that they need real hands on help to get them through a bad patch?

Small things are good too.

We can think before we speak and if we hear someone else speaking out of turn – “Eww that’s so gay” – we can say “please don’t say that”. If we hear or witness a homophobic phrase or act, we can tell the perpetrator that they are out of order. If we see something we suspect to be bullying going on, we can step in as a witness. Anyone can do this. You don’t need to be a martial artist. You don’t need to be fit. You don’t need to be young. Just be aware that it happens and ready to step in if you see it. And remember, just because someone looks serene as a swan on the surface, it doesn’t mean they aren’t paddling frantically against the undertow.

Comment here to win a $5 gift card, better still click here to join the Rafflecopter and have a chance of winning a $50 gift card.

The latest in the series of Captain Harding novels has just been released!

Welcome Home, Captain Harding by Elliott Mackle

Returning to California after eighteen terrifying months in Vietnam, Captain Joe Harding is assigned a trio of duties: assisting his fatherly former commander at base operations, spying on misbehaving bomber pilots and organizing an air show designed to counter the anti-war fever sweeping the state. Meanwhile, his much younger tennis partner has enrolled at Cal Berkeley, enmeshed himself in pacifist politics and resumed his role as Joe’s lover. When a playmate from Wheelus, a one-time fighter pilot now flying for TWA, shows up at Joe’s house in Merced, the three men must navigate the joys and difficulties inherent in creating their own sort of ‘welcome home.’

Continuing the adventures and misadventures begun in Elliott Mackle’s award-winning Captain Harding’s Six-Day War and Captain Harding and his Men, Joe and his fellow officers and men are up against a hot-dogging, risk-taking aircraft commander, a pair of drug-abusing co-pilots and a married administrator with a taste for sexual blackmail. When a Broadway show causes a death in the family, a test flight goes terribly wrong and Joe’s honor and patriotism are questioned, he must fight to clear his name and rebuild his imperiled career.

A terrific addition to the story of Joe Harding and his men. I enjoyed it very much.

Available from all the usual places including Amazon and ARe

My guest today is Rebecca Cohen, whose latest release – Life on the Land – concerns subjects very close to my heart.

Over to you, Rebecca!

Oh, biology, how I love thee. And Welsh Myths, I’ve got a thing for you too.  Many years ago, I studied biology at university (more specifically microbiology/virology and later biochemical engineering), and ever since I’ve had a love of life on a microscopic level. In my latest release, Life in the Land, my hero’s (Bobby Sawyer) superpowers are the result of the magic in his family’s farmland, and I got to combine mythology and biological science to build my world.

The keen-eyed reader will spot references to Welsh mythology. One reference is to Amaethon, and that the Sawyer family refers to a local hillock as Amaethon’s Altar. Amaethon is the god of agriculture, and is described as being the reason for the Battle of the Trees or Cad Goddeu, which is something else I sneaked into the story. Bobby is relieved that during his lifetime they won’t need to fulfill blood rites to the agricultures god, and I use these little references to infer that these myths are where magic comes from to feed Bobby’s powers. It’s no coincidence that one of the most important things on the farm is an ancient oak tree.

Bobby’s particular gifts allow him to manipulate plants, and I had great fun with him being able to hear the conversation of rude carrots and cheeky spouts. But what I really enjoyed was getting down to the cellular level, playing in the world our naked eye can’t see. Trilling chloroplasts, anyone?

What I had hoped for with Life in the Land was to combine myth and science, two things that are often thought of as mutually exclusive. But I happen to think they make perfect bed fellows.

Short Excerpt from Land in the Land

Bobby let himself be pulled toward the trunk, the roots curling around his body in a firm embrace. Nestled next to the tree trunk, he swore he could hear drumming from its core. He laid his head against the bark and closed his eyes.

Every cell of the tree thrummed with the same pulse. Behind his eyelids, Bobby could see the microscopic world inside the tree. Layer upon layer of water-laden cells made up the trunk’s innards, all jostled together as a noisy factory of life. His mind climbed the trunk and followed the path as it diverged to the left and ran across the branches. The way ahead narrowed, and he arrived into an explosion of green, the leaves humming happily. Tiny explosions fizzed and crackled as the chloroplasts trilled and sang, busy converting water into energy using the meager rays of the weak morning sun. It was beautiful. He could barely breathe as he watched, mute in amazement.

The tree’s roots began to loosen their grip, and his eyelids fluttered open.

The world before him looked fresh and new. Every detail was vivid and clear, from the petals on the drooping dandelions to the spikes of the hawthorn hedges. His long fingers wormed their way into the soil that the oak’s roots had disrupted. Bobby could taste the goodness, the nitrates and the minerals tripping over his tongue. The tightness that had sat in his chest for weeks began to unwind, and a warmth spread through his veins, radiating out from his breastbone, down his arms, and through his fingers. Slowly, Bobby withdrew his hands from the soil, and he could hardly believe his own eyes as the lines on his palm began to glow, lit up in gold. He turned his hands over to see the same golden color swim under his fingernails.

Links for Life in the Land:

DSP: http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=4109

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Life-in-the-Land-ebook/dp/B00EOHT98E/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1377104211&sr=8-4&keywords=life+in+the+land+rebecca

Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Life-in-the-Land-ebook/dp/B00EOHT98E/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1377102122&sr=1-1&keywords=life+in+the+land+rebecca

Author Bio and Links:

Rebecca Cohen is a Brit abroad. Having swapped the Thames for the Rhine, she has left London behind and now lives with her husband and baby son in Basel, Switzerland. She can often be found with a pen in one hand and a cup of Darjeeling in the other.

Blog: http://rebeccacohenwrites.wordpress.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/R_Cohen_writes

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rebecca.cohen.710