Elin Gregory

Ever heard of a ‘twofer’? Well that’s what you’re getting tonight – two for the price of one and worth every penny. My guests tonight are Tristram LaRoche and Daniel DeLoite. I first got to know Tristram through his historical novel The Hun and the General, which pairs Attila the Hun with a Roman general. With my passion for the horse archer cultures the book was a must read and I was impressed with the edgy prose. Tristram introduced me to Daniel’s work, which is of a far more robust nature than I would normally choose to read, but I gave it a go anyway because – hey, British authors need to stick together. All I can say is that I was pleasantly surprised.

They are here to celebrate their first joint venture – a self published volume both in Kindle format and paperback, comprising one of Tristram’s stories and several of Daniel’s – and it is called Manthology. So read on for a chat with the guys and an excerpt of my favourite of Daniel’s books, Dead Gorgeous.

Welcome, fellas.

~~~

Tris: I never thought it would happen. The first time I came across Daniel deLoite (Shut up, Dan! Behave.) I thought he was a right jerk-

Dan: Oh,hark at you!

Tris: But I was going to say how wrong I turned out to be, if you’ll give me chance.

Dan: Ok, be my guest. I’ll play with myself a bit while you finish boring everyone.

Tris: Thanks. Go do it in the fast lane of the M1 if you like. Now, I never thought it would happen-

Dan: You said that-

Tris: Ssh! Never thought I would write a book with anyone, let alone the uber tricky Daniel.

Dan: Well, we haven’t exactly written one together, have we?

Tris: Oh, how picky! OK, we’ve collaborated on an anthology. Is that better?

Dan: Yes. Spot on. Actually, some spot off would come in handy at my place.

Tris: Good grief. Will I live to regret it, I wonder? Anyway, Dan persuaded me to stick my novella On My Knees between the same covers as five of his short stories.

Dan: Much better! You’re getting the hang of it – at last.

Tris: And we called it MANTHOLOGY. It’s only available from Amazon because we wanted to put it on their Prime programme so that you can borrow it for FREE if you want to. And-

Dan: *buzz* Repetition of ‘and’.

Tris: *groans*

Dan: We’ve also whacked out a paperback version at a really interesting price, again from Amazon or the Createspace store.

Tris: Say “thank you” to Elin for even entertaining your presence.

Dan: Huh?

Tris: You heard me. You’ve said some pretty biting things about female writers of gay fiction and she hasn’t banned you from her website.

Dan: Yet.

Tris: Don’t! Just say “thank you Elin”.

Dan: Thank you Elin. I didn’t mean anything personal, like 😉

Tris: And thanks from me, too, Elin. You’re a star. I’ve persuaded the tight-fisted Dan to let you have an excerpt.

Dan: Nothing wrong with tight fisting.

Tris: Ssh! Go away.

MANTHOLOGY in paperback and eBook from Amazon

and the Createspace store

An excerpt from Daniel deLoite’s short chiller, Dead Gorgeous which is part of the Manthology

Max knew me too well. After half an hour he’d found his place on the dance floor – a clear area near the old baptismal font that had been turned into a bar for the evening – and he partied with anyone and everyone. I’d picked up a can of lager and found my way up the steps to the organ loft, trying to escape the infernal racket of the so-called music. I leaned on the balustrade and looked down into what was left of the church. Many of the pews had gone, whether to a good home or at the hands of vandals I couldn’t tell, and mounds of rubbish had been swept into shapes resembling giant molehills on the cracked floor. My eyesight couldn’t penetrate the gloom to the far corners, and the strobe lighting that flashed somewhere beneath me tormented my vision. No sooner did I think I’d worked out the carvings and statues than the frantic light would pummel my senses and something completely different would be staring back at me. What the fuck? I shook my head and looked at the can of lager. Not even Special Brew.

As the music changed track, I thought I heard a sound behind me. I turned on my heel, my eyes automatically searching the floor in expectation of a rat. They say that wherever you are in London you’re never more than six feet from one of the effing creatures. Anyway, it was far too dark down on the floor to see, even if there had been a family of vermin. When I raised my eyes the organ caught my attention. Everything in the church had a look of decay and dilapidation, dust had gathered everywhere – the Goths downstairs didn’t seem at all bothered by it but I did think it must really fuck with their black clothes. But the organ stood there untarnished, its pipes as bright as the day they’d been fitted, the glorious carvings oozing with the rich warmth of tropical hardwoods as if they’d been waxed and polished only that morning. I breathed in and the smell could not have been more remote from the staleness I’d expected, all beeswax and honey and vinegar.

By now my eyes had become better accustomed to the dim light, my back to the nave and the incessant strobing. Yet, as the swatch of light flashed on behind me, the face of an angel appeared and disappeared, appeared and disappeared. I stepped closer and put out my hand to feel it, like a blind man acquainting himself with a stranger. The angel stood too high for me to reach and I was glad to find the organist’s stool nearby. I dragged it across the floor and climbed up, grabbing hold of the angel’s arm with my free hand to steady myself. My own body cast an intermittent shadow now, and I traced the intricate carving that gave life to this creature of Heaven. I never could tell the gender of angels and often joked that when you’d seen one, you’d seen them all, yet something about this androgynous face attracted me. I felt the square jaw, the full lips, cheeks so gently formed they felt soft despite being made of wood. High cheek bones and a subtly prominent brow reminded me of the chiselled features so often seen on male models and I smiled to myself. Dare I? My hand made its way downwards, running through the folds of the robe.

“Do you like angels?” The voice seemed to come from the wooden lips and I flinched, grabbing the rich folds of the rigid garment to prevent myself falling from the stool. I peered at the face, trying to make it out. “Do you like angels, Rick?” The lips didn’t move. What the fuck? Of course they didn’t move, it was a fucking statue!

The sound I’d heard before, the rustling that made me think of rats, came louder now from behind. I turned, still clinging to the angel’s robe with one hand, can of lager in the other.

“Hello, Rick.” Even in the gloom I could see the source of the voice. The strobe had no effect on the face, its luminescence cold and constant, as if not really there.

My senses told me this was the same face as the carved angel, but how? I held up the can of lager, turned my eyes on it even though I could barely see it, and threw it to the floor. “Jesus.”

“Not quite.” The voice had an ethereal quality that rose above the clatter and fizz of the discarded can, light but smothering the rhythmic sounds below. It sounded male and female all at the same time.

A tremble ran through my body and when I opened my mouth to speak my teeth chattered. The apparition moved toward me and I heard the rustle again. Fear pinned me to the spot, even as I felt hands on my crotch and heard the zip of my flies being pulled down. My entire body stiffened instantly.

You can find Tris here: http://tristramlaroche.com/

And Dan here: http://danieldeloite.blogspot.co.uk/

I think the best thing I can do is allow E.L. to introduce herself in her own words:

E. L. Van Hine is a scholar of English and European colonial literature, and a student of Western philosophy. She was born in Lowell, Massachusetts on December 2, 1959, holds a B.A. in English (Literature) from the University of Massachusetts at Fitchburg (1982), matriculated at Harvard University (Foreign Literature in Translation) and University of Massachusetts at Lowell, earning high honors from all of these institutions. She began publishing as a journalist in 1975 while still a high school student, and completed her first novel, ‘Princes of the East’ in 2000 after writing and publishing poetry for ten years. ‘Tourmaline’ is the first book in an omnibus series of police procedurals set in the 1980’s. The second book, ‘Killer on the Road’ is expected to be in print in spring of 2012. Other books in print are available on Lulu; ‘The Erotic Etudes’ (2005), as well as multimedia recordings of her poetry and songs.

Welcome E.L.

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

E.L : Yes, and no.  From a sketch of a character, which is not much more than a name  (the name is the first thing to come actually) the character emerges, with my fiction, through dialogue and through interaction with other characters.  Then the scene and history emerges around them, because for me, the character, and his (I mostly write male chief protagonists, for reasons I now only later in my life fully understand); and I usually find out there is a historic frame and I start in on the historical research.  History fills in the details as I research.  That is how I wrote the first novel I actually completed, which encompasses 8 weeks in the campaign of Alexander into Asia Minor, the Anabasis Alexandri (Alexander’s March Up Country.)   The name of the book is “The Confession of Alexandrus Basileus 334” which opens as he and Hephaestion have taken Troy and founded the first city of Alexandria, and he is confessing to his mentor, Aristotle, in a long letter.  One might think Alexander is overdone, but at the time I wrote “The Confession”, Michael Crichton had not yet written the screenplay of “Alexander” and no film treatment had been done since the 1940’s; certainly none that addressed his bisexuality – the 1940’s portrayal from Hollywood was a strictly heterosexual manly hero, defying his well-known biography.  I developed the book from its opening chapters  through close readings of a number of sources such as “Anabasis Cyrae” by Xenophon, and Xenophon’s later work on Alexander, the “A History of My Time” which prominently conveys – after the end of Alexander III’s sreign, the Anabasis Alexandri” which first conveys the fantastical tale of Alexander spending a night of passion with a wild Amazon queen so she could give birth to more single-breasted Amazonian archers, since Alexander was very early known as the greatest warrior in the known world, and had been blessed by Artemis, goddess of the hunt.  My Alexander is not anyone else’s Alexander, because I based him upon the various viewpoints his contemporaries, such as Arrianus, Xenophon and Kallisthenes (who was on Alexander’s Asian campaign and chronicled it), and fueled my own outline of him with their views – and of course, his dialogue.

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

E.L : I attend classical music concerts (my preferred era is late Rococo and early Romantics, even some late Romantics, jazz and electronic music by Tangerine Dream).  I also write poetry (I have written twenty volumes of lyric poetry in traditional forms and published three of them so far), I compose simple piano music and play the piano, when I’m not holding down a day job.  I keep various blogs depending upon what mode of life I am in.

Elin: Do you have a crisp mental picture of your characters or are they more a thought and a feeling than an image?

E.L : I have a phrase and an expression and a name.  They talk themselves into reality.

Elin: Villains – incredibly important in fiction since they challenge the main protagonists and give them something to contend with beyond the tension of a developing relationship. What sort of villains do you prize? A moustache-twirling nightmare or … ?

E.L : The scheming politician with some redeeming quality, who could go either way until justice inevitably catches up with (or fails to catch up with) him and he comes to a seriously bad end or is killed by my protagonist with extreme prejudice or put in jail for 10 years or more (depending upon severity of crime.)

Elin: “Had we but world enough and time” and no other commitments, is there anything you would write that you’ve been eyeing and putting off because it’s just too big a project? Anything else?

E.L : It’s been mostly a matter of money.  I have a very well paying day job which I need to pay for my life and  care for my loved ones both related and unrelated; and that is mostly allocated; but now that I have had a stable situation for some years now, I not only have some cash put by but I also have good enough credit that I am applying for a business loan. I have over 40 books completed in various stages of undress; it’s enough to keep editors and artists going for another 10 years just to get them finished, but I’ve been treating the writing as more of a hobby while I earn money.  That time is coming to an end; if the SBA loan goes through I will pay for the services I need to get covers on and typos cleansed out of the manuscripts, and tightening of the dialogue. I am overconscious of quality, so every typo in print makes me wince; and so I hold on much too long.  However I am very grateful that the first, or second, or fifth draft of my early books (I speak of “Princes of the East” and its uncompleted sequel “The Two Empires” as well as “Alexandrus” ) never got accepted when first submitted because the dialogue was horribly heavy-handed.  Ten years later,  I was able to cut and slash without sensitivity because I wasn’t holding on to precious phrases.  So that is what I  would do if I had unlimited funds.  Keep picking at things as if they can be made perfect.

Elin: When you have been writing a scene, have you ever scared yourself/upset yourself so much that you decided to tone it down a bit?

E.L : I completely slashed out the entire sex content of my gay erotica novel that already had a following. I am speaking of “The Tales of Greenlea County” which is recent historical gay erotica/police procedural (what a combo!).  I did this at the behest of an editor who was a prudish git and it caused me to get incredibly shy and paranoid about what I had written with such confidence in 2006-2007.  And after much soul searching and consultation with the gay men who were the most loyal readers, and the straight women who were a close second, I reverted to Draft 4 and closed my eyes and published. I haven’t regretted it.  But it very much limits my publication choices if I were to go to commercial publishing – I had an offer on a fantasy hetero novel – which is good as it is, 15 years in the making in fact – and the editor of Untreed Reads said “I loved the story but I can’t publish it with the sex in it.”  It was the most mild erotic content I have written.  I think once again I am ahead of the sensibilities of most readers; but I don’t know for sure.

Elin: Of all your characters, who have you enjoyed writing most – least – whose voice was the most troublesome to catch?

E.L : I enjoyed writing Alexander the most, his sense of self-righteousness was monumental. He had Ares on his side – it was hard to argue with him, and I wish I had that kind of confidence.  I wrote the book in exactly the time period covered by the novel – 8 weeks.

I enjoyed writing Saheris (“Princes of the East”) the least because his early life is very similar to my own and his tragedies and traumas are analogies of similar situations I was in as a child.  And I had to vary his point of view because he goes from age 3 to age 15 in the space of 230,000 words.  Every scene that featured Saheris was himself at a different age and maturity; and I got his timeline and biography mixed up several times, and I had a lot of challenges imagining what kind of vocabulary he could use at the age of 5 or 6. It helped having very small children around during that time because I couldn’ t have accomplished it otherwise.

Elin: What are you working on at the moment?

E.L : Two things, “In the Empire of Hermes” which I had started right before my auto accident in fall of 2009 and never finished – it is set in the world of Saheris and Princes of the East; and the 25^th book in the “Greenlea” series which I have been working on since shortly after that accident, “The Runaway Deputy” which is now standing at 110,000 words.

Elin:  Could we have an excerpt from your latest release please?

E.L : From “The Death of a Mad Composer” (2012)

And so.

Politics.

Early in the modest growth of my opus, at the beginning of Fame, I was moved to make dedications, at first to those I loved and respected. Politics, then, consisted of making dedicatory remarks to those who commission a work, those who make it financially possible to compose it, or to perform it when it is aborning. This is the first level of Politics, and even Beethoven in his excellence, was moved to do so.

However, if Beethoven were in some way compelled in his art, then how could it be, after Napoleon proclaimed himself Emperor of his newly conquered Europe, that Beethoven were able to simply slash out the dedicatory line and rededicate it to the Austrian king? Because,

The music was not to the end of Napoleonism. It was inspired by the Wellspring, and the only Political part of it, was its dedication. As was my own, though I admit to inspirations and insights that were instilled by thus and such vision of beauty, from time to time, by a youth who struck my eye with bright, bold passion, who reminded me passingly of my Schiller. I find myself thinking, how fiercely I regret, this morning,turning Charles away. If he knew, if he only knew… but dying is a serious business and one may not simply insert Romance in the midst of death – it is not done! not even in the late Romantic forms!

I must be about my dying, forthwith!

But this cannot be the same level of Politics, for myself, for Schubert and Beethoven. Schubert in hiscomplete mastery of all things musical, as by Nature Itself, or by the caprices of the Wellspring, was perfectly able to say “You like this key? then you shall have it in this key” for a blushing youth leaning over his piano who abashes him with bold and hungry stares. And he composes, right there at the piano, an F minor impromptu. I can if I squint, see the graceful shape of that youth who was the sensual form of the inspiration heaven gave to Schubert the night he wrote that impromptu! That is not corruption, but rather an inspiration, as though the meditation upon a natural beauty which evokes desire, reflects a higher desire.

Perhaps a better key could be selected by the Angel, but why should it not be? Perhaps the youth was an F minor youth. I would not know…

~~~

You may buy Louise’s work at her Lulu page and follow her through her website.

My guest today is Liam Livings, aspiring author, one of the organising team behind my favourite annual event – the UK Meet – and owner of a car called Muriel.

Welcome Liam!

###

Elin: I understand that your first novel is finished as is with a rather special beta 🙂 Is this your first work or have you been writing for years?

Liam and Muriel.

Liam:  Yes, Clare London kindly agreed to read it, not just once, but twice! I won’t be offended if she bows out of betaing for the next book. The second time it had been significantly polished after my other beta readers. I’ve been writing on and off since I was about 14: I started writing poetry and pen portraits while sat bored in my French exchange’s lessons. I’ve written for my secondary school’s creative writing magazine (how very of my school to have had that, which only occurs to me now, typing it). I’ve kept a diary since 1998, every day, which is both a blessing and a curse. When I travelled round Australia I wrote quite a few pen portraits about people I met, I’ve used these as the basis of some characters Kieran and Jo meet in Best Friends Perfect. Before writing BFP, I think I was waiting for someone to say it was ok to write a novel (not sure who, but anyway…) This is my first ‘I want to get this published’ work, and has been my entry to the world of GLBTQ fiction (about which I knew nothing before the UK Meet in September 2012). It hadn’t occurred to me what I’d written was GLBTQ fiction, I just wrote something which I would want to read, about characters I could identify with, and ‘as a gay man’(again with the very phrases) there are of course other gay men within the world I created.

One may be in the middle of nowhere but that’s no reason to allow one’s standards to drop.

Elin: Have you decided yet whether to self publish or go down the traditional route? What has influenced your choice?

Liam:  I recently submitted it to a potential publisher, based on their broad range of gay fiction. The fact that it’s not a category romance, but more of a coming out story, with plenty of humour I hope, meant I didn’t think it would suit some other publishers. I’ll wait to hear and take it from there – ‘playing it by ear’ as my Mum says *crosses fingers*. I’ve read loads about how great self publishing is, and then loads more about how awful self publishing is. That’s the beauty of the internet isn’t it?

Elin: There’s a very entertaining sample of your novel on your website. If you were given the opportunity to follow it up with whatever you wished is there any genre you’d love to have a bash at?

Liam:  Thanks, I’m glad you found it entertaining! The rest is the same – a mixture of humour and more serious topics. I think it’s so important to be able to laugh, even during the darkest times in life. A friend was very ill for a month or so in hospital, being visited by an endless round of grapes toting and sympathetic simpering friends, until his best friend turned up, plonked herself in the seat, looked around the room and said, ‘You look like sh*t, when you getting out so we can have a drink? Where can I have a fag?’ It was the first time he’d smiled since collapsing four weeks earlier.

Sorry, bit of a digression there, it’s all this tea you’re giving me! My favourite genre is contemporary romance, but I do like a bit of recent historical periods too. For instance I read a great book set in the 1930s, Windfall by Penny Vincenzi: I could literally taste the gin fizzes and see their clothes as they walked along the beach at Le Touquet Paris Plage. I also like the idea of stories set in the relatively recent past, so Best Friends Perfect is set in the nineties, maybe something set in the eighties would be fun! There’s something about a time pre-internet, social media, smart phones which gives you loads of story options which nowadays a character would just google the answer. Is recent periods in history a genre? I’m interested in friendships, relationships and how those shape us as individuals, so probably not romance in the purest sense, but there’s definitely a bit of romance there too. Have I answered the question?

Elin: Do you plan your novels or do your characters shove you aside with a manic giggle and go their own way?

Liam:  I’m a planner: I write a chapter summary of a few points, then before writing each chapter thrash that out a bit more, before actually writing it. Often I find what the chapter actually contains is different from the original points. And that’s usually the characters shoving me out the way and taking the driving seat, so I suppose it’s a bit of both. I like to work up character biogs before I dive in, and those usually steer me as I move through the book, and become more comfortable with the characters.

Elin: Let’s have some sources of inspiration – movies, books, architecture, conversations overheard in Lidl/Morrisons/Waitrose?

Liam:  I’m a bit of a magpie for ideas really: I have an ongoing note on my phone for sparks of inspiration which I add to most days. I can get ideas from anywhere – films, music lyrics, conversations overheard on public transport…Much of the time, events in my life and those around me give me ideas – conversations with friends and family. Best Friends Perfect has autobiographical elements in it, but not too autobiographical, enough to make it ring true I hope. I take the phrase, conversation, situation, person which has inspired me and throw the idea around a bit – is it an interesting premise for a book, could that be the basis of a scene?

He’s a writer – watch out that he doesn’t put you in a book!

Elin: Do you have a crisp mental picture of your characters or are they more a thought and a feeling than an image?

Liam:  At the start of a piece of writing, I have an idea what they look like, how they dress, how they stand etc. This becomes clearer as I work my way through the writing, and they change what I’d originally planned them to do. This image, and I wouldn’t say it’s crisp, dictates how they behave as I get to know them more throughout the writing.

Elin: So what’s next? Can you talk about your current WIP or do you refer to keep them underwraps until they are finished?

 Liam:  The Second Book (TSB) no better title yet, is finished in first rough draft stage. It’s about how a new friend causes a man to re-evaluate and question everything in his life, his relationships with friends, family, partner up to that point. Much like Best Friends Perfect, it’s about friendships, relationships and how they inform who we are, but also how a new friendship can throw everything you thought you knew upside down.

Elin: Could we please have an excerpt of something?

 Liam:  Here’s a sample of TSB

~~~

I imagined pasting on a false smile and telling all our friends how 1999 had been such an amazing year again.

‘You’re so lucky,’ they’d say, gesturing around the house. ‘Ten years, it’s like a proper married couple, you’re so lucky.’

I would nod, and Christian would hug me from behind and kiss my neck in that way which used to send a jolt of horniness straight to my groin, until recently when he had touched my hand and I’d shivered, so frustrated and untapped was my libido from months and months of Sahara-like dryness.

The double bed, perfectly made, with an indentation from one of our dogs, stared back and mocked me. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d had sex in it, in fact I couldn’t remember the last time we’d had sex anywhere in the house, the shower, kitchen, living room, all scenes of perfect domestic bliss, like you’d have with your brother or mother. Shiny, smiley, happiness, which if you peered behind the curtain was more like a flat share than a marriage.

Why this room? Why this house? Why those clothes?

Surely this New Year’s Eve, of all NYEs was something to celebrate. I mean, it’s the start of a new century, we’d all soon be walking around in shining silver one pieces, driving hovering cars and eating instant freeze dried food from silver packets wouldn’t we? Now it was officially the twenty first century, the future was arriving and we were here for the ride.

Part of me was humming the lyrics to the Debbie Harry song, ‘Here comes the twenty first century, It’s gonna be so much better for a girl like me…I want that man.’ But what if you already had that man, and you’d already had him for more than ten years, was the new century still something to look forward to?

~~~

Many thanks for agreeing to be my guest, Liam. I hope you enjoyed your time in my Comfy Chair.

If you would like to follow Liam, please click on the following links:

Blog: http://www.liamlivings.com/blog.html

Website: www.liamlivings.com

Twitter: @LiamLivings

Email: liamlivings@gmail.com

Wednesday is Hump Day – this means it’s Hump Day Hook time! Hump Day Hook – where a bunch of authors provide snippets for each other’s delectation, education, elevation and so forth.

My snippet is from an untitled Regency romance parody that I wrote in the 1980s. In this section Lady Cicely is discussing her suddenly acquired fiance with her scapegrace brother, who really didn’t mean to lose her at cards, it sort of just happened, and he’s just as shocked as she is that there’s an announcement about the engagement in the Gazette.

~~~

“I’m so sorry, Sissy,” Aubrey was saying as she crushed the paper between her hands. “I can only assume that it is intended as a joke.”
“Well, it isn’t very funny,” Cicely was close to tears. “I am going to be a laughing stock. Oh, Aubrey – I’m engaged to a man I’ve never even seen!” She stood up and went to her desk, fumbling for paper and a wafer. “I’ll write to him immediately and demand that he put a rebuttal in tomorrow’s paper along with a full apology.” Her hands were shaking so much that she almost dropped her pen.
“Truth to tell, Sis,” Aubrey said, wearily, “I should imagine that this will come as something of a surprise to him. I’ve never seen any man drink as much as he did last night and survive.”
“With any luck, he didn’t. That would solve all our problems.” Cicely sniffed and plied her hankie. “What is this FitzRoy like anyway?”
“Patrick FitzRoy? He’s Irish.”
“With a name like that,” Cicely snapped, “he’d hardly be Italian!”

~~~

Here are the other contributors.

So the Hop against Homophobia and Transphobia is over for another year. I hope everyone who took part had fun. I read some wonderful posts, some entertaining posts, some tragic ones and many many that both educated me and left me food for thought. Thank you all the authors, publishers and bloggers who made the event such a success.

Thank you also to the commenters who went from blog to blog supporting the posters and an especial thank you to the people who visited my blog. With the magic of names scribbled on bits of paper and draw out of my special name drawing hat [it’s a three cornered piratey one] I’m delighted to announce that the winner of my giveaway is Andrew J Peters. Thanks for taking part, Andrew. I will make a £15 donation to AKT in your name and send you a copy of Alike As Two Bees in the format of your choice.

Cheers, folks and I hope to see you all again next year.

My guest today is my old friend B G Thomas who is celebrating the release of his 18th story, The Boy Who Came In From The Cold, and who is one of the “go to” guys for M/M romance.

No more natter – on with the questions! And be sure to read to the end where there will be a competition to enter.

~~~

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

BG: The answer is somewhere in the middle. I rarely create a character to fit a part. I am not a grab character from box A and one from box D, so that everything balances out. “Oh! I need a swishy guy” or “Oh! I need a big beefy guy!” They just come to me. Like wondrous magick. But I don’t always know much about them. That comes as I write the story. They reveal themselves as I go.

In the case of my new novel, “The Boy Who Came In From the Cold,” it started as a sexy little short story I wrote years ago. A story that bothered me because editors in those days wanted nothing buy sex–plot, what plot? I knew that Todd Burton and Gabe Richards were far more than that. I fell in love with both of them and as the years passed, they wouldn’t let me go. They kept calling to me. So I found the manuscript, it wasn’t even five thousand words, dusted it off, reread it, and suddenly they began to really talk to me. I was thrilled with the layers and depth to them, their past, their hurts and angers, and how an unfortunate set of circumstances brought them together. How quickly they fell in love amazed me. Lust at first sight is one thing, but love? I could hardly contain these men. I finally gave up and let it happen. I was very happy with the result.

 Also, when my characters become real enough to me, they demand to show up again. Often just in a cameo, but sometimes more. Or it will go the other way. My character Tommy from “All Alone in A Sea of Romance,” appeared in several of my shorter pieces and finally demanded his story be told, and that he finally get a chance to find a man instead of always being the bridesmaid and never the bride.

Or in the case of my new novel, Bianca from “Bianca’s Plan” shows up. I couldn’t help it. I didn’t even see it coming! I was writing along and BAM! there the little devil was. My holiday story “Bianca’s Plan” stunned me with how well it sold and lots of people have told me they like her. So hopefully they’ll be happy that she shows up again and let us know her two daddies are doing great.

Elin: What are you reading? Something to be clutched to the bosom or tossed aside with force? Fiction or non-fiction?

 BG: I’m reading an amazing book called “Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know,” by Alexandra Horowitz. I have trouble reading non-fiction sadly, because I think so much of it is so dry. Not this book. And if you are a dog-lover, you mustread this book. It started as research for the book I am writing now, and has turned into something that makes me understand my dog in ways I never did before. She pretty much tells The Dog Whisperer that he is full of shit. Dogs are not wolves. They are an evolutionary miracle and the greatest genetics experiment of all time. Dogs have been with mankind for far longer than anyone thought, maybe 40 thousand years, and their domestication might have been more important than the discovery of fire for humans. And it is romantic! so romantic. Not in some weird way, but if love your dog now, just wait until you read this book. And see how much they really do love us back.

Elin: What are you working on at the moment? Can you discuss it or do you prefer to keep it a secret until it’s finished.

BG: Well, a writer is always worried that if they say too much, someone else might like the idea and rush something out, right? I will say the book is called “Hound Dog and Bean” and it is one of the most delightful stories I have ever written. I think people will fall in love with the characters, or at least I hope they do!

Elin: Could we please have an excerpt of something?

BG: Sure! I’ll present the first few pages of the book and how Todd and Gabe meet. You can decide if it is an auspicious meeting or not. Rest assured things…heat up after this.

~~~

It was cold outside. It was really cold. Freezing cold.

Todd Burton, freezing himself, watched as a man with a big industrial broom swept what was an obviously already shoveled sidewalk. The snow was falling harder than ever and was piled everywhere.
Jeez, it’s snowing like a son of a bitch out there. Todd glanced nervously over his shoulder into the lobby of the apartment building. No one seemed to be watching him.
What the hell am I going to do?
If this had happened to him a week ago, it wouldn’t have been so bad. Not good. But not nearly as bad.
Luckily, one of the building’s residents had let him in out of the cold in the first place. A big guy–good-looking, tall and wide—wearing
a long woolen (and obviously warm) coat.
Todd would have done almost anything for that coat. His pale-tan lightweight fall jacket barely kept out the chill of late autumn. It didn’t
stand a chance against the snowstorm outside the warm lobby.
“You’ll wear it and like it,” his mother had screamed. “We ain’t made of money!”
If he hadn’t chosen to wear a sweater to the New Year’s Eve party last night, he didn’t know what he would have done. It was the only thing keeping him from being chilled to the bone. His gloves were a joke—the simple one-size-fits-all type bought at Family Dollar, with a hat purchased at the same place—and all but useless. He might as well have been naked.
So it had been a stroke of luck when the big man had asked Todd why he was standing under the awning of the Oscar Wilde apartment
building.
“Waiting for a ride,” Todd replied, even though it was a lie. He was no more waiting for a ride than he was waiting for the results of a pregnancy test. But it got him out of the frigging cold. Todd flexed his wet toes in the confines of sneakers worn to death. His feet were still frozen and aching after nearly an hour. Lord yes, his toes hurt.
This sucks, he thought. This sucks zombie dick.

“What am I going to do?” he muttered as the snow, abundant as the feathers from a high-school-girls’ pillow fight, fell thickly to the ground. Icicles, looking like the teeth of some primeval creature, hung just outside the large plate-glass windows. I’d hate to be the poor guy that one of those fell on.
“Still waiting?” came a voice from behind Todd, and, startled, he jumped and let out a cry. He spun around and found himself gazing up into the face of the man who’d let him into the building. No longer in his winter wear (where was that coat?), the man had changed into jogging shorts and a T-shirt that stretched over a massive chest and proclaimed that he was 2CUTE2BSTR8.
It took Todd a moment to figure it out, but when he did, his mouth dropped open. Too cute to be straight. The guy was queer. It was a little more than Todd’s small-town naïveté could take in. This guy? A fag? It just didn’t seem possible. The guy was a powerhouse. A total class-A stud. This was no swishy, limp-wristed, pink-wearing gay boy.
The man eyed him suspiciously, and Todd realized he needed to say something. “Uh-uh, yeah, I don’t know what’s taking… uh, George… so long.”

Piss. Did I actually say “uh George”?

The man nodded, went to retrieve his mail, and on his way back, stopped again and looked Todd up and down. But this time his gaze lingered just a bit. Todd felt his stomach give a weird sort of flip-flop.

“Look,” said the man. “Watch yourself, okay? The building manager has been known to have a shit fit when hustlers come in the building for, well, whatever they come in here for. Just don’t get caught.”
Todd stiffened. Hustlers? Did this guy think he was looking to sell himself? Before he could think of how to respond, the man crossed the lobby and disappeared into the elevator.
He thinks I’m for sale! Todd shook his head. Cursed under his breath. Do I look like a hustler? he wondered and thought about the boys who sold themselves in the park. Maybe I do, he realized, horrified.

Todd thought of the man who had let him into the building. That coat hadn’t come from Wal-Mart.

There was the pinging from the elevator as the doors opened, and speak of the devil, it was the same man. He was carrying what looked like a plate and a mug and was heading in Todd’s direction. When he got closer, the wondrous aroma of coffee hit Todd and he saw the man had a sandwich as well. To Todd’s surprise, the man handed them both over. His mouth fell open. The day had been one of the shittiest ever in a year of total shit. And here, out of the blue, a complete stranger was showing some small-town kindness?

Todd only hesitated for a second, all but snatched the food and coffee from the man, sat down on the windowsill, and practically gulped everything down. Both were a relief beyond words. Todd almost swooned. He hadn’t had so much as a bite all day, and with barely twenty bucks in his pocket and no idea when he’d get more, he’d been afraid to buy so much as a dollar grease burger from Mickey D’s.
He ate the food so fast he barely tasted it. Oh! And the coffee filled him with a warmth that finally let him shake off the cold that had plagued him all day. He actually gave a shiver as it lifted.
“I’m Gabe,” said the man.
With only a few bites left, Todd nodded but didn’t offer his own name.
“What are you doing out in this weather, anyway?” Gabe asked.
Todd stopped chewing. Boy, was that a question and a half. He swallowed hard. How did he explain it? It was awful. He was ashamed. How did he tell a complete stranger that he felt like a total failure?
Todd gave the guy a quick look, then a longer one. The guy was huge. A good head taller, at least, than Todd’s five foot nine and downright massive: really built. He obviously worked out. A lot. Like the guys in the muscle mags that Todd collected. Gabe’s pecs looked as big as dinner plates, and Todd could see the man’s abs even through his shirt. His waist seemed almost as small, his hips as narrow, as Todd’s, impossible as that should be.
And good-looking. Really good-looking. The man had short light brown hair and light blue eyes (the color of a country summer sky) and a face like a movie star. This guy could have any woman he wanted. Why had he chosen to go gay?
“Okay, so if you don’t want me to know—”
Know? Know what? Did I miss something?
“—can I at least get that name?”
“Uh, Todd.”
“Todd what?”
What the hell? “Why do you need to know?”

Gabe shook his head. “Okay, Mr. Uh Todd Whydoyouneedtoknow, I’ll leave you alone.”
The man started to turn away, and suddenly, Todd didn’t want Gabe to leave. “I was kicked out of my apartment,” he cried out in a
rush.
Gabe stopped, turned back.
“Surprised the shit out of me too. Got home this morning from a New Year’s party, and the lock had been changed.”
Gabe’s eyes widened just a bit. “Damn.”
“What kind of asshole kicks someone out on the streets in this kind of weather?” Todd asked. He began to wring his hands. “I thought
there were laws that protected you from that.”
“I believe there are, but that’s not going to do you any good right now,” Gabe said.
“No shit.” Todd sighed. “You really queer?” he asked without thinking. His lack of a filter from thought to spoken word had bounced him against the walls of authority all his life.
“The word is ‘gay’,” Gabe said, “and yes I am.”
Gay and proud of it, Todd thought with wonder. “Sorry,” he said and meant it. After all, the guy had helped him when no one else would. So what if he chose to fuck a dude instead of a girl? It was his choice.
Gabe crossed his arms over that expanse of chest. “You got a place to stay? A friend?”
Todd felt the last of his strength leave him and his shoulders
slumped in defeat. “No.”

“What about the friends you partied with last night?”
“No way.” The people at that party hadn’t been his friends.
There was a pause, and Gabe looked him up and down once more. Not rudely, but it made Todd feel weird anyway. He couldn’t quite describe the feeling. The guy wasn’t drooling or any fucking thing like that, but still…. Gabe was a guy. And despite parades and gay marriage, the end
of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, and gay and lesbian support groups in high schools, men with men wasn’t anything he was used to. The guy seemed nice. Had given him food. Gabe had shown him more kindness than anyone else in this fucking city, so—
“Look,” said the big man, “I’ve never paid for it, but you’re awfully cute, and it would give you a place to stay for the night, and….”

Todd started. “What?”
“I mean it’s not going to be like Pretty Woman, where I have to pay extra to get you to stay the night, right? I mean, I’m getting you out of the snow and—”
“I’m not a whore,” Todd snarled. “And I’m not a fucking queer.”
Gabe’s face froze, his warmth vanishing as if it had never been there. He reached out and took Todd’s now empty mug. “Good luck,” he said, voice icy. “And like I said, don’t let the building manager catch you, or you’ll be back out on the street, blizzard or not.” Gabe turned and strode back to the elevator without looking back.
Great. Shit. Why did I do that? “I gotta stop losing it,” he said aloud. I could have just told him I’m not gay, not a hustler. The guy—
Gabe—was nice. He would have taken no for an answer. Todd turned back to look out the lobby windows. Gasped. The snow, which had
been coming down hard, was now a writhing wall of white.

He looked back to the elevator. But Gabe was gone, of course.

Now what am I going to do?

~~~

To find out, check out the book The Boy Who Came In From the Cold, on sale now from Dreamspinner Press.

Follow BG at any or all of the links below!

BG’s Website: http://bgthomas.t83.net

BG’s Live Journal:  http://bg-thomas.livejournal.com/

BG’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bgthomaswriter

Twitter: @BGThomasBooks

Or to email BG directly: bgthomaswriter@aol.com

Special Message from BG:

CONTEST! Hey! I want to do a little give-away. Head over to DSP and check out the full story description of the novel. I have built into the story a little pun, or joke as it were. If you can figure it out, email me at bgthomaswriter@aol.com. There will be one or two winners, depending on how many people email me.  

~~~

Many thanks, BG, for being such a great guest.