tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-186770342024-03-13T17:47:50.680-05:00K. Z. SnowK. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.comBlogger551125truetag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-9133039338858225792019-06-24T20:31:00.001-05:002019-06-24T20:31:24.181-05:00Duluth Harbor Cam: Boat ScheduleWhy don't any of these ships ever head into Lake Michigan? I've traced the routes of many, sometimes as far as the Seaway, but never has one gone down into Lake Michigan!K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-29178900034508534792018-03-12T12:25:00.001-05:002018-03-12T12:27:01.523-05:00A Little News, But Not MuchWell, it appears my website host sent their renewal notice to my (for all intents and purposes) DEAD Yahoo mailbox, so some Singapore-based business bought my .com domain. This practice I will never, ever understand. Why would someone want a website bearing another person's name?<br />
<br />
Anyway, if you have some inexplicable, burning desire to visit my author site, it is now www.kzsnow.net. That's right: dot NET. (There's a handy-dandy button on the far right that will take you there -- if, that is, it isn't all screwed up again.) I'm in the process of making changes to my book listings almost everywhere.<br />
<br />
The titles I published through Ellora's Cave and Samhain are, as you likely know, gone. Soon, the titles I've published through Loose Id will also be gone. That leaves a couple of novellas at Liquid Silver Publishing (<i><a href="http://liquidsilverpublishing.com/product/fugly/" target="_blank">Fugly</a></i> and <i><a href="http://liquidsilverpublishing.com/product/bastards-and-pretty-boys/" target="_blank">Bastards and Pretty Boys</a></i>) and a batch of books at Dreamspinner Press.<br />
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I still don't know what's going to become of my disenfranchised work. I've been feeling pretty defeated for a number of years, so it's difficult to come up with a plan and stick to it. All the monkeyshines in the m/m genre, from which there's apparently no escape, certainly don't help.<br />
<br />
Many thanks to those of you who still care.<br />
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K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-51927474545716078262016-11-18T10:10:00.002-06:002016-11-18T10:10:43.577-06:00A Dystopian Christmas Story<span style="font-size: large;">Two years ago, I participated in a </span><span style="font-size: large;">blog hop for which I had to write a short holiday-themed story based on a picture prompt. I'm reposting the story this year because it seems particularly, and frighteningly, appropriate. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Don't worry; it has a hopeful ending. ;-) You'll find it <a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=18677034#editor/target=post;postID=8725463889320309076;onPublishedMenu=editor;onClosedMenu=editor;postNum=12;src=postname" target="_blank">here.</a></span><br />
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K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-41341238782634573322016-04-15T10:47:00.000-05:002016-04-19T10:11:12.800-05:00Update: A Bundle of (Steampunk) Joy!Dreamspinner Press is offering my steampunk Mongrel trilogy as a bundle! This means you get all three books -- <i>Mongrel</i>, <i>Merman</i>, and <i>Machine</i> -- for one money (as an auctioneer would say). Not only that, the price is far less than the cost of each title separately. You can now preorder at DSP; the release date is April 29.<br />
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In addition to the <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=7673" target="_blank">publisher's site,</a> the deal will be offered on Amazon and ARe. I'll put up direct links as soon as I have them. In the meantime, here's the path to the gay bundles on Amazon. You might find something else to entertain yourself with. ;-)<br />
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</span><span style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a class="a-link-normal a-color-base a-text-bold a-text-normal" href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_hi_1?rh=n%3A283155%2Ck%3Aebook+bundles&keywords=ebook+bundles&ie=UTF8&qid=1460733167" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none;">Books</a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> : </span><a class="a-link-normal a-color-base a-text-bold a-text-normal" href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_hi_2?rh=n%3A283155%2Cn%3A301889%2Ck%3Aebook+bundles&keywords=ebook+bundles&ie=UTF8&qid=1460733167" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none;">Gay & Lesbian</a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> : </span><a class="a-link-normal a-color-base a-text-bold a-text-normal" href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_hi_3?rh=n%3A283155%2Cn%3A301889%2Cn%3A10719%2Ck%3Aebook+bundles&keywords=ebook+bundles&ie=UTF8&qid=1460733167" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none;">Literature & Fiction</a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> : </span><a class="a-link-normal a-color-base a-text-bold a-text-normal" href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_hi_4?rh=n%3A283155%2Cn%3A301889%2Cn%3A10719%2Cn%3A10165%2Ck%3Aebook+bundles&keywords=ebook+bundles&ie=UTF8&qid=1460733167" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none;">Fiction</a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> : </span><a class="a-link-normal a-color-base a-text-bold a-text-normal" href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_hi_5?rh=n%3A283155%2Cn%3A301889%2Cn%3A10719%2Cn%3A10165%2Cn%3A10169%2Ck%3Aebook+bundles&keywords=ebook+bundles&ie=UTF8&qid=1460733167" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none;">Gay</a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> : </span><a class="a-link-normal a-color-base a-text-bold a-text-normal" href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_hi_6?rh=n%3A283155%2Cn%3A301889%2Cn%3A10719%2Cn%3A10165%2Cn%3A10169%2Cp_n_feature_browse-bin%3A618073011%2Ck%3Aebook+bundles&keywords=ebook+bundles&ie=UTF8&qid=1460733167" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none;">Kindle Edition</a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> : </span>ebook bundles</span></h2>
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<br />K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-32961043365821091902015-11-23T17:09:00.002-06:002015-11-23T18:25:39.561-06:00Is it possible to be TOO forgiving?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I suspect most of you have heard by now that the author/artist/blogger known as <a href="http://thornysterling.com/2015/11/22/the-truth/" target="_blank">Thorny Sterling</a> has outed himself as a poseur. (For ease of expression I'm going to use male pronouns, although it's entirely possible this individual is female.) Thorny's life is a fiction. The ensemble cast with which he populated that life -- Jazz, Alec, Carter, Grams, Mores, etc. -- are all made up.<br />
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I've lost count of the number of m/m romance writers who've fessed up to misrepresenting themselves over the years, at least to a limited degree. None of those other instances particularly bothered me unless plagiarism was involved. After all, ours is a unique genre; it draws writers of all genders (yes, <i>all</i>; I'm abandoning the binary) and orientations. Sometimes we stretch the truth to make it fit our self-images. Or we shroud our true identities for personal and/or professional reasons. For the record, I've never BS'ed anybody about anything except my name. But that doesn't mean other authors don't have perfectly valid reasons, whether practical or emotional, for their benign biographical fictions.<br />
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Which brings us back to Thorny Sterling. At first his post puzzled me, because he gives a number of different and equally specious reasons for launching his Grand Deception. (I'll get back to that in a minute.) When I read through the comments, I became even more puzzled. Most everybody was giving him "attaboy" pats on the back and expressing their support. Why? Because they found his posts entertaining and sometimes instructive. And they were charmed by his "Sunshine" persona. And they liked how his other blog characters were written. Then they expressed their good wishes for his future, and some even wanted to hear more from him and, yes, be his friend. In other words, they viewed his biographical fictions as benign. But were they?<br />
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<i>"You're a big fat bullshitter who's misled a whole lot of people, but that's okay! You're still cool! Honesty isn't <u>my</u> default setting for relationships!"</i><br />
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Huh?<br />
<i><br /></i>
Seriously?<i> </i><br />
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This Thorny, this oh-so-endearing make-believe twink, catfished a large and diverse group of people. And he indeed hurt many of them. He didn't just lie his ass off, he kept embroidering his lies and betraying his friends' trust. He invented a suicide and passed it off as real. He invented a disabled veteran and passed <i>him</i> off as real. If you don't believe this kind of shit crosses a line, you need to rethink your line-crossing criteria. The most compassionate of Thorny's followers were reduced to tears by some of his stories. The most generous sent him money and gifts. (It appears he even had a button somewhere for "donations." I doubt any were returned.) So, yeah, these weren't benign lies. People were wounded by them. In a variety of ways. <br />
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I used to read his blog in its early days; I found it refreshing and often amusing. Then came a rather startling surge of self-importance in li'l' Sunshine . . . and it was at that point I got suspicious and backed away. Thorny's modest accomplishments certainly didn't justify the creation of a cult, but that was what he seemed to be aiming for. I watched incredulously from the sidelines as an alleged kid in his early twenties began behaving like a seasoned sales-promotion specialist. The Cult of Thorny quickly expanded, and not just around an updated Winesburg, Ohio (maybe I should say Our Town, which was written by his namesake), but also around an impressive array of products and services. His craptastic, derivative novella even got reviewed at both <i>USA Today</i> and Dear Author, and its cover won a Rainbow Award.<br />
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Suddenly, a naive and insecure college student was proving himself capable of some pretty savvy marketing.<br />
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But more was never enough. The con continued. The adoration and, probably, the money kept pouring in. I felt ever hinkier about him and so continued to avoid his blog.<br />
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Until yesterday, when one of my Facebook friends mentioned Thorny's online confession (which came, as confessions are wont to do, only after someone caught him out). I pondered his mishmash of excuses and kept coming back to one sentence: <i>"I knew even then </i>[2010]<i> that gay boys got all the attention." </i>And there, I'm convinced, is the motivation for his lengthy and elaborate con.<br />
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Whoever Thorny Sterling really is, he was astute enough to realize what suckers m/m romance readers and writers are for Real Live Gay Boys, especially if those boys know how to work the crowd. And this blogger sure as hell knew how to do that. It's fairly clear from his <i>mea</i> <i>culpa</i> post that generating income was a major factor in the decision to invent Thorny and, ultimately, turn him into a cash cow. Of course, generating attention, <i>doting</i> attention, was the first step in the process. Our Hydra-headed impostor became expert at that, too. The attention and accolades and dollars soon rolled in, and likely would've kept rolling in if the fraud hadn't been exposed.<br />
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I guess you know<i> my</i> answer to the question posed in this post's title. <b>Yes</b>. Rarely have I been so put off by a community member's behavior that I've publicly condemned it, but this is one of those occasions. So, in the name of genuine GLBTQ* folks who are struggling; in the name of actual disabled veterans who are struggling; in the name of every struggling person for whom despair has or will become a one-way ticket to suicide (as well as the loved ones of such stricken people); in the name of all tender-hearted allies who were royally and repeatedly duped . . . fuck you, "T". I hope you go away and stay away. <br />
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P. S. According to people on Facebook, "Thorny Sterling" is a woman. I don't know her name, though.<br />
<br />K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-2960922204749646682015-08-28T14:04:00.001-05:002015-08-28T14:04:29.098-05:00A Big ProjectPublished authors, or at least some of us, tend to get squirrelly after our books are out for a while. We're bugged by their covers, especially if they misrepresent characters. Uncorrected errors in the text become as persistently annoying as head lice. We think of things we should've left out of the story or put in story, or whole sections we wished we'd written differently. We repeatedly curse ourselves for our lack of foresight. And, of course, reader interest drops off precipitously within the first year after release -- if there was ever much reader interest to begin with -- and that, too, becomes irksome.<br />
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I've wrestled with all those issues and one more: the fact that circumstances have conspired since 2007 to prevent a related group of my stories (novels and novellas) to be issued by the same publisher at, say, two-month intervals, with covers that have a similar look. Yeah, the books probably should've been treated as a series.<br />
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Smart writers with tech savvy, or who make enough money to hire people with tech savvy, figured out years ago that the only way to have full control over one's creative output is to self-publish. I'm not sure I'm up to it in terms of patience and know-how, but I'll soon be venturing into this terrifying realm. I'm already having nightmares about it.<br />
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The details are on my website. Rather than repeat them all, I'll give you <a href="http://www.kzsnow.com/in-progresscoming-soon.html" target="_blank">this link.</a><br />
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<br />K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-57347870062992044892015-08-11T10:13:00.001-05:002015-08-11T10:14:02.677-05:00La Boucle Parfaite -- Wow!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I didn't make this myself -- honest! Just came upon a link in my Twitter feed. Although I can't yet find this French translation of <i>The Zero Knot</i> on the Dreamspinner site, I assume the ARC is already available. What a thrill!K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-18161054693114735292015-07-23T12:58:00.002-05:002015-07-23T13:17:03.509-05:00Flash Sale! 25% Discount at ARe<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5nRVv_4V1Sg/VbEtxDx5xFI/AAAAAAAAD9A/Eklg6T6crPE/s1600/KZS_Electric_coverlg%2B%25282%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5nRVv_4V1Sg/VbEtxDx5xFI/AAAAAAAAD9A/Eklg6T6crPE/s200/KZS_Electric_coverlg%2B%25282%2529.jpg" width="132" /></a></div>
All Loose Id titles, mine included, are 25% off <i>today only</i> at All Romance eBooks. As I mentioned on Facebook, my sentimental favorite is <a href="https://www.allromanceebooks.com/storeSearch.html" target="_blank">Electric Melty Tingles</a>, which also happens to be the cheapest. I've forgotten why the second chapter is the excerpt. (Kind of odd, eh?) Anyway, here's how the book begins. It was well-received by reviewers when it was first released in 2010. Don't know if that means much, but there ya go.<br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 150%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif; line-height: 150%;">Chapter One</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif; line-height: 150%;">1970<span style="font-size: 14pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">Louie was, I swear, the
hardest-working woman in show business. Not like James Brown was the
hardest-working man in show business, although her splits did put his to shame.
As I watched her hit the floor again, like a drafting compass with a broken
hinge, I could almost feel my testicles parting company and landing like
finials on either side of my pelvis. The other men at Oliver Duncan’s bachelor
party must’ve felt the same; they all winced in unison, even as they cheered. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">“Louie, Louie,” the dancer’s
none-too-original signature song, grated out of a battered 8-track player. I
amused myself by sipping a martini at the wet bar and watching Oliver’s
reactions to the bumping, grinding, and boob jiggling going on just inches from
his face. He seemed to be enjoying himself. Flushed to his hairline, he chortled
and squirmed. Then he teasingly stuck out his tongue as Louie began undoing his
necktie and unbuttoning his shirt.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">That’s when <i>I</i> began to
squirm. Suddenly, the scene wasn’t so amusing anymore. I was watching someone
undress and fondle my best friend. I was watching Oliver behave in a sexually
suggestive way, which was something I’d never before had to witness. Seeing his
interaction with the dancer wasn’t the same as accepting the fact he was
getting married. The most I’d seen him do with Naomi, his betrothed, was put an
arm around her or give her a rather sanitized peck now and then. Louie,
however, was coaxing out his inner beast. Coaxing out Oliver’s inner beast was
something only <i>I</i> was allowed to do. In the privacy of my imagination. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">I looked around the enormous,
handsome hotel suite for some distraction. None was available. I couldn’t even
engage in drunkenly senseless conversation, since every pair of eyes in the
room was trained on the stripper.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">“Excuse
me,” I said to the bow-tied bartender. He was a little older than I, maybe in
his mid </span><span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">twenties, and none too shabby. But he, too, was distracted. I
leaned farther across the bar. “<i>Excuse me</i>.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Yeah, the deaf SOB
was straight, like everybody else at this godforsaken bash.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">His gaze flickered
reluctantly in my direction.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Could I have
another one, please?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Why the hell not? I
didn’t have to drive home. A limo was at the ready to shuttle around whichever
party-goers weren’t staying at the hotel.
Oliver’s father wasn’t only footing the bill for this suite at the
Pfister, the drinks, and the dancers, he’d arranged for safe transportation. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";"> Christ, what a night. I glanced through
wreathing cigarette smoke in Oliver’s direction. Louie was sitting on his lap
now, her legs on either side of his hips, and doing a slow hump as Smokey
Robinson crooned, “Ooh, baby, baby.” I looked away. Nope, this wasn’t so much
fun anymore.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">My gaze wandered to
the windows. Outside, city lights sparkled in the darkness of the August night.
I would’ve rather been out on the Avenue, cruising for sailors. Not that I’d
ever cruised for anybody, much less men in uniform, but I’d heard about such
things. The sailors came to <st1:city w:st="on">Milwaukee</st1:city> regularly
from the <st1:placename w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Great
Lakes</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Naval</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Training</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Center</st1:placetype></st1:place></st1:placename>
and sauntered down the sidewalks in pairs and groups. They were as much a part
of the cityscape as the glowing Weather Flame atop the Wisconsin Gas building.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">To me, anyway. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">I’d often watched
them—cute caps set at jaunty angles above their dress blue jumpers, Vs of white
undershirts visible at their necklines, pants hugging their round asses—and
thought they looked like fuckable dolls. I had no clue how to interpret each
man’s swagger, no clue what it was that set the gay ones apart or how exactly
to go about approaching them. So I simply watched and dreamed and, back at
home, sometimes jerked off while I imagined a bold recruit smiling at me as he
took off his hat. The hat removal was, in my fantasies, always an invitation,
the prelude to an indescribably thrilling encounter.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Hiya, cutie.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Startled, I jerked
to the right. A dazzling, gap-toothed grin and cloud of perfume hit me. At my side
stood a woman in a neon-pink negligee. Her hand smoothed circles onto my back.
She had straight, bluish black hair only slightly longer than her glued-on
eyelashes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Uh…hello.” I had
to be polite. It was Oliver’s bachelor party, and his father had put out
beaucoup bread for it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I’m Krysti,”
chirped my unwanted companion. “What’s <i>your</i> name?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Ned. Just…Ned.”
Well, it wasn’t <i>just</i> Ned, but she didn’t need to know the Surwicki part.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">As my attention
funneled back to the party, I remembered that Louie wasn’t alone. Oliver’s
older brother Darryl had hired a troupe of three dancers. Flame-haired Louie,
vivacious as she was, couldn’t possibly cater to all nineteen men in
attendance. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Krysti tucked some
stray strands of hair behind my ear. I tried as inconspicuously as possible to
inch backward.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Wouldja like a
little something special, Just Ned? Want me to boogaloo down your Broadway?”
Her fingers danced down my shirtfront to the waistband of my trousers.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Uh-oh. A little
something special from the Electric Eurydice didn’t appeal to me whatsoever.
Not unless there was a sailor lurking beneath that lingerie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“<i>Woooo</i>, go
for it, man!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">I tilted past
Krysti to look in the direction of the voice, although I already knew whose
voice it was. Oliver, who’d either slid or been pulled from his chair, sat on
the floor with his shirt open and zipper down, waving a beer bottle. His hold
on the neck was precarious. I worried the bottle might slip from his curled
fingers and thump him on the head. He was trying to point at me but couldn’t
seem to get his forefinger fully straightened.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">From all
indications, he was rip-roaringly drunk.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">I’d never seen him
like this. He drank, yeah, but never to excess. Considering the occasion, I
supposed overindulgence was understandable. He was only doing what a man was
supposed to do.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Being vulnerable to
the charms of scantily clad women fell vaguely into the same category. As did
getting married. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Whatcha waiting
for, Schnickelfritz?” he called out with a sloppy grin I found disarming as
hell. “Get that cherry popped!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Oh God, why did he have to holler about my cherry, and when was he
going to stop calling me Schnickelfritz? Each one of us was only half German. Besides, it
sounded so fucking <i>silly</i>. But I supposed there were worse names.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Krysti fired him a
look. “We don’t do that sort of thing,” she said with snippy indignation.
“We’re entertainers.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“That’s okay,” I
mumbled. “My cherry’s already been popped.” Not by a female, granted…<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Louie, now sitting
in the chair above Oliver and gliding her hands inside his open shirt, leaned
over and whispered in his ear. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Oliver lifted his
eyebrows and pulled down his mouth. “Pardon, mademoiselle,” he said to Krysti in
perfect, slurred French. He swung his raised arm to his midsection to affect a
bow of apology, but he swung it too hard. Beer shot out of the bottle and splashed onto Louie’s inner thigh. She yelped and fell backward, Oliver
toppled onto his side, and the room erupted into hoots and guffaws.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Excuse me,” I said
to Krysti.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">I hustled over to
the guest of honor to make sure he was all right. Kneeling beside him, I eased
the bottle out of his hand. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Hope you’re
planning to replace that,” he said as I got him to sit up.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Don’t worry about
it.” I twisted around and set the bottle on a cluttered coffee table. “Just
worry about one of these bozos tripping over your ass.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">More music cut a
tinny swath through the raised voices in the room. Stevie Wonder, “Signed,
Sealed, Delivered.” To me, the song was like a bad portent. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">All three
entertainers were dancing now, slinking and shimmying from man to man, trying
to tease some reaction from their alcohol-saturated libidos. The third woman, a
blonde named Misty, let Curtis Orton pluck maraschino cherries from her
cleavage. Two guys on a loveseat pulled Krysti down between them, and Darryl
Duncan, Oliver’s older brother and the temporary holder of the family purse
strings, swayed with his hands on Louie’s hips. The fact he was married didn’t
seem to deter him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“They’ll do it for
enough money, you know,” Oliver said to me. His hand rested on my leg. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Do what?” I felt a
little foggy myself.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Handjob, blowjob,
maybe even fuck. What’s-her-name just told me.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<i><span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Handjob, blowjob,
fuck</span></i><span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">. Those words alone, coming from Oliver’s mouth, made a barbed
tingle clutch at my groin. I wanted to lower him back to the floor, carefully
crawl on top of him, and kiss him for hours on end as I finished the undressing
that Louie had begun. Even disheveled, he was a knockout. His sable hair was
charmingly mussed, his heavy eyelids gave the rich darkness of his irises a
sultry cast, and his lips bore a scrim of moisture.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I’m not
interested,” I said, trying hard not to focus on his mouth.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";"> “Don’t be uptight about it. Money’s not an
issue. And I’m pretty sure Darryl brought along a box of rubbers.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I wouldn’t be
interested even if they were full-body rubbers.” It was the biggest hint I’d
ever dropped, but it fell unnoticed. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Shit, I’d wanted to
get cozy with Oliver since we were fourteen years old. After almost seven years
of longing, the most touch I’d ever gotten from him were playful shakes and
friendly hugs and an occasional clap on the back or shoulder. Buddy stuff. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Considering I’d had
a deep, dark, smoldering crush on him since high school, buddy stuff was more
tormenting than satisfying.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Aw, c’mon, Ned,
loosen up,” Oliver said, his hand moving aimlessly on my thigh, driving me
crazy. “I want you to have a good time.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I’m having a good
time just watching all you preppies get stupid.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Please don’t use
that word. Ever since that stinko movie came out, I’ve been given enough shit
just because of my name.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">He meant <i>Love
Story</i>, of course. Ryan O’Neal’s character was named Oliver, and Ali McGraw
as his snotty bitch of a girlfriend called him “Preppie.” The reference made me
grin.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I’ll lay off the
word,” I said, “if you lay off trying to hook me up with some Salome.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Deal. So, you got
a new secret love or what?” Oliver’s accompanying wink was so spazzy, I thought
for moment he had something in his eye.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I might.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Yeah?” Smiling,
Oliver lifted his shirttail and daubed at a corner of my mouth. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Heat shot through
me.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Piece of pimiento
from your olive,” he murmured.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Thanks.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">He kept looking at
me. His besotted, beguiling smile had shrunk and taken on a different quality.
It made me feel way more than I wanted or needed to feel, especially on the eve
of the eve of his wedding. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";"> A young man I didn’t know brought deliverance.
He stumbled into us, grabbed Oliver by the shoulders, shook him, and bellowed,
“Olé Ol-<i>lie</i>!” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">I squinted up at
the numbskull. His cheeks puffed out as a belch apparently rumbled up from his
stomach -- at least I hoped it was a belch -- and his head wobbled a little.
The guy was one of Oliver’s friends from <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Dartmouth</st1:city></st1:place>.
I was out of their loop. I had a ponytail and went to Milwaukee School of
Engineering and had always called Oliver, Oliver. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">As Numbskull
toddled away, Oliver suddenly clamped my face between his hands and gave me
both the worst and best kiss of my life. Impishly, his smile widened for
second. Then he bumbled off the floor like a sack of flour with feet, gave my
head an affectionate rub, and wove through the room to receive more olés.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">My lips prickled. I
touched my fingers to them, trying to relive the feel of his mouth on mine,
that startling silky softness and humid heat, the subtle poke of his whiskers.
Of course there’d been no tongue. The kiss hadn’t been that kind of kiss. But
it still had sucked the air right out of my lungs. And the room. And the entire
atmosphere. If he did it again, I vowed, I would kiss him back and make it
last. Fuck what people thought.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">A hand appeared in
front of my face, prompting me to look up. Smiling down at me was a clean-cut
blond guy whose name I couldn’t remember.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Need some help
getting it up?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">I blinked at him. <i>No,
no, you moron. Not getting “it” up, just getting up. From the floor.</i> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“No, thanks. I can
manage.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">I bounced to my feet. The guy grabbed my shoulders to steady me. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“You look as out of
place here as I feel,” he said affably. “No offense.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">I tried to gather
my wits, but the effort wasn’t going well. “Yeah, well, I don’t go to <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Dartmouth</st1:city></st1:place>.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I’m not a college
guy either. My name’s Russ. Who’re you?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Ned. A friend of
Oliver. From high school.” My attention finally found its way to Russ. He was
broad-shouldered and very well built, and his neatly combed hair was shiny as a
polished helmet.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">We shook hands. His
grip was so firm it made me reel a little. More and more he reminded me of…of…<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">One of
those sailors</span></i><span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I don’t know
anybody here,” Russ said. “I just work for Blumenthal’s. You know, the
caterer.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “All I did was deliver the hors
d’oeuvres. Then Darryl invited me to hang out.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Won’t you get in
trouble with your employer?” Damn, my throat felt dry.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Nah. I called him
hours ago. Long as I get the van back in one piece, Felix don’t care how I
spend the rest of the evening.” Russ looked toward the bar and the nearby hors
d’oeuvre table. “Can I, uh…get you a drink or some food or something?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Thanks, but I’m
set.” He was such a nice, simple guy and seemed so utterly guileless, I had
trouble entertaining the notion he might be hitting on me. So maybe he
wasn’t. Maybe he just felt obligated to earn his invitation to the party by
doubling as a waiter. “I’m leaving soon, anyway.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Russ’s smile
collapsed. “You are?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Yeah. Oliver’s
father hired a limo…”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Oh. So you live in
the city?” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“I have an
apartment near MSOE.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Nodding, Russ
licked his lips. “I think I’ve seen you around.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">“Really? Where?”
More to the point, why would he even remember me? I didn’t exactly look like
Robert Redford.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">Russ’s voice
lowered. “Castaways. The Rooster.” His sky-blue eyes fixed on my face.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">My lips parted;
shock and germinal excitement had instantly made my breath go shallow.
Castaways and the Rooster were queer bars. “What’re you saying?” I asked in a
strained monotone.</span><br />
“Just wondering if
you’d like some company on that limo ride.”</div>
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<span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Book Antiqua";">[<i>Chapter One continues from this point</i>.]</span></div>
K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-41550325004923359522015-07-13T11:30:00.001-05:002015-07-13T11:33:33.724-05:00She can see! She can see!Well, not close-up. Not yet.<br />
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So . . . I've gone through two outpatient cataract surgeries. The first was a breeze: lasted only a few minutes, it seemed, and I didn't feel a thing. Better yet, the improvement in my vision was immediate and startling. The second operation, four days ago, was more stressful: took much longer (there was some kind of minor setback or complication), and I felt considerable discomfort. When I went in for my follow-up exam the next morning, I was anxious and dispirited. No instant improvement <i>this</i> time. In fact, no noticeable improvement at all, and I'd had a bit of discharge overnight. (TMI, I know. Sorry.)<br />
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The doc who does my exams is an older underling of the Grand Poobah whose eponymous practice is in the Madison area but has smaller "satellite" clinics. (The Grand Poobah motors into my area of the outback once a month to suction out old farts' cataracts and insert shiny new IOLs or intraocular lenses. That's his specialty. He's done roughly 26,000 of these operations.) Anyway, Old Doc peered into my right eyeball, found nothing alarming, and told me to give it time to heal. All eyes, he calmly assured me, respond differently to the procedure. "Just keep putting in your drops and wearing the shield at night." So that's what I've been doing. And, lo and behold, my vision is indeed improving! It still isn't 20/20 like my left eye, but it's waaaay better than before.<br />
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Once both eyes have thoroughly healed, I'll be fitted for new glasses. They'll be primarily for reading. Not sure yet if I'll need some degree of correction for working at the computer, since it's a mid-distance thing. But in any case, I'm thrilled with the difference thus far. I no longer have to wear glasses every waking hour because my world is immeasurably clearer, brighter, and more detailed.<br />
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If you've never been on the verge of blindness, you can't imagine what a joy it is to see colors in all their subtle-to-brilliant glory. To watch baby sparrows flitting around their birdhouse, and chipmunks chasing each other through the grass. To read menus posted at restaurant drive-throughs or behind their counters. To watch movies, peruse the offerings at a resale shop or rummage sale, spy on your neighbors!<br />
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Never take your senses for granted. Revel in them at every opportunity. :-)<br />
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K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-39262062822707688342015-05-07T11:41:00.000-05:002015-05-07T11:41:54.870-05:00Update, and Another Great Sale!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rdK2yPoelds/VUuDpsuhpnI/AAAAAAAAD70/vlMFwnJr-qg/s1600/Year3and4_FBbanner.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="146" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rdK2yPoelds/VUuDpsuhpnI/AAAAAAAAD70/vlMFwnJr-qg/s400/Year3and4_FBbanner.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<br />
Because I'm a "Year Three Author" at <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/AuthorArcade/kz-snow" target="_blank">Dreamspinner Press</a> (yeah, I've been with them since 2009), all my DSP titles will be 35% off from May 8 through May 14. To see what I have to offer -- view covers, and read blurbs and excerpts -- click on the link above.<br />
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On a more personal note, it's probably a good thing I decided to go on sabbatical. Last month my eye doc discovered cataracts in both my eyes, which obviously explains why my vision has degenerated, At this point I couldn't write or edit a manuscript no matter how much I wanted to. (Just composing this post is a hell of an effort.) I had a WIP going, but continuing with it proved beyond my visual capability. Even reading is becoming difficult. (Thank goodness for my Kindle!) So . . . I'm facing cataract surgery. I suspect other stuff is wrong with me too, since I haven't seen a doctor in more years than I can count. (Thank you, American healthcare system!)<br />
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As many of you know from experience, any breakdown of one's body is stressful. When that breakdown is due to advancing age, which clearly isn't reversible, and finding rides to and from appointments is like trying to conjure cotton candy from the wind, the stress can lead to high anxiety and deep depression. If/when my physical problems are resolved, I'll post again. In the meantime you all take care, okay? K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-68965913907497695292015-02-07T14:31:00.002-06:002015-02-07T15:01:51.971-06:00A New Story with Old Characters<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I've posted a free short on one of my blog's pages. "The Substitute" is the most recent entry in the Jackson Spey / Adin Swift storyverse, inspired by a picture fellow author K-lee Klein put up on Facebook. (Thank you, K-lee!)</div>
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You can find the story <a href="http://kzsnow.blogspot.com/p/the-substitute-jackson-adin.html" target="_blank">here.</a><br />
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Some of you, but probably not many of you, are familiar with Jackson and Adin. They're my most beloved and possibly most interesting couple, and they've certainly been around the longest. They made their first appearance together in <i>Plagued</i>, a novel released by Ellora's Cave in 2007, and went on to develop a full, complex, and often rocky relationship in subsequent books. (You can find the <a href="http://www.kzsnow.com/jackson--adin-books.html" target="_blank">complete list</a> at my website.) </div>
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"The Substitute" takes place approximately six months after <i>Carny's Magic</i>, a novel published by Loose Id. </div>
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Hope you like it. And I hope squabbling couples are encouraged by it. ;-)</div>
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K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-31648054467348141102015-01-17T16:14:00.000-06:002015-01-17T16:14:01.709-06:00RatingsI might be taking a break from writing, but I haven't taken a break from thinking. ;-)<br />
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Simply put, I want to see the rating system for books disappear, primarily from Goodreads. I wouldn't mind seeing it disappear from privately-owned review sites, too. Those stupid stars (or marmosets or dandelions or whatever) have caused more grief and contention than anything else in the bookworld -- or at least the corner of the bookworld that I frequent. Over the past decade, I've seen countless writers go temporarily insane over star numbers. I've seen citizen reviewers manipulate those star numbers either to pimp or to punish authors. I've seen author buddies abuse those star numbers to show support for each other. I've seen authors rate their own work. The whole system is hopelessly, absurdly corrupted. <br />
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Moreover, books can't be evaluated like cars and appliances. Their worth can't be conveyed on a scale of one to five. Reading, like sex, is a highly subjective experience. The only way to express the nature of that experience on a reader-by-reader basis is through words. WORDS. (Can you imagine people slapping stars on each other's genitals following an intimate encounter? Heh.) At least Amazon requires you to post a review along with your rating. I'm still not sure if the book must be a "verified purchase" or not, but their system is far preferable to the way Goodreads does things. <br />
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Serious readers want and need honest reviews, not mere ratings and certainly not juvenile games played with icons. A review can be a few words long or a few paragraphs long. One needn't possess the vocabulary of John Updike to express one's satisfaction or dissatisfaction with a book.K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-72892500761144228632015-01-11T11:04:00.000-06:002015-01-11T11:04:43.389-06:00CaNoWriMoDear Friends,<br />
<br />
I'm taking a sabbatical of indeterminate length. 2014 was a "D" year for me: a year of disappointment, disillusionment, discouragement, and depression. There are many reasons for this. I'd considered laying out those reasons -- part of me feels my readers deserve to know -- but the further I got into my litany of let-downs, the more self-indulgent the exercise seemed. Who wants to hear somebody, anybody, whine <i>ad nauseam</i>? Blech.<br />
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So to hell with specifics. In a nutshell, my confidence is tapped out. I need time to take stock of my writing career. (Actually, "writing career" is an oxymoron in my case.) Dozens of criteria are indicative of an author's critical and/or popular success. Over the past year or more, I haven't measured up to any of them -- a fact I can no longer ignore. In addition, there are aspects of publishing and promoting within the m/m romance genre that have drained me of incentive. <br />
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If I do regain some shred of mojo, if I manage someday to weave more tales and publish them, I don't know when or under what name or in what genre. For the time being I simply need to withdraw and reassess my capabilities and expectations. I also plan on reading a lot, but most likely <i>not</i> romance.<br />
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By the way, I've turned off comments. It isn't my intention to harvest sympathy and reassurances through this post. I merely wanted to let my loyal readers (and jeez, how I treasure you!) know what's going on. I've also cut back drastically on my Internet presence, although I still check in periodically at Facebook and Twitter, mostly for fun. (I've come to know many wonderful people through social media and don't want to lose track of them!) My blog will remain, albeit in a largely dormant state. If I have something to spout off about, or an announcement to make, I'll put up a post.<br />
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Thank you all so much for reading my books. Please take care of yourselves, and have a fulfilling 2015!<br />
<br />
Love,<br />
<i>KZ</i> <br />
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<br />K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-87254638893203090762014-12-17T00:00:00.000-06:002016-11-18T10:37:19.308-06:00A Bit of Holiday Fiction, Redux<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b style="text-indent: 0in;"><span style="font-size: 16.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Gift Exchange</span></b></div>
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<i>It is the heart that does the giving; the fingers only let go.</i><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">The door opened at his back. A cheery fanfare of sleigh bells ushered in a wave of frigid air. Before the sound died and the cold surrendered to warmth, Brome looked up from the cluster of porcelain buildings he’d been regarding, their windows aglow -- a village in miniature. His gaze snagged for a moment on the tall white church at its center. A ghost image of the gilded cross atop its steeple lingered in his retinas and briefly stamped itself on the face of the new customer.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">No, not a customer. Lieutenant Eliason from the Redemption Center, the place from which Brome had just fled. Tense, hyperalert, he turned back to the rows of artfully arranged houses and shops that had no match in the real world. They were too pretty. The world was not.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Without drawing attention to himself, Eliason strolled down the right-hand aisle toward his target. Brome, acting oblivious, continued to study the villages. Beneath the sweeping heat of fever, a chill gripped him. His head and muscles ached. Sweat slicked his forehead. With a handkerchief he’d pulled from his jacket, he wiped his face. Why, today of all days, did he have to feel like shit?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">And why the hell did Eliason have to show up?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Brome thought he’d timed his getaway just right. Disposal of a witch, an adulterer, and an infidel was scheduled for this evening, three blocks away on the Square. Even if the Red Center was quick to broadcast a fugitive alert, those hangings would keep the local flock occupied for a while. He would’ve had a good chance of making it to the bus or train station.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Brome.” Eliason stopped beside him. “I saw you take off in this direction after throwing the trash bags in the dumpster. Care to tell me why?” He kept his voice low.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Because I wanted to.” Brome had always been intrigued by the charming little store with its striped awnings and six-pointed brass star above the door. The State allowed Jews to buy special licenses for selling goods and services to the Faithful. <i>Christmas Love</i> seemed a pleasant place to hide until the Eradication Event got underway and he could bolt.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">He moved farther down the aisle as he pretended to study the array of holy-day decorations. “I’m entitled to my hour of private time after supper. I work hard when I'm on kitchen detail.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“But you left the premises without signing out, and you aren’t accompanied by your brother.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<i><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Brother</span></i><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">. Stupid euphemism. Cathcart was his keeper.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Weren’t you assigned a new one?” Eliason paused before a terraced hill of teddy bears. Gingerly, he touched two of them, stroking their fur, brushing one's heart-patterned bow with his fingertips. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Wary but curious, Brome followed the tentative movements from the corner of his eye. There were times like this when he thought he could actually like Eliason. Times when he</span><span style="font-size: 18.2857151031494px;">’</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">d caught the lieutenant watching him in the dining hall with a bemused smile or giving him a slight nod as they passed each other in the Center’s hallways.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Well?” Eliason prompted.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Yes. They saddled me with Cathcart.” Brome couldn’t temper the resentment in his voice. “They don’t trust me, and I don’t trust <i>him</i>.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Carols lilted through the shop’s gossamer veil of scent: apple and cinnamon, as if small, perfect housewives were baking pies in those small, perfect houses surrounded by sparkling snow. Brome thought of his grandmother. She was neither small nor perfect, but she accepted him, would shelter him. <i>If</i> he could get to her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">His prospects weren’t looking good.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“<i>To save us all from Satan’s power when we were gone astray…</i>” Brome warned himself not to let his guard down. Smiles and nods aside, Eliason was his enemy. The lieutenant was there because Brome had gone astray and needed to be retrieved. He had to be saved from Satan’s power. At least, that was how the Redemption Center and the State</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"> saw it.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Still tailed by Eliason, Brome turned up the next aisle. They passed a decorated tree.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“How many transgressions are on your record?” Eliason continued to touch items --ornaments now -- in that tender and almost reverent way he’d touched the bears. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">A crystal snowman caught his attention. He gently lifted it away from the bough on which it hung and let it rest on the insides of his fingers, as if he were holding a treasured but fragile memory. Maybe he was.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Brome was uncomfortably moved by the sight. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Four,” he answered. There was no point in lying about it. The most elaborate lie wouldn’t secure Brome’s freedom. He’d have to wrest his freedom from the fist of the government and its church.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“One more and you’ll be--”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“I know what I’ll be. So you might as well leave. I’m not going back.</span><span style="font-size: 18px;">” Determination flared into defiance.</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span style="font-size: 18px;">“</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">No matter what they do to me, I’m never going to change. I’ll never be part of the flock. Soon they'll classify me as irredeemable. So what’s the point of my being at the Center, except to face disposal one day?”</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Eliason's brow contracted. “But . . . where will you go?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Brome had expected threats, not concerned interest. His guard slipped. “North. To a cottage on a lake. I know the owner. She</span><span style="font-size: 18px;">’</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">ll welcome me.”</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">He said nothing more. Not only had he already divulged too much, he suddenly felt lightheaded. Stress, the flu . . . <i>boo-fucking-hoo, </i>a mocking voice in his head concluded. <i>Queerboy</i>. That less-than-sympathetic sentiment had come from a reversion specialist who’d hurt him until he cried. Brome denied the details entry into his mind.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">The shop twirled. Its floor tilted and fell away. Brome swayed, reached out to steady himself. His hand lightly connected with the ornament-laden tree. Loaves and fishes, cherubs and seraphs, doves and camels and lambs tinkled as he jostled them. An arm came around him from behind and kept him upright.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“You’re burning with fever,” Eliason murmured, as if Brome didn’t know. “You need to lie down.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“I’ll be okay.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Not if you traipse around in this weather. You’re already sick.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Either leave me alone, lieutenant, or do what you came here to do.” If Eliason chose the latter course, Brome figured he could give him the slip once they were outside. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Eliason continued to hold him, although the dizzy spell, and the need for support, had passed. “Brome, listen to me.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“My name is David. <i>David</i>,” he grated. “And I’m gay.” Many bleak months had passed since he’d spoken his first name or declared his orientation. The words thrilled him. Reclaiming his identity, feeling it fill his mouth and slide from his tongue, was his greatest act of rebellion. <i>“My name is David. And I’m gay.”</i> All the stubborn lawlessness that had landed him in the Redemption Center was contained in that seven-word manifesto. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">He thought Eliason might reply, <i>“Sorry, David, your field trip ends here. You’re not ‘gay’ anymore. You’re back to being Brome, a common deviant who needs straightening out.”</i> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Again, the lieutenant surprised him. “I’m Matthew,” he whispered, his mouth moving against the ill-shaven skin between David’s mouth and ear. The feel of his lips made David tingle. “Let me come with you. We can look after each other.” Finally, he withdrew his arm.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">David’s eyes widened. He turned to face Eliason. “What?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Was this a trick? But there was no need for trickery to nab a runaway. Lieutenants and other officers carried InstAlarms that, with the push of a button, summoned help. Some even kept hypodermic needles full of tranquilizer in their pockets. David could easily have been rendered helpless. In fact, he'd been waiting for some sign of impending capture . . . only, there’d been none.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Why?” he asked. “You’ve made it through the program. You’re ex-homo now, a success story. And you have guaranteed employment.” That alone was no small reward, given the country’s crippled economy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Revulsion twisted through Eliason's features. “I hate it there. My life’s a lie. Can’t you tell? Please, David, take me with you. There</span><span style="font-size: 18px;">’</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">s no one else I can--”</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Is everything all right?” The middle-aged woman who’d approached them was, David assumed, one of the shop’s owners. He</span><span style="font-size: 18px;">’</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">d glimpsed her at the checkout counter when he’d come in, standing beside a man who could</span><span style="font-size: 18px;">’</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">ve been her husband. Her auburn hair was pulled into a thick, gleaming side-braid and her eyes were at once sharp and soft. </span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Two ladies, visible through a bank of creche-lined shelves, hurried toward the door. They appeared to be the last shoppers in the store. The Eradication Event would be starting soon.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Better now,” Eliason answered. “My buddy has the flu.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Stunned, David directed his bleary gaze to the ornament Eliason had been admiring. He still wasn’t sure he could accept the man’s confession and believe <i>he</i> could be defiant too. And they could be comrades.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">The woman nodded. “It’s going around. He should be in bed.” She hesitated for a beat. “Don’t you work at the Redemption Center? I’m sure I’ve seen you entering and leaving the building.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Eliason’s cheeks flushed. “Not anymore.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Perceptively, the woman looked from him to David and back. “I see.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“I like your Old Man Winters,” David said abruptly, diverting her attention to figurines of robed men with white beards. Her inquisitiveness made him uneasy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">The woman smiled wistfully. “His name is Santa Claus, at least in English. I know we’re not supposed to utter it, but that’s his name.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">She was right. Calling the figure anything other than Old Man Winter was a criminal offense. Yet here was a Jew, giving a Christmas icon’s name back to him, quietly insisting it be recognized.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">David’s heart drummed faster. He didn’t risk glancing at Eliason’s face, afraid his hope wouldn’t be reflected there.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">The bell at the county jail began to ring. Three measured peals, a pause, then three more. Repeated. Repeated. The guilty were being led to the gallows. David and his companions winced. Bells signaled every noteworthy event: weddings, baptisms, funerals; executions and escapes from institutions. David had come to hate bells, except for the ones on the shop’s door.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“If you’d like to take a nap,” the woman said to him with a kindness and serenity that almost, <i>almost</i> counteracted that dreadful tolling, “we have living quarters in the basement. The guestrooms</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"> aren't </span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">luxurious but they’re clean and comfortable. No one goes downstairs except my husband and I and a few people we</span><span style="font-size: 18px;">’</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">re close to. I’m Susan, by the way.” She pointed at the well-dressed man behind the counter. “That's Ari.”</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">David glanced at Eliason, at<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Matthew<i>.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></i>Yes, hope was in his clear, bright eyes, in the shimmer of optimism on his face.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><span style="font-size: 18.2857151031494px;">“</span>Can my . . . friend come with me?</span><span style="font-size: 18.2857151031494px;">” </span><br />
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><span style="font-size: 18.2857151031494px;">“O</span>f course.</span><span style="font-size: 18.2857151031494px;">”</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Still, David hesitated.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“I know my offer seems hasty,” said Susan. “It might even sound strange. But this isn’t a trap, in case you’re worried. We believe what a brave young woman named Anne Frank once wrote. </span><span style="font-size: 14pt;">‘. . . N</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">obody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world’.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">David considered as he and Matthew exchanged uncertain looks. He did need to rest and recover before starting his trek, and they both had to lay low for a while. Matthew gave him a subtle go-ahead nod.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“I’d appreciate that,” David said. “Thank you.” Survival, he realized, wasn’t only about suspicion; it was also about trust.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Susan looked pleased. “You’re quite welcome. And your names are…?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Matthew told her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Ah, two of my favorites! Follow me, Matthew and David. There’s aspirin in the medicine chest and orange juice in the fridge. Plenty of food, too.” Susan laughed. “We do love to eat. So help yourselves.” She led them to the back of the shop and pulled aside a red curtain concealing a storage area. A nondescript door stood beyond stacks of boxes and large lawn displays. Susan wended through the stock, leaving a faint tendril of apple-and-cinnamon fragrance in her wake.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">David fingered the crystal snowman in his pocket. If Matthew was still with him when he reached Gran’s house, he would give it to him on Christmas morning.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“I need to pay you for something,” he told their hostess. He couldn’t boost the ornament. Not now.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“We’ll take care of it another time. Ari and I have a dinner date.” After unlocking the door, Susan turned on a stairwell light. Candle flames flickered in the darkness below. “You can stay as long as you need to. We’ve harbored people before.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">“Harbored?” Matthew echoed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
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<span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Susan laid a hand on the side of each of their faces. “Yes. It brings us joy.” She gestured toward the stairwell. “Go on. Make yourselves at home. Don’t be alarmed if you find a tunnel behind a panel in the pantry. It has a good purpose. But I suggest you not go exploring until I tell you more and David feels stronger.” Another smile, full of caring. “We</span><span style="font-size: 18.2857151031494px;">’</span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">ll talk again later. Merry Christmas.” </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">Maybe the merriest of all</span></i><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;">, David thought as he and Matthew walked side by side toward their futures.</span><br />
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</span> <span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 15.3600006103516px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; line-height: 15.3600006103516px;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: x-small;">Copyright</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 15.3600006103516px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; line-height: 15.3600006103516px;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: x-small;">© 2014 K. Z. Snow</span></span><span style="font-size: medium;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<!-- end InLinkz script -->K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-6088317025408108142014-12-15T14:46:00.000-06:002014-12-15T14:53:40.998-06:00The Window of MercyI just finished the memoir <i>Body Counts</i> by Sean Strub (a gay activist who, among other things, founded <i>POZ</i> magazine). After reading this book and seeing powerful movies about the early years of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, I can't help being grateful for where I live.<br />
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The upper Midwest might not be glamorous or exciting, and the winters are certainly a bitch to get through, but my place of residence could very well have been a life-saver.<br />
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In the late summer/early fall of 1982, I lived and worked in northeastern Wisconsin. Through a gay coworker from Green Bay, I began socializing with a group of twenty-something queer men, including a heterosexually-oriented transman, whom I blogged about last year. (However, that's irrelevant to this particular post.) I not only had a helluva lot of fun with my new friends, I had a brief fling with one who was, I believe, the only bisexual in the group. I'll call him Marty.<br />
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On that subtly-shaded orientation spectrum from thoroughly heterosexual to thoroughly homosexual, Marty was only a few, narrow gradations away from the thoroughly-gay end. He was vastly more attracted to men. When I asked him out of curiosity how many male lovers he'd had and how many female, he estimated he'd been intimate with approximately 500 guys and maybe a dozen women.<br />
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Marty and I engaged in a range of sexual activity -- if you catch my drift. Since not getting knocked up was my primary concern, I was already on a birth-control regimen. I figured since I had that angle covered, condoms were unnecessary. Besides, certain forms of sex couldn't lead to pregnancy anyway. And besides that, Marty had no STDs. He was, like the others in the group, a profoundly decent, caring man, and I knew he would've told me if he could transmit some unpleasant germ.<br />
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Yes. I was inexcusably naive. Or maybe I had that sense of invulnerability the comes with youth.<br />
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I don't remember if word of the "gay cancer" had reached the hinterlands by 1982. Possibly, but I don't recall my friends ever talking about it. (The acronym <i>AIDS</i> had only just come into use that same autumn.) If local media outlets covered the story at all, their "coverage" was probably brief and vague. But lack of widespread attention hadn't kept the disease from ravaging the gay populations of New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. Given Marty's promiscuity, if he and I had lived in a major urban area, especially along one of the coasts, chances are we both would've become infected.<br />
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Our window of mercy certainly didn't stay open very long. Within a handful of years, maybe even months, HIV/AIDS was sweeping the nation. Flyover country certainly didn't get a pass. The virus claimed my housemate's younger brother, who lived in the Milwaukee area, in the early 1990s, just as it claimed a sweet, funny guy who'd been a groomsman at my first wedding.<br />
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So, yeah, I was spared the consequences of my reckless behavior -- but just barely. (By the way, I believe Marty was also spared. I don't know if he ever became HIV positive, but I do know he's still alive.)<br />
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I only wish -- damn, do I wish -- the millions of lives that were ended by this plague could've had their window of mercy too.<br />
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<br />K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-72855751988911788242014-12-08T13:39:00.002-06:002014-12-09T09:37:21.634-06:00Should authors be expected to bowdlerize their own work?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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My favorite read of 2014 was K. J. Charles's <i>Think of England</i>. The same is true for a lot of people, which isn't surprising. It's an extraordinarily well-written and entertaining novella. But -- and I suppose this was inevitable -- a certain contingent of critics seems to think the author should have been more considerate of her readers' sensibilities. You see, the book is set in the early 20th century, in a superficially genteel society fouled by undercurrents of class consciousness and bigotry. The characters' Antisemitism, for example, is obvious.</div>
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The critics fear these elements could serve as "triggers" for certain readers.<br />
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Okay, let's go with that. Should Ms.Charles have minimized or offset the -isms of Edwardian England: racism, sexism, imperialism? Should she not have used ethnic slurs like <i>dago</i>? Should hero #1, Archie, have been more pure of heart and noble, and his social milieu more sanitized?</div>
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I say, Bullshit. And here's why (aside from the fact Archie redeems himself quite nicely, I feel). </div>
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First, this is a work of historical fiction. Good writers of historical fiction make every effort to remain true to the tenor of the time, and realities of the place, about which they're writing. This means background verities aren't always pleasant and seldom reflect the degree of sociopolitical enlightenment for which residents of the 21st-century Western world strive. (Well, some of us, anyway. I have my doubts about millions of my fellow Americans.)</div>
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Second, one can't logically be an opponent of institutionalized censorship while being a <i>pro</i>ponent of rigorous and sweeping self-censorship. Censorship is censorship, whether it rests in the hands of a church or state or on the shoulders of individual authors. Decrying one while advocating the other skirts perilously close to hypocrisy, regardless of the hypocrite's good intentions.</div>
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Third, fussing over "triggers" in fiction is an absurd exercise in futility. How does one define the term? What constitutes a trigger? Dozens upon dozens of themes and situations are potentially <i>far</i> more disturbing than period-appropriate mores. Consider domestic violence, child sexual abuse, rape, addiction, abortion, crime, infidelity, terminal illness, terrorism, war -- the list goes on and on. Hell, even mentioning snakes or spiders or Donald Trump's hair can set off anxiety in some people. </div>
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Does the possibility of upsetting or offending certain subsets of readers mean authors should never write about the issues I mentioned above? And countless others? I, for one, avoid BDSM content because it makes me intensely uncomfortable. I spent years in a physically abusive relationship. Although I realize, intellectually, there's a vast difference between consensual BDSM and the terror inflicted by a cruel partner, BDSM is one of <i>my</i> triggers. Do I expect authors to eliminate it from their work? Of course not. My point is, over-delicacy in treading around readers' real or imagined sensitivities will leave writers with blank pages.</div>
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So I say, we need to worry less about the subject matter of fiction and more about the craft of fiction. That's the area that cries for improvement.</div>
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K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-32301392934265227702014-11-04T13:38:00.000-06:002014-11-04T16:05:26.585-06:00Thank you . . .To a loyal reader who's very dear to me. (You know who you are!) Heck, all three of my loyal readers are precious to me. ;-)<br />
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I'm honored that she nominated <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=4950" target="_blank">Machine</a> for this award. Thank you, Reggie, for being so supportive!<br />
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K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-85849893812657228492014-10-14T11:10:00.000-05:002014-10-14T11:10:53.756-05:00There ARE other languages than English. :-)I'm incredibly proud to announce that my Dreamspinner Press new-adult novel <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=2565" target="_blank">The Zero Knot</a> will be issued in a French language edition by publisher Reines-Beaux. It's slated to appear in their 2015 catalog.<br />
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My beloved <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=2069" target="_blank">Mongrel</a> could also be headed for publication by a foreign press. Should it sell well enough, the other two books in the trilogy (<i>Merman</i> and <i>Machine</i>) will be issued by the same publisher. I'll pass along more details when I get them. What with the Frankfurt Book Fair just ending and GRL getting underway, this has been a very busy time for m/m publishers. That's why I'm hesitant to bug TPTB for further info.<br />
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Fingers crossed tight, though! I've missed Fanule, Will, Clancy, and Simon something fierce, and would love to see them introduced to new readers. K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-12298235250018411162014-10-01T10:08:00.000-05:002014-10-01T10:08:06.085-05:00The Resurrection Men<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-XXxtZO-xmyI/VCGrNzqJrCI/AAAAAAAADzk/Dct4PqZ86iI/s1600/Marlon%2Bas%2BLonzo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-XXxtZO-xmyI/VCGrNzqJrCI/AAAAAAAADzk/Dct4PqZ86iI/s1600/Marlon%2Bas%2BLonzo.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lonzo (Marlon Teixeira, from his Kult Models portfolio)</td></tr>
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You know how we writers can be -- always searching for sources of inspiration. ;-)<br />
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Here's how I pictured the main players in <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=5290" target="_blank">Resurrection Man.</a><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EU-op4En0HI/VCGqf3BCWpI/AAAAAAAADzU/6rQcaYy-9cc/s1600/Elijah%2C%2BChord%2BOverstreet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EU-op4En0HI/VCGqf3BCWpI/AAAAAAAADzU/6rQcaYy-9cc/s1600/Elijah%2C%2BChord%2BOverstreet.jpg" height="200" width="147" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Elijah (Chord Overstreet)<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Michael (anonymous)<br />
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I felt kind of bad casting Marlon in the role of Alonzo, but that photo is a perfect representation of the character when he dresses to look respectable. :-)</div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-10BN8gEjoFg/VCGq3HMxoWI/AAAAAAAADzc/6kHi7Bwf3Kw/s1600/Michael%2BHanlan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-10BN8gEjoFg/VCGq3HMxoWI/AAAAAAAADzc/6kHi7Bwf3Kw/s1600/Michael%2BHanlan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a>K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-66866689857610713932014-09-27T19:43:00.000-05:002014-09-27T19:46:19.100-05:00Another Kind of Bullying<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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We who read and/or write m/m romance and gay fiction -- in fact, the entire GLBTQ* community, allies included -- despise bullying. I don't need to explain why. But there's an insidious kind of bullying infesting the U.S. legal system: frivolously spiteful, vindictive lawsuits intended to harass, punish, and/or muffle disseminators of information.<br />
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By "information" I mean facts, not rumors or baseless allegations with a negative cast. We have libel and slander laws to protect us against the latter. Bogus information can be harmful; it can damage people's personal and business reputations, financial stability, and physical as well as psycho-emotional well-being. However, when accusations can be substantiated, when information can be verified, the disseminator is "guilty" of only one thing: telling the truth.<br />
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Some people fear the truth. It is their enemy. They're likely to cry "Witch hunt!" to deflect attention from their wrongdoing when the truth gets out. Yes, I know, persecution of innocents has indeed<i> </i>taken place throughout history, and far too often. Single words identify some of the more heinous examples: Inquisition, Salem, McCarthyism. But . . . making helpful information public is definitely <i>not</i> a "witch hunt." It's more akin to enlightenment.<br />
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I got to pondering these things when I found out a fairly large, prosperous publisher is suing a book blogger for defamation. <i>A book blogger!</i> Here is the <a href="http://dearauthor.com/ebooks/the-curious-case-of-elloras-cave/" target="_blank">offending post.</a> Here is a copy of the <a href="http://www.thepassivevoice.com/09/2014/elloras-cave-sues-dear-author-book-blog-for-defamation/" target="_blank">complaint as filed.</a> And here's <a href="http://dearauthor.com/misc/elloras-cave-sues-dear-author/" target="_blank">the respondent's announcement of the suit.</a> What I find most disturbing is the <b>complainant's demand to know the identities of site visitors who commented anonymously</b>. Why is this part of an already questionable action? WHY? My opinion: if this, too, doesn't smack of bullying -- an attempt to scare authors-under-contract into shutting up -- I don't know what else you'd call it. (We're still allowed opinions under the First Amendment, aren't we?)<br />
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I find the whole situation unconscionable and reprehensible.<br />
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<span style="text-indent: 0in;">Anyway, I got a
hell of an education today as I followed relevant links. The more I
read, the more I learned about: 1.) "vexatious litigants"
(people/entities who continually, often groundlessly sue other people/entities,
thereby making themselves a nuisance to the court system); 2.) anti-SLAPP
statutes (from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation" target="_blank">Wikipedia</a>), "A </span><span style="text-indent: 0in;">strategic lawsuit against public participation</span><span style="text-indent: 0in;"> [</span><span style="text-indent: 0in;">SLAPP</span><span style="text-indent: 0in;">] is a lawsuit ... intended to censor, intimidate, and silence critics by burdening them with
the cost of a legal defense until they abandon their criticism or
opposition"); 3.) the Streisand Effect (from <a href="http://www.thepassivevoice.com/09/2014/elloras-cave-sues-dear-author-book-blog-for-defamation/" target="_blank">The Passive Voice</a>), "the phenomenon whereby an attempt to hide, remove, or censor a piece of
information has the unintended consequence of publicizing the information more
widely, usually facilitated by the Internet"; 4.) Chilling Effects (at <a href="http://vacuousminx.wordpress.com/2014/09/27/chilling-effects/" target="_blank">Vacuous Minx</a>). You can also find out more about these terms, and their RL ramifications, at <a href="http://the-digital-reader.com/2014/09/26/elloras-cave-sues-dear-author-book-blog-defamation/#.VCdKCfldXmo" target="_blank">The Digital Reader</a> and <a href="http://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/blog/elloras-cave-sues-dear-author-more-streisand-effect" target="_blank">Smart Bitches Trashy Books.</a></span><br />
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<span style="text-indent: 0in;">Some sobering stuff, dear friends, and all very cogently explained. I'm sure we've only seen the beginning of what promises to be an enormous public outcry. Streisand Effect, indeed. </span><br />
<span style="text-indent: 0in;"><br /></span><span style="text-indent: 0in;">This whole mess has nothing to do with whether or not you like Dear Author. I, for one, rarely visit there anymore. Rather, <i>all</i> of us in the book world -- authors, readers, reviewers, bloggers -- should care about <b>this particular form of bullying</b>. Hell, all U.S. citizens should care, because it imperils a freedom we cherish: that of unfettered (within the realm of reason) expression. If we won't tolerate those who seek to ban books, we shouldn't tolerate fatcats within the publishing industry who seek to prevent scrutiny with threats of legal or other retaliatory action.</span><br />
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<span style="text-indent: 0in;">If you're wondering why I posted this, go back to the first paragraph. And remember: if you don't stand up for something, you'll fall for anything. I finally had to stand up. </span><br />
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<br />K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-28647533658710142922014-09-22T19:28:00.000-05:002014-09-22T19:28:17.703-05:00What constitutes virginity?This Thursday, September 25, Harmony Ink will release <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=5477" target="_blank">Ben Raphael's All-Star Virgins.</a> Although it's a YA story, and in spite of its title, it isn't about a group of teenage guys losing their virginity.<br />
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And yet, it is.<br />
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innocence (a more significant kind of purity than sexual inexperience), and the
true nature of self-acceptance, which has little to do with the approbation of
others. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The five 16-year-old friends who comprise the Ben Raphael All-star
Virgin Order all have their own reasons for being part of BRAVO. Two want
attention and affirmation from their peers and teachers. Three want to deflect
attention from personal secrets while garnering that affirmation. Their
individual motives all have certain elements in common, though: fear, neediness, and naiveté.
It’s these qualities that make the young men “virginal”—in the ways of the world and of
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One pivotal event serves as their initiation into adulthood.
Although this assault by life’s harsh realities is painful and irreversible, it
also helps the boys reorder their priorities. The insights they gain will help
them find the kind of contentment that doesn’t come from being widely admired
but instead comes, quietly and securely, from within.<br />
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A third, related thread has to do with a predatory female teacher, but that's a whole other discussion. If you read this novella and have questions about it, please feel free to message me. This is a touchy, complicated subject that has nothing to do with "slut shaming" and everything to do with abuse of authority, and it happens more often than you might realize. I was once a teacher, so my feelings are strong. (Guess you got a taste of my attitude in <i>Xylophone</i> if you read it.) Taking advantage of people too young, insecure, and/or troubled to make reasoned choices is INEXCUSABLE.<br />
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Thanks in advance if you choose to buy and read <i>Ben Raphael's All-Star Virgins</i>!<br />
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<br />K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-10578609281402339862014-09-12T13:45:00.002-05:002014-09-12T13:45:44.409-05:00Where have all the villains gone?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I don't mean "damaged" characters. We have those in abundance. Antiheroes, too. I mean the bona fide bitches and bastards, users and abusers, manipulators and liars and cheats. Where are they in romance fiction? Have they been scared away by our desire for happy escapes? Or by our need to psychoanalyze them? Have we romance readers and writers become so determined to validate our genre that we insist on stories free of <i>all</i> characters that smell even faintly of stereotypes? Has moral turpitude become so subjective that we must now be able to sympathize with each and every "misguided" soul?<br />
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I say no to all of it. To rejection of unpleasant people in romance. To fussy, PC dissections of bad guys' mental states. To the snobby assertion that they're all stereotypes. Let's face it, people who are alarmingly devoid of conscience exist in real life. I bet we all know/have known some. Bad apples appear in both genders and all orientations, and their self-absorption can be damned odious as well as destructive.<br />
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Frankly, I miss villains (sorry for the simplistic term, but I think you know the kinds of characters I mean). That's why I often include unlikable and conniving people in my books. I believe we <i>need</i> such players -- depending on the nature of the story, of course -- in romance. Antagonists add conflict, dramatic tension, gravitas. They can serve as foils for the good guys, can challenge and test and teach them. In fact, they can propel entire plotlines. And they've done so throughout the history of literature.<br />
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Hell, they've done so throughout the history of humanity.<br />
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I've had a variety of nasty characters in my books, and I've loved imagining all of them. Some have terrifying supernatural abilities: Joseph Beaudry, the bokor<i> </i>(Voodoo priest) in <i>To Be Where You Are</i>; the sorcerer Bezod in <i>Carny's Magic</i>; several of the strange beings in the Utopia-X series. Most, however, are entirely human. They just happen to be self-serving shitheads: C. Everett Hammer III in <i>Jude in Chains</i>; father and son sociopaths, Karl and Kenneth, in <i>Bastards and Pretty Boys</i>; the stage illusionist known as the Turk, and the shady sugar-daddy Edgar Jonns in <i>Mobry's Dick</i>; businessman Alphonse Hunzinger in <i>Mongrel</i>; the two pedophiles in <i>Xylophone </i>(although I can't say I enjoyed imagining them; it was difficult and distasteful). I have another one coming up in <i>Ben Raphael's All-Star Virgins</i>, releasing September 25.<br />
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Occasionally, if I think it's relevant, I'll delve into a villain's background or dig into his mind. Usually, though, I don't. Not too far, anyway. Why? <b>Because villains are rarely primary characters.</b> Biographical and psycho-emotional detail should be reserved for the MCs. When writers try too hard to "three-dimensionalize" their bad guys, who are almost always secondary characters, it blurs a story's focus. Conveying a sense of what drives them (psychopathy, greed, ego, bigotry, religious fervor, sexual obsession, etc.) is enough. This doesn't mean antagonists have to be shorn of personality or believability, just that their internal landscapes shouldn't overshadow the MCs'.<br />
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So, do you say "yea" or "nay" to villains in romance fic? Do you accept them in fantasies and paranormals but not in contemporaries? If so, why? Do you insist on a thorough examination of their lives and motives? And here's a sticky issue: must m/m romance writers, in particular, avoid casting <i>women</i> in a bad light? Why, if all females aren't moral exemplars? (And, heaven knows, we sure aren't!) <br />
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<br />K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-84738041196329750212014-09-03T13:25:00.000-05:002014-09-03T13:25:18.555-05:00Interview and Giveaway!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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On Saturday September 6, I'll be Meredith's guest at the <a href="http://diversereader.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Diverse Reader blog.</a> I'm being interviewed and I'm giving away an ebook -- your choice of <i>any</i> title, as long as it's mine ;-). But you don't have to hustle your butt over there on Saturday; the giveaway runs through the following Friday, September 12. See? Lots of time! </div>
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The winning entrant will of course be chosen at random. So please stop by for your chance to grab a freebie! You can find all my available books at my <a href="http://www.kzsnow.com/" target="_blank">my website.</a> Or you can scroll down the right sidebar here on my blog. Hope to see you at Diverse Reader!</div>
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K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-56570489118441062132014-08-27T13:37:00.003-05:002014-08-27T13:39:06.493-05:00Have I been writing Bummer Fic?My next release will be on September 25, and it will be <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=5477" target="_blank">this one</a> (which you can currently pre-order for a mere <b>$2.79</b> because it's a young adult story! Oh, and the same YA sale at Dreamspinner / Harmony Ink also includes <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=2565" target="_blank">The Zero Knot</a>. The reduced prices will be in effect through the end of August.)<br />
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Now that the announcements are out of the way, let's move on to the title of this post.<br />
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I have the impression some readers are avoiding <a href="http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=5290" target="_blank">Resurrection Man</a>, my August 6 release, because they assume it's depressing. They'll probably think the same of <i>Ben Raphael's All-Star Virgins</i>. I can't blame them, really, because the blurbs for both books contain certain words and phrases that don't exactly scream <i>happy-happy</i>, <i>joy-joy</i>! </div>
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But here's the thing. We writers of GLBTQ* fiction, whether romance or not, seem to have a penchant for tackling unpleasant subjects: bullying and bashing, HIV/AIDS, childhood sexual abuse, homelessness, religious intolerance, social prejudice, family rejection, etc. As most of you surely know, such experiences are all too often a part of living outside the heteronormative mainstream. Some of us don't want to ignore how our characters' "otherness" has impacted their lives.</div>
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Okay, so there's that. There's reality, which can be damned harsh but which some authors respect nonetheless. I, for one, try not to shy away from it. But also keep <i>this</i> in mind: romance writers are committed to optimistic outcomes. Even if you see dreaded words and phrases in our book blurbs, rest assured we'll manage to extract some measure of hope and fulfillment for our main characters. (After all, many people enjoy their sweetest triumphs after suffering through trials that seem defeating but turn out not to be.) We're definitely not penning "Bummer Fic" (except, maybe, in smallish, digestible doses). We want our characters to grow and learn through adversity, and be rewarded for their endurance, as much as you do. </div>
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So don't be skeered! We'll never put you through the wringer without fluffing you up at the end. ;-) <br />
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K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18677034.post-88655758601441396172014-07-22T10:11:00.000-05:002014-09-01T11:11:45.271-05:00Another Cover Reveal<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Sixteen-year-old Jake McCullough and his buddies Rider, Brody, Carlton, and Tim feel like the invisible boys of Ben Raphael
Academy, an exclusive coed prep school. Teachers and fellow students look
through them, not at them. Brody decides they need “mystique” to garner
attention and admiration, especially from girls. “Nobody has more mystique than
a desirable virgin,” he declares. Thus is born Ben Raphael’s All-star Virgin
Order or BRAVO.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The five friends polish their physical appearances. Brody
launches a subtle but canny publicity campaign. Soon, the formerly invisible
boys are indeed being noticed. The pinnacle of their acceptance seems to
come in the form of invitations to the Valentine’s Day dance. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But the young men’s motives are more complex than
they appear to be. For different reasons and to different degrees, all the
BRAVO members are emotionally fragile. Two have already taken wrong turns in
their quest for affirmation and succumbed to a seductive female teacher. Jake
and Rider, roommates and best friends, are attracted to each other but balk at
declaring their feelings; they fear the stigma of being gay.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">Virginity, it turns
out,</span><span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"> </span><span style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">comes in different guises</span></span><span style="font-family: "Book Antiqua","serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">.
</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">An unspeakable tragedy
pushes the BRAVO boys, and Jake and Rider in particular, across the threshold from
innocence into experience and makes them realize what’s truly important in
life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><b>~ Coming September 25 from Harmony Ink ~</b></span></div>
K. Z. Snowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01373906799954038740noreply@blogger.com0