Larry Benjamin's Blog: Larry Benjamin's blog - This Writer's Life
June 14, 2013
Last week, in Part 1 of this blog post, I covered my introduction to working with an editor and the edit process with the publication of my first two books.
This week, as promised, I take a look at the process for the forthcoming Unbroken. This particular venture into editing was both whimsical and edifying—I’d known the brilliant and sarcastic Debbie McGowan as a friend before she became my editor. This post details some of our most entertaining exchanges.
Our first editor/writer exchange occurred when Beaten Track acquired the print rights to my short story collection, Damaged Angels. One story, “A Working Boy,” is the tale of a hustler who falls in love with a former trick. He comes to understand the difference between sex for cash and sex as an expression of love. In error I had used both “cum” and “come” when describing male ejaculation which prompted the following comment:
[DMG]: There is a hysterical conversation taking place about this and the distinction of 'to ejaculate' and 'to arrive' …Anyway, I digress... OK - a couple of thoughts on this. Given the character AND the change from working sex to making love, we could make the shift from cum (porny - suits a hustler) to come (still slang, obviously, but more literary) in the last part. This is an issue we will return to in Unbroken!
[LB]: Okay, I like your approach of using the two spelling.
Then we moved onto Unbroken, which Beaten Track will publish this summer.
“He squinted in the watery blue light, laughed. “
[DMG]: You do this quite often - grammatically it requires an ‘and’.
[LB]: I Inserted and; we can look at case by case but the absence of “and” is a stylistic thing for me.
“Being reminded of Tony, of his absence, hearing him referred to in that way, caused something inside me to tear; fear, reason, unmoored, Miss Doolollie uncaged: I told you one day we would strike back. Today is that day.”
[DMG]: Writing in prose? Assuming you are, this is beautiful and it stays - this stylistic issue also relates back to prior comments regarding ‘lack of and’ - we just really need to make a decision one way or the other.
[LB]: Thank you and per my previous comment I’d rather not use “and” in these instances. Think of it this way, in 20 years when college students are writing papers on my works, this will give them a point to ponder…I shall be sure to mention “any missing “ands” are wholly the fault of the author” in my Acknowledgements.
[DMG]: Going to watching out for overuse of ‘serious’ - could be your ‘word of the novel’!
[DMG]: OXFORD COMMA ALERT (consistency check)
[LB]: What the hay is an OXFORD COMMA? But okay
[DMG]: Used in lists before an 'and'.
“He kissed me; I tasted the iron taste of blood, the salt of tears, though whether mine or his, I could not say.”
[DMG]: Could probably lose this (second “taste”)
[LB]: Good point. Okay.
"She chattered the whole way about Madame Billaud and her flight to Germany where she would change to a flight bound for Paris."
[DMG]: Why on to Germany to go to Paris. when Germany is past France when travelling from the US? It should be a city anyway - would imagine Dublin, but might be London or Manchester.
[LB]: Good catch. Geography is so not my thing; also except for Canada, I haven’t been out of US. London sounds good. Changed
“His fingers parted the tangle of curls that covered my head, and he pressed his lips against the spot he’d cleared. I fell asleep with his lips pressed against my skull like the promise of a new day.”
[DMG]: No edit - just WOW! Felt it needed to be said.
[LB]: Thanks. I love this scene.
“Upstairs, Thibodeaux pushed Jose to the front of the crowd directly in front of the stage. The go-go boy dancing center stage noticed him, flashed a smile, and shimmied over. He stepped to the edge of the stage and started to gyrate.”
[DMG]: Too many mentions of stage. Maybe try “The go-go boy dancing center stage notice him, flashed a smile and shimmied over, gyrating right in front of him. “
[LB]: Ok changed
Walking away from his mother and catching my hand in his, he said, “Come on. Let’s go.” His anger seemed to squeeze all the breathable air out of the room.
[DMG]: You use this structure quite a lot and it’s fine, but sometimes I think a change of order would be refreshing. Try instead (maybe): He walked away from his mother and caught my hand in his. “Come on. Let’s go,” he said. His anger seemed to squeeze all the breathable air out of the room.
[LB]: Let’s not change.
“When my mother came in with the turkey, she stopped short seeing Jose sitting next to me.”
[DMG]: Suggest rewrite: My mother came in with the turkey and stopped short when she saw Jose sitting next to me.
[LB]: Ok, change made. I actually lie your rewrite better than original.
“His mother, Marisol, and his nieces gathered and packed clothes, a box of Pampers, milk and whatever else they had on hand.”
[DMG]: Do you need to name-brand this? Would diapers not suffice?
[LB]: Changed. I used Pampers her as many people use “Kleenex” when they mean “tissue;” so the brand name comes to refer to the item itself, an advertisers dream.
[DMG]: NOTE: I will tackle the layout once we’re done editing - no point worrying about overflowing singular lines at this point! Thought I’d mention it now, as this is the one ‘chapter’ where it particularly stands out.
[LB]: Overflowing singular lines? Um yeah okay whatever you say.
“Good that’s settled, then,” Robert said, slapping his hand on the table, which seemed to be his wont.”
[DMG]: I know you acknowledge the repeat of this with ‘seemed to be his wont’, but I’m still not sure.
[LB]: Be sure. It stays. It will play nicely in the movie version ;-)
[DMG]: Blond or blonde? Which would you like? I think prior to this you’ve only used blond.
[LB]: I don’t care as long as it’s consistent.
[DMG]: Emdashes vs ellispes. It’s up to you, but I use emdashes for change of direction or where brackets could be used, and ellipses for thought processes and interruptions. I’m not bothered especially, so whichever you want to do (beauty of independence – we can cater for author preference in most cases), but you are a bit emdash-happy!
[LB]: Note please, I am taking the high road and ignoring you calling me emdash happy!
[DMG]: I know you think I'm obsessed, but do you realise you use 'invited' 4 times in this paragraph?
[LB]: *(massive) sigh* I rewrote. Can you live with the word used twice?
[DMG]: Dairy Queen and ice cream (scene)...letting it go...
[LB]: That sound you hear? The train leaving the station…
“Jose turned to the boys and Sam who stood just behind us and a little to the side.”
[DMG]: Do you need to give exact coordinates for Sam’s location?
[LB]: Fine. I rewrote--“Jose turned to the boys and Sam.”-- but when the movie director places them in the wrong spot for this scene it will be your fault!
[DMG]: I'll be sure to be getting in his/her face and DEMANDING that Sam is precisely 45.2 degrees NNW of Lincoln!
Once edits were completed, I mentioned her in the book's Acknowledgements:
Debbie McGowan, my friend, my editor―You believed in me from the beginning: You’re brilliant and exasperating. Your exacting standards and persistence were essential in making this book the best it could be.
Debbie wrote back “…and I’m sorry that I am exasperating, well, sort of sorry. If it pushes you to keep polishing, then it’s worth it.”
And that, my friends, I believe, sums up the best writer/editor relationship.
www.larrybenjamin.com
Don’t forget to like my Facebook page and connect with me on Twitter, too.
This week, as promised, I take a look at the process for the forthcoming Unbroken. This particular venture into editing was both whimsical and edifying—I’d known the brilliant and sarcastic Debbie McGowan as a friend before she became my editor. This post details some of our most entertaining exchanges.
Our first editor/writer exchange occurred when Beaten Track acquired the print rights to my short story collection, Damaged Angels. One story, “A Working Boy,” is the tale of a hustler who falls in love with a former trick. He comes to understand the difference between sex for cash and sex as an expression of love. In error I had used both “cum” and “come” when describing male ejaculation which prompted the following comment:
[DMG]: There is a hysterical conversation taking place about this and the distinction of 'to ejaculate' and 'to arrive' …Anyway, I digress... OK - a couple of thoughts on this. Given the character AND the change from working sex to making love, we could make the shift from cum (porny - suits a hustler) to come (still slang, obviously, but more literary) in the last part. This is an issue we will return to in Unbroken!
[LB]: Okay, I like your approach of using the two spelling.
Then we moved onto Unbroken, which Beaten Track will publish this summer.
“He squinted in the watery blue light, laughed. “
[DMG]: You do this quite often - grammatically it requires an ‘and’.
[LB]: I Inserted and; we can look at case by case but the absence of “and” is a stylistic thing for me.
“Being reminded of Tony, of his absence, hearing him referred to in that way, caused something inside me to tear; fear, reason, unmoored, Miss Doolollie uncaged: I told you one day we would strike back. Today is that day.”
[DMG]: Writing in prose? Assuming you are, this is beautiful and it stays - this stylistic issue also relates back to prior comments regarding ‘lack of and’ - we just really need to make a decision one way or the other.
[LB]: Thank you and per my previous comment I’d rather not use “and” in these instances. Think of it this way, in 20 years when college students are writing papers on my works, this will give them a point to ponder…I shall be sure to mention “any missing “ands” are wholly the fault of the author” in my Acknowledgements.
[DMG]: Going to watching out for overuse of ‘serious’ - could be your ‘word of the novel’!
[DMG]: OXFORD COMMA ALERT (consistency check)
[LB]: What the hay is an OXFORD COMMA? But okay
[DMG]: Used in lists before an 'and'.
“He kissed me; I tasted the iron taste of blood, the salt of tears, though whether mine or his, I could not say.”
[DMG]: Could probably lose this (second “taste”)
[LB]: Good point. Okay.
"She chattered the whole way about Madame Billaud and her flight to Germany where she would change to a flight bound for Paris."
[DMG]: Why on to Germany to go to Paris. when Germany is past France when travelling from the US? It should be a city anyway - would imagine Dublin, but might be London or Manchester.
[LB]: Good catch. Geography is so not my thing; also except for Canada, I haven’t been out of US. London sounds good. Changed
“His fingers parted the tangle of curls that covered my head, and he pressed his lips against the spot he’d cleared. I fell asleep with his lips pressed against my skull like the promise of a new day.”
[DMG]: No edit - just WOW! Felt it needed to be said.
[LB]: Thanks. I love this scene.
“Upstairs, Thibodeaux pushed Jose to the front of the crowd directly in front of the stage. The go-go boy dancing center stage noticed him, flashed a smile, and shimmied over. He stepped to the edge of the stage and started to gyrate.”
[DMG]: Too many mentions of stage. Maybe try “The go-go boy dancing center stage notice him, flashed a smile and shimmied over, gyrating right in front of him. “
[LB]: Ok changed
Walking away from his mother and catching my hand in his, he said, “Come on. Let’s go.” His anger seemed to squeeze all the breathable air out of the room.
[DMG]: You use this structure quite a lot and it’s fine, but sometimes I think a change of order would be refreshing. Try instead (maybe): He walked away from his mother and caught my hand in his. “Come on. Let’s go,” he said. His anger seemed to squeeze all the breathable air out of the room.
[LB]: Let’s not change.
“When my mother came in with the turkey, she stopped short seeing Jose sitting next to me.”
[DMG]: Suggest rewrite: My mother came in with the turkey and stopped short when she saw Jose sitting next to me.
[LB]: Ok, change made. I actually lie your rewrite better than original.
“His mother, Marisol, and his nieces gathered and packed clothes, a box of Pampers, milk and whatever else they had on hand.”
[DMG]: Do you need to name-brand this? Would diapers not suffice?
[LB]: Changed. I used Pampers her as many people use “Kleenex” when they mean “tissue;” so the brand name comes to refer to the item itself, an advertisers dream.
[DMG]: NOTE: I will tackle the layout once we’re done editing - no point worrying about overflowing singular lines at this point! Thought I’d mention it now, as this is the one ‘chapter’ where it particularly stands out.
[LB]: Overflowing singular lines? Um yeah okay whatever you say.
“Good that’s settled, then,” Robert said, slapping his hand on the table, which seemed to be his wont.”
[DMG]: I know you acknowledge the repeat of this with ‘seemed to be his wont’, but I’m still not sure.
[LB]: Be sure. It stays. It will play nicely in the movie version ;-)
[DMG]: Blond or blonde? Which would you like? I think prior to this you’ve only used blond.
[LB]: I don’t care as long as it’s consistent.
[DMG]: Emdashes vs ellispes. It’s up to you, but I use emdashes for change of direction or where brackets could be used, and ellipses for thought processes and interruptions. I’m not bothered especially, so whichever you want to do (beauty of independence – we can cater for author preference in most cases), but you are a bit emdash-happy!
[LB]: Note please, I am taking the high road and ignoring you calling me emdash happy!
[DMG]: I know you think I'm obsessed, but do you realise you use 'invited' 4 times in this paragraph?
[LB]: *(massive) sigh* I rewrote. Can you live with the word used twice?
[DMG]: Dairy Queen and ice cream (scene)...letting it go...
[LB]: That sound you hear? The train leaving the station…
“Jose turned to the boys and Sam who stood just behind us and a little to the side.”
[DMG]: Do you need to give exact coordinates for Sam’s location?
[LB]: Fine. I rewrote--“Jose turned to the boys and Sam.”-- but when the movie director places them in the wrong spot for this scene it will be your fault!
[DMG]: I'll be sure to be getting in his/her face and DEMANDING that Sam is precisely 45.2 degrees NNW of Lincoln!
Once edits were completed, I mentioned her in the book's Acknowledgements:
Debbie McGowan, my friend, my editor―You believed in me from the beginning: You’re brilliant and exasperating. Your exacting standards and persistence were essential in making this book the best it could be.
Debbie wrote back “…and I’m sorry that I am exasperating, well, sort of sorry. If it pushes you to keep polishing, then it’s worth it.”
And that, my friends, I believe, sums up the best writer/editor relationship.
www.larrybenjamin.com
Don’t forget to like my Facebook page and connect with me on Twitter, too.
June 5, 2013
It seems like I’ve been reading a lot of posts about editors and the editing process lately. Having just wrapped up edits on my new book, Unbroken, I thought I’d share my thoughts on the editorial process and share some of my more memorable exchanges with my editors. To date I’ve worked with three, make of that what you will.
I don’t submit a book until it is complete and as good as I can make it. Once I finish a book I go back and read it though twice to check for consistency, sequencing, character development, etc. then I do a final read through for proofing purposes. This is the part I hate the most, mostly because I’m not a very good proofreader and I’m not a detail person. Still it must be done. Because I don’t use a beta reader, my editor is the first person to read the book and my first opportunity to hear feedback.
I particularly value an editor’s input and expertise because I’ve read affair amount of self-published books and I can generally tell when a professional editor wasn’t involved. A good editor can make a great book sparkle. I try, always to listen to mine—which doesn’t mean I will agree with everything said, but I do listen—because unlike a reviewer, an editor has no axe to grind; he or she is simply there to make sure your book is professionally written and is the best it can be. Your editor is your book’s advocate if not necessarily your best friend and most adoring fan.
That said, let me share with you some actual exchanges with my editors.
What Binds Us
I was lucky enough to work with the stellar Rhonda Helms as my editor for my first book. I was terrified because I’d never worked with an editor. She was knowledgeable and patient but firm.
[RH]: Watch overuse of “look” and its forms. Go through and change at least half.
[RH]: You say “would” a lot. Watch overuse.
[RH]: Watch overuse of exclamation points. I’ve removed some. Recommend you do the same.
[RH]: Watch for this. If you’re continuing dialogue that has an interjected dialogue tag, use a comma and keep the first word in lower case. If you’re starting new dialogue, use a period and cap the first word.
[Me]: An interjected dialogue tag? You see why I need you?
“Mrs. Whyte was…different, a riddle without an answer. We didn’t see much of her. She appeared everyday at four o’clock, like a miracle. And at every meal, like an overly busy choreographer, to orchestrate our elaborate repasts. She seemed distracted, one casual eye on us, the other, more scrupulous, on other things.”
[RH]: This doesn’t quite work for me, actually…I tried tweaking it, but you can’t literally have your eyes on two different things. I’d reword. Maybe say attention half on them, half on…what else?
[Me]: I love that sentence but I’ve rewritten but I warn you, one day, somewhere, this sentence will reappear.
"Mrs. Whyte was…different, a riddle without an answer. We didn’t see much of her. She appeared everyday at four o’clock, like a miracle. And at every meal to orchestrate our elaborate repasts, like an overly busy choreographer. She always seemed distracted, as if whatever the three of us were up to didn’t warrant her full attention."
“Around his mother, Dondi was different. His voice grew deep. His manner of speech changed, was completely without artifice. If he spoke in italics to his friends, to his mother, he spoke lower case Times New Roman.”
[RH]: Italics isn’t a font, to be technical. It’s a tweaking of a font…change this to match up. Also, you can’t speak a font type.
[Me]: I tried & tried to rewrite this but couldn’t make it work so I just deleted.
“We got bikes out of the garage and rode them into the quaint Victorian village that was a gingerbread fantasy. We stopped at the old-fashioned ice-cream parlor, where we’d taken Geo and shared a banana split. After, pushing the bikes ahead of us, we walked along the wharf. His father’s mental illness and Dondi’s whoring seemed very far away.”
[RH]: Show a little more connection between the two of them here. A sentence or two about how they didn’t speak much, but they didn’t need to. They took comfort in each other’s presence. Or something like that. Let these little moments of them finding comfort and solace in each other show through in your prose.
[Me]: I added the following sentence.
“Matt didn’t say much, and neither did I. We didn’t need words; we had each other.”
“He did not possess the savage musculature of Michelangelo’s David, was more the David of Donatello’s imagination: slim, narrow-hipped, almost girlish. He was a beautiful white cat, lean and graceful. He had hair on his legs, long silky strands like climbing vines that only accentuated his nakedness. I thought of all those nights at Aurora when he’d lain on the other side of a door and might as well have been on the other side of the world. I thought of all those orgasms puddled on my stomach, damning as spilled milk, induced by just this image.”
[RH]: GREAT paragraph. This is so well done.
One of the best unexpected bonuses to working with an editor: actual praise and validation.
Damaged Angels
Damaged Angels didn’t require much in the way of developmental edits, but it did reveal apparent weakness in my grasp on correct grammar. Editor Cindy C. was firm and crisp and never having met her, I imagined her poring over my manuscript by candlelight, while wearing a starched black habit and slapping a rule r against her palm in dismay at the discovery of yet another present participle phrase.
[CC]: I noticed you have a tendency to use what are called present participle phrases. They are usually found at the beginning of a sentence with a word that ends in -ing. Many of them are grammatically incorrect. But even when they aren’t grammatically incorrect, you should minimize the usage. I’ve marked them and have inserted a comment explaining the issue. It’s not a huge problem, but it shows up enough times that I felt it would be easier to include these longer notes to explain the issue.
“I try to focus swollen, red eyes on the bedside clock.”
[CC]: This violates your POV. Your narrator has no way of knowing his eyes are red, only that they are swollen or tired or scratchy, etc.
“Eventually, the expensive booze silences my body’s screaming need for him. I plunge headlong into sleep, while he cries helplessly into the soft suede of the sofa.”
[CC]: This violates your POV. Aaron is narrating this story, so we can only know what he knows. If he’s asleep, then how does he know his lover is crying helplessly into the sofa?
[Me]:Good point. I rewrote.
I listen to him crying softly in the next room before I plunge headlong into sleep.
“Eddying at his feet is a sea of broken, blackened glass like shattered dreams. A thousand thousand jigsaw pieces reflecting the hopelessness and despair of a city lost.”
[CC]: Query: intentional repeat of thousand?
[Me]: Yes; that’s a deliberate repetition; it’s a stylistic thing for me.
“As he lay on the sandy beach, his paprika skin darkening to cinnamon, surreptitiously eyeing the half-naked native boys frolicking at the water’s edge, restless with a vague, nascent longing, his mother would accuse him of not concentrating, or worse, of not trying, as he gave wrong answer after wrong answer.”
[CC]: You want to be very careful about adding multiple phrases on top of each other as you do here. They can create unclear modifiers, as you’ve done twice. When you add multiple modifying descriptions offset by commas, you create confusing modifiers. We don’t know whether the phrase after the comma is supposed to modify the noun that immediately precedes it, or the one before that (or the one before that one)
[Me]: (wondering) Is she still speaking English?
“It’s not crooked,” she bristled. “It’s European!”
[CC]: Bristled isn’t a dialogue tag – it’s not a way of speaking. She can bristle without it being a tag, but not as a tag.
[Me]: I rewrote. Better? If not feel free to delete “She bristled” and leave as straight dialogue.
She bristled. “It’s not crooked. It’s European!”
“Then, refilling his glass from a pitcher on the counter, he wandered off in search of less alarming sights.”
[CC]: Improper participle here. He’s not simultaneously refilling his glass and wandering off.
[Me]: (thinking) present participle phrases? Confusing modifiers? Improper participles? Yikes! Maybe I should become a painter…
[Me]: Okay I think I corrected all of these.
"He refilled his glass from a pitcher on the counter, before wandering off in search of less alarming sights."
“Billy! William Thurston Howell! You come back here! Right! Now!”
[CC]: Is this an unintentional reference to the Gilligan’s Island character?
[Me]: Yikes! Thanks for catching that. I’ve renamed him.
Each of my editors has taught me a lot and helped me become a better writer. I try to use everything I learn in the next book I write so hopefully each editor has made the job of her successor easier.
Next week I’ll blog about edits to my newest book, Unbroken, scheduled for a Summer 2013 release from Beaten Track Publishing. You won’t want to miss the details on a conversation with my editor about how to refer to...ummm…male ejaculate. In the meantime, leave a comment telling me about your experiences working with an editor.
www.larrybenjamin.com
Don’t forget to like my Facebook page and connect with me on Twitter, too.
I don’t submit a book until it is complete and as good as I can make it. Once I finish a book I go back and read it though twice to check for consistency, sequencing, character development, etc. then I do a final read through for proofing purposes. This is the part I hate the most, mostly because I’m not a very good proofreader and I’m not a detail person. Still it must be done. Because I don’t use a beta reader, my editor is the first person to read the book and my first opportunity to hear feedback.
I particularly value an editor’s input and expertise because I’ve read affair amount of self-published books and I can generally tell when a professional editor wasn’t involved. A good editor can make a great book sparkle. I try, always to listen to mine—which doesn’t mean I will agree with everything said, but I do listen—because unlike a reviewer, an editor has no axe to grind; he or she is simply there to make sure your book is professionally written and is the best it can be. Your editor is your book’s advocate if not necessarily your best friend and most adoring fan.
That said, let me share with you some actual exchanges with my editors.
What Binds Us
I was lucky enough to work with the stellar Rhonda Helms as my editor for my first book. I was terrified because I’d never worked with an editor. She was knowledgeable and patient but firm.
[RH]: Watch overuse of “look” and its forms. Go through and change at least half.
[RH]: You say “would” a lot. Watch overuse.
[RH]: Watch overuse of exclamation points. I’ve removed some. Recommend you do the same.
[RH]: Watch for this. If you’re continuing dialogue that has an interjected dialogue tag, use a comma and keep the first word in lower case. If you’re starting new dialogue, use a period and cap the first word.
[Me]: An interjected dialogue tag? You see why I need you?
“Mrs. Whyte was…different, a riddle without an answer. We didn’t see much of her. She appeared everyday at four o’clock, like a miracle. And at every meal, like an overly busy choreographer, to orchestrate our elaborate repasts. She seemed distracted, one casual eye on us, the other, more scrupulous, on other things.”
[RH]: This doesn’t quite work for me, actually…I tried tweaking it, but you can’t literally have your eyes on two different things. I’d reword. Maybe say attention half on them, half on…what else?
[Me]: I love that sentence but I’ve rewritten but I warn you, one day, somewhere, this sentence will reappear.
"Mrs. Whyte was…different, a riddle without an answer. We didn’t see much of her. She appeared everyday at four o’clock, like a miracle. And at every meal to orchestrate our elaborate repasts, like an overly busy choreographer. She always seemed distracted, as if whatever the three of us were up to didn’t warrant her full attention."
“Around his mother, Dondi was different. His voice grew deep. His manner of speech changed, was completely without artifice. If he spoke in italics to his friends, to his mother, he spoke lower case Times New Roman.”
[RH]: Italics isn’t a font, to be technical. It’s a tweaking of a font…change this to match up. Also, you can’t speak a font type.
[Me]: I tried & tried to rewrite this but couldn’t make it work so I just deleted.
“We got bikes out of the garage and rode them into the quaint Victorian village that was a gingerbread fantasy. We stopped at the old-fashioned ice-cream parlor, where we’d taken Geo and shared a banana split. After, pushing the bikes ahead of us, we walked along the wharf. His father’s mental illness and Dondi’s whoring seemed very far away.”
[RH]: Show a little more connection between the two of them here. A sentence or two about how they didn’t speak much, but they didn’t need to. They took comfort in each other’s presence. Or something like that. Let these little moments of them finding comfort and solace in each other show through in your prose.
[Me]: I added the following sentence.
“Matt didn’t say much, and neither did I. We didn’t need words; we had each other.”
“He did not possess the savage musculature of Michelangelo’s David, was more the David of Donatello’s imagination: slim, narrow-hipped, almost girlish. He was a beautiful white cat, lean and graceful. He had hair on his legs, long silky strands like climbing vines that only accentuated his nakedness. I thought of all those nights at Aurora when he’d lain on the other side of a door and might as well have been on the other side of the world. I thought of all those orgasms puddled on my stomach, damning as spilled milk, induced by just this image.”
[RH]: GREAT paragraph. This is so well done.
One of the best unexpected bonuses to working with an editor: actual praise and validation.
Damaged Angels
Damaged Angels didn’t require much in the way of developmental edits, but it did reveal apparent weakness in my grasp on correct grammar. Editor Cindy C. was firm and crisp and never having met her, I imagined her poring over my manuscript by candlelight, while wearing a starched black habit and slapping a rule r against her palm in dismay at the discovery of yet another present participle phrase.
[CC]: I noticed you have a tendency to use what are called present participle phrases. They are usually found at the beginning of a sentence with a word that ends in -ing. Many of them are grammatically incorrect. But even when they aren’t grammatically incorrect, you should minimize the usage. I’ve marked them and have inserted a comment explaining the issue. It’s not a huge problem, but it shows up enough times that I felt it would be easier to include these longer notes to explain the issue.
“I try to focus swollen, red eyes on the bedside clock.”
[CC]: This violates your POV. Your narrator has no way of knowing his eyes are red, only that they are swollen or tired or scratchy, etc.
“Eventually, the expensive booze silences my body’s screaming need for him. I plunge headlong into sleep, while he cries helplessly into the soft suede of the sofa.”
[CC]: This violates your POV. Aaron is narrating this story, so we can only know what he knows. If he’s asleep, then how does he know his lover is crying helplessly into the sofa?
[Me]:Good point. I rewrote.
I listen to him crying softly in the next room before I plunge headlong into sleep.
“Eddying at his feet is a sea of broken, blackened glass like shattered dreams. A thousand thousand jigsaw pieces reflecting the hopelessness and despair of a city lost.”
[CC]: Query: intentional repeat of thousand?
[Me]: Yes; that’s a deliberate repetition; it’s a stylistic thing for me.
“As he lay on the sandy beach, his paprika skin darkening to cinnamon, surreptitiously eyeing the half-naked native boys frolicking at the water’s edge, restless with a vague, nascent longing, his mother would accuse him of not concentrating, or worse, of not trying, as he gave wrong answer after wrong answer.”
[CC]: You want to be very careful about adding multiple phrases on top of each other as you do here. They can create unclear modifiers, as you’ve done twice. When you add multiple modifying descriptions offset by commas, you create confusing modifiers. We don’t know whether the phrase after the comma is supposed to modify the noun that immediately precedes it, or the one before that (or the one before that one)
[Me]: (wondering) Is she still speaking English?
“It’s not crooked,” she bristled. “It’s European!”
[CC]: Bristled isn’t a dialogue tag – it’s not a way of speaking. She can bristle without it being a tag, but not as a tag.
[Me]: I rewrote. Better? If not feel free to delete “She bristled” and leave as straight dialogue.
She bristled. “It’s not crooked. It’s European!”
“Then, refilling his glass from a pitcher on the counter, he wandered off in search of less alarming sights.”
[CC]: Improper participle here. He’s not simultaneously refilling his glass and wandering off.
[Me]: (thinking) present participle phrases? Confusing modifiers? Improper participles? Yikes! Maybe I should become a painter…
[Me]: Okay I think I corrected all of these.
"He refilled his glass from a pitcher on the counter, before wandering off in search of less alarming sights."
“Billy! William Thurston Howell! You come back here! Right! Now!”
[CC]: Is this an unintentional reference to the Gilligan’s Island character?
[Me]: Yikes! Thanks for catching that. I’ve renamed him.
Each of my editors has taught me a lot and helped me become a better writer. I try to use everything I learn in the next book I write so hopefully each editor has made the job of her successor easier.
Next week I’ll blog about edits to my newest book, Unbroken, scheduled for a Summer 2013 release from Beaten Track Publishing. You won’t want to miss the details on a conversation with my editor about how to refer to...ummm…male ejaculate. In the meantime, leave a comment telling me about your experiences working with an editor.
www.larrybenjamin.com
Don’t forget to like my Facebook page and connect with me on Twitter, too.
May 10, 2013
I didn’t sleep around much when I was young and single and this puzzled my friends. We were young and gay, after all, during a time when the prevailing wisdom suggested that once one had slept with all the available men on the East Coast, one simply moved to the West coast and started over.
For me desire has always come about as a result of something else; desire, for me, was an outgrowth of emotional attachment or personal attraction. Some friends pitied me for I clearly wasn’t good looking enough to join the party. Others, kinder perhaps, saw my refusal to join the fun as a confirmation of the fact that I did not understand the point of being gay. It was an unmooring from society, a freeing from responsibility, a denial of obligation, of fidelity to anyone or anything beyond the moment, beyond desire; it was a celebration of the absence of the need to build a lasting relationship, of the absence of the desire to commit.
I dared not tell them that I believed love and sex required us to be accountable—to ourselves, to those we loved and those who loved us. I dared not tell them that I had always dreamed of settling down with one person, that I had always dreamed of getting married, that when, at age twelve, I realized I was gay, that dream did not die.
Instead, I waited and I dreamed. And I read. A lot. Mostly the classics: The Brontes, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Dickens. When I got to college, I discovered the gay writers: Edmund White, Felice Picano, Gore Vidal.
I still read a lot of gay fiction. One thing that burns me about a lot of gay contemporary fiction is the amount of sex they include. I tend to get bored with prolonged sex scenes; unless a sex scene is short, I skip over it. I recently finished reading a book which left me disappointed because while it had a promising premise it became quickly apparent that the “plot” was merely a device to weave a series of sex acts into a book.
When I read a book whose characters have lots of non-stop sex, I’m left wondering do these people ever sleep? go to work? do laundry? Most galling is descriptions of anonymous sex and numerous hook ups with virtual strangers. More than forty years into the LGBT battle for equality, more than twenty-five years into the AIDS epidemic, I’m left to wonder: have we come no further than this? Do people still believe being gay is only about sex?
This got me thinking about how I approach sex in my writing. I tend to write about romantic love which presents a challenge. I mean how do you write about two people in love and without writing about their sex life? When I write about sex, I try hard not to trivialize it. I try hard not to reduce it to some simple biological imperative requiring no more thought―and carrying no more meaning― than blowing one’s nose or scratching one’s ass.
In my first book, What Binds Us, I struggled with the problem of sex because it was important as it allowed the characters to connect with each other on a physical level which was a connection they craved.
In the book, it takes a long time for Thomas-Edward and Matthew to connect which irritated some readers and a few reviewers but I got an email from one reader who described herself as “a straight, white woman;” she wrote, in part, “By reading your story, I learned that real love does not have to be physical to be real…Reading this earlier could have changed everything for me…”
The first time Thomas sees Matthew naked he is stunned by how beautiful he is. He can’t help remembering how, longing for Matthew who slept in an adjoining room, he had been compelled to masturbate. He writes:
He did not possess the savage musculature of Michelangelo’s David, was more the David of Donatello’s imagination: slim, narrow-hipped, almost girlish. He was a beautiful white cat, lean and graceful. He had hair on his legs, long silky strands like climbing vines that only accentuated his nakedness. I thought of all those nights at Aurora when he’d lain on the other side of a door and might as well have been on the other side of the world. I thought of all those orgasms puddled on my stomach, damning as spilled milk, induced by just this image.
The story or Thomas-Edward and Matthew is mostly about the surprise they feel in discovering each other. When they finally come together, each is sure there is no one in the universe as magical and wondrous as the other. I imagined their sex would be romantic, almost poetic. I thought detailing the mechanics of their sex (i.e. who did what to whom) would interrupt the magic, so I wrote:
Flesh touched flesh. Limbs entwined: black, white, black; lips and tongue and teeth tasted flesh too long hungered for. We did everything. Nothing about either of us was forbidden the other. “No” was not in the vocabulary of our sex. I looked at his face through the V of my legs. I looked at his face above me and below me. I found I liked saying his name, said it over and over again. He said nothing, only smiled in the light and held me close.
Always before, sex had been a negating experience. With ejaculation came an end to desire, to intimacy. With Matthew, sex was an affirmation, a shouted yes. Afterwards, we stood on the threshold of something. Always before, the threshold had been behind me. And I’d stood alone.
Avoiding the description of sex in Damaged Angels, my collection of short stories, was considerably more difficult as several of the stories were about young men who worked in the sex industry. One story, “A Working Boy,” is told from the point of view of Pitch, a rent boy who takes us on a journey through a regular “work day.” He is on the cusp of committing to his quasi boyfriend, an older man he refers to as Loverman. While working one day he has an epiphany:
“I start thinking about quitting again. I guess I first started thinking about quitting after I met Loverman. Once, in bed with him, it occurred to me that we weren’t having sex, which is what I have all the time. It was something else. I mean, the moves were the same, but there was all this feeling. I remember thinking that maybe what we were doing was making love…
He goes on to explain:
When I first met him, I sold him my body, which didn’t surprise him. What I did that night was make him a present of my heart. Which surprised us both.”
In “Precious Cargo,” one of my favorite stories in the collection, the protagonist, yearning for his absent lover masturbates in the shower. I wanted to capture not so much the act of self-pleasure but the emotional vaunt of his need, the emptiness he feels in his lover’s absence:
“…I feel it pucker against my intruding finger. Open. Sucking. Greedy. Full of need. Quicksilver seed scatters. Sown on white tile. Fruitless. Sliding down the drain.”
Later when he and his lover come together briefly:
“He steps forward. Holds my head between his thighs. A pulse beats against my temple. The masculine scent of him fills my nostrils. My open mouth. Welcoming. The triumvirate of his manhood.”
For me, Damaged Angels was in many ways experimental—in use of language, subject matter and sexual portrayal. Coming between What Binds Us and the forthcoming Unbroken, both romances, with Damaged Angels, I wanted to step away and stretch myself in a different direction as a writer. I wanted to tell a grittier story to explore “dirtier” sex.
In Unbroken the sex is more complex because I needed to render a few different kinds of sex—first time sex, sex-for-its-own-sake, make up sex, sex within the context of a deep and abiding love and rougher sex within the context of that same love. The sex scenes were harder here because they needed to be described in detail but also needed to describe more than the mechanical aspect of sex, each act needed to reveal something about the characters’ emotions and state of mind. As a result, much of the sex in Unbroken left me breathless. I can only hope it does it same for my readers.
While all the stories I’ve written so far are about love and desire, not all explore the sex act. And that I think is as it should be. For me it’s always about the love, the characters and the nature and context of desire.
www.larrybenjamin.com
For me desire has always come about as a result of something else; desire, for me, was an outgrowth of emotional attachment or personal attraction. Some friends pitied me for I clearly wasn’t good looking enough to join the party. Others, kinder perhaps, saw my refusal to join the fun as a confirmation of the fact that I did not understand the point of being gay. It was an unmooring from society, a freeing from responsibility, a denial of obligation, of fidelity to anyone or anything beyond the moment, beyond desire; it was a celebration of the absence of the need to build a lasting relationship, of the absence of the desire to commit.
I dared not tell them that I believed love and sex required us to be accountable—to ourselves, to those we loved and those who loved us. I dared not tell them that I had always dreamed of settling down with one person, that I had always dreamed of getting married, that when, at age twelve, I realized I was gay, that dream did not die.
Instead, I waited and I dreamed. And I read. A lot. Mostly the classics: The Brontes, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Dickens. When I got to college, I discovered the gay writers: Edmund White, Felice Picano, Gore Vidal.
I still read a lot of gay fiction. One thing that burns me about a lot of gay contemporary fiction is the amount of sex they include. I tend to get bored with prolonged sex scenes; unless a sex scene is short, I skip over it. I recently finished reading a book which left me disappointed because while it had a promising premise it became quickly apparent that the “plot” was merely a device to weave a series of sex acts into a book.
When I read a book whose characters have lots of non-stop sex, I’m left wondering do these people ever sleep? go to work? do laundry? Most galling is descriptions of anonymous sex and numerous hook ups with virtual strangers. More than forty years into the LGBT battle for equality, more than twenty-five years into the AIDS epidemic, I’m left to wonder: have we come no further than this? Do people still believe being gay is only about sex?
This got me thinking about how I approach sex in my writing. I tend to write about romantic love which presents a challenge. I mean how do you write about two people in love and without writing about their sex life? When I write about sex, I try hard not to trivialize it. I try hard not to reduce it to some simple biological imperative requiring no more thought―and carrying no more meaning― than blowing one’s nose or scratching one’s ass.
In my first book, What Binds Us, I struggled with the problem of sex because it was important as it allowed the characters to connect with each other on a physical level which was a connection they craved.
In the book, it takes a long time for Thomas-Edward and Matthew to connect which irritated some readers and a few reviewers but I got an email from one reader who described herself as “a straight, white woman;” she wrote, in part, “By reading your story, I learned that real love does not have to be physical to be real…Reading this earlier could have changed everything for me…”
The first time Thomas sees Matthew naked he is stunned by how beautiful he is. He can’t help remembering how, longing for Matthew who slept in an adjoining room, he had been compelled to masturbate. He writes:
He did not possess the savage musculature of Michelangelo’s David, was more the David of Donatello’s imagination: slim, narrow-hipped, almost girlish. He was a beautiful white cat, lean and graceful. He had hair on his legs, long silky strands like climbing vines that only accentuated his nakedness. I thought of all those nights at Aurora when he’d lain on the other side of a door and might as well have been on the other side of the world. I thought of all those orgasms puddled on my stomach, damning as spilled milk, induced by just this image.
The story or Thomas-Edward and Matthew is mostly about the surprise they feel in discovering each other. When they finally come together, each is sure there is no one in the universe as magical and wondrous as the other. I imagined their sex would be romantic, almost poetic. I thought detailing the mechanics of their sex (i.e. who did what to whom) would interrupt the magic, so I wrote:
Flesh touched flesh. Limbs entwined: black, white, black; lips and tongue and teeth tasted flesh too long hungered for. We did everything. Nothing about either of us was forbidden the other. “No” was not in the vocabulary of our sex. I looked at his face through the V of my legs. I looked at his face above me and below me. I found I liked saying his name, said it over and over again. He said nothing, only smiled in the light and held me close.
Always before, sex had been a negating experience. With ejaculation came an end to desire, to intimacy. With Matthew, sex was an affirmation, a shouted yes. Afterwards, we stood on the threshold of something. Always before, the threshold had been behind me. And I’d stood alone.
Avoiding the description of sex in Damaged Angels, my collection of short stories, was considerably more difficult as several of the stories were about young men who worked in the sex industry. One story, “A Working Boy,” is told from the point of view of Pitch, a rent boy who takes us on a journey through a regular “work day.” He is on the cusp of committing to his quasi boyfriend, an older man he refers to as Loverman. While working one day he has an epiphany:
“I start thinking about quitting again. I guess I first started thinking about quitting after I met Loverman. Once, in bed with him, it occurred to me that we weren’t having sex, which is what I have all the time. It was something else. I mean, the moves were the same, but there was all this feeling. I remember thinking that maybe what we were doing was making love…
He goes on to explain:
When I first met him, I sold him my body, which didn’t surprise him. What I did that night was make him a present of my heart. Which surprised us both.”
In “Precious Cargo,” one of my favorite stories in the collection, the protagonist, yearning for his absent lover masturbates in the shower. I wanted to capture not so much the act of self-pleasure but the emotional vaunt of his need, the emptiness he feels in his lover’s absence:
“…I feel it pucker against my intruding finger. Open. Sucking. Greedy. Full of need. Quicksilver seed scatters. Sown on white tile. Fruitless. Sliding down the drain.”
Later when he and his lover come together briefly:
“He steps forward. Holds my head between his thighs. A pulse beats against my temple. The masculine scent of him fills my nostrils. My open mouth. Welcoming. The triumvirate of his manhood.”
For me, Damaged Angels was in many ways experimental—in use of language, subject matter and sexual portrayal. Coming between What Binds Us and the forthcoming Unbroken, both romances, with Damaged Angels, I wanted to step away and stretch myself in a different direction as a writer. I wanted to tell a grittier story to explore “dirtier” sex.
In Unbroken the sex is more complex because I needed to render a few different kinds of sex—first time sex, sex-for-its-own-sake, make up sex, sex within the context of a deep and abiding love and rougher sex within the context of that same love. The sex scenes were harder here because they needed to be described in detail but also needed to describe more than the mechanical aspect of sex, each act needed to reveal something about the characters’ emotions and state of mind. As a result, much of the sex in Unbroken left me breathless. I can only hope it does it same for my readers.
While all the stories I’ve written so far are about love and desire, not all explore the sex act. And that I think is as it should be. For me it’s always about the love, the characters and the nature and context of desire.
www.larrybenjamin.com
April 28, 2013
It was my friend, Shirley, who gave me the idea. When my second book, Damaged Angels, was recently released in paperback by Beaten Track, she asked, “Can I just go into Barnes & Noble and buy it?”
“I guess,” I said.
“Let’s go look for it.”
“What?”
“Let’s go see if they have it. If they do, we’ll pick it up and talk real loud about what a wonderful book it is and how brilliant the author is.”
I’d, of course, seen the new cover and the book in “layout” via PDF but I was still anxious to hold it in my hand. I will never forget the day my author’s copies arrived (duly documented on my Facebook page). I was even more excited when Stanley asked if he could have one and if I would sign it for him. Looking back, that’s when I got bitten, I think.
I was possessed by an uncontrollable urge to see my book on a shelf in a bookstore. I had jury duty the week the book released and as soon as they dismissed us for lunch, I rocketed down to Giovanni’s Room—the oldest continuously operating gay book store in the U.S. I searched the new book displays and the shelves. Alas, no book. I inquired at the counter (guilt induced me to buy two other books I had no interest in reading.) The guy behind the counter said they could order the book and sent me upstairs. The guy upstairs said he could order it after looking it up on his computer. He immediately launched into a long, incomprehensible soliloquy about the discount offered by the supplier. Evidently the 5% discount meant the store wouldn’t make any money on the sale of the book. I felt bad so I ordered two copies (more royalties for me, right?) He asked for my name and phone number so they could call when the book came in. Too embarrassed to give my own, I gave them Stanley’s name.
Glancing at the book’s description on his computer, he said, “I’ve never heard of Larry Benjamin. May I ask how you know about him?”
Crap. Busted. “Um…well…I’m him. That is… it’s my book. I mean I’m Larry Benjamin.”
He stared at me for a minute. “Why didn’t you say so? We get authors in here all the time and they never tell us who they are.”
We chatted a few more minutes during which I tried to sound articulate and writerly and also plugged the hell out of Unbroken due out this summer.
Next, I went to Barnes and Noble where a surly dishwater blonde listlessly looked up my book. She showed me her computer monitor.
“Yep that’s it,” I said.
“We’ll have to order it,” she said.
“Okay, that’s fine.”
“You’ll need to pay in advance.”
“That’s fine. I’d like two copies, please.”
“Two copies, Damaged Angels by Larry Benjamin,” she repeated as she typed. “Your name please?”
“Er…Larry Benjamin.” I paused, waiting for the inevitable question.
“Benjamin. How do you spell that?”
Was she freakin’ kidding me?
At the checkout, the clerk reviewed the order, read it back to me “Two copies, Damaged Angels by Larry Benjamin.”
I handed and her my credit card. She glanced at it, ran it through and handed it back. “Have a nice day,” she said handing me my receipt.
Really that was it?
I‘m not sure what I expected, but a marching band and an offer of champagne and hordes of people pleading with me to sign their copy of my book wouldn’t have surprised me.
I picked up my books two weeks later. A different surly dishwater blond, this one with dark roots, searched behind the counter and handed me a plain brown parcel which had my name highlighted in yellow and presumably containing my book. “Have a nice day,” she said without making eye contact.
As I walked to the car with my nondescript brown parcel, I remembered a trip I’d made to Washington D.C., right after graduation with my then boyfriend. He’d taken me to the White House because, he said, that’s what families do and we are a family.
We stepped over the homeless people sleeping on blankets on the sidewalk and peered through the gates.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “It’s smaller than I imagined.
www.larrybenjamin.com
Follow me on Facebook: http://ow.ly/kv2Nl
“I guess,” I said.
“Let’s go look for it.”
“What?”
“Let’s go see if they have it. If they do, we’ll pick it up and talk real loud about what a wonderful book it is and how brilliant the author is.”
I’d, of course, seen the new cover and the book in “layout” via PDF but I was still anxious to hold it in my hand. I will never forget the day my author’s copies arrived (duly documented on my Facebook page). I was even more excited when Stanley asked if he could have one and if I would sign it for him. Looking back, that’s when I got bitten, I think.
I was possessed by an uncontrollable urge to see my book on a shelf in a bookstore. I had jury duty the week the book released and as soon as they dismissed us for lunch, I rocketed down to Giovanni’s Room—the oldest continuously operating gay book store in the U.S. I searched the new book displays and the shelves. Alas, no book. I inquired at the counter (guilt induced me to buy two other books I had no interest in reading.) The guy behind the counter said they could order the book and sent me upstairs. The guy upstairs said he could order it after looking it up on his computer. He immediately launched into a long, incomprehensible soliloquy about the discount offered by the supplier. Evidently the 5% discount meant the store wouldn’t make any money on the sale of the book. I felt bad so I ordered two copies (more royalties for me, right?) He asked for my name and phone number so they could call when the book came in. Too embarrassed to give my own, I gave them Stanley’s name.
Glancing at the book’s description on his computer, he said, “I’ve never heard of Larry Benjamin. May I ask how you know about him?”
Crap. Busted. “Um…well…I’m him. That is… it’s my book. I mean I’m Larry Benjamin.”
He stared at me for a minute. “Why didn’t you say so? We get authors in here all the time and they never tell us who they are.”
We chatted a few more minutes during which I tried to sound articulate and writerly and also plugged the hell out of Unbroken due out this summer.
Next, I went to Barnes and Noble where a surly dishwater blonde listlessly looked up my book. She showed me her computer monitor.
“Yep that’s it,” I said.
“We’ll have to order it,” she said.
“Okay, that’s fine.”
“You’ll need to pay in advance.”
“That’s fine. I’d like two copies, please.”
“Two copies, Damaged Angels by Larry Benjamin,” she repeated as she typed. “Your name please?”
“Er…Larry Benjamin.” I paused, waiting for the inevitable question.
“Benjamin. How do you spell that?”
Was she freakin’ kidding me?
At the checkout, the clerk reviewed the order, read it back to me “Two copies, Damaged Angels by Larry Benjamin.”
I handed and her my credit card. She glanced at it, ran it through and handed it back. “Have a nice day,” she said handing me my receipt.
Really that was it?
I‘m not sure what I expected, but a marching band and an offer of champagne and hordes of people pleading with me to sign their copy of my book wouldn’t have surprised me.
I picked up my books two weeks later. A different surly dishwater blond, this one with dark roots, searched behind the counter and handed me a plain brown parcel which had my name highlighted in yellow and presumably containing my book. “Have a nice day,” she said without making eye contact.
As I walked to the car with my nondescript brown parcel, I remembered a trip I’d made to Washington D.C., right after graduation with my then boyfriend. He’d taken me to the White House because, he said, that’s what families do and we are a family.
We stepped over the homeless people sleeping on blankets on the sidewalk and peered through the gates.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “It’s smaller than I imagined.
www.larrybenjamin.com
Follow me on Facebook: http://ow.ly/kv2Nl
April 7, 2013
I am probably irritating. I talk. A lot. Probably too much. And I ask a lot of questions. Because I am interested; I want to know. This personality trait led to a fight with the Mister the other night. We had an argument as couples do. Or rather I had an argument. He sat across the table silent until I grabbed my glass of wine and headed upstairs to my office, more frustrated than angry. I am often frustrated with him. I think my frustration stems from his unwillingness/inability to answer me: why are you mad? Why are you so cranky? This is a trait he shares with my father. It wasn’t until a few years ago that I realized that it takes far more strength to hold your tongue than to unleash it; the knowledge, however, does not mean I forgive my father his silence. And so I’m reluctant to let Stanley off the hook. I am articulate—I can tell you at any given moment exactly what I’m feeling and why or why I’ve done/said what I did. Not so with him and this both frustrates and angers me.
Coco, our ailing, aging, Lhasa Apso has taken to drinking inordinate amounts of water. She drinks almost to the point of compulsion. But she won’t pee. We walk her for blocks and many, many long minutes and still nothing, not even a dribble. It frustrates me because I want to know why she is drinking so much, why she does not feel the need to pee. I pee. A lot. I pee almost as much as I talk. I cannot imagine what it is like to not pee for 12 hours at a stretch. I worry that she is in distress or in any sort of discomfort.. I’m a worrier and a fixer but I can’t fix what I don’t understand. And she can’t talk.
When I write, I almost always know my characters’ motivations for their actions. In real life, not so much. I am a lover of words but more than that I believe in words.
In the last few weeks, I’ve read over the body of my work as I was getting ready for the paperback release of Damaged Angels and doing first round edits on Unbroken. I’ve realized silence, the inability of some to articulate what they are feeling is a recurring theme in my writing; certainly it is the central theme in the forthcoming Unbroken.
In Unbroken, main character Lincoln tells us:
My parents, unable to change me, had instead, silenced me. When they’d stilled my hands, they’d taken my words, made me lower my voice to a whisper. Later, I remained silent in defense, refusing to acknowledge the hateful words: Braniac. Sissy. Faggot.
In What Binds Us, Matthew and Thomas-Edward almost miss the chance for love because each is afraid to tell the other he loves him.
The men and boys in Damaged Angels are often inarticulate, sometimes able to outrun their demons but never able to talk to them, to negotiate a truce, an end to the hostilities. This is most true in “Spam,” in which Billy’s father mirrors, uncomfortably, my own father, as I search for the source of his silence:
Sensing defeat, but unable to surrender, Billy turned to his father. “Dad?” One word, but in that one word was a plea of grand eloquence.
His father glanced at his mother. “Your father says, ‘No,’” Teresa informed her son. Then to her husband, “Isn’t it time you left for work?”
He nodded, rose, kissed the proffered cheek.
“Dad?” Again the plea, febrile desire.
His father turned to look at him. With his eyes, he asked him to understand. And then he was gone, a lone white figure fading into the whiteness of the morning.
Do not misinterpret the silence of Billy’s father. Do not think him a foolish man. Or worse, an indifferent one, for in truth, he is neither. Nor has he always been a man of silences. In fact, it was not until some months into his marriage to the girl, Teresa, with the hair of combed fire, that he lost his words.
As for the Mister and I, we are fine. I was sleeping when he left for work the next morning but he kissed the top of my head as he does every morning to wake me. As I lay there half-awake I realized we are not two characters in a romantic novel, are instead just two guys with common goals and similar sensibilities, but very different personalities who love and respect each other, who are trying to build something lasting.
I am a talker. Sometimes I need to listen. But in order to listen, I need Stanley to talk. Sometimes.
For the full story on the paperback release of Damaged Angels, see Beaten Track Publishing’s blog here: http://networkedblogs.com/JZhC2
www.larrybenjamin.com
Coco, our ailing, aging, Lhasa Apso has taken to drinking inordinate amounts of water. She drinks almost to the point of compulsion. But she won’t pee. We walk her for blocks and many, many long minutes and still nothing, not even a dribble. It frustrates me because I want to know why she is drinking so much, why she does not feel the need to pee. I pee. A lot. I pee almost as much as I talk. I cannot imagine what it is like to not pee for 12 hours at a stretch. I worry that she is in distress or in any sort of discomfort.. I’m a worrier and a fixer but I can’t fix what I don’t understand. And she can’t talk.
When I write, I almost always know my characters’ motivations for their actions. In real life, not so much. I am a lover of words but more than that I believe in words.
In the last few weeks, I’ve read over the body of my work as I was getting ready for the paperback release of Damaged Angels and doing first round edits on Unbroken. I’ve realized silence, the inability of some to articulate what they are feeling is a recurring theme in my writing; certainly it is the central theme in the forthcoming Unbroken.
In Unbroken, main character Lincoln tells us:
My parents, unable to change me, had instead, silenced me. When they’d stilled my hands, they’d taken my words, made me lower my voice to a whisper. Later, I remained silent in defense, refusing to acknowledge the hateful words: Braniac. Sissy. Faggot.
In What Binds Us, Matthew and Thomas-Edward almost miss the chance for love because each is afraid to tell the other he loves him.
The men and boys in Damaged Angels are often inarticulate, sometimes able to outrun their demons but never able to talk to them, to negotiate a truce, an end to the hostilities. This is most true in “Spam,” in which Billy’s father mirrors, uncomfortably, my own father, as I search for the source of his silence:
Sensing defeat, but unable to surrender, Billy turned to his father. “Dad?” One word, but in that one word was a plea of grand eloquence.
His father glanced at his mother. “Your father says, ‘No,’” Teresa informed her son. Then to her husband, “Isn’t it time you left for work?”
He nodded, rose, kissed the proffered cheek.
“Dad?” Again the plea, febrile desire.
His father turned to look at him. With his eyes, he asked him to understand. And then he was gone, a lone white figure fading into the whiteness of the morning.
Do not misinterpret the silence of Billy’s father. Do not think him a foolish man. Or worse, an indifferent one, for in truth, he is neither. Nor has he always been a man of silences. In fact, it was not until some months into his marriage to the girl, Teresa, with the hair of combed fire, that he lost his words.
As for the Mister and I, we are fine. I was sleeping when he left for work the next morning but he kissed the top of my head as he does every morning to wake me. As I lay there half-awake I realized we are not two characters in a romantic novel, are instead just two guys with common goals and similar sensibilities, but very different personalities who love and respect each other, who are trying to build something lasting.
I am a talker. Sometimes I need to listen. But in order to listen, I need Stanley to talk. Sometimes.
For the full story on the paperback release of Damaged Angels, see Beaten Track Publishing’s blog here: http://networkedblogs.com/JZhC2
www.larrybenjamin.com
February 18, 2013
So, if you read this blog regularly, or you follow me on Facebook or Twitter, or even if you just ran into me randomly on the street, you know I’ve spent the last ten months writing my third book. And if you do any of those things, you know it was called “His Name Was Jose.” (see my earlier blog post for the reason why: http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_...).
About halfway through writing the book, I changed the title because as I wrote the story it became clear to me the story was larger than Jose. In fact, it had three other titles before I landed on the final one. The story as it unfolded, as my characters told it to me, became more than just a romance between two young gay men. It became a tale of survival, of what it takes to hold on to love and each other in an often hostile, unwelcoming world. It examines the damage we, as a society, as parents, inflict when we pin our expectations and preconceived notions of what a boy (or girl) should be/do, on our youth. It looks at how that can break us, how we can be made to feel we are broken and, most importantly, how we have the power to unbreak ourselves. Thus, the new title is “Unbroken.”
"Unbroken," which spans 40 years, opens in 1964, when protagonist, five year old Lincoln de Chabert, a gentle effeminate boy, comes home from kindergarten and announces he will marry his best friend, Orlando, when he grows up. He is told he can’t marry another boy; the news baffles him: “Why not?” he asks “You said I could do anything. You said I could grow up to be President.”
His parents spring into action determined to unbend him― his father takes him to baseball games and the movie, “Patton;” it’s a battle of wills as Lincoln is determined to be himself at all costs.
When at twelve Lincoln falls in love with the new kid, Jose, he is confused:
“I had believed their lies, had ignored my own truth. I would change they told me, just wait and see. I would want to marry a girl, have children, and a dog, and a split-level house in the suburbs just like on The Brady Bunch because that’s what all boys wanted when they grew up and left childish things behind. Time, they said, would fix me, and I’d feel as other boys felt…Time had passed and I was still…broken.”
As I got ready to send the manuscript to my publisher, I realized I needed to describe the book’s genre. I ended up describing it as, “Part romance, part coming-of-age novel, part elegy.” But I think it is nothing so much as a love letter from my 12 year old self to the 12 year old boy I fell in love with in seventh grade. A boy, I suspect, who was barely aware of my existence let alone the fact that I was in love with him. A boy who smiled at me in innocence, and changed my life. It is a love letter lost for years and-finally delivered, by the post office, to that boy, 40 years late.
About halfway through writing the book, I changed the title because as I wrote the story it became clear to me the story was larger than Jose. In fact, it had three other titles before I landed on the final one. The story as it unfolded, as my characters told it to me, became more than just a romance between two young gay men. It became a tale of survival, of what it takes to hold on to love and each other in an often hostile, unwelcoming world. It examines the damage we, as a society, as parents, inflict when we pin our expectations and preconceived notions of what a boy (or girl) should be/do, on our youth. It looks at how that can break us, how we can be made to feel we are broken and, most importantly, how we have the power to unbreak ourselves. Thus, the new title is “Unbroken.”
"Unbroken," which spans 40 years, opens in 1964, when protagonist, five year old Lincoln de Chabert, a gentle effeminate boy, comes home from kindergarten and announces he will marry his best friend, Orlando, when he grows up. He is told he can’t marry another boy; the news baffles him: “Why not?” he asks “You said I could do anything. You said I could grow up to be President.”
His parents spring into action determined to unbend him― his father takes him to baseball games and the movie, “Patton;” it’s a battle of wills as Lincoln is determined to be himself at all costs.
When at twelve Lincoln falls in love with the new kid, Jose, he is confused:
“I had believed their lies, had ignored my own truth. I would change they told me, just wait and see. I would want to marry a girl, have children, and a dog, and a split-level house in the suburbs just like on The Brady Bunch because that’s what all boys wanted when they grew up and left childish things behind. Time, they said, would fix me, and I’d feel as other boys felt…Time had passed and I was still…broken.”
As I got ready to send the manuscript to my publisher, I realized I needed to describe the book’s genre. I ended up describing it as, “Part romance, part coming-of-age novel, part elegy.” But I think it is nothing so much as a love letter from my 12 year old self to the 12 year old boy I fell in love with in seventh grade. A boy, I suspect, who was barely aware of my existence let alone the fact that I was in love with him. A boy who smiled at me in innocence, and changed my life. It is a love letter lost for years and-finally delivered, by the post office, to that boy, 40 years late.
February 8, 2013
Yesterday, I posted an angry response to a post by fellow writer, Laura Susan Johnson, author of “Crush” and “Bright,” her current work in progress. Her post was in response to a gay author who, after reading excerpts from "Bright," told her gay readers were tiring of gay fiction being mostly about gay erotica and indiscriminate gay "encounters". In her post, defending her position, Laura wrote in part, “the very words "gay" and "homosexual" and "lesbian" are not only about identity, they are about sexuality.” (read the complete post here: http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_...)
I posted a response, writing, in part, that as a writer and a gay man I was completely put off by her assertion. I put forth the notion that “being gay, lesbian, homosexual is about attraction, it’s about who you want to hold hands with, who you want to go to prom with, who you want to build a life with. Sex is an outgrowth of attraction, an expression of something. And yes, sometimes it’s just a primal urge but surely not all the time, not every time, not exclusively.”
In retrospect, my response was probably a bit harsh (I can be a bit of a hot head—especially when I care about something passionately), so after a night’s sleep I have decided to attempt to articulate my position again. As Laura explained her thinking through her characters, I think I will attempt to do the same.
In “His Name Was Jose,” the book, I’m currently finishing, the main character, Lincoln, is introduced at age 6. He lands in hot water when he comes home from first grade and announces he will marry his best friend, a boy, when he grows up. To make matters worse, he is an effeminate boy. My challenge here was how to define Lincoln as gay outside the context of sexuality (he is after all six). Later, when he is twelve he falls in love with Jose. Again the challenge was describing desire, attraction, without the element of sexual desire. That same sex attraction makes him gay but he is not yet a sexual being. What does yearning for another boy feel like at that age, the age before sex rises to consciousness? In large part because so much of the character of Lincoln is grounded in me and my experiences, it was mostly a matter of remembering. And when Lincoln does discover sexual desire, it takes an odd form. Later, at 15 when he enters into his first sexual relationship with another boy, Tony, I try to get beyond the act itself to what is drives their desire, what they get from the closeness of sex, how it makes Lincoln feel.
I think the best way to sum up my view point on what it means to be gay is to quote a passage from the book. Thirty years after he last saw Tony, Lincoln wonders where he is, what he is doing:
“I found myself thinking about Tony more and more. I remembered the two of us looking at Time magazine, at a photo of two men in San Francisco, climbing a hilly shaded street holding hands. In daylight. “Look,” he’d said, “That could be us one day.” We’d marveled at that picture, that such a place existed. Tony cut the picture out, and after carefully folding it, tucked it into his wallet. I’d like to think that he’s in San Francisco now. That he’s found a man to hold hands with. That is my wish for him. I know it was his for me.”
What do you think? How do you define being gay?
For more about me, my take on gay romance and my books, visit me at www.larrybenjamin.com
Note: You can read Laura’s follow up post here: http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_...
I posted a response, writing, in part, that as a writer and a gay man I was completely put off by her assertion. I put forth the notion that “being gay, lesbian, homosexual is about attraction, it’s about who you want to hold hands with, who you want to go to prom with, who you want to build a life with. Sex is an outgrowth of attraction, an expression of something. And yes, sometimes it’s just a primal urge but surely not all the time, not every time, not exclusively.”
In retrospect, my response was probably a bit harsh (I can be a bit of a hot head—especially when I care about something passionately), so after a night’s sleep I have decided to attempt to articulate my position again. As Laura explained her thinking through her characters, I think I will attempt to do the same.
In “His Name Was Jose,” the book, I’m currently finishing, the main character, Lincoln, is introduced at age 6. He lands in hot water when he comes home from first grade and announces he will marry his best friend, a boy, when he grows up. To make matters worse, he is an effeminate boy. My challenge here was how to define Lincoln as gay outside the context of sexuality (he is after all six). Later, when he is twelve he falls in love with Jose. Again the challenge was describing desire, attraction, without the element of sexual desire. That same sex attraction makes him gay but he is not yet a sexual being. What does yearning for another boy feel like at that age, the age before sex rises to consciousness? In large part because so much of the character of Lincoln is grounded in me and my experiences, it was mostly a matter of remembering. And when Lincoln does discover sexual desire, it takes an odd form. Later, at 15 when he enters into his first sexual relationship with another boy, Tony, I try to get beyond the act itself to what is drives their desire, what they get from the closeness of sex, how it makes Lincoln feel.
I think the best way to sum up my view point on what it means to be gay is to quote a passage from the book. Thirty years after he last saw Tony, Lincoln wonders where he is, what he is doing:
“I found myself thinking about Tony more and more. I remembered the two of us looking at Time magazine, at a photo of two men in San Francisco, climbing a hilly shaded street holding hands. In daylight. “Look,” he’d said, “That could be us one day.” We’d marveled at that picture, that such a place existed. Tony cut the picture out, and after carefully folding it, tucked it into his wallet. I’d like to think that he’s in San Francisco now. That he’s found a man to hold hands with. That is my wish for him. I know it was his for me.”
What do you think? How do you define being gay?
For more about me, my take on gay romance and my books, visit me at www.larrybenjamin.com
Note: You can read Laura’s follow up post here: http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_...
February 4, 2013
As part of the Next Big Thing Blog Hop, I tagged new author and friend, T.A. Hall, whose debut novel, “Dancing Like Nobody's Watching - Contra Dance,” will be out this Spring. I am hosting him on my blog this week, so read on to learn more about his soon-to-be released debut novel.
1. What is the working title of your book?
Dancing Like Nobody’s Watching – Contra Dance
2. Where did the idea come from for the book?
The idea to write the book came to me in 1998 while caring for my partner of 10 years who was dying of AIDS. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had slipped into a slight depression. I was in my late twenties carrying an enormous amount of responsibility which I was emotionally ill equipped to handle. To have such a wholesome, fulfilling relationship deteriorate before my eyes, not through any fault of either one of us, was difficult. I didn’t think I’d ever have a relationship like that again until the day I opened an email that contained a piece of prose entitled “Happiness is a Journey” by Crystal Boyd. It inspired me to write a story that would encourage others to keep dancing (i.e. living) until their journey ends.
3. What is the genre of the book?
I am not sure exactly how to categorize it. I guess Contemporary m/m romance would be the best description.
4. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
There are three main characters for which casting is of utmost importance. I could see Brian White as Jayson, the lead character; Antwon Tanner, as Thaddeus; and Lance Gross as Erik. That’s of course, IF they’d be open to playing gay characters.
5. What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?
On his quest for freedom and independence, Jayson comes face-to-face with fear, and the harsh realities of being young, gay, and black in the 80's ― when house music reigned, friendships were treasured, and AIDS ravaged an already isolated Community.
6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency/publisher?
Because of my control issues, I’ve decided to self-publish this one. I anticipate a Spring 2013 release.
7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
I actually started writing in 1998 rather feverishly, but life happened (career, graduate school, law school) and I stopped writing. Then, I lost what I’d written and saved to a thumb drive; I decided that it wasn’t in the cards for me to write the story. I later found it while cleaning my home office in 2011. Finding it was, to me, confirmation that I had to finish what I’d started. I wrote rather consistently for about a year and finished July 22, 2012. I started to cry after I typed the last word of the first draft.
8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
I really don’t think it’s like any other story, however, “Invisible Life,” by E. Lynn Harris, comes to mind. There are elements to the story that might seem similar or familiar because life tends to affect us in similar ways – either directly or indirectly, but I don’t believe THIS story’s been written, though I think it’s been lived by many.
9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?
1) An amazing partner who made me a believer in same gender love,
2) Some incredible friends who lost their battle with AIDS and received no medal for the fight, and
3) words contained in a random email I opened at work one day, that reminded me of why I am still here.
10. What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
Lovers of 80’s and 90’s music will appreciate the trip down memory lane, as lyrics from the era are scattered throughout the story….dancing is, of course, in the title, right?
Intrigued? Watch the trailer for “Dancing Like Nobody’s Watching – Contra Dance” here: http://animoto.com/play/oFKc0dG9OkGUn...
I love the cover for this book--it has so much movemnet and promise. Check it out here: http://tahallthewriter.bravesites.com...
Well this has been fun. If you missed my previous post on my next big thing, a collaboration with Randy Ott, you can read about it here. http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_...
Special thanks to my fellow writer and friend, Andrew. Q. Gordon, who tagged me. Read an excerpt from his latest release, “The Last Grand Master,” here: http://andrewqgordon.com/2013/02/01/w...
http://www.larrybenjamin.com/
1. What is the working title of your book?
Dancing Like Nobody’s Watching – Contra Dance
2. Where did the idea come from for the book?
The idea to write the book came to me in 1998 while caring for my partner of 10 years who was dying of AIDS. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had slipped into a slight depression. I was in my late twenties carrying an enormous amount of responsibility which I was emotionally ill equipped to handle. To have such a wholesome, fulfilling relationship deteriorate before my eyes, not through any fault of either one of us, was difficult. I didn’t think I’d ever have a relationship like that again until the day I opened an email that contained a piece of prose entitled “Happiness is a Journey” by Crystal Boyd. It inspired me to write a story that would encourage others to keep dancing (i.e. living) until their journey ends.
3. What is the genre of the book?
I am not sure exactly how to categorize it. I guess Contemporary m/m romance would be the best description.
4. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
There are three main characters for which casting is of utmost importance. I could see Brian White as Jayson, the lead character; Antwon Tanner, as Thaddeus; and Lance Gross as Erik. That’s of course, IF they’d be open to playing gay characters.
5. What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?
On his quest for freedom and independence, Jayson comes face-to-face with fear, and the harsh realities of being young, gay, and black in the 80's ― when house music reigned, friendships were treasured, and AIDS ravaged an already isolated Community.
6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency/publisher?
Because of my control issues, I’ve decided to self-publish this one. I anticipate a Spring 2013 release.
7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
I actually started writing in 1998 rather feverishly, but life happened (career, graduate school, law school) and I stopped writing. Then, I lost what I’d written and saved to a thumb drive; I decided that it wasn’t in the cards for me to write the story. I later found it while cleaning my home office in 2011. Finding it was, to me, confirmation that I had to finish what I’d started. I wrote rather consistently for about a year and finished July 22, 2012. I started to cry after I typed the last word of the first draft.
8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
I really don’t think it’s like any other story, however, “Invisible Life,” by E. Lynn Harris, comes to mind. There are elements to the story that might seem similar or familiar because life tends to affect us in similar ways – either directly or indirectly, but I don’t believe THIS story’s been written, though I think it’s been lived by many.
9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?
1) An amazing partner who made me a believer in same gender love,
2) Some incredible friends who lost their battle with AIDS and received no medal for the fight, and
3) words contained in a random email I opened at work one day, that reminded me of why I am still here.
10. What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
Lovers of 80’s and 90’s music will appreciate the trip down memory lane, as lyrics from the era are scattered throughout the story….dancing is, of course, in the title, right?
Intrigued? Watch the trailer for “Dancing Like Nobody’s Watching – Contra Dance” here: http://animoto.com/play/oFKc0dG9OkGUn...
I love the cover for this book--it has so much movemnet and promise. Check it out here: http://tahallthewriter.bravesites.com...
Well this has been fun. If you missed my previous post on my next big thing, a collaboration with Randy Ott, you can read about it here. http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_...
Special thanks to my fellow writer and friend, Andrew. Q. Gordon, who tagged me. Read an excerpt from his latest release, “The Last Grand Master,” here: http://andrewqgordon.com/2013/02/01/w...
http://www.larrybenjamin.com/
January 27, 2013
I was tagged for the Next Blog Hop. Again. This time by my friend and fellow author, Andrew Q. Gordon. Fortunately, I recently began work on a fourth book with the amazing Randy Ott. More on that in a minute.
I’d like to thank Andrew (in my head I call to him as “Q” but I’m not sure how he’d take that, so we’ll stick to “Andrew” here) for tagging me. If you missed Andrew’s Blog Hop post, last week, you can read it here: http://andrewqgordon.com/2013/01/20/t... And, he has a new book, “The Last Grand Master,” releasing February 1. You can learn more about it here: http://andrewqgordon.com/2013/01/25/t...
Now, onto my—and Randy’s—Next Big Thing:
1. What is the working title of your book?
In one of our early email conversations, I told Randy that I thought he was a remarkable man. He dismissed my admiration by writing back, “I'm nothing special…when you get knocked down, you pull up your big girl panties and take on another day.” We both agreed that at least for a working title, we had to use “Pull Up Your Big Girl Panties.”
2. Where did the idea come from?
Larry: Randy approached me with the idea of writing his life story. He asked if I’d be willing to help him tell his story. Once he ran down the highlights, I realized it was a remarkable story, unlike any I’ve heard or read before. I knew he needed to tell his story and I wanted to help him tell that story.
Randy: I’ve been told many times I should write a book about all I’ve been through. Up until a few months ago I sort of shrugged it off. I know I’ve survived and thrived no matter what’s been thrown at me but this is my life. I don’t know what it’s like to live any other way. It’s just what I’ve been handed.
3. What is the genre of your book?
Absolutely it’s a memoir, and maybe inspirational, with lots of humor thrown in.
4. Which actors would you chose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
Randy: I really don’t know. Probably more than one because of the physical size change. Maybe Kiefer Sutherland post weight loss/post accident.
5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
It’s a story of survival, of resilience, of one unstoppable man who survives an HIV then AIDS diagnosis, falls into depression and eats and cries and cries and eats until he weighs 347 pounds, undergoes Bariatric Surgery, loses 186 pounds, then gets into a car accident, which leaves him with a level 2 and 3 lacerated liver and spleen, 14 broken ribs, head trauma, coma and congestive heart failure.
6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency/publisher?
We’re looking to use a publisher rather than self-publishing. That’s the route I went for my first two books and it seems to work well for me.
7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
We’re actually just beginning to work on the project. We have an outline, Randy will be working from.
8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Randy: I don’t know of any quite like this off hand. I think that’s what will make it pull you in.
Larry: I have to agree. It’s a touching story of strength and resilience and determination. It’s full of drama but Randy tells it without melodrama or self-pity. And he laughs at himself and his situation. I think that’s what makes this book unique.
9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?
Larry: Just hearing Randy’s story and getting to know him over the last couple of months made me want to help tell this story. He is such a remarkable man. He’s been through so much yet he remains strong, upbeat and positive in attitude. He should be an example and an inspiration to us all.
Randy: I ran a weekly support group for weight loss surgery patients for about two and a half years. I tried to use my 186 pound weight loss to inspire the pre-op patients and recent post-op patients. I tried to show them that it takes determination but it can be done. There have been some patients who have told me that I really helped them. Several told me they wouldn’t have made it without my weekly Pep Rally. I figure if I can be such a help to our group, maybe through my book can I help others, who out there alone, with no support system them, get through the rough days so they can succeed, too.
Secondly, I only personally know one person who has lived with HIV longer than I. Knowing my status can show currently diagnosed people that it’s no longer a death sentence. You just have to find a good Infectious Diseases Doctor, find the right meds for your strain of HIV, then TAKE YOUR MEDS. I mentored a patient for a local clinic to get him on the right track. Once diagnosed, taking your meds becomes like your job. You take them as directed and never miss a dose. No excuses if you wants to live. It’s simple!
Third and last, recovery from a horrific car crash. The first trauma team doctor didn’t want to operate on me. He said it was a waste of time. A second team was willing to operate. However, that doctor said IF I survived I, most likely, wouldn’t walk or talk again. Anybody who knows me knows you can’t shut me up.
I walked in a 5K last Summer and plan to run in one this Spring. Recovery was worse than anything I can describe in a few sentences. But after 34 days in the hospital I went home. Slowly I got rid of the walker then the cane. Now I walk/run on the treadmill and outside. Recovery is in your lap. If you want it badly enough, you just have to fight like hell, Pull Up Your Big Girl Panties and take responsibility for your mental and physical well-being.
10. What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
Randy: It’s just a feel good story about someone beating the odd 3 times and still ready to take on the day and crack a few jokes along the way.
Larry: If you’ve read either of my books, you know I have a distinctive voice. Randy has his own way of expressing himself. And the story will be told entirely from his point of view. Until now, writing, for me, has been a solitary experience, so I’m looking forward to the complexity and excitement of working collaboratively, of subordinating my voice to Randy’s.
Once again this has been fun—what’s more fun than writing about writing? Thanks for reading. We’re going to close with eth opening lines from “Pull Up Your Big Girl Panties:”
I stood speechless and watched Mother drown puppy after puppy in a galvanized bucket. She held them under the water until their helpless little bodies gave up, and stopped swimming, I knew then, I was going to have to work hard and become a fighter if I was going to survive.
I was 7 years old.
I tag another new author and friend, T.A. Hall, whose debut novel, “Dancing Like Nobody's Watching - Contra Dance,” will be out this Spring. I’ll be hosting his blog post here next Monday February 4, so stop by to check it out. For more on T.A. Hall, visit his website at: http://tahallthewriter.bravesites.com/
I’d like to thank Andrew (in my head I call to him as “Q” but I’m not sure how he’d take that, so we’ll stick to “Andrew” here) for tagging me. If you missed Andrew’s Blog Hop post, last week, you can read it here: http://andrewqgordon.com/2013/01/20/t... And, he has a new book, “The Last Grand Master,” releasing February 1. You can learn more about it here: http://andrewqgordon.com/2013/01/25/t...
Now, onto my—and Randy’s—Next Big Thing:
1. What is the working title of your book?
In one of our early email conversations, I told Randy that I thought he was a remarkable man. He dismissed my admiration by writing back, “I'm nothing special…when you get knocked down, you pull up your big girl panties and take on another day.” We both agreed that at least for a working title, we had to use “Pull Up Your Big Girl Panties.”
2. Where did the idea come from?
Larry: Randy approached me with the idea of writing his life story. He asked if I’d be willing to help him tell his story. Once he ran down the highlights, I realized it was a remarkable story, unlike any I’ve heard or read before. I knew he needed to tell his story and I wanted to help him tell that story.
Randy: I’ve been told many times I should write a book about all I’ve been through. Up until a few months ago I sort of shrugged it off. I know I’ve survived and thrived no matter what’s been thrown at me but this is my life. I don’t know what it’s like to live any other way. It’s just what I’ve been handed.
3. What is the genre of your book?
Absolutely it’s a memoir, and maybe inspirational, with lots of humor thrown in.
4. Which actors would you chose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
Randy: I really don’t know. Probably more than one because of the physical size change. Maybe Kiefer Sutherland post weight loss/post accident.
5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
It’s a story of survival, of resilience, of one unstoppable man who survives an HIV then AIDS diagnosis, falls into depression and eats and cries and cries and eats until he weighs 347 pounds, undergoes Bariatric Surgery, loses 186 pounds, then gets into a car accident, which leaves him with a level 2 and 3 lacerated liver and spleen, 14 broken ribs, head trauma, coma and congestive heart failure.
6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency/publisher?
We’re looking to use a publisher rather than self-publishing. That’s the route I went for my first two books and it seems to work well for me.
7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
We’re actually just beginning to work on the project. We have an outline, Randy will be working from.
8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Randy: I don’t know of any quite like this off hand. I think that’s what will make it pull you in.
Larry: I have to agree. It’s a touching story of strength and resilience and determination. It’s full of drama but Randy tells it without melodrama or self-pity. And he laughs at himself and his situation. I think that’s what makes this book unique.
9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?
Larry: Just hearing Randy’s story and getting to know him over the last couple of months made me want to help tell this story. He is such a remarkable man. He’s been through so much yet he remains strong, upbeat and positive in attitude. He should be an example and an inspiration to us all.
Randy: I ran a weekly support group for weight loss surgery patients for about two and a half years. I tried to use my 186 pound weight loss to inspire the pre-op patients and recent post-op patients. I tried to show them that it takes determination but it can be done. There have been some patients who have told me that I really helped them. Several told me they wouldn’t have made it without my weekly Pep Rally. I figure if I can be such a help to our group, maybe through my book can I help others, who out there alone, with no support system them, get through the rough days so they can succeed, too.
Secondly, I only personally know one person who has lived with HIV longer than I. Knowing my status can show currently diagnosed people that it’s no longer a death sentence. You just have to find a good Infectious Diseases Doctor, find the right meds for your strain of HIV, then TAKE YOUR MEDS. I mentored a patient for a local clinic to get him on the right track. Once diagnosed, taking your meds becomes like your job. You take them as directed and never miss a dose. No excuses if you wants to live. It’s simple!
Third and last, recovery from a horrific car crash. The first trauma team doctor didn’t want to operate on me. He said it was a waste of time. A second team was willing to operate. However, that doctor said IF I survived I, most likely, wouldn’t walk or talk again. Anybody who knows me knows you can’t shut me up.
I walked in a 5K last Summer and plan to run in one this Spring. Recovery was worse than anything I can describe in a few sentences. But after 34 days in the hospital I went home. Slowly I got rid of the walker then the cane. Now I walk/run on the treadmill and outside. Recovery is in your lap. If you want it badly enough, you just have to fight like hell, Pull Up Your Big Girl Panties and take responsibility for your mental and physical well-being.
10. What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
Randy: It’s just a feel good story about someone beating the odd 3 times and still ready to take on the day and crack a few jokes along the way.
Larry: If you’ve read either of my books, you know I have a distinctive voice. Randy has his own way of expressing himself. And the story will be told entirely from his point of view. Until now, writing, for me, has been a solitary experience, so I’m looking forward to the complexity and excitement of working collaboratively, of subordinating my voice to Randy’s.
Once again this has been fun—what’s more fun than writing about writing? Thanks for reading. We’re going to close with eth opening lines from “Pull Up Your Big Girl Panties:”
I stood speechless and watched Mother drown puppy after puppy in a galvanized bucket. She held them under the water until their helpless little bodies gave up, and stopped swimming, I knew then, I was going to have to work hard and become a fighter if I was going to survive.
I was 7 years old.
I tag another new author and friend, T.A. Hall, whose debut novel, “Dancing Like Nobody's Watching - Contra Dance,” will be out this Spring. I’ll be hosting his blog post here next Monday February 4, so stop by to check it out. For more on T.A. Hall, visit his website at: http://tahallthewriter.bravesites.com/
December 30, 2012
So now that the holidays are pretty much behind us (New Year’s doesn’t count—really a day devoted to Mummers and football is a holiday in my book), I thought I’d share the secrets to successful holiday entertaining. There are, you see, rules―secret, unspoken. Until now.
Invitees
Don’t invite your relatives. You are friends with your friends for as reason—they like you and you like them. You spend time together because you want to. No growing up stories or bond of blood ties you together. There aren’t decades of buried resentment between you, or sibling rivalries.
If you must ignore my advice and invite your mother, be sure to leave something uncleaned (see “Cleaning” below). She will spot it immediately and set to work scrubbing and polishing, leaving you free of her company. Also if she can criticize your housekeeping abilities, she will be less likely to criticize the person you’ve chosen to marry/date/cohabitate with/fuck, or the fact that your dog sleeps in your bed.
Cleaning
Don’t befriend anyone taller than you—this allows you not to worry about what the top of your range hood or refrigerator looks like.
Don’t befriend anyone who has a neater, more organized house than you do. Trust me, you’ll regret having them over.
Remove from your invite list friends who have a child who is crawling. Nothing reveals that your gorgeous Brazilian Cherry floors have not been mopped in two years, faster than a 12-month old crawling across said Brazilian Cherry floors in spotless Baby Gap attire.
When having guests, clean the bathroom last. When you finish cleaning the bathroom, sit on the toilet and look around. Women are more observant than men and far more likely to both be in this position and have the time to look around. Make sure there is nothing for them to see.
Speaking of which, remove the sex toys and/or Viagra from the medicine cabinet. Make a note to find a new home for these after the party; they don’t belong in the medicine cabinet.
Cooking
Be firm about your menu and style of eating—buffet? Sit down? Cocktails on the back lawn? We prefer sit-downs with the good china and Grammy’s silver. I always politely refuse offers to contribute a portion of the meal. I like to control my entire menu including dessert and wine selection. Potluck doesn’t work for me. I know that. Everyone I know, knows that.
Mix it Up
Don’t be afraid to invite people who don’t know each other—they have you in common so chances are they will have other shared interests.
Same goes for the food. For Christmas we mixed ethnicities—Asian inspired cranberry-kumquat relish and southern Smoked Sausage Jambalaya. We like to mix the fancy with the mundane so we had served caramelized onion & orange relish in pastry shells and sliced pear on blue cheese drizzled with dark chocolate balsamic vinegar on homemade French bread alongside pigs in a blanket. What boomer doesn’t remember those from childhood and who doesn’t find comfort in biting into a cocktail frank wrapped in dough?
Remember: Grace Under Pressure
Accidents happen: glasses break, wine gets spilled. (For our commitment ceremony, Stanley was terrified of red wine stains so the entire menu was built to complement white wine and champagne.) In the event of an accident, always act gracefully and ease your unfortunate guest’s embarrassment—remember he or she feels badly enough. Did your neighbor get too enthusiastic during the toast and shatter the vintage stemware you’d coveted practically since birth and finally inherited from great aunt Fiona after falsifying her will? Shrug and say “Oh thank you—I hated those glasses. Now I have an excuse to get ones I really like!”
Relax
Really, relax—if you’re relaxed and having fun, your guest will too.
Want to know more about me? Visit: http://www.larrybenjamin.com/
Invitees
Don’t invite your relatives. You are friends with your friends for as reason—they like you and you like them. You spend time together because you want to. No growing up stories or bond of blood ties you together. There aren’t decades of buried resentment between you, or sibling rivalries.
If you must ignore my advice and invite your mother, be sure to leave something uncleaned (see “Cleaning” below). She will spot it immediately and set to work scrubbing and polishing, leaving you free of her company. Also if she can criticize your housekeeping abilities, she will be less likely to criticize the person you’ve chosen to marry/date/cohabitate with/fuck, or the fact that your dog sleeps in your bed.
Cleaning
Don’t befriend anyone taller than you—this allows you not to worry about what the top of your range hood or refrigerator looks like.
Don’t befriend anyone who has a neater, more organized house than you do. Trust me, you’ll regret having them over.
Remove from your invite list friends who have a child who is crawling. Nothing reveals that your gorgeous Brazilian Cherry floors have not been mopped in two years, faster than a 12-month old crawling across said Brazilian Cherry floors in spotless Baby Gap attire.
When having guests, clean the bathroom last. When you finish cleaning the bathroom, sit on the toilet and look around. Women are more observant than men and far more likely to both be in this position and have the time to look around. Make sure there is nothing for them to see.
Speaking of which, remove the sex toys and/or Viagra from the medicine cabinet. Make a note to find a new home for these after the party; they don’t belong in the medicine cabinet.
Cooking
Be firm about your menu and style of eating—buffet? Sit down? Cocktails on the back lawn? We prefer sit-downs with the good china and Grammy’s silver. I always politely refuse offers to contribute a portion of the meal. I like to control my entire menu including dessert and wine selection. Potluck doesn’t work for me. I know that. Everyone I know, knows that.
Mix it Up
Don’t be afraid to invite people who don’t know each other—they have you in common so chances are they will have other shared interests.
Same goes for the food. For Christmas we mixed ethnicities—Asian inspired cranberry-kumquat relish and southern Smoked Sausage Jambalaya. We like to mix the fancy with the mundane so we had served caramelized onion & orange relish in pastry shells and sliced pear on blue cheese drizzled with dark chocolate balsamic vinegar on homemade French bread alongside pigs in a blanket. What boomer doesn’t remember those from childhood and who doesn’t find comfort in biting into a cocktail frank wrapped in dough?
Remember: Grace Under Pressure
Accidents happen: glasses break, wine gets spilled. (For our commitment ceremony, Stanley was terrified of red wine stains so the entire menu was built to complement white wine and champagne.) In the event of an accident, always act gracefully and ease your unfortunate guest’s embarrassment—remember he or she feels badly enough. Did your neighbor get too enthusiastic during the toast and shatter the vintage stemware you’d coveted practically since birth and finally inherited from great aunt Fiona after falsifying her will? Shrug and say “Oh thank you—I hated those glasses. Now I have an excuse to get ones I really like!”
Relax
Really, relax—if you’re relaxed and having fun, your guest will too.
Want to know more about me? Visit: http://www.larrybenjamin.com/
Larry Benjamin's blog - This Writer's Life
The writer's life is as individual and strange as each writer. I'll document my journey as a writer here.
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