Ryan Field's Blog, page 496

Fifty Shades of Grey...E.L. James

First, this post is based on my experiences as a reader and a consumer. As a blogger I'm allowed to step back and speak as a customer sometimes. I have never let my career as a writer define me in any way and when I write posts like this I'm thinking just like any other reader out there who loves to buy books.

Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James is interesting to me because I first learned about it a couple of weeks back by reading a horrific review by someone with an unpronounceable name. I came across the review on a well known romance review web site. I posted about my experience here on the blog, without mentioning names (I'm not linking to the post now because I didn't mention the book was Fifty Shades of Grey at the time and I don't want to single anyone out...or give them extra hits on their web site for free). Oddly, after I read the scathing review, a good friend in New York phoned me later that night to make plans for the following weekend and she mentioned she was reading the book and loved it. Much later I heard that Jay Leno had spoken about it, along with a few others in the mainstream media I won't bore you to death with now.

I'd already bought the book based completely on the bad book review. I'd made the purchase because I find that whenever I see a bad review on this one particular web site nine times out of ten I'm going to wind up loving the book. It's a fascinating concept I've posted about more than once. It doesn't make much sense. But it works for me as a consumer. All I can say is when a handful of like-minded people don't like a book, and hundreds (maybe thousands) of others do, something isn't quite right.

I'm still reading it now. I'll post more in the future after I'm finished. Because this isn't a book review site I'm allowed to post about books I'm reading just as much as I'm allowed to post about books I've read. And I want people to know Fifty Shades of Grey is one of those books that draws the reader in and holds them captive until they can't keep their eyes open any longer. I read late at night, usually until about one in the morning, and I've been staying up much later than I normally would. It's also a love story with BDSM, and I'm not even fond of BDSM.

I've heard the book was pubbed as fanfic, and frankly that doesn't bother me in the least. I don't know who set the rules up for fanfic, but I'm glad to see that the mainstream basically doesn't care about those rules. I've always believed that if something is done well, no matter how many times it's been done before, it deserves to be recognized on its own. And I couldn't applaud this author more for doing it so well.

I would recommend this book to anyone who hasn't read BDSM or erotic romance before and I haven't even finished. And in this case I can't say that people either loved it or hated it. I double checked this to be sure. As I write this post, out of 261 customer reviews on Amazon, 183 loved it with five stars and only 17 hated it with one star. This is not what I would call a love it/hate it book. This is what's called a few people with distinctly defined taste in books who didn't like it. Which is fine. It actually helps me balance what I'm going to buy when I'm shopping for books.

I will post more after I've read it in full. From what I'm hearing from friends I'll wind up reading the entire trilogy.

Release Day...Unmentionable: The Men Who Loved on the Titanic

It's finally being released today. UNMENTIONABLE: THE MEN WHO LOVED ON THE TITANIC, is a love story about something that might have happened on the Titanic. In almost everything I've ever read about The Titanic I've never once heard about gay men. Of course the word gay meant something totally different back then. If you were attracted to the same sex you were considered mentally challenged. But I know there were gay men on that boat somewhere. There had to be. And I wanted to write something as a tribute to them on the 100th Anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic.

I'm going to be posting a lot more about Titanic history in the coming weeks. I've been reading periodicals with first hand accounts of what happened, and one very interesting article about people who were supposed to be on the ship and didn't make it in time. But today I'd like to focus more on the product details so readers know what they are getting.

This is a m/m erotic romance. There are sex scenes between two consenting adults, both are men. If the sex scenes were removed or altered, there would still be a love story that arcs. Even though one character dresses up as a young woman and pretends to be the other character's cousin, this is fake and they are not related to each other at all. It's a long short story, about 13,500 words. I could have called it a novella but I don't consider anything under 20,000 words a novella. As far as the ending goes, I'm not giving any spoilers. But it's the Titanic. It went down before anyone even realized what was happening. Anything even remotely resembling a happy ending (sorry RWA), for those who perished and those who survived, would be nothing more than bittersweet at best.

Most of all, it's a love story that could have happened. I once read a wonderful civil war novel written by Rita Mae Brown who wrote the classic LGBT novel, Rubyfruit Jungle, and the main character was a young woman who pretended to be a man during the civil war. Though I read that over 20 years ago, this inspired me to do the same thing with "Unmentionable," only with a male pretending to be a female. And I did add the storied character, Molly Brown, but I referred to her as Maggie Brown in the story because that's the way people always referred to her in real life. From Wiki:

She became known after her death as The Unsinkable Molly Brown, although she was not called Molly during her life. Her friends called her Maggie.




If anyone has any questions about product info or content, please feel free to comment or e-mail me in private. I'll be more than happy to answer any questions. Here's the cover copy:

The kind of love no one spoke about 100 years ago.

One hundred years ago on April 14, 1912, the RMS Titanic hit an iceberg on its way to New York. Though it had been considered unsinkable by all standards, it went down in the cold waters of the Atlantic, taking with it stories of love and romance that weren't discussed openly in those days. This was especially true with stories of love between two men. One of those hidden stories of the Titanic dealt with the unyielding love and strong romance between a young man named Liam and his older lover, Oliver. Because Oliver was a wealthy business man in America with a great deal of notoriety, the only safe way to bring Liam aboard the Titanic was to dress him in fine women's clothing and claim he was Oliver's shy, distant cousin returning to America for the first time in many years. They finally begin to relax when they realize that everyone on the ship believes Liam is a woman, until that fateful night on April 14th when destiny intervened and changed their lives forever.

An E-mail From Allromanceebooks about Skater Boy

I wanted to post this tonight because it's still current. And there seems to be so much misinformation floating around I wanted to clarify some of this misinformation with the help of ARe. In the last e-mail today, here's what ARe said:

We're working on an FAQ that we hope will correct some of the mis-information that we're starting to hear is being disseminated. We hope to have that available tomorrow, but it might not be until Monday.

After I e-mailed ARe the first time asking why my book, Skater Boy, had been taken down, they were kind enough to get back today with an explanation. I asked ARe for permission to post the e-mail here on the blog and they said it was fine.

I would also like to add that ARe asked me to mention that authors who have books out with publishers should ask their publishers to contact ARe about a problem that concerns a book being considered for review. In other words, because publishers have access to the panel publishers should be the ones writing in to request a review. So if you do have a book that's been questioned, contact your publisher and ask them for assistance. My publisher at LYD was only too happy to comply.

I received your earlier email as well, I just didn't have a chance to complete my response yesterday.

Of course I'll look into this for you and explain as best I can.
I'm curious about where you are receiving the "Banned List". Several emails have come my way listing "incest, bestiality, or underage characters" - so I'm thinking someone, somewhere, has posted their interpretation of our list of restrictive content (and they've left quite a bit off). Secondly, very, very few titles have been discontinued with no hope of reconsideration. Very few have even been inactivated with an appeal offered. We're talking in the neighborhood of 0.002% of our titles.

We emailed your publisher a list of titles that were inactivated and offered to reconsider them after they reviewed and modified (should they wish to do so) the metadata associated with the listings.

Search engines are blind to the actual content of the book, as is a customer prior to purchase. So how a book is presented and packaged is extremely important. As a seasoned author, I'm not telling you anything you don't know. An important restriction that was left off of your list was books written for or marketed to the barely legal market. Some tags and/or key words in the summary of your title triggered review of this for your title - for example, the combination of "daddy fetish", "skater boy", "skater boy fetish", "skater boys", combined with other variations of tags using the word "Erotica". Erotic/Boys/Fetish/Daddy.

If this is a story involving Young Man/Older Man, or a May/December relationship, those tags could easily convey the age gap. Your publisher should send an email to our determinations@allromanceebooks.com address after they review and adjust the meta-data (summary, tags, and excerpt). We can work with them to get this back up. No bookseller can read titles by every author they sell - we have over 150,000 authors in our database. I have read several of your titles that were published by Ravenous - they were both Erotic Romance with a distinct emotional/relationship arc to the story. I suspect this one is, too. But the tags make it look like something different.

I hope that makes this clearer.

Lori

I'm happy with the explanation as far as my book goes. I don't think ARe was targeting the book on purpose and I know my publisher has no problem changing tags to read "Man/Older Man, or a May/December relationship." This is, indeed, what the theme of the book is. From what I'm gathering, some books are being questioned because of certain words we haven't been paying attention to. I've harped here many times about writing clear product descriptions so readers know exactly what they are getting. But I've never been concerned with tags before. I'll pay closer attention now, trust me, to make sure there's nothing left to doubt.

We're living in unusual times right now. A lot of things about the Interwebs have yet to be defined. Publishing seems to change daily and there's always something new happening. I'm thankful to ARe for getting back as soon as they did with an explanation and for the comments they made about my books with ravenous romance. My publisher at loveyoudivine.com is working on the tags and getting the book reviewed. I have no doubt the book will be put back up on ARe as soon as this happens.

I've always posted about ARe being my own main source for information when it comes to product descriptions to the extent that I point readers to them for my own published books, and I'll continue to do so.

Seth Godin, Censorship, Allromanceebooks.com, and Apple

(Update: I received an e-mail from Allromanceebooks.com with an explanation as to what might have happened. They were very gracious and took the time to explain everything in detail to me. Evidently, it's something to do with the way the book was tagged. Which I understand. I will post more soon. I've always supported ARe for their excellent product descriptions, and it's nice to know they care enough to get back this soon.)

Late last night I went over to Dystel & Goderich to read a few blog posts to take my mind off the fact that ARe banned one of my books for no valid reason I can see, and I found a blog post there about censorship with a link to a great article written by Seth Godin.

Although Seth Godin's situation is quite different from mine, it's still the same thing in a general sense. Apple is allegedly refusing to carry his book for their own reasons, which are explained in detail in his article.

In my case with "Skater Boy" it's not only unfair because my book doesn't fall under any of the targeted categories that are being banned, but also because it's implying I write books with these taboo topics. In other words, I have never written about incest, bestiality, and the other taboo topics that are all being banned right now. I've never read them either. I don't even read BDSM books. I respect those who do. But it's not for me. (Not to mention the fact that ARe took down "Skater Boy" this week, and left up an anthology where the same story was published a few years earlier under the title "In This Our Day.")

And the sheer fact that I don't have the choice anymore bothers me intensely. As a reader, I don't like other people making these decisions for me, nor do I like having my freedom taken away. I'm an adult and I feel capable of making adult decisions without anyone's help.

Anyway, check out Seth's article about his experience. It's very interesting.

There's been a long history of ubiquity at the bookstore. With a few extreme exceptions, just about every book is available at every bookstore if you're willing to order it. Universal availability feels like part of the contract we make with bookstores-we expect them to sell everything. In the digital world, this goes triple, because there's no issue of shelf space to deal with. Read more...

2012 Rainbow Award Guidelines

I noticed that Elisa Rolle posted the guidelines for the upcoming 2012 Rainbow Awards. Here's the link, which will show you how to enter and what to do.

I've already volunteered to be a juror again and I'm looking forward to this even more than I did last year. One reason is because Elisa has started what I'd hope would become a tradition. It seems to be working that way as more an more authors participate. And what I like most is that it's not just for m/m romance. There are categories and all LGBTQ books and authors are welcome to submit...including digital books. In fact, out of the six books I read last year, all were digital except for one.

So please take the time to check out the guidelines. Though I didn't enter anything last year, I'm thinking of entering this year myself with one book in particular.

I Guess I've Been Banned, and for No Valid Reason: "Skater Boy"

Before I get into this, I'd like to clarify that I have never written anything with underage characters, bestiality, incest, or any of the other things/topics that have been banned because of the recent PayPal issue. I've heard PayPay is not the blame, and I'm not pointing any fingers at them now. But I've been banned for no good reason and I'm not happy right now. It's one thing to be censored for a reason, it's a completely different issue to be censored for no good reason.

My publisher informed me my story, Skater Boy, has been banned on ARe. And I do, indeed, take offense to having a book banned on ARe or anywhere else...censored...that doesn't contain anything that's considered part of the taboo list. The term "Skater Boy" is widely used in the gay male community as a type of guy who wears baggy jeans, funky hats, and tends to be rough around the edges.

But, I assure you, there are no underage characters in this short book. I don't judge those authors who decide to do things like this, but I've never done it and never will do it. In fact, the main character, Jared, the guy referred to as a the Skater Boy, is only a quasi skater boy. He's in his twenties and is clearly a consenting adult. This is one of the tamer stories I've written.

To add to this, the original version of this story was published in an anthology by Cleis Press in a book, get this, titled "Skater Boys." I didn't come up with that title. The editor at Cleis did. I just released a newer revised version of my story with Loveyoudivine.com as a digital short story because I didn't sign an exclusive with Cleis, and I wanted to change the story and see how the story would do on its own. The original title of my story in the anthology was "In This Our Day." Interesting how they failed to check this out before they banned the book.

What infuriates me more than any form of censorship is when the censorship isn't even accurate. The only reason why this book is being targeted is because the word "boy" is in the title. It has nothing to do with content or what's part of the banned list of topics.

Here's the blurb for Skater Boy, and I defy anyone to find a hint of underage content in this story.

When Bradley Klinger (a consenting adult, not a minor) moves from the city to a small town in the mountains of upstate New York, the last thing he expects to find is a hot young skater boy named Jared who never stops flirting with him. They meet in the small restaurant Jared (Jared owns a restaurant; he's clearly over the age of twenty-one ) owns, thanks to Jared's sixty year old partner in New York with whom he shares an open, sexless relationship. Though Jared is kept by the older man in every sense of the word, from his Bentley Continental to his small restaurant in the mountains, Jared doesn't waste any time getting to know Bradley much better. And though Jared is the kind of young skater boy, in baggy, low-hanging jeans and loose T-shirts, Bradley has always dreamed about, Bradley is concerned the age difference between them might be too vast. (The age difference is between two consenting adults, not an adult and minor) But Jared doesn't stop pursuing Bradley, to the point where he actually follows Bradley home one night on his skate board.

I'd really like someone to clarify why this book has been banned. I've also let my publisher know she can change the title to "Skater" if she wants to. I hate to buckle to that kind of censorship, but if one word is going to hurt the publisher I'd rather concede. And I hope ARe and other retail web sites that sell digital books are paying closer attention to the books they are banning. This is an implication and a reflection on me as an author, and the kind of fiction I write, and I'm not fond of being targeted and placed in a category for no reason at all.

(update: Here's a direct quote from the book about the character referred to as "skater boy." "Mt. Saint Hope was a small town; people talked. Over the next week, Bradley heard Jared
was the lucky twenty-one-year-old..." And, I just learned the Cleis Press book, "Skater Boys," has not been banned on ARE.)

Release: The Virgin Billionaire's Little Angel

In this final book in The Virgin Billionaire series, THE VIRGIN BILLIONAIRE'S LITTLE ANGEL, one of the things I wanted to do most was tie up the storyline in subtle ways with the first book in the series. In fact, I wanted to end the last book with the first line of the first book. Unfortunately, it didn't work out that way.

But I did bring back an integral character that was mentioned in the first book, is mentioned in all the books, and yet never actually appears in any of the books. The character is a woman named Elena. She has a fictional web site in France where she writes about and posts photos of gay men in very tasteful, elegant, and artist ways. It's no secret now that I loosely based this unseen character on Elisa Rolle, who runs a m/m romance book review blog at livejournal from Italy. At the time, I had no idea this book would become a series. I met Elisa a few years ago in person. She came to my home, we had lunch, and our friendship grew after we met in person.

I also tend to think about the future sometimes. I do believe, without a doubt, what Elisa has been doing with her web site will become part of LGBT history. She will be looked upon as one of the pioneers of LGBT literature and digital publishing one day years from now when I'm long gone. And I wanted to put something wonderful about her in writing because she's done so many wonderful things for LGBT authors and books.

Here's an excerpt, without spoilers, from a section of this book where Luis is reading Elena's web site:

After he walked for about fifteen minutes, he decided to sit down on a park bench and relax. This was something he rarely did in the park. He crossed his legs, swerved to the right, and pulled his phone out of his pocket. He turned the phone on and checked his messages. There was nothing of importance that couldn't wait until later. Then he went to the website where he wrote guest blog posts, Elena's Romantic Treasures and Tidbits, to see what Elena's latest blog post was about. He preferred to read Elena's posts instead of his own, after all these years, because they still made him feel warm and safe in a way nothing else could. This one thing in his life remained his own private secret treasure no one could alter.

Cover: The Virgin Billionaire's Little Angel..."Think Wild"

Here's the newest cover for the last book in the Virgin Billionaire series, THE VIRGIN BILLIONAIRE'S LITTLE ANGEL.

The reason why I added "Think Wild" to the title of this post is because that's a slogan for an ad campaign in the book that has an interesting twist. In fact, this slogan, "Think Wild," changes Luis's life in more ways than one. And I know, "Think Wild," is not grammatically correct. But this time I was going for a catchy ad and I was thinking the way an ad writer would think, not like an author would think. "Think Wildly" doesn't work, and frankly, it's not very catchy.

There's also a bareback sex scene. It's been done responsibly and the characters all have actual test results and papers to prove they are all, indeed, without sexually transmitted diseases. It wasn't easy to work this into the book in a natural way that made sense. But I wanted to do it for a few reasons. First, gay men enjoy this. Second, if they can't enjoy it in real life they can enjoy the fantasy of it in books. Third, I think it's relevant to the story and the characters involved. For me, the balance in m/m romance comes when a certain amount of reality is mixed with the absolute escapism. Because if it's just absolute escapism it's not going to be very interesting.

To balance out the bareback sex scenes, I also added something which I think is integral to the book. There are a few chapters that get heavily involved in HIV/AIDS, and just how serious it is when someone goes into full blown AIDS. I can't say any more because I'd spoil it for readers. But I didn't hold back this time, and most of what I wrote was loosely based on things I've personally witnessed since I was in my early twenties. In a way, I almost didn't want to do this with m/m romance. I wasn't sure I wanted to share these stories in a m/m romance. But I think the readers will "get" it, and I'm glad I decided to do it.

But this book isn't just about wild adventures and bareback sex. Because it was the final book in the series I wanted to tie things up in a way that I've been hinting at throughout the entire series. No spoilers. But here's a hint. It's something that Luis has been dreaming about all his life. It's probably the most emotional thing he'll ever experience and has nothing to do with sex.

The book will be released tomorrow, and I'll post more then with links that will lead to where the book can be purchased. I'd like to thank the cover artist at ravenous romance for coming up with something so simple and elegant this time. One thing I'm not fond of are those old time looking book covers. I like book covers to depict the time period in which we live now, not time periods from the past that look as if the artist was trying too hard to be "artistic and creative," or worse, "deep and literary."

It's Baby Goat Season Again in Sharon Springs, NY

This morning I open an e-mail and it reads, "Baby Goat Bananza." The address reads "Unknown Sender." And I immediately think, "Okay, it's that tired old kangaroo of a "m/m author" who's always complaining about everyone, and has been writing not so nice things about me on her blog."

Or, I'm wondering if it could be spam with an attached virus. (It's happened.)

So my first instinct is click delete. But it's baby goats. Seriously. I'm going to ignore something about baby goats? I actually do know someone who has goats in Somerville, New Jersey.

In any event, I opened the e-mail and the world didn't stop. It wasn't spam, it wasn't my friend in Somerville. It's actually a newsletter from the Beekman Boys, way up in Sharon Springs, NY. I've been on the fence about them regarding a few things. Here's one post I wrote about gay men being referred to as "boys" back in 2010. However, the more I've been following them the more I "get" what they are trying to do. And, I do, indeed, know more than a few fine gay couples who remind me of them. Tony and I, as a gay couple who have been together for twenty years, are a little different in the sense that we don't focus our lives around being gay or being different. We're a couple and we're here; you like us or you don't and we prefer not to be defined by anyone (even though that's often easier said than done). However, it's nice to see any same-sex couple living, working, and interacting together on national television. And, Farmer John, they guy in charge of the goats,balances them very well.

For those who haven't been following The Beekman Boys, here's a link to their web site. I'm actually dying to take a long weekend and see Sharon Springs. I could drive from New York to Maine blind folded I know New England so well. I've sat in traffic on the Bourne Bridge so many times I've lost count. I know Long Island from Oyster Bay to East Hampton. But I know nothing about upstate New York and I've always wanted to take a road trip there. If we do it this summer, I'll try to do a series of posts with photos while we're there. I think a lot of readers enjoy these personal things sometimes.




If you check out The Beekman Boys web site, you'll find all kinds of interesting things. Dr. Brent is adorable. There are videos, blogs, and pages where you can shop for the products they offer. I've had the goat cheese and liked it. In fact, I'll be ordering more for a dinner party we're having later in March.

"The Trouble with Hairy" by Hal Bodner

This isn't an actual review, because I don't do many reviews here as a rule. A lot of authors ask me to read their books and review them and there's no way I could do all those reviews. There wouldn't be enough time for me to write, and it would change the blog too much.

But I will comment in a general sense on books I love...and authors I respect. I wrote about Hal Bodner's new book a week or so ago and wanted to follow up. The first book of Hal's I read was "Bite Club." I loved it for many reasons...the solid writing, the well developed characters, and the way the gay characters/situations are treated...and when Hal told me about "The Trouble with Hairy," I couldn't wait to see what he'd done this time.

The interesting thing about "Hairy" is that Hal self-pubbed this one on Amazon. I want to begin by stating for those who are looking for books self-pubbed that the quality of this book is as good as anything that would have come from a "traditional" publisher or small e-press. Hal is a well published author and he's had more than one book published the traditional way. He's not new to publishing or LGBT fiction. This time I noticed a few nice additions to "Hairy," like a note to readers at the beginning. And a personal dedication page. I like reading these personal things in books. With this book from Hal, I had a feeling of intimacy I don't see as often as I'd like. (Fanny Flagg does this a lot, with recipes and comments.) Hal's voice, which is a strong voice in fiction, came through with absolute clarity. Maybe I'm carrying this too far, but I had the feeling Hal was doing what he always wanted to do and he knew what his readers would enjoy. And that's a nice feeling!! It's evident this book is all about the readers.

The storyline returns to WeHo, with returning characters Chris and Troy...and gay men are being murdered. Yes, it's suspenseful and chilling at times. But it's done with a sense of humor mingled with suspense...and there's a werewolf. Other enjoyable characters are brought back, and some elements continue where they left off. But this time I found more character arcs...or rather in-depth development that should, indeed, happen in a sequel. I felt closer to them, if that's even possible. Though it's paranormal, there's enough humor and wit to make you smile more than once. A few times I laughed out loud, as I tend to do when I'm reading anything from Hal...even his facebook posts are funny. There's also a little bit of camp, and it's the kind of camp I don't see often enough either. For those who don't know what "camp" is, here's a link. And the pace moved quickly, which for me is an important element in any novel.

Becky, the WeHo coroner, is an interesting character:

Despite her ghoulish profession, or perhaps because of it,
Becky was always quick with a smile, a clever quip and a helping
hand in times of adversity. She was a favorite of the City Council
and adored by her staff and the members of the Sheriff's
Department with whom she worked. Even West Hollywood's
ineffective mayor, Daniel Eversleigh, looked upon Becky as he
would a favorite niece. She was also, to Delaney's further irritation,one of the few people besides Clive himself who seemed to be able to actually get along with West Hollywood's notoriously
cantankerous City Manager.

Hal writes the best detailed scenes/descriptions that help draw the reader into the story, and we and care (and fall in love with) the characters and settings as a result. I especially love old film star references. Here's one good example of what I mean:

Gertie and Ruth lived in a small one bedroom apartment in the
converted old Charlie Chaplin Studios on Poinsettia Place. Each
unit was unique and, to most people, would be uninhabitable with
oddly slanting floors and windows and doors chosen for quirkiness
rather than functionality. In the women's living room, the trunk of a huge avocado tree grew smack dab up through the middle and out
through the roof which Gertie had surrounded with a cunningly
constructed wooden bench adorned by Ruth's needlepoint
cushions. Visitors found their home strange, but Gertie and Ruth
loved it.

All in all, I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys good fiction, and to anyone who's looking for a good read in LGBT fiction. No spoilers...but I really loved the ending most of all. It's clearly fiction, yet authentic in a slightly larger than life way like all of Hal's fiction. And I'll be recommending this one to my partner, Tony, who happens to be the worst critic I know when it comes to gay fiction. I rarely recommend anything to him because he is so critical (He has what I call "Ivy League Syndrome"). But this time I know I'm safe.