'Nathan Burgoine's Blog, page 81

#PrideMonth — Queer YA

It’s Pride Month, and a couple of conversations I had recently reminded me of something I don’t think I say enough as a queer author: thank you to the authors who came before me.

Like pretty much everything else in the queer community, the present is built on the work of the past, which often didn’t (and still doesn’t) get the recognition that the present does. I talk a lot about how we (the queer “we”) don’t inherit our stories—spoiler: here it comes again—but this is one aspect of it that I’m not sure I’ve said well personally.

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Seriously, so much crippling self-doubt.

Writing a queer YA over the last year was daunting. I’m still worried, still nervous, and still working on the proofs (they’re due this week). I’m constantly second-guessing myself, flinching at the potential for something to go truly, massively wrong, and staring in the mirror and thinking, Dude. You’re not a young adult. What are you doing?

The answer, of course, is I’m trying to do what I always do: write stories for people like me to read, because I remember what it was like not finding stories with people like me, or—worse—only finding stories with people like me that ended with the people like me not surviving to the end of the book, because they were people like me. That was awful.

I was trying to remember the first YA I read where there was a gay character, and whether or not I read it when I was a teen or not, and I think the answer might be a Christopher Pike book. There was a character in the Final Friends series who turned out to be gay. It wasn’t a particularly great bit of representation, and in no way was the book at all about him (in fact, his gayness was part of the murder mystery red herring and a comedic b-plot where the heroine of the book is basically throwing herself at him and he tries to shame her as an escape and… yeah, anyway, not great).

I’ve mentioned before that prior to that, in a high school class, we studied a story where the gay character died and my teacher was incredibly blunt to the class about how and why the character had to die. It was a terrifying moment, and that came before. It was my first fictional “me.”

By the time I was older and working in the bookstore, I realized that there were stories out there about people like me—and some of them were even YA—but I had to jump through hoops and make special orders to find them. They existed while I was younger, but no teacher had them at hand to pass them to me. They sure weren’t in the library. Annie on My Mind was published in the early 80’s, and the two girls not only made it to the end of the book but so did their relationship! There’s a part in the book where one of the characters is reading an encyclopedia about homosexuality and they notice that there’s no use of the word ‘love’ in the entry. She goes to bed thinking that the writers of that entry maybe needed to speak to someone like her, because she could tell them what she feels is love.

That moment stuck with me. And I cannot tell you how much I wish I’d had that book in my hand back during the time it was written.

There were queer YA books when I was a young queer. Blackbird was written in 1986. It could have been incredible had I read that book when it came out. I would have been able to walk into my teen years with my head up with language about what I was and the knowledge others like me existed. But I had no idea, no access, and no way to do more than randomly stumble across a character here and there if I was lucky. (And given I jumped ship from YA quite early into reading contemporary fantasy where there was metaphorical queerness to be had, if not literal queerness, I didn’t have much luck at all, and even then the occasional gay guy showed up just to die, but that’s a rant for another day).

Young queer me could have read queer YA. But he never got the chance.

Instead, it wasn’t until the early nineties, when I was a bookseller and a university student, and I had access to backlist titles I could research and order (using a microfiche, no less), and I was learning about books like Ruby (it came out the year after I was born!). I could special order books for myself, if I pre-paid for them.

I couldn’t put them on the shelf to sell to customers, though.

Then it was the aughts, and I was shelving David Levithan and Alex Sanchez and Michael Thomas Ford in YA, thinking, Holy shit. Look at this. Gay boys in YA books. That was nearly twenty years ago now, and I still reel about that sometimes, with the enormity of what it might mean that queer people in their thirties had access to queer YA books with queer YA characters.

But then, almost to a person, I’ve heard them say, “There were no queer books when I was young.”

But there were! And then I realize things hadn’t changed. Or at least, by the nineties and aughts, they hadn’t changed enough. Because queers still grew up thinking they didn’t have stories.

It’s that same damn inheritance problem we’ve always had: if no one is passing our stories to the next generation, queerlings can’t what they don’t know, and although the present day is a different place, it’s not like the shelves at local brick and mortars are spilling over with queer rep (especially if we talk intersections with race or disability or neurotype, or step away from gay or lesbian rep and look at the rest of the queer rainbow). Back in the 90’s I was starting to put some of those books on the shelf, but the kids who were queer youth in the 90’s weren’t finding them. They didn’t get front-and-centre placement. And their parents sure as heck weren’t out there looking for them and making sure their kids had them, just in case. Libraries were still being challenged.

Those books were there, even when I was a queer kid. Not enough of them, of course. Nowhere near enough of them. But some existed, and more existed every year. It’s just no one gave them to the queer kids. We didn’t find them. We couldn’t find them.

A lot of that hasn’t changed, especially depending on where you might live. Libraries still get challenged. Adults still buy books for young adults with a boat-load of assumptions. But when I was working on my own YA, I got to speak with some queer teenagers through a few high school SAGAs, GSAs, and Rainbow Clubs. They have language around identities and concepts I didn’t learn until I was in university (and after). Queerness is evolving and growing and it’s brilliant.

And they know full well they deserve stories about people like themselves.

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Listening to this one right now on audio. It’s awesome.

So I look at the proofs for Exit Plans for Teenage Freaks, and I have hope. When I was a kid, a book about a nerdish gay kid who develops a teleportation problem would have been exactly what I wanted to read. In many ways, my writing career is about time-travel: I’m trying to write back in time. I was an X-Men nut, loved board games, and a giant nerd. Back when I was that kid, my parents would never, ever had gotten me a copy of the book.

But if I was that kid today? Thanks to Rosa Guy and Nancy Garden and Larry Duplechan and M.E. Kerr and Michael Thomas Ford and David Levithan and Alex Sanchez and so many other authors who put those first books out there and forced the glacial publishing industry queer YA stories needed to exist, that time-traveling kid might have a chance find it on his own.

Today we have They Both Die at the End and Anger is a Gift and Not Your Sidekick and they’re front-and-centre on bookshelf displays. I walk into bookstores and see them and I have hope.

Maybe this time, thanks to all the authors who came before, queers will grow up knowing they have stories.

 

June Flash Fiction Draw

Happy Pride! Today is the first Monday of the month, so it’s time to dig out my Geek & Sundry playing cards and do the draw for June. What am I talking about? Well, if you’ve not seen one of these monthly draws so far, the background is this: as a kind of challenge to myself (and anyone else who wanted to try), last January I started a year-long monthly Flash Fiction Draw Challenge. I made three piles of suits from a deck of cards, and then assigned a genre to each club, an item to each diamond, and a location to each heart. Once a month, drawing three cards creates the challenge. No more than 1,000 words, and no longer than a week to work on it, and… ta-da. Stretched writerly muscles, fun, and zero stress. (And that last rule is paramount: if it gets stressful or stops being fun? Eject. There’ll be another challenge next month.)

The first draw (which was a Fairy Tale involving a Tattoo Machine set in a Prison!) and the results were fantastic in January, and February’s draw (Crime Caper, Compass, Soup Kitchen) was a challenge (though with awesome results). March‘s Romance, involving a VHS Cassette, set in a Firewatch Tower led to a great range of results. April gave us Historical Fictions set on Dirt Roads dealing with Rat Poison, and the timelines involved in those results were all over the place. Or time. You get it. May dropped some science fiction in our lap, taking place above the clouds and involving a dog whistle.

I made a video of this month’s draw, which included my favourite rainbow unicorn t-shirt.

The chart from which the draws were made was this (minus the cards from previous draws, greyed out):

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And the result for June? Eight of clubs, seven of diamonds, and king of hearts. Which means anyone who wants to play along is going to write a flash fiction piece of 1,000 words within the following guidelines: a fantasy story, set in a junkyard or scrapyard, and including hot chocolate.

If you do participate, please pop a link to this post, or to the Facebook video above so I can gather all the stories again for a round-up post next week.

But the most important thing? This is supposed to be fun and inspiring. If it’s not working for you, take a pass. There’ll be another challenge on the first Monday of July (that’s July 2nd), from the remaining nine items on the list. The “rules” such as they are are pretty limited: You have to use the genre, the item, and the setting (though you can play a bit fast and loose within those guidelines), no more than 1,000 words, and the piece needs to be finished by next Monday (June 11th). That’s it.

Enjoy!

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#PrideMonth — Closets

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I saw a lovely post yesterday that reminded everyone celebrating Pride to remember that being out is not synonymous with pride nor queerness, and it reminded me of conversations I’ve had over the years about the whole notion of “coming out,” and the how the single most misunderstood thing about “coming out” when I have these conversations with non-queer people is the idea that it’s a singular thing that happens.

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It’s not like that. When I bump into books that get that? It’s awesome. So often narratives treat it in that singular way. “I came out,” the character says, wiping their hands and ta-da, they’re done.

Now, “When did you come out?” is a question that comes up (from within and without the queer community) and it’s a valid enough question. I generally answer it to mean when I first started telling people with the intent of letting those closest to me know, to the point where I knew the genie was out of the bottle and people would talk to each other thereafter about it.

Some people take coming out to mean “when did you tell your family?” Some mean “when did you tell the first person?” There are quite a few interpretations, and there’s no one answer, really.

Just like there’s no one “coming out.”

I had to come out to myself. Then I came out to a boy while I sat with him in a rainy cabin. I accidentally came out to some friends when I’d had too much to drink and was terrified about how awfully my family had reacted to learning the truth (I turned out to be correct about that fear, too). At the start of university, I went to a coming-out discussion group, and then told my closest two friends. And then other friends. Eventually, I came out to my boss at the bookstore, when she kept talking to me about a young woman she knew that I might like to meet.

She offered to pray for me. HR got involved. It was awkward.

Fast-forward many years. Over a decade ago, the laws changed on a federal level, and I proposed. We had to come out to the clerk, to get the paperwork. I had to come out to the jeweller, to get the rings made. Then my fella and I started to plan a wedding. I had to come out to the venues we were touring as options. I had to come out to the wedding planner at the venue we selected, then come out to the baker, the DJ, the suit rental place, the photographer, the officiant, and the florist.

The photographer, by the way, quit shortly before the wedding, after phoning my husband to say she “wasn’t okay with it.” She was, for the record, very fucking lucky she got him on the phone and not me.

Every single step of the way to getting married involved coming out to people who then had the power to take this moment and ruin it in some small way if they wanted to. A grimace, a refusal, a rant—all of those things were within the realm of possibility and a risk with every freaking step of the journey.

And it’s not over. It happens all the time. For the rest of our lives.

Name change forms (I took my husband’s name after getting married). Bank accounts. Tax forms. Walking the dog together in the neighbourhood. Meeting new people (like, every single time we meet new people). Going out for dinner, shopping, or on vacation (If I never hear “Are you brothers?” ever again, I will be very happy).

Every interaction with new people includes the potential to be coming out. Every single time. And every time you come out, you’re risking that moment being something anti-queer. Anything from outright hatred and physical threat to a snide comment to that facial expression that says, “Ew.”

And there are times where people confuse “Out” to be carte-blanche. I remember once sitting with a group of people I didn’t know super-well, though I did know a few of them on a professional level. This was at an event, a conference, and I had been speaking, multiple times throughout the day, about queerness and the intersection of queerness and writing—and then, in the bar, after the long day, someone said something homophobic. I just didn’t have it in me to speak up. I was tired, I didn’t know the person speaking from a stranger on the street (and also they were a pretty important guest of the conference), and honestly? I was done. I was tired, and didn’t want to get into a talk about why “queer shouldn’t be the punchline of your travel anecdote.”

And then one of those people who did know me decided to step up and said, “Meanwhile, that’s just ‘Nathan’s daily life.”

All eyes on me. The man started to apologize, awkwardly, tripping over the whole “No, no, it’s totally okay that a guy hit on me!” (which, just seconds ago, had been the punchline).

So I had to speak up, have the conversation about what the guy said, and do a quick queer 101 discussion—but the choice to do so was taken from me in a totally well-meaning move.

(Yeah, so don’t do that. It’s still possible to out someone who is generally out in their life.)

Of course, on the flip side, there’s the magic moment when you see someone else’s queer pin or flag or patch or necklace, or a queer couple holding hands, or the person you come out to grins in the “Oh, me too!” way. Those connections, those smiles, those moments of “Hey, I see you, and you see me.” are magic.)

Anyway. I loved the graphic. It’s spot-on. Totally. But coming out—like so much else—isn’t binary, and it never freaking ends.

It’s okay if that’s too much sometimes, no matter how long it’s been since you started coming out.

 

Queer Doesn’t Mean Romance

Given recent discussions, I’ve reworked a blog post originally meant for a bit later this month and I’m posting it today. I’ve got a couple more on similar themes, but I don’t want to lump them all in together.

Today I’m talking kinda-sorta about romance, but specifically the relationship between romance and queerness and how the two get conflated and how that’s not okay. This happens on two levels. One is more annoying than anything else, and a double standard.

The other? It erases and rejects some queer people, and despite many of those particular queer voices being loud about it, I still bump into many who just don’t know. Given I try to blog quite a bit on aspects of queerness, especially from a writing/reading point of view, this feels like an opportunity.

So. Queer books and romance. Like chocolate and peanut butter, right?

Short answer? No. (This is the “annoying/double standard” thing.)

Longer answer? No, for more than a few reasons, many of them inherent to the idea of ‘Queer’ in and of itself. 

Let me explain what I mean.

There is exactly one type of queer story that requires a romance, and that’s a queer romance. As facetious as that may sound, it comes into play a lot in the world of queer books, especially reviews of queer books and it is often assumed that queer stories will include romantic sub-plots at the least. I write a lot of queer speculative fiction, and the number of times I’ve bumped into reviews (whether or my queer spec-fic or someone else’s queer fictions) where the review criticizes the romance as “lackluster” or mentions how things “faded to black” when the fiction in question isn’t a romance at all are legion. And yet, read reviews of not-specifically-queer science fiction books and you’re not likely to find readers bemoaning the the lack of romance.

This happens, I think, because romance is such a huge slice of the book pie to begin with, and even more so in the queer book world. Readers of queer romance are loud and voracious and basically a force of nature. And I love that. I do. I write queer romances as well as queer spec-fic, and have zero intention of stopping. When I see that energy aimed toward queer romance? It’s awesome.

But if it’s not a romance? It becomes much less awesome when the same stick is used to measure. Because when a story is not a romance, that’s not a flaw. At all. Queer readers absolutely get to exist and be represented outside of romance. We deserve to be in horror, and mystery, and science fiction, and thrillers and… Well. You get the idea.

As you can imagine, this is a giant bugaboo of mine on that level alone.

But it’s that other level where the conflation of queer stories requiring romance does a more visceral disservice.

Queerness can inherently have nothing to do with romantic love and still be queer. Transgender people are queer, and that has nothing inherently to do with romance. And more specifically, Aromantic people are also queer. Stories about them are queer, and the prevalence of slogans like “love is love”—and assumptions about what makes a story queer—exclude some queer people. I want to believe that most of the time, that’s by accident and without forethought, but it’s exclusionary nonetheless. Impact matters more than intent. Squishy stories? Queerplatonic stories? Those are queer stories.

Romance not required.

So. What do we do? Well, for the former issue, there’s a simple solution to conflating romance with queerness in fiction: stop doing it. If a book’s romantic plot (or sub-plot) or lack thereof gives the reader pause, a quick check to the category listing of the book is all that’s really needed to make sure the book is being judged for what it is, rather than what it isn’t. If a book isn’t a romance, complaining about the lack of romance flat out doesn’t make sense.

On the more serious side of the issue, as queer people (and as queer writers) we can do a whole bunch of things to make sure we’re not dismissing/erasing aromantic queers. Mikayla has an amazing series of resources available through their blog and their twitter (drop a coin in their ko-fi, too.)

Also at this point, I want to point out the awesomeness that is Claudie Arseneault‘s Aro and Ace Database (seriously, check it out), which gathers listings of asexual and aromantic (and the spectrums thereof) stories. And you should also check her tale The Baker Thief, which specifically aims to subvert some romantic plot tropes. Claudie has a patreon, too.

As for myself? I’ll often toss in a romantic sub-plot into stories that aren’t strictly romance, but I have written queer tales where romance was the point at all. They’re still queer.

“Old Age, Surrounded By Loved Ones” is about sisters, and what one would do for another in an extreme moment. Leah’s status as a lesbian is incidental to her familial love.
“Negative Space” is about André facing down the fallout of being victimized in a hate crime, as well as finding justice for murder victims with unclosed cases.
“Keeping the Faith” is a noir paranormal mystery about the theft of a priest’s faith. The gay detective is a bit smarmy, but there’s nothing romantic going on.
“Conceptually Speaking” is about a trans telepath making first contact with an alien race.
“First Shift” is about a gay time-traveler finishing his training and being sent on his first mission to save someone important.
“There & Then” is about a sixteen year old gay boy who’s developing the gift to see emotion, as well as peer into the past or future, and struggling to figure out what he needs to do to find a future of his own.

 

Of Echoes Born is now available from @BoldStrokeBooks

It’s June!

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Oh, this cover. *sniff* It’s so pretty.

That means the June releases from Bold Strokes Books are out on their web-store! This includes—I may have mentioned this before—Of Echoes Born.

So, if you order direct from BSB, you get it a bit earlier than everywhere else (and they have all the e-book formats, worry not). If you’ve got a local brick and mortar or you’ve got a local source you’d rather use, worry not: the hard release date when the June releases become available everywhere else is June 12th.

Of Echoes Born contains twelve short stories, six of which are reprints and six of which are new (and includes a novelette-length Village story).

Outside a hospital in Ottawa, a heartbeat returns long enough for a good-bye. Downtown, a man steps into shadows of the past to help those who have died find their way free from their memories. In Niagara, an ice wine vintage is flavored with the truth of what happened on a dark evening of betrayal. In British Columbia, the snow itself can speak to someone who knows how to listen.

The past echoes through these queer tales—sometimes soft enough to grant a second chance at love, and other times loud enough to damn a killer—never without leaving those who’ve heard it unchanged.

Of Echoes Born is the first short story collection from Lambda Literary Award finalist ’Nathan Burgoine.

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Advance praise from Publishers Weekly: “Burgoine assembles 12 queer supernatural tales, several of which interlock…The best tales could easily stand alone; these include ‘The Finish,’ about an aging vintner whose erotic dalliance with a deaf young man named Dennis gets complicated, and ‘Struck,’ in which beleaguered bookstore clerk Chris meets Lightning Todd, who predicts his future wealth and romance. A pair of stories set in ‘the Village,’ a gay neighborhood, feature appealing characters and romances and could be components of a fine Tales of the City–like novel.”

Funny sidenote: This morning I woke up to find my macbook wouldn’t connect to the internet, which is not a great way to start the day on any day, but release day? Even less optimal. I managed to get my connection to work again (big sigh of relief).

This probably goes down on the side of “write and schedule posts ahead of time, you dunce.” I’m usually better at that. In my defence, I’d been writing and scheduling my posts for #PrideReads yesterday, and used up all my screen spoons for that.

 

#PrideReads Day One – A Queer Novel I’d Like to See Written

Edit: I’m dropping out of this theme for the month. The short reason is this: It’s hurting and excluding people I wanted to include in the first place, and that’s not okay. I thought I could patch-job. I can’t. The longer reason is: The original idea happened super-quickly. It jumped from brainstorming to being posted without any chance to look it over. Every suggestion I sent in I sent in with the umbrella term “queer” and references to either (a) genres, or (b) ideas a writer/reader would like to see more of/write. I don’t think I was clear enough when I sent in suggestions I absolutely meant queer that way. That’s on me. So the first graphic came out and was posted and used an incomplete acronym, and yeah, that was cringeworthy. It was posted and tagged before I’d ever seen it and I fired off a request for it to be fixed to the people organizing. And the fix isn’t enough. The specific identity questions don’t cover the full range. Yesterday I started writing some of the posts ahead of time, scheduling them to go live at 7:00a each morning. I wrote a few of them ahead of time—and especially day 5, where my answer was both a resounding no and an explanation of why making the correlation between romance and queer excludes aromantic queers. (I had a similar post outlined for the question about sex, and the question about straight characters, because, again, asexual people are queer, and straight isn’t the opposite of queer.) Anyway. I’m starting to ramble. I thought I could patch-job my way through the month, using every mention of queer to remind and reinforce that my queer is absolutely LGGBTQQIAAP2S+, but there’s enough hurt and dialog out there already to tell me no, I can’t. I’m sorry. My queer includes the whole umbrella, and those identities deserve more than a patch-job. 

 

And we’re off! Let’s see how far I get into this month of prompts about queer books and queer writing before I cheat and dodge a question or answer something not quite the way it was intended. I swear I don’t do it on purpose.

Now, I have to admit, this very first question stumped me. I have reading patterns I enjoy, and I often stick to them, and I generally find what I’m looking for.

For example? My audiobook listening is almost entirely contemporary romances of some sort (usually ladies-loving-ladies, since I find digging through what’s available for fellas-loving-fellas really tough to navigate without bumping into tropes I truly dislike), with a dash of science fiction. (Most recently, I just finished listening to Crescent City Confidential by Aurora Rey—so good, but bring snacks because she makes you hungry with her descriptions of food—and N.K. Jemisin‘s Broken Earth series, which was SF with a phenomenally casual queer inclusiveness that I freaking loved.)

My e-reader tends to be where I put shorter fiction, which I adore. Novellas and short stories (and anthologies and collections). Almost entirely queer (and generally all over the place, genre wise). Right now? That’s Not Here, Not Now by Alex Jeffers.

My physical books, the ones that come with me in my book bag or sit beside the bath or the bed? Those are almost always queer, too, and generally hit every genre but horror (which is a rare, rare read for me). This particular pile is very, very large right now, but includes Brey Willows‘ Fury’s Bridge and Robyn Nyx‘s Escape in Time.

So. I sat back and went through my reading experiences and then I remembered Wild Cards.

Wild Cards was a shared-world anthology edited by George R.R. Martin that was basically a super-hero world. I loved it. I read it voraciously, all the various follow-up volumes. The telekinetic Turtle, the projective teleporter Popinjay… I loved so many of the characters.

And, you can likely guess how many of the characters were queer.

Yeah. It’s been many years since I read them, but… I’m pretty sure… None.

So, that’s my answer for today: I would love to read a shared-world superhero anthology of short fiction with a queer cast of characters. Give me a gay pyrokinetic, and a bisexual telepath working together to figure out who’s chasing down the ace teleporter who got away with the incriminating proof from the criminal element of who’s behind a series of queer hate crimes. A trans speedster could chase down the armoured convoy SUVs holding the teleporter captive and…

You get it.

Of course, this means I cheated already. Anthologies aren’t novels.

Well. That didn’t take long.

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If you want to play along this month with #PrideReads, you don’t have to make massive blog entries like I did today (and indeed I’m doubtful I’ll do the same every day myself) but if you do Tweet or Facebook or Instagram your own suggestions, make sure you add the hashtag, and we’ll all learn about some great queer books, queer writers, and queer ideas.

Happy Pride Month!

Welcome to the Village

Of Echoes Born will be available at the Bold Strokes Books website this Friday, June 1st. To say I’m excited about this collection would be a wee understatement, because—this will surprise no one who knows me—short fiction is my favourite.

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That’s Ian.

That doesn’t mean I don’t have space in my heart for other things. Both as a reader and a writer, I still love novels and series, but shorter fiction? Novellas and short stories? Oh, they’re my jam.

Even when I had my first short fiction piece published, which was “Heart” in Fool For Love: New Gay Fiction, I had a plan about interconnected short fiction pieces. At the time, I’d wanted to start with Ian, a character with the ability to see how people feel as colours in the air around them, alongside a less predictable gift to glimpse the past or the future.

Instead, one of the characters around Ian, Jeremiah, caught my attention, and Miah’s relationship with Aiden (a.k.a. “Moose”) took centre stage. Moose could heal people, but had repressed that gift for years after witnessing a loss. Miah had a heart condition. They hit it off, and it became “Heart.” Ian stuck around just enough to get mentioned twice in “Heart,” though.

And they all live in the Village.

The Village—my fictionalized version of the little gay village here in Ottawa—gets a major debut in Of Echoes Born, even though I’ve already visited it multiple times in Handmade Holidays, Saving the Date, and probably a majority of the other short fiction I’ve already published.

“A Little Village Magic” pulls double-duty in the collection. First, it tells the story of Gabriel Riche, who absolutely, positively doesn’t believe in magic despite working at a little New Age/Occult shop in the Village, and his fumbling attempts to gather enough courage to make a connection with the charming artist repainting a defaced memorial. Alas, the thing about magic is it doesn’t matter much if you believe in it when it believes in you.

The second job of “A Little Village Magic” is to spark a change in the Village. The magic that pops up in the novelette will have impact on person after person in the Village. Gabriel’s just the first. The novelette connects with almost every other story in the connection with one (or two) degrees of separation. Ian’s bookstore is there, as is Michel’s gallery, and Phoebe’s consignment shop, and Ivan’s tea shop and café, and—of course—the oft-referenced Bittersweets small fair-trade coffee chain from Handmade Holidays (and, as Ru would undoubtedly mention, the one with the better grinder is in the Village).

I have plans for Ivan. And Marion. And Michel. And even Officer Hotbody. And if readers enjoy “A Little Village Magic,” I’ve got a plan for more novellas set in the Village (and even a re-release of “A Little Village Magic” with a bit of an expansion to further set the stage).

This Friday the Village is officially open.

I hope to see you there.

#PrideReads

Hello! I’ve hooked arms with some lovely authors—Kathryn Sommerlot, J.P. Jackson, Kevin Klehr, and Nicki J. Markus—to brainstorm up a month of prompts for a Twitter hashtag about queer reading for Pride month.

So, starting June the first? Daily prompts about reading, writing, and queerness. Join us. Bring your books, authors, recommendations, and wish-lists for asexual, aromantic, bisexual, gay, genderqueer, intersex, lesbian, nonbinary, trans… well, you get the idea. It’s Pride, it’s books.

Join in, tag it #PrideReads, and lets see if we can’t make noise for some awesome books (and shine a light on some awesome opportunities for books we wish we saw more of.)

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(Edit to add: I want to be extra-clear that when I say Queer or LGBTQIA+ I’m including Asexual, Aromantic, Pansexual, Nonbinary, Two-Spirit, and other identities that are far too often gatekept or missed by the queer community at large. The graphic here says queer or LGBTQIA+ and it’s important to me to make sure I’m clear that queer will always mean LGBTQIA2SP+ Etc.)

Friday Flash Fics — Noodle

Today’s Friday Flash Fics photo is another lighthearted snap that made me smile. It also reminded me (once again) of William and Ben from “Range of Motion” (printed in Men in Love). This takes place a few weeks after the end of “Range of Motion,” when they’ve been dating for a while.

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Noodle

William stepped into the dental office and smiled at the woman behind the counter. She smiled right back, and he wondered if maybe he should have put on a shirt rather than the striped tank he wore at the gym.

Too late now.

“Your name?” she said, then her gaze shifted and she noticed the patch on the front of the tank. “Oh. William.”

“I’m not here for an appointment,” he said. “I’m here to pick up a friend. Ben Wright.”

The woman tapped on the keyboard, a small line forming between her eyebrows.

“Sorry,” William said. “It’ll probably be under Reuben Wright.”

“Ah, yes. Got it.” Her smile returned. “He’s almost ready. Have a seat.”

William nodded and sat down to wait. It didn’t take long.

Reuben was upright, but the vague way he was looking through the room wasn’t promising. He blinked a lot.

Beside him, a woman in bright patterned scrubs looked at the people waiting, and noticed him stand up.

“William?” she said.

“Hi,” he said, coming over to them.

“So, everything went really well. His wisdom teeth came out clean, and there weren’t any complications with his wires or the implants,” she said.

“Hi,” Ben said, and reached out and touched one fingertip to William’s nose. “Boop.”

“But he’s still a little out of it,” she said, with expert-level seriousness.

*

William had Ben’s painkiller instructions—and the painkillers themselves—in his pocket. He kept his hand supportively at the small of Ben’s back while Ben blinked and walked with him. They only had to go a half-dozen blocks to get to William’s apartment, but William was already wishing he’d borrowed Mick’s car.

“I wanna sit down,” Ben said. His voice was a bit muffled by the cotton swabs left inside it.

“Sorry buddy,” William said. “It’s not far now.”

“Sitting,” Ben said, and proceeded to turn away from him.

William wrapped one arm around his waist. “Woah.”

Ben looked up at him. “I would really like to sit down.” There was a little bit of drool in the corner of his mouth. There was quite a bit more in his beard.

“You can lie down at my place once we get you there.”

Ben seemed to be trying hard to focus on William’s face. “I like kissing you.”

“I’ve been enjoying that, too.” He had to swallow a laugh. It wasn’t fair to Ben. The guy was as high as a kite.

“If you let me sit down, we could kiss,” Ben said. His eyebrows wagged.

“Oh my God, you’re adorable,” William said. “But seriously. We gotta get you to my place.”

“Are you trying to get me into bed?” Ben grinned. The effect was somewhat ruined by the drool.

“Yes, but not like that. You need to lie down. You need to take your pills. You’re staying over for recovery.”

“Not nookie?”

“Not nookie.”

“I would like nookie.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” William could feel his face burning. ‘Nookie’ hadn’t been on the menu yet. He and Ben had been taking it slow for weeks, and that had been fine. William had intended to go as slow as Ben needed.

“My beard probably feels great in places.”

“Okay!” William tried to get Ben walking again. “C’mon, buddy.”

“I can’t wait. I need to sit down.” Ben eyed him piteously. “My body is noodly. Noodles. Noodle-like.” He leaned forward and pressed his forehead against William’s shoulder. “I am spaghetti.”

William burst out laughing, then wrapped his arms around Ben. “Oh buddy. I’m sorry.”

“I can lie down now?”

William took a deep breath, crouched, and picked Ben bodily off the ground, carrying him the rest of the way.

 

 

 

Friday Flash Fics — Four Windows

Today’s Friday Flash Fics shot made me think of William and Ben from “Range of Motion” (which appeared in Men in Love) but then made me think of a few other characters, including Johnny and Matt from Handmade Holidays, and before long this happened.

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Four Windows

4D

“I swear to God, if you don’t start smiling…”

“Sorry,” Kent said. He pushed his sunglasses back up his nose, took another sip of his water, and tried a smile.

Vanessa fixed her red boa. “It’s Topher’s first Pride. We are here for him, you are here for him, and you will damn well smile like it’s a celebration.” Her voice had dropped with every word, and Kent felt his face heat up.

She was right. He was being an ass. Just because Pride reminded him of He-Who-Would-Never-Be-Named-Again-Amen, it was no reason to ruin Topher’s first pride.

“What do you think?”

They turned.

Topher wore rainbow suspenders, a choppy blond wig, and bright red pants.

“You,” Vanessa said, “look fabulous.”

Topher laughed and spun.

Kent couldn’t help but remember his own first Pride. He’d come out way younger than Topher, but he’d been no less enthusiastic.

He knelt down and went through his bag, pulling out some of his leather kit.

Topher grinned and clapped his hands. “Take it off, mister.”

Over Topher’s head, Vanessa mouthed the words ‘thank you’ to him.

Above them, the flag Topher had fixed on the window frame flapped.

Kent shucked his shirt, and there was cheering from the street below.

Okay, maybe it wouldn’t be impossible to get in the mood after all.

4C

“How about this one?” Alastair held the phone out for the guys.

“I like it,” Sam said.

“Veto,” Jonah said.

Alastair groaned. “You two are the literal worst. Why did I ever start a band with you?”

“Shut up. My face looks funny,” Jonah said.

“You look like leather bell-boys,” Alastair said. “I’m not sure your faces are going to even register with our followers. We have to be at the club for sound-check in an hour. Please. Just let me post you guys watching the Pride Parade, and then we can get our asses to Chances.” He wanted to show the band having fun all through Pride. They were a queer band. It mattered.

“Okay, okay. Try again,” Jonah said.

Alastair lined up another shot. He eyed the screen, then showed it to them.

“Much better,” Jonah said.

“Veto,” Sam said.

Alastair exhaled. At this rate, he’d have to redo his hair, and it had taken him over an hour the first time. Who’s idea had it been to go all retro punk for this damn show, anyway?

 

3D

“Oh, hello Officer Hotbody!” Ben shouted.

Beside him, Riley sunk down to hide. “Oh my God, Ben, what is wrong with you?”

“Have you seen that man’s arms?” Ben leaned on the windowsill. “If I had arms like that, I’d never wear sleeves.”

“You’re not wearing sleeves now,” Sean said. Ben was sporting a red tank top.

Riley rose slowly, saw that the police officer in question had moved on, and leaned his chin on Ben’s shoulder. “Besides, you already have nice arms.”

“Yeah,” William said. “Mine.” He mugged a quick flex, and the other three watched as the sleeves of his white T-shirt caught around his biceps. It was obvious which of them was the personal trainer.

Ben grinned and slid over. William wrapped the arms in question around him.

They were so cute together, and they hadn’t had an easy ride getting there. Riley could feel himself blushing, and eyed Sean out of the corner of his eye. He wondered if Sean’s beard was as soft as it looked.

Maybe, if the day went the way he hoped, he’d find out.

“What’s got you grinning?” Ben said, one eyebrow rising.

They all turned to look at Riley, who tried not to die on the spot. “Nothing. Just… Happy Pride.”

“Happy Pride,” Ben said, then kissed William. There were cheers from the street below. Riley grinned, watching them. They were certainly putting on a show for the crowd.

“Hey, Riley?” Sean said.

Riley turned just in time to find out the beard was, indeed, soft.

 

3C

The back of Johnny’s pink jacket said “Pink Ladies.”

“I don’t get it,” Jay said.

“We have got to get you a better education,” Matt said. He hopped up onto the windowsill and leaned against the frame. “It’s from Grease.”

Jay blinked. “Oh. That’s a movie, right?”

“Musical,” Matt said.

“Lord, forgive him, for he knows not what he does not know,” Johnny said. “In the name of the Frenchie, the Sandy, and the Holy Rizzo, Amen.”

“I surrender,” Jay said.

“Okay,” Matt said. “Now that you’re here, you can change.”

“Change?”

“You’re wearing grey,” Johnny said.

“I came from work,” Jay said.

“Take a look around,” Johnny said. “Do you see all the rainbows?”

“I don’t have another shirt,” Jay said. He couldn’t help but smile, though. “I’m sure no one will mind if I wear grey. Look, those women are wearing black.”

“They’re wearing black leather, Jay.”

“Well, I don’t have any leather, either.”

“Oh, for God’s sake. Here. At least hold this.” Matt handed him a pink balloon.

Jay held it. It bobbed in the wind. “I feel like an idiot.”

“That’s because you’re not in the right frame of mind.”

“Is the right frame of mind ‘exhausted after an eight hour shift’?”

“It is not.”

Jay laughed. Then he leaned forward out the window, and bellowed, “I’m tired and cranky and my friends keep telling me I’m doing Pride wrong!” Then he let go of the balloon.

Matt and Johnny covered their faces, but Jay watched the balloon rise. The wind caught it, and it zagged off to his right as it rose. He leaned out the window just in time to watch a really, really hot guy in black leather straps and sunglasses catch it.

Their gazes met. Or at least, Jay assumed they did behind the mirror shades.

“Thanks for the balloon,” the guy said.

Beside him, Johnny leaned out the window. “He’s too pure to be pink!”

Jay had no idea what that meant, but it made the hot guy smile. A lot.

“Does that mean he’s going to show up in a leather jacket with a cigarette later?”

“What’s happening?” Jay whispered.

“Shh,” Matt whispered back. “I promise we’ll dress him right before the big race.”

“4D,” the guy said. “You should all come up after the parade. It’s my friend’s first Pride.”

Beside him, a hyper guy in a blond wig and rainbow suspenders waved down to them. “Happy Pride!” he yelled.

“Happy Pride!” they yelled back.

Jay watched the hottie tie the balloon string to his wrist, then they all went back to watching the parade.

“So,” Johnny said, “after the parade, we’re going up there, and the first thing you have to say is ‘Tell me about it, stud.’”