Sarah Black's Blog: Book Report, page 17
October 29, 2011
Trip Report: Boise to Moab
Trip Report: Boise to Moab
We left Boise at o’dark thirty, a tradition in my family. When we moved when I was a kid, we all got up at 0400. Each kid had a pillow and blanket and a spot in the car to fall back asleep, and my dad had a few quiet dark hours of peaceful driving before the requests for bathrooms started up. That’s a powerful memory for me, sitting in the back of a moving car, all warm and snuggled in to the pillow, hearing the wheels on the highway, and sometimes my mother’s voice, very quiet. It always smelled like coffee, and there was a rustle of the maps as my mom folded them to the right quadrant.
I didn’t realize until I wrote that how much my own roaming around in a pickup truck mimics those old trips. The kid always brings his pillow and a blanket- a nice wool Pendleton camping blanket that we keep in the truck, and he sleeps while I drive in the dark and drink coffee and think about things.
Oddly enough, I had a hard time finding a map. Maybe they’re falling by the wayside like paper books. I ended up having to print directions from Mapquest, but they were really easy the first leg- get on the interstate going east, and drive for 305 miles. Hard to take a wrong turning with those directions.
Just outside of Boise we saw a shooting star, which I took to be a good omen. We’ve only seen one other shooting star in our travels, on the road down in Texas from Alpine to Big Bend. This was a little one, but I was happy to see it.
We drove across the Snake River in Pleasant Valley, and the fog hung heavy and wet just above the water. The Snake is a wide, flat, muddy slow river in this part of the state. Just outside of Bliss, Idaho, the sun started to rise, and the sky was so many colors that we don’t have names for in English I amused myself trying to think up colors. But by the time I had identified a particular dark orange red as the color of a winter squash called a Keri, the colors had changed to something else.
I saw a bison standing in a corral in the middle of an RV park. He was standing very still, and breathing very slowly, in a way that struck me as ominous. Like he was plotting something. I don’t know if I’d be able to rest easy inside the thin aluminum walls of a camper if I could hear the thick, raspy breath of a two-ton bison outside the window.
We stopped in Albion, Idaho to get gas, and there were a couple of horse trailers parked next to the road. The horses were out of the trailers, and there were six or seven cowboys with them, wearing barn coats and Stetsons and boots, drinking coffee and standing with the horses. It struck me that they were all standing around not speaking. Just resting against their horses, drinking coffee and thinking about the morning. By the time we got out of the bathrooms, they were up in the saddles and riding off, still not speaking. This is why I secretly desire to be a cowboy- for the quiet, and the ability to climb on a horse and ride away in the early morning. But for now a pickup truck will have to do me.
I’m listening to country music on the radio, and it occurs to me all the songs about cowboys riding away and leaving are about the restless hearts of boys. Why do girls never get to ride away? In truth, I’ve done my fair share of roaming around because I couldn’t stand to stay any longer. I dig through the CDs until I find Bonnie Raitt. The Dixie Chicks. Thank goodness I’m not the only girl with a restless heart.
When we cross into Utah, the landscape starts to look a little tidier. The wildness seeps away in the politeness of the Utah road signs. “Drowsy Drivers Exit NOW!” Idaho doesn’t have any signs for pansy-ass drivers who can’t stay awake. If they did, the sign would say, “Wake Up, ASSHOLE!” Oh, well, I watch Idaho getting smaller in my rearview mirror. I never love a place as much as when I’m leaving it.
The interstate down through Salt Lake was like Limbo, for those of you who went to Catholic school. The kid spotted a ferris wheel, a roller coaster, a haunted circus, and a mini-golf establishment with a tiny Mount Rushmore at the entrance. The final hole was a golf ball hit into the Statue of Liberty. I declined to stop at any of these treats, and we eventually made it through the smoggy polluted air and back into the red rocks of wild Utah.
I kept a careful eye out for any signs of sister-wives, but only in tiny Ephraim did I see a little white house with “The second wife’s house” painted on the front in red cursive. If you had your own house, then the benefits of the whole sister-wife deal were more obvious. It would be sharing the kitchen that was the dealbreaker, not sharing the husband. Did I just say that? What the heck kind of romance writer am I?
We finally hit the mountains and the red rock country of southern Utah, with the strange hoodoos and the empty roads, and started seeing Utes and Navajo roaming around on their horses or in their pickups. My heart was singing, I’m home! I’m home! We got a hotel in pretty little Moab, and I immediately set out to roam around- then I realized I was wearing sneakers. I didn’t even have a decent pair of boots! You can’t walk around Canyonlands in sneakers. I’ve been gone too long. Albuquerque tomorrow, and start the new job. We’ll find a diner that sells fry bread and mutton stew, with peach pie for dessert.
We left Boise at o’dark thirty, a tradition in my family. When we moved when I was a kid, we all got up at 0400. Each kid had a pillow and blanket and a spot in the car to fall back asleep, and my dad had a few quiet dark hours of peaceful driving before the requests for bathrooms started up. That’s a powerful memory for me, sitting in the back of a moving car, all warm and snuggled in to the pillow, hearing the wheels on the highway, and sometimes my mother’s voice, very quiet. It always smelled like coffee, and there was a rustle of the maps as my mom folded them to the right quadrant.
I didn’t realize until I wrote that how much my own roaming around in a pickup truck mimics those old trips. The kid always brings his pillow and a blanket- a nice wool Pendleton camping blanket that we keep in the truck, and he sleeps while I drive in the dark and drink coffee and think about things.
Oddly enough, I had a hard time finding a map. Maybe they’re falling by the wayside like paper books. I ended up having to print directions from Mapquest, but they were really easy the first leg- get on the interstate going east, and drive for 305 miles. Hard to take a wrong turning with those directions.
Just outside of Boise we saw a shooting star, which I took to be a good omen. We’ve only seen one other shooting star in our travels, on the road down in Texas from Alpine to Big Bend. This was a little one, but I was happy to see it.
We drove across the Snake River in Pleasant Valley, and the fog hung heavy and wet just above the water. The Snake is a wide, flat, muddy slow river in this part of the state. Just outside of Bliss, Idaho, the sun started to rise, and the sky was so many colors that we don’t have names for in English I amused myself trying to think up colors. But by the time I had identified a particular dark orange red as the color of a winter squash called a Keri, the colors had changed to something else.
I saw a bison standing in a corral in the middle of an RV park. He was standing very still, and breathing very slowly, in a way that struck me as ominous. Like he was plotting something. I don’t know if I’d be able to rest easy inside the thin aluminum walls of a camper if I could hear the thick, raspy breath of a two-ton bison outside the window.
We stopped in Albion, Idaho to get gas, and there were a couple of horse trailers parked next to the road. The horses were out of the trailers, and there were six or seven cowboys with them, wearing barn coats and Stetsons and boots, drinking coffee and standing with the horses. It struck me that they were all standing around not speaking. Just resting against their horses, drinking coffee and thinking about the morning. By the time we got out of the bathrooms, they were up in the saddles and riding off, still not speaking. This is why I secretly desire to be a cowboy- for the quiet, and the ability to climb on a horse and ride away in the early morning. But for now a pickup truck will have to do me.
I’m listening to country music on the radio, and it occurs to me all the songs about cowboys riding away and leaving are about the restless hearts of boys. Why do girls never get to ride away? In truth, I’ve done my fair share of roaming around because I couldn’t stand to stay any longer. I dig through the CDs until I find Bonnie Raitt. The Dixie Chicks. Thank goodness I’m not the only girl with a restless heart.
When we cross into Utah, the landscape starts to look a little tidier. The wildness seeps away in the politeness of the Utah road signs. “Drowsy Drivers Exit NOW!” Idaho doesn’t have any signs for pansy-ass drivers who can’t stay awake. If they did, the sign would say, “Wake Up, ASSHOLE!” Oh, well, I watch Idaho getting smaller in my rearview mirror. I never love a place as much as when I’m leaving it.
The interstate down through Salt Lake was like Limbo, for those of you who went to Catholic school. The kid spotted a ferris wheel, a roller coaster, a haunted circus, and a mini-golf establishment with a tiny Mount Rushmore at the entrance. The final hole was a golf ball hit into the Statue of Liberty. I declined to stop at any of these treats, and we eventually made it through the smoggy polluted air and back into the red rocks of wild Utah.
I kept a careful eye out for any signs of sister-wives, but only in tiny Ephraim did I see a little white house with “The second wife’s house” painted on the front in red cursive. If you had your own house, then the benefits of the whole sister-wife deal were more obvious. It would be sharing the kitchen that was the dealbreaker, not sharing the husband. Did I just say that? What the heck kind of romance writer am I?
We finally hit the mountains and the red rock country of southern Utah, with the strange hoodoos and the empty roads, and started seeing Utes and Navajo roaming around on their horses or in their pickups. My heart was singing, I’m home! I’m home! We got a hotel in pretty little Moab, and I immediately set out to roam around- then I realized I was wearing sneakers. I didn’t even have a decent pair of boots! You can’t walk around Canyonlands in sneakers. I’ve been gone too long. Albuquerque tomorrow, and start the new job. We’ll find a diner that sells fry bread and mutton stew, with peach pie for dessert.
October 18, 2011
How to Read (and Write) a Short Story
How to Read (and Write) a Short Story
I have been reading comments lately on why people are dissatisfied with short stories: they don’t feel like they know the characters, the endings are open, with too many loose ends, the conflict is never resolved properly, not enough setting, etc. I’ve been taking this issue seriously, because I love to read and write shorts, and I feel like many people are missing out on the subtle joys of this form.
When I first started reading short stories, naturally I compared the reading experience to novels, which I was more familiar with. Shorts were different because I couldn’t sink into that fictional dream in the same way. I couldn’t immerse myself in the world of the novel. But before long I realized that the way one read and felt a short was different.
Sometimes I think reading novels is the way I meditate. I’m sure my brain waves would look like a monk in a hermitage if someone were to watch them when I’m reading a good novel. I don’t pay attention to anything but the story. I don’t look at how it’s structured, take notes on clever bits of craft—I’m there, in the story, and I don’t come out unless the house is on fire.
When I read a short, though, it’s a different experience. It feels like I’m reading slower, more carefully, delighting in the subtle use of prose and the quiet, smaller story. I would liken it to holding a small piece of crystal in the palm of my hand, turning it to catch the sun, studying the way the sunlight hits it. A novel is a huge, lovely, baroque crystal chandelier in comparison. While each is beautiful and both are similar, they are not in their essential nature alike, and so should not be compared to each other. Reading a short story is a new experience, different from reading a novel.
The specific elements of a short are different from those same elements in a novel. I would suggest the major difference is the conflict. Conflicts in novels tend to be broad and deep, and have both internal and external elements. A good novel conflict is a serial killer stalking one hero, while the other is fighting alcoholism and they are both dealing with an episode of cheating while under the influence. While the conflict in a short is smaller, it is no less serious, and can be one of the great delights in this form.
A good conflict in a short is one that is familiar, real, and potentially a deal breaker, but one that can be resolved in a reasonable time-frame. An example: Character A rolls over and studies the face of the man on the pillow next to his. He says, “I love you,” not realizing he has spoken out loud, until he sees the look of horror and stunned disbelief on the face next to his. Character B says, “Oh, shit,” and sprints out of the bedroom, tripping over his jeans as he tries to put them on while running.
Communication, and miscommunication, has been done to death in romance novels, but maybe that is because it is so familiar and so many of us find communication the most dangerous thin ice in a relationship. While it is hard to sustain the conflict over miscommunication over the course of a novel, it is very well suited to a short.
Like the conflict, the time frame in a short is usually compressed. A story can last over the same length of time as a novel, but if so, it tends to be episodic. This is a technique I love but many readers don’t like- again one is more familiar with time-lines in novels- day by day, minute by minute action. But more usually, the time line in a short tends to be a short length of time with the familiar day by day story line.
Characterization in a short is one of the reasons I love this form. Without the depth of a novel, characters retain a degree of subtlety and mysteriousness that makes them feel very real to me. I was in the grocery story today, getting coleslaw at the deli, and thinking of two characters I’m working on now. I wondered if they would prefer chicken tenders or drumsticks? Regular or spicy? I don’t actually need to know this to write their story, but I’m interested enough in them to wonder. That’s what a short does—it gives you enough interest in a character to think about him. Everything doesn’t have to be answered. Besides, people are complicated and mysterious enough we will never really know them. We won’t know them—but we can be friends.
The resolution in a short is as subtle as the rest of the story. Without a myriad of tricky strings that need to be untangled at the end, the short can have an ending that is full of hope and the future, without spelling out every fried chicken sort of detail. What I want to know at the end is that they are on their way. They are walking down the road together, at peace. And I want to know that their story continues somewhere in story heaven, and maybe someone else is writing it. Maybe the characters are writing it themselves. A short story is like an Indian Summer day. There are not many of them. They don’t last long, but they are delightful in a way that is unique to themselves. They live on in our memory.
I have been reading comments lately on why people are dissatisfied with short stories: they don’t feel like they know the characters, the endings are open, with too many loose ends, the conflict is never resolved properly, not enough setting, etc. I’ve been taking this issue seriously, because I love to read and write shorts, and I feel like many people are missing out on the subtle joys of this form.
When I first started reading short stories, naturally I compared the reading experience to novels, which I was more familiar with. Shorts were different because I couldn’t sink into that fictional dream in the same way. I couldn’t immerse myself in the world of the novel. But before long I realized that the way one read and felt a short was different.
Sometimes I think reading novels is the way I meditate. I’m sure my brain waves would look like a monk in a hermitage if someone were to watch them when I’m reading a good novel. I don’t pay attention to anything but the story. I don’t look at how it’s structured, take notes on clever bits of craft—I’m there, in the story, and I don’t come out unless the house is on fire.
When I read a short, though, it’s a different experience. It feels like I’m reading slower, more carefully, delighting in the subtle use of prose and the quiet, smaller story. I would liken it to holding a small piece of crystal in the palm of my hand, turning it to catch the sun, studying the way the sunlight hits it. A novel is a huge, lovely, baroque crystal chandelier in comparison. While each is beautiful and both are similar, they are not in their essential nature alike, and so should not be compared to each other. Reading a short story is a new experience, different from reading a novel.
The specific elements of a short are different from those same elements in a novel. I would suggest the major difference is the conflict. Conflicts in novels tend to be broad and deep, and have both internal and external elements. A good novel conflict is a serial killer stalking one hero, while the other is fighting alcoholism and they are both dealing with an episode of cheating while under the influence. While the conflict in a short is smaller, it is no less serious, and can be one of the great delights in this form.
A good conflict in a short is one that is familiar, real, and potentially a deal breaker, but one that can be resolved in a reasonable time-frame. An example: Character A rolls over and studies the face of the man on the pillow next to his. He says, “I love you,” not realizing he has spoken out loud, until he sees the look of horror and stunned disbelief on the face next to his. Character B says, “Oh, shit,” and sprints out of the bedroom, tripping over his jeans as he tries to put them on while running.
Communication, and miscommunication, has been done to death in romance novels, but maybe that is because it is so familiar and so many of us find communication the most dangerous thin ice in a relationship. While it is hard to sustain the conflict over miscommunication over the course of a novel, it is very well suited to a short.
Like the conflict, the time frame in a short is usually compressed. A story can last over the same length of time as a novel, but if so, it tends to be episodic. This is a technique I love but many readers don’t like- again one is more familiar with time-lines in novels- day by day, minute by minute action. But more usually, the time line in a short tends to be a short length of time with the familiar day by day story line.
Characterization in a short is one of the reasons I love this form. Without the depth of a novel, characters retain a degree of subtlety and mysteriousness that makes them feel very real to me. I was in the grocery story today, getting coleslaw at the deli, and thinking of two characters I’m working on now. I wondered if they would prefer chicken tenders or drumsticks? Regular or spicy? I don’t actually need to know this to write their story, but I’m interested enough in them to wonder. That’s what a short does—it gives you enough interest in a character to think about him. Everything doesn’t have to be answered. Besides, people are complicated and mysterious enough we will never really know them. We won’t know them—but we can be friends.
The resolution in a short is as subtle as the rest of the story. Without a myriad of tricky strings that need to be untangled at the end, the short can have an ending that is full of hope and the future, without spelling out every fried chicken sort of detail. What I want to know at the end is that they are on their way. They are walking down the road together, at peace. And I want to know that their story continues somewhere in story heaven, and maybe someone else is writing it. Maybe the characters are writing it themselves. A short story is like an Indian Summer day. There are not many of them. They don’t last long, but they are delightful in a way that is unique to themselves. They live on in our memory.
September 27, 2011
This is the End!
This is the End!
I’ve been thinking about endings. If there is one thing readers complain about with my stories, it’s the end- or rather, the suddenness of the ending. Someone diagnosed me with SES- Sudden Ending Syndrome! I write the sort of ending I like. I suppose most writers do- and I end the story when the story tells me it has come to the end.
Almost always, I have planned and plotted more than I end up writing. But there comes a point where the major conflict is resolved and my fingers are hovering over the keyboard, and the story just says, “Nope, we’re done.”
Not always resolved completely, but nothing ever is—I feel like the key to the ending is when some sort of redemption occurs, or is possible. That’s the sort of ending I like to read and write, and the sort of ending that causes the occasional reader to howl for my blood, tear hair by the roots, and such.
So since I believe in studying and working at writing, and I love it so much, I am indulging myself by studying how other writers end their stories.
Michael Perry is one of my favorite writers. He writes humor and memoir, and I recently finished his books Truck: A Love Story, and Coop. He uses a particular structure for his books that makes the ending seem just right. He usually structures the books around the year, and sometimes has chapters as months or seasons. The end comes with the end of the year. But even better, he ends his books by having the narrator go to bed at the end of the day and fall asleep. These are very happy, rounded, peaceful endings that seem right because they are following the natural end of the day.
Tim O’Brien wrote the endings of a couple of the stories in The Things They Carried in a way that is very powerful, and seems quite right for the stories- the characters soldier up and march off into the future. Here’s the ending to The Things They Carried:
“He might just shrug and say, Carry on, then they would saddle up and form into a column and move out toward the villages west of Than Khe.”
Here’s the end of the story In the Field: “Maybe he would just take a couple of practice swings and knock the ball down the middle and pick up his clubs and walk off into the afternoon.” For these sorrowful stories, the endings are perfect.
Denis Johnson ended his short story Car Crash While Hitchhiking, from Jesus’ Son, like a punch in the face. The whole story has a voice like a gasoline fire, and ends with “And you, you ridiculous people, you expect me to help you.” This ending is all about the extraordinary voice. Jack Kerouac’s On the Road ends with a powerful voice as well- “I think of Dean Moriarty, I even think of Old Dean Moriarty the father we never found, I think of Dean Moriarty.” I listened to Kerouac reading the end of this book on Youtube- that was a real gift.
My favorite ending in all of fiction, though, is the end to Norman McLean’s A River Runs Through It. His language is tender and beautiful, but what he did was he used the last lines to open the story up, from his particular story of this man and his brother and his father, and he made it eternal and everlasting. It was like this story left you staring into the night sky, at a particular star, when you suddenly realize you’re staring into the night sky, and there are billions of stars right above your head. This way of making a story that is particular connect with the universal is, I think, perfect.
“Eventually, all things merge into one...and a river runs through it.
The river was cut by the world's great flood...and runs over rocks from the basement of time.
On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words.. and some of the words are theirs.
I am haunted by waters.”
I’ve been thinking about endings. If there is one thing readers complain about with my stories, it’s the end- or rather, the suddenness of the ending. Someone diagnosed me with SES- Sudden Ending Syndrome! I write the sort of ending I like. I suppose most writers do- and I end the story when the story tells me it has come to the end.
Almost always, I have planned and plotted more than I end up writing. But there comes a point where the major conflict is resolved and my fingers are hovering over the keyboard, and the story just says, “Nope, we’re done.”
Not always resolved completely, but nothing ever is—I feel like the key to the ending is when some sort of redemption occurs, or is possible. That’s the sort of ending I like to read and write, and the sort of ending that causes the occasional reader to howl for my blood, tear hair by the roots, and such.
So since I believe in studying and working at writing, and I love it so much, I am indulging myself by studying how other writers end their stories.
Michael Perry is one of my favorite writers. He writes humor and memoir, and I recently finished his books Truck: A Love Story, and Coop. He uses a particular structure for his books that makes the ending seem just right. He usually structures the books around the year, and sometimes has chapters as months or seasons. The end comes with the end of the year. But even better, he ends his books by having the narrator go to bed at the end of the day and fall asleep. These are very happy, rounded, peaceful endings that seem right because they are following the natural end of the day.
Tim O’Brien wrote the endings of a couple of the stories in The Things They Carried in a way that is very powerful, and seems quite right for the stories- the characters soldier up and march off into the future. Here’s the ending to The Things They Carried:
“He might just shrug and say, Carry on, then they would saddle up and form into a column and move out toward the villages west of Than Khe.”
Here’s the end of the story In the Field: “Maybe he would just take a couple of practice swings and knock the ball down the middle and pick up his clubs and walk off into the afternoon.” For these sorrowful stories, the endings are perfect.
Denis Johnson ended his short story Car Crash While Hitchhiking, from Jesus’ Son, like a punch in the face. The whole story has a voice like a gasoline fire, and ends with “And you, you ridiculous people, you expect me to help you.” This ending is all about the extraordinary voice. Jack Kerouac’s On the Road ends with a powerful voice as well- “I think of Dean Moriarty, I even think of Old Dean Moriarty the father we never found, I think of Dean Moriarty.” I listened to Kerouac reading the end of this book on Youtube- that was a real gift.
My favorite ending in all of fiction, though, is the end to Norman McLean’s A River Runs Through It. His language is tender and beautiful, but what he did was he used the last lines to open the story up, from his particular story of this man and his brother and his father, and he made it eternal and everlasting. It was like this story left you staring into the night sky, at a particular star, when you suddenly realize you’re staring into the night sky, and there are billions of stars right above your head. This way of making a story that is particular connect with the universal is, I think, perfect.
“Eventually, all things merge into one...and a river runs through it.
The river was cut by the world's great flood...and runs over rocks from the basement of time.
On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words.. and some of the words are theirs.
I am haunted by waters.”
September 19, 2011
Death of a Grievous Angel
here's the blurb for the new book! Out I think sometimes in November from Dreamspinner-
Death of a Grievous Angel
Jesse Clayton loves painting, his cowboy grandfather, and his life as an artist with a wild abandon that leaves scorch marks on everything he touches. Budding Navajo cartoonist Lorenzo Maryboy is a hard-working former Marine: staunch, brave, and honorable. Chance brings them together on the road to Marathon, Texas, and passion flares.
Just as always, Jesse puts his art ahead of everything. He betrays their growing trust, and that Lorenzo can’t forgive. But Jesse’s found something he loves more than his art, and what he does to win Lorenzo’s forgiveness is far more dangerous than either man understands.
Death of a Grievous Angel
Jesse Clayton loves painting, his cowboy grandfather, and his life as an artist with a wild abandon that leaves scorch marks on everything he touches. Budding Navajo cartoonist Lorenzo Maryboy is a hard-working former Marine: staunch, brave, and honorable. Chance brings them together on the road to Marathon, Texas, and passion flares.
Just as always, Jesse puts his art ahead of everything. He betrays their growing trust, and that Lorenzo can’t forgive. But Jesse’s found something he loves more than his art, and what he does to win Lorenzo’s forgiveness is far more dangerous than either man understands.
August 3, 2011
Murder at Black Dog Springs
The character of Curtis Benally in this story is one of my favorite characters- and I didn't mean for him to be- he isn't a main character, and he sort of snuck in under my guard. That happens sometimes to everyone, I guess.
Murder at Black Dog Springs by Sarah Black
I’m very pleased this story is out in ebook format through the Kindle Store- it has only been available in print until now. This story is set in one of my favorite places on earth. Here’s an excerpt:
Blurb: Code Talker Logan Kee returns to Lukachukai Mountain in 1947, hoping to forget the horrors of war in the Pacific. But there is talk of uranium mining in Dinetah. When one of the mining executives is found shot to death on his land, Logan and his lover, Mike, a former Seabee, have to find the killer before the wrong man is accused of murder.
http://tinyurl.com/4verxua
It wasn’t many miles before the city fell away, then the paved road, and we were out in Navajo country, the truck kicking up a plume of red dust that could be seen for miles. The rusty sandstone cliffs were streaked with ivory gypsum, the ground littered with craggy boulders. The trees were short and twisted by the wind, juniper and pinion pine, and the brush was scrubby sage and creosote, rabbitbrush and snakeweed. Mike stared out the window, then he sighed and leaned his head back against the seat, his eyes closed.
“That’s what Navajo people do, breathe a sigh of relief when they get out of the city and back home. You spend much time out here when you were a kid?”
“Some. Mostly just driving through. My dad’s a geologist, and he used to come out here, scouting around. I loved to get out of the truck and climb around in the rocks. Explore the caves and the arches. Maybe some nice Navajo lady would fix me a piece of fry bread and a bowl of stew.”
“Your dad, what was he scouting around for?”
Mike sat up, shifting in the seat. “He was looking for places to mine minerals.”
I looked over at him. “Vanadium?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s why Emerson looked at you like that when you told him your name. McCann Mining, that’s you?”
“No. That’s my father. Listen, can we keep that info on the Q-T? I don’t want to get mixed up in whatever they’ve got going on right now.”
“What they’ve got going on right now is they’re opening mines, Mike. They’re mining uranium on the reservation.”
“I know.”
“It’s stirring up a bit of controversy. The elders, they don’t like it. Mining breaks some of the old traditions, the old taboos. But there’re a lot of men coming back from the war and looking for jobs. People got used to those regular paychecks. And now there’s nothing out here, no work, and they don’t want to go back to herding sheep. I don’t know. I guess I can see why people want the mines.”
Mike turned to face me across the seat. “Most of those men didn’t stand in Nagasaki with the Second Marines. You did, and I did. Makes me think a little differently about mining uranium. You know that’s what they’re using it for. They’re making more of those bombs.”
“Is that what’s got you so stirred up?” I waved my hand in his direction, and he grinned at me.
“Got me so messed up, you mean? Don’t worry. I’m not much of a drinker, Logan. You won’t have to dry me out or anything. It’s just…I think I missed the guys. I don’t miss the war, shit, no. But I really missed you. You and Curtis and Jay and all the guys. Course, I didn’t know you were going to put me to work.”
“Looks to me like you need some work to do. You spend too much time sitting around thinking. It gets a man down if he has anything at all to think about.”
“Tell me about your land. Black Dog Springs? You got water?”
“It’s up on Lukachukai Mountain, and I’ve got water year round and a hot springs I want to dig out a bit, line with sandstone and get it deep enough to sit in come winter. I’m tucked up against the mountain, and it blocks the north wind. Good sun and good grazing if I want to have some sheep. My mother’s uncle, it’s part of his allotment. He’s like my grandfather, I guess. Joe Curley. He’s the head of our family, our clan. He made the arrangements for my Enemyway when I got home.”
“What’s the Enemyway?”
“A ceremony. To clean me of the contamination of war. To put me back on the right path.”
Mike stared at me across the seat, his eyebrows raised. “Did it work?”
I shrugged, kept my eyes on the road. “I guess it depends on how you want to look at it. I stayed out with him when I got back, until the ceremony was done. I grew up on that land. Then I just didn’t want to leave it again. I feel good there. And Joe, he’s getting older. He needs somebody around. That’s what Emerson was bitching about.”
“When you get married, you usually go live with your wife’s family, right?”
“Yeah. She has a good hogan, and I had a well dug out there before I left. I think her mother took the money I sent every month and bought sheep. They don’t have anything to complain about.” I looked over at Mike, who was keeping his face noncommittal. “The families arranged it. I didn’t have much say.”
Mike closed his eyes again, leaned back against the seat. “It smells good out here. I missed it. I missed it when I was overseas and I missed it when I went home to Flagstaff. The city has really grown in the last few years, and it’s so noisy and dirty you can’t imagine. There’re nearly ten thousand people living there! I couldn’t hear myself think. I couldn’t sleep.”
“Go to sleep now if you want. We got another couple of hours driving until we’re home.”
Mike smiled. “Yeah, maybe I will.”
I kept my eyes on the road until I could hear gentle snores from the other side of the truck. Mike’s blond hair was longer now than when he’d been in uniform, and it was falling down over his forehead, brushing the tips of his ears and curling against the back of his neck. It was streaky, dark honey blond, as fine as cornsilk. I knew what Mike was talking about, missing the guys but not missing the war. But actually I was missing the war, too. I’d done something important. I’d been part of something, and now it was all over and I was feeling sort of lost. Lost and bored. I liked the rhythm of traditional life, the quiet and the peace, but I hadn’t had an original thought in months.
I’d liked being part of a unit. I had always been apart, my Navajo face, dark skin and black hair, and the work on the top-secret Code-Talker project had kept me separate from the others in the unit. I’d made a couple of good friends. Mike was one of them. We seemed to find each other in the chaos every so often, and we would sit down together, have some coffee and a smoke, talk about home.
Murder at Black Dog Springs by Sarah Black
I’m very pleased this story is out in ebook format through the Kindle Store- it has only been available in print until now. This story is set in one of my favorite places on earth. Here’s an excerpt:
Blurb: Code Talker Logan Kee returns to Lukachukai Mountain in 1947, hoping to forget the horrors of war in the Pacific. But there is talk of uranium mining in Dinetah. When one of the mining executives is found shot to death on his land, Logan and his lover, Mike, a former Seabee, have to find the killer before the wrong man is accused of murder.
http://tinyurl.com/4verxua
It wasn’t many miles before the city fell away, then the paved road, and we were out in Navajo country, the truck kicking up a plume of red dust that could be seen for miles. The rusty sandstone cliffs were streaked with ivory gypsum, the ground littered with craggy boulders. The trees were short and twisted by the wind, juniper and pinion pine, and the brush was scrubby sage and creosote, rabbitbrush and snakeweed. Mike stared out the window, then he sighed and leaned his head back against the seat, his eyes closed.
“That’s what Navajo people do, breathe a sigh of relief when they get out of the city and back home. You spend much time out here when you were a kid?”
“Some. Mostly just driving through. My dad’s a geologist, and he used to come out here, scouting around. I loved to get out of the truck and climb around in the rocks. Explore the caves and the arches. Maybe some nice Navajo lady would fix me a piece of fry bread and a bowl of stew.”
“Your dad, what was he scouting around for?”
Mike sat up, shifting in the seat. “He was looking for places to mine minerals.”
I looked over at him. “Vanadium?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s why Emerson looked at you like that when you told him your name. McCann Mining, that’s you?”
“No. That’s my father. Listen, can we keep that info on the Q-T? I don’t want to get mixed up in whatever they’ve got going on right now.”
“What they’ve got going on right now is they’re opening mines, Mike. They’re mining uranium on the reservation.”
“I know.”
“It’s stirring up a bit of controversy. The elders, they don’t like it. Mining breaks some of the old traditions, the old taboos. But there’re a lot of men coming back from the war and looking for jobs. People got used to those regular paychecks. And now there’s nothing out here, no work, and they don’t want to go back to herding sheep. I don’t know. I guess I can see why people want the mines.”
Mike turned to face me across the seat. “Most of those men didn’t stand in Nagasaki with the Second Marines. You did, and I did. Makes me think a little differently about mining uranium. You know that’s what they’re using it for. They’re making more of those bombs.”
“Is that what’s got you so stirred up?” I waved my hand in his direction, and he grinned at me.
“Got me so messed up, you mean? Don’t worry. I’m not much of a drinker, Logan. You won’t have to dry me out or anything. It’s just…I think I missed the guys. I don’t miss the war, shit, no. But I really missed you. You and Curtis and Jay and all the guys. Course, I didn’t know you were going to put me to work.”
“Looks to me like you need some work to do. You spend too much time sitting around thinking. It gets a man down if he has anything at all to think about.”
“Tell me about your land. Black Dog Springs? You got water?”
“It’s up on Lukachukai Mountain, and I’ve got water year round and a hot springs I want to dig out a bit, line with sandstone and get it deep enough to sit in come winter. I’m tucked up against the mountain, and it blocks the north wind. Good sun and good grazing if I want to have some sheep. My mother’s uncle, it’s part of his allotment. He’s like my grandfather, I guess. Joe Curley. He’s the head of our family, our clan. He made the arrangements for my Enemyway when I got home.”
“What’s the Enemyway?”
“A ceremony. To clean me of the contamination of war. To put me back on the right path.”
Mike stared at me across the seat, his eyebrows raised. “Did it work?”
I shrugged, kept my eyes on the road. “I guess it depends on how you want to look at it. I stayed out with him when I got back, until the ceremony was done. I grew up on that land. Then I just didn’t want to leave it again. I feel good there. And Joe, he’s getting older. He needs somebody around. That’s what Emerson was bitching about.”
“When you get married, you usually go live with your wife’s family, right?”
“Yeah. She has a good hogan, and I had a well dug out there before I left. I think her mother took the money I sent every month and bought sheep. They don’t have anything to complain about.” I looked over at Mike, who was keeping his face noncommittal. “The families arranged it. I didn’t have much say.”
Mike closed his eyes again, leaned back against the seat. “It smells good out here. I missed it. I missed it when I was overseas and I missed it when I went home to Flagstaff. The city has really grown in the last few years, and it’s so noisy and dirty you can’t imagine. There’re nearly ten thousand people living there! I couldn’t hear myself think. I couldn’t sleep.”
“Go to sleep now if you want. We got another couple of hours driving until we’re home.”
Mike smiled. “Yeah, maybe I will.”
I kept my eyes on the road until I could hear gentle snores from the other side of the truck. Mike’s blond hair was longer now than when he’d been in uniform, and it was falling down over his forehead, brushing the tips of his ears and curling against the back of his neck. It was streaky, dark honey blond, as fine as cornsilk. I knew what Mike was talking about, missing the guys but not missing the war. But actually I was missing the war, too. I’d done something important. I’d been part of something, and now it was all over and I was feeling sort of lost. Lost and bored. I liked the rhythm of traditional life, the quiet and the peace, but I hadn’t had an original thought in months.
I’d liked being part of a unit. I had always been apart, my Navajo face, dark skin and black hair, and the work on the top-secret Code-Talker project had kept me separate from the others in the unit. I’d made a couple of good friends. Mike was one of them. We seemed to find each other in the chaos every so often, and we would sit down together, have some coffee and a smoke, talk about home.
July 19, 2011
Slackline out at Dreamspinner!
My sweet little summer story!
Slackline by Sarah Black- out today at Dreamspinner
Blurb: When Bobby Kincaid is walking the slackline – a narrow, flat webbed rope stretched between two anchor points – he offers a silent gift of beauty to the air and sky. Making peace with the world is one reason he’s drawn to the seastacks off Scotland’s Orkney Islands. Colin Rose, the Olympic skier who pushed Bobby away after a horrific accident two years earlier, is another. But Bobby and Colin will each need to heal before they can return to that space between earth and heaven where they both can fly.
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/stor...
Excerpt:
Bobby was breaking the most important rule for slackliners, the critical rule, numero uno, the Prime Directive. But the very fact that he was breaking this rule meant he would never be caught. The strangely circular logic appealed to him, as did the quiet, and the clean salty smell of the wind. He was setting up a slackline across the sea of Hoy, from one of the famous seastacks that dotted the Orkney coast. And he was going to walk it alone.
Not very safe; there was no question it was risky, probably stupid, highly dangerous. But it was worth it for the silence. No chattering from the other climbers, no cameras strapped to heads filming the whole deal. This was the way slacklining was supposed to be—the only sounds the waves, and the wind, the only audience the strange, flat-eyed seabirds who watched him set up the anchors. Man on a tightrope, walking across one of the coldest, rockiest seas on earth. For the beauty of it all, and the pleasure of doing it.
It was more than just pleasure. Bobby had developed an entire theoretical model of slacklining in his head, the result of many hours of solo hiking and climbing and walking on bouncing tightropes. This model was why he was crouched at the base of the Old Man of Hoy, wrapping his anchors around the rocks.
Slacklining, he explained to the birds, should be a silent gift of beauty. It should be offered up to the air, and the sky, with no witnesses, no sponsors, no sounds, other than a quiet thank you for the day, and the bounce in the line, and the ability of his body to move through the yoga routine called Salute to the Sun. He suspected that gifts of beauty such as his, offered up with a clean heart, would somehow alter the karmic load of pain that was dragging civilization to its knees.
But he refused all such thoughts of the consequences, good or bad, concentrated on making something beautiful and pure, his gift to the world. He stepped out on the line.
The slackline was a narrow flat webbing rope, pulled almost taut, but with a bit of bounce. His feet, snug in their Vibram Five-Fingers, curled around the line, and he crouched, arms outstretched, until he found his center.
He started into his routine, the Surya Namaskar, Salute to the Sun. This had been the first yoga series he had mastered, and it was still his favorite to do on a slackline. The line felt good under his feet, strong and with just enough give. He was halfway through the routine, with salt spray on his lips and the sun just touching the sea, when a nasty wind came up off the water and tumbled him off the line.
It felt like he had been falling forever, that his outstretched arms had turned into wings. But thoughts of Icarus filled his head, wax melting in the sun and feathers tumbling into the sky. He was going to miss the rocks, he was sure of it, and braced himself for the shock of falling into arctic water.
A second gust of wind howled around the Old Man, so loudly he wanted to clap his hands over his ears, and it tumbled him head over heels. He tried to tuck his knees in, with some vague idea of rolling, but there was no rolling, only the rough North Sea and the rocky shoreline waiting below.
His right shoulder and arm hit a sharp edge of rock under the surface of the water. He tried to pull his head up, but it was too late, and his last thought before his face slammed into the rock was that he was probably not going to see Colin Rose after all.
Slackline by Sarah Black- out today at Dreamspinner
Blurb: When Bobby Kincaid is walking the slackline – a narrow, flat webbed rope stretched between two anchor points – he offers a silent gift of beauty to the air and sky. Making peace with the world is one reason he’s drawn to the seastacks off Scotland’s Orkney Islands. Colin Rose, the Olympic skier who pushed Bobby away after a horrific accident two years earlier, is another. But Bobby and Colin will each need to heal before they can return to that space between earth and heaven where they both can fly.
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/stor...
Excerpt:
Bobby was breaking the most important rule for slackliners, the critical rule, numero uno, the Prime Directive. But the very fact that he was breaking this rule meant he would never be caught. The strangely circular logic appealed to him, as did the quiet, and the clean salty smell of the wind. He was setting up a slackline across the sea of Hoy, from one of the famous seastacks that dotted the Orkney coast. And he was going to walk it alone.
Not very safe; there was no question it was risky, probably stupid, highly dangerous. But it was worth it for the silence. No chattering from the other climbers, no cameras strapped to heads filming the whole deal. This was the way slacklining was supposed to be—the only sounds the waves, and the wind, the only audience the strange, flat-eyed seabirds who watched him set up the anchors. Man on a tightrope, walking across one of the coldest, rockiest seas on earth. For the beauty of it all, and the pleasure of doing it.
It was more than just pleasure. Bobby had developed an entire theoretical model of slacklining in his head, the result of many hours of solo hiking and climbing and walking on bouncing tightropes. This model was why he was crouched at the base of the Old Man of Hoy, wrapping his anchors around the rocks.
Slacklining, he explained to the birds, should be a silent gift of beauty. It should be offered up to the air, and the sky, with no witnesses, no sponsors, no sounds, other than a quiet thank you for the day, and the bounce in the line, and the ability of his body to move through the yoga routine called Salute to the Sun. He suspected that gifts of beauty such as his, offered up with a clean heart, would somehow alter the karmic load of pain that was dragging civilization to its knees.
But he refused all such thoughts of the consequences, good or bad, concentrated on making something beautiful and pure, his gift to the world. He stepped out on the line.
The slackline was a narrow flat webbing rope, pulled almost taut, but with a bit of bounce. His feet, snug in their Vibram Five-Fingers, curled around the line, and he crouched, arms outstretched, until he found his center.
He started into his routine, the Surya Namaskar, Salute to the Sun. This had been the first yoga series he had mastered, and it was still his favorite to do on a slackline. The line felt good under his feet, strong and with just enough give. He was halfway through the routine, with salt spray on his lips and the sun just touching the sea, when a nasty wind came up off the water and tumbled him off the line.
It felt like he had been falling forever, that his outstretched arms had turned into wings. But thoughts of Icarus filled his head, wax melting in the sun and feathers tumbling into the sky. He was going to miss the rocks, he was sure of it, and braced himself for the shock of falling into arctic water.
A second gust of wind howled around the Old Man, so loudly he wanted to clap his hands over his ears, and it tumbled him head over heels. He tried to tuck his knees in, with some vague idea of rolling, but there was no rolling, only the rough North Sea and the rocky shoreline waiting below.
His right shoulder and arm hit a sharp edge of rock under the surface of the water. He tried to pull his head up, but it was too late, and his last thought before his face slammed into the rock was that he was probably not going to see Colin Rose after all.
June 28, 2011
TUAREG out today from Loose ID!
TUAREG out today from Loose ID!
http://www.loose-id.com/Tuareg.aspx
Blurb: When photographer Leon Davis takes a job tracking down the nearly-extinct Zanzibar leopard, he isn’t expecting to fall in love with the mysterious and sexy Tuareg tribal leader, Ibrahim Ag Akhamok. Ibrahim has his own secrets, and he knows more than he lets on about the leopard. And what about Piers, the murdered photographer that Leon replaced? Until Leon discovers what Piers was doing in Zanzibar, and who killed him, he can’t face his own demons -- and he can’t earn the love of the powerful and dangerous Tuareg.
Excerpt:
Leon got in line at the Starbucks in the lobby behind Maggie. He loved the way she dressed, some sort of Katherine Hepburn-Annie Hall hybrid of tweed pants and vests, with thick-soled boots in the winter and heavy linen with oxfords in the summer. She turned around and gave him an up and down, her forehead creasing. “What’s the matter, Leon?”
“Nothing. Why?”
“You look like you didn’t sleep. Did you hear about Piers?”
“Piers is a prick. Whatever happened, I’m sure he deserved it. What, did he get arrested for being an asshole?”
Maggie winced. “Baby, you don’t want to say that too loud unless you want to put yourself on the suspect list. He’s dead. Killed while on assignment to the beautiful island of Zanzibar.”
“No way.”
She leaned closer, and he could hear the relish in her voice. “Run through with a Tuareg sword.” Maggie didn’t like Piers any more than he did.
Leon stared at the young barista making espresso and thought about Piers. Well, he wasn’t happy he was dead, of course, but what he had said to Maggie was still true. Run through with a sword? Piers had a way of digging too deep and too personal, standing too close, looking over your shoulder to read whatever was in your hands. Leon sometimes felt like Piers had taken a sharp steel surgical tool, shoved it into his liver, taken a little piece out, and studied it. His stomach always ached when he spent too much time in Piers’s company. Piers knew he made people uncomfortable. Was he just being a good reporter, as he claimed? Leon didn’t think so. He thought Piers liked watching people try to squirm out of his fist when he squeezed tight.
“Double latte, right?” The line shifted impatiently behind him, and he realized he must have been standing there too long, not saying anything.
“Yeah, thanks.” He pulled a five out of his pocket and paid the cashier. Zanzibar? Run through with a Tuareg sword? He must have pissed somebody off. The Tuareg were armed, and they spoke with the steel in their fist. But they were farther north, right? In the Sahara? He moved away to the serving counter and spoke to Maggie again. “So are they sending anyone? To finish his assignment? What was he working on?”
“They’ll probably send someone,” she said, looking at him curiously. “Leon, can I ask you something?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “Why do you still dress like you’re in high school? You’re wearing jeans and a T-shirt from the Onion and a hoodie, for Christ’s sake, and you must know they’re thinking about offering you a job. You’ve got hair halfway down your back. Who wears their hair this long anymore? How old are you? Twenty-seven? Twenty-eight? Why are you carrying a backpack around with you everywhere? A backpack, a hoodie, hair in a ponytail—you’re a little moodier than usual, and people are going to start watching to see when you pop out of the men’s room with an automatic weapon.”
Leon felt his mouth drop open, and he reached for his latte without looking. “Wha—It’s cameras! There’re my cameras! I mean…”
She narrowed her eyes again. “You look like one of those guys who hops the freight trains out west. Who am I thinking of?”
“Jack Kerouac. Cool. Well, too bad there’s not a freight train going through DC, heading west right now. I would hop it just to end this conversation. It’s like you’re channeling my mother.”
Maggie laughed, a big, rich laugh that had everyone in the Starbucks line looking over at them. “All I’m saying is, a button-down shirt wouldn’t kill you and might even make you look a little bit more like a grown-up. Now drink your coffee, and let’s get to work.”
http://www.loose-id.com/Tuareg.aspx
Blurb: When photographer Leon Davis takes a job tracking down the nearly-extinct Zanzibar leopard, he isn’t expecting to fall in love with the mysterious and sexy Tuareg tribal leader, Ibrahim Ag Akhamok. Ibrahim has his own secrets, and he knows more than he lets on about the leopard. And what about Piers, the murdered photographer that Leon replaced? Until Leon discovers what Piers was doing in Zanzibar, and who killed him, he can’t face his own demons -- and he can’t earn the love of the powerful and dangerous Tuareg.
Excerpt:
Leon got in line at the Starbucks in the lobby behind Maggie. He loved the way she dressed, some sort of Katherine Hepburn-Annie Hall hybrid of tweed pants and vests, with thick-soled boots in the winter and heavy linen with oxfords in the summer. She turned around and gave him an up and down, her forehead creasing. “What’s the matter, Leon?”
“Nothing. Why?”
“You look like you didn’t sleep. Did you hear about Piers?”
“Piers is a prick. Whatever happened, I’m sure he deserved it. What, did he get arrested for being an asshole?”
Maggie winced. “Baby, you don’t want to say that too loud unless you want to put yourself on the suspect list. He’s dead. Killed while on assignment to the beautiful island of Zanzibar.”
“No way.”
She leaned closer, and he could hear the relish in her voice. “Run through with a Tuareg sword.” Maggie didn’t like Piers any more than he did.
Leon stared at the young barista making espresso and thought about Piers. Well, he wasn’t happy he was dead, of course, but what he had said to Maggie was still true. Run through with a sword? Piers had a way of digging too deep and too personal, standing too close, looking over your shoulder to read whatever was in your hands. Leon sometimes felt like Piers had taken a sharp steel surgical tool, shoved it into his liver, taken a little piece out, and studied it. His stomach always ached when he spent too much time in Piers’s company. Piers knew he made people uncomfortable. Was he just being a good reporter, as he claimed? Leon didn’t think so. He thought Piers liked watching people try to squirm out of his fist when he squeezed tight.
“Double latte, right?” The line shifted impatiently behind him, and he realized he must have been standing there too long, not saying anything.
“Yeah, thanks.” He pulled a five out of his pocket and paid the cashier. Zanzibar? Run through with a Tuareg sword? He must have pissed somebody off. The Tuareg were armed, and they spoke with the steel in their fist. But they were farther north, right? In the Sahara? He moved away to the serving counter and spoke to Maggie again. “So are they sending anyone? To finish his assignment? What was he working on?”
“They’ll probably send someone,” she said, looking at him curiously. “Leon, can I ask you something?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “Why do you still dress like you’re in high school? You’re wearing jeans and a T-shirt from the Onion and a hoodie, for Christ’s sake, and you must know they’re thinking about offering you a job. You’ve got hair halfway down your back. Who wears their hair this long anymore? How old are you? Twenty-seven? Twenty-eight? Why are you carrying a backpack around with you everywhere? A backpack, a hoodie, hair in a ponytail—you’re a little moodier than usual, and people are going to start watching to see when you pop out of the men’s room with an automatic weapon.”
Leon felt his mouth drop open, and he reached for his latte without looking. “Wha—It’s cameras! There’re my cameras! I mean…”
She narrowed her eyes again. “You look like one of those guys who hops the freight trains out west. Who am I thinking of?”
“Jack Kerouac. Cool. Well, too bad there’s not a freight train going through DC, heading west right now. I would hop it just to end this conversation. It’s like you’re channeling my mother.”
Maggie laughed, a big, rich laugh that had everyone in the Starbucks line looking over at them. “All I’m saying is, a button-down shirt wouldn’t kill you and might even make you look a little bit more like a grown-up. Now drink your coffee, and let’s get to work.”
June 13, 2011
Fearless and Lawless in one volume at the kindle store!
Now available in ebook format! Fearless and Lawless by Sarah Black in one volume at the Kindle store.
http://tinyurl.com/44nkbq6
Colton passed his service revolver to the security officer behind the front desk at the hospital. The guard was tall and very dark, with a full black beard and faint traces of Ethiopia in his voice. He put the revolver in the lockbox and handed Colton the receipt.
“You got some pretty nurse upstairs, right, Lieutenant? Every day at lunchtime, you get you something good to eat, my friend?”
Colton smiled at him, his jaw stiff. Every day, this same backslapping, big stud routine. “Not me, man. I’m just getting my blood pressure checked.” He slapped his hard belly. “You know you can’t be too careful with your health.”
He cut through the cafeteria, picked up a couple of salads, then walked through the indoor healing garden to the professional building. The University of Arizona hospital was a gorgeous, glass-walled sanctuary of air-conditioned quiet in the middle of Tucson’s gritty downtown. The professional building was still, the staff at lunch or behind closed office doors, with their shoes off and their ties loose.
The surgical residents had a suite of small offices behind the radiology wing. Diego’s door was closed, but the surgical nurse was behind the desk. “Hi, Lieutenant Wheeler.”
“Ma’am. Does he have a patient?”
She shook her head. “Those salads look good. He’s gonna have to eat fast, though. He’s got to be in surgery in an hour.”
Colton knocked quietly on the door, then pushed it open. Diego was sitting at his desk in a pair of green surgical scrubs, initialing a stack of lab reports. His hair was pulled back in a slick black ponytail, and there was a faint line of annoyance between strong dark eyebrows. He smiled when he saw Colton standing there, stood up and came around the desk. “Hey. I thought you couldn’t get away for lunch!”
“I just arrested the dumb fucker. He was taking up too much time. You hungry?”
“Yeah, I am.” Diego turned back to the desk, shoved the stack of papers and medical journals to the side.
Colton set the salads down on the desk and pulled another chair up. “You want blue cheese or Italian?”
“I think Italian,” Diego said, opening the plastic containers. The little chef’s salads were pretty, dark green lettuce and cherry tomatoes, ham and cheese and half a boiled egg each. Diego slipped his egg onto Colton’s salad, then poured dressing from the little plastic pouch. “What are you doing? You’re just standing there.”
Colton smiled and picked up the blue cheese. “I was just looking at you, baby. You all right? You looked like you had a headache when I came in.”
Diego shook his head. “Bad mood. I’m getting spoiled, having you around so much. I think I like your undivided attention. I’ve been acting like an asshole since you told me you couldn’t come for lunch.” He shoved a forkful of salad into his mouth. Noon, and Diego’s jaw was already dark with whiskers. Colton could see a little patch of black chest hair in the V of the scrub top. It looked like the V of dark hair below his belly.
Diego stared at Colton’s hand, suspended halfway to his mouth. Laughter lit his eyes, and his voice turned honey-sweet, melting a bit into the rhythm of Spanish, his native tongue. He leaned forward, and Colton could see himself, double reflections in Diego’s dark eyes. “You bring the handcuffs?”
Colton laughed out loud and swiped at his head. “You’re like a boner on two legs, man. I ought to tie you up and leave you for one of the nurses to find. But I don’t know if they’d let you up. One of those girls might just climb on board, take a ride on the love train, you know what I’m saying?”
Diego was shoveling salad in like he might not get another chance to eat this week. Or like he wanted to finish quick, have time for some... Colton put the plastic lid back down on his salad. He could eat later. Diego probably wouldn’t have another free minute until tonight. “You got duty tonight, baby?” Colton stood up and started unbuckling the black leather belt from around his waist.
Diego stared up at him. “Nope. You?”
“Nope.”
Diego was eating faster. “Hold on, Colton. I’m coming, just wait for me. Wait...”
Colton shook his head, reached behind him, and locked the office door. “You just finish your lunch without choking, and I’ll take care of you.” He unbuttoned his uniform shirt, draped it over the back of the chair, unsnapped the waistband of his uniform trousers. He reached for Diego’s hair, pulled the ponytail loose and slid his fingers through it until the tumbled, silky black mass of hair fell forward to his shoulders, across his face.
Diego’s eyes were as black as his hair, dark like the night sky, huge now as he stared up at Colton. He stood up, tossed the plastic container of salad toward the trash.
Excerpt from Lawless:
It was the time of the siesta, and the air was so still and quiet that Colton turned off the little fan that sat next to the bed and listened. “Did you hear that?”
Diego was splayed out across their bed, his head pressed into the white pillowcase. Colton saw a long, curved line of sweat down his backbone, so he turned the fan on again and angled it to blow over his skin.
“Thanks, that feels good. Did I hear what?”
“Nothing. That’s the thing. No chickens, no babies, no horses, no little boys sneaking around.”
“It’s nothing sinister, Colton. It’s too hot. Everybody’s asleep.”
Colton nudged him with his toes. “You’ve been sleeping for an hour. Maybe longer.”
“That last duty kicked my butt. Thirty-six hours, Jesus. They had the patients backed up in the ER, just waiting for an OR to get free. I was second to one of the ortho guys. That ortho surgery is hard, jerking bones around. I don’t think I’m cut out for it.”
Diego had wanted to be a heart surgeon, but a vicious hate crime the year before had left him with only one eye. Now he believed his depth perception wasn’t good enough, and he was working as a general surgeon. Colton had felt a quiet undercurrent of sadness in him this last year, like he’d lost some of the joy in his work, in being a doctor. But Diego said he was fine and would change the subject when Colton brought it up.
“It’s too quiet around here,” Colton said again. Since the three Juans, little boys who lived on the ranch and were all named Juan, had peeked into the window when he was giving Diego a blow job, Colton had been a little skittish about fooling around during siesta.
The thick adobe walls of the small casitas kept the temperature down some, but it was still almost ninety degrees in their bedroom. “It’s too hot to fool around.” He didn’t sound very sure.
Colton’s ranch was on the border with Mexico, in the badlands between Nogales and Sasabe. They had four generations living there, most of them washed up in that dry land by strange tides of fate, and with nowhere else to go. Maria Goretti took care of the ranch. She was the niece of the original Maria who had taken care of the ranch; had a reputation for plucking girls in trouble out of the reach of the men who were abusing them, letting them stay at Colton’s ranch to have their babies in peace. Some of them never left again.
Nobody in the borderlands would mess with Lt. Colton Wheeler or his ranch or the people who lived under his protection. He was a lawman, the old-fashioned kind who knew which rules could bend and which rules could break and which butts needed to be kicked. He was a legend, and so was the old man who lived out there with them, Lt. Manuel Del Rio, a tough retired Mexican cop and Diego’s great-uncle. Between Manuel and Colton, one in Mexico and one in America, they had protected this rough scrubby desert land for nearly seventy years. They loved it with a passion that was hard to understand, and they loved Diego, too.
Colton wondered sometimes if Diego wouldn’t rather be living some cool urban dream in Paris or Amsterdam instead of kicking around the Sonoran desert. Well, he’d had the choice, and he chose Colton and the borderlands, his family and his people and a medical practice that would never make him rich.
“I don’t hear any little boys,” Diego said, rolling over and letting the fan blow on his chest.
Colton reached for the sweaty black hair that covered Diego’s chest in wiry curls, traced it down to his belly, then down into the thick, curly nest between his legs. His dark cock was stirring, and he stretched his arms over his head, stretched and yawned and reached for the cup of green tea he’d left on the bedside table. “So, Colton. Let’s fool around.”
Colton sat up and looked at the little windows. They were covered with white linen curtains that fluttered a bit when the fan blew in their direction.
Diego leaned up on an elbow and looked at him. “So what if the three Juans look in the window?”
“It was my ass they were staring at,” Colton reminded him. “And laughing at, the little jerks.”
“You’re just so pretty. They wanted to see what a natural blond looks like.”
Diego put the cup of tea back on the table. He was propped up on his side, and Colton looked at the long curvy length of him, ivory skin and curly black hair, long, slender legs with runner’s thighs. He was wiggling his toes, a sure sign he was getting turned on, and another sure sign was rising, heavy and dark between his legs.
http://tinyurl.com/44nkbq6
Colton passed his service revolver to the security officer behind the front desk at the hospital. The guard was tall and very dark, with a full black beard and faint traces of Ethiopia in his voice. He put the revolver in the lockbox and handed Colton the receipt.
“You got some pretty nurse upstairs, right, Lieutenant? Every day at lunchtime, you get you something good to eat, my friend?”
Colton smiled at him, his jaw stiff. Every day, this same backslapping, big stud routine. “Not me, man. I’m just getting my blood pressure checked.” He slapped his hard belly. “You know you can’t be too careful with your health.”
He cut through the cafeteria, picked up a couple of salads, then walked through the indoor healing garden to the professional building. The University of Arizona hospital was a gorgeous, glass-walled sanctuary of air-conditioned quiet in the middle of Tucson’s gritty downtown. The professional building was still, the staff at lunch or behind closed office doors, with their shoes off and their ties loose.
The surgical residents had a suite of small offices behind the radiology wing. Diego’s door was closed, but the surgical nurse was behind the desk. “Hi, Lieutenant Wheeler.”
“Ma’am. Does he have a patient?”
She shook her head. “Those salads look good. He’s gonna have to eat fast, though. He’s got to be in surgery in an hour.”
Colton knocked quietly on the door, then pushed it open. Diego was sitting at his desk in a pair of green surgical scrubs, initialing a stack of lab reports. His hair was pulled back in a slick black ponytail, and there was a faint line of annoyance between strong dark eyebrows. He smiled when he saw Colton standing there, stood up and came around the desk. “Hey. I thought you couldn’t get away for lunch!”
“I just arrested the dumb fucker. He was taking up too much time. You hungry?”
“Yeah, I am.” Diego turned back to the desk, shoved the stack of papers and medical journals to the side.
Colton set the salads down on the desk and pulled another chair up. “You want blue cheese or Italian?”
“I think Italian,” Diego said, opening the plastic containers. The little chef’s salads were pretty, dark green lettuce and cherry tomatoes, ham and cheese and half a boiled egg each. Diego slipped his egg onto Colton’s salad, then poured dressing from the little plastic pouch. “What are you doing? You’re just standing there.”
Colton smiled and picked up the blue cheese. “I was just looking at you, baby. You all right? You looked like you had a headache when I came in.”
Diego shook his head. “Bad mood. I’m getting spoiled, having you around so much. I think I like your undivided attention. I’ve been acting like an asshole since you told me you couldn’t come for lunch.” He shoved a forkful of salad into his mouth. Noon, and Diego’s jaw was already dark with whiskers. Colton could see a little patch of black chest hair in the V of the scrub top. It looked like the V of dark hair below his belly.
Diego stared at Colton’s hand, suspended halfway to his mouth. Laughter lit his eyes, and his voice turned honey-sweet, melting a bit into the rhythm of Spanish, his native tongue. He leaned forward, and Colton could see himself, double reflections in Diego’s dark eyes. “You bring the handcuffs?”
Colton laughed out loud and swiped at his head. “You’re like a boner on two legs, man. I ought to tie you up and leave you for one of the nurses to find. But I don’t know if they’d let you up. One of those girls might just climb on board, take a ride on the love train, you know what I’m saying?”
Diego was shoveling salad in like he might not get another chance to eat this week. Or like he wanted to finish quick, have time for some... Colton put the plastic lid back down on his salad. He could eat later. Diego probably wouldn’t have another free minute until tonight. “You got duty tonight, baby?” Colton stood up and started unbuckling the black leather belt from around his waist.
Diego stared up at him. “Nope. You?”
“Nope.”
Diego was eating faster. “Hold on, Colton. I’m coming, just wait for me. Wait...”
Colton shook his head, reached behind him, and locked the office door. “You just finish your lunch without choking, and I’ll take care of you.” He unbuttoned his uniform shirt, draped it over the back of the chair, unsnapped the waistband of his uniform trousers. He reached for Diego’s hair, pulled the ponytail loose and slid his fingers through it until the tumbled, silky black mass of hair fell forward to his shoulders, across his face.
Diego’s eyes were as black as his hair, dark like the night sky, huge now as he stared up at Colton. He stood up, tossed the plastic container of salad toward the trash.
Excerpt from Lawless:
It was the time of the siesta, and the air was so still and quiet that Colton turned off the little fan that sat next to the bed and listened. “Did you hear that?”
Diego was splayed out across their bed, his head pressed into the white pillowcase. Colton saw a long, curved line of sweat down his backbone, so he turned the fan on again and angled it to blow over his skin.
“Thanks, that feels good. Did I hear what?”
“Nothing. That’s the thing. No chickens, no babies, no horses, no little boys sneaking around.”
“It’s nothing sinister, Colton. It’s too hot. Everybody’s asleep.”
Colton nudged him with his toes. “You’ve been sleeping for an hour. Maybe longer.”
“That last duty kicked my butt. Thirty-six hours, Jesus. They had the patients backed up in the ER, just waiting for an OR to get free. I was second to one of the ortho guys. That ortho surgery is hard, jerking bones around. I don’t think I’m cut out for it.”
Diego had wanted to be a heart surgeon, but a vicious hate crime the year before had left him with only one eye. Now he believed his depth perception wasn’t good enough, and he was working as a general surgeon. Colton had felt a quiet undercurrent of sadness in him this last year, like he’d lost some of the joy in his work, in being a doctor. But Diego said he was fine and would change the subject when Colton brought it up.
“It’s too quiet around here,” Colton said again. Since the three Juans, little boys who lived on the ranch and were all named Juan, had peeked into the window when he was giving Diego a blow job, Colton had been a little skittish about fooling around during siesta.
The thick adobe walls of the small casitas kept the temperature down some, but it was still almost ninety degrees in their bedroom. “It’s too hot to fool around.” He didn’t sound very sure.
Colton’s ranch was on the border with Mexico, in the badlands between Nogales and Sasabe. They had four generations living there, most of them washed up in that dry land by strange tides of fate, and with nowhere else to go. Maria Goretti took care of the ranch. She was the niece of the original Maria who had taken care of the ranch; had a reputation for plucking girls in trouble out of the reach of the men who were abusing them, letting them stay at Colton’s ranch to have their babies in peace. Some of them never left again.
Nobody in the borderlands would mess with Lt. Colton Wheeler or his ranch or the people who lived under his protection. He was a lawman, the old-fashioned kind who knew which rules could bend and which rules could break and which butts needed to be kicked. He was a legend, and so was the old man who lived out there with them, Lt. Manuel Del Rio, a tough retired Mexican cop and Diego’s great-uncle. Between Manuel and Colton, one in Mexico and one in America, they had protected this rough scrubby desert land for nearly seventy years. They loved it with a passion that was hard to understand, and they loved Diego, too.
Colton wondered sometimes if Diego wouldn’t rather be living some cool urban dream in Paris or Amsterdam instead of kicking around the Sonoran desert. Well, he’d had the choice, and he chose Colton and the borderlands, his family and his people and a medical practice that would never make him rich.
“I don’t hear any little boys,” Diego said, rolling over and letting the fan blow on his chest.
Colton reached for the sweaty black hair that covered Diego’s chest in wiry curls, traced it down to his belly, then down into the thick, curly nest between his legs. His dark cock was stirring, and he stretched his arms over his head, stretched and yawned and reached for the cup of green tea he’d left on the bedside table. “So, Colton. Let’s fool around.”
Colton sat up and looked at the little windows. They were covered with white linen curtains that fluttered a bit when the fan blew in their direction.
Diego leaned up on an elbow and looked at him. “So what if the three Juans look in the window?”
“It was my ass they were staring at,” Colton reminded him. “And laughing at, the little jerks.”
“You’re just so pretty. They wanted to see what a natural blond looks like.”
Diego put the cup of tea back on the table. He was propped up on his side, and Colton looked at the long curvy length of him, ivory skin and curly black hair, long, slender legs with runner’s thighs. He was wiggling his toes, a sure sign he was getting turned on, and another sure sign was rising, heavy and dark between his legs.
May 25, 2011
SOCKEYE LOVE OUT TODAY!
Sockeye Love is a new release today!
Sockeye Love by Sarah Black
Wildlife photographer Grey Morisette is living a half-life, quietly mourning his lover, Saya Kihn, who disappeared twelve years earlier into the infamous Insein Prison in Rangoon.
Grey takes a picture of Sal Sanchez falling into an Alaskan river with a sockeye salmon in his arms. Sal’s a law student, and his passion for the environment and love for the native tribes, his beautiful young face and eager hands, cannot be ignored. But there isn’t room in Grey’s heart for two lovers. How can he bear to let Saya Kihn go, after loving him so long, and reach out for the love Sal is offering him?
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
READ AN EXCERPT: The soft light of dawn filled the tent, and Grey rolled over, looked into the face of the man next to him. Strong jaw, covered in dark whiskers, soft young mouth, lashes against his cheek. Grey smiled when he opened sleepy eyes. “Hey. You want some coffee?”
A quick shake of the head. “Thanks, I’ve got to go. We’re supposed to go into the village this morning, talk to the elders.” He hesitated, and his face looked suddenly shy. “Thanks for last night. I mean…”
“Yeah, kid, it was great…”
“Ben. My name is Ben.”
Grey reached up, traced across the boy’s forehead with his fingertips, over his nose and down across his mouth. “You’ve got pretty brown eyes, Ben.”
That got him a quick smile, and he watched Ben scramble up, tug on his jeans and sweatshirt. He turned around before he ducked out of the door. “Thanks, Grey. You’re a legend, man.”
Grey gave him a little salute, watched his young butt when he bent over and wiggled out of the low door to the tent.
Grey Morisette was a legend with a camera, not in a sleeping bag. He lay back for a moment, enjoying the warmth of the tent, the smell of a sweaty boy, the pleasant stretch in his thighs from the climb yesterday. Ben split pretty fast, he thought. No coffee and morning snuggle. Maybe because you couldn’t remember his name, dickhead.
He slipped his sheepskin boots on over his jeans, climbed out of the tent. There was a smoky drift from wood campfires on the cold air, the smell of coffee pots starting to bubble. He walked upriver to his favorite big spruce tree, took a leak, then went back to the tent and pulled out his camera. He hated not having a camera in his hand. He’d spent his entire life afraid the one perfect shot was going to happen right in front of him, and he wouldn’t have a camera ready to catch it.
The campsite was nestled among a grove of Sitka spruce, near the headwaters of Bristol Bay, where the great rivers of Alaska came together and spilled out into the Bering Sea. They’d gathered to document the salmon run, maybe the last wild salmon in these waters, or anywhere. If Pebble built the open pit mine they wanted, this land would be gone, poisoned beyond repair, the huge, open mine like an ulcer that would never heal. The sulfuric acid they would use to leach the gold from the rock would spread into the groundwater like cancer. So a group of activists, writers, and photographers had gathered here for the last week of summer to watch the salmon run.
Grey knew that the young environmentalists had not given up. They talked in excited voices, eager as young pronghorns in spring, ready to save the world. They were going to start with Bristol Bay, and they didn’t have any doubt they would win.
Grey didn’t have any illusions about who was going to win this battle. He’d seen too many fights with enthusiasm and youth and the unquantifiable value of nature pitted against money. He just wanted to get it all down before it was gone, show the world what they had lost. “You’re sounding pretty cynical, old man.” Maybe cynical, maybe realistic. The world was what it was. He pulled off the lens cap, checked the lens and lifted the camera. The soft morning light, little smoky campfires and bright yellow tents like downed balloons dotting the ground, strong, eager, passionate boys and girls in jeans and messy hair, already talking about what to do, making plans to save this little part of Alaska. This photo would be for him, Grey thought, to remember this trip, and all the trips like it.
Sockeye Love by Sarah Black
Wildlife photographer Grey Morisette is living a half-life, quietly mourning his lover, Saya Kihn, who disappeared twelve years earlier into the infamous Insein Prison in Rangoon.
Grey takes a picture of Sal Sanchez falling into an Alaskan river with a sockeye salmon in his arms. Sal’s a law student, and his passion for the environment and love for the native tribes, his beautiful young face and eager hands, cannot be ignored. But there isn’t room in Grey’s heart for two lovers. How can he bear to let Saya Kihn go, after loving him so long, and reach out for the love Sal is offering him?
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
READ AN EXCERPT: The soft light of dawn filled the tent, and Grey rolled over, looked into the face of the man next to him. Strong jaw, covered in dark whiskers, soft young mouth, lashes against his cheek. Grey smiled when he opened sleepy eyes. “Hey. You want some coffee?”
A quick shake of the head. “Thanks, I’ve got to go. We’re supposed to go into the village this morning, talk to the elders.” He hesitated, and his face looked suddenly shy. “Thanks for last night. I mean…”
“Yeah, kid, it was great…”
“Ben. My name is Ben.”
Grey reached up, traced across the boy’s forehead with his fingertips, over his nose and down across his mouth. “You’ve got pretty brown eyes, Ben.”
That got him a quick smile, and he watched Ben scramble up, tug on his jeans and sweatshirt. He turned around before he ducked out of the door. “Thanks, Grey. You’re a legend, man.”
Grey gave him a little salute, watched his young butt when he bent over and wiggled out of the low door to the tent.
Grey Morisette was a legend with a camera, not in a sleeping bag. He lay back for a moment, enjoying the warmth of the tent, the smell of a sweaty boy, the pleasant stretch in his thighs from the climb yesterday. Ben split pretty fast, he thought. No coffee and morning snuggle. Maybe because you couldn’t remember his name, dickhead.
He slipped his sheepskin boots on over his jeans, climbed out of the tent. There was a smoky drift from wood campfires on the cold air, the smell of coffee pots starting to bubble. He walked upriver to his favorite big spruce tree, took a leak, then went back to the tent and pulled out his camera. He hated not having a camera in his hand. He’d spent his entire life afraid the one perfect shot was going to happen right in front of him, and he wouldn’t have a camera ready to catch it.
The campsite was nestled among a grove of Sitka spruce, near the headwaters of Bristol Bay, where the great rivers of Alaska came together and spilled out into the Bering Sea. They’d gathered to document the salmon run, maybe the last wild salmon in these waters, or anywhere. If Pebble built the open pit mine they wanted, this land would be gone, poisoned beyond repair, the huge, open mine like an ulcer that would never heal. The sulfuric acid they would use to leach the gold from the rock would spread into the groundwater like cancer. So a group of activists, writers, and photographers had gathered here for the last week of summer to watch the salmon run.
Grey knew that the young environmentalists had not given up. They talked in excited voices, eager as young pronghorns in spring, ready to save the world. They were going to start with Bristol Bay, and they didn’t have any doubt they would win.
Grey didn’t have any illusions about who was going to win this battle. He’d seen too many fights with enthusiasm and youth and the unquantifiable value of nature pitted against money. He just wanted to get it all down before it was gone, show the world what they had lost. “You’re sounding pretty cynical, old man.” Maybe cynical, maybe realistic. The world was what it was. He pulled off the lens cap, checked the lens and lifted the camera. The soft morning light, little smoky campfires and bright yellow tents like downed balloons dotting the ground, strong, eager, passionate boys and girls in jeans and messy hair, already talking about what to do, making plans to save this little part of Alaska. This photo would be for him, Grey thought, to remember this trip, and all the trips like it.
May 7, 2011
Sarah Black Chats with the Wildly Talented Paul Richmond
Paul, your romance book covers for Dreamspinner Press are really unique among the current ebook covers for their realism and painterly qualities, as well as the tongue-in-cheek humor. Can you talk a bit about your process? How do you determine things like mood and tone?
I receive a spec sheet from the author in which they share a synopsis of the novel, descriptions of the main characters, and their vision for the cover. Sometimes they even provide photos of models or celebrities who inspired them as they wrote. Of course I can’t actually draw Jake Gyllenhaal on a cover, unless of course you convince him to give consent — or better yet, to come model for it!
But it does help to have a good sense of what the author envisions, because unfortunately I don’t have time to read every novel before doing the artwork and I do want to make sure that what I create represents the story well. I can usually get a sense of the tone from the author’s description, and from there I start doodling little sketches to work out the best composition. Then I take reference photos. When I can convince my friends or my reluctant-to-model partner to pose for me, that’s always preferred.
However, I’ve been known to set the camera on self-timer mode and dive in front of it when needed. Those photos are always priceless – especially when one of our whippets wanders down into my studio just in time to be caught by the camera watching curiously as his owner scrambles to straddle a chair seductively or lose his pants while pretending to cross an Alaskan river (sound familiar, Sarah?) Good times!
Oh, the cover for Sockeye Love! I can’t wait. I really love that story- I burst into tears when I wrote the last line, always a good sign.
I can’t wait to read it! The synopsis was really intriguing, and I’m looking forward to bringing out all the detail in the Alaskan setting. Before I get to the detail stage though on any cover, I have to make a rough sketch (using the photo references as guides), scan it, add type, and then it’s off to the publisher/author for the seal of approval. Once I get the go-ahead, I render the illustration in black and white colored pencil and add the color and other enhancements digitally in Photoshop. It’s a fun process, and I love trying to get inside the heads of the characters and bring their stories to life.
I’ve thought once or twice that I recognized your face on a romance hero! You’re going to be more famous than Fabio! My favorite cover of yours is the one you did for my story Idaho Battlegrounds, where the heroes are together in a pink bathtub. Do you have a favorite cover? Can you show us?
That would be like asking me to pick my favorite child -- and with more than eighty under my belt at this point, I’m busier than the Duggars! A recent one that makes me smile is “Gay Knights and Horny Heroes” by Michael Gouda. Who doesn’t love a good Arthurian wardrobe malfunction?
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/stor...
Are you only doing book covers for the gay romance crowd, or do you have book covers with other presses? You illustrated children’s books at one time?
At the moment, the gay romance crowd is keeping me pretty busy, but I have dabbled in other areas including children’s books and editorial illustration, and I’m always interested in exploring new possibilities. I love being a storyteller in my own way, and would love to branch out and tell many different kinds of stories with my artwork. Of course gay romance themes will always have a special place in my heart because I’m a hopelessly romantic gay man!
I’m sure I’m not the only person who has noticed your boys don’t wear belts. Sometimes their jeans are a bit droopy in the back. Sometimes they even lose their pants! And the rainbow flag boy you painted for Elisa’s Romance awards is one of my favorites. So what’s with all these boys with their underwear showing?
http://paulrichmond.bigcartel.com/pro...
http://paulrichmond.bigcartel.com/pro...
http://paulrichmond.bigcartel.com/pro...
Well, my Cheesecake Boys certainly do have a hard time keeping their pants on, don’t they? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been walking out of the grocery store with both arms full of grocery bags only to notice that my pants had plummeted to my ankles! Or all those occasions when I’ve been taking out the dogs in the early morning hours only to have a gust of wind blow up my bathrobe exposing my tighty-whities!
Really?
Ok, those things have never happened — but they aren’t any more unlikely than the ridiculously contrived scenarios that robbed pin-up girls of their clothing back in the 40’s and 50’s. I love classic pin-up art from that time period, but always wondered why we never got to see men experiencing similar wardrobe malfunctions.
Surely if the elastic in a woman’s panties could give out causing them to fall around her ankles as she boards a bus, there must have been times when guys (especially with the low-slung trouser fashions these days) felt an unexpected draft on their lower half. So I decided to paint men in accidental states of exposure, concocting hilarious wardrobe malfunctions that rendered them the “damsels in distress." And I’ve been having a blast depantsing cute guys on canvas ever since.
I love pin-up art, and pulp covers, too. And who are these Cheesecake Boys? Other artists?
I’m always on the lookout for potential Cheesecake Boy models. At first, I started by recruiting my partner Dennis and friends, and then I thought it would be fun to do a series featuring gay male celebrities. I reached out to a number of people and everyone was very gracious to indulge my crazy request – even taking racy reference photos of themselves caught in states of accidental exposure to help me with their portraits. Some of the models featured in the series include actor Jesse Archer, photographer Mike Ruiz, blogger Perez Hilton, and fashion designer Jack Mackenroth. I’d love to expand it, so if you know anyone who has trouble keeping their pants on....
http://paulrichmond.bigcartel.com/pro...
Are you still working with Kaleidoscope? Can you talk about your new anti-bullying project with your friend and mentor?
Yes, Kaleidoscope is a wonderful organization here in Columbus that serves as a community center and safe haven for LGBT teens. I’ve volunteered in various capacities, ranging from doing presentations to the youth about my artwork to conducting a weekly art night, and even organizing a gallery exhibit of their artwork.
It’s incredibly inspiring to be around young people who are so self-aware, because I didn’t come out the closet myself until after graduating from college. My conservative upbringing kept me in denial for quite a while and made the process difficult. I can’t believe the bravery of these kids, some of whom come from similar circumstances or worse — even parents who have disowned them because of what they see as their “bad choices.”
In addition to the grief many of these young people are given at home, they also have to deal with the painful experience of bullying at school – a huge issue facing so many young people today, with sometimes tragic outcomes. As someone who was bullied myself because of my effeminate nature and artistic inclinations, I felt a need to do something to help others dealing with this issue.
Despite the challenges I faced at school, I was very fortunate to have a loving art mentor when I was growing up. Her name is Linda Regula, and I give her a tremendous amount of credit not only for inspiring me to become the artist I am today, but also for helping me get through a difficult childhood. She taught me how to express what I was going through on canvas, and that made all the difference for me. I don’t know how I would have survived without such a creative outlet.
That’s why Linda and I recently decided to launch the You Will Rise Project, a website dedicated to displaying creative works by people of all ages who have been or are currently being bullied. It’s exciting because it’s not about us as adults telling teenagers what to do. We simply give them a place to create and share with each other. It's a way for them to see that they aren't alone, and to be validated for their artistic creations.
Even though we’ve only been up for a few weeks, we’ve already received a massive amount of submissions from all over the world, and some exciting offers from other organizations to collaborate. I think this is going to develop into an incredibly worthwhile project, and I’m honored to be working with Linda to spread the message she so generously taught me as a kid. If you’d like to see the website and get involved, check it out here:
http://www.youwillriseproject.com
What a wonderful idea- like a beautiful empty stage, and you’re telling folks, go on up, it’s your turn to shine. You participated in the It Gets Better Project. Can you tell us what that was like?
I’m so proud of Dan Savage for leading this monumental effort to help LGBT people share their stories and send messages of hope to teenagers. It’s a great project, and I was thrilled to learn about it early on and be among the first to create a video submission. I shared some of my artwork in my video and let kids know that it will indeed get better because they will grow up, join in the fight, and help make it better. Here’s a link to my It Gets Better video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zh3DIJ...
What is going on with the strange Chinese pirate you are stalking across the ebay-globe?
That was the weirdest experience! Someone e-mailed me a link to an eBay store and said I should check it out because it appeared that someone was selling reproductions of my work and claiming it as their own. What I discovered was an entire Chinese painting village ripping off the work of thousands of artists and attributing it to fictional names. They actually pulled several images of my Cheesecake Boy paintings from my website, cropped them so my signature was removed, and posted them in their eBay store as original paintings by Cai Jiang Xun.
I was baffled, especially since the original paintings were still in my possession. I reported the incident to eBay and assumed they would close the seller’s account, but what I learned was that eBay takes a very passive stance on copyright infringement, occasionally shutting down individual listings of repeat offenders, but never closing their accounts. So rip-off artists simply wait a week or two and re-post the same images.
That’s when I decided to take matters into my own hands. Working with some of my friends, we began writing to “Cai Jiang Xun,” posing as potential customers in order to unravel the truth behind his elaborate charade. We posted the entire conversation on a blog, and it’s quite an entertaining read:
http://paulrichmondstudio.blogspot.co....
I hope that our efforts will help raise awareness about this issue. It caught the attention of a number of national and international news organizations and websites, and I’ve even had the opportunity to do a presentation via Skype to students at the Art Institute of Chicago about the experience. I continue to monitor Cai Jiang’s eBay store and have not seen my work resurface yet. However, many other artists continue to be ripped off by Chinese painting villages, and I do my best to alert everyone whose work I recognize.
This is one of those times when I think- truth is so much weirder that fiction! I really loved your DADT painting, with the subtle Botticelli references. I was in the Navy during DADT, and before-- Can you talk about the painting? It went to a show in New York?
Thank you for your military service, first of all. That's a tremendous sacrifice, and one that I could never imagine doing myself. I'm always grateful to those who do. The painting came about because my friend Savannah Spirit contacted me in November and asked if I’d like to create something for an exhibit she was curating in NewYork in January. The show was called “Hotter than July: A Sexploration,” and she was looking to present a variety of erotic themed art.
This was at the time of all the controversy surrounding the possible DADT repeal, so I decided to create a piece that explored that theme. The fact that anyone could justify excluding someone from military service on the basis of their sexual orientation at this point in history seemed completely absurd to me, not to mention infuriating.
I decided to depict two semi-nude military men covering each other’s mouths to symbolize DADT. Two angels appear at the top of the composition, representing our diva allies Lady Gaga and Kathy Griffin who both helped bring a great amount of attention to this issue.
The painting was met with a tremendous response, including a tweet from Kathy Griffin herself (still waiting for yours, Gaga!). The curator told me that my painting was the “Madonna moment” of the show because it tied eroticism to a controversial political issue, and that’s about the greatest compliment this boy could hope for!
http://paulrichmond.bigcartel.com/pro...
Are you happy with the way your career has developed? Are you where you thought you would be? What do you see developing with your art in the next few years?
I’m thrilled with the way my career has developed, and I’m excited to see where it leads. I’m much more of a dreamer than a planner. I couldn’t tell you where I’ll be five years from now, but I could give you a list a mile long of projects and ideas I want to pursue. That’s how I’ve always been, and I think having a certain amount of flexibility and openness has been really helpful.
As natural a fit as it is for me, I wouldn’t have guessed a few years ago that I’d be doing gay romance cover illustrations. It actually never crossed my mind. But when the opportunity presented itself, I jumped at the chance. In the next few years, I hope to continue doing cover art, possibly branching out into other genres, and maybe even doing a graphic novel or children’s book project. I also hope to continue developing as a fine artist and displaying my work in galleries.
I have a fun idea for a painting series I hope to flesh out soon that would be a re-imagining of the Snow White story (my childhood favorite) from a gay-glam perspective. I’m tentatively calling it “Lily White and the Seven Divas.” I’ve also been talking to some companies about doing various clothing lines featuring my artwork, one being a designer men’s underwear line, which I think would be awesome! I hope that works out in the near future. And I hope to see our anti-bullying project really take off and make a difference for young people all over the world. I’d love to travel with Linda and do workshops and presentations to raise awareness about it.
Now I have got to see Lily White and her Divas. I laughed when I saw on your website that you wanted to be a Disney Princess. I wanted to wear jeans and cowboy boots and kick Princess-Butt. I knew the words to every Marty Robbins song, and I really wanted that black leather outfit he wore on the cover of Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs. But my family wasn’t ready for me to be a cowboy. In fact, they still aren’t! How has your family reacted to your art?
That’s hilarious! Rope the wind, girlfriend! :) I never wanted to be a cowboy, but I certainly fantasized about being WITH a few! My sister was like you, always much tougher than me. It worked out great because we could swap Christmas presents – she always wanted my pick-up trucks and GI Joes and I wanted her Barbies.
I’m thankful that even though my parents weren’t excited about my dream of becoming a Disney princess, they always encouraged my artistic aspirations. They drove me every week to art lessons beginning when I was three and a half, kept my art supply shelf well-stocked, and dutifully bitched about the injustice of it all whenever I didn’t win top prize in the local art competitions. I’m so grateful they supported me in that way because it laid the groundwork for a life of creative pursuits, and gave me something to be proud of even when I was starting to doubt my self-worth in other ways.
I came out of the closet shortly after graduating from art college, and began using my work to explore that journey. I never intended for anyone to see those paintings – especially my parents. They were for me. But then my friend Melissa encouraged me to submit them to some galleries and things began taking off.
The process of coming out of the closet with my family was a struggle (fortunately with a happy ending), but they’ve always supported my artistic endeavors and I think it seemed only natural to them that I would use my art in this way. It’s what I had always done, thanks to the early guidance from Linda, and it has served me well throughout my life.
Website: http://www.paulrichmondstudio.com
Blog: http://www.paulrichmondstudio.blogspo...
Store: http://www.paulrichmondstore.com
I receive a spec sheet from the author in which they share a synopsis of the novel, descriptions of the main characters, and their vision for the cover. Sometimes they even provide photos of models or celebrities who inspired them as they wrote. Of course I can’t actually draw Jake Gyllenhaal on a cover, unless of course you convince him to give consent — or better yet, to come model for it!
But it does help to have a good sense of what the author envisions, because unfortunately I don’t have time to read every novel before doing the artwork and I do want to make sure that what I create represents the story well. I can usually get a sense of the tone from the author’s description, and from there I start doodling little sketches to work out the best composition. Then I take reference photos. When I can convince my friends or my reluctant-to-model partner to pose for me, that’s always preferred.
However, I’ve been known to set the camera on self-timer mode and dive in front of it when needed. Those photos are always priceless – especially when one of our whippets wanders down into my studio just in time to be caught by the camera watching curiously as his owner scrambles to straddle a chair seductively or lose his pants while pretending to cross an Alaskan river (sound familiar, Sarah?) Good times!
Oh, the cover for Sockeye Love! I can’t wait. I really love that story- I burst into tears when I wrote the last line, always a good sign.
I can’t wait to read it! The synopsis was really intriguing, and I’m looking forward to bringing out all the detail in the Alaskan setting. Before I get to the detail stage though on any cover, I have to make a rough sketch (using the photo references as guides), scan it, add type, and then it’s off to the publisher/author for the seal of approval. Once I get the go-ahead, I render the illustration in black and white colored pencil and add the color and other enhancements digitally in Photoshop. It’s a fun process, and I love trying to get inside the heads of the characters and bring their stories to life.
I’ve thought once or twice that I recognized your face on a romance hero! You’re going to be more famous than Fabio! My favorite cover of yours is the one you did for my story Idaho Battlegrounds, where the heroes are together in a pink bathtub. Do you have a favorite cover? Can you show us?
That would be like asking me to pick my favorite child -- and with more than eighty under my belt at this point, I’m busier than the Duggars! A recent one that makes me smile is “Gay Knights and Horny Heroes” by Michael Gouda. Who doesn’t love a good Arthurian wardrobe malfunction?
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/stor...
Are you only doing book covers for the gay romance crowd, or do you have book covers with other presses? You illustrated children’s books at one time?
At the moment, the gay romance crowd is keeping me pretty busy, but I have dabbled in other areas including children’s books and editorial illustration, and I’m always interested in exploring new possibilities. I love being a storyteller in my own way, and would love to branch out and tell many different kinds of stories with my artwork. Of course gay romance themes will always have a special place in my heart because I’m a hopelessly romantic gay man!
I’m sure I’m not the only person who has noticed your boys don’t wear belts. Sometimes their jeans are a bit droopy in the back. Sometimes they even lose their pants! And the rainbow flag boy you painted for Elisa’s Romance awards is one of my favorites. So what’s with all these boys with their underwear showing?
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Well, my Cheesecake Boys certainly do have a hard time keeping their pants on, don’t they? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been walking out of the grocery store with both arms full of grocery bags only to notice that my pants had plummeted to my ankles! Or all those occasions when I’ve been taking out the dogs in the early morning hours only to have a gust of wind blow up my bathrobe exposing my tighty-whities!
Really?
Ok, those things have never happened — but they aren’t any more unlikely than the ridiculously contrived scenarios that robbed pin-up girls of their clothing back in the 40’s and 50’s. I love classic pin-up art from that time period, but always wondered why we never got to see men experiencing similar wardrobe malfunctions.
Surely if the elastic in a woman’s panties could give out causing them to fall around her ankles as she boards a bus, there must have been times when guys (especially with the low-slung trouser fashions these days) felt an unexpected draft on their lower half. So I decided to paint men in accidental states of exposure, concocting hilarious wardrobe malfunctions that rendered them the “damsels in distress." And I’ve been having a blast depantsing cute guys on canvas ever since.
I love pin-up art, and pulp covers, too. And who are these Cheesecake Boys? Other artists?
I’m always on the lookout for potential Cheesecake Boy models. At first, I started by recruiting my partner Dennis and friends, and then I thought it would be fun to do a series featuring gay male celebrities. I reached out to a number of people and everyone was very gracious to indulge my crazy request – even taking racy reference photos of themselves caught in states of accidental exposure to help me with their portraits. Some of the models featured in the series include actor Jesse Archer, photographer Mike Ruiz, blogger Perez Hilton, and fashion designer Jack Mackenroth. I’d love to expand it, so if you know anyone who has trouble keeping their pants on....
http://paulrichmond.bigcartel.com/pro...
Are you still working with Kaleidoscope? Can you talk about your new anti-bullying project with your friend and mentor?
Yes, Kaleidoscope is a wonderful organization here in Columbus that serves as a community center and safe haven for LGBT teens. I’ve volunteered in various capacities, ranging from doing presentations to the youth about my artwork to conducting a weekly art night, and even organizing a gallery exhibit of their artwork.
It’s incredibly inspiring to be around young people who are so self-aware, because I didn’t come out the closet myself until after graduating from college. My conservative upbringing kept me in denial for quite a while and made the process difficult. I can’t believe the bravery of these kids, some of whom come from similar circumstances or worse — even parents who have disowned them because of what they see as their “bad choices.”
In addition to the grief many of these young people are given at home, they also have to deal with the painful experience of bullying at school – a huge issue facing so many young people today, with sometimes tragic outcomes. As someone who was bullied myself because of my effeminate nature and artistic inclinations, I felt a need to do something to help others dealing with this issue.
Despite the challenges I faced at school, I was very fortunate to have a loving art mentor when I was growing up. Her name is Linda Regula, and I give her a tremendous amount of credit not only for inspiring me to become the artist I am today, but also for helping me get through a difficult childhood. She taught me how to express what I was going through on canvas, and that made all the difference for me. I don’t know how I would have survived without such a creative outlet.
That’s why Linda and I recently decided to launch the You Will Rise Project, a website dedicated to displaying creative works by people of all ages who have been or are currently being bullied. It’s exciting because it’s not about us as adults telling teenagers what to do. We simply give them a place to create and share with each other. It's a way for them to see that they aren't alone, and to be validated for their artistic creations.
Even though we’ve only been up for a few weeks, we’ve already received a massive amount of submissions from all over the world, and some exciting offers from other organizations to collaborate. I think this is going to develop into an incredibly worthwhile project, and I’m honored to be working with Linda to spread the message she so generously taught me as a kid. If you’d like to see the website and get involved, check it out here:
http://www.youwillriseproject.com
What a wonderful idea- like a beautiful empty stage, and you’re telling folks, go on up, it’s your turn to shine. You participated in the It Gets Better Project. Can you tell us what that was like?
I’m so proud of Dan Savage for leading this monumental effort to help LGBT people share their stories and send messages of hope to teenagers. It’s a great project, and I was thrilled to learn about it early on and be among the first to create a video submission. I shared some of my artwork in my video and let kids know that it will indeed get better because they will grow up, join in the fight, and help make it better. Here’s a link to my It Gets Better video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zh3DIJ...
What is going on with the strange Chinese pirate you are stalking across the ebay-globe?
That was the weirdest experience! Someone e-mailed me a link to an eBay store and said I should check it out because it appeared that someone was selling reproductions of my work and claiming it as their own. What I discovered was an entire Chinese painting village ripping off the work of thousands of artists and attributing it to fictional names. They actually pulled several images of my Cheesecake Boy paintings from my website, cropped them so my signature was removed, and posted them in their eBay store as original paintings by Cai Jiang Xun.
I was baffled, especially since the original paintings were still in my possession. I reported the incident to eBay and assumed they would close the seller’s account, but what I learned was that eBay takes a very passive stance on copyright infringement, occasionally shutting down individual listings of repeat offenders, but never closing their accounts. So rip-off artists simply wait a week or two and re-post the same images.
That’s when I decided to take matters into my own hands. Working with some of my friends, we began writing to “Cai Jiang Xun,” posing as potential customers in order to unravel the truth behind his elaborate charade. We posted the entire conversation on a blog, and it’s quite an entertaining read:
http://paulrichmondstudio.blogspot.co....
I hope that our efforts will help raise awareness about this issue. It caught the attention of a number of national and international news organizations and websites, and I’ve even had the opportunity to do a presentation via Skype to students at the Art Institute of Chicago about the experience. I continue to monitor Cai Jiang’s eBay store and have not seen my work resurface yet. However, many other artists continue to be ripped off by Chinese painting villages, and I do my best to alert everyone whose work I recognize.
This is one of those times when I think- truth is so much weirder that fiction! I really loved your DADT painting, with the subtle Botticelli references. I was in the Navy during DADT, and before-- Can you talk about the painting? It went to a show in New York?
Thank you for your military service, first of all. That's a tremendous sacrifice, and one that I could never imagine doing myself. I'm always grateful to those who do. The painting came about because my friend Savannah Spirit contacted me in November and asked if I’d like to create something for an exhibit she was curating in NewYork in January. The show was called “Hotter than July: A Sexploration,” and she was looking to present a variety of erotic themed art.
This was at the time of all the controversy surrounding the possible DADT repeal, so I decided to create a piece that explored that theme. The fact that anyone could justify excluding someone from military service on the basis of their sexual orientation at this point in history seemed completely absurd to me, not to mention infuriating.
I decided to depict two semi-nude military men covering each other’s mouths to symbolize DADT. Two angels appear at the top of the composition, representing our diva allies Lady Gaga and Kathy Griffin who both helped bring a great amount of attention to this issue.
The painting was met with a tremendous response, including a tweet from Kathy Griffin herself (still waiting for yours, Gaga!). The curator told me that my painting was the “Madonna moment” of the show because it tied eroticism to a controversial political issue, and that’s about the greatest compliment this boy could hope for!
http://paulrichmond.bigcartel.com/pro...
Are you happy with the way your career has developed? Are you where you thought you would be? What do you see developing with your art in the next few years?
I’m thrilled with the way my career has developed, and I’m excited to see where it leads. I’m much more of a dreamer than a planner. I couldn’t tell you where I’ll be five years from now, but I could give you a list a mile long of projects and ideas I want to pursue. That’s how I’ve always been, and I think having a certain amount of flexibility and openness has been really helpful.
As natural a fit as it is for me, I wouldn’t have guessed a few years ago that I’d be doing gay romance cover illustrations. It actually never crossed my mind. But when the opportunity presented itself, I jumped at the chance. In the next few years, I hope to continue doing cover art, possibly branching out into other genres, and maybe even doing a graphic novel or children’s book project. I also hope to continue developing as a fine artist and displaying my work in galleries.
I have a fun idea for a painting series I hope to flesh out soon that would be a re-imagining of the Snow White story (my childhood favorite) from a gay-glam perspective. I’m tentatively calling it “Lily White and the Seven Divas.” I’ve also been talking to some companies about doing various clothing lines featuring my artwork, one being a designer men’s underwear line, which I think would be awesome! I hope that works out in the near future. And I hope to see our anti-bullying project really take off and make a difference for young people all over the world. I’d love to travel with Linda and do workshops and presentations to raise awareness about it.
Now I have got to see Lily White and her Divas. I laughed when I saw on your website that you wanted to be a Disney Princess. I wanted to wear jeans and cowboy boots and kick Princess-Butt. I knew the words to every Marty Robbins song, and I really wanted that black leather outfit he wore on the cover of Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs. But my family wasn’t ready for me to be a cowboy. In fact, they still aren’t! How has your family reacted to your art?
That’s hilarious! Rope the wind, girlfriend! :) I never wanted to be a cowboy, but I certainly fantasized about being WITH a few! My sister was like you, always much tougher than me. It worked out great because we could swap Christmas presents – she always wanted my pick-up trucks and GI Joes and I wanted her Barbies.
I’m thankful that even though my parents weren’t excited about my dream of becoming a Disney princess, they always encouraged my artistic aspirations. They drove me every week to art lessons beginning when I was three and a half, kept my art supply shelf well-stocked, and dutifully bitched about the injustice of it all whenever I didn’t win top prize in the local art competitions. I’m so grateful they supported me in that way because it laid the groundwork for a life of creative pursuits, and gave me something to be proud of even when I was starting to doubt my self-worth in other ways.
I came out of the closet shortly after graduating from art college, and began using my work to explore that journey. I never intended for anyone to see those paintings – especially my parents. They were for me. But then my friend Melissa encouraged me to submit them to some galleries and things began taking off.
The process of coming out of the closet with my family was a struggle (fortunately with a happy ending), but they’ve always supported my artistic endeavors and I think it seemed only natural to them that I would use my art in this way. It’s what I had always done, thanks to the early guidance from Linda, and it has served me well throughout my life.
Website: http://www.paulrichmondstudio.com
Blog: http://www.paulrichmondstudio.blogspo...
Store: http://www.paulrichmondstore.com
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