Clustering stories & Easter eggs

Apologies for skipping a few times - my day on the blog is Friday, and some Fridays are utter pigs in terms of workload, and sometimes I remember only on Saturday it was my turn. (This is not to talk trash about pigs - perfectly nice, tasty animals.)

I  also don't really believe in blogging when I have nothing to say. (Yep, it happens. I can spend days just sitting by myself, perfectly entertained without any need to talk about it or to anybody. I call those phases the introvert part of my cycle.)

Anyways. One fascinating question I've recently thought a lot about is - when we're creating worlds, are we really creating ONE world? To explain, I'm sometimes fascinated by the idea that characters from different books meet. Silvio could conceivably be in London, where I'm increasingly drawing my international characters - a weak imitation of the real diversity going on here. But it's a setting I know reasonably well, and London would be an attractive base for many of my characters (though Stefano and Donata decided to settle in Paris - just a short train ride away, really). Nikolai and Henri are definitely settling in London for the time being.

Stephen King did it. His stories were full of cross-references. You ended up with Stephen King's take on Maine rather than individual stories. (As a kid it annoyed me a bit - it could seem like an elaborate reference/joke that I could never work out.)

As an adult, I really like that idea. I like shared universes, too (like the Tucker Springs series by LA Witt, Marie Sexton and Heidi Cullinan), the idea that we're looking at something larger that exists outside the one book we're currently reading, but the current book is adding to it.

My own worlds are increasingly converging. Incursion is set in the same overall sci-fi set-up as Dark Edge of Honor (the Doctrine is just such a fascinating thing to explore - I can't stay away from the impact of totalitarian systems on human souls). There's a brief mention of the Doctrine in Incursion, which likely adds nothing to Incursion, but opens that large arch that invites the reader to see the bigger picture. It's an Easter Egg to discover and enjoy.

Mostly, I'm doing these in one genre - the Market Garden contemporary series (written with LA Witt) mentions characters who are the main characters of other parts of the series. While Tristan and Jared open the series in Quid Pro Quo, Nick is mentioned who is the main character in two novellas. In those, we mention the owner of the club, Frank. Who gets his own novel. It's fun. (And seems to spark further books on Frank's friends Mike and Geoff and Raoul in Frank's novel. Think of it as a literary daisy chain, where everybody gets to have fun...)

But then the real Easter Eggs: "Market Garden" of course is the name of a WWII operation. With the club owner something of a military... enthusiast, he's aware of that and chose the name as a bit of an insider joke. That all goes back to my WWII novels, which all happen in "the same version of WWII". All my main characters I set in WWII are taking part in the same war, and some have walk-on parts in the stories of the others. (Baldur of Skybound was the pilot who shot down my American pilot in an as-yet unpublished WWII novel, for example.)

Or another one: There's a part in a Market Garden story where our contemporary characters go to a museum to look at some paintings. These paintings showed up first in my WWII novel set in Paris. In the context of my overall work, the paintings are silent witnesses to a story that was never really told "in the real world", hopefully building a resonance, for want of a better word.

I see my stories as a kind of modern chorus ensemble - ideally, taken as a collective, they'll build more force and feed off each other, building harmonies and dissonances, but those are just my very "arty" concepts. I'm essentially hoping to mimic things I've observed about the "real world" and comment on history versus story versus reality, but wow, deep shit, and it should absolutely work without all those crazy meta ideas.

Maybe what I enjoy most is to cross genres there. Not only am I moving items and themes from the past into the future, but I'm firmly connecting my "literary" efforts to my "genre" work. Same brain. Same process. I don't like divisions here, and they are all happening in the same world. All I'm doing is apply slightly different tools and voices. You CAN play metal on classical instruments.

I'm just hoping that my faithful readers who read everything I do, enjoy finding these cross-references. It's the best I can do to map my own brain and creative processes - that express themselves in stories. Actually, in clusters of stories. Can't help it, that's how I roll.

Inspiration is other people

I’m not sure who said it, but today on the train, I remembered the truism “hell is other people”, and there’s much to be said for that (as somebody who’s been bullied and comes from a very odd family indeed, I’m the first to subscribe to that world view. Hell IS other people).

But the reverse is also true, and like all sides of a coin, they aren’t that far apart, either. I’ve encountered a fair few authors in my life who suffer like dogs when anybody is more successful than them. Not just envy - gut-churning hatred up to the point where they are almost losing their lunch over somebody’s success. To these, hell is other writers, even the fact that anybody writes stories out there. Or has ever written anything, or will ever write anything - because The Enemy is any piece of work by anybody not themselves.

I’ve lost friends over this. Some people were so envious that I sold a novel or a story or even have what they call “a track record” in print publishing that they couldn’t deal with it. The constant sniping and “but I’m really a better writer than you” not-quite-jokes kinda gave it away.

A few months ago, I met a very lovely lady here in London. She’s also a writer (I tend to do better with other creative types in my social life), and I ended up feedbacking her novel that had suffered damage from some rather inconsiderate input from high-powered people in the business, so she could submit it to a new literary agent. I helped her put the novel back on track, I talked her down from the cliff, I listened to the whole range from self-deprecation to dismay, just listening and offering some ideas. Once the edits were made, I put everything else on hold to proof the novel, because she’s my friend, because the novel’s good, and because I was the right person at the right time. I could help, so I did.

Two weeks later, she’s signed with a prestigious literary agency that, so far, seems to be doing everything right, with everything on track for a series book deal in the mainstream. From zero (previously unpublished), my friend is on track to make a huge splash in a market that actually pays money, supported by people who seem to know what the hell they are doing.

It’s the kind of thing that has never happened to me and quite possibly never will, considering what type material I'm writing. It’s the kind of thing I wanted ten years ago and then weaned myself off of. I’m rather happy being a medium-sized fish in a tiny pond, as my partner calls me, often enough mockingly. I’d have gone on writing what I do and for whom I did happily for many years without even looking across the fence to the mainstream. Because, yeah, the mainstream sucks, getting an agent is near-impossible, I'm a non-native speaker competing with natives, and I write dark and intense stuff. Barbara Cartland I'm not.

Throughout her path, I’ve carefully examined my emotions. Am I actually envious? Logic says I should be, right? It used to be a pattern in my younger years.

But I’m not. My friend is the perfect example of a very talented, extremely hard-writing (meant to say “hard-working”, but I love this Freudian slip), humble and nice person getting a break. I have other friends who got big or biggish in the mainstream, even one literary sensation.

I’m not comparing my fortunes to them – I see how much work it takes to get there. And I’m not competing with them, because what can you possibly compete in? Sales numbers? Royalty payments? At the end of the day, considering the sales numbers and royalties of some really horrendous books out there, that metric is completely meaningless.

The only way to measure success for me is by metrics I’m setting myself. The only person I have to beat and to compete with is myself. And that is pretty much all about trying to grow my sales over time and not publishing one bad book (it’ll happen, but I can try to avoid that as best I can, because what I consider "a solid book" might still be hated by my readers, and I'm experimenting every now and then, and some experiments go badly wrong).

What her success does, though, is one thing. It has reminded me that I have the occasional mainstream-workable idea. It was one of the two things that has led to a re-think in terms of my writing career, the other being the bullying dynamics unleashed by a number of people in November 2011 (I’m starting to thank the gods for that, actually, not for the bullying, but for the response to it - the bullies can still go and fuck themselves until they mend their ways). In the end, I’m emerging from late 2011 a saner, healthier, happier, more productive and more ambitious writer.

I’m emerging as a writer who will give this mainstream thing a shot, as I’ve promised my partner years ago, as I’ve considered for years (now that my English is good enough), and I’ll see if I can hack it. The first books are historicals and I rather suspect that’s where I’m heading overall, but gods know where this will take me. It's an adventure not unlike the one I embarked on when I wrote the first paragraph of "Special Forces", my first long-form English language gay story, committing myself to years of work and putting myself on the map. Or when I wrote "Deliverance", my first commercial English language story. Or when I wrote Scorpion, Counterpunch, Dark Soul - each and every single one a leap forward and a huge risk.

Now writing mainstream fiction, I’m not competing with my friend (I’m working in historicals, she in a totally different genre) - I’m using her as inspiration to dream bigger dreams than I have recently. Nothing is more inspiring than the positive example of other people.

Bringing the herd home - finishing Dark Soul

I've been writers' blocked pretty much through November and December (thanks to the major kerfuffle in our tiny waterglass of an industry, and fanned by certain individuals harassing trans* writers), which brought my on-going Dark Soul series to a grinding, painful halt. It also renewed my desire to step outside this particular genre, so my next books will go first to big agencies, which means a huge lag in publication, but, basically, my partner has won the moral argument of what I should attempt to achieve in terms of my writing career. I'm not saying that with any bitterness or anger, BTW, it's just one of many realisations I've had.

I'll continue to do what I'm doing, but it's going to be slower. I'll move from one-track writer to dual-track writer. Which means an overall slowing down and longer (much longer) waits for new releases. That's OK, I have plenty of sequels and prequels and spin-offs to write which will go faster.

The kerfuffle and the ensuing writers' block, however, not only made me reconsider my whole career plan (as little of a plan I have), but also stopped Dark Soul dead. Now that I've overcome the block, I can say that, yes, absolutely, Dark Soul was at risk to never get finished. Authors in a personal crisis of any kind always hurry to say "but I won't affect my current obligations". That's nonsense; we're lying. We're doing damage control. We don't want to have our readers freak out - it's enough that WE are freaking out, we really can't deal with five hundred emails asking "But what about X!!!???".

There were other things going on in my personal life at the same time, which I kept under wraps.

But I'm back on track. I've completed Dark Soul 4 and am working on Dark Soul 5 (which is the final installment), and expect to wrap that up this month, so maybe I'll write the next blog post here reporting completion.

With the huge gaping hole between DS3 and DS4, I did lose part of the story in my head, though. I did lose the initial energy that, under normal circumstances, would have carried me all the way through the book. The energy was the same as during Scorpion, and Counterpunch. A glorious rush where things just happen and all I have to do is type.

I lost the flow in the middle, and while I'm reasonably sure that post-edits, nobody will be able to tell that some of those pages were a pure slog to write while I was battling fears and insecurities - it's a lot like returning to an extreme sport after an injury, things get really tentative once you understand you're not unkillable - the worry is there that I lost something as I passed through that black hole.

However, I can finish this and I know what's going to happen. It's just harder work, making sure I get the voice right (Stefano is softening a lot during the storyline, but that's intentional, so I'm not too worried), making sure I'm not misrepresenting the characters, or putting in contradictions.

What I do like very much about publishing an episodic novel like that (where episodes are structured like short stories) is that readers are trusting me. I keep reading reviews where people say "no idea where this is going, but I'm loving the ride." My readers don't know what exactly they are reading (is it a mafia tragedy, a crime story, a character study, or is it a Romance?) - they don't know whether the main characters will survive, even, or end up together. Some seem to expect I'll kill either Silvio or Stefano or both, and absolutely, it's always a possibility. If the story demands it, I'll do it, regardless of expectations. I'm being "experimental" here, not for the sake of it, but mostly because the story demands it.

Right now, Dark Soul can be a romance, or maybe it's not, but people seem to agree that it's very romantic. I think I'm pretty cool with that. I'm even more cool with the fact that, while everything but a "category romance" and everything but a "typical m/m romance", Dear Author, which focuses largely on romance, added it to its recommended reads with a great review.

There are people out there who trust me to bring the herd home (my expression for coralling all plot threads - or most of them and making a good, satisfying ending). People are waiting for the story to finish - regardless of what it is, in the end. They just trust me to entertain them and to give them a satisfying read. I think that's a terrific place to be for me, since I'm not really made to be a category writer or an author who writes "conventional" romance (I admire those who can do that - it's a hard job).

So, thank you for your trust, and, if you look outside the window there - that huge dust cloud? That's me, bringing the herd home for you.

Sometimes beauty's enough

You guys/gals tend to know me more for the long, somewhat philosophical entries here. I could write one of those, and I'm still considering posting about the appalling behaviour of certain moderators and (few) members of a certain m/m-focused book group during the month of November and ongoing. But, know what? You can't cure bigots. And while I'd love to denounce that kind of shit, I'm not going to waste my creative breath (little as I have at the moment) on assholes/bigots/transphobes.

I've been creatively blocked for around 4-6 weeks, thanks to, in a large part, the hounding and persecution that went on in November. You might have noticed that I didn't write my posts here during that time. I was just blogged out and way, way too angry to post anything, whether philosophical or other.

But all things have a positive side, such as the "Embrace the Rainbow" campaign started by Kris, and the distinct sense that the trans* writers in our genre have wrestled some more respect from it all. I'm pretty sure that the next wankfest will happen, but not yet. Me, I'm retrenching, regrouping, and getting my Muse back on track. Those assholes can't keep me from writing, at least not permanently.

Whatever I'll be writing - whether mainstream or not, or both - the best way for me to get my Muse going is music.

So, I'm presenting to you TVXQ! (Suggested by Barbara Sheridan, most likely...) Enjoy. Sometimes, beauty is enough to get stuff rolling.

The Mercenary Post: Get a Kindle (or certificate) AND "Counterpunch"

I've been remiss in my duties - means I barely blogged for a few weeks. The main reason is that I'm currently 150% engaged in the little start-up publisher I co-founded with Rachel Haimowitz and Chris Hawkins, Riptide Publishing, which is an amazing labour of love. I've always toyed with the idea to one day start a business, but in this case, suddenly all the missing skills and people appeared and formed a kick-ass team. The authors who have signed up with us are at the very top of their game, and we are looking forward to launching their stories on October 30.

Being a publisher (running part of the business), and editor (ultimately turning a good book into a better book and guiding authors), and face of a company (giving interviews, approaching authors, customer service) in addition to being full-time employed has, admittedly, eaten into my writing time.

It would be weird if it were any different. Then again, we saw that coming and expected no less. It can be uncomfortable to suppress the urge or form new habits, but I expect to be able to go back to some writing once our launch is done. You guys of course won't notice the difference for a fair while, because the books I wrote before we founded Riptide are still in the pipeline and are being produced as we "speak". There's, first, the "Dark Soul" series, a line of hot and kinky short stories collected in a few volumes that still form an overarching plot - and that plot is clearly a romance. But there's also a lot of soul-searching and character exploration as people deal with their scars and darkness and the taboo to be gay in the Cosa Nostra.

"Dark Soul" is the first book I'm putting out via Riptide - just look at the cover! - and the process has been everything I hoped for: the editing has been brutal, but I'm convinced that "Dark Soul" is, writing-wise, the smoothest, stylistically best I've ever written in English. It does pay off to have an editor rip the guts from a story and question everything that's not 100% solid. I can't praise Rachel enough for kicking the complacency out of me. She's one tough lady.

And the year ends with another release: On 20 October, Samhain releases "Break and Enter", written with Rachel Haimowitz (do you detect a theme?). The link has an excerpt.

After that, things will quieten down a lot. I'll be working on three full-sized historical novels, and those take a lot of time. If I do nothing else, creatively, in 2012 but get those three novels ready, I'll have been really busy.

But before that happens, my second English solo novel will hit the shelves. On 4. November, Storm Moon Press is putting out "Counterpunch", my boxing novel.

And if you pre-order the book (before the release date on 4 November), you can win a Kindle or a $115 book certificate. Right now, Counterpunch is 20% off, too.

Here's the blurb:

Fight like a man, or die like a slave.

Brooklyn Marshall used to be a policeman in London, with a wife and a promising future ahead of him. Then he accidentally killed a rioter whose father was a Member of Parliament and had him convicted of murder. To ease the burden on the overcrowded prison system, Brooklyn was sold into slavery rather than incarcerated. Now, he's the "Mean Machine", a boxer on the slave prizefighting circuit, pummelling other slaves for the entertainment of freemen and being rented out for the sexual service of his wealthier fans.

When Nathaniel Bishop purchases Brooklyn's services for a night, it seems like any other assignation. But the pair form an unexpected bond that grows into something more. Brooklyn hesitates to call it "love"—such things do not exist between freemen and slaves—but when Nathaniel reveals that he wants to help get Brooklyn's conviction overturned, he dares to hope. Then, an accident in the ring sends Brooklyn on the run, jeopardizing everything he has worked so hard to achieve and sending him into the most important fight of all—the fight for freedom.


So, if you like some grit in your romance, you can't go wrong with Counterpunch. It should tide you over until I get the historicals ready. Hell, it'll tide *me* over while I slave away over the research...

Pimping post: Dark Edge of Honor

I've been wrapped up completely in a super-secret little project that is a lot of fun, too. And as it goes when you're having fun, time flies. It's already August, and I do wonder where the previous seven months went.

One of the things I did this year was edit/rewrite Rhianon Etzweiler's and mine "Dark Edge of Honor", which is our military gay sci-fi romance/thriller.

Here's the blurb:

Sergei Stolkov is a faithful officer, though his deepest desires go against the Doctrine. A captain with the invading Coalition forces, he believes that self-sacrifice is the most heroic act and his own needs are only valid if they serve the state.

Mike, an operative planted within Cirokko's rebels, has been ordered to seduce Sergei and pry from him the Coalition's military secrets. His mission is a success, but as he captures Sergei's heart, Mike is tempted by his own charade and falls in love.

When the hostile natives of the planet Cirokko make their move, all seems lost. Can Mike and Sergei survive when the Coalition's internal affairs division takes an interest in what happened in the dusty mountains of Zasidka Pass...?


It's a sizeable novel at 96k (and you can pre-order it here), and it presents a different version of one my favourite characters ever.

See, Vadim Krasnorada of the epic Special Forces series began as a paratrooper character named Sergei, back in 1995, when I wrote one of my first stories with explicit sex. Sergei burst onto the stage, scarred, messed up, clearly traumatized, and in that story I killed him in a restroom in Frankfurt, protecting a man who was most definitely not worth it.

The character has haunted me since then. I call him the "Sergei type", and he feels like somebody I know incredibly well. I used the character in many ways and incarnations. One of my print-published novels was about another "Sergei", in this case, however, he chose love and life rather than death. The main difference? This Sergei was less giving and more taking - but just as stoic as the first one.

One short story and one novel in, I still hadn't exorcised the "Sergei type". There was still stuff to talk about, still things he'd do and I found interesting. When the time came again that I needed a character to write something, I examined the character again and decided to use the "Sergei type" again - but this time, I'd make him a "golden boy", somebody special and admired (the other two Sergeis never were). I also made him very, very intelligent and pretty educated (the other Sergeis weren't - I'd assume one of them was almost illiterate).

That way, Vadim Krasnorada was born, probably one of my favourite characters. The rest is history - one million words of "Special Forces", all free here.

Yet, I *still* wasn't done. In "Special Forces", Vadim is about thirty, and he's already a tough bastard with combat experience and a lot of experienced that have hardened him against the world. He's also aware he's gay, and he's forcing other men to submit to him. He'd an institutionalised rapist when we meet him.

Yet, throughout the book, there's the hint of a different Vadim. One who's softer, more idealistic, who wants to believe in Communism and is all bright-eyed and idealistic. I do love writing idealists, and I do love the conflict between an ideology (any ideology - religion or political identity) and the individual. I can't stay away from exploring themes of honor, identity, duty, and I assume I'll do that for the rest of my creative life.

In short, there was no space to explore Vadim's younger years, his idealism and honor, his struggle with the political system he'd been born into. I wanted to explore those bits of the "Sergei type" - how do we mature and how do we become the people we are?

So, I teamed up with Rhianon Etzweiler (who was starting work on a military novel) and pitched her this idea. She welcomed me as a co-writer, and I brought the "Sergei type", now just "Sergei" - this time young, idealistic, very much still discovering who he is - while she brought Mike.

And this is how "Dark Edge of Honor" was born. I hope you enjoy it.

Creativity is like a Large Hadron Collider

I normally don't start a blog post with advertising - and I'm really actually not, because this post does have a point.

Today marks the release of Rachel Haimowitz' "Where He Belongs", a most excellent collection of short stories and vignettes related to her surprise smash hit "Anchored: Belonging".

Now, it's no secret that Rachel and me have been collaborating, and we're currently embarking on a big old adventure I hope to be able to talk about very soon, but for the moment, Rachel's a writer I greatly admire. Also, she links to some extremely hot stuff on her Twitter account, so by all means follow her.

But the real point is - I'm talking about how ideas happen. Sometimes I don't know, but I have an example where I do know. My ideas tend to happen when two (or sometimes three) things collide that weren't touching before.

In a way, creativity is like the Large Hadron Collider, that enormous man-made machine that spins particles around, accelerating them very fast, then smashing them into each other and then looks what happens (they are looking for new particles/waves and try to work out how the universe happens... fascinating stuff).

Creativity is the same (although we usually don't care much about the Birth of the real Universe - internal universes are plenty for us writers to content with).

One of those particles was Rachel Haimowitz' "Belonging" world - featured in both "Anchored" and "Where He Belongs". That world, which is built around the idea that our modern world still has slavery (it was never abolished) grabbed me by the collar a few months ago and never let me go. Her take on slavery in our current day world just struck a nerve, a big flaring nerve of "wow, that's awesome".

The Muse pounced on that world with utter glee - and within a few days, I knew I wanted to write something about slave fighters in that world.

That's the particle my brain brought to it. "Awesome stuff - what does this mean for warriors/fighters/soldiers?" is my usual response to almost anything.

At this stage, the first spark of idea could have turned into anything - cage fighters, or soldiers, or something like that, but the idea was looking for a shape for a while, and that is the part of the process that just has to happen. Inspiration, if you will.

The third particle was missing.

Well, my partner brought that one to the table. He's been boxing for two years (resulting in some very nice changes...). Now, you might or might not be aware, but tomorrow is the fight of David Haye "Haymaker" versus Wladimir Klitschko. It's a much anticipated heavyweight title fight, and it's been trying to happen for a year or so.

So my partner was telling me all about Haye and Klischko, and the third particle appeared and smashed into the others.

Yes, I'd write about slave boxers. Brooklyn Marshall was born, first as a bundle of resentment and anger, then as a London boxer (boxing in a very similar stable to the one my partner trains in - which incidentally was the place where David Haye started his career), then eventually as an angry, desperate, but ultimately unbroken man in a situation where he has to fight for his freedom, life, and dignity. Part gladiator, part criminal, part good man fallen on bad times.

I refined the basic idea with research and my partner thankfully indulged me with questions like "what hurts more - a punch to the kidney or the face?" and stuff like diet, training regime, preparation, attitude. It all came together. I can still see all the componwents, but in the end, "Counterpunch", the novel set in Rachel Haimowitz' "Belonging" world, became totally its own thing.

And now that it's all written and sold and we're in the last stages of the book design (cover and everything) - now the long-anticipated fight between Haye and Klischko will actually happen (it was postponed a few times). And I'll be sitting on the couch tomorrow with friends and cheer them on.

Klischko seems like the nicer guy, but Haye is by far the more exciting boxer, but whoever wins, they helped me make that novel, just one of those things that went into making something new.

Death of a novel

I'm emerging from my "internet and social media" holiday to write a blog post. All day, I was wondering what to write about, and I was about to let this slot slip past and ignore it. I *am* on social media holiday, after all.

I've just received another rejection for a novel. It's been turned down by any even remotely suitable publisher I could think of. All options are exhausted. If I put in three or four months of incredibly hard work (basically writing it from scratch), it might still happen, but there are also factors beyond my control that make that option very unappealing.

I've received enough feedback from the editors rejecting it that I know the book is fundamentally flawed. Tension needs work. The pacing needs work. The plot needs work. I've already edited and rewritten this book twice - changing everything several times. This was the best I could do, and it's not good enough.

There's the point when an author has to weigh the pros and cons. Keep pushing - increasingly frustrated and angry, and to the detriment of the other books that clamour for attention - or cut one's losses and let this go.

I never could let go. I'm a stubborn bastard. I sometimes think I can fix everything. I make my living fixing texts and have for seven years. But something that happened in my personal life yesterday showed me the limits of that "fixability". Sometimes, cutting your losses is the best thing one can do. Let things go. People. Books. Ideas of self. Ideas of capability.

Sometimes saying "this is out of my hands" and "I won't fight this" is the best option - no rage, no anger. In writing, I strive very very hard - I can't write formula and I probably never will learn that skill (it's a skill, and one I admire) - which means, sometimes I fail, fall flat on my face. I'm not sure who said it, but I remember a quote that goes something like this: "I may fail, but as long as I fail *better* every time, I'm making progress."

I'm now burying that failed novel and its equally failed prequel. Six or eight months of work - but who's keeping track. *G*

Every novel teaches me something. This one teaches me to let go and admit defeat - and to focus on the as-yet unfailed novels. To keep moving forward and not dwell on the past that can't be changed.

The Fear of the Writer

We tend to not talk about fear. Whenever writers talk about fear, it's often the fear of bad reviews and rejection of the manuscript. While those fears can be quite nasty (I still hate getting rejected, and getting several one-star reviews in a day really makes me want to go back to bed), I haven't met one writer whose fear or reviews or rejection actually kept them from writing.

Those fears happen *after* the fact. The crime is committed, the book/story is written. It's Luther's "Here I stand, I got no choice" (one of the great Acts of Defiance in history - "Fuck you, Pope!" - but hey, it helps having some kings and dukes and counts on your side while you do that...)

However, writers tackle other fears *before* the fact, too.

Bear with me, while I move back to what triggered that thought.

I read (ok, started reading) an interesting book on writing (if you could see my study - I have a bookcase full of them), which has an exercise that knocked my socks off. It's "The 90-Day Novel" by Allan Watt (self-published via Kindle).

One of the first exercises was "Write down your fears about the novel" (we're still in the "why don't you just write the book" chapter).

Next exercise: "Now write the one fear that you *haven't* admitted to in the last exercise" (paraphrasing here).

Then came the cracker. "How does your fear relate to the fear of your main character in that book?"

My socks were blown clean off. There's one book I keep pushing in front of myself, namely my WWII novel, which I started in late 2009. In the meantime, I've written half a dozen novels, so it's clearly not writer's block.

Examining my fear and comparing it to the fear of my main characters, I worked out they are identical.

Both characters, but mainly Richard, have that deep, gnawing fear of not being "good enough" or "worthy". David struggles with getting the whole Jewishness and Americanness together in his mind (basically denying one and being denied the second for his troubles), whereas Richard has the towering spectre of his father, his social class' duties/obligations and the fact that he grew up too fast and has too much responsibility while living in a culture where he has to be a certain way or risk imprisonment and death.

Fear of inadequacy. Of being unable to process things as they should be processed. Being unable to do things as they "should be done".

It's a small thought, really, and it's amusing that a paragraph in a writing book got me there, but it's a valuable insight for me.

Now that I know what I'm up against, I can fight it. While the characters face their fears, I might be able to get that book written.


And on a totally unrelated note, happy Easter for those who celebrate it. In my case, Easter means chocolate eggs and lots of sleeping and a fair amount of writing. But that's great. :)

The wonders of research (or: the boxer)

Right, everybody, sorry I've been remiss in my updating here. Every time my slot came up, there was something serious in the way. Like a complete edit of my upcoming novel. Two weeks ago, I got my eyes lasered and didn't really want to update the blog with "OMG I'M SCARED!"

But my eyes are pretty much healed now (no more shortsightedness from this author – and I'll spare you the details, but LASIK is a gift from the gods), and I have sent off all the revisions I have to do in the foreseeable future. I'm in the right frame of mind to talk.

So, let's talk. I'm currently working on a story about boxing. (Sorry, I'm always talking about books that I'm working on, so you can't really buy them yet… I haven't even quite decided where to send it…but I hope that when we talk next time in two weeks, it'll be done and I'll be editing it).

Now, my partner's been boxing for two years. I watched him fight (and lose) in a "white collar boxing charity" event, and I never really thought much about it all. He's also running half-marathons, and I'm not really getting into that, either. As far as I'm concerned, I welcome his boxing because that means he's out of the house three times a week and that means I can write without interruptions. Writers are selfish like that.

But I did begin to feed him articles on boxers, or the random trivia I came across. I did watch David Haye fight, and Calzaghe, because, yeah, it was on on the telly and it is strangely fascinating. Above all, I was starting to give him books on boxing as presents (my book buying habit and his interest caused that). I started to leaf through the books. Read some quotes. Started asking questions.

Gradually, I worked out I have a character who's a boxer. It took a long while to get Brooklyn to talk. Like many of my characters, Brooklyn's not really a talker. He's just there, more a presence than a voice. I knew he was disgraced, and I knew he lived in Rachel Haimowitz' "Belonging" world, which is basically our world, but slavery was never abolished. See, Brooklyn's a slave. And a boxer, and on the way to become the slave world heavyweight champion.

Thankfully, Rachel was so kind to allow me to play in her sandbox. I'll likely end up writing more there, because slavery is a fascinating topic, especially if we're looking at slaves who fight very very hard to be free again.

But even more, during the research for the boxer story, I learnt a fair amount about both boxers and the sport, read some fascinating accounts of fights, and realized it's really not just about overpaid guys hitting each other in front of the camera.

As my partner says, "just about anything is fascinating if seen in enough detail." That really sums it all up. You can look at the most mundane things, stuff you'd thought was boring, but if you really, really look at it and look at it long enough with an open mind, suddenly you get stories. Thousands of them. Little pieces will all swirl around and then suddenly settle, creating a completely new picture.

Sometimes, you get myths shattered. Of course I knew about Muhammad Ali, but I didn't know about what he did to Ernie Tyrell.

It's worth checking out, it's a fascinating story. Go. Have a look. Wikipedia is a good start.

Enjoy your find. We can talk about it when you come back. I'll be here.

My mind has been taken over by editing

I've done very little in the last few weeks but editing. There are really several stages in the creative process. There's the initial idea ("Wow, I have an IDEA!"), immediately followed by doubts ("I don't really know how to write this – there's too much research involved – I have too much work on my plate"), then comes the writing itself, which again has several stages of enthusiasm and fear. Then you edit and submit the text. Then the text comes back.

And if anybody thought that by then – with a contract in pocket – things would be easy, they are dead wrong. The real work is to get the manuscript from 90-95% good to 100%. Personally, I think that's 50% of the work with very little of the fun. There's no fun in editing, just relief it's over and I solved a problem.

My writing life has also slowed down considerably. Last year I had 10 releases. This year, two are firmly planned and another one is very likely. I expect to finish two more projects (mainly big rewrites of stuff that's done), but that's it.

But the truth is, I'm no good at short stories. Even my novellas come out at the long end, and most projects I started as novellas have turned into novels. So, yeah, the two books coming out this year are the gay sici-fi novel "Father of All Things" (title might yet change) with Carina Press in August, co-written with Rhianon Etzweiler, and the gay fantasy novel "Scorpion", which should be out from Dreamspinner in May.

So, currently I'm doing the last edit on "Father of all Things" (at this stage, it's only details, after a fairly comprehensive re-write in January/early February), and the edits for "Scorpion" will hit my desk in the next few weeks.

I've been editing so much all I really want to do at this stage is writing. There are plenty of ideas, three books that want to be written urgently, but edits come first.

The good news is – next time I'm posting here (in two weeks), I'll have a sneak preview of edited text from one of the releases.

The Wild Ride

I missed my post two weeks ago (sorry for that, real life was extremely busy and I only remembered it the next day), but I can’t possibly miss this one. Last post of the year 2010.

And what a year it’s been. Lots of my writer friends had terrible years. People laid off, illnesses, houses got flooded, and the wretched economy in the US, UK and most of Europe doesn’t make things any easier.

Against that, though, many bright spots for readers and writers: ebook sales are up. We learned the shocking/exciting number that Amazon sold more ebooks than hardcovers (granted, who buys hardcovers anyway?). The Kindle 3 launched and shifted a huge amount of units all year, and most at Christmas. Every day, hundreds and thousands of readers join the e-reading part of the population.

And there’s more fun on the horizon.There’s the iPad (I’m foregoing one until it becomes a writing machine – proper software to do some heavy lifting in terms of getting words out), but that’s only one of many tablets. Five years from now, we’ll have a lot more interesting shiny gadgets on which to read and write. Part of why I want to grow really, really old? I want to see what technology comes out and goes mainstream. I’m a gadget hound. I love technology.

Going over my own last year’s resolutions, I got 80% of the important stuff (I didn’t go to the gym as much as I’d planned, though). I finally bought my house. I moved in and got all the bits and pieces into place. I left a job that bored me to tears and got a great job that paid a little more and taught me a huge amount of valuable skills. As the year turns, I’m leaving that job and go work for an investment bank for a lot more moolah.

Creatively speaking, 2010 was awesome. Last year at this time, I had one story out, “Deliverance” in “Forbidden Love”. Now it’s twelve. Yes. Eleven more. I had almost one release per month (I slacked off in December, I admit). Five of those are novellas, four are short stories, two are full-sized novels. Two more novels slated for 2011 (“Scorpion” with Dreamspinner Press and “Father of all Things” with Carina Press).

In 2010, I was dragged, almost kicking and screaming, onto Facebook. I blogged. I got this guest blogging gig here, and I just started another guest blogging gig at Savvy Authors.

More importantly, I met people. Loads and loads of people. Now, I can get people fatigue. I am, believe it or not, an introvert. I’m probably the most extroverted introvert you’ll ever meet, but it was great to meet so many readers (Amora and Marcie and Tina and Britta and Karen and Arzu and Kate and all the others over at Goodreads), new authors (life’s good when there’s talent out there like Rachel Haimowitz, A M Tuomala and Rhianon Etzweiler), and I’ve been reading and reviewing and generally found my rhythm. I write more and better than ever before in my life – unless I’m blocked 6-7 weeks, which happens, but it’s no big drama.

I’ve gathered the strength to look at all my failed novels (aka, I now have the courage to open that big drawer with all the HORROR inside). The financial thriller trainwreck. The menage that isn’t quite an espionage story. I feel I can tackle all that now and fix it.

As the year turns, I’m nervous about starting work at the bank (writer meets financial industry. I think it might be hilarious - or painful).

I’m working on the edits of “Break and Enter”, which I co-wrote in a couple days (find an excerpt here).

I’m working on two novels at the same time. Still the WWII novel and the sequel to “Scorpion”. I’m heading off in a few minutes to have breakfast with my partner at a very nice, non-chain cafe that recently opened in my city.

When my partner asked what I wanted to do for New Year, I said I am completely happy to write all day, then pause at midnight, get a vodka orange, stand at the window that looks out over the park (or street), watch the fireworks, toast to the new year, and then sit back down to write.

As to 2011, I just expect more of the same, only better.

Happy New Year!

Win "Transit" and/or "First Blood"

Okay, 'tis the season, and I've been remarkable remiss in my "duty" to "promote" my books. It's not that I don't like promoting (but if I ever send you an email with nothing but "I'm great, NOW BUY MY BOOK" - just shoot me), it's that I've been busy getting a new job and getting the magazine to print. Don't you just hate it when real life gets in the way of being an author?

So. Giveaways. Amora/Amara over at her blog sponsors a giveaway of "Transit". I'm sponsoring a second copy, so there's the chance to win two. Just read the excerpt and answer the question.

Here's some more info on "Transit".



Awesome.

Next one on the list. I'm giving away HARD COPIES (yes, actual paper/print books) of "First Blood".



I got five copies, nobody needs that many, so I'll sign them, wrap them in Christmassy paper and off they go. I ship globally, even though that might end up costing an arm and a leg, but hey, it's Christmas and I don't believe in being cheap. So all readers from Ulan Batar to the remote villages of Canada are more than welcome to enter.

Enter here.


If you're not a member of Goodreads, you can still post there, but I'll need an email address. After all, I'll have to get in touch to get your real world address so I can post the book.

Contest ends MONDAY.

That's it from me this time. See you in two weeks. :)

Lying fallow

It's a bit weird that every time it's my time on the blog, I've just returned from a business trip. First Moscow, then Chicago, then Warsaw. I can't tell you much about Warsaw. I can talk about a local five star hotel and that it has very comfy beds and a restaurant that serves a strange mix of Asian foods, from Chinese, Thai, to Japanese, and compared to other places where I've eaten, you get skinned alive with the bill.

Warsaw is a haunted city, a city of ghosts. I'm not sure November is the best time to visit it. I missed both the National Museum and the Warsaw Uprising Museum. But the scars of history run deep in this odd place, full of classisist facades meant to impress and then the crooked, aged, fading Old Town. Where the taxi driver points out the war memorial, saying "voina, voina", and I'm the only guest in the taxi who knows voina is war. Not that it was ambivalent when the taxi driver added "Hitler, Hitler". I certainly want to go back and explore the history of the place and see it in daylight. In a foggy late November evening, Warsaw only showed two faces, and that clearly wasn't all there was to it.

Not that I'm going anywhere near Poland with my current World War II novel. Maybe I should. Maybe I should write another, a different story, dealing with the things that happened there. The sheer amount of suffering almost demands it, and also adds a "stay away", if we're talking romance. You need huge amounts of skill and mental fortitude to cut fiction from the bleeding wounds of history - respecting your material (and the people who died and suffered) on one hand, and at the same time telling the story.

I'm deeply ambivalent about touching anything relating to the Third Reich. I can't delude myself I'm doing it for art, for one, like the literary writers. I aim to entertain, primarly. But I'm aware I'm treading ground where only a thin layer of time covers the millions of skeletons under my feet. Rarely am I more aware of my nationality and birth language/mother tongue than where my ancestors have spilled blood, and within living memory.

While immersing myself into the history of the Third Reich and its people (in many ways, it's a foreign culture and a different planet), I'm fallow as a writer. I haven't written any meaningful quantities for three weeks now, partially because I've just finished a couple novels, partially because I've been away on business, and strangely, I struggle to write while sitting in a hotel in a foreign country.

It's disconcerting in that "oh ye gods, I'll never write again!" kind of way, but I know stuff is going on in my subconsciousness. Thoughts, feelings, energy. Much of the stuff writers work with is intangible. As a famous writer said, writers and spiders make a living from their guts. I know things are going on, I can feel the current pull and move, but the surface is untroubled. I'll have to trust that things will begin emerging when they are ready.

Serendipity

I'm still on a business trip in Chicago – first time US, first time Midwest, first time Chicago, and I reckon I couldn't have made a better start inside the States. At least everybody says so. I'm right now stuck in a hotel lobby waiting for time to pass so I can grab a last meal before I put my stomach at the tender mercies of British Airways (there's a pizzaria around here that has a very interesting take on pizza – it resembles a savoury cracker more than anything else, but it's very good).

Most of the trip was devoted to business, but I did manage to get some writing research in. See, there are things in the US that we don't have in the UK. I've eaten some terrific bagels, shopped at Walgreens (I needed a couple protein bars), and yeah, Starbucks in the same around the world. I met contacts in Caribou Coffee (a shameless Starbucks clone - ad why not clone something *good*?), and went into a Barnes & Noble and a Borders (we do have Borders, but yours is nicer).

I got a feel for Chicago, I hope, or at least the business area, and downtown, and the Gold Coast. All of that is not what my company paid for (well, they did, I'll make them pay for the protein bars), but it's all research. One of my Russian characters is relocating here to live with a couple Americans, so I walked the street with “Russian eyes”, remembering Moscow and how he'd see the city. I made some photos too to jog the memory.

Needless to say, I didn't write a word, and I even “missed” the launch of my latest book, “Transit”, which I wrote with Raev Gray and was published by Dreamspinner. It's a seriously busy day when a writer is surprised by a book launch.

Things are germinating, however. The “guys in the basement”, as Stephen King calls the muses, are moving furniture. And all the lucky accidents are working in my favour, too.

I walked down Michigan Avenue at around noon, and there was a Borders. Now, writers and bookshops are like moths and flames, but I did have this feeling of “I should look for Jewish soldiers in WWII while I'm here.” Not exactly the kind of topic that is on the bestseller lists, but Borders had the perfect book.

The need to come to grips with David was overwhelming, and that was one of the things that has been worrying me a lot lately. What do I know about Jewishness in war? Well, there it was, eye-witness accounts of Jewish GIs. I believe in that kind of lucky accident. Very often, when I define a problem (“I know nothing about horsebreeding in Eastern Prussia in the 1940ies”) and then go into a random bookstore, I tend to find the exact book that answers that exact question. Just like I get quartered in the exact area where my character would end up living – out of the whole wide US of A.

Writing is very often just lucky accidents, or a series of small miracles, or a chaotic brain seeing patterns where none exist. You decide, but it works very well for me.

Post-book hangover

Yesterday I wrote the last sentence of my current novel “Scorpion”. There are still at least three scenes that are complete crap, the whole thing has a ton of typos, and there are some logic issues, but I have a book. A new, solo-written fantasy novel. I started that one on my holiday in Turkey, in the week before I started work at my new job. That’s four months ago now, and I’m taking into account that for at least two of those months, I wasn’t really writing (but editing, and sometimes just working long hours at my paid job to keep the mortgage payments coming).

When I went to Turkey, I didn’t actually want a new project. I had one. I brought a pile of books to research and had an e-reader full of books I had to review. I got some reviewing done, but most of the time during that week I spent typing on my netbook, writing around 18thousand words about a character that just showed up and demanded to be heard. Kendras – the tough mercenary I was writing about – didn’t take a “no” for an answer, and besides, it was fun. And, yeah, hot. It certainly pressed my buttons. The world where he lives is a dog-eat-dog place.

Have a visual:



If you’re injured and have no money, you starve or bleed to death or die of an infection. Kendras, shell-shocked from losing most of his unit, is an unlikely “romance” hero. While I hope that one of the m/m romance & gay romance publishers will buy the book, to me, it’s not just about the guy Kendras falls in love with (or has been in love with for a while). It’s also a book on how he grows as a person and what else goes on in that strange place where he lives, where three cities are in constant war, the church pretends that gods exists, human sacrifice is one of the rites that keeps the world going, and mercenaries are as likely to sell their bodies as their swords – and nobody bats an eyelash.

I’m not trying to sell you the book (would be counter-productive, because it’s not out yet and won’t be for several more months). It’s just that right after a book, my head is still not back from that world. I still feel it. It’s very much in my bones at this point.

Apart from the sheer amount of time it takes, it’s also hard to keep writing at that speed. It’s just under 70thousand words and I wrote at least 25thousand of those in the last two weeks, while working around 50-55 hours/week in my day job and being responsible for a financial publication. Getting a magazine to press (today) and finishing a novel (last night), has left me with a feeling not unlike a hangover.

The head hurts, reality is a fuzzy, blurred place, but sleep is for the wicked and a no-no. Choosing between writing and work doesn’t work. I don’t have the courage to quit my day job – I like having a pension and owning a house. But writing is why I’m here and life’s short, so “I’m tired”, or “I worked so hard” is no excuse. My job is to get words out, and that was what I did. If it’s only 500 words a day – that means 3,500 words a week, and a 60k novel in around four months. If you keep doing that, that’s three novels per year. Not bad at all. (And 500 words is not an outrageous amount – this entry has just under 700 words).

Even if I didn’t feel like it, there was always “just one more sentence” and “c’mon, just one paragraph today.” That’s how you write books. That’s how I wrote “Scorpion”, my first finished solo novel in a pretty long time.

I can relax now. I’ve taken Monday off (as the magazine goes to the printer today), and I’ll spend the weekend editing, writing a synopsis, re-writing three scenes. I’ll fill up the fridge with fresh food, do my taxes, go to the gym, but above all, I’m hoping to sleep, rest and recover. (To be ready for the next one.)





(Images used without permission)

I’ve come back from Russia

Yesterday, I returned from a business trip to Moscow. It was my first time in Russia. Now, you might find this ironic, considering how many Russian characters I have created.

Then, I’m using a Russian pseudonym. It used to be that German writers chose English pennames to pass for British or American – largely because the German reading public firmly believed that “German writers can’t write entertainment”. When I began writing gay romance in English, it was clear I needed a pseudonym. German is all but unpronouncable for most English speakers. I considered going with an English-sounding name. Then I thought, “hang on, there are plenty of those”... and my heart has been beating for the Russians ever since a childhood first terrified of the nuclear holocaust, then when relief when Gorbachev made the Russians “human”. Sting’s “The Russians love their children too.” As a child of the Cold War, I was always fascinated with the side whose story we in Western Germany were never told. While America was the “cool place”, Russia – or then the Soviet Union, was the mysterious place. I was way more intrigued by the one side that I didn’t understand.

But of course, I’m not Russian, and while I have Russian friends, all I knew up to now was theoretical. Triggered by that age-old fascination, I’ve read a lot about Russian history and culture. I have shelves and shelves of books about various subjects, and I know too much to romanticise Russians...too much.

What I want to say is, three days ago, I stood on Red Square – the place of military parades and of GUM, the Russian version of Harrod’s or Saks. I’ve walked past the highly polished block of copper-coloured atrocity that is Lenin’s tomb, and photographed the crazy coloured domes of St Basil. I’ve talked to Russians (bankers and other finance people) about their country. One guy walked me back to Tverskaya street, the massive, constantly gridlocked representation boulevard which makes Oxford/Regent Street look like Legoland – it’s so big and busy it’s mind-numbing. I’ve seen nothing like it – not Unter den Linden in Berlin, and not even the Champs Elysee in Paris. Moscow is its own category.

When the guy walked me to Tverskaya, we walked past an official building, I think a Ministry of some sort. In front stood two Russian military/paramilitary types looking bland and bored and wielding big automatic weapons (machine pistols? I didn’t look that closely). The guy next to me walked a little faster, noticed my interest in the building and said “never attract their attention. They are thugs. If you look Russian, you’ll pass... if you look like something else, you’re automatically a target.”

I knew that. It’s even in “First Blood”, the book Barbara Sheridan and I wrote and which was released today by Dreamspinner. There’s a passage where one Russian calls the police corrupt and “thugs”.

I knew all that, because I’ve done my research, and spoken to Russians, but up until this man’s cautious sneer when he talked about them, it has never really sunk in. What it means to live in a society that is afraid of its police and that keeps its head down, glad they fit in, glad that they look Russian, rather than, say, Chechen or Chinese, or whatever. Despite all my research, I was ridiculously naive.

There are many things I could talk about – the violent clash of pre- and post-Soviet architecture, which is a brutality and coarseness on the mind that makes you reel. The permanent Moscow gridlock that lasts from morning until late in the night. The fact that there are never enough taxi drivers and that you can just flag down a private car, negotiate a price and destination, and get taken to your destination by a total stranger. While I was in Moscow, the “thug police” abducted a gay activist, kept him somewhere for two days, and then released him outside the city.

As the Moscow Times wrote, rather laconically, “He then went home by bus”.

If anything, I admire how the Russians are dealing with adversity. There is a fundamental irony and jadedness behind it all – like the other option would be to cry over it, but clearly, that country has cried so much it has no tears left.

So, from this, two things. One – I really, viscerally understand what I only rationally understood before. And second – I was damn glad when I saw a British policeman that I don’t have to “fit in”, that I’m living in a country where I don’t have to be afraid, where I don’t have to keep my head down.

When I told my partner this, he laughed. “Yeah, but you’re not black and poor.”

Point taken.

The reader is you

Hi, I’m Aleksandr Voinov and I’m the new guy on the team. Great to be here. I was brainstorming about what I want to blog about, and I could have told you about the book I just finished, or the one that I’m now continuing to write (world financial markets and scandals permitting). That one is a WWII romance set in Germany, and it’s pretty interesting – there’s a lot of great stuff in there, Spitfires, evil bankers, and acts of heroism… but as I said, I’m not talking about that today.

Today, I’m talking about you. And me. It’s sometimes strange to think that we’ll never meet – we meet by accident, but unless you email me, I don’t know you exist. Unless you see my book and read it, you don’t know I exist.

But we are having an exchange – we do, you hear my words in your brain, and ideally I’ll put some stories, images and characters in your head that will help you shorten that commute, that doctor’s visit, or take your mind off worries as you read in bed, maybe listening to a thunderstorm. If you respond to that is totally your choice, so you can leave a comment here or at my usual blog or send me an email or talk to me in a forum. Right now, you might curl up on the sofa in the conservatory, or read stuff on the beach. You might be 16, 60, male, female, you might be rich, poor, fortunate, unfortunate, healthy or dying.

Me, when you read this, I might already be dead. I might have given up writing, or maybe my agent has finally convinced me to write something that can make me (and him) good money. I don’t know, and at this point we both can’t know.

The fact that we meet here is nothing short of a miracle. Six-odd billion people on the planet, hundreds of millions of webpages, and we meet here. How was your day? Have you heard of me before? Will you send me an email or comment on this? (You’re welcome to, provided I’m still around…).

I think what I’m saying is that meeting is a miracle. Meeting online, two strangers that both love a good story is nothing short of astonishing. In the vast world of rushing electrons, here we are. Wow.

When I meet people – online or in business – I try to make the most of it, because meeting is so accidental and random. I try and tell a cracking good story to readers, or, in business, really listen to the people I’m interviewing. Taking their position before I go back to “neutral” – as neutral as the press ever gets, anyway.

But it goes both ways – we can’t know where we’ll end up from here. Many people that got in touch over one of my stories are now friends – we hang out on Facebook or Goodreads and joke and play, because ultimately, this writing gig is not about selling you a book or selling myself.

We’re two strangers meeting who both love a good story, and that’s really it. Let’s make the most of it.