author interview

Playing Superhero by LGBT Author Hans Hirschi

May 10, 2013 By Brandon Leave a Comment

As a young boy, my brother and I would play super heroes. I’d be the Flash, he’d be Batman. We’d save the world with our combined imaginations. That imagination also helped me write stories from a very young age. I had all but forgotten about it until I recently discovered some old writing from my preteen and teen years.

I also kept diaries. I lost those, however, to a “gay purging” fire after my first coming out at the age of seventeen, a few months before I headed west, to America, as an exchange student. There, encouraged by my English teacher, I took up writing again, a journal filled with teen angst and stories about saving the world, centaurs and other mythical creatures.

In 1991, inspired by hopeless love (he was straight), I wrote poetry and published my first book “Moments.” After that, it would take me nine years before I’d write again, and by that time I had gone nonfiction, publishing a book on e-learning in Swedish and in 2010, a management book, “Common Sense” in English. Oddly, majoring in literature had turned me away from reading and writing fiction, and traveling the globe on business for many years, didn’t help either. [Read more…] about Playing Superhero by LGBT Author Hans Hirschi

Interview with LGBT Author Dick O’Connor

May 3, 2013 By Brandon 3 Comments

Welcome author Dick O’Connnor to the blog.

Brandon: Poking around your social sites I noted that you’re gritty and raw, just like real life. I like that. Tell us a little something about yourself that we won’t find online.

Dick: I am a former model (I got too old and the binge drinking was hell on my abs) and a wannabe socialite. I’m originally from a desert cow town in Southern California and got into the gay club scene when I was eighteen once my best friend spotted my innocence in a club and took me under his wing, boozed me up, and taught me how to detach emotion from sex. Overall I’m a neo-Libertine.

B: Where did Stiff come from and what motivated you to write it?

D: STIFF: Memoirs of a Dick is my attempt to recount the stories to the best of my blacked-out memories in college; unfortunately, alcohol can make things a little hazy. If it didn’t happen the way I remember then it damn well should have.

[Read more…]

Interview with LGBT Author Lichen Craig

April 26, 2013 By Brandon Leave a Comment

I’m talking with friend and fellow author, Lichen Craig today. Often the interviewer, but rarely the interviewee, I thought it was time we switched the chairs around and found out a little more about her. ~B

Can you tell us a little about your writing background?

I have been writing for many years – nonfiction up until 2012. Sometimes I had other professions at the same time. It all amounts to a lot of experience that helps in setting a scene! I wrote on wildlife, environment, current events, and politics. I was fortunate to have a stellar education for it: I stumbled into the University of Iowa and the renowned Writers Workshop there. I actually double majored, with journalism, and that was great: the journalism school taught me to write tight and edit.

Where did the idea for Gentlemen’s Game come from?

I don’t really know. I was in a place in my life where several things were haunting my mind. Chiefly was bisexuality. I had a few friends who seemed to be so lost . . . torn between two worlds: on the one hand was the straight community questioning and rejecting them, and on the other was the gay community looking down their noses at them. The idea that, because they were attracted to both sexes they were somehow in denial about their sexuality seemed awfully simplistic, judgmental, and condescending to me. I contacted a national expert on the subject, a psychologist, and learned a lot that was absolutely fascinating. I had also been thinking about bisexual people in the closet – in heterosexual marriages, and perhaps never giving themselves permission to explore their own sexual orientations. So those things fed into it. As I wrote, some of my own background in working with crime and abuse victims came into it. [Read more…] about Interview with LGBT Author Lichen Craig

Guest Post by LGBT Author Majorie F. Baldwin

April 12, 2013 By Brandon 4 Comments

Man Made Man by Majorie F. Baldwin Thanks for inviting me to your blog, Brandon. I love to talk about my science fiction and the Phoenician Series, in particular. I’ve lived with some of these characters in my head for nearly my entire life. Joshua Andrew Caine, for instance, came to me (fully-formed) at about age 5. No kidding, preschool and this adult man was running around in my head. Creepy, no?

This was a strange synchronicity. After I drafted this blog post, I added you to my circles on GooglePlus and ran across that Australian video panel on what it means to write “gay fiction.” As you’ll read in a bit, labels are a really sticky point with me—as in they don’t stick. Clearly, we are of like minds here.

But let me back up a sec. My introduction to the gay community was when my older brother came out to me. I was 12 and didn’t really understand the whole socio-cultural implication of “being gay” because one, I was 12, and two, it was the 1970s so this was pre-AIDS. Being gay was not commonly mentioned on television or in pop culture so I wasn’t exposed to it in my sheltered suburban childhood. It was shocking news that Uhura and Kirk had kissed on Star Trek (I was appalled; isn’t that sexual harassment? He was her boss!) [Read more…] about Guest Post by LGBT Author Majorie F. Baldwin

My Favorite Book – LGBT Author Pol McShane

April 5, 2013 By Brandon 1 Comment

In the ongoing My Favorite Book series I asked author Pol McShane to stop by and tell us which one of his books he considers his favorite. ~B

I have written several books, but none are more near and dear to me than Luthor. This may sound a bit odd for those who read the book and experience the intense tale within its pages, but the character Luthor has a way of reaching into one’s heart and not letting go. Luthor is the story of an affluent family ruled by an abusive father, Garvin Brodrick.

The family lives in a large mansion in Salem, Massachusetts. The two children, Amanda and Joshua, are repeatedly abused both physically and sexually by Garvin. Their mother, Lillie, is aware of the abuse, but unable to help. As the first half of the story unfolds, Amanda and Joshua find solace and comfort in each other’s arms. Through a series of events, the two find themselves the sole heirs to the fortune and living alone in the mansion. But their love for one another continues. This union produces a child born with hideous deformities, including a rare skin disease and eyes that are extremely sensitive to light. [Read more…] about My Favorite Book – LGBT Author Pol McShane

Interview with LGBT Author Carey Parrish

March 29, 2013 By Brandon Leave a Comment

Welcome Carey Parrish to the blog, my friend and fellow author. We’ve gone back and forth on social media but I’ve never really had the chance to chat with this amazing man. Today, we changed that. Hope you enjoy. ~B

Of the books you have in print, which one is your favorite and why?

I would say my novel Big Business. It’s a sequel to my first novel Marengo. The reason I feel so proud of it is because I tackled the most complex plot I’ve yet written about with that one. I brought back characters from Marengo, who proved to be very popular with readers – I was still getting emails asking for more of them almost two years after Marengo was published – and I put them all in a heftier plot with a lot more intrigue and danger. I also introduced some new characters which I had a blast creating in my mind! The whole thing flowed like honey once I finished my outline and my research, and really started writing the book. And I was really proud of the fact that even though it is a sequel, it stands on its own; you don’t have to read the first one to enjoy the second. I plan to do more with this series. [Read more…] about Interview with LGBT Author Carey Parrish