writing

Ordinary Heroes – Gay Couples

May 10, 2012 By Brandon 1 Comment

I originally posted this on Chick n Dicks (they’re generous enough to invite me around once in a while) when they were doing an Ordinary Hero’s segment for the month of February. In light of the president’s endorsement yesterday and the fact that I personally believe that gay couples CAN change people’s misconceptions just by being who they are, I have re-posted it again here, with a few edits for SFW reading.

Let’s face it, we like our escapist reading. We love the hot swarthy men who jump into the fray, take down the bad guys with claws, fangs and superpowers; and it’s even better when they’re having really hot m/m sex right after. (Got to burn off all that adrenaline somehow!)

I read a lot of different genres and it always struck me that some of the most ordinary characters in the books were, in fact, the ones that had the most profound impact; the unsung heroes that allowed the main character his glory.

But that reflects in real life too, because it’s usually not the one in front of the podium that’s made the change in someone’s life. It’s the person you never hear of, the one that doesn’t do it for the glory, or the attention, or (let’s face it) the really hot sex. They do it because it’s right, because their heart says that there is more to being human than just taking.

It might be someone like that accountant you noticed but never really saw. You know the one pushing his pencil around all day, tapping at keys and making sure all the numbers are right. Then he goes home to his quiet life and…

On the Whimsy

April 30, 2012 By Brandon Leave a Comment

So when I started this out I was being convinced by friends that I ‘just had to publish.’

It won’t be much, new book tech, kindle, nook and all that… Yeah, right. I had to figure out a whole new language, find book marketing bloggers that weren’t trying to pedal me some bullshit scheme about how they were going to make me the next NYT bestseller, and then there were all those querky tech problems that I still have no clue about. [Read more…] about On the Whimsy

Stephen Dobbins – Guest Post

April 21, 2012 By Brandon Leave a Comment

Dad was a diplomat, or so I was told. Honestly I was too young to understand or care. He might have been MI5 for all I knew. The only thing I understood was that he was gone a good bit, and that when he was home we were an inseparable lot; me, my mum and him.

My parents loved me a great deal and I always felt loved even when I thought that I was different from other boys. But they loved each other even more and I could see it each time their eyes met. Maybe that was why their death hurt me so much, because their love for each other was the spark in my small world that told me how much I was loved.

When my dad left in the mornings my mum’s last touch was just a light whisper of her fingertips, as if enticing him to hurry through the day and come back home again. And when he did return there was always a small cuddle in the foyer, or the kitchen, or wherever he caught Mum unawares. I use to watch them when he snuck in and winked at me, a conspirator’s nod before he ambushed Mum with his simple affections. It always made me smile. [Read more…] about Stephen Dobbins – Guest Post

On Writing: Beginning with the End

April 13, 2012 By Brandon 2 Comments

writing, fiction, the hook The hook in music is the riff that captures the listener and pulls them into the song, the beat and the experience of the music. It’s what gets you humming the tune days later and what brings listeners back to the artist and the memories they experienced when that particular song was playing. It’s one of the things I love about music.

In writing it’s a little different, but no less important. Creating a hook is built on sentences, one leads to another, and another, and another. From my perspective, it’s more like a maze, the further a writer can get you into the maze, the harder it is for you to get out until you reach the end. [Read more…] about On Writing: Beginning with the End

Questions from readers

April 11, 2012 By Brandon Leave a Comment

I’m getting more and more questions from readers so I thought I would create a blog post that answered some of the most common. If you have a question, please feel free to contact me via my website or one of my social media sites. I may answer you personally, or make a blog post about it, or both.

You stated in an interview that some of the characters in The Value of Rain were based on real people, can you tell me which ones?

Many of the characters were based on real people, the character Snow was one of them and the real person he was based on had a literal pelt of scars from his shoulders down to his wrist. Snow was a stark, beautiful young man whose voice haunted me until I gave him a voice in Rain.

Poetry Month – Poetry and Prejudice

April 2, 2012 By Brandon 1 Comment

As many of my reader’s already know, I’m a great fan of poetry. I even dabble in a bit of it myself, though I will be the first to say that my own poetry sucks. I need to stretch my fingers a bit more when I put words on paper, which is why I have such great respect for a wordsmith that can do in ten words what it takes me in ten thousand.

I read all kinds of prose and poetry and it doesn’t have to be a specifically oriented in gender, ethnicity or race. It just has to be good; it has to touch me and evoke something from within myself that makes me stop and wonder why I have not noticed this before.

But honestly, there are many times when I think that the words we commit ourselves to, both in our writing and our reading, are hindered by the labels we put on it. Or should we blame marketers and publishers who value easily labelled societal segments for being neat little cubbyholes of potential sales and profit? That would be a bit too easy, wouldn’t it? It would be all their fault, and not our own ingrained prejudices and petty bigotries that we don’t let out to the world or, often, comprehend within ourselves.

Poetry exposes those gilded crimes, like good prose. It opens us to new possibilities and worlds, new ways of thinking, it keeps us breathless, pent up, internalized until we can stand it no more. Save with our tears and our sorrow and our joy. It shows us the chair in the forest of words.

Poetry has that effect. Because that’s what its for. For change and progress and evolution.

For the soul; the one that beats, the one to come, and the one that has passed.

Photo credit: H. Keller