Gay Romance: "His Only Choice" Human Cheese; James Franco/Brokeback Mountain

Gay Romance "His Only Choice"

I'm going to be releasing a new 30,000 word novella in my Second Chance series titled, His Only Choice. This time the story is set in New York's Hudson River Valley and the main character is the owner of a small brick and mortar bookshop. I've been to that part of New York a few times and fell in love with so many things, and I've wanted to set a book there for a long time. Here's the book description, subject to change. And I'll post more as I get closer to a release date.

In this third installment of the Second Chance series by Ryan Field, Lance has to figure out a way to deal with the fact that his partner, Davis, of twenty years will be traveling extensively in Asia and leaving him alone for long stretches at a time. So Lance plunges into making important changes to the small brick and mortar bookshop he owns in New York's Hudson River Valley to keep it competitive with the rising popularity in e-books. He's also trying to deal with turning forty years old and it's not working out well. In order to fill the lonely hours when he's not working, Lance joins a gym and meets a very young personal trainer named Sergio who makes him feel so young and desirable again he starts lying about his age and telling Sergio he's only thirty-five years old.  

 Like other books in the Second Chance series the story bounces from present to past a few times and the choice Lance has to make to get his second chance isn't clear until the story is in full swing. But there are more than a few sexy gay surprises to keep m/m readers wondering what will happen next, which include whether Lance will ultimately choose his safe, quiet life with Davis. Or will he choose to go another round with dark, sexy Sergio with the weight lifter's body and scruffy rough beard?

 

Human Cheese

 

When I read this article about making "human" cheese, I found it interesting for several reasons. One in particular has to do with a book review I once received where I compared the scent of a certain human body part to the scent of cheese. I thought it was accurate. The editor and publisher thought it was accurate. But one reviewer actually went berserk and made it sound as if I'd stolen the Holy Grail. The fact is that when you are writing erotica and you want to show something sometimes you have to be realistic. And there are people who find the male arm pit highly erotic...or other male body parts I won't mention in this post right now...and many of these body parts resemble some of the finest, most expensive, cheeses in the world. It's also a way to incorporate humor into a story, too, if it's done carefully. You don't want to laugh at the character; you want to laugh with the character. There's a big difference. In full disclosure, I haven't compared any human body scents to cheese since that book. And the only reason is so no one could take it out of context ever again.

 

In any event, this is how they make human cheese:

 

Biologist Christina Agapakis has created a cheese that rivals France's most fragrant dairy product. You see, it's actually made from foot bacteria (or "toe jam"), as well as the bacteria found in armpits, belly buttons, and mouths all mixed up with milk. Yum. She even enlisted famous food people, like Michael Pollan, to donate their bacteria. 

 

Read more here.

 

And this piece in Huff Po gets into even more detail, but also mentions human cheese is not something you'll be serving at your next cocktail party.

 

The project compares the odors between man and cheese, questioning why what is prized in one is reviled in the other. "Can knowledge and tolerance of bacterial cultures in our food improve tolerance of the bacteria on our bodies?" the gallery asks, posing one of the great questions of mankind. The cheese is not meant to be eaten, but visitors were allowed to take a grand whiff of the stinky objets d'art.

 

James Franco/Brokeback Mountain

 

In an essay I think many of my m/m readers will find interesting, James Franco discusses sci-fi rom-com, "Her," and compares it to Brokeback Mountain at one point. I've heard it said that the origins of m/m romance can be traced to BM, as we know m/m romance now. I wonder if Franco knows this...or even that there are so many people reading m/m romance nowadays. His piece isn't so much a review of Her as it is an essay with commentary. Franco is also a contributor to Vice and he's written other pieces there.  

 

There is a moment in Her when Samantha and Theo go through the typical break-up scenario that’s prevalent in most romantic comedies, a scene that has destroyed many a real-life couple, when one lover reveals how many lovers he or she has had (or in this case, currently has). But this usually hackneyed archetype is given new vitality because it now involves a non-human—much like Brokeback Mountain achieved much of its acclaim by using a traditional tragic love story that was invigorated by swapping the traditional gender preferences of the players.

 

You can read this in full at Vice.

Franco is also the author of several books, the most recent, Actors Anonymous, you can find here and read my review. It's one of the best works of fiction of its kind I read in 2013.

 

 

Question From a Reader...

I'm lucky in the sense that I have a regular correspondence with a lot of my readers, especially because I write in a genre known for its discretion.

The fact that most readers don't leave reviews or comments in public because they read erotica or erotic romance discreetly doesn't always mean they don't sometimes contact authors. I have a huge file set up just for e-mails readers have sent me over the years. And sometimes they ask the most interesting questions.

This one came earlier today. I would never disclose the name or identity of the reader because that would be about as unethical as it gets. But I asked if I could print the question in a blog post and the reader said it was fine.

What is the most unusual review you've ever had?

The most unusual review I've ever had was about my book prices. I once had a review on Amazon where a reader left one star, without buying or reading the book, and then left a comment in the review section complaining about the price of the book. If I recall correctly, the publisher was running a sale that week and the book was cheaper there than on Amazon. I know that sucks. But authors don't have any control over how their books are priced...anywhere. It's not like I can dictate to a publisher how my books should be priced. So I thought it was unusual that someone would leave a comment like that, either assuming I did have control over pricing, or not caring about the fact that I had no control over pricing. Either way, it had nothing to do with the book, the story, or the quality of the book.

There's nothing wrong with an unusual review. I'm sure that one unusual review that's going to really floor me has yet to even happen. And I'm sure there will be another after that as well. So I don't mind unusual reviews in the least. While I don't learn much from them because most don't make sense, I'm not surprised when I see them. And because I plan to be around writing the same books I've been writing for the past twenty years for the next twenty years, I'm sure there are more unusual reviews on the way.

A good friend of mine once said this: career writers aren't like hobby writers. Career writers don't retire, they expire.

If You're Writing Erotic Romance....

You have to check this out. And I'm not only linking to wiki, I'm copying and pasting from wiki for those who don't like to click links. (I know how much links annoy you:)

But seriously. This is one is a must for all authors of erotica. And even if you don't learn anything, you'll have something interesting to talk about that will impress everyone.

There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. ~Favorite Anaïs Nin Quote

Anaïs Nin

Here's the part about erotica...to read more check out the entire link here:

Erotic writings

Nin is hailed by many critics as one of the finest writers of female erotica. She was one of the first women to explore fully the realm of erotic writing, and certainly the first prominent woman in the modern West to write erotica. Before her, erotica written by women was rare, with a few notable exceptions, such as the work of Kate Chopin.

According to Volume I of her diaries, 1931–1934, published in 1966 (Stuhlmann), Nin first came across erotica when she returned to Paris with her [husband,] mother and two brothers in her late teens. They rented the apartment of an American man who was away for the summer, and Nin came across a number of French paperbacks: "One by one, I read these books, which were completely new to me. I had never read erotic literature in America… They overwhelmed me. I was innocent before I read them, but by the time I had read them all, there was nothing I did not know about sexual exploits… I had my degree in erotic lore."


Portrait of Anaïs Nin in the 1970s.Faced with a desperate need for money, Nin, Miller and some of their friends began in the 1940s to write erotic and pornographic narratives for an anonymous "collector" for a dollar a page, somewhat as a joke.[15] (It is not clear whether Miller actually wrote these stories or merely allowed his name to be used.[16]) Nin considered the characters in her erotica to be extreme caricatures and never intended the work to be published, but changed her mind in the early 1970s and allowed them to be published as Delta of Venus[17][18] and Little Birds.

Nin was a friend, and in some cases lover, of many leading literary figures, including Henry Miller, Antonin Artaud, Edmund Wilson, Gore Vidal, James Agee, James Leo Herlihy, and Lawrence Durrell. Her passionate love affair and friendship with Miller strongly influenced her both as a woman and an author. Nin wrote about her infatuation with the Surrealist artist Bridget Bate Tichenor in her diaries.[19][20] The rumor that Nin was bisexual was given added circulation by the Philip Kaufman film Henry & June. This rumor is dashed by at least two encounters Nin writes about in her third unexpurgated journal, Fire. The first is with a patient of Nin's (Nin was working as a psychoanalyst in New York at the time), Thurema Sokol, with whom nothing physical occurs. She also describes a ménage à trois in a hotel, and while Nin is attracted to the other woman, she does not respond completely (229–31). Nin confirms that she is not bisexual in her unpublished 1940 diary when she states that although she could be attracted erotically to some women, the sexual act itself made her uncomfortable. What is irrefutable is her sexual attraction to men.

Nin's first unexpurgated journal, Henry and June, makes it clear, despite the notion to the contrary, that she did not have sexual relations with Miller's wife, June. While Nin was stirred by June to the point where she says (paraphrasing), "I have become June," she did not consummate her erotic feelings for her. Still, to both Anais and Henry, June was a femme fatale—irresistible, cunning, erotic. Nin gave June money, jewelry, clothes, oftentimes leaving herself broke. In her second unexpurgated journal, Incest, she wrote that she had an incestuous relationship with her father, which was graphically described (207–15). When Nin's father learned of the title of her first book of fiction, House of Incest, he feared that the true nature of their relationship would be revealed, when, in fact, it was heavily veiled in Nin's text.