Welcome To Weirdsville: Sweet, Sweet Death

(from Meine Keine Fabrik)


Here's a fun little piece from Welcome To Weirdsville that answers the age-old question "Does molasses run in January?"  Alas, the answer is yes ... and tragically...

Sweet, Sweet Death

"Tell me, what was 15 feet high, moved at 35 miles-per-hour, and killed 21 people in 1919?"

"I don't know, Mr. Bones, what WAS 16 feet high, moved at 35 miles-per-hour, and killed 21 people in 1919?"

"Well, before I tell ya, I'm going to first have to tell you about the sweet brown liquor called rum."

No, before you ask, an elephant didn't get smashed and went on a killing spree (though in another column I might talk about how Mary, a killer pachyderm, was lynched by a monster crane) – this is rather background on a certain gruesome catastrophe that, while unspeakably fatal, was also particularly – almost comically – unusual.

Not to blow the surprise, but if you happen to live in Boston, you might want to simply go onto the great fiction on this website. Your parents and grandparents have probably already spoken, with hushed seriousness, of this certain day – January 15, 1919 – though you may have replied, "Right, sure–"

Liquor has always been a big cash cow. It is with no exaggeration that businessmen have said that you can't go broke investing in sin – and an almost guarantee big seller has always been alcohol. Cheap materials, easy to produce, high profit margin, and with addicted consumers, booze is an entrepreneur's dream – especially in the years before 1919. But this was 1919, and a nightmare was lurking not too far away – a nightmare, that is, for those Americans who like a little sip now and again, and for the business that tried to meet that tipsy demand. In other words: Prohibition.

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Amos Lassen Likes The Very Bloody Marys

(from M. Christian's Queer Imaginings)


Check out this wonderful review of The Very Bloody Marys that Amos Lassen posted to Amazon. Thanks, Amos!

The homoerotic nature seems to appeal to gay people. Anne Rice had a career based upon the blood sucking creatures until she turned to Jesus. Other vampire novels and movies have won us over but "The Very Bloody Marys" is M. Christian is headed to be our new favorite. Christian is a new voice in the field and he is unique and fascinating. His arrival on the vampire scene gives us an entire new way to look at the demons. He is funny and fierce at the same time and will keep you entertained throughout the 171 pages of his new book. 

Christian is not new to the gay writing scene having been responsible for over fourteen anthologies and his short fiction has appeared in over 200 books as well as one novel and several collections. "The Very Bloody Marys", however, is about to become his breakthrough novel. 

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2 For Me and Me for 2: An Interview with two M. Christians

(from M. Christian's Queer Imaginings)


In 'celebration' of the re-release of Me2 - the queer horror/thriller I supposedly wrote - by the great folks at Sizzler/Renaissance E Books, here's a fun little interview I did with another "M. Christian" about the book:

2 For Me and Me for 2: 

An Interview with two M. Christians

Tape Begins

M.Christian 1: So I’ve finally apprehended you, foul fiend!

M.Christian 2: What the hell are you talking about? I caught you!

MC1: There’s no denying it: you’re the wretched scoundrel who’s been impersonating me, writing books under my name, soiling my creative reputation, attempting to profit by using my name –

MC2: Hold it right there, buddy! I don’t know what kind of twisted game you’re playing but you’re the one who’s been copying me, ripping off my name –

MC1: Liar! J'accuse! It is you who have stolen my identity, my very existence, and sought to supplant me as the rightful owner to the life of ‘M.Christian!’

MC2: You’re freaking nuts!

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Yet More Philosophy

Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem he has to solve.
- Erich Fromm

Absolutely. Brillaint

The Stuff That Nightmares Are Made Of

(via Meiene Kleine Fabrik)

 

The planet -

The planet does not need more ‘successful’ people. But it does desperately need more peacemakers, healers, restorers, storytellers, and lovers of every shape and form. It needs people who live well in their places. It needs people of moral courage willing to join the fight to make the world habitable and humane. And these needs have little to do with success as our culture has defined it.

- David Orr

Banksy On Advertising

M. Christian's ManLove Collection From Sizzler Editions

(From M. Christian's Queer Imaginings)

I can never say it enough: Renaissance E Books/Sizzler Editions is the best: not only have they been fantastic in re-releasing my queer erotica - as well as lots of other fun books - but they just put up this great subsection on their site just for my gay erotic books...

AND speaking of which, not only have they just put out a new edition of Me2 (which I still deny writing) but coming very, very soon is a re-release of my Lambda finalist collection, Dirty Words - and here's a look at the fantastic new cover:

Welcome To Weirdsville: The Not-Tall Tale Of The Very Tall Potsdam Grenadiers

(from Meine Kleine Fabrik)


Here's another fun article from my new book, Welcome to Weirdsville - this time on the (rather) tall Potsdam Grenadiers:

The Not-Tall Tale Of The Very Tall Potsdam Grenadiers 

If you're going to dream, the old saying goes, then you might as well dream big. But Friedrich Wilhelm I did more than dream because, as another expression says all too well: It's good to be the King.

Friedrich, born in 1688, was just one in a series of notable Prussian leaders. Friedrich, though, unlike his father, Frederick I – who achieved much during his reign, including wearing the crown for the first time, or Friedrich's son – Frederick II, who was a reformer and fervent supporter of reason and the arts – Friedrich, to put it mildly, loved a man in uniform ... in a secularly big way.

Friedrich, you see, had this thing about the military. Oh, sure, he did, during his reign, improve his then-tiny country's defenses, and carefully – almost pathologically – controlled Prussia's economy to the point when he finally passed away he left behind an awesome surplus. But Friedrich's military obsession wasn't really about keeping his people safe, or even about acquiring new territories: Friedrich liked – really liked – a grand spit and polish display.

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Some Assembly Required - From Love Without Gun Control

(from M. Christian's Technorotica)

Here's a treat: one of my favorite stories from my science fiction/horror/fantasy (no smut ... promise!) collection Love Without Gun Control - from the great Renaissance E Books

Some Assembly Required

She hadn't thought about Mark in years – then, suddenly, she did. It wasn't something obvious, like seeing his face on someone else's who also had pale blond hair, like burnished steel, or eyes like amber marbles, but something swift and intangible, like a floating piece of consciousness you remember as not being fact, reality, but part of a dream half-forgotten.

Lisa had been standing in the warm sunshine down on Solano Avenue, walking back with her sister from seeing a movie – something with explosions and lots of male sweat, details already mostly forgotten. They'd parked far away, and chatted emptily as they marched back to Lisa's battered little sports car.

He'd had a tension about him sometimes, an almost tangible armor that would slip over him. The first time it had happened they'd fought later in the day, Lisa convinced on some level that she'd been the cause. It had happened, so quickly and without apparent cause and had lingered for hours, and he hadn't spoken a word about it. When the same had happened to Lisa, in other relationships, it usually meant anger at her, a stewing resentment just needing an impetus to release. Better, she'd learned, to get it out when she wanted to – beat the fight to the punch.

Hot, hard sunlight in her eyes and she replied mechanically to Shirley's polite sisterly banter. Why now – why think of that and Mark... now? The laughter of children in front of a nearby toy store, an old woman glacially making her way down the sidewalk in a mechanical walker, a burnished Latino man clipping branches from a tree in front of a doctor's office.

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How To Wonderfully WriteSex (19)

Check it out: my new post at the fantastic WriteSex site just went up. Here's a tease (for the rest you'll have to go to the site):

Oh, dear, I’ve done it again. 

You’d think would have learned my lesson – what with the fallout over the whole Me2“plagiarism” thing – but I guess not. 

Just in case you may have missed it, I have a new book out, called Finger’s Breadth. As the book is a “sexy gay science fiction thriller” about queer men losing bits of their digits – though, of course, there’s a lot more to the novel than that. 

Anyhow, I thought it would be fun to create another bout ofcrazy publicity by claiming that I would be lopping off one of my own fingersto get the word out about it. 

Naturally, this has caused a bit of a fuss – which got me to thinking, and this thinking got me here: to a brand new Streetwalker about publicity … and pushing the envelope. 

The world of writing has completely, totally, changed – and what’s worse it seems to keep changing, day-by-day if not hour-by-hour. It seems like just this morning that publishing a book was the hard part of the writing life, with publicity being a necessary but secondary evil. But not any more: ebooks and the fall of the empire of publishing have flipped the apple cart over: it’s now publishing is easy and publicity is the hard part … the very hard part. 

What’s made it even worse is that everyone has a solution: you should be on Facebook, you should be on Twitter, you should be on Goodreads, you should be on Red Room, you should be on Google+, you should be doing blog tours, you should be … well, you get the point. The problem with a lot of these so-called solutions is that they are far too often like financial advice … and the old joke about financial advice is still true: the only successful people are the ones telling you how to be successful. 

That’s not to say that you should put your fingers in your ears and hum real loudly: while you shouldn’t try everything in regards to marketing doing absolutely nothing is a lot worse. 

But, anyway, back to me. One thing that’s popped up a lot lately has been people telling me that I’ve crossed a tasteful line in my little publicity stunts – that somehow what I’ve been doing does a disservice to me and my work. 

Yeah, that smarts. But hearing that I also have a rather evil little grin on my face: for what I’ve done is nothing compared to what other writers have done. 

Courtesy of Tony Perrottet of Th e New York Times (“How Writers Build the Brand“), comes more than a few tales of authors who have done whatever they could – and frequently more than that – to get the word out about their product. Case in point are these gems: ” In 1887, Guy de Maupassant sent up a hot-air balloon over the Seine with the name of his latest short story, ‘Le Horla,’ painted on its side. In 1884, Maurice Barrès hired men to wear sandwich boards promoting his literary review, Les Taches d’Encre. In 1932, Colette created her own line of cosmetics sold through a Paris store.”

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