There’s really nothing like a country adultery song, is there?
The stitches in my gums are starting to dissolve, which means healing is happening. I don’t know if and when I can eat something a little more solid–like bananas and watermelon–but trust me when I say I cannot wait to eat something I can gum a bit. That really doesn’t sound appealing, does it? But much as I love protein shakes and ice cream (please note the lack of mentioning baby food), I really want something else. I really want Five Guys, to the point where I’d buy one and puree it if I wasn’t aware enough to know that it would be disgusting and still inedible for me.
In a little bit I’ll be heading to the Tulane Institute of Sports Medicine where I am finally meeting with the kind of specialist who can potentially work on my left arm injury. It’s a very long and tragic story, how I got here at any rate, and I’ll probably go into more at another time, but it’s not something I feel like talking about at the moment. The primary problem is I don’t remember if I’ve talked about it here already or not? The joys of getting older and having a much more slippery memory than I used to have, I suppose. I slept really well last night–certainly could have slept longer, so I think this weekend will entail a lot of sleeping in, quite frankly. I don’t feel tired and worn out the way that I remember feeling before on Friday mornings, so I guess that’s a good sign. I’ll run some errands on the way home and hopefully won’t have to go out much this weekend. I also need to get back to writing something other than emails and blogs, to be honest. I was thinking about this last night, and since I’ll take Shawn’s book with me this morning to read in the waiting room, hopefully that will crack the trouble I am having reading since coming home and I think the answer to cracking the writing issue is to start the actual editing of Jackson Square Jazz. Why not? It needs to be done and it’s just been sitting there waiting for me to do it for years now. I also think I’m going to pull that short story collection I’ve been wanting to get into print, and see how close it is to being finished and what unpublished stories there are on hand that need more work on them. I think those are both valid projects for me to make some progress on this weekend around cleaning and watching football games, I think.
We got caught up on both Ahsoka and Only Murders in the Building last night, which was nice. I was tired when I got home from work last night–very tired–and was actually able to come straight home from work for once. I finished a load of laundry–still sitting in the dryer, actually–and a load of dishes that need to be unloaded once I get the kitchen back into some kind of decent shape.
As I sat in my chair last night waiting for Paul to come home while watching a documentary on Youtube about the final collapse of the Hapsburg dynasty, I wondered if my ability to now recognize anxiety for what it actually is as it starts (I just always thought everyone’s brain worked that way before) and fend it off had anything to do with with my not writing? I think I may have burned myself out a little bit with all the writing work I’ve done this year; juggling two new novels at the same time wasn’t the smartest move I’ve made in my career–but I had no way of knowing what my life situation was going to be like last fall, winter and spring either. I also think if I can get over the reading hump, the writing hump will melt away like nothing before my very eyes. It’s a lovely thing to believe (we tell ourselves lies in order to live), and it may very well be true–reading always inspires me and makes me want to get back into my chair at the keyboard and working away at something. I also just checked and my new glasses are scheduled to arrive on Monday, which is great, as my prescription has grown stronger but I am still wearing my old ones. This is, if you will recall, the year of getting things done–hence the hearing aids, the mouth surgery, and following up on getting my arm taken care of. I am looking forward to being able to see properly again, and chew again, to go along with my new ability to hear, which is lovely and something to which I’m still adapting.
So my big plans for this weekend involve cleaning the house (as always), revising and reediting Jackson Square Jazz, and reading All the Sinners Bleed, which has a very strong and powerful opening. I may do other things–I do have a hefty to-do list to take care of this weekend, but nothing I can’t really handle–and of course I’ll be watching the LSU game tomorrow morning as well; using the nervous energy LSU games always give me to clean the living room. If it weren’t for the early start time of that game, I’d take some boxes of books to donate to the library sale, but that will have to wait until next weekend, alas. (They’ve been in the living room since Labor Day, and I’ve not pruned the books again since because, well, there’s already too many boxes in the living room.)
And on that note, I’m going to get another cup of coffee and head into the spice mines to start getting ready to head uptown for the doctor’s office. Wish me luck, Constant Reader, and I will chat at you some more probably later on. Have a great Friday!
Wednesday morning and back up at an ungodly hour to make it back to work. But I was also kind of tired of lolling around the apartment on pain meds, doing very little to nothing, including not much thinking. It’s nice sometimes to not have to think, but I always worry that not using my mind is making it lazy, if that makes sense? Probably not, but I know what I meant. I always worry that my brain will atrophy if I don’t use it. Well, that made more sense. See what I mean? You see why I am concerned?
I didn’t sleep well last night–not bad, just not great. I’ve gotten used to ten to twelve hours of sleep per night since the surgery, so I wasn’t sure how getting up this morning would go. Not bad, to be honest; I don’t think I had a good night of sleep because of anxiety about not waking up, but I feel okay so far. I’m just so tired of soft food. Today I’ll be taking baby food with me to the office, and I am not really looking forward to that, in all honesty. I think I’ll take ice cream for lunch–I will miss eating ice cream every day when my mouth finally heals, but I am so ready for solid food you have no idea. I am so going to Five Guys when this is all over!
I didn’t get much accomplished yesterday. The pain pills don’t make me loopy the way the ones they used to prescribe (the highly addictive oxy family of opiates), but they do something to the wiring in my brain that doesn’t quite make sense to me. I did get a load of laundry done, another load of dishes, and I filed and straightened up the workspace–which looks a lot more bearable this morning than it did yesterday morning–but I didn’t get as much accomplished as I would have liked because my mind was spacy and I kept losing track of time. Paul got home late last night and we watched another episode of Painkiller, which is such evidence of how broken our entire system is (I still get angry at the Sacklers just thinking about it) that I don’t know how anyone could watch it and not fall into despair.
I did find myself–I blame the pain meds–falling into a pit of anxiety yesterday afternoon, spiraling and everything, but once I realized what was happening I thought use this nervous energy and that’s when I started cleaning. I put the kitchen rugs in order and swept, put away dishes and started filing and organizing. My computer files are a disaster that will take days, if not weeks, to sort out; I did make some attempt at it yesterday to no avail. I also went into another research wormhole about the Filipino community of southeastern Louisiana–I love that there’s always something new and startling to learn about this region–and I really would like to write about Manila Village, or St. Malô; it was known by both names. It could be another Sherlock story, I think, since I so strongly established him in 1916 New Orleans; Manila Village/St. Malô was destroyed in the hurricane of 1915 (which also wiped Freniere off the map, and I want to write about Freniere as well; the witch’s curse and all)–a lot was going on in the New Orleans era during the twentieth century teens decade (there was also an outbreak of bubonic plague and the last really bad yellow fever epidemic during that decade, and then of course there’s the banana wars, which is also endlessly interesting) and of course, I would love to write about it all.
I want to write about everything.
It’s also Pay-the-Bills day; time slipped past me while I was recovering from this oral surgery mess–and of course Friday is my appointment with the Tulane Institute of Sports Medicine about my arm (I’ll talk more about that later)–and I do think that I am going to need to work on the filing system this weekend. The LSU-Mississippi State game is at the ungodly hour of eleven a.m., so I can probably get some work on the filing done during that. I have duplicate files and the problem–the primary problem–is I allowed the files to get out of control during the pandemic and the system I’d been using completely broke down. The file cabinet itself has been a mess for years, and what I really need to do is decide on a new system or figure out if the old one can still be used, despite how much work it’s going to take. I also need to take stock and figure out what needs to be worked on and what needs to be done, and where I am at with everything. I don’t have any contracts currently in place (which is usually a very scary place for me to be, frankly, but I am not letting the anxiety about that make me do what it usually does; throw out a bunch of proposals only to end up with too many deadlines and more stress than any writer needs.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Here’s hoping my energy doesn’t flag and I make it through the day safely. I hope you also have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again probably tomorrow.
I’ve been sleeping deeply and well lately for an insomniac; I suspect it has more to do with the pain being exhausting than anything else. Any surgery is traumatic to the system and requires rest for recovery, and oral surgery is no different than any other. I’ve taken today off as well as tomorrow; I was thinking yesterday I could probably just go in today and do some paperwork or something, but (and this is not laziness) I started thinking it’s probably best to give myself enough recovery time before I head back in–and I also know the clinic is jam-packed with appointments for today and tomorrow, and I just don’t think I have the energy to deal with that today. I think one more good night’s sleep with probably do the trick.
The Saints won a nail-biter yesterday and I didn’t watch the US Open final; I just can’t with Novak Djokovic anymore. I used to like him until he became an anti-vax/COVID denier, and I can’t with that, I’m sorry. I respect his athleticism, commitment to his sport and being the best, but as a person? I can’t help but feel he’s a selfish, arrogant, borderline sociopathic asshole. Of course he’s entitled to his opinion, but he’s not entitled to me being a fan and watching him play, either. For the record, that’s how it works. I don’t deny him the right to be an anti-vaxxer/COVID denier, but I also don’t have to be a fan or watch him play. We got caught up on Only Murders in the Building and Ahsoka last night, too. I also finished several in-progress blog entries, including the one called “Shame” about homophobia in crime fiction and how things have gotten better over the years–but we can’t forget how bad it used to be, either, which was the point of the post, really; telling the crime community that we’re here, we’re queer, and we’re not going any fucking where.
Get fucking used to us.
Today I am going to try to do some chores around here. I’m feeling like a slug–anxiety talking again; I always feel like I should be doing something and down-time is time wasted–so I think I should do some things today. I suppose it depends on my energy stores, and how long it holds out. I want to read some more of Shawn’s book this morning–I think my resistance to that brutal opening was more of the post-surgery exhaustion–and I also need to empty the dishwasher and do another load that is soaking in the sink. I also want to make something to take for lunch this week–I’m thinking Swedish meatballs in the slow cooker, but am not sure if my minimal chewing abilities can handle the meatballs, even if I cut them up smaller before putting them in my mouth; I don’t think I can swallow them unchewed in some fashion–and I do need to go buy more ice cream and yogurt. I think some of the soups and ramen on hand could be useful. I can’t wait till I can eat a burger again, to be honest.
I also need to answer all the emails that have been languishing in my inbox for quite some time. I owe Dad an email–I’ve not had the strength after Bouchercon and the surgery to face writing him–and my sister’s birthday is this week. I also need to mail something, so I think I’ll drive uptown to make groceries and see what else is possible for soft foods for the week (mashed potatoes, baked potatoes, that sort of thing). I need to get the things on my to-so list knocked out, too. I feel more rested and more myself this morning, but maybe that’s because the pain pills haven’t quite kicked in yet. I also need to start revising/editing Jackson Square Jazz; I’m very excited about that finally being available again, and since Scotty turns twenty-one next year, I kind of want to celebrate the series throughout the year and I don’t know, maybe give away first editions? Something, anyway.
It’s also hard to believe Chanse will be twenty-two in January. I’ve been doing this for over a third of my life now. I owe it all to my stubbornness and obliviousness. Someone smarter and more aware would have probably given up a long time ago, but here I am, still here, older and possibly wiser and certainly not much smarter than I was all these years ago when I was a wide-eyed innocent walking into the world of the published word. I always remember that first August Paul and I lived here back in 1996. We went to a fundraised for the LGBT Center, and there was a tarot card reader there. (I’ve always been fascinated by tarot; I blame the James Bond movie Live and Let Die, which also connected New Orleans and the tarot in my mind. I write about a “private eye” who’s slightly psychic and reads tarot cards and lives in New Orleans. Coincidence? Probably not. Sadly, it’s always been one of my favorite Bond movies and always has held a special place in my brain for introducing me to Bond, New Orleans, and the tarot…unfortunately, the film does NOT hold up forty or fifty years later.) Anyway, the question I thought about as I held the cards in my hand was will I ever be a published writer? The answer the cards gave her was “Yes, but it will not be anything like you think it will be.” A generic answer, yes, that could apply to any number of questions…things are generally never what you thought or imagined they would be. Being a published author is definitely not anything like I ever dreamed or fantasized about when I wasn’t one. I know I thought being published would change my life for the better (I was not wrong about that) but…yes, it’s nothing like what I thought it would be like. Publishing can be a very cold and lonely place, but all you can really control is the work itself. You can’t control whether or not you get published, you can’t control whether or not the book sells, you can’t control the way readers and reviewers will react to it, you can’t control whether you get award recognition. All you actually can control is the writing itself, and do the best you can. I always hope my work is getting better–which should make reediting and revising the original Jackson Square Jazz interesting…
And on that note, I am going to bring this to a close, make another cup of coffee, and start working on the chores around the kitchen, while streaming music through my iHome speakers. I’ll probably check back in later–I have all those unfinished blog entries I need to eventually finish and post–and I also want to get some fiction writing done today as well. Have a great Monday, Constant Reader–do you think today’s photo will get my adult content flags on social media?
I have really come to love Bouchercon, and it’s always a highlight of my year.
Things have seriously changed for the better.
Queer Crime Writers after a dinner out in San Diego, with Marco’s lovely husband Mark Gutkowski
Bouchercon last week was a marvelous, marvelous experience. I had such an amazing time, saw some people I’ve not seen in quite some time (and quickly remembered why I love them so much), and stayed up way later every night than I should have–one of my many neuroses is FOMO, of course; I still regret not going to Dallas in 2019–but I laughed a lot, had some great panels, and made some new friends, too. I ate great meals, had some marvelous cocktails, and I really liked the hotel (once I figured out the shortcuts to the meeting spaces). It also made me think about my own history with the event, how things have changed for the better, and how I hope it keeps changing for the better. There were so few of us queer writers who used to go back in the day; now we have enough of us to have a happy hour where we get together and drink and chat about writing and the business and oh, how we all laugh. It’s wonderful.
When I first got started in this business, publishing was different. I had to explain this recently to someone I am hiring to do the ebook for Jackson Square Jazz for me; why I didn’t have a pdf file, because back then there were no ebooks and you got your page proofs in the mail, as well as your marked up manuscript for the editing process. So all I have on hand is the unedited version of the book I turned in. But what also was nice back then was there was a support system for queer writers that we no longer have–there were queer newspapers, queer magazines, and queer bookstores. We had a queer book of the month club–Insightoutbooks–and their influence in shaping and developing my career cannot be underestimated. After Hurricane Katrina and the six months spent touring for Mardi Gras Mambo, I kind of withdrew back into myself. I don’t remember much of 2006-2008, to be perfectly honest; I just know that I went back to work full time in 2008 and after adjusting my writing/editing schedule to that, it was around 2009 or 2010 that I resurfaced and started thinking about promotion and marketing again.
And what I found was that during those lost years (I call it the Hibernation) everything had changed. The queer newspapers and bookstores were mostly gone. ISO shut down. And I realized, with a sinking heart, that I was going to have to start going to mainstream conferences to promote myself. After working so hard in the mid to late 1990’s ensuring I could exist in almost entirely queer or queer-friendly places, I found myself having to essentially start over. Queer writers never mattered to the mainstream crime organizations and conferences, and I braced myself, knowing I was going to encounter homophobia yet again.
It didn’t take very long–although in retrospect, I’m actually surprised it took as long as it did.
I joined Mystery Writers of America, and later, Sisters in Crime. I also went to Bouchercon in Indianapolis and San Francisco. I didn’t know more than a handful of people and tended to glom onto the people I did know (sorry about that, guys; social interactions at events where I don’t know anyone ramps up my anxiety, so I glom onto the people I know). Indianapolis I wasn’t in the host hotel, I was across the street–and it was cold. It was the weekend of the Ohio State-Purdue game, I can remember that because my hotel was full of OSU fans, so I found myself mostly hanging out in my hotel room and reading, while braving the cold to go across the street for my panels and events. It was nice, and decided to go to San Francisco for it the next year. There I was in the host hotel and realized oh you really need to stay in the host hotel in the future, because it made everything easier. I was starstruck most of that weekend–I rode in the elevator with S. J. Rozan once and another time with Laurie R. King, which was incredible. I only had one panel, at 4 pm on Friday afternoon that no one came to, but I had a really good time—and even decided to put together a bid to host it in New Orleans (and that is a whole other story), before yet another person decided that it was time for a Bouchercon programmer to put the fag back in his place, letting me know that I and my books weren’t important enough (the exact wording was “surely you have to understand that someone who’s edited a couple of anthologies doesn’t really deserve to be on panels”–despite the fact that my tenth novel had just been released…and of course, the greatest irony of this was that I went on to edit three of their anthologies) to grace any panel, and that any panel I’d been given in the previous two years should be considered a gift.
Should be considered a gift.
A fucking GIFT.
(For the record, Paul is an event planner by trade. He is executive director of both the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival as well as Saints & Sinner, a queer litfest. Just to be certain I wasn’t overreacting and being a diva-bitch, I let him read the email. His response? “If one of my staff, interns or volunteers wrote an email like that to an attending author I would fire them on the spot.” And before anyone starts up with the “programming a Bouchercon is hard” I will remind you that Margery Flax and I wrote over one half of the program for Dallas in three fucking days and contacted everyone with their assignments and then reorganized and redid the program to accommodate schedules and wrong panel assignments for about two weeks before it was done–with the local chair constantly throwing things at us that made us start pulling threads and weaving it back together again….nothing like “oh, sorry, I forgot that I promised these people a panel for this” after you’ve redone it for the fourth time. That happened a lot. And the entire time, we were incredibly polite and friendly and did whatever we could to accommodate people; apologizing and fixing it repeatedly. NOT ONE PERSON RECEIVED A FUCKING EMAIL TELLING THEM TO CONSIDER ANY PANEL THEY GOT AS A GIFT.
But then, I’m not an unprofessional piece of shit whose pathetic ego sees programming as power to abuse, either.
I wasn’t saying (and was very respectful) oh I am such a big deal how could you not give me an assignment, all I asked was hey, I know how hard your job is, but I don’t understand how you get on a panel and what can I do differently in the future to get one? What am I doing wrong? I approached them with kindness and respect for the work they were doing and got bitch-slapped, demeaned, and insulted in response. No author who is paying their own way to a conference and essentially providing the event with free entertainment for its audience should ever be treated so contemptuously by event organizers, period. The fact that when I expressed these concerns to the national board all I got back was mealy-mouthed excuses and “we’re sorry you’re offended” told me everything I needed to know about the organization and its board; the way they were treating me about the New Orleans bid (I had planned on having Susan Larsen–former chair of the National Books Critic Circle, chair of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction twice, long time programmer for the TW Fest and a nationally respected book reviewer–help out along with Pat Brady, long time publications chair of the Historic New Orleans Collection, huge mystery fan, and also a long time programmer for TWFest only to be told their vast knowledge and experience wasn’t “good enough” and I needed to get the homophobic trash who told me I was nothing to program New Orleans–yeah, like that was ever going to happen) was also egregiously horrible, condescending, insulting, and unprofessional.
Needless to say I cancelled my trip to St. Louis and never considered attending Cleveland; I tend to not go where I am not welcome. I am not taking my hard-earned money from my “nothing career” and giving it to a homophobic organization, where I then get to beg for scraps and get treated like shit. I have better ways to spend my money, thank you. (And yes, I know who the programmers were and yes, I will carry that grudge to the grave.)
I withdrew my bid to host for New Orleans, and I washed my hands of the mainstream mystery community. Who needs it? They were never going to accept me or my work, they were never going to read my work, they didn’t give a shit about me, and it was pretty clear they never would. I was kind of at sea for a few years, there. There were no more queer newspapers, no more queer bookstores, no more gay Insightoutbooks.com book club, nothing. Outside of the TWFest and Saints & Sinners, I had no conference outlets to promote myself and my work. The mainstream mystery world clearly wanted no part of me, so what was I supposed to do? So, I just kept writing. I operated my social media pages as a promotional outlet for my work, and I kept writing this blog. I did finally return to Bouchercon when it went to Albany; friends convinced me to go, and one powerful friend requested me for a panel she assembled–and it came through. Having friends made a huge difference, really, and through my friends I met and made more friends, and Bouchercon slowly became a must-go event for me every year…eventually reaching the point where I never had to be concerned about getting on a panel, while at the same time no longer caring whether I did or not. It became more about seeing my friends and being around other writers than a work/promotional thing for me. Ironically, once I no longer cared or worried so much about being on things…I started getting put on more and more things, with bigger and increasingly more important co-panelists (I still can’t get over the fact that I was on a panel with ATTICA LOCKE in Minneapolis. I was too nervous to say anything to her; I spent that entire panel looking at my co-panelists and listening to them speak and wondering why the fuck I was on that panel).
And now, of course, we have a group: the Queer Crime Writers, and a core group of us have been showing up together at conferences ever since we bonded at Left Coast last year (and bonded even more with more of us at Bouchercon Minneapolis last year): John Copenhaver, Marco Carocari, Kelly J. Ford, and Robyn Gigl–who’ve all become very dear to me over the last year or so. Teresa Cain/Carsen Taite joined us in San Diego, and became my con-wife; what a great time we had!
And somehow, I am getting nominated for mainstream awards, an outcome I could have never predicted. I won the Anthony for Best Anthology for editing Blood on the Bayou, and was nominated for Best Short Story at the Dallas event for “Cold Beer No Flies” (I lost to S. A. Cosby, no disgrace there). Last year Bury Me in Shadows was nominated for Best Paperback Original (losing to Jess Lourey) and Best Children’s/Young Adult (losing to Alan Orloff); neither of those losses were devastating because Jess and Alan are also friends of mine, and I couldn’t have been happier for them both. This year I had three nominations in three categories for three different books–Best Anthology for Land of 10000 Thrills (losing to S. J. Rozan for MWA’s Crime Hits Home); Best Children’s/Young Adult (losing to Nancy Springer for the latest Enola Holmes, hello, no disgrace there); and Best Humorous for A Streetcar Named Murder (losing to Catriona McPherson for Scot in a Trap)–again, with the exception of Springer, I lost to very talented friends I like very much (I’ve not met Springer). That’s seven Anthony nominations in total, to go along with the Macavity, the Agatha, the Lefty, and the Shirley Jackson nominations. Not bad for a queer writer, wouldn’t you say? Ten mainstream award nominations? I certainly never would have dreamed all those years ago when I was told “any panel you get should be considered a gift” by Bouchercon programming.
That doesn’t mean the community is free from homophobia; it’s still there. I have mentioned before the mainstream cisgender male author who is clearly afraid to acknowledge my existence and always beats a hasty retreat whenever I walk up; I find his homophobia amusing. You’re not hurting me, bro, because I don’t want to know you, either. It doesn’t mean that I can’t be sitting in a booth in the hotel bar with a bunch of friends only to have a straight man look at me, smirk and say “faggy” in a sentence, as though daring me to call his ass out because he’s so much more important than I am; no worries, asshole, I don’t even have to repeat the story to anyone because since then you’ve shown all the big names you’re buddies with that you’re actually a piece of shit, and yes, I’ve watched it all with the same fucking smirk you had on your face when you thought you’d pull out your micro-penis and slap it down on the booth table in Toronto, and when I hear stories about you, I am delighted to pull out “Well, I’ve known he was trash since he said faggy in front of me, looking me in the face and smirking as he said it”.
Assholes will always out themselves, at least in my experience–and I’m very patient. I store the receipts and pull them out to corroborate horrific behavior when the timing is right.
I’ll save the racism, sexual harassment, and homophobia I faced in Albuquerque at Left Coast for another time.
I’m very pleased with the progress that has been made in our community over the last five or six years–I mean, the Rainbow Diversity panel about queer crime writing in Toronto was packed, when such panels in the past only drew maybe four or five audience members. Codes of conduct have been implemented to protect attendees from sexual harassment and pervy conduct, as well as racism and homophobia.
Progress is often slow, and it is easy to get impatient. I don’t know if my involvement with Bouchercon has made things better for queer writers there, but I do know the award nominations show other queer writers that such things are possible for them. Nothing says you’re welcome here than seeing members of your community nominated for the awards. The more of us that attend also means that more of us will get nominated, be on panels, and be able to talk about our work to readers who might open their minds and read our books. Being visible at these events is crucial and important.
And like water wearing down a stone, we have to keep relentlessly pushing.
(John, Marco, Kelly, and Rob Osler have all been nominated for mainstream awards over the last year, along with me. Edwin Hill and PJ Vernon have also been recognized for their brilliant work, too. This is so wonderful to see–I’d be delighted even if I weren’t with them in this grouping. And if you’ve not read any of us, there’s not a single person I’ve mentioned by name you can go wrong with. It’s also exciting seeing the new queer talent rising in writers like Margot Douaihy.)
I was torn about going to Nashville next year; their anti-trans and anti-queer laws have me not really wanting to spend my queer money there. But the point was made that going and being very present was an act of defiance…and Lord knows I love defying homophobes, so I guess I am probably going to go. I can visit Dad either before or after, so it actually makes sense for me to go. I’ve decided to write a very gay story to submit to their anthology (which means I need to get back to work on it), and so yeah…I think defiance is the way to go.
Plus….I love my Queer Crime Writers. I can’t imagine not being around them next year, and I would absolutely go nuts from FOMO.
So, in closing, thank you, Queer Crime Writers. I love you all, and thank you for letting me into your group. Let’s keep making a difference, shall we?
As an adult, it has always amused me that historically gay men (or men who were attracted to other men) inevitably became/were artists, and just as inevitably were commissioned to sculpt and paint and create religious art to adorn Catholic cathedrals and the palaces of the church hierarchy. I loved that they used their art and their patron’s money to create images of beautiful men in various stages of undress or nudity, but since it was within the context of a religious scene, it was okay. Even the crucifix inevitably shows Jesus in nothing more than a modesty loincloth, with his lean muscular frame carved lovingly to look beautiful and sexy. The eroticism of classic religious art, that competing duality of religious fervor and sexual ecstasy (look at depictions of the Ecstasy of St. Teresa sometime, if you want to see some straight up erotic imagery; I’ve always wanted to use “The Ecstasy of St. Teresa” as a title sometime), confused me as a child–it wasn’t until much later that I realized most classic and Renaissance religious art could be easily be categorized as “Revenge of the Homosexuals on a Repressive Institution”–but it also interested me. When I was a kid hungering for erotic masculine images, I could never go wrong with religious art.
I mean, this is on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel:
And don’t even get me started on depictions of St. Sebastian.
I love that they sculpted his pubic hair onto that last statue. Nice authenticity!
Someday I may write about St. Sebastian…or a boarding school named after him, which would be nice imagery for a queer crime/horror y/a set at such a place.
There was also a lot of homoerotic art in depictions of Greek and Roman mythology–the Laöcoön statue is one; and any depictions of Hercules/Heracles, Achilles, Apollo, etc.
And we’ll talk about Ganymede another time.
I was raised as a Christian, of the Church of Christ brand of Protestantism–and a hard, cruel, you’re-going-to-burn-in-hell-for-believing-anything-else faith it is indeed. I can’t speak to what that denomination is like outside of the South, or even Alabama for that matter–I did notice that the version in Kansas wasn’t nearly as hard or unforgiving; but still pretty unforgiving, in comparison to other sects–but I do know that where I am from, the Church of Christ is hard, rough, and sees a lot of stuff as sin. (Southern Churches of Christ are also very argumentative–which hardly seems Christian, does it? Members are always getting up in arms about something and wind up going to another congregation, sometimes having to move churches more than once.
And when I was about eight or nine, my grandmother bought me a copy of The Children’s Bible, which was filled with illustrations (amazing how all those Middle Eastern Israelites were white, and even some had blond hair and blue eyes)…and maybe (probably) it wasn’t the intent of the publisher, but there was some seriously homoerotic imagery in the book. About ten years ago I was thinking about The Children’s Bible and wondering whatever happened to my copy…and remembering some of the illustrations in it, I thought no, you can’t be remembering that correctly and so I went on eBay and bought a used copy.
And when it arrived, my memories were actually correct.
I mean, look at the muscles on Goliath. That image was burned indelibly into my brain, and it’s entirely possible my appreciation of muscles comes from….The Children’s Bible.
Perish the thought!
Grooming!
Indoctrination!
And of course, my favorite story in the book was David and Jonathan.
I mean, look at how they drew David!
I mean, it may not be Michelangelo, but damn.
(I also love that a Bronze Age Middle Eastern Jew somehow had pearly white skin, blonde hair, and blue eyes. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiight.)
Though David has awesome legs in both depictions, seriously.
When I was a kid, I’d always reread the David and Jonathan story (can’t imagine why it was my favorite…). I wanted a best friend like David–I always saw myself as Jonathan, the supporting player, the way I always did–gorgeous and charismatic and beautiful and beloved of God. I would think about the story and while I was too young and innocent to conceive of it as anything other than friendship–the same way I thought of the “friendship” between Achilles and Patroclus in tales of the Trojan War–when I got older, whenever I thought about the story I wondered about how deep that friendship between Prince Jonathan and David son of Jesse was. Why include the story at all? It really doesn’t add a whole lot to the tale of David’s life, and did it really matter for King Saul to have a son who was David’s friend and great love? Jonathan dies–not even the Bible was immune from bury your gays–and David mourned him with a great grief that seemed a bit more than “my best bro died.” I wanted to write the story myself, despite my lack of historical knowledge of the period or even when it was actually set, but I wanted to write about their love, their falling in love–and let’s face it, God didn’t really seem to have a lot of problems with their relationship, did he? He didn’t come to David and tell him to stop giving it to Jonathan; God didn’t curse the two of them or punish Israel for it; and yes, Jonathan is eventually killed…but even then God doesn’t come to David and say, did you not read Leviticus? I could hardly let you go on fucking him forever, you know.
So, I guess I am supposed to read it literally and just think they were best friends and loved each other as brothers. Yeah, no. There’s absolutely no reason for this story to be included in the David story in the Bible; none, unless of course there’s a kernal of truth in the story (don’t come for me, I’ve never bothered to find out if the Bible’s Old Testament kings of Israel were real people; I do know that real people turned up in the Old Testament that existed in history–Babylonians and Assyrians, for example, as well as Egyptians)but the mystery for me of why this story was included, why it was included if its merely legend or why was it included if they were real is the real question. There’s no moral lesson to be learned from the story of their friendship; their love and loyalty to each other was an issue for Jonathan because his friend’s greatest enemy was Jonathan’s own father, a king anointed by God–despite God capriciously turning His back on Saul for really such an insignificant reason that it really just boiled down to God just liked David better; I always felt sorry for Saul–how much would it suck to lose God’s favor for no good reason? Just because God found someone He liked better? (And considering the things God forgave David for, or just overlooked, really makes the hard turn away from Saul that much more petty and bitchy.)
God’s kind of an asshole in the Old Testament, frankly.
But yes, I’d love to write this story sometime. (Because I don’t have enough else to do, right?) I’d also want to write it from Jonathan’s perspective, although the death would be hard to do (Madeline Miller managed it with Song of Achilles quite beautifully) story-wise; but is the kind of challenge I love. Maybe someday, and maybe writing it will help me in my constant and never-ending life quest to come to terms with the religious grooming drilled into my brain as a child. I even have a great title for it, too.
I also have a novel in mind revolving around Michelangelo’s statue of David, too; maybe I could combine research and do them at the same time. THAT would be a challenge, would it not?
Several weekends ago, I did an on-line panel for Outwrite DC. The moderator was John Copenhaver (whom you should already be reading), and my co-panelists were the always delightful and intelligent Kelly J. Ford, Margot Douaihy, Renee James, and Robyn Gigl. The video is actually up on Youtube, if you would like to watch it. John’s questions were insightful and intelligent (as always), and the conversation was marvelous, inspiring, and fun; there’s nothing I love more than communing with other queer crime writers (or any writers, to be certain), and I always try very hard to not monopolize panels because I do have a tendency to talk too much–especially if and when I get going on a topic I am passionate about. So, I thought it might be fun to take John’s questions and turn them into a long form interview, for thoroughly selfish and totally self-promotional reasons.
The panel blurb claims that “queer characters are riveting and necessary material for crime fiction and how those stories can shape (and perhaps reshape) the landscape of contemporary crime fiction.” Do you agree with this statement—and why do the stories of queer characters have the potential to shape crime fiction?
I completely agree with this statement. Queer crime fiction has a very proud history that was never really recognized or appreciated by the mainstream crime writers, readers, organizations, and conferences. That is changing for the better.
New blood is always necessary for any genre–horror, romance, crime, literary fiction–because genres tend to stagnate after a certain period of time. The cultural shifts of the late 1960’s and 1970’s echoed in crime fiction, for example; you couldn’t write crime in those periods without addressing all the cultural and social shifts; Ross Macdonald’s later novels are a good example of this. The 1970’s saw a lot of anti-hero books being written. The private eye sub-genre had grown quite stale by this time, which was when the women really moved in and gave it a shot of adrenaline–Marcia Muller, Sara Paretsky, and Sue Grafton blazed that trail, and revitalized a sub-genre that had kind of lost its way. Queer writers and crime writers of color are currently doing the same to the entire genre. Voices and perspectives we aren’t used to seeing are now getting into print and changing how we see, not only our genre, but each other. Crime fiction has always given voice to societal outsiders and outliers; queer people and people of color are the ultimate outsiders and outliers in this country. Who better to tell stories of societal alienation?
Why did you choose your sub-genre? How do you think the sub-genre has influenced the types of characters you write?
Well, I write in several different ones. Chanse MacLeod was a straight private-eye series; Scotty Bradley was more of an amateur sleuth/humorous series, but he does have a private eye license in Louisiana. A Streetcar Named Murder was a cozy, with an amateur sleuth heroine who gets caught up in a family mystery. I’ve also done young adult and “new adult,” whatever that is (it’s been described as ages 16-25), and Gothics with a touch of the supernatural. I tend to write things that I like to read, and I have a varied reading taste. I started writing the Chanse series because I wanted to do a harder-edged private eye series with a queer twist and set it in New Orleans. I didn’t know about J. M. Redmann’s Micky Knight series when I started writing Chanse; would I have done something different had I known she’d already covered the hardboiled lesbian private eye in New Orleans? We’ll never know, I suppose. Scotty was meant to be a lark; a funny caper novel and a one-off. And here we are nine books later…
As for Streetcar, I had been wanting to try a traditional mystery with a straight woman main character for a long time. When the opportunity presented itself, I jumped in with both feet. I like trying new things and pushing myself. Having to follow the “rules” of a traditional cozy was a challenge–especially because I have such a foul mouth in real life. I love noir so am working on two different gay ones at the moment.
Why do you think amateur detectives are appealing? Do you think there’s a reason queer characters often find themselves in the role of amateur detective?
I think it’s because we all think we’re smarter than the police? We enjoy seeing a character we can identify with figuring things out faster than the cops, especially without access to all the evidence, interviews, and forensics the cops do. Murder She Wrote has been off the air for about thirty years and yet the books based on the show continue coming out every year. If we start out in mysteries reading the juvenile series–Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys and Judy Bolton and all the rest were amateurs, so we always cut our teeth in the genre with them to begin with. Scotty is basically an amateur, even though he has a private eye license he rarely uses; he and the boys never get hired (although they kind of do in the new one, coming this November.)
Let’s talk about place. Greg, your books take place in the South. Why is place important to the crime novel—why is it especially important to the queer crime novel?
Place shapes who we are–not just as queer people, but as people in general. There are similarities between growing up in a small town in the Midwest and growing up in one in the South, but the differences are very marked. I’ve lived all over the country–pretty much everywhere but New England or the Northwest–and always felt, as a Southerner (despite no accent and not growing up there) like an outsider. Couple that with being gay in a time when it was still considered a mental illness, and you have someone always on the outside looking in. But I have that Southern pull to write about the South–although many would say that writing about New Orleans and writing about the South are not the same; like me, New Orleans both is and isn’t of the South, and I feel that very strongly. I’ve written books set in California and Kansas, even one in upstate New York, but I very much consider myself a Southern writer.
Place is even more important in a queer crime novel because place shapes the queer people so much. As a writer, I think one of my strengths is setting and place, and I think that comes from being very much a fan of Gothics growing up. Gothics are known for place and mood, and I think those are two things I do well.
All of you write wonderfully flawed characters. Sometimes, as LGBTQ+ writers, we feel the burden of representation and the urge to write only positive LGBTQ+ characters as an attempt to undo history’s (the dominant culture’s) demonization of us. Unfortunately, that can be limiting—even flattening. Clearly, you’ve all struck a beautiful balance with your characters. Talk a bit about how you approached this issue.
The flaws, to me, are what make the characters seem real. Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys always annoyed me because they were so perfect; no one is that perfect, and anyone that close to perfect in real life would be irritating and insufferable. I am am quite aware that I am flawed (one of my biggest flaws is believing I am self-aware because I most definitely am not), but I am not trying to be perfect; I just want to be the best version of myself that I can be. By showing queer people with all their facets and flaws and failures and blind spots, we’re showing the reader that we are human; despite what those who hate us say or claim, we are human beings just like everyone else, just trying to get through life and do the best that we can. The villain in my first book was a gay man–and the entire book was a commentary on how we, as queer people, tend to overlook flaws and red flags from members of our own community. Just because someone is queer doesn’t mean they are a good person–and queers with a criminal bent do exist, and often take advantage of that sense of camaraderie we feel with each other, especially when we don’t know the person well. I tend to trust a queer person more readily than I will a straight person, and that’s wrong–which is why I think we feel so much more hurt when queer people betray us.
Speaking of the demonization of LGBTQ+ folks … Ray Bradbury of Fahrenheit 451 fame said, “There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running around with lit matches.” What do you think about the current tactics to ban queer books from schools, libraries, and even bookstores in places like Florida, Arkansas, and Texas? Why are they targeting queer books?
This is, I hope, the last gasp of the homophobes who’ve never updated their hate speech in over fifty years. What the hate group “Moms for Liberty” are doing and saying is no different than what Anita Bryant said and did in the 1970’s, what Maggie Gallagher and her evil co-horts at the National Organization for Marriage repeated, then came the One Million Moms…all too often it’s the cisgender straight white women who are the real foes of progressive politics who fight to uphold a bigoted status quo. They always claim they’re concerned moms worried about their children–but are perfectly fine with them being shot up at school; working in a meat factory on the night shift at thirteen (have fun in hell, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, when you get there and French-kiss your Lord and Master Lucifer); or shouldn’t have the right to vote…they know better than a child’s actual parents, you see, about what the child needs or wants. Maybe they should spend more time with their own children than worrying about everyone else’s? Phyllis Schlafly, queen skank of the conservative right, ignored her own family while she embarked on her crusade to strip women of their rights and autonomy–all the while shrieking like a hyena into any microphone nearby that she was fighting progress to save the American family while selling some Leave it to Beaver-like nonsense as reality. I always felt sorry for her gay son. Imagine that as your mother.
As for why, it’s about control and power. I actually respected Anita Bryant more, because she truly believed all the vile, horrible, unChristian things she said and espoused. Most of the others, including the unspeakably vile and disgusting Moms for Liberty, are working a grift for money, attention and power. Hilariously, they’ve sold their souls in the worst possible way in the guise of family, religion and God; if they’ve ever actually read their Bibles, they need to work on their reading comprehension skills as they are both apostates and blasphemers who will spend eternity doing the breast stroke in the lake of eternal fire. Hope they enjoy it.
Sorry your husbands and children don’t love you, but who can really blame them?
What are you working on next? What’s coming up?
I have a short story in an anthology called School of Hard Knox from Crippen and Landru (and somehow got a co-editor credit for the book with Donna Andrews and Art Taylor); Death Drop, the first in a new series from Golden Notebook press, drops in October; and the ninth Scotty comes out in November, Mississippi River Mischief. I am writing a gay noir, and may be writing second books for the new series I started with Crooked Lane last year as well as a sequel to Death Drop, and have a couple of short stories I want to finish to submit to anthologies I’d love to be in.
…on a flight to Dallas this afternoon. However, in delightful news, I am sharing the Dallas-San Diego legs of the trip in both directions with none other than the Lady H, aka Lady Hermione, aka Carsen Taite. That is always fun. I don’t have enough time changing planes in Dallas on the way out to get Whataburger on the way (I’ll get Shake Shack at New Orleans airport before I leave) but here’s hoping I can get it on the way home, because I know I will be starving by the time I get to Dallas. (I just checked; I have two hours in Dallas on the way back so Whataburger fer shur! The departure flight is at eleven something California time, so I probably won’t eat anything before boarding….unless there’s donuts or something at the San Diego airport, which I am sure there is.) It’s truly sad how excited I can get about food options that I don’t normally have access to, isn’t it?
But I am all packed and ready to head to Metairie for my eye appointment on the way to the airport. It would probably be more accurate to say I overpacked–I really don’t know why every time I go to something like this I have to take so much with me, including books–what if I run out of something to read!?!?!? Um, bitch, you’re going to a convention for mystery readers. There will be free books in my conference book bag. Books will be given away at various times over the weekend. There’s a book room and several book sellers.
But yes, by all means, Greg, weight yourself down bringing coal to Newcastle.
My supervisor and I were looking around yesterday for pictures of our old office on Frenchmen Street for a presentation she is doing at the US Conference on AIDS (she’ll leave the day I return to work), and we couldn’t find any, anywhere. I knew I probably had some in my archive of photographs on the back-up hard drive (which is horribly horribly disorganized), and so I went digging around in those files after I finished packing last night. Oh, the memories–and oh, the fucking receipts! Apparently–not really a surprise to anyone who knows me–I’ve been keeping receipts for decades. Old assholish behavior from people who should know better that I’d completely forgotten about–both the person and the behavior. Also, some people have been assholes for a very long time. Stick with what you’re good at, I guess? But yes, at some point I am going to have to organize those picture files–and there are tons of duplicates.
So.
Many.
Duplicates.
Nevertheless it was a fun way to pass an hour or so while the laundry laundered and the dishes washed in their respective machines. There are so many things I need to be better about–the picture files, for example, could be incredibly useful for inspirations and/or putting me into the mood to write a particular kind of story. I found the photo file of the pictures I used to help me visualize and write Timothy; I did do this for Mississippi River Mischief, but never took the time to look at the photos before diving into writing or trying to get the work done. It probably would have helped some, and therefore I need to remember the value of visual aids for my writing going forward. I am taking stuff with me to edit over coffee, or to muse over and/or think about; I always take my journal with me when I go to panels because people say things I want to remember later, or make me think about something I am working on, sometimes solving a puzzle I’d be trying to untangle. I love being around other writers, I really do. It’s always fun, and I get to hang around smart people and listen to them tell funny stories and laugh and be amazed that I get to know all these amazingly brilliant and smart and witty people and get to call them friends? The teenaged kid in Kansas whose house had a corn field across the street and dreamed big dreams in that bedroom with the ugly beige walls and brown shag carpeting would have slept well and gotten through life a little easier had he known his life would turn out even better than he’d ever dared to dream. I complain a lot. I whine a lot. I get irritated easily and my temper frays and flares a little more lately than I’d prefer, frankly. It’s also so, so easy to go down the dark path to depression and who cares and why bother and all that morose self-pitying nonsense that doesn’t make anything any better but certainly can make everything seem worse. But I do know how incredibly lucky and blessed I am. People also seem to think I’ve led an interesting life. I don’t think so, but it’s also all I know so it just seems normal to me. I get to write books and stories and get them published. People read them, seem to like them, and want me to write more of them. I even get nominated for awards here and there and now and again…quite a lot of times, actually.
And while it may not seem like it most of the time when I’m complaining, I’m pretty happy with my life and how it’s all turned out. I’ve also realized that I’m incredibly lucky and blessed with my writing career. I’ve been nominated for the Anthony Award seven times now–twice for Best Anthology, once for Best Short Story, once for Best Paperback/Ebook Original, twice for Best Children’s/Young Adult, and once for Best Humorous. That’s really not a bad haul, you know. I’ve also been nominated for a Lefty and an Agatha and a Shirley Jackson and a Macavity–not bad for a big old queer writer of queer books, you know? It’s also lovely seeing these mainstream awards starting to slowly recognize queer writers and our books. I also found, you see, a lot of pictures of conferences and signings and readings and book events and conferences from throughout the length of my varied and odd career. It’s been a lovely ride so far, and I really wish I would allow myself the luxury of enjoying myself and enjoying my career.
My goal for this weekend is to have as much fun as possible, hug as many people as I can, and relax and enjoy the ride as a three-time Anthony nominee. That’s pretty amazing, and something that queer teenager back in Kansas couldn’t have dared to dream.
And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. I need to do one more load of dishes before i depart and the kitchen will be thus clean. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and as always I will probably be updating social media with today’s travel shenanigans. Don’t know if or when I will be back here, but will do my best.
And just like that Wednesday has rolled around again, and today is the day I meet with the orthopedic surgeon to determine just what needs to be done to repair my torn left biceps muscle. I am a little nervous, to be honest, and more than a little trepidatious about it. I’ve not had any kind of surgery since having my tonsils out as a child and a potentially cancerous lesion removed in 2007, so I’ve kind of been lucky on that score (I don’t consider tooth extraction–even the wisdom teeth–as surgery; just how my mind works so don’t @ me, okay?). Dr. Google has told me that I’ll need physical therapy, a soft cast, and a sling (not the fun kind) for a while, maybe as much as six months to a year, which is definitely not pleasant or anything I want to happen to me at any time, but if needs be, it needs be, I guess.
At least after today I won’t have to wonder any more.
But my rebooting the week seemed to have done the trick. Yesterday was a good day; I slept really well and was in a very good mood when I came to work. A friend texted me to remind me that it was also my first birthday since Mom died, and so subconsciously I was probably grieving, which was why the energy felt so off Monday (the news of Tiger’s passing didn’t help much in that regard) and it really should have hit me when I got Dad’s note in the mail. It’s funny, I keep trying to tell Dad that it’ll gradually get easier but it really never does, does it? Hell, just typing since Mom died makes my eyes fill. I need to remember to keep being kinder to myself, and not so hard always on myself. After work I ran errands again–much as I hate driving all the way uptown every day, at least when I do there’s a place to park when I get home, and Paul’s expecting something, and I needed to make a little groceries on the way, too–and followed my Monday strategy of showering after emptying the dishwasher and putting my groceries away. I did finish the new draft of “Whim of the Wind” last night–and I have a place to try getting it published now–so I am going to let that sit for a couple of days before digging back into it. I’m glad that I let go of the sentimental attachment to the story since I wrote it back in college; it makes so much more sense to revise it into something different but keeping the same feel and vibe. I don’t think I stuck the landing on the second draft, but I have something to work with now, and that’s terribly important.
I tried working on another story after I finished that revision but alas the fountain had run dry by then. I did pull up both stories I want to get to work on, and maybe after my appointment this afternoon–and errands after that–I’ll be able to sit here and finish both stories tonight. I slept great last night–even better than i had the night before–and actually didn’t wake up until four (then five, then the alarm) which was probably the longest stretch of “straight through” sleep I’ve had in I don’t know how long. It was again miserably hot yesterday, but these last few days haven’t felt quite as hellish as the ones before. Paul was late getting home last night (board meeting) and after I finished writing for the evening, was kind of lost. I did do a load of laundry and another load of dishes, even going so far as to clean and straighten up the kitchen (I also showered when I got home; the twice daily showers seem to be doing the trick–getting things done and sleeping well) before repairing to my easy chair to watch some Youtube. Yesterday evening I revisited some scenes from old soaps, mostly General Hospital and All My Children–I still haven’t accepted that it’s no longer on the air–and I was also thinking about all the actors from soaps we lost to HIV/AIDS back in the day; and how many really gorgeous young men had appeared on the soaps when I used to watch and then just disappeared…which, of course, makes me wonder. (I love that the actor who played Derek Mallory, the police chief on Edge of Night back in the late 70s and early 80s, started in gay porn movies.) Someone really should write about that; and how actors had to remain closeted to have careers until the modern day era where there are only four soaps left, but they often have gay characters and storylines now. (was it Christian McLaughlin who wrote Glamourpuss, about a closeted gay soap star who gets outed, so the show makes his character gay and turns him into the villain?), I remember when Donna Pescow played the lesbian nurse on All My Children back in the day–she wasn’t around long, of course, the occasional queer character rarely lasted for long–but i would love to read a book about the history of queer actors and queer storylines on the daytime soaps–I remember the gay teen storyline on One Life to Live back in the day (Ryan Philippe’s first big break as an actor was playing that gay kid) and remember thinking wow what a difference this storyline would have made to teenaged me back in the day.
Representation matters, people. It really does. And if you’ve never not seen yourself reflected back to you in popular culture, you literally have no idea what it feels like or how moving it is when you finally do.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again later.
And somehow, almost twenty-one years have passed since Scotty Bradley burst forth into the world with Bourbon Street Blues, one of what I hoped was the most unconventional and original amateur sleuths in the history of crime fiction. This is neither the time nor the place to again tell the story of how I created him, or how what was supposed to be a one-off stand alone book became a series spread out over twenty years (!!!); I’ve told those stories endlessly over the last twenty years both here and on panels. But Scotty remains very precious to me all these years later, and I still care about getting him and his life right on the page. I don’t torture him or make his life as miserable as I do Chanse’s (poor, poor Chanse), but he has his own problems and issues that he has to face–but his endless optimism and willingness to face things head on and deal with them, rolling with the punches and always getting back up, has never once wavered in all the years I’ve been writing him. I love him, his family–even the stuffy Bradley side; I love that the unconventional family their son married into pushes every single one of their buttons–and I love his New Orleans.
The other night I was scrolling through Youtube and, just for the hell of it, searched for a song that I’ve been trying to find a digital copy of for my Spotify or Apple Music accounts; Erin Hamilton (Carol Burnett’s daughter) remade Cheap Trick’s “The Flame” as a dance song (she also did the same with that old 1970s classic, “Dream Weaver” and I prefer her versions to the originals), and I love the extended remix. I found the video on Youtube and as I listened to it, it brought back a lot of memories of going out to the gay bars, hitting the dance floor and staying out there all night, getting caught up in the music and just having a great time. I think this song predated the turn of the century, so it’s a late 90’s recording…anyway, it really made me think, put me back into a Scotty place in my mind, and as I listened, sang along, and bopped my head, the next Scotty book started forming in my head….and I realized that’s been part of the disconnection I felt writing the last few Scotty books; sure, I could and can still write him, and sure, I could get back into his head space, but it was much harder for me to do than it used to be. I thought it might be because I don’t go to the Quarter at all anymore, or that I don’t spend any time in gay bars anymore; that I don’t know what it’s like to be a gay man in his forties (almost fifties) today–my own memories are of a completely different world than the one we live in now. But now I know what I was doing wrong–I was listening to the wrong kind of music while writing him. If I want to ease back into Scotty’s mind and world, I need to listen to dance music I used to hear in the gay bars.
And can I say that it’s a real shame that it’s so hard to track down old gay bar dance remixes?
Knowing this means I’ll probably keep going with Scotty for a while longer, at any rate. I love him, I love the character, and I know I’ve been avoiding dealing with some things in that series that will eventually have to be addressed…but it’s absolutely lovely to know that I can slip back easily into his mind-space just by listening to great old gay dance remixes.
“I think we should turn it into a home gym,” I said into the gloom. “I mean, wouldn’t it be great to just have to go downstairs to work out? And we can put in a sauna and a steam room. What do you think, guys?”
It was the Monday night after Mother’s Day, and the termites were swarming.
That was why we were sitting around the living room in the dark. The only illumination in the entire building came from two blasphemy candles, flickering in the center of the coffee table. Modeled after Catholic prayer candles, one had a picture of Drew Brees in his Saints jersey with a halo and heavenly light shining on his head with the words Pray to Breesus around the base. The other was St. Chris Owens of Bourbon Street.
So, yeah—blasphemy candles. They’re very popular here.
Yet even the scant pale light from the teardrop shaped flames was enough to draw an occasional scout termite from the gloom. We wouldn’t see it until it landed on the glass lip of one of the candles, before dive-bombing into the flame. There would be a brief sizzling sound, and then the yellow flame flickered and turning briefly reddish as the termite immolated. Once it was consumed, the flame would be steady and yellow again.
The swarming rarely lasted more than an hour, but that hour seemed to last an eternity.
Termites have always been the bane of New Orleans’s existence. The domestic kind were bad enough. Houses and buildings were tented to get rid of infestations, the bright yellow and red stripes announcing to the world that a termite Armageddon was happening inside. The city’s original termite problem had grown exponentially worse since the particularly vicious Formosan variety had hitched a ride on a freighter to the fertile feeding grounds of our old, mostly wooden city shortly after World War II. The dampness of our climate must have made them feel like they’d arrived at termite Disney World. The little fuckers love wet wood, so the entire city was an all-you-can-eat buffet. They’d killed live oaks that had survived hurricanes, destroyed historic homes, and I’d heard that they could even chew through brick and mortar.
Maybe that was an urban legend, but it wasn’t one I was interested in proving.
Formosan termites swarmed.
The first rule of surviving Formosan termite season was speed. Every source of light had to be turned off the moment you spotted the first scout. They’re drawn to the light, like moths, but unlike moths, they’re drawn to the light in the hundreds of thousands, turning your home into a scene from Cecil B. DeMille’s ultimate cheesefest The Ten Commandments. The big streetlamps along Decatur Street outside drew the swarms, horrifying clouds of little monsters flying around, frantically trying to mate while shedding wings like revoltingly nasty snowflakes.
It is incredibly hard for me to believe that I have written seventeen or so books and countless short stories set in New Orleans and never have once addressed the swarms of Formosan termites we live through every spring. They return after Mother’s Day and haunt us in the evenings, usually between eight and nine pm, until Memorial Day, give or take. They aren’t a nightly occurrence, thank the heavens, but they are usually at their worst on Mondays and Tuesdays. No one had warned Paul and I about them, so the first time we were swarmed we didn’t know what to do. Remembering that horror from the old apartment on Camp Street (we had a massive security light attached to the house right outside our living room, so any light at all inside would draw clouds and clouds of them inside), how was it possible I had never written about the Formosan termite swarms? And with Scotty having bought the building on Decatur Street from Millie and Velma–who I sent into retirement along the Gulf Coast of Florida–and learning about the responsibilities and drawbacks to being a New Orleans home-owner, as well as trying to figure out how to redesign the interior for more functionality as a single-family dwelling? Of course, the question of what to do with the empty retail space on the first floor would be an issue; I wouldn’t want a living space right on the sidewalk of Decatur Street at any time of day or night or month or year. I also wouldn’t want to deal with renters, either, and thus neither would Scotty. But the space can’t just be left vacant, either. So, I thought it would be a great way to open the book with them sitting out the swarms in the dark, with a couple of candles lit, talking about the renovation plans?
After I finished writing Royal Street Reveillon, I was pretty damned pleased with myself. I thought it was perhaps the best Scotty book of the entire series, and reflected my growth as a writer along with Scotty’s growth and development as a character. When I finished it, I had the thought I always have whenever I finish writing a series book: maybe that should be the last one. But I immediately dismissed that thought from my head; I had left something in the personal story of Scotty and the boys hanging with a bit of a cliffhanger, so I knew there had to be one more book at least to tie off that loose end. I was also thinking about a local-ish political scandal of the last decade–the usual, a conservative Christian pro-family politician outed for having an inappropriate relationship with a teenager (who was over seventeen, the age of consent for boys in Louisiana), and a political powerhouse dynasty that had ruled a near-ish parish for generations was dead in the water. I had been thinking a lot also about taking Scotty and the boys outside of New Orleans and the safety of Orleans Parish for an adventure; as my knowledge of Louisiana grew exponentially along with my study of the state’s history, I really wanted to set a book in a part of Louisiana I could fictionalize and have some fun with. I had already created a couple of fictional parishes and towns in previous work; The Orion Mask particularly was set in fictional Redemption Parish–but Redemption wouldn’t work for this one, so I needed another one.
While I was thinking this through, I remembered that two Nancy Drew mysteries were connected to New Orleans–she was only here for a couple of chapters of The Ghost of Blackwood Hall, but most of The Haunted Showboat was set here, or just outside of the metropolitan area (a quick reread showed that “Carolyn Keene’s” Louisiana and New Orleans bore no resemblance whatsoever to the reality…but I knew I had a Nancy Drew Easter egg in Bury Me in Shadows (Blackwood Hall), and I wanted to put one in a Scotty book–so why not a showboat? The ruling dynasty of the invented parish–St. Jeanne d’Arc, for the record–was given the same name as the relatives of Bess and George’s that they and Nancy were visiting in The Haunted Showboat, Haver. I even named the house in Mississippi River Mischief the same name as the Havers’ home in The Haunted Showboat, Sunnymeade.
And yes, the Havers’ showboat/gambling casino was also named the River Princess.
I originally planned on the case coming to Scotty through his sort-of-nephew, Frank’s blood nephew Taylor; someone he met in group therapy (which he is doing to help get through what happened to him in the previous book), or possibly even a boyfriend, someone he’s seeing. I could never get it to work right…and finally, I realized it couldn’t come from Taylor. Taylor is going to continue growing as a person and as a character, but this was too soon after his own trauma for him to be trying to help other people. And then I remembered David, Scotty’s best friend, the music teacher. David’s not been in a book since Mardi Gras Mambo, but I’ve never forgotten about him. And it made sense–David has moved on from his old school and now teaches at NOCCA (our local Fame high school), and the kid is one of his students–and David finds out by confiscating the kid’s phone in class. I wanted to create a character based on this absolute sweetheart of a young man I met; I don’t remember how we met, but friends of a mutual friend were in New Orleans, and wanted me to meet them for drinks…and they had a daughter who went to school here. The kid was a friend of hers, absolutely adorable and sweet, and a ballet major at Tulane. After the daughter and her friend left, the parents immediately turned to me and asked me, “is he gay? <The daughter> think so, and so do we.” What I should have said was, “Well, he’ll let people know if and when he’s ready”; what I actually said was “absolutely.” (I did later find out the kid did eventually come out; wherever he is, I hope he is happy and living his best life. He was so sweet and charming and likable…) When I started writing the character, I made him unlikable, arrogant and sure of himself and his own beauty, and the effect it had on other people. That was wrong, and I went back and made him more of a naïve kid, with a strong sense of right and wrong; and the story worked a lot better. It wasn’t like Scotty to be so judgmental about this kid; if anything, especially after what happened to Taylor, he’s be super-protective.
And this tale–the corrupt old politician and the beautiful teenager working at the food court at Lakeside Mall–gave me a chance to dig into something from Scotty’s past that’s never been truly explored: that his first lover was his high school wrestling coach when he was about fifteen/sixteen. This came up in Jackson Square Jazz–which of course has been unavailable for thirteen years–and I always meant to circle back around to it, just never did…but over the years there have been throwaway lines in books about how Scotty has always preferred older men (Frank is fifteen years older; we’re not really sure how old Colin is), and so to bring it up again in this instance? Yes, perfect.
I loved my story about the corrupt politician, the wrecked showboat in St. Jeanne d’Arc Parish, and the teenager, but something was missing.
I realized two things: something very important was missing, and the crimes of the Haver family were just too big and too many to fit into this book, so I chose to focus on only one…and then the Murdaugh case broke. The Murdaughs were a real life Haver family, and their crimes were almost exactly the same! So, I ripped one of their crimes from the headlines and made that the primary focus of the story, and it was the right choice: the book started falling into place and the story began flowing. I was very nervous about the book–slicing out all the other crimes while building up only one was tricky, since they were all woven through the entire manuscript and the new one had to be as well. I also wasn’t sure if the subject matter was handled appropriately; the old/young daddy/boy thing is the gay community is often mistaken for something much worse than it is, and talking about gay teenagers’ sexuality is also kind of a third rail. But I trust my editor, and she loved it.
Saturday morning and my birthday eve. Yes, it’s tomorrow; Gregalicious hits the big 6-2 tomorrow. It’s been a hell of a year since my birthday last rolled around, and to say that I am in a much better place today than I was a year ago on this date would be putting it mildly. I didn’t know, for example, that I’d lose both my mother and my cat before my next birthday. It does seem weird to not have a cat on my birthday; this is my first cat-free birthday since we first got Skittle all those years ago when we lived in the carriage house. At this time last year I was trying to get my shit back together after having long COVID, but other than that I really don’t remember much of what was going on last August, to be honest. I suppose I could go read last year’s entries around these dates, but maybe it’s best not to remember. Who knows?
I did manage to get over to the West Bank Office of Motor Vehicles, and after what seemed like forever, I did finally get my Louisiana Real ID/driver’s license, and the new picture is even worse than the old. (Why do they tell you to lower your chin and look down? Everyone knows that will result in a much worse picture.) But I also made groceries, grabbed Five Guys for lunch, and then came home to finish my work-at-home chores. I managed to get the bed linens laundered and did some picking up around here. I also read some more of the Alfred Hitchcock Presents stories, which was fun. I dipped back into Stories to Be Read Late at Night, originally published in 1962. I read “Evening Primrose” by John Collier, which was interesting and creepy, about ghosts living in a department store, and “The Sound Machine” by Roald Dahl, which was creepy and strange and everything I would have expected from a Dahl story. I’d not read anything by him before, but I know he wrote Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, as well as the short story one of the more famous Alfred Hitchcock Presents episodes was based on–the one where the wife kills her husband with a frozen leg of lamb, which she then cooks and serves to the investigating officers. The story was, as I expected, creepy, macabre, and one of those stories where you aren’t sure if what you’re reading is happening…or if it’s all a product of the narrator’s fevered, slowing disintegrating mind. It was interesting–but both of these stories reminded me yet again of how limited my imagination and creativity is when it comes to writing short stories; why not expand my mind and try things that are different and outside of my comfort zone, and what better place to try experimental writing and experimental creating than in a short story rather than a novel? The key here is to remember that anything is possible and to not either fear trying out new things or limit myself by saying oh you can’t write that.
Because I can write anything.
I do have to go out into the heat today–mail and a few things to pick up at the store–but I’d rather not go out into the heat. Yesterday didn’t seem that terrible–it was in the high nineties but the humidity was lessened, it seemed; although it was hot as fuck, don’t get me wrong, I handled it better yesterday than I have the rest of the summer–which leads me to believe it wasn’t as humid and the heat index not as high. That, or I am getting used to it, and that’s appalling. No one should get used to this.
I also wrote a lengthy entry about the genesis of Mississippi River Mischief, as well as one about the other book I have coming out this fall that I’ve not really talked about; I also worked on my short story revision a bit more last night before collapsing into my easy chair. We watched more Awkwafina is Nora from Queens, which is amazingly funny–she really can do anything–and then retired for the evening. I slept really well again last night, which was wonderful as always; I love when I sleep well, and so hopefully I’ll be able to get a lot done today. I also want to spend some time reading this morning as well–either short stories or getting back into Kelly J. Ford’s The Hunt, which is fantastic; I just haven’t had the bandwidth mentally lately to focus on reading a novel.
It feels very cool in the apartment this morning, which is, as always, a lovely thing. I’ll probably post the entry about the new Scotty book at some point this weekend; at some point this weekend I’ll also finish the entry about the other book I’ve been so mysterious about now for quite some time. I also have a Bible entry I want to finish writing, but I also need to go back and read some appropriate Bible passages to make sure I am remembering correctly; and of course, there’s nothing I want to do less than read some Bible passages.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines for the morning. Have a great Saturday, Constant Reader, and I’ll probably check back in with you again later.
Queer and Loathing in America 