Another Great Me2 Review!

Here's a great review of Me2 from gayinwa.com.au - groovy!

From gayinwa.com.au:

M. Christian is known as a writer of erotica, with stories in several spicy anthologies such as Best American Erotica, Best Gay Erotica and Best Lesbian Erotica. This time he´s playing in the sci fi genre with the psychological thriller, Me2. Fear not, however, as Christian has not forgotten to pen some sizzling scenes involving the gay hero.

At first glance, I was sure that this was going to be yet another cheesy addition to the growing number of sci-fi books and films about cloning. What comes to mind is the Sixth Day, a film in which Arnie Schwarzenegger´s character is secretly cloned and battles the people behind his cloning. Similarly, in Me2, the main character discovers that there is someone who is exactly like him, quite possibly a clone, taking over each part of his life. Christian is masterful in describing the Starbucks employee´s transition from bland but satisfied, to a blundering paranoid individual who questions his every move.

These kinds of sci-fi psychological thrillers aren't usually my cup of tea, but Me2 is suited to a much broader audience. I say this because the underlying tale lies not in the main character´s possible cloning by some secret government agency, but goes deep into theories of identity and identity theft. It questions how our identities are formed, especially queer identity. Christian seems to suggest that our identities come down to what we choose to buy, as we collect material possessions to mould our identities based on how we want other people to see us.

Christian also raises the question of the possibility of the Genetic Mirror Theory, which states that each person has a genetic twin. This idea that there could be more than one of us out there raises some hairs along the way, or at least gives you some food for thought!

Me2 is a chilling and gripping novel. At first I really did think it was a bit of overdone genre about cloning, but it turned into something much more philosophical and interesting. Worth a read.

Book Devotee And Stroke The Fire

The blast that is the Stroke the Fire blog tour continues with a great little write-up and except on the every cool Book Devotee site:

Excerpt: 

“STROKE THE FIRE”

“Man’s got a home, then that’s where he sleeps. Can’t, myself, see how you can stand the god-derned quiet out there in the flats,” Lew had said, listening to the music of the man’s voice.

The man shrugged, the tip of his cigar bobbing in the soft night. ”That it be. Name’s Last. Jeff Last.”

Lew wiped the grime off his hands (and hopefully the fool’s grin off his face) and offered his own. ”Lew. Just Lew around here.”

The handshake lasted a bit too long, long enough for the two men to size each other up. Lew in his Stinkhole clothes was a burly barrel of a man, all beard and round blue eyes. He looked fat from aways, but if you’re ever seen him haul cornmeal or lumber you’d know that it was iron, fella, strong, strong, iron and not just insulation against Craggy’s winds.

Last was long and lanky, and while the light was none too good in that narrow little ways between the public corral and Miller’s Fine Feeds, you could tell that he was a beanpole: Six feet easy, in buckskin and serape. In the dark beneath his wide brimmed hat, his shaved face was carved and as Craggy as Lew’s mountain home. The handshake had lasted way too long. Now, he thought, how to get this fine feller up the mountain…

“Gotta hit the trail if I’m ta make Ridgewood by dawn,” Jeff had said, and Lew’s heart had sunk down to his Stinkhole boots.

“Knows how it is–” he had said, starting to turn, maybe extend a hand, and an invitation for another time.

“But you is one fine figure of a man. Might temptin’–”

Lew stared, unsure of how exactly to respond.

“You think the same, Lew of the Mountain?” Jeff had said.

Even in the low light cast from the lanterns of Sal’s Lew could see Jeff’s fine figure, out in all it’s glory there in the “street” of Stinkhole.

Gay Radio Hosts Turn Hate Into A Message Of Hope

Gay Radio Hosts Turn Hate Into A Message Of Hope:

After a billboard was vandalized twice, Craig Olsen and Robbie Laughlin of “The Craig & Robbie Hour” opted to have a local artist turn the defamation into a “message of hope.”

First erected in July, the radio show's billboard near the corner of Beverly Boulevard and La Brea Avenue was covered in purple paint over the summer. The replacement was later pelted with paintballs in November. But after the second hate crime, co-host Craig Olsen opted not to have the advertisement reprinted. Instead, he commissioned artist Jaime Ochoa to turn the hate into a piece of art. 

"I wanted to turn this [gay] hate crime into a positive message for the community," Olsen tells FishbowlLA. 

The investigation following the November vandal has resulted in no leads. While Olsen remains on edge, he's clearly more confident now that the billboard has been enhanced by the artwork. The co-host is reminding people in the neighborhood that "[they] belong here." 

"It's almost like my holiday card to my community," he tells the Los Angeles Times while being photographed in front of the billboard. "I want the person who did this to walk by and see that I made it better."

(via mediabistro.com)

Full Moon Bites And Stroke The Fire

Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful .... another part of the Stroke The Fire blog tour, this time from the great folks at Full Moon Bites has just gone up: featuring a give-away and an excerpt from my best-of-my-very-best queer erotica: STROKE THE FIRE: The Best ManLove Fiction of M.Christian (part of the special Renaissance E Books/Sizzler Editions M.Christian ManLove Collection)

FROM THE INTRODUCTION BY FELICE PICANO, LAMBDA AWARD WINNER LAMBDA LIFETIME 

ACHIEVEMENT AWARD 

See what I mean? Short story writing is hard. 

M. Christian's new collection of singular and satisfying short stories, Filthy Boys, is subtitled "Outrageous Gay Erotica." Emphasis on "outrageous." Although each of them does deliver a more than adequate erotic charge, Christian is after bigger game here. He's writing short stories. You know, like the ones you had to read in high-school: stories about suburbanConnecticut teens and hardscrabble poor white trash and adventurers desperate to light a fire to stay alive. The ones you had to discuss in class, using terms like "irony" and "thematic development" in those seconds before your forehead hit the top of your desk out of total apathy. 

Take heart. Christian's stories are sexy, smart and a lot more fun-

Stroke The Fire On Cecilie Smutty Hussy's Place

Very cool: as part of the Stroke The Fire blog tour, the very fun Cecilie Smutty has just posted a brief Q&A with yers truly about my best-of-my-very-best queer erotica: STROKE THE FIRE: The Best ManLove Fiction of M.Christian (part of the special Renaissance E Books/Sizzler Editions M.Christian ManLove Collection)

I am pleased to say that M. Christian has graced the Lair with his presence... Please put together a warm, smutty welcome for our guest today!

Since you are a new to me author, I am hoping to bring you to the light of others! So let’s share!

Why don't you tell us a little about yourself.... Something that we cannot Google about you, lol!

Well, let's see ... I began with fertilization (thanks, mom; thanks, dad) then quicly moved along to being a zygote and then to cleavage before going onto blastocyst differentiation. Nine or so months and I was on the scene as a – according to mom – rather big infant.

From there to about high school is not really worth talking about -- bullies, zits, voice cracking, hair where there hadn't been hair before, hormones – the usual stages of development from sprout to young adult.

I'd always been a creative kid – thus the bullies – but didn't really have much of a direction for it, but then in High School I was struck (almost literally) by the idea of being a writer. When I say struck I mean it almost literally: I went after being a published author with a serious vengeance. Reading somewhere that the best way of becoming a writer is to ... well, write I set myself a rigorous regimen.

In the end it paid off ... though in a rather usual way: in 1993 (or so), on the spur-of-the-moment I took a class in writing erotica taught by Lisa Palac (who was editing a magazine at the time called FutureSex). Spur-of-the-moment (2) I handed her a story I had just written ... and was totally, completely, utterly shocked -- and totally, completely, utterly delighted – that she bought it for her magazine. A short time later the same story was picked up by Susie Bright for her Best American Erotica 1994.

Just like that I was a published author: a pornographer, sure, but after struggling with my rigorous regimen for (yes, you may gasp) a little under ten years I was ecstatic. After that first story I write another and another and another until...

...here I am: 400+ published stories in anthologies like (the already mentioned) Best American Erotica, Best Fetish Erotica, Best Bisexual Erotica – and even Best Gay Erotica, and Best Lesbian Erotica – plus a whole lot more. I've edited over 25 anthologies – including the Best S/M Erotica series; Pirate Booty; My Love For All That Is Bizarre: Sherlock Holmes Erotica; The Burning Pen; The Mammoth Book of Future Cops, and The Mammoth Book of Tales of the Road (with Maxim Jakubowksi); Confessions, Garden of Perverse, and Amazons (with Sage Vivant), and lots more.

My short stories have been collected into many books covering a wide variety of genres, including the Gay Literature/Lambda Award finalist Dirty Words and other queer collections like Filthy Boys, and BodyWork; also collections of non-fiction (Welcome to Weirdsville, Pornotopia, and How To Write And Sell Erotica); science fiction, fantasy and horror (Love Without Gun Control); and erotic science fiction including Rude Mechanicals, Technorotica, Better Than The Real Thing, and the acclaimed Bachelor Machine.

I've even written quite a few novels: the queer vamp novels Running Dry and The Very Bloody Marys; the erotic romance Brushes; the science fiction erotic novel Painted Doll; and the rather controversial gay horror/thrillers Fingers Breadth and Me2.

I'm even an Associate Publisher for Renaissance E Books, where I (really) try to be the publisher I want to have as a writer, and to help bring quality books (erotica, noir, science fiction, and more) and authors out into the world. My site is www.mchristian.com.

Tell us a little about your book?

The book I'm pushing right now is called STROKE THE FIRE: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian and it's the best-of-the-best of my queer erotic short stories – taken from my previous collections Bodywork, Filthy Boys, and the celebrated Dirty Words. In addition to the best stories from each book I also included the introductions to each book as well: Me from BodyWork, Felice Picano from Filthy Boys, and Patrick Califia from Dirty Words. A lot of the stories have been in books like Best American Erotica, Best Gay Erotica, and the like.

What's rather odd (to be polite) about this book is that while it's queer erotica –and I've written a lot of queer fiction in general – I'm straight.

The way it happened – me being a straight author of queer fiction – is actually rather simple: one day an editor friend was doing a book of gay erotica and wanted to know if I could write a story ... so I did, and he bought it. A few dozen or so stories later I got an offer by a gay publishing house to write a novel, which led to move novels, some anthologies and the rest, as the cliché goes, is history.

Being serious for a second, I am always very clear with every editor and publisher I work with that I am not gay. In fact when I teach my Sex Sells: How To Write And Sell Erotica class – and what I also say in my How To Write And Sell Erotica book – is that fiction is fiction and that writers should always stretch themselves creatively but when it comes to be a writer talking to a publisher they should never, ever pretend to be someone they are not.

I cannot begin to say how touched I am by the queer community for being (1) to supportive of my work and (2) so understanding of who I really am. A great friend of mine – a publisher of many of my books – once said, and I totally agree with him, that love is love: meaning that even though I may not be sexually queer I adore my gay characters and friends. The mechanics are secondary once you realize that all of us – gay, bi, straight or otherwise – have more in common than less and that we all share the same, basic emotional landscape.

Oh, and just for shits and giggles, here's the table of contents forStroke The Fire:

Stroke The Fire
The Greener Grasses
Hollywood Blvd.
The Hope Of Cinnamon
Suddenly, Last Thursday
That Sweet Smell
Utter West
Friday Night At The Calvary Hotel
Spike
How Coyote Stole Sun
Echoes
Blue Boy
Matches
Wet
Coyote And The Less Than Perfect Cougar
Counting
About The Author (which is actually the title of a story)

How easy do stories come to you?

I like to say I have it bad -- I'm not just a writer by profession but in every way, every part of myself: I just absolutely love to think about stories, plots, characters, novels, settings ... you name it. Sure, writing can still be a trial (to put it mildly) especially when you have to hammer your head again and again and again against things like publicity and the other awful, icky parts that come with the professional side of writing, but when it does get difficult I always try to get back to the joy I feel when I'm writing ... when I'm tellingstories.

What is your favorite part of the book?

I don't really have any favorites ... mainly because I always try and look forward rather than backward when I think about stories and novels and all that. When I'm feeling cute I say that my favorite story is the one I haven't written yet.

You can only pick 3 words for your main characters ... what would they be?

Hum ... I do know that my stories and books and characters have a tendency to be bittersweet – which kind of reflects my view of life, I guess: that there really aren't happy, shiny endings but, instead, shiny, happy moments in what can be dark and stormy lives.

That being said I'm actually working on a new book – a sequel to my science fiction erotica collection The Bachelor Machine – where my goal is to write not just hot science fiction erotica but stories where the future is depicted as being a very positive place. Part of my reason for doing this is noticing that the stories in I wrote for the original Bachelor Machine were a tad ... stormier than usual, but also because I've noticed a lot of people seem to be reflexively negative about the future. So I want to show that the future could just as easily become a wonderful, positive place – even with scary things like genetic engineering, artificial intelligences, memory alteration, and so forth.

Which was the easiest character to write and the hardest -- and why?

Characters themselves, believe it or not, can sometimes be the problem. I usually write as more of a storyteller, who keeps his characters really tightly in check as what they are doing is usually more important who they are. I know some writers who let their characters roam free, and say that their books or stories aren't done until the characters tell them so ... but that's just not the way I work.

But I should also say that I'm a huge fan of pushing yourself in all kinds of ways: professionally, personally ... you name it. So one thing I'm planning for the future is a book where the characters are running the show – if just to see how it all goes. After all, I didn't know I could write erotica until I tried, didn't know I could write gay fiction until I tried, didn't know I could edit books until I tried ... you get my gist. Who knows what I – or anyone – might be good at until you give it a shot?

What are you currently working on?

Well, I just mentioned a book that is more character than plot-driven as an experiment, and I also chatted a bit about my follow-up to The Bachelor Machine ... but I'm also planning in starting a new novel very soon. I really enjoyed writing the books Me2 and Finger's Breadth – as they touched on a favorite theme of mine: playing with the unexpected and unusual way we human beings act and interact with each other -- the roles we unconsciously play, the dark (and light) sides of our natures that come out under adversity, mob psychology ... all that fun stuff.

Do you have anything due to release soon?

The great folks ay Renaissance/Sizzler Editions (who I also – ahem – happen to be an Associate Publisher for) are going to re-releasing a new edition of my erotic romance, Brushes, and a collection of my non-queer short stories. I'm also finishing up my first shot at a comic book, called Masquerade (with incredible art by Wynn Ryder), and an anthology I edited – about food and sex – called A Lover's Feast, and a new edition the transgender anthology I edited a few years back, Trans Figures.

In other words I like to stay busy – and then some! I'm also getting out there more as a reader/teacher/performer. Just check out my sub-site at mchristian-teaching.blogspot.com for info on all that fun stuff.

What's one thing that you enjoy about writing?

Well, as I said I have it bad. I see writing as an almost spiritual thing – that, somehow, my one little brain can create characters, worlds, tales ... all kinds of things ... that, if I do my job right and/or am damned lucky can reach out and truly affect people's lives. And if I really do my job right and/or am lucky my words will outlive me by decades or maybe even hundreds of years.

When I teach my classes I tell my students – and tell myself when things get dark and depressing – that writers are true and real magicians: our spells are our words, our stories, and they can literally change the world.

I truly love to explore, learn and more of all play with language and story. It's not just what I do as a living but who I am as a person. I don't think I could ever not be a writer.

What do you prefer ebooks or paperbacks?

I actually started my 'career' in the days of paper so I'm one of those folks who can actually look at both pretty clearly ... and I have to say, without hesitation, that eBooks are better for both writers as well as readers. Sure, writers won't get those advances again, but they always seem to forget that's just what they were: money givenagainst the sales of their books, and the brutal truth is that if their books didn't make that money back – and more – their 'career' could very well be over. With eBooks there is no pressure to make your book into a bestseller in the first month – in fact, eBooks can sit on their virtual shelves for a very long time before taking off and it in no way affects how the publisher feels about that author's work. This also means that publishers can take books that are more ... experimental, as they don't have to invest thousands of dollars into printing, distributing and promoting them – just to break even!

eBooks are great for readers (and authors as well) as books don't have to die. One of the man things I love about working for an eBook publisher is being able to re-release books that otherwise would be either out-of-print or practically out-of-existence. I think that is marvelous as there are so many fantastic books out there that otherwise people would never have a chance to read. With eBooks they can!

Is there a genre you would like to write but are a little apprehensive to try?

Well, I always try to push myself in all kinds of ways – you've already heard my little rant about "not knowing you are good at something until you try" so, with that in mind there are a LOT of things I'd love to try: I have plans to try my hand at either a one-act play or a screenplay, a more (ahem) optimistic romance novel, a straight-up horror novel, plus a few really out-there-experimental projects that will hopefully push the boundaries of what a book can be. We're seen a little bit of this kind of stuff with augmented reality games but I want to do so much more with it.

Okay ... personal time! Oh yeah, I go there: If you thought you were safe ... Nah ... Forgot it ... Not a chance! We will start off slow and easy, I promise!

What is on your night stand/dresser?

I really don't have either: I live in what I call an artist's colony – which is really just a big, crazy house I share with a musician, painter, and a gardener. My room is small but – as mom was an interior decorator – it's really very nice. I only have room for a small bookcase (comic books) a large bookcase (books), my desk, and a bed. I do have a few odd things, a pair of model Theo Jansen strandbeests, another pair of models but this time from Hieronymus Bosch's Garden Of Earthy Delights, a miniature terrarium, and two huge stained glass windows my father made.

What are you listening to you right now?

Actually I don't write to music: I'm much more of a visual person so I watch movies while I work. I don't have cable – in fact I can't stand broadcast TV – but I have a great Internet connection so I have Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and a whole bunch of other great sources of entertainment and information. Right now I'm watching Roger Corman's War-Gods Of The Deep on YouTube (with Vincent Price) but later I'm planning on watching one of my all-time favorite films: Seconds by John Frankenheimer (starring Rock Hudson).

What are you reading right now?I have an iPad and a rather huge eBook library but, thanks to a nice sale on Amazon, I scored a bunch of Philip K. Dick books for a buck each, so I'm halfway through my favorite of his: Eye In The Sky.

What is your favorite season? Holiday?

My family is just my brother (my mom and dad both passed away) and so my family is all my friends -- so we don't have a lot of traditional holidays. I like to say that we have a celebration every time any two of us get together ... that and holidays and such just feel a bit too stiff and 'traditional' for me.

You know you do ... Quickie time ... Think fast ... Dark or Milk Chocolate?

Dark, absolutely. Vosage's bacon dark when I can afford it, Trader Joe's dark chocolate peanut butter cups when I can't

Whipped or Melted?

Definitely melted: cheese is one of my big weaknesses – though I have been trying to cut down on it a bit.

Straight up or with a twist - sex?

Even though I've written quite a lot of queer fiction (erotic or non), I'm straight – and even though I've written a lot of kinky sex I'm actually a very meat-and-potatoes straight guy ... though I have a weakness of big, beautiful girls. But I never let my libido run the show: I fall in love with a woman, first, and her body second.

What's your fave drink - in a glass or on her?

Can I say in her ... I'm more than a tad orally fixated when it comes to sex.

Spank or Flogger?

Neither, but I teach classes in both ... as well as bondage, caning, nipple play, cupping, and a whole lot more.

Junk or Health Food?

Neither, as I'm kind of a foodie – though I do try and eat as healthy as I can. At home I've been experimenting (be afraid ... be very afraid) to give me better options than just quesadillas, but I love to get out and try new places and new cultures. There's this Turkish place in Berkeley I'm seriously in love with....

Leather or Lace?

Either is fine with me. I'm a very empathetic lover so if my partner lives something and gets turned on then I get turned on ... even though, like I said, I'm really a very simple guy when it comes to sex.

Control or Be Controlled?

I say controlled: I'm a pleaser – especially in bed. Oh, I know how to top and am quite good at it but my heart is never really in it ... though, again, if my partner is into it then I will definitely try anything.

Vampire or Werewolf?

Neither – even though I wrote two vamp books (Very Bloody Marys and Running Dry) and plan on working on a sort-of werewolf book – I really am quite bored with the whole paranormal thing. Come on, folks, let's be a bit more original!

Seven Weeks Of M.Christian: Week 2 - Queerer Than You Can Imagine

Continuing my seven (possibly terrifying) weeks of M.Christian, here's my newest installment...

...my reasoning behind this is that I haven't really talked a lot about myself for a while so I thought it would be a fun little experiment to post - once a week, for seven weeks - a series of essays about little ol' me: where I came from, my professional journey, being an editor, being a publisher ... and even my hopes and dreams for the future.

Hope you like!

(this week's piece was also run on Buffy Kennedy's site "Buffy's Ramblings" as part of the Stroke the Fire Guest Blog Tour that the great folks at Renaissance E Books/Sizzler Editions were so kind of set up for me)

#

Wanna hear a funny ... well, if not funny then at least odd ... story?  In our previous installment you heard of my journey from amateur to professional writer.  Pornographic (mostly) but a professional writer, nonetheless.

Since I published by first story in 1993 I've been – to put it mildly – writing up a storm.  I'm not going to inflict my entire bio on you (that's at the bottom of this piece as well as on my site at www.mchristian.com) but let's just say that I've written quite a few stories – that have been collected into quite a few collections – as well as more than a few novels.

Onto the funny: quite a few of those stories, more than a few of the collections, and most of those novels – plus a serious number of anthologies where I've been an editor – feature gay or lesbian characters.  In fact I've had stories in the celebrated Best Gay Erotica, Best of the Best Gay Erotica, Best Lesbian Erotica, Best Bisexual Erotica, Best Transgendered Erotica, and I was even a finalist for the gay literature award, the Lambda's...

Anyway, I think you get the build-up, so here's the punchline:

I'm straight.

Not even bisexual.  Oh, sure, I've gotten more than a few offers (very flattering) but, as I like to say, Mr. Happy only responds to women.  Now I also like to say I'm politically gay in that I vote a very purple ticket and consider gay rights to be the litmus test for any politician, nation, city, and so forth; socially bi in that I have no problem kissing and telling my male friends that I love them; and sexually ... like I said: straight. 

Now I want to be very clear that my reason for being a non-queer author in a queer world did not spring from any kind of deception: I am very out about being a straight guy (though a few of my gay friends don't believe me), and when I teach classes in smut writing I tell my students – with great emphasis – never to lie about who they really are to sell a story. 

How I got to where I am is actually a simple – but important – story, especially for writers.  It started very simply: a friend of mine suggested writing a gay story for a special anthology.  Now, I had never thought about anything like that – hell, I'd only just selling stories so I hadn't considered much of anything – so I gave it a shot.  Surprise: it was bought.  This put me on the gaydar, so to speak.  Soon I was not just writing gay (and lesbian) stories but editors and publishers were actively seeking me out to write for them.  No dummy, I wrote what people wanted to buy ... which puts me close to where I am now.

While I may, at worst, be a literary opportunist – one of my taglines is, after all, is that I'm A Literary Streetwalker With A Heart of Gold – I truly feel honored to be not just accepted but in many ways honored by the gay and lesbian community.  I've been brought to the verge of tears more than once by a gay, lesbian, bi, or transgendered person telling me that anything I wrote has touched them, or when a member of the community asks me to write for them.

In this, I feel, is a lesson for any writer: I did not know – at all – that I could write queer stories until I tried.  Who knows what you could be good at until you try?  I tell my students all the time to try, experiment, with everything and anything – even if it’s something you may not even like.  The worst that happens is that you find out that a certain genre is not for you, but then you could be wonderfully surprised that you not only enjoy, but are quite good at, writing for that genre.

Stretch, play, have fun, try, experiment ... in writing but also in life, to get a bit philosophical. 

Before I close, I want to touch on one final thing.  Often I get asked is how I can write about characters that don't share my sexual orientation.  Now, writing beyond yourself is what fiction is all about: horror writers don't really kill people, science fiction authors don't – mostly – come from other worlds ... you get the idea.  Fiction is fiction, and good fiction suspends our disbelief to the point where we forget that what we are reading isn't exactly true.

But I do have one bit of advice that's come from being a straight guy in queer clothing: I don't write about queer characters ... I write about people.

While I may not know what being a gay man is actually like, and I'm not equipped to know a lesbian one, I do know about hope, fear, delight, wonder, the giddy thrill of arousal, the nervousness that comes with the first few moments of sex, the lightheaded joy that comes when lust turns into love ... I may not know a few (ahem) details but I know what it means to be a human being, and no matter what anyone says we are all, down deep where it matters, more alike than not.

Yes, I write about gay characters, but – following my own advice – I am also constantly trying to expand my repertoire: challenging myself as much as possible.  I've tried my hand at romance, horror, science fiction, non-fiction, mysteries, historical ... sometimes I succeed, sometimes I feel I need a lot more work ... but no matter what I write, and where my life goes from here, I will always hold in the depths of my heart a love for all the gay men and women who have been so kind and supportive of me and my work. 

I may not know everything about what it means to be queer – but I certainly, absolutely, totally know what love feels like. 

Lynna Reynolds Likes Stroke The Fire

Here's a great review of my new book, Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Stories of M.Christian (part of the new M.Christian ManLove Collection from Renaissance E Books/Sizzler Editions) by Lynna Reynolds - from the very cool Stroke The Fire blog tour!

This book is the best of M.Christian’s ManLove Fiction but it is so much more. Instead of giving us one story, he packs in a lot of stories in just a few pages. When you purchase this book you need to know that the stories can be very graphic. And what’s good about an anthology is you don’t have to feel as if you have to read all the stories at once.

M.Christian gives us one story where he has you thinking of food. He also shows the reader that there is more than one way for two people to love each other. Some couples seem totally vanilla and others more adventurous. There are those people that like to be treated like someone else’s property. One short story had me thinking that if it were made into a movie Nathan Lane would be the perfect diva (a la Bird Cage).

Our author also doesn’t use the same type of story over and over. We get some paranormal, a lot erotic, and even some gore (think bloody). This book is not for someone who can’t think outside the box or have an open mind. You need to accept strong language and scenes that are very descriptive. There was one short story that had me think “incestuous”. M.Christian even surprised me with one story with religious undertones (I have a feeling you will know it as soon as you read). I will admit that a couple of the stories lost me – but it’s possible it was just me. You will have to let me know if you feel the same.

If you are looking for a straight book of romance, you won’t find it here. M.Christian explores all different types of love and you become a part of the story. Unless you are a person with no feelings, you can’t help but be touched (good or bad) by his writing. If you are someone that likes a little “meat” to your story, then you will want to get this book.

Rating: 4 stars

Church's Christmas Billboard Implies Jesus Was Gay

Auckland's St.-Matthew-in-the-City has gone and done it again. 

The Anglican church just put up this Christmas billboard outside of their building. Nice play on words, seemingly saying that many people only connect with Jesus at Christmastime. Add the rainbow halo, and another meaning is added. 

Earlier this year, the church erected a Gay rights board that angered some locals. Some of their previous billboards have been defaced. This one is just inviting ire. 

Ad agency: WhybinTBWATequila, Auckland.

(via BuzzFeed)

Way To Go, George!

George Takei slams Scalia for ‘repugnant’ anti-gay comment:

During an appearance on MSNBC, actor and LGBT activist George Takei called for Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia to recuse himself from upcoming cases involving the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and California’s Proposition 8. 

Scalia recently told an audience at Princeton University that someone could be morally opposed to homosexuality in the same manner they were morally opposed to murder or bestiality.

“Well, it seems to me that if Justice Elena Kagan can recuse herself from the Boston case, Justice Scalia needs to consider recusing himself,” Takei said. “He is obviously not unbiased. He is clearly biased in this situation. So how can he look at the issue and make a judgement fairly.”

“I really do think, first of all that statement was a repugnant statement to equate homosexuality with murder, and any Justice who has so little thought before he speaks should not be participating in the ruling on the cases involving DOMA or Proposition 8,” he added.

The U.S. Supreme Court announced last Friday that it would address the rights of LGBT people to marry in two separate cases regarding California’s same sex marriage ban and DOMA.

I (Heart) Sir Ian McKellen

37 Vintage Photos Of Sir Ian McKellen









(via BuzzFeed)

The Gay Bible?

There's a gay-friendly version of the King James edition dubbed “Queen James Bible.” The new interpretation of the Bible is meant to address homosexuality by updating specific passages from the previous version.

KJV: And they called unto Lot, and said unto him, Where are the men which came in to thee this night? Bring them out unto us, that we may know them.

QJV: And they called unto Lot, and said unto him, Where are the men which came in to thee this night? Bring them out unto us, that we may rape and humiliate them. (Page 21)

KJV: Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is an abomination.

QJV: Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind in the temple of Molech: it is an abomination. (Page 75)

KJV: If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

QJV: If a man also lie with mankind in the temple of Molech, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them. (Page 76)

Via: queenjamesbible.com

Thanks To SCIFISLACKER

Thanks so much to the great SCIFISLACKER who just posted my press release for the release of The M.Christian Manlove Collection: The Best-Of-The-Best Queer Books From Celebrated M.Christian - and who asked to look at some of the books.  Hope you like!

FOR IMMEDIATE PRESS RELEASE: M.Christian and Renaissance E Books/Sizzler Editions are extremely proud to announce a special imprint commemorating Lambda Award Finalist M.Christian’s best queer fiction and erotica: The M.Christian ManLove Collection!

Featuring special re-releases of M.Christian’s critically-acclaimed novels and collections, the The M.Christian ManLove Collection also includes a extra-special, brand-new, best-of-his-best of his queer erotic fiction: Stroke the Fire: The Best ManLove Stories of M.Christian

The M.Christian ManLove Collection collection includes:

Stroke the Fire: The Best ManLove Stories of M.Christian

Sizzling tales of bad boys, bruised hearts, and sweaty encounters. Lambda Award finalist M.Christian’s stories of men-who-love-men have been selected for Best Gay Erotica, Best American Erotica, and Best of the Best Gay Erotica. Eavesdrop on what hot men who are doing hot things with other hot men say to each other between the sheets ... and up against the wall. Start reading the fiery ManLove fiction of M.Christian with this personally selected collection of his very best stories.

M.Christian's stories are the fairy tales whispered to one another by dark angels whose hearts and mouths are brimming with lust. He goes beyond the pale, ordinary definitions of sexuality and writes about need and desire in their purest forms. Readers daring enough to stray from the safety of the path will find in his images and words a garden of delights to tempt even the most demanding pleasure-seeker.

 - Michael Thomas Ford, Lambda Award winner

M.Christian is a literary stylist of the highest caliber: smart, funny, frightening, sexy -- there's nothing he can't write about ...  and brilliantly.

- Tristan Taormino 

$8.50

9781615084890

ISBN 232 Pages

(available on ibooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other fine eBook distributors

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The Very Bloody Marys
Can San Francisco survive a marauding gang of Vespa-riding vampires? Before it's sucked dry, the city's only hope may be gay male Valentino, only a trainee for the supernatural law enforcement agency, Le Counseil Carmin. Swept up in the whole blood-sucking business when his mentor goes missing, Valentino is called upon to deal with the menace of these "Bloody Marys." But Valentino soon realizes that, in order to dispose of the gang, he must go into areas he never dreamed of, deal with some very strange characters and learn the truth about the dark side of town. The Very Bloody Marys is a horror novel about vampires, ghouls, faeries, and the undead that move around after dark. Part chase, part gallows humor, and all shivery excitement, this man love story from the wildly imaginative.

M.Christian creates a variety of quirky characters from wizards to zombies to fairies, and the tone captures the feeling of a fast-paced horror movie, alternately funny and creepy.

- HorrorWorld

$7.99

9781615087792

186 Pages

ISBN (available on ibooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other fine eBook distributors)

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Dirty Words: Provocative Gay Erotica
Here it is: the Lambda Literary Award Finalist Dirty Words: the queer collection shows just how hot and imaginative Manlove erotica can be!  From mischievous Native American spirits, to victims of cybernetic nightmares, these stories will amaze, amuse, terrify, fascinate and – always – excite you. Subtle and not, these well-crafted tales will touch you – and always excite you – in ways you’d never expect.  With a very special introduction by Patrick Califia.

Dipping into his erotic prose is like being doused with a bucket of icy cold water on a sticky Summer’s day. It’s a sense awakening experience, which enlivens and sweeps you away in the same narrative breath. It’s dark, it’s dangerous, it’s horny, it’s mouthwatering, it’s witty and it’s sharp.  Read my lips: Read this book.

- Skin Two

$7.99

9781615087464

ISBN 169 Pages

(available on ibooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other fine eBook distributors)

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Me2: The Classic Gay Gothic

M.Christian's controversial horror/thriller of queer identity is back in a brand new edition!  He looks just like you.  He acts exactly like you.  He takes away your job.  He steals your friends.  He seduces your lover. None of them can tell the difference. Every day he becomes more and more like you, pushing you out of your own life, taking away what was yours … until there’s nothing left.  Where did he come from?  Robot?  Alien?  Clone?  Doppelganger?  Evil twin?  Long lost brother?  A fascinating novel of identity, Me2 is a groundbreaking Manlove chiller you’ll remember for a long time – no matter who you are, or who you think you may be. (Despite rumors that this book was written by an impostor - but, rest assured, this is the real 'M. Christian.'  Accept no substitutes!)

Me2 is a unique and always entertaining fable-novel about what exactly identity may entail and how we may or may not decide whether it's worth the price of keeping it.

- Felice Picano, author of Art & Sex in Greenwich Village

$7.99

ISBN 9781615088058

186 Pages

(available on ibooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other fine eBook distributors)

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Filthy Boys: Male-Male Erotica

A fantastic collection of queer erotica spanning both literature and hotter-than-hot erotica – with a special introduction by Lambda-Award winner Felice Picano.  Includes the celebrated stories such as "The Hope of Cinnamon," "Suddenly, Last Thursday," "That Sweet Smell," "Utter West," and "Friday Night at the Calvary Hotel"

If you are looking for sexually-charged fiction that also has heart and intelligence Filthy Boys is the collection for you.

- Emily Veinglory, author Lovers and Ghosts

To say this is a great book is an understatement. Filthy Boys transcends its genre of erotica and enters the realm of literature.

- Donovan Brown, author My Brotha My Brotha.

$5.99

9781615084265

ISBN 204 Pages

(available on ibooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other fine eBook distributors)

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BodyWork: Male-Male Erotica

There is simply no one better at writing hotter-than-hot gay erotica than the Lambda Literary Award Finalist M.Christian, and with this -- his newest collection -- you'll see why!  From cowboys looking for some same-sex love on the range to jocks working out in unique ways this book is guaranteed to reach out and give your gay desire a good tug! Check out this brand new book by an acknowledged master of genre and see why everyone says he's an wonderful erotic writer.

Reading these tales is like climbing on for a sexual magic carpet ride through different times and places, diverse bodies, and infinite possibilities.

- Carol Queen 

Rarely is raunch paired with such style and wit, M.Christian’s stories offer the sizzle of stroke-book sex combined with the dark lyricism of the perverse.

- Lucy Taylor 

ISBN 9781615089390

$5.99

126 Pages

(available on ibooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other fine eBook distributors)

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Calling M.Christian versatile is a tremendous understatement. Extensively published in science fiction, fantasy, horror, thrillers, and even non-fiction, it is in erotica that M.Christian has become an acknowledged master, with more than 400 stories in such anthologies as Best American Erotica, Best Gay Erotica, Best Lesbian Erotica, Best Bisexual Erotica, Best Fetish Erotica, and in fact too many anthologies, magazines, and sites to name.  In erotica, M.Christian is known and respected not just for his passion on the page but also his staggering imagination and chameleonic ability to successfully and convincingly write for any and all orientations.

But M.Christian has other tricks up his literary sleeve: in addition to writing, he is a prolific and respected anthologist, having edited 25 anthologies to date including the Best S/M Erotica series; Pirate Booty; My Love For All That Is Bizarre: Sherlock Holmes Erotica; The Burning Pen; The Mammoth Book of Future Cops, and The Mammoth Book of Tales of the Road (with Maxim Jakubowksi); Confessions, Garden of Perverse, and Amazons (with Sage Vivant), and many more.

M.Christian's short fiction has been collected into many bestselling books in a wide variety of genres, including the Lambda Award finalist Dirty Words and other queer collections like Filthy Boys, BodyWork, and his best-of-his-best gay erotica book, Stroke the Fire.  He also has collections of non-fiction (Welcome to Weirdsville, Pornotopia, and How To Write And Sell Erotica); science fiction, fantasy and horror (Love Without Gun Control); and erotic science fiction including Rude Mechanicals, Technorotica, Better Than The Real Thing, and the acclaimed Bachelor Machine. 

As a novelist, M.Christian has shown his monumental versatility with books such as the queer vamp novels Running Dry and The Very Bloody Marys; the erotic romance Brushes; the science fiction erotic novel Painted Doll; and the rather controversial gay horror/thrillers Fingers Breadth and Me2. 

M.Christian is also the Associate Publisher for Renaissance E Books, where he strives to be the publisher he'd want to have as a writer, and to help bring quality books (erotica, noir, science fiction, and more) and authors out into the world.  His site is www.mchristian.com.

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Sizzler Editions - an imprint of Renaissance E Books - has been one of the leading publishers of erotica in ebook form since 1999. Sizzler Editions publishes the best in contemporary and classic erotica.

Sizzler Edition's list of writers includes many bestselling and award winning authors, such as Reese Gabriel, Powerone, Terri Pray, Heather McVey, Rod Harden, Marilyn Jaye Lewis, R. Greco, Tilly Andrews, Mykola Dementiuk, and others.

Visit our site at sizzlereditions.com for new book excerpts, cover previews, to listen to new author interviews, and more.

Sizzler Editions was founded by the late David O. Dyer, Sr., to whom all the company's subsequent efforts are gratefully dedicated.

#

For review copies of any of these books – or for further information - please do not hesitate to contact M.Christian:

M.Christian

General site: www.mchristian.com

Queer fiction site: mchristian-queerimaginings.blogspot.com

mchristianzobop@gmail.com

(415) 305-8742

The Next Big Thing - And Stroke The Fire

I'm extremely pleased to be part of the round-robin blog tour started by John Everson - my own invitation coming from the brilliant Lucy Taylor - called The Next Big Thing.  By the way, I also got invites from a similar one from my pal Fulani (via Vanessa Wu) so I'm posting this one, at once, in thanks to all of these great folks!

From here check out the excellent blogs of five of my friends who I've tagged to carry on the tour - they should be posting their answers in about a week or so:

• Jason Rubis 
• Nik Havert
• Felice Picano
• Jan Graham 
• A. F. Waddell

1) What is the working title of your book?

Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian!

2) Where did the idea for the book come from?

Well, to put it mildly I have written more than my fair share of queer erotica and fiction – starting with "Stroke the Fire" that was picked up for Best Gay Erotica 1994 – and ending with this brand new best-of-my-very-best short gay erotica: Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian!

The book is made up of my handpicked favorite stories from three of my queer erotic collections: the Lambda Award finalist Dirty Words, Filthy Boys, and BodyWork. What's even cooler than this brand new best-of-my-very-best book the great folks at Renaissance E Books/Sizzler editions – that also published Stroke the Fire – have re-released not just Dirty Words, Filthy Boys, and BodyWork, but my queer novels The Very Bloody Marys, and (the rather controversial) Me2 as part of a whole "M.Christian" imprint: The M.Christian: The Manlove Collection ... pretty cool, eh?

3) What genre does it fall under?

Even though Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian is basically queer erotica is also contains a lot of stories that run the gamut from horror (like "Wet," Boy," "Echoes" "Matches" and others) to science fiction ("Blue Boy," "Utter West," "Counting," etc) and even stories that, sure, might be gay and erotic but are more-than-a-but off-the-map (like "How Coyote Stole Sun" and "Coyote And The Less Than Perfect Cougar").

I also kept the introductions to the three books that were used to make up Stroke The Fire: my own from BodyWork  Felice Picano's from Filthy Boys and Patrick Califia's from Dirty Words.

4) Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Since the book is a collection that's really tough to say ... though I sometimes visualize actors when I write (like Christian Slater and R. Lee Ermey for my novel, The Very Bloody Marys) I rarely do it when I write short stories. But if I had to pick some actors to appear in Stroke The Fire: The Movie I'd have to pick Ian McKellen, Alan Rickman, Christopher Lee, Nathan Fillion, the boys from Supernatural -- sorry, girls, as it's a gay male book there aren't many roles for women, not that I wouldn't love to get Emma Thompson, Gina Torres, Judi Dench, in there somewhere ... if just because I think they are wonderful and it would be a blast to meet them.

5) What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian is quite literally a collection of the best-of-the-best of M.Christian's short queer erotic fiction, taken from his acclaimed collections Dirty Words (a Lambda Literary Award Finalist), BodyWork, and Filthy Boys.

6) Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian has been published by Renaissance E Books/Sizzler Editions as the benchmark of their The M.Christian: The Manlove Collection imprint, which reprints not just the erotic collections Dirty Words,  BodyWork, and Filthy Boys but also the non-erotic queer novels The Very Bloody Marys, and Me2.

7) How long did it take you to write the first draft?

As the book is a collection – made of other collections – that's really tough to answer. Dirty Words came out in its first edition back in 2001 ... with the other collections coming out every could of years since then. But then the earliest story in the whole book, "Stroke The Fire," first appeared in Best Gay Erotica 1994 so you could almost say that the book took both a month to put together but the content took 18 years ... and, boy, does that sound like a long time when you think of it that way.

8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

For me, Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian is a way of putting everything I've felt proud of writing – that's queer and erotic – into one juicy bundle of pages. Sure, there have been other collections but, as far as I know, there hasn't been a collection that's a collection of other collections ... so I think that Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian is more than a tad unique.

9) Who or what inspired you to write this book?

The wonderful Renaissance E Books/Sizzler editions asked me to put this book together as part of their launch of their special The M.Christian: The Manlove Collection – to be the one place, if people interested in my queer erotica needed just one place, to go to get the best-of-my-best. If you like what's here, in other words, then you'll no doubt love the other books, collections, and anthologies I've done.

10) What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

Well, probably the most unique thing about Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian – and the other queer books and stories I've written over the years – is that I'm a straight guy.

It always takes folks more than a bit aback then I say that but – really, honestly – that's what I am: sure I might write about gay characters (and even gay sexuality) but, more than anything, I'm a writer ... and books like Stroke The Fire (and the books that make it up) are just part of what I do.

Now I want to be absolutely clear that I never, ever, lie to editors, authors publishers, or readers about my own sexuality – though there have been a few odd situations over the years, of course. To this day some people simply think that I'm lying to myself about my own sexuality ... but, honesty, unless you’re a woman (especially a BBW) then Mr. Happy just doesn't salute. Sorry, guys....

I got into being a 'gay' author pretty much the same way I became a horror/fantasy/non-fiction, etc., writer: I saw an opportunity – or was asked to participate in some project-or-other – and, since writers and regular human beings grow through challenges, I gave it a shot and (bingo!) I found that I wasn't just comfortable writing queer fiction but that people actually wanted more of it. No dummy, that's what I did: and so I have a few novels, collections and, with Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian, my own best-of-my-best collection of short queer erotica.

Speaking of other things, I also write non fiction (Welcome to Weirdsville, Pornotopia, and How To Write And Sell Erotica); science fiction, fantasy and horror (Love Without Gun Control); and erotic science fiction including Rude Mechanicals, Technorotica, Better Than The Real Thing, and the acclaimed Bachelor Machine – as well as the erotic romance novel Brushes, the science fiction erotic novel Painted Doll, and over 25 anthologies like the Best S/M Erotica series; Pirate Booty; My Love For All That Is Bizarre: Sherlock Holmes Erotica; The Burning Pen; The Mammoth Book of Future Cops, and The Mammoth Book of Tales of the Road (with Maxim Jakubowksi); Confessions, Garden of Perverse, and Amazons (with Sage Vivant), and many more.

Amos Lassen Likes Stroke The Fire

This is very cool: the wonderful Amos Lassen just posted a very flattering review of my new best-of-my-very-best short erotic fiction,
Stroke The Fire: The Best ManLove Fiction of M. Christian!

I do not read a lot of erotica but I do read a lot of M.Christian and I have, in fact, been reviewing him for almost eight years. “Stroke the Fire” is some of his collected erotica and the stories here are the writer’s own personal selections. Here we have hot sexy men having hot sexy sex, bad boys having sex with good boys and good boys having sex with bad boys. This is just what you need when you cannot get the real thing to keep you warm on a cold winter night.

So Cute!

The First And Cutest Same-Sex Couple To Get Married In Seattle:

Washington's new marriage law took effect at 12:01 Thursday morning.

Jane Abbott Lighty, 77, and Pete-e Petersen, 85, take an oath while receiving the first same-sex marriage license in King County on Thursday, Dec. 6. Washington state voters upheld Referendum 74 in November. Lighty and Peterson have been together for 35 years. 

 

 

12 of Stephen Fry’s Wise, Witty Quotations

12 of Stephen Fry’s Wise, Witty Quotations:



Stephen Fry is an actor, writer, poet, TV host, narrator, and for all I know a terrific cook — the man is so prolific he has a Wikipedia page devoted simply to listing his works. Through all of his work he weaves threads of good humor, keen intellect, and a tremendously open attitude about his own life: the result is a tapestry of wit that is eminently quotable, and deserving of careful reading. Below, I’ve collected my favorite Fry quotations.

1. On Incuriosity
“The only reason people do not know much is because they do not care to know. They are incurious. Incuriosity is the oddest and most foolish failing there is.“
From The Fry Chronicles (Kindle Locations 1265-1266).

2. On Kindles
“This is the point. One technology doesn’t replace another, it complements. Books are no more threatened by Kindle than stairs by elevators.”
From Fry’s Twitter account

3. On Cultural Diversity
“…[L]ook at the kind of people who most object to the childishness and cheapness of celebrity culture. Does one really want to side with such apoplectic and bombastic bores? I should know, I often catch myself being one, and it isn’t pretty. I will defend the absolute value of Mozart over Miley Cyrus, of course I will, but we should be wary of false dichotomies. You do not have to choose between one or the other. You can have both. The human cultural jungle should be as varied and plural as the Amazonian rainforest. We are all richer for biodiversity. We may decide that a puma is worth more to us than a caterpillar, but surely we can agree that the habitat is all the better for being able to sustain each. Monocultures are uninhabitably dull and end as deserts.”
From The Fry Chronicles (Kindle Locations 3852-3857)

4. On Libraries
“What’s great about them is that anybody can go into them and find a book and borrow it free of charge and read it. They don’t have to steal it from a bookshop. … You know when you’re young, you’re growing up, they’re almost sexually exciting places because books are powerhouses of knowledge, and therefore they’re kind of slightly dark and dangerous. You see books that kind of make you go ‘Oh!’”
From Fry’s March 2001 appearance on Room 101.

5. On New Age Philosophy
When asked his opinion about a Dream Catcher:
“The key word for me (my spleen isn’t really big enough to explode with all the splenetic juices of fury that drive me when I consider this), but the real key word that triggers my rage is the word ‘energy’, when people start talking about it in terms of negative or positive types. For instance, ‘there’s very negative energy in here.’ What are you talking about? What do you mean? I mean, let’s think about it. What does energy mean? Well, we know what it means: energy from petrol when it’s burned, it moves the car. ‘This room has positive energy’ — well, where the f***’s it going then? It’s not moving. It’s covering up such woolly thinking, such pathetic nonsense.

“And astrology: most people will say of astrology, ‘Well, it’s harmless fun.’ And I should say that for 80% of the cases it probably is harmless fun, but there’s a strong way in which it isn’t harmless. One, because it is so anti-science. You will hear things like, ‘Science doesn’t know everything.’ Well, of course science doesn’t know everything. But, because science doesn’t know everything, it doesn’t mean that science knows nothing. Science knows enough for us to be watched by a few million people now on television, for these lights to be working, for quite extraordinary miracles to have taken place in terms of the harnessing of the physical world and our dim approaches towards understanding it. And as Wittgenstein quite rightly said, ‘When we understand every single secret of the universe, there will still be left the eternal mystery of the human heart.’”

From Fry’s March 2001 appearance on Room 101.

6. On Smoking
“I think I have always linked smoking and sex. Maybe this is where I have been going wrong all my life.”
From The Fry Chronicles (Kindle Locations 439-440)

7. On Clichés
“It is a cliché that most clichés are true, but then like most clichés, that cliché is untrue. Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will always hurt me.”
From Moab Is My Washpot (p. 113)

8. On His Singing Voice
“I have to mime at parties when everyone sings ‘Happy Birthday.’ … mime or mumble and rumble and growl and grunt so deep that only moles, manta rays and mushrooms can hear me.

“I’m not even tone deaf, that’s the arse-mothering, f***-nosed, bugger-sucking wank of the thing.”

(Note: this bit appears below the heading “I Can’t F***ing Join In” and above the heading “I’m Not Even Tone F***ing Deaf.”)
From Moab Is My Washpot (pp. 85-86)

9. On Poetry and Laziness
“You cannot work too hard at poetry. People are bad at it not because they have tin ears, but because they simply don’t have the faintest idea how much work goes into it. It’s not as if you’re ordering a pizza or doing something that requires direct communication in a very banal way. But it seems these days the only people who spend time over things are retired people and prisoners. We bolt things, untasted.

“It’s so easy to say, ‘That’ll do.’ Everyone’s in a hurry. People are intellectually lazy, morally lazy, ethically lazy…

“… When people get angry with a traffic warden they don’t stop and think what it would be like to be a traffic warden or how annoying it would be if people could park wherever they liked. People talk lazily about how hypocritical politicians are. But everyone is. On the one hand we hate that petrol is expensive and on the other we go on about global warming. We abrogate the responsibility for thought and moral decisions onto others and then have the luxury of saying it’s not good enough.“
From Fry’s interview with The Daily Telegraph promoting his book The Ode Less Travelled: Unlocking the Poet Within.

10. On Critics



“It may be true that critics perform a service, that actors and writers and artists need their egos deflating, that the public needs to be advised about how, where and when to spend their money on artistic activities, that ‘standards’ must be maintained. All the foregoing may be fine and convincing reasons for the existence of critics. The point is that no one would volunteer for this dreadful trade but the kind of worthless and embittered offal that we, by and large, get. What decent person would want to spend a life picking and caviling? Picture this scene. A critic arrives at the gates of heaven. ‘And what did you do?’ asks Saint Peter. ‘Well’, says the dead soul. ‘I criticized things’. ‘I beg your pardon?’ ‘You know, other people wrote things, performed things, painted things and I said stuff like, “thin and unconvincing”, “turgid and uninspired”, “competent and serviceable,”…you know’.”

11. On Drugs and Music
“LSD reveals the whatness of things, their quiddity, their essence. The wateriness of water is suddenly revealed to you, the carpetness of carpets, the woodness of wood, the yellowness of yellow, the fingernailness of fingernails, the allness of all, the nothingness of all, the allness of nothing. For me music gives access to every one of these essences of existence, but at a fraction of the social or financial cost of a drug and without the need to cry “Wow!” all the time, which is one of LSD’s most distressing and least endearing side-effects.”
From Moab Is My Washpot (pp. 83-84). Random House Inc Clients. Kindle Edition.

12. On Believing in Oneself
“I used many times to touch my own chest and feel, under its asthmatic quiver, the engine of the heart and lungs and blood and feel amazed at what I sensed was the enormity of the power I possessed. Not magical power, not all that Carrie teenage telekinetic wank, but real power. The power simply to go on, the power to endure, that is power enough, but I felt I had also the power to create, to add, to delight, to amaze and to transform. Yet I was unwanted, rejected and unthought of. My mother, yes, she believed in me, but everybody’s mother believes in them. No one else believed in me.

“Principally of course—oh how one sees that now—myself. Principally, I did not believe in me. I believed in ghosts more than I believed in me, and take my word for it, I never believed in ghosts, I’m far too spiritual and emotional and passionate to believe in the supernatural.”
From Moab Is My Washpot (p. 381).