Marquesate ~ Basic Training
From: MLR Press

Review of: Marquesate ~ Her Majesty’s Men

The Golden Age Of Gay Fiction
From: MLR Press

Now on Kindle!

The Golden Age Of Gay Fiction
From: MLR Press

IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award

The Golden Age Of Gay Fiction won!

Rick R. Reed ~ Tales From The Sexual Underground From: MLR Press Released: March 5th 2010 Hey everybody…I’m just stopping by here today to share my latest release (the book kind…get your mind out of the gutter). Now, get your mind back in the gutter for Tales from the Sexual Underground, which is subtitled “Fact, Fiction, and Stranger than Fiction.” Get between the covers with me and discover some of my raunchiest and most provocative fiction and essays.

I wanted to write about people who were not just out, but out there, people who lived their sexual lives in ways most of us could only imagine…and for whom the flavor vanilla had absolutely no appeal. I interviewed porn stars, prostitutes, self-proclaimed sex pigs, and delved into bizarre sexual practices. It was eye-opening, arousing, and a lot of fun (but never, never good clean fun). I also include here my favorite dirty stories. They all explore a side of life that exists not in the twilight zone, but in my favorite destination…the sexual underground. Rick R. Reed

I start off with the following piece because I have found, to paraphrase Dorothy in the The Wizard of Oz, that when it comes to sexual gratification, there’s often no place like home.

My Perfect Date

He knows me, so he knows the best time is a quiet one. We stay in. Dinner, drinks, and of course, the last part, the best part.

He starts off casually, wearing a pair of faded Levis, a white T-shirt worn soft, bare feet, hair still damp from the shower. There’s a CD playing, soft, maybe Oscar Peterson conjuring up Gershwin from his piano. He’s got a few candles lit, but nothing scented. The air in his apartment is clean, with a trace of the soap from his shower lingering.

We sit on the couch and he makes me a drink. He already knows what I like, a dirty martini made with vodka, heavy on the dirt. We laugh about how I like things dirty, but not too much. We keep our minds out of the gutter, at least for now.

After the drinks, the music, the light fading to purple outside, we move to the dining room. Old oak pedestal table, mismatched chairs and cream pillar candles…used before. He makes a light meal, because he knows that later, we won’t want anything too heavy weighing on us. A simple salad, arugula, red onion, plum tomatoes, drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. There’s a chicken breast, poached in broth, lemon juice and walnuts, some rice. Strawberries with sour cream and brown sugar for dessert. A glass or two of white wine, an Alsatian Riesling.

We linger over the dinner, slow; the candles burn down. The sky outside fades from purple to navy blue, a glow to the south…city lights. We move to the bedroom, undress slowly.

He knows how to touch me. Knows where to make the pressure slippery and where to make it rough. Knows when to move slowly and when to increase the tempo and when to slow it down again…he doesn’t want things to end too quickly. He knows that my nipples are sensitive and toys with them just hard enough, so I will feel the ghost of his caress in the morning. And all the while: music, orchestrated to ebb and flow, a soundtrack to our passion. We start off with Bach, Mendelssohn, end up with Crystal Method and Prodigy. Romance to filth. And he tells me, the whole time, about past lovers, knowing it excites me as much as his touch. Like the music, he starts off slow and romantic, telling me about his first love, Ron, how they were playful, in love, existing only for each other…so young. He tells me about a particular New Year’s Eve, in a darkened bedroom in Florida, high on pot and champagne and bringing each other the most incredible gifts. But as our passion rises, so does the depravity. He moves on to orgies, nights with strangers fueled by Ecstasy, a frantic, furtive coupling with a Northwestern student in an alley by the el tracks one night in August, fucking each other sweatily while the train crackled and roared above, its human cargo oblivious. He tells me about backroom sex, the smell of poppers, leather, cum and spit in the air, groping, being groped, connecting with shadows. He tells me everything, moving faster and faster, until even his tales and touch blur and I offer up my seed; it covers my belly in viscous arcs.

And I roll over and look at him…in the mirror. He is me. He is me.

For you Canadians out there OUTtv is having a contest and one of the prizes is an MLR Press package.

Anthology ~ Esprit De Corps
From: MLR Press

Victor J. Banis
Josh Lanyon
Samantha Kane
George Seaton

Why does this sound like that pig is involved?
I can’t really review this anthology because I was sorta “involved”… but I do want to thank Laura Baumbach at MLR Press for letting me pitch this idea and contribute to helping make this book happen. I can honestly say this anthology represents some of my favorite Gay Romance Authors making magic about gay men serving in the military and I was so jazzed this actually came together and Anne Cain of course rocks the cover here. What a dream come true and simply top shelf all the way!

Merry Christmas Everyone!
I hope you like it as much as I do.

I like the idea of the ePublisher doing a general commercial of their offerings.

The Golden Age Of Gay Fiction

From: MLR Press

Wow, that was fast! Laura is quick on the updates.
The Golden Age Of Gay Fiction is now available.

Earl Kemp Magazine has an article The History of a Collection by Drewey Wayne Gunn who is the editor of this book by the way. Great inside info on MLR Press and Laura Baumbach who is one of those “straight women” we have been hearing about and also on her spare time is doing great things for Gay Literature. So yeah.

I say again: YOU SO HAVE TO GET THIS ONE!

I noticed you guys really liked seeing that old cover art so I decided maybe providing a few more classic covers to promote the subject of this wonderful textbook in which essay after essay provides rare glimpses at the real facts around the evolution of Gay Literature. Further promoting the festishizing of Gay Men and demeaning to Gay Men and focusing on Gay Sex and more sex and those Tighty Whitey covers. FOR SHAME YOU GAY FICTION WRITERS! Oh sorry, where was I? Oh yeah, because it’s common sense that sex sells and how better to make a buck than publishing about taboo subjects using relatively cheap printing technology. Welcome to the Internet, would you like a beverage with your porn?

Oh and by the way, Victor J. Banis provides his expert views in The Golden Age of Gay Fiction but there is another great article he wrote on Earl Kemp called Godfather Virgin that you can read while you wait.

Anyway, onto more reality, relevant facts about the genre and oh those classic covers…

Chef Lou Rand Hogan ~ The Gay Cookbook
From: Bell Publishing Company

Lance Lester ~ Cruising Horny Corners
From: Companion Book

Chris Davidson ~ Go Down Aaron
From: Ember Library Book

Lance Lester ~ Waco’s Boy
From: Pleasure Reader

Chris Davidson ~ Caves Of Iron
From: Green Leaf Classics

YOU SO HAVE TO GET THIS ONE!

This is a must have series of essays from some of THE experts of Classic Gay Fiction and all that but I also had to share with you what I found when I opened the book. ORIGINAL COVER PHOTOS! Hot damn! Now you get to see the type of book covers I used to peruse in the library back when I used to have to sneak over to the gay section. These are the books I used to sneak home with me to hide under the bed.

Thank you Laura and MLR Press. You guys so rock!

The saddest part is most of the early Gay Fiction Classics I am showing you here on the blog and the ones you will see in the book are not in eBook form and are in fact sorta hard to track down in paperback. I have linked you to the most logical places to pick up a reasonably priced edition if you are interested.

Gordon Merrick ~ The Lord Won’t Mind
From: Alyson

Patricia Nell Warren ~ The Front Runner
From: Bantam

Neville Jackson (AKA Gerald Glaskin) ~ No End To The Way
From: Corgi

Richard Chopping ~ The Ring
From: Bantam