Happy Ending is set in the same East Coast small town, Smithfield, like Gobsmacked, and has some traits in common with it, but it’s an independent story.

The feeling of a “familiar” story, the little town where everyone knows everyone else, the gay characters that yes, maybe have some trouble, but more or less are living like ordinary people among the small community, those are the traits in common. Other than that, David and Seth are two completely different characters from Tony and Mark.

Seth is a 36 years old business man, and truth be told, neither so nice. His sister Nikki died leaving him the sole relative of a six years old baby girl, Molly, and Seth is not sure what to do with her. Seth is used to deal with construction workers and budgets and due lines, not with barbies and little pony, all in shades of pink and purple. The new turn in his life also cost him his in live partner, Quinn, who packed and moved in Florida; I have the feeling that Seth misses more Quinn’s cooking abilities than the partner though.

From what I gathered, Seth is a creature of habit who doesn’t like change; for this simple reason it's never passed on his mind to cheat on Quinn, not since he loved the man, but since he was not interested in looking around. When Quinn is out of the picture Seth, after a short period of mourning, starts to notice again the dating world around him, and his eyes focus on David. Not that it’s so difficult, in a small town like Smithfield David works three jobs, and all of them are somewhat involved with Seth: he is a masseur in the spa where Seth goes once a week; he is a waiter in the pub Seth frequents more than once a week; and finally he is a young adult writer and Seth has a six years old girl who reads his books.

But David is not Seth’s type, or so he thinks. First he is way to younger, 10 years; second, he is not on the same level of Seth, he has no steady job, he is the picture on unsteadiness; third, with his long black hair, piercings and tattoo, he is not the man Seth would picture on his side, even less now that he is the parent of a child. But one thing is thinking it and another thing is to convince his body that he doesn’t like David. David on the other hand, after the initial usual misunderstanding, seems more than willing to deepen their acquaintance, and the sex is great, easy and without second thought regrets.

As before, the story is good, the drama and angst is there, but like the small town in which the story is set, also the drama is small, not so overtly imposing to overcome the romance. All in all, everything is near, even the solution and the answers to all the questions. Happy Ending, like Gobsmacked, is a little and nice story, with an homey flavour.

http://www.aspenmountainpress.com/romance/male-male-erotica/happy-ending/prod_230.html

Buy at 1 Romance Ebooks

Amazon Kindle: Happy Ending (Men of Smithfield)

Series: Men of Smithfield
1) Gobsmacked: http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/657594.html
2) Happy Ending

Reading List:

http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bottom.php?tag=reading list&view=elisa.rolle

Just because, the cover of the coffee table photo book Tony Duran made from the shot he did for the Dieux du stade 2010 Calendar:



It took me at least two minutes to understand how many bodies were involved, and I'm still not sure ;-) The link to buy it is not yet available, meanwhile, if you are interested, you can buy the Calendar:

Amazon: Dieux du stade 2010

And since it's almost up to the theme, a link I found on kyellgold:

British Lions rugby legend Gareth Thomas: "It's ended my marriage and nearly driven me to suicide. Now it's time to tell the world the truth - I'm gay"

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1237035/British-Lions-rugby-legend-Gareth-Thomas-Its-ended-marriage-nearly-driven-suicide-Now-time-tell-world-truth--Im-gay.html

"Ex-Lion Gareth Thomas reveals he is gay"

Read more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/rugby_union/welsh/8421956.stm

I have already said it before, I really like when J.M. Snyder plays with her boys, meaning that when her stories are about boys not yet men that are playing with life. This is the feeling I have of Carey’d Away, even if it’s not specifically said, I think all the characters in here are really young, probably young men just out of college or maybe even little more than teenagers.

The story is about a group of friends, a gay couple, Tyreese and Bill, a lesbian one, Shonda and Jan, and the black sheep, Carey. Carey is the only one who is still single, who plays the field every night, but lately the game is no more funny. Carey wants a boyfriend; oh no, he doesn’t want the serious thing, home, family and stability, he wants the cute thing, a boy to kiss, someone to play with, someone to fill his mind and flutter his stomach. Actually he is not even a likable character, he is lazy and bratty, maybe even careless, but he is so cute and full of life that the reader is willing to forget all his faults.

Pat is a shy guy, even a bit nerdy; he is the guy who no one looks in high school, for sure no one like Carey would. That is a feeling I had for all the novella, the feeling of reading an high school story, even if the characters are older and already out of school; but there was that innocence, that joy of life that usually you only find in a story about teenagers. Anyway Pat is both happy and scared when he realizes that Carey is interested in him, he is scared to not being up to Carey’s expectation. Carey is easy and free, Pat is careful and shy. Carey wears his gayness like a bow; Pat takes it hidden away from prying eyes. Even when they are among friendly company, Pat doesn’t feel comfortable, and if Carey wants to have his way with him, he has to find a way to make Pat forgets of the world around them.

This is only a night in their life, both characters are cute, and from the little details here and there, I can say that they are young and happy, but this is not they “life” story. We can’t say what will happen in a month, if Carey will loose interest or if Pat will realize that he is too different from Carey and his friends to be comfortable with them, but for now, they are young and happy, and that is enough.

http://www.amberquill.com/AmberAllure/CareydAway.html

Amazon Kindle: Carey’d Away

Reading List:

http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bottom.php?tag=reading list&view=elisa.rolle

I slept in till nine this morning. Huzzah!

I feel quite rested this morning, although my lower throat is sore. I wish this cold or whatever the hell it is will go away at some point. I'm not quite sure what the problem is, but I grow weary of it. I am rather tired of it, and it is rather cold this morning--at least it is here in the Lost Apartment. I am not writing a word of fiction this weekend; the Lost Apartment is a sty and must be cleaned thoroughly before I even think about writing anything. However, with Christmas just around the corner (less than a week, EEK!) I have lots to get done. John and Michael have invited us over for dinner on the holiday, which we did two years ago and was very nice, and I am going to make a really nice meal for me, Paul and Skittle on Christmas Eve; I am thinking a nice pot roast with potatoes and carrots. Paul loves pot roast, and frankly I am rather fond of it myself--I just never think to make it. I am going to make some potato leek soup at some point over this weekend, and maybe some sausage bread, and I think Monday I am going to make homemade sloppy joes. A rather ambitious cooking plan, to be sure, but there you have it.

Must get kitchen cleaned and organized.

I put up the tree to surprise Paul last night while he was with his trainer, and as such cleaned the living room. Tis truly amazing what a difference it makes when the house is clean. There's still too much clutter--as always--but I am planning on getting through all these books I am judging before the New Year, and then getting them out of the way. And in a moment of complete insanity, I agreed to serve as a judge for yet another book award in the new year.

Heavy sigh. One would think I'd learn.

I do have some errands to run today--post office, grocery store, storage place--and then I think I am parking my ass in the easy chair. We are invited to a Christmas party tonight, but given how wretched my throat feels, I don't think it's a good idea. We'll see how I feel.

It also is weird to have no college football distraction today.

But the bowls are coming, the bowls are coming!

And tonight the Saints play the Cowboys in the dome. On my way home from work last evening, I noticed that they were already tailgating in the CBD. Awesome.

I also posted this link on my Facebook yesterday, but I am putting it here as well. This is probably the best article I've seen about New Orleans since the storm anywhere written by someone Not From Here:

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/columns/story?page=hotread14/Saints

And what is the deal with these spaces between paragraphs? I hate when they change formatting. Maybe I should read the emails they send me..

calendula_witch and I are off to Seattle shortly, for tbclone47's party, then social time with markferrari and shelly_rae. A whirlwind tour, back to Portland tomorrow afternoon, then she flies home to San Francisco at 0:dark:stupid Monday. the_child and I will follow on Boxing Day.

Difficult night last night for me in cancerland. I've been oversleeping and napping a lot, as part of the healing process. My body decided about 1 am that it had had enough sleep, and I spent a couple of hours rattling around. Both sides are extremely uncomfortable to lie on, due to the two recent surgeries, so I tend to go to my back, which is an unnatural sleeping position. I wound up in the lounger in the living room, where I could at least cradle my body in a more comfortable position. I'm not in a lot of pain, but the discomfort borders on the extreme.

Awake, I was having weird anxiety thoughts. Last night, calendula_witch had been reading about one of my high school classmates in The New Yorker. I'd said something mopey about never being famous enough for The New Yorker, she gave me a funny look and pointed out we never would have met if I hadn't been a well-known public person, given that we met at a conference she came to in part to work with me as an instructor. I had to laugh at that. Still, the thoughts came back to me in the night. I'd given up reading my high school almuni newsletter in my mid-twenties, when I was a low level grunt in the advertising field, and my classmates were making their debut on the London stage or becoming directors of investment banks in the Caymans or whatever. That's the thing about going to a very academically competitive, very exclusive private school — most of the folks around you are loaded with privilege and brains, which is a hell of a combination. Frankly, I'm loaded with both too, not pleading any kind of poverty here, but the ladder runs much higher than my rung, and we all have that human tendency to look up.

So look up I did last night, and feel somewhat sad and sorry for myself. Add to this the string of minor domestic disasters of late (the moth infestation, the plumbing problems, the burning of the garlic bread last night, the hidden water somewhere in my car...) and I have plenty to be grumpy about if I let myself. This morning on our walk, calendula_witch and I discussed that line of thought. I am, of course, prima facie an idiot. My social media presence reaches about 5,000 people every day. Tens of thousands of people read my fiction. The me of ten years ago would have gazed in envious awe at the career I have today. Human nature being what it is, we always stand at the center as the world moves around us. I often need to be reminded that I am special. She does this for me, brilliantly.

Meanwhile, when I did sleep, I had some pretty classic anxiety dreams. My brother had died, in my dream, of a rather strange accident, and I was so drug-addled I kept forgetting this. My parents were trying to keep it together for me in my cancer-ridden state. And so we went round in a little parade of misery, most of this theatre of the emotion taking place on the Portland MAX train in my dreamland. Then my teeth started falling out unexpectedly.

I don't need a Joseph to interpret that dream. Oneiromancy is second nature to any competent writer, it's what we do on the page after all. Still, that was interwoven with my anxieties about my life. When I finally did give up and rise from the chair, everything hurt. Luckily, my temperament and lifestyle have equipped me to think in layers without unhealthy compartmentalization, so I am able to recognize that except for the pain in my left and right chest, I feel pretty good, and respond accordingly. Part of the journey of cancer is managing the things that pop into my head, and keeping myself on track.

Seattle beckons now, and we are close to being later than we mean, so I am off. I will see some of you later today. Regular blogging service may be interrupted tomorrow, due to traveling back, but we shall see. In any event, y'all play nice while I'm gone.

Your Saturday moment of zen.



Sunflower in SE Portland. © 2006, 2009 Joseph E. Lake, Jr.



This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

In which I am interviewed by Ann Wilkes

Paul Genesse reviews Steampunk — Is very complimentary of me.

Interrupting Gelastic Jew on trusting your process — She's talking about piano, but this applies very well to writing.

Deconstructing Melville — One drawing for every page of Moby Dick. (Snurched from Drawn!.)

Annals of linguistic prejudice — Interesting, rambling post from Language Log on dialect, culture and politics.

In Defense of Foxhole Atheists — Ah, Christianity. (Snurched from Scrivener's Error.)

?otD: Do you turn your face toward the rain?

---

12/19/2009
Body movement: 60 minute suburban walk
Hours slept: 6.5
This morning's weigh-in: n/a (forgot)
Currently reading: Finch by Jeff VanderMeer

The story caught me a bit unprepared since it plunged me in the middle of something happening between Brett and Shawn. They are not stranger, Shawn works for Brett, but now they are not at work, they are in a BDSM resort. They are not together, and the reader doesn’t know if Brett went there to stop Shawn to do a big mistake, or if he was there just by chance. What the reader knows is that Brett has his eyes on Shawn for months now, and he is not willing to let someone else snatch the boy from under his nose.

Brett is a dominant and he recognized in Shawn all the signs of a submissive; not only Shawn is little and pretty, he is also very willing to let someone else take the lead during lovemaking. But once the sex is finished, Shawn refuses to continue with the game, claiming that he is not a submissive. Actually I think that Shawn is for sure a submissive but he has not found the right dominant: Shawn is at the same time cute and bratty, he is like a kitten, ready to purr but easy to scratch the hand that is stroking him if he notices a lack of interest in the stroke. Shawn is not a submissive eager to please; he is a submissive eager to let someone else please him.

Shawn is exactly what you define an high-maintenance boy-toy, he is not for every man, only a very self-conscious dominant will be able to rein him. Only a dominant who doesn’t need to be reassured on his power can take in hand a submissive like Shawn, since Shawn will never reassure anyone, Shawn will ask, will pretend, but he will also surrender with grace.

I like the story, but I would have liked it more if it was not only a moment in time; I missed the preface, the little and continuous teasing of an unwilling Shawn (or maybe not so unwilling) during job hours, and I missed what it will be of them once they will leave the resort to go back to their everyday life. I wouldn’t have minded to have a bit of office affair romance spiced with naughtiness.

http://www.total-e-bound.com/product.asp?strParents=&CAT_ID=&P_ID=507

Reading List:

http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bottom.php?tag=reading list&view=elisa.rolle

I think jaye_valentine  will like this commercial, even if it could have been a bit more... naughty. Anyway I like the idea, even if I would have preferred for the male car driver to be a little more "pretty", but I read comment around of people who like the butch imaginery.

In a clever commercial about the uniqueness of identical twins, the ad shows the similarities of two young men as they get ready in the morning.



As if in the military, Erik and Derek get ready together in the morning, shaving and even showering together. They wear the same clothes and each makes his own music mix for their MiniDisc players. They both leave their apartment together and wait to be picked up.

One is picked up by a sexy woman in a slinky outfit, and the other is picked up by a rather unlikely, not-so-attractive (by idealistic advertising standards), goateed wrestler. The ad agency, which clearly intended for somewhat of a shock effect with the wrestler, purposely picked someone who does not reflect society's general view of "beauty" and absurdly put him in a wrestler's outfit.

Commercial Closet Association

Company: Sony Corp.
Brand: Sony MiniDisc
Ad Title: Twins
Business Category: Consumer Electronics
Media Outlets: Television
Country: Australia , New Zealand , Philippines
Region: Australia/New Zealand
Agency: Generator
Year: 1999
Target: Mainstream
Ad Spotter: Michelangelo Signorile

Just a note, the big pine tree you see was a very little and ugly christmas tree my aunt decided it was not fit to be in her house. My mom, when she saw it had the root, told her to not threw it away, and she put it in our garden... my mother always rescued everything alive, stray cats, dogs, plants...



( Read more... )

My hair, after being French braided for two days.

Photograph © 2009 Shannon Page, used with permission.

I remember with pleasure By Degrees, the previous romance by J.B. McDonald, and In the Rough is almost a sequel. Rick and Jay, the two men of this new story, were also in the previous book; Rick is Tim’s older “big brother”, the reference figure social services assigned to Tim when he was a troubled teenager. But Rick is not the perfect man that usually is assigned to this task; he himself was a runaway kid, escaping and abusive father when he was only 13 years old. Rick was only lucky to find Jay before any other potential danger found him, and Jay took him under his wing. Jay who at 16 years old was barely old enough to look after himself, who was already and hustler and a drug addicted, Jay tried to save Rick from all of it, since he was unable to save himself. And Rick obviously falls in love for Jay.

Now 20 years later, Rick is still in love with Jay, but he is also angry. Oh yes, to the reader Rick could seem the perfect balanced man, the mainstay for the unbalanced Jay, but for me Rick is only a very upset man; for almost 20 years he has waited for Jay to change, for finally stop behaving like a teenager and take in hand his life. After that, obviously, Jay would finally realize that Rick is the perfect man the readers already see, and he would fall in love back for him… yes, Rick is always supporting of Jay, he is always ready to help him, even now that he is trying to obtain his daughter’s custody, and he is always willing when Jay is in the mood for some buddy-sex without strings attached, but deep inside Rick is always hoping for more, he is always trying to change Jay, to fit him to the image of the perfect partner that he wants, someone completely different from his own father.

And instead Jay is avoiding all of it, he is avoiding having a serious relationship, he is avoiding having a family, he is avoiding settling down… he is trying to be as far as possible from how his father was. But when his daughter needs him, then Jay understands that it’s time to change his life, and even if not consciously, he is slowly arriving to the conclusion that, since Rick was always there for him, since he loves him and Rick loves him back, then why they couldn’t be a family? What I was probably expecting was that sooner or later one of them arrived to the logical conclusion that being together, and living together, would have solved their entire problem. Since Rick loves Jay, for me it was obvious that he should offer to Jay his heart and his home; since Jay loves Rick, for me it was obvious that he should accept Rick’s help for the well-being of his daughter… but what it was obvious for me, it wasn’t for them.

Sometime I had the feeling that Rick was willing to help Jay, but only so far; he was risking a lot, but not all of him, I had the impression that, in the end, he was not willing to risk his heart. It’s not that Rick is not a good man, it’s probably that he has some hung ups from his past that he has never realized to have: he can’t fully help Jay, risking his heart, since he himself needs to be comfortable with his own trouble. For all the novel, all the people around focused on Jay, and on making him change, to be a better man and a good father, but no one, if not sometime Tim, had the courage to bring aside Rick and tell him to grow. When they were young, Rick thought Jay to be the world; when they got older, Rick thought he overgrown Jay, and now Rick thinks to be better than him since he has a job and a place to stay. In the end, I think that instead Rick has never overgrown his best friend, and Jay still is the older and bigger of the two, who is still taking care of all the people he loves, while at the same time trying to destroy himself due to some bad placed guilty sense.

http://www.torquerebooks.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&manufacturers_id=261&products_id=2110

Amazon: In the Rough

Series:

1) By Degrees: http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/584822.html
2) In the Rough

Reading List:

http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bottom.php?tag=reading list&view=elisa.rolle

And to the one hater that told me to STFU and quit with the podcasts, dude, just take me off your reading list, dummy. Okay, this was the episode that had Snookie getting cracked in the face. Eesh. Again, I had to break it up, but they're seamless when you play them.

I swear to god, I love this show. It's absolutely crack and KUH-RAY-ZEE. Have a great weekend, everyone!

Part one
Part two
Part Three

( transcript for those that can't dl )

I know it's cheesy, but the other day I downloaded a butt-load of classic Neil Diamond (and no, that awful "Come to America" was NOT one of them), and have actually enjoyed listening to them.

I never claimed to have great taste in music.

We finally watched the last disc of Harper's Island the other night, and sadly, Paul's and my suspicions about the killer were proved to be correct. Nevertheless, it was a lot of fun to watch. We are now in the midst of Season 3 of The Tudors--and while it is still incredibly well-done, it's just not as interesting without Anne Boleyn; the last four wives were rather anti-climactic. Ah, well.

I am starting to come out of the post-book malaise, which is actually a really good thing. I had one of those Grealicious moments of stark horror yesterday morning; for some reason I'd gotten it into my head that Beautiful was due on April 1, and yesterday morning I was thinking about it, and realized, "That's not right; you picked the due date, and I distinctly remember thinking after I picked it that I'd be able to enjoy the TW Fest for the first time in years--Paul and I even discussed it." So, I dug out the contract and was horrified to see that it is due March 1. YIKES!!! Of course, I had no idea at the time that a Super Bowl trip by the Saints was a distinct possibility; and obviously I completely blanked out the two weeks of Mardi Gras.

Guess I need to get cracking, eh?

But there's a lot of housecleaning I need to get done; my house needs to be put in order before I neglect it for three months.

Heavy sigh.

I got a surprise commercial shoot today (whee!) which means that I'm about to leave and won't be back until lunch-ish. Which means that my planned podcast of the Jersey Shore won't happen until after lunch. Which means, okay, I'll stop that. Does anyone even care about my thoughts on yaoi? douchebaggery? This was the episode when Snickles got popped in the nose, if that helps you any. (That was actually pretty intense and horrible, poor little orange oompah loompah!) So I'll leave it up to a poll if I should spend the time making a podcast, or if it's just my Nana listening to it fifteen times.

(And I like making them, it's good voice over practice. But hey, if they're irritating, that's good to know. I'll just sit over here like a dog in the dark eating wet cigarette butts, I hope you know. What, you're too good ta listen to someone talk? Mr. Big Shot podiatrist too busy to call ya mother? I was in labor for nine months, yes, the whole time I carried you, I was in labor, but did I complain once? My feet looked like Challah bread... [/Linda Richman] Lol.

[ETA] Suck it, haters, it's up. ;)

Poll #1500589 TRW: Oompah Loompah-land (Jersey Shore) podcast
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 23

Stoney, I would like you to

What I need you to unnerstan is:

A'right a'ready, I gots ta get ready to be a hot nurse. The call didn't ask for a hot nurse, but I can read between the lines. (Lol. Way to fast track yourself to getting dumped by your agent!) (Oh, and I spent SEVEN hours cutting out felt birds yesterday. I scheduled a massage for tomorrow morning. Hunched over a counter for hours? I feel like I'm a semi-colon. *kee-rack*

shelly_rae takes the train home to Seattle this morning, and life officially goes back to more-or-less normal here at Nuevo Rancho Lake, at least until chemo starts on January 8th. Life being more-or-less normal, calendula_witch arrives later this morning by plane from San Francisco. We'll spend some time recentering, then at a family Christmas party tonight. Tomorrow we're off to Seattle for tbclone47's birthday party, where we will see markferrari and shelly_rae, along with many other dear friends.

calendula_witch flies home on Monday. I follow next Saturday, the day after Christmas, accompanied by the_child. We'll get to meet calendula_witch's mysterious aunt from foreign parts, which will be good fun, and bomb around San Francisco. the_child comes back home the 30th, I return on the 3rd, then we begin the slide home into chemo land.

It will be a good Christmas, and good end to the year. I'll be cherishing all that for the New Year, because kicking cancer's ass through chemo is going to take every ounce of good I've ever had in my life. May all of you have a holiday season as joyous and filled with love as mine.

Here, courtesy of shelly_rae, are photos of the zombie hair incident.

( Under cut for potential ick )

I am pleased to announce that my short story "Torquing Vacuum", from the Sunspin continuity, has been accepted for publication by Clarkesworld.

Your Friday moment of zen.



Ginormous pipe, Lime, OR © 2002, 2009 Joseph E. Lake, Jr.



This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.