Author Interview: ALEX MORGAN

Author Interview by A.J. Llewellyn

1. Hi Alex and welcome to the Divas’ den! I would like to thank you for stopping by and want to start by asking about your two nome des plume, Alex Morgan and Alan Scott. I know Alan’s work is mainstream rather than erotic, but there is a paranormal element threaded through these stories. Please tell me a little bit about both these talented authors.

Thank you, AJ! I appreciate and am quite honored with the invitation. I wrote my first two novels under the name Alan Scott (since my last name is difficult to pronounce) and those did have the paranormal elements of psychic powers such as telekinesis, telepathy and clairvoyance. I’ve always been fascinated by comic books and the super-hero genre as well as mysteries. So I created a group of men who were trained to develop psychic powers and apply them to solving crimes. Think of X-Men meet Hercule Poirot!

When loveyoudivine Alterotica was asking for gay erotica short stories for publication, I saw an opportunity to have my creations finally in print. So I developed the character Corey Shaw (handsome, telepathic and gay) to solve a murder involving the BDSM community. I wasn’t prepared to mix my mainstream with my gay erotica works so I went with the name Alexander Morgan, my ‘pirate’ name since 1995, for loveyoudivine.

2. Which of them is closest to your heart and do they ever fight with each other? Do you ever have to pull over on the side of the freeway and tell Alex and Alan to play nicely?

LOL! No, I’m not that over-the-top. Think of them as the super-hero and his secret leather identity.

3. His secret leather identity? I love it! Provincetown features heavily in your stories…is this a place you love?

Yes, I’ve been to Provincetown several times and just recently to do a little research for “Safe Word”. When I came up with the idea of a murder in the gay BDSM community, I thought that Provincetown would be the ideal setting for the story.

4. I know you live in Washington DC with your partner and your cat…please tell us a little about your life there. It is a place of inspiration for you?

Not yet. But I’m thinking about picking up where Margaret Truman left off. All of her mysteries took place in the DC area, but she never wrote “Murder in Adams Morgan” or “Murder at the Green Lantern” (the Green Lantern is a popular gay bar here).
I draw most of my inspiration from my travels around the country (much like Agatha Christie who wrote her books based on her travels around the globe). For example, my first novel “Inside Passage to Murder” is set on a cruise ship in Alaska. “A Faire Day for Murder” takes place during a renaissance festival in Oklahoma.

5. I thought Corey Shaw was a convincing hero in your short story “Safe Word” from the MEN Anthology. He is also in another short story I believe…”Provincetown.” Any plans to bring him back?

I first introduced Corey in a short story written for a contest on Writing.com and then featured him again in another story “Provincetown” for an erotica contest. I created “Safe Word” with him specifically in mind. “Provincetown” is now a chapter in the extended version of “Safe Word” which I discuss a little later in the interview.

You will see Corey in future works, although I have no immediate plans for him.

6. You seem to favor BDSM as a genre…what is your feeling about the genre in general? May I ask if you practice this in your life?

Oh, you’re getting rather personal here, AJ! LOL

AJ says: I've been told that before!

No, I do not practice this in my life although I’d love to. There I’ve let out my deepest darkest secret. I do love the BDSM concept and the Power Exchange between two men. To me there is nothing hotter than a handsome man tied up and at the mercy of another. This can create many different situations for a writer of BDSM to develop, since the dynamics have endless possibilities!


7. Alex, I am on my way over! Ahem...let me ask you, which erotic fiction authors do you read? And which are your favorite authors?

The erotica authors on Writing.com are excellent and I love reading their works. For the longest time, I shied away from reading any type of gay literature because I found the stories to be more unbelievable than a group of super-powered mutants or a 200-foot tall, radioactive Tyrannosaurus Rex destroying Tokyo.

I enjoy reading Jon Michaelsen’s work “Pretty Boy Dead”, a murder mystery set in Atlanta’s gay community and Sephina’s “Servants of Night”, an erotic vampire story.

8. I know you are a big mystery lover…if I was new to the genre, what would be my five top must-reads?

These choices are my opinion only, so another mystery lover would probably disagree and have an entirely different list, but mine’s better! LOL

1. Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie. This was the first book I read outside of the “Hardy Boys” and loved it. Hercule Poirot figured out the mystery without being in the wrong place at the wrong time like Frank and Joe. What a concept!
2. Any Brother Cadfael novel by Ellis Peters. She is probably the best author of historical mysteries. Her works have been made it onto the silver screen with Derek Jacobi in the title role.
3. Ashes of Aries by Martha C. Lawrence. Ms. Lawrence is the only other mystery writer I have found (so far) that has a psychic sleuth. Elizabeth Chase is a psychic investigator and based on Ms. Lawrence’s own experiences studying the paranormal. “Ashes” is not her first novel but I find it to be a better work. I think she was working her way through the Zodiac but for some reason, she only has five novels.
4. Green Grow the Dollars by Emma Lathen. Emma Lathen is the pseudonym of two women who also wrote under the pseudonym R. B. Dominic. Lathen’s sleuth is John Putnam Thatcher, a Wall Street banker. Dominic’s is Senator Benton Safford from Ohio in Washington, DC. In “Green Grow the Dollars”, Thatcher solves the mystery in a very simple way. He makes a phone call and asks one question. Lathen’s books are also fun to read since many were written in the 60’s and 70’s, when bankers’ offices had mini-bars but no computers.
5. Absolution by Murder by Peter Tremayne. Tremayne is the pseudonym of a well-known expert on ancient Ireland. His sleuth is a young nun Sister Fidelma. I like his series because he puts so much of the society and environment from that era into his stories that ancient Ireland comes to life in his pages. Margaret Frazer also has a great historical series with her Dame Frevisse character.

9. My to-read list just grew bigger! LOL...I know you have some upcoming releases…one for LoveYouDivine in the MOH Anthology and a Halloween story. Please tell me about them and also please tell me what else you’re cooking on the stove.

Actually, my short for Men On Holiday is “Soumets-toi á moi”, a Mardi Gras theme. The title can be translated loosely to mean “Surrender the booty”. It involves the ghost of the pirate Jean Lafitte stalking two young men who have discovered a piece of his treasure.

I have also submitted a story to loveyoudivine titled “Love’s Snowblind”. The idea came from a friend of mine in Canada who has extremely poor eyesight. “Love’s Snowblind” is about a man getting lost in a forest during a blizzard and is rescued by a (near) blind man, who takes him back to his cabin and nurses him back to health. There is a short but unique bondage scene in it, of course!

And I am in the process of expanding “Safe Word” into a novel! I’m very excited about that. It is in the first editing phase right now so no date for its release has been set.

10. If you could get a publishing deal to write one non fiction book on anything in the world you wanted, what would it be and why?

I have been so intrigued by the works of Erik Larsen “Isaac’s Storm” (Galveston Hurricane of 1900), David McCullough’s “The Johnstown Flood” and David Laskin’s “The Children’s Blizzard”. It’s not that I have a morbid fascination with weather-related catastrophes but I am so impressed with the authors’ abilities to chronicle the changes in weather prior to the disasters, and then recreate minute-by-minute the series of events as experienced by the people in those communities.

I would like to write about the destruction of Port Royal, Jamaica by earthquake, fire and then tsunami in 1692. It was a haven for pirates during that era and was nothing more than a heathen den of iniquity and hedonism and its destruction was heralded as God’s punishment on the evil. I’d like to recreate the catastrophic events of that dreadful day in the same manner as Larsen, McCullough and Laskin.

On behalf of Dark Diva Reviews, I'd like to thank you for stopping by today Alex and for putting up with me!

Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity to reach out to your audience, AJ!

To find out more about this talented author, please visit his links:

http://pennedbyalanscott.com/alex_home.htm

www.loveyoudivine.com

Author Interview: CAROL McKENZIE

Author Interview by A. J. Llewellyn

1. Hi Carol and welcome to the Divas’ Dark Den! My first question to you is about your latest release Cowboy Dreams for the Men on Holiday Anthology. It’s actually M/M/ rather than a M/M story isn’t it?

I appreciate the warm welcome AJ and many thanks to Divas’ Dark Den for having me today. Okay...now to answer your question. Let’s see...I wrote a story titled Cowboy Dreams over a year ago and it is not gay lit but more M/M/F historical. The story that released this December, 2008 at loveyoudivine is titled Cowboys’ Christmas.

C.C. is a gay love story with bits of eroticism in it. Two rodeo hands hook up after fulfilling their obligations to the rodeo circuit one cold December day in the state of Washington.

AJ says: Wow that sounds hot!

Thanks AJ! To clarify, Cowboys’ Christmas is not “porn” hot, but it’s more a romantic, warm story. At thirty, their backs ache from the rigors of being bucked off horses. Because they work different circuits, time separates them, but their love remains in tact. Every year they meet at the same spot and spend time together. The story contains couple of lovemaking scenes. C.C. is my addition to the print anthology to be published by loveyoudivine in 2009 titled Men On Holiday.

2. Was Pure Artistry - which is in the original Men antho - your first foray into the M/M realm and how did it come about?

A couple of years ago, I wrote Day of Reckoning which was my first serious attempt to write gay lit. I’ve always loved cowboys, gay or straight, and found that I had a lot of fun writing them. I believe Pure Artistry is the third attempt to write gay lit. I’ve read Lassoed by B.A. Tortuga and her work inspired to write my own story. I also watched (and loved) the movie Brokeback Mountain. This award-winning movie also inspired me to write M/M.

3. What kind of research did you do to write M/M?

As far as research goes, I’ve read stories by Ally Blue, (Willow Bend) and B.A. Tortuga, (Lassoed) and J. M. Snyder (Working Man). I’ve read articles on blogs which serves up a great source of research material. My deceased stepson was gay and for this reason I’m drawn to and know a little about this type of literature and lifestyle. The M/M title which necessitated a lot (I mean a lot) of research is releasing at www.ShadowfirePress.com January 16th, 2009.

Its title is Pirate of Purgatory Island and is about a Pirate who saves a Boston medical understudy from another pirate who plans to take him aboard his ship as a sex slave.

4. A pirate? That sounds amazing! I love pirates - but since it is involves a med student it’s clearly not a period piece…so I am curious what this research involves?

It involves many hours of study. Regarding pirates and medicine of the 1700s, I learned a lot from history.org . Google and the local library are both helpful instruments of research.

As you know, obtaining a degree in medicine today differs greatly when compared to the study of the profession in the 1770s. Doctors of Medicine chose young, bright men to study and work under their tutelage. There were very few skilled practitioners and a lot of people died from illnesses that today are seemingly simple to cure. A lot of quacks set up practice and made people deathly ill or killed them with their creative cures.

5. I cannot wait to rea this! Let me ask you, have you encountered any negativity being a woman writing gay erotic fiction? There is a disturbing groundswell for this…but my feeling is men have been writing as women and about women for years. Victor J. Banis pointed out to me that Brokeback - which you mention here, was written by a woman. He goes so far as to say that a man could have written this book. What is your opinion on this debate?

No, I’ve not personally encountered negativity. I believe most open-minded people realize that it is the Twenty-first Century, and creativity should not be thwarted by people telling people what subject or who they should write about. It’s akin to telling an artist what or who they may paint a picture of.

6. I know you also write F/F fiction. Is this a genre you plan to continue and which do you prefer?

I enjoy switching genres after finishing a story. F/F stories, to me, are as much fun to write as M/M stories. I plan to continue writing more of them for each of my three publishers, loveyoudivine, Shadowfire Press and Siren-Bookstrand Publishing. All this genre flip-flopping gives me a chance to regroup mentally and emotionally when the story is finished. I enjoy writing not only M/M and F/F, but also M/M/BF and interracial BF/WM.

7. What, in your opinion is the reason that so many women are flocking to this genre both as writers and readers?

Quite frankly, two attractive men loving and lusting after each other, is mesmerizing and turn a lot of women on...including me. I guess that’s why I write it.

8. A bisexual female writer I know also suggested to me that women feel gay men have a sexual freedom of self expression that they don’t have and therefore get to live out their fantasies in some ways by writers of gay erotic fiction and of course, gay porn. I was quite taken by this analysis. What do you feel about what she said?

To shove everyone under one umbrella of thought is a questionable practice and I cannot speak about how everyone feels. I suppose, in some cases, she is right, that some men may be freer in their sexual expression.

Women, who were once suppressed, are finally becoming freer in thought, expression, and creativity. Some women have a more romantic, softer side than men. A definite niche prefers romance as opposed to the “porn” side of M/M relationships.

9. Did you read much M/M before you wrote this piece and who are your favorite authors?

As I’ve stated previously, I read stories by B.A. Tortuga, Ally Blue, and J.M. Snyder. They’re enjoyable authors to read. However, I’m finding that there are many talented authors out there who write M/M. A.J., some day soon I will read one of your books.

AJ says: Wow, thanks!! And since I am a man and the other authors you mention are women, are they any male authors you read?

Since you’ve mentioned it, I read the free read that you offer on your website today. It was HOT! So, I guess you’re one of the male M/M writers that I’ve read.

AJ: LOL. Thanks, Carol!

Of course I’ve read the wonderful works by Jon Michaelsen and Max Griffith who are authors at loveyoudivine. They are friends and we all belong to a forum at WDC and criticize each other’s work.

AJ says: I adore Jon Michaelsen's work too.

My favorite gay blog is Debriefing the Boys. I get great story ideas from it. It is located at: http://debriefingtheboys.blogspot.com/2007/12/full-disclosure.html

10. I know you are married with children…how does your family feel about your erotic fiction? Are they supportive? Do they read it?

Actually, I write incognito. My husband knows what I write and is very supportive. My two living sons are grown and have families. They live far away and don’t know what I write. I’m not ready to tell them

11. What are you working on now?

I’m inspired to write another gay cowboy story. In fact, I’m ironing kinks out of a possible plot now; I hope it flies.

12. Please tell me something about your writing routine. Do you write every day?

I write every day from four to four-thirty in the morning and write in spurts until three in the afternoon. Between chunks of prose I tackle mundane matters like housework and errands. My most productive writing occurs when I get warmed up, between five and six in the morning.

13. I am always intrigued by writers’ muses. Stephen King says his is a grumpy guy with battered wings and a massive cigar. What is yours like?

Ahhh, Stephen King is a prolific writer and his impression of his muse is hilarious. I love his stories, especially The Stand and Tommyknockers.

My muse (a real P.I.T.A.) is elusive, like a wraith. She gets her kicks by aggravating me when I instead need her support. She is difficult to get along with, can be obnoxious and derives pleasure from sitting on my shoulder or standing behind my chair, questioning my punctuation and grammar and filling my mind with doubt regarding the preceding paragraph.

AJ says: your muse is a PITA? Must be a close friend of mine!

On behalf of Dark Diva Reviews, I’d like to thank the wonderful and talented Carol McKenzie for stopping by today. Please learn more about this awesome author at her links:

http://www.carol-mckenzie.com/

Carol’s blog is www.xanga.com/mckbooks and she invites everyone to stop by!