Damon Suede...

Love is a many-gendered thing. I have dipped my big toe into the churning waters of gay romance and the M/M subgenre. The happiest endings come at the end of a road that is soft and rough...

 

Best Romance of 2011!

The Romance Reviews has just named Hot Head the Best Book of 2011 in GLBT – Contemporary Romance! Deep gratitude to everyone who took this book to heart.

And back in the winter, the Goodreads M/M romance group held their readers choice awards and I won nine awards in ten categories against some amazing titles: including Best Book, Best Debut, Best Contemporary, Best Sex Scene and more besides! 2011 was a pretty phenomenal year for the homo-romance, yo, so I'm really honored to have been recognized against such stiff competition!

Not only that, also at Goodreads in a competition which included all books published last year, Hot Head was selected as #3 for the Best Romance of 2011, the only gay romance on a list which includes titles by New York Times Bestsellers JR Ward, Nalini Singh, Sherrilyn Kenyon, and Nora Roberts. Thank you to everyone who voted...I'm so psyched to see M/M get recognition for its impact on the romance genre.

And as the Lists are coming in from review sites and book clubs, Hot Head has found a lot of favor...and odd as it is, even Grown Men has found traction with the fans. Many thanks to everyone who took a chance on my books this year!

 

Sudsy studs

Where is the witty, sexy serialized melodrama of your gaytime dreams? Boxer Falls is a weekly homoerotic soap opera being posted at the M/M Romance Group at Goodreads. And we've got a starpowered stable contributing to the nuttiness: Andrea Speed, Eden Winters, Mary Calmes, Amy Lane, and more!   Join Ellis Carrington, Poppy Dennison, and Damon Suede along with a host of your favorite scribes as they cut loose with suds and studs in abundance.

This project grew out of a desire to do some fun fast writing that could include a wide range of styles and stories. With its punchy episodes and high drama, it'll be a great way for authors to cut loose and for readers to explore unfamiliar voices or subgenres.  If you have an interest in over-the-top romance, come get soapy with us. You'll need to be a member of the M/M Romance Group at Goodreads to stay tuned, but then... you already are right? :) Campy antics ahead!

 

Professional Authors of LGBT Romance?

I'm a member of the Romance Writers of America and the Rainbow Romance Writers. Why aren't you? Rainbow Romance Writers is the home of career-focused authors and industry professionals interested in promoting gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender romances. If you write LGBT romance and you haven't joined, the RRW is up to all kinds of nifty shenanigans. As an active chapter of the Romance Writers of America, we continue to push for research, awareness, and education in unexpected communities. We are changing minds, one heart at a time.

 

Making waves

Sexy upstart Riptide Publishing invited me to be a part of their awesome launch lineup with my sci-fi novella Grown Men in October! Founded by savvy M/M authors, Riptide aims to make a helluva splash in homoerotic fiction with an eye toward filling the demand for rich, complex stories that pull you under.

Their team is setting the bar very high in every facet of book preparation and production and planning a lavish Grand Opening that will last through the autumn complete with a mindboggling blogtour and swanky prizes out the yingyang! If you're curious about their plans, definitely have a looksee at the Riptide site.

 

 

Get your Suede on

People are getting geared up for GayRomLit! After a bunch of requests for promo items, I've built a simple store called Damon Suede Gear at CafePress which features all kinds of gay romance goodness... with my cover art, Suede slogans, and more... CafePress allows me to offer everything from simple Tshirts to thongs to shotglasses to customized Iphone cases. Feel free to have a poke around, and if you don't see something that you know you want, give me a heads up and I'll try to build it for you.

 

Fighting fires with gasoline

A few months ago Dreamspinner Press snapped up my first M/M novel in less than 72 hours and now it's in stores. Hot Head is a contemporary love story about a Brooklyn firefighter who has fought forbidden feelings for his best friend since 9/11... until a gay porn site asks them to appear together, forcing him to face his suffocating terror and desire to protect the one person who matters. 

Dreamspinner Press released Hot Head June 15th, 2011 in softcover and ebook, with audiobook due shortly. Check out a full description here along with an excerpt, reviews and more. Watch this page for more details! Where there's smoke there's fire!

 

Great times at goodreads

Over at the phenomenal goodreads M/M Romance Group, the amazing mods spent the summer steering a colossal community writing project a gigantic free anthology to follow... featuring fan favorites to first-timers. This amazing bunch of romance readers remains one of the most robust M/M communities anywhere. If you haven't joined, what the heck are you waiting for?

My own contribution appeared on July 24th: "Seedy Business," a crazy science fiction homo-romance about sperm piracy and sibling rivalry gone seriously wrong. This 12k word short story is the second transmission in what looks to be a new series about rough men and bad blood at the margins of the galaxy. Up next: Grown Men, coming this October from Riptide.

 

Getting Aural: Listening for your Muse

Inspired by a Rainbow Romance discussion on kickstarting fresh genre writing, I've posted on an idiosyncratic part of my creative process: "scoring" my work before it exists. In the interest of specificity, I described the way I used this method to clarify the early, early itch that led to HOT HEAD, long before I knew the characters names or more than the basic romantic M/M hook. If you're a writer looking for block-breakers, or if you just dig my gay firefighter romance and would like to sneak a peek behind the curtain, you might get a kick.

Without Merrick: the father of gay romance

And because I started reminiscing about my early forays into queer fiction, I just wrote a fan letter 25 years late to the author who taught me to love gay romance novels way back when I was a mere stripling... Gordon Merrick, arguably the author of the first gay romantic bestseller in publishing history. Take a walk down memory lane with my overview of some of the guiltiest of homoerotic pleasures.

 

We Frenched THAT Quarter!

Big fun in the Big Easy! Imagine a literary retreat for the readers and writers of GLBT romance, in New Orleans in the Autumn. Cemetery tours, Steamboat outing and nightlife excursions! I was there, bells on and bits out, and the event was a knockout... This amazing manlove confab took over the Bourbon Orleans and probably several blocks of the Vieux Carré as well! Who knew that so many passionate bibliophiles have a fierce appetite for homoeroticism?! Bring it on, says me. You can't fight a stubbly, muscular, anguished tidal wave! If you have more than a passing interest in gay romance fiction you should consider joining the party next year for GRL 2012 in Albuquerque. Check it out here.

 

Gearing up

Sweet friction, hot fiction, no restrictions! There's no rest for the wicked... and I have all sorts of trouble brewing at the moment. Up next:

• Hard Head: Book Two in the "Head" series featuring Tommy Dobsky, a self-destructive paramedic from first encountered in Hot Head...
• Spring Eternal: mythic adventure runs riot in the greasy underbelly of a Gilded Age Manhattan.

 

"It's no trick loving somebody at their best. Love is loving them at their worst."

(The Real Thing - Tom Stoppard)