I am soooo excited to have Josephine Myles on the blog today, she is no stranger to Pants Off and it's always a delight to have her here. She is here today talking about her new awesmazing release Handle With Care, which I reviewed previously. Lets give a warm welcome to the fabulous Miss Myles!
Gay superhero comics
I’ve always been drawn to comics—proof I am indeed a geek at heart.
However, until I started researching for Handle with Care, I had no idea
there was a thriving homoerotic comic book industry out there, and one
that had nothing to do with Japanese yaoi manga.
For those of you not in the know, yaoi (or Boy’s Love) comics are
written by and for a predominantly female audience and have their own
code of conventions, including a highly stylised relationship between
seme and uke – literally translated as attacker and receiver. While
there are forms of gay manga out there that feature a range of body
types and relationships, traditional yaoi is likely to feature lean,
adolescent heroes, with the more masculine looking character topping the
more feminised one.
I know there are many yaoi fans out there, but I’m not especially
drawn to the artwork or stories I’ve sampled so far—I’m very happy to
hear your recommendations, though! The yaoi I’ve read just didn’t have
the subversive humour and punchy artwork of my all-time favourite
graphic novels, such as Jamie Hewlett’s
Tank Girl and Garth Ennis’
Preacher.
When I was coming up with the character of skatepunk delivery boy
Ollie in Handle with Care, I knew I wanted him to be an idealist and a
dreamer. I just needed to find a way of illustrating this. Inspiration
came when leafing through Cali Boys, a book of gay comic book artwork by
Joe Phillips. His pictures of attractive young men getting it on had
certain similarities to the yaoi tradition, but with a distinctly
American flavour. Further online investigation revealed that Phillips
has illustrated for various mainstream comic book franchises, including
Marvel’s X-Men series.
X-Men ended up having a special place in Handle with Care, as being
one of the things Ollie and Ben first bond over. Ollie spots a life-size
cardboard cut out of Nightcrawler in Ben’s hallway, and offers to lend
Ben his X-Men comics. There were several reasons I chose X-Men rather
than some other comic book superhero series. Most importantly, in 2009
Marvel made history for publishing the first mainstream comic to feature
two established male heroes kissing on page (Rictor and Shatterstar in
X-Factor #45). I also knew that because of the movies, X-Men would be
easily recognised by the reader. Finally, I chose Nightcrawler to be
Ben’s hallway key holder not only because he’s my favourite character in
the films, but because he was played by Alan Cumming—an openly bisexual
actor.
Ollie eventually developed into an aspiring illustrator himself,
penning pornographic superhero pictures. I was heavily influenced by the
artist
Patrick Fillion, whose incredibly well-endowed heroes caught my
eye. It was really difficult to find any “safe” pictures to illustrate
this post, as Fillion revels in explicit detail. Do check out his work
if you have any interest in finding out the sort of thing I had in mind
for Ollie’s artwork!
There is a huge amount of gay comic book artwork out there, and when
funds allow, I hope to be able to build myself up a collection to rival
Ben’s DVD stash. For now, though, I’ll be choosing my purchases
carefully and taking recommendations for books that combine a strong
storyline with great artwork.
What about all of you out there? Do you enjoy comics, or have you never been able to see the appeal? Care to share why?
Handle with Care by Josephine Myles – the blog tour
To
celebrate the release of my second novel, Handle with Care, I’m on a two
week blog tour.
A grand prize will be awarded to a randomly chosen
commenter during the tour: an exclusive Handle with Care mug (which I’m
happy to post worldwide), and a $25 voucher to spend at All Romance
eBooks (or alternative ebook retailer of your choice). I’ll make the
prize draw on Wednesday 9th May at 9am (GMT), and will announce the
winner on my blog. Visit the tour itinerary for a list of all the stops,
and comment on each to increase your chances of winning!
http://josephinemyles.com/published-stories/handle-with-care/the-blog-tour/
Blurb:
The best things in life aren’t free…they’re freely given.
Ben
Lethbridge doesn’t have many vices left. After raising his little sister
to adulthood, he wasted no time making up for the youth he lost to
responsible parenting. Two years of partying it up—and ignoring his
diabetes—has left him tethered to a home dialysis regimen.
He can
do his job from his flat, fortunately, but most of his favourite things
are forbidden. Except for DVD porn…and fantasizing over Ollie, the
gorgeous, purple-haired skateboarder who delivers it.
Their
banter is the highlight of Ben’s lonely day, but his illness-ravaged
body is the cruel reality that prevents him from believing they’ll do
anything more than flirt. Not to mention the age gap. Still, Ben figures
there’s no harm in sprucing himself up a bit.
Then one day, a
package accidentally splits open, revealing Ben’s dirty little
secret…and an unexpected connection that leaves him wondering if he’s
been reading Ollie wrong all this time. There’s only one way to find
out: risk showing Ollie every last scar. And hope “far from perfect” is
good enough for a chance at love.
Warning: Contains superhero
porn comics and a cute, accident-prone delivery guy with colour-changing
hair. Readers may experience coffee cravings, an unexpected liking for
bad mullets, and the urge to wrap Ollie up and take him home.
Kindle US: http://www.amazon.com/Handle-with-Care-ebook/dp/B0073WI0ZU/
Kindle UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Handle-with-Care-ebook/dp/B0073WI0ZU/
Samhain: http://store.samhainpublishing.com/handle-with-care-p-6754.html
Author Bio:
English through and through, Josephine Myles is
addicted to tea and busy cultivating a reputation for eccentricity. She
writes gay erotica and romance, but finds the erotica keeps cuddling up
to the romance, and the romance keeps corrupting the erotica. Jo blames
her rebellious muse but he never listens to her anyway, no matter how
much she threatens him with a big stick. She’s beginning to suspect he
enjoys it.
Jo’s website: http://josephinemyles.com/
Email: josephine_myles@yahoo.co.uk
Blog: http://josephinemyles.com/blog/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/josephine.myles
Twitter: @JosephineMyles
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