And you, Ms Somerville, I’m afraid I can’t say that about you. Frankly, as far as I watch you ‘in action’, you show yourself as a nasty, paranoid, vengeful, hostile, raving, cold-hearted, witchhunting rumormonger. You don’t even PRETEND to be nice.

Wow. Guess you don’t pretend to be nice, either?

Your avoidance of answer said it all.

Thank you for reminding me.

To make things clear, I’m not on behalf of anyone. I take full responsibility for my words and action.

just from one reader to another: You are not doing ‘your’ author any favors by calling others names on their behalf. It reflects badly on the author.

I’ve only read one of JL’s book, which he graciously sent to me so I could try before I buy (because I’m not into romantic suspense). I liked it up to a point, a lot, but then it broke down for me and I thought it was because he was a male writer. It seemed lacking in some essential, ethereal quality that, being only a reader and not a writer, I cannot quite put into words.

If he were female, then obviously the gender of the author had nothing to do with my not being entirely satisfied with the writing. Maybe the Leigh Greenwood titles I read that also seemed somehow lacking to me, which I blamed on him being male AFTER I found out he was, are just lacking because of what I as a reader expect and it doesn’t have anything to do with the writer’s gender and all with their writing ability to produce something that works for me, as one specific reader. I don’t know, but I still suspect gender does have to with writing style to a certain extent.

I just know that I do not enjoy books written by men as much, mostly because I don’t like the subject matter so many of them write about. That has more to do with content than with style per se, but style does come into it.

I may be missing out on great writing, but if the the writing is about a subject matter I have zero interest in, I’m not missing anything at all (saying I ought to read more male writers is like telling me I have to read more classics to improve my mind; ain’t gonna happen, cause I ain’t got no interest in that fancy high-faluting stuff either. :)

Oh, and I’m not a native speaker either…

Bored now. Go run your mouth off over at Teddy Pig’s little slash fest. He’s the one who turned this into a clusterfuck.

I’ve got books to write.

First things first, I’m not anyone’s ‘minion’. I’m just a fan of Josh Lanyon’s work, and he doesn’t know my existence. I’m not even a native speaker, as you can tell from my unskillful English.

Now, may I ask you again: Do you have any tangible PROOF that Lanyon is a straight WOMAN pretending to be a gay MAN? Because you are practically saying that he’s lying through his teeth, and that’s a serious accusation. And you know damned well many readers wouldn’t forgive an author for that. You need to give more proof than those flippant ‘I thinks’ and ‘I feel from his writings’.

Don’t evade the question. Answer me straight.

Now things are getting out of hand, but that’s what you want, right? First you picked up a brief mention of Lanyon’s name in a relatively long post, then you couldn’t wait to jump in with your two cents, stating that you HAVE A FEELING that Lanyon indeed is a female author hiding behind a gay persona. And, WHAM! This ASSUMPTION somehow became a FACT, and then you forced Lanyon to admit… WHAT?! That he’s a woman because he writes like a woman? That he really is a gay man (God Forbid!) who’s ‘imitating the female style of gay romance’ (WTF is that)? That he’s… what Ann Somerville says he is? Hello, since when authors have to specifically report to you on their genders?

Anyone who has a slice of brain must see how ridiculous this whole thing is. Before this, Lanyon’s gender has never been an big issue. It’s YOU who made an issue of it. It’s YOU who started all this out of nothing, deliberately, aggressively, viciously. You want to put doubts and disbeliefs into people’s head. You want people to take a dim view of Lanyon and question his honesty and integrity. You want to bring him down. You want to tarnish his reputation. You want to hurt him as bad as you can. With what, a few petty speculations and ‘feelings’? You know better than that, Ann.

No one said it better than Lanyon’s publisher and friend Laura Baumbach. Let me cite her from another blog, ‘One point people who are claiming Josh has created a male persona to enhance his status as a M/M romance author have all conveniently forgotten. Josh has been JOSH for at least 10 years, writing successful mysteries and winning significant writing awards. Years before he started writing M/M romance. He must be one hell of a planner to have concocted this persona a decade ago just to enhance his current writing. God, I admire Josh more and more each day. ‘

Why do I care? Because I hate to see nice people getting hurt. From what I observe with my own eyes, Lanyon is ever a gentleman. Surely he has flaws – who doesn’t – but he always strives to be a decent, polite, caring, honest person. And you, Ms Somerville, I’m afraid I can’t say that about you. Frankly, as far as I watch you ‘in action’, you show yourself as a nasty, paranoid, vengeful, hostile, raving, cold-hearted, witchhunting rumormonger. You don’t even PRETEND to be nice. It’s no wonder people like Lanyon would piss you off so much.

But that’s not the whole story, right? You and him had a history long time ago, and you hated his guts since then. You seize every opportunity and attack ruthlessly, slash and slay a lot of people by the way. Well done, Ann!

Any outsider who doesn’t know but interested in the history of all this mess, you can dig it out yourself. The argument on this forum, at least on Ms Somerville’s part, is not a general discussion of the tradition of pen names, or author’s right of privacy and anonymity. This is personal and malicious and horrible. You don’t need to believe me, and you don’t need to believe anyone for that matter. See it with you own eyes, and draw your own conclusion.

As for Lanyon, all I want to say to him is: You displeased the wrong people; watch out at every corner from now on.

I can well imagine that at some point retreating to female-written books might simply be a perceived safe harbor from masculine authority.

I read mostly female authors because I’m gravitating to a richer experience. I’m one of those “psychic gender-detectors” who can, more often than not, determine the sex of authors from their writing. And in my reader’s eyes, the female authors are mostly better at writing character driven stories. I’m not saying men can’t write well in that style, but they certainly don’t flock to it. I don’t see how a strong preference for a particular style of writing means I’m retreating from authority – that would assume I view male writing as authoritative.

My attitude is pretty much that when men can show me that they are as educated — as steeped, really — in female-written books as women are in male-written books, we can have a serious discussion about whether educated, intelligent women should be choosing to read only female-authored books. Until then, I get the escapist (from patriarchy) fantasy in choosing women-authored books for pleasure.

I’m really confused by this. Are you saying there’s something wrong with reading only female-authored books? That the only reason women read women-authored books is to escape patriarchy? Isn’t this the basic argument leveled against romance novels – that they’re escapist reading with no real merit or relation to the real world?

Are there Correct Choices as to what “educated, intelligent” women can read for pleasure? I left required reading lists behind in college, and I’ll continue to avoid writing that I don’t enjoy. Personally, I think women can choose to read whatever they want without apology or discussion with men.

The person who turned this into a ‘is he gay or straight’ discussion, is Teddy Pig, so you need to go talk to him.

All I said that I felt, from the writing, Lanyon was female. After all the carrying on over the last few days, I feel even more certain of that. Lanyon is now, belatedly, admitting through his site, what I have been saying – that he/she has and is claiming to be a male. This is despite people like Maggie stating he hadn’t done any such thing.

Personally, I don’t believe it. You may feel otherwise. But the person putting the importance on the gender is him/her, and he/she has been pitching himself/herself as not just a man but a gay man, allowing that belief to stand unchallenged. So if it’s true, then he/she is acting honestly. If not, then she/he is not.

My belief is the latter. Nothing you say, Lanyon says, or any of his supporters say, will change that belief, because of the way Lanyon reacted when this was posed. Not only how he reacted, but his friends and supporters reacted. I’m sure you’ve seen the same kind of reaction from in the closet celebrities when asked if they’re gay. You can make your own decision. I honestly don’t mind what you believe on this score, but I do mind being repeatedly called a liar.

This entire issue only matters because Teddy Pig decided to make a total drama out of a misreading of what Jane posted, and what I said. So go ask him why he did that.

Lanyon’s how to book might well be excellent but as MD said above, there are plenty of books/guides about how to write m/m, written by women, on the internet. If someone I know is actually gay writes one, I might be interested.

I think the real thing to do is do like my college English professors and cite from the text on where you think you feel he is really a she. Im willing to gather that would be a hard thing to do. For example, lets say we take the Annie (back when she went by E. Annie Proulx) out of her name and it was gender-neutral E. Proulx and read Brokeback Mountain (before the phenomenon). Now. When I read it (before it became a juggernaut), it shook me to the core by how great the WRITING was. She truly captured the heartbreak of two gay men which newsflash is not that different from a heterosexual breakup. I willing to wager that depression, feeling like your guts have been wretched out of your body, and crying are symptoms of heartache that knows no gender.

If you feel that he is perpetruating a fraud, you would need to do like my English professors would tell me: “Back up your theory by citing from the text”.

I guess we have to agree to disagree on that Josh Lanyon is using false marketing for his non-fiction book that has nothing to do with HIM but with the nature of writing . Now if he did a JL Leroy (if u dont know who Im talking about do a quick Google) or even a James Frey then this whole post would have some merit. But I have read Man, Oh Man more times than I care to say (re-reading it now to be exact) and NOWHERE does it say “This is how you should write M/M fiction because I am a gay man”. Trust me. That is a statement I would have picked up on. And in that some of you REALLY need to show and prove to give your point any validity

I find these calls to “judge the book and only the book” echoes of the calls of New Critics who believed that any work of literature gives up all its meaning within the four corners of the text itself.

Which is nonsense. How can you examine Dickens out of context, or Marx, or any serious writer? Are we supposed to know what Animal Farm refers to, without reference to the Soviet experience?

The author might be dead, but the author is still part of the construction. More so when the constructed persona is intended to play into the art – as it does when a female author sells herself as male, or vice versa. If it didn’t matter…they wouldn’t do it.

I do laugh to see all these people claiming we should only look at the book, when they are the first to howl they will NEVER read a book by this or that person because of
1. Bad review by that author
2. Bad behaviour by that author
3. That author smells bad

Can’t really have it both ways, can they?

One is that even though I do not believe the generalization that men and women write with different, gender-based voices, I do believe that there are genres of writing that rely on a particular gender perspective, and even more narrowly, there are genres of writing that stand on the gender of the author (feminist memoir, for example).

But beyond that there is the current marketing machine that IMO works very assiduously to identify readers with authors in gender specific ways. And I don’t, honestly, know of an author who has even tried to escape that. Which is not the same thing as saying there are no authors who haven’t tried to game the system to their advantage. Just that I haven’t come across any authors who have not submitted to the impulses of the marketing machinery to greater or lesser degree.

Finally, though, I do not think it follows logically that if one recognizes or even purchases a book based on the purported gender of the author that such a thing means they will not be able to read the book objectively. First of all, our best attempts at objectivity are *always* compromised by various ideological imperatives. But also, I find gender blindness, like color blindness, to be an unattractive aspiration for the same reason I find *blindness, per se* unappealing. I do not think recognition of gender leads to untenable subjectivity any more than I believe that ignoring it gives the reader a more objective view of a book. We bring so much to our reading experience, and we will inevitably create for ourselves an authorial voice that fits with those experiences and expectations.

I know there is more to this, but I haven’t yet thought it through. In any case, I find these calls to “judge the book and only the book” echoes of the calls of New Critics who believed that any work of literature gives up all its meaning within the four corners of the text itself. New Criticism was ultimately rejected as incomplete, hegemonic, and unfairly ignorant of the various cultural influences that give rise to any text. So I’m sure that accounts for some of my resistance, as well. But in any case, I think we need to interrogate this notion of what it means to judge books on their own terms. IMO, that cannot occur until the context in which they were written is understood and considered.

For the record, I would also like to have ttthomas’ babies, but I don’t think either of us have the stuff the other is looking for.

Thank you Paul, that’s a very sweet thing to say. It’s true, I’ve already found what I’m looking for and what she has in common with you is a lovely graciousness.

To me it’s about gender. When someone claims to be male – and more than that, writes a book on how to write about gay men – then the maleness, to me, becomes important. Being a gay woman isn’t the same as being a gay men, nor does being a bi woman. Erastes is a bi woman, so is Lee Rowan. So might Lanyon, for all I know or care. Erastes is queer, certainly, but not a man. She doesn’t have balls, a penis, and hasn’t fucked a man with that penis. The ‘man’ bit is important – otherwise you’re imitating it. The thing that makes m/m a joke to actual gay men very often is how shoddy that imitation is – and how insultingly stupid it is too.

Whether you convince yourself you are the bestest fake gay male writer evah, or not, if you’re selling to an audience looking for the real deal, then it’s a cheat.

I’m not ignorant – I know many people are fluid in their feelings about their gender, and some writers in m/m are transsexuals (FTM). But if you’re talking about how boy parts work, and how they feel to the owner, then I don’t think even a transsexual can talk from personal experience about that the same as a cis-male can (thought they can certainly talk about things like the effect of testosterone and so on, body image etc.) This is where it gets complicated, at least for me because while I know how important it is for transmen to be accepted and treated as the men they feel they are, and actually are. Yet with some transmale authors I still see their writing as being on the female side. Again, this is not a criticism, it’s just a question of the focus.

To me, the worst thing about all the screeching from the ‘other’ side is the way it’s considered insulting to be a female, or known to be one. It’s like this shocking secret that one must hide, and having it discovered is like outing a gay person to his employers or something. Strange how all the bellowing about it doesn’t matter if the writer is male or female, assumes that it very much matters if they’re thought to be female.

I needed that.

I’m off to bed now.

But, yeah, we’re not in disagreement.

**totally off topic reply**

You’re welcomed :) Yes, dysmenohrea is a blanket term for, you’re right, we-don’t-know-what-you-have-so-we’ll-just-shove-it-under-this-diagnosis, but it also covers several structural problems, hymen deformities, vaginal prolapse, tipped uterus…

Makes me want, just one time, for those darned male doctors who say ‘this won’t hurt a bit’ to have the chance to experience how much it ‘won’t hurt’…

And I need to stop. I don’t want to pull this off topic again. :-)

If that’s the case, it’ll be interesting to see if the aftermath is like Mrs. Giggles predicts.