UK Under Snow - Yes, All Of It

New John Barrowman Album Coming 22 Feb

John Barrowman's new CD is coming out 22 February.

Tracklisting:
When I Get My Name In Lights (from The Boy from Oz)
One Night Only (from Dreamgirls)
Copacabana (from Copacabana)
I Won’t Send Roses (from Mack and Mabel)
Memory (from Cats)
The Kid Inside (from Is There Life After High School?)
My Eyes Adored You (from Jersey Boys)
Don't Cry Out Loud (from The Boy From Oz)
So Close (from Enchanted) duet with Jodie Prenger
Unusual Way (from Nine)
You’ll Never Walk Alone (from Carousel)
The Winner Takes It All (from Mamma Mia!)
Oh What A Night (from Jersey Boys)

For all the information you need, please visit:
http://www.johnbarrowman.com/news.shtml#johnbarrowman

Laundry Pug Spotted in Ad

This is from an old magazine advertisement for the Kenmore Elite HE3t.

And who is the star of clean living but a PUG!

Because if you're a person concerned with being green who has the disposable income to purchase a high efficiency washer (the current HE5t is something like $1600), the expensive, high-maintenance pug is probably the dog for you.  :)

Enduring Lovecraft

There is something touching about this.

Here is a short story, handwritten in parts, by H.P. Lovecraft. It is a submission copy.

Which means this is the actual manuscript he sent in to a publisher hoping it would be bought for publication. His address is in the top corner (along with a request to "please return").

This happens to be one of my favorite of his stories, so I know it does get published, though perhaps not by the person to whom he sent this particular copy.

Lovecraft was one of those writers whose genius was not discovered by the mainstream until long after his death.  He struggled monetarily all his life.

This manuscript here was just sold on eBay for over $2,000.

I wonder if he ever made half that much on his writing himself.  I hope, wherever he is, he's amused.

Do You M/M?

Are you one of the many (many, many) readers of m/m romance? Do you swoon to Alex Beecroft's False Colors: An M/M Romance or Erastes' Transgressions: An M/M Romance?

For anyone who might be thinking, "What, M&M's have romance?" and trying to picture the green girl M&M in something slinky.... no.

M/M is short for male/male - as in leave-out-the-annoying-heroine-and-just-give-us-two-hot-men - romance. This genre is extremely popular, especially in ebooks.

I like the historical ones. Now, you might think there wouldn't be much scope for realism in such romances.  And there you would be wrong.

I have been reading Male-Male Intimacy in Early America: Beyond Romantic Friendships and it is fascinating how fluid love could be in early America. Not only was there no word yet for homosexuality, there was no real concept of it as a permanent existence. As this was also before companionate marriage, both men and women got married because it was expected - not only for social but for business and economic reasons. So whom you married often did not coincide with whom you loved. And once in a while someone left us evidence that the person they loved shared their gender. How they then handled this can be very emotional and touching.

We tend to think of maritime settings as being the best venue for historically accurate m/m romance, and indeed, next I am going to be reading the non-fiction An American Seafarer in the Age of Sail: The Erotic Diaries of Philip C. Van Buskirk, 1851-1870. However, there were Virginia planters, mountain men, trappers, farmers, and even urban citizens who experienced the love that dared not speak its name. (BTW, apparently Philadelphia rocked when it came to wild sex during the Federal period.)

Quite a diverse field for authors to mine for story-lines!  I encourage anyone who writes or reads m/m fiction to check out the non-fiction.

And speaking of inspiring tales of m/m non-fiction, I must of course mention I Am What I Am, John Barrowman's new autobiography.

Yes, I'm a fan-girl. I dare you not to be. :)