Book Reviews, Rants, & Raves!: Summer Love Anthology from Duet, an Interlude Press Imprint

Today I’m very lucky to be interviewing S.J. Martin author of The Most Handsome.

Hi S.J., thank you for agreeing to this interview. Tell us a little about yourself, your background, and your current book.

What is the most satisfying thing about being a writer?

It’s a great feeling bringing new characters and their adventures to life. Ideas for new stories sometimes get stuck in my head and bounce around for a while –I love having the ability to create an entirely new world from that first thought about a character or situation.

Do your characters ever take over your writing and make the story go somewhere you hadn’t originally planned?

Oh, this happens all of the time! More often than not, I sit down with a plan for where the story is going to go, but the characters refuse to cooperate. Recently, I was working on a story where a certain theme was supposed to be a relatively minor one and instead, it ended up being 60 pages! I wanted the story to head down a particular path, but it went down an entirely different one.

How did you celebrate the release of your book?

I’m planning on dancing around my apartment clutching the book to my chest once I receive it! Not kidding—I’m going to do a happy dance. This is my first published story and it means a great deal to me. I’ve been writing for most of my adult life, and it feels SO wonderful to be included with the other amazing writers in the anthology.

How did you come up with the idea for this book?

I was daydreaming about a soft and fluffy romance one day. As a transgender man, I’ve had great difficulty finding love stories with transgender characters. Ones that DO contain trans folks are often sad and filled with a lot of agonizing and trauma for them. I wanted something completely opposite from that. The funny thing is: I don’t normally write light-hearted stories. It was quite difficult to break out of my normal mold and get out something so different. I’ve sometimes been told that my writing can make people cry because I write about darker themes usually. This story is about as cheerful and upbeat as I could manage.

Have you ever written naked?

This question made me laugh out loud! Nope, no naked writing as of yet. Maybe when I get ready to publish my first novel.

Blurb:

Summer Love is the first collection of short stories published by Duet, the young adult imprint from Interlude Press. These short stories are about the emergence of young love of bonfires and beaches, of the magical in-between time when young lives step from one world to another, and about finding the courage to be who you really are, to follow your heart and live an authentic life. The contributing authors have written stories about both romantic and platonic love featuring characters who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, pansexual and queer/questioning. The authors also represent a spectrum of experience, identity and backgrounds.

Beautiful Monsters

SUMMARIES & AUTHOR BIOS

A campaign volunteer is assigned to assist his high school’s Gay Straight Alliance for the Pride Parade, forcing him to face the students he had previously avoided, and the truth about himself.

Author: Rachel Davidson Leigh is a writer, educator, and small town native who tells stories she wishes she could have read as a teen. Beautiful Monsters is her first published work of fiction. She lives in Wisconsin with her family and two dogs who are spoiled out of their tiny minds.

The Willow Weeps for Us

Jack, the young son of a grocer, falls for a charming piano teacher at the dawn of World War II.

Author: Suzey Ingold is a writer, linguist and coffee addict, currently based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Brought up in a household where children's books are quoted over the dinner table, literature has always had a strong influence on her life. She enjoys travelling, scented candles and brunch.

The Fire Eater’s Daughter

When a traveling carnival comes back to town, Ruth must choose between caring for her mother and a life with the beautiful and mysterious Constance, the fire eater’s daughter.

Author: Amy Stilgenbauer is a writer and aspiring archivist currently based in southeast Michigan. She is the author of the novelette series, Season of the Witch, as well as the Young Adult novel, The Legend of League Park. When she isn’t writing, Amy enjoys all things bergamot and tries to keep her cats away from her knitting.

Surface Tension

Logan just wants a summer where he can be anonymous and fit in without labels, but that all changes when he meets out-and-proud Dave at summer camp.

Author: Ella J. Ash is a lawyer by day and an author by night. She has been a writer in online fan communities since 2006. She also enjoys dance parties with her family and cooking experimental vegetarian cuisine. She lives in Toronto with her partner, three daughters and four tropical fish.

My Best Friend

In a letter to his best friend, a young gay man reminisces about their relationship.

Author: H.J. Coulter lives in Winnepeg, Canada, where she works as a respite worker and studies music, in hopes of one day becoming a musical therapist. My Best Friend is her professional writing debut.

What the Heart Wants

A young student discovers attraction and desire through her experience drawing figures in her summer art class.

Author: Naomi Tajedler was born and raised in Paris, where art has always been a part of her life—including painting, restoring books, and working in auctions. She started writing in online fan communities in 2009.

The Most Handsome

Carter, a Cape Cod boy who recently came out as transgender, meets and falls in love with a college student visiting for the summer.

Author: S.J. Martin lives with his partner and their cranky, rotund cat in Washington D.C. He’s a barista by day and a writer by night. He makes a mean cappuccino and lives for good coffee, good books, and good company. The Most Handsome is his first published story.

Something Like Freedom

A boy finds a safe space from which to imagine a new future after leaving his conservative parents’ home, thanks in part to a new friend.

Author: Caroline Hanlin is a full time statistician, a part time stage manager, and an avid sports fan. She currently resides in Boston, where she enjoys writing during her commute. Something Like Freedom is her first published short story.

On the Shore

A young woman retreats to her parents’ beach house to nurse a broken heart, but instead meets a vivacious girl who helps her find joy again.

Author: Rachel Blackburn is a writer, musician and librarian based in central Ohio. When free from work, she enjoys cuddling with her cats, drinking tea, and baking more cupcakes than necessary. On the Shore is her professional writing debut.

Pages or Words: 276 pages

Categories: Please keep in mind that as an anthology, not all stories contain all elements listed.

Bisexual, Contemporary, Fiction, Gay Fiction, Lesbian Romance, M/M Romance, Romance, Trans*, Young Adult, Collection

Excerpt: (From Beautiful Monsters)

Beautiful Monsters

By Rachel Davidson Leigh

“Glad to see you could join the party,” Terrence deadpans, pressing a rainbow bandana into André’s hand. André grabs a second bandana out of the bag, stuffs one in each of his back pockets, and then goes in for a third.

“Cody was checking out the parade route,” André replies, in a smooth lie. “It turns out we’re still walking six blocks through absolutely nothing and then calling it a day.” Terrence laughs, and, as he turns away, André presses a handkerchief into Cody’s hand. “Use it wisely,” he whispers into Cody’s ear. “You’re one of us now.”

One of us. He’s never been part of an “us.” Cody stares down at the lines on the handkerchief and then at the two patches of color on the back of André’s jeans as he walks toward the arriving cars.

Cody expects panic, but it doesn’t come. Maybe he isn’t ready to be Gay with a capital G, but if “us” can mean being one of these idiots, then maybe he’s ready to have people of his own. As he watches the sharp sway of André’s hips, the heat rising up his neck doesn’t feel like fear. It feels like... clarity, as though the run put everything in perspective and now he can’t stop seeing André in crisp, dazzling color.

Someone presses a sign into his hand and guides him toward the parade staging area with the rest of the crew. Once again, he can’t hear himself think over the din, but it’s different now. At the meeting, and for years before that in the hallways, he felt like an invader locked out by a wall of sound, and now he’s somehow wandered inside.

Sales Links:

Interlude Press web store: store.interludepress.com

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1941530362/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1941530362&linkCode=as2&tag=dueboo-20&linkId=PSLGE6VBRPEALU2J

Independent Bookstores: http://www.indiebound.org/book/978-1-941530-36-8?aff=InterludePress

About the author:

Where to find more information:

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Goodreads Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25375979-summer-love