We’re so pleased to welcome author Shae Connor to The Novel Approach today on the tour for her new novel Nobody’s Son. Enjoy Shae’s guest post, and then be sure to click on the Rafflecopter widget below to enter for the chance to win a $25 Dreamspinner Press gift card and ebook copies of Unfortunate Son and Wayward Son, the first two books in the series.
Good luck!
Boosting #OwnVoices
By Shae Connor
Thanks, as always, to Lisa and the crew at TNA for having me today. :)
Putting together this blog post was difficult. I did the usual things you do when you’re looking for recommendations for a certain kind of book: crowdsourcing on social media, searching on Google, looking through review sites. I found… not a whole lot.
As a straight, cisgender woman writing a book about two black gay men, one of the things I wanted to do for my blog tour was take the opportunity to boost authors writing about gay black men from their own perspectives. Unfortunately, finding queer men of color writing romance about queer men of color turned out to be pretty tough. That’s not all too surprising, of course. The vast majority of romance in all its forms is written by women, so the pool of men is small to begin with. Each additional specification adds difficulty.
I found four men who fit what I was looking for. I know three of them and have spent significant time with two of them in person (including a round trip from Atlanta to New Orleans in one case!). They are wonderful men with wonderful stories to tell, no matter what the characters they write about. If you haven’t read their work, please do. You won’t regret it.
Larry Benjamin (http://www.larrybenjamin.com) is the author of a number of books, but in romance, he’s best known for his titles Unbroken and What Binds Us. Unbroken was a 2014 Lambda Literary Award finalist, a 2014 IPPY (Independent Publishers) Gold Medal Award winner, and a 2014 Rainbow Award runner up. His most recent release is Vampire Rising, a novella from Beaten Track Publishing.
Vicktor Alexander (http://vicktoralexander.com) is a prolific author of many romance stories, including (just to name a few) Perfect Mistake, The Alpha’s Beautiful Mate, and Dakota. His book Raising Shawna was a finalist in the 2014 Rainbow Awards for best Gay Paranormal Romance. His latest title, The Servant Duchess of Whitcomb, book two of the Scandalous Whispers of the Remmington Realm series, will be released by Dreamspinner Press on November 27.
Jacob Z. Flores (http://www.jacobzflores.com) has been publishing gay romance for the past three years and is known in particular for his Provincetown series, which received third place for M/M Romance Series in the Paranormal Romance Guild’s 2014 Reviewer’s Choice Awards. His book The Gifted One received an honorable mention in the 2013 Rainbow Awards. The latest in his The Warlock Brothers of Havenbridge series, Blood Tied, released in September from Dreamspinner Press.
The fourth author is one who was recommended to me as a result of a Twitter query, so I’m less familiar with his work. Frederick L. Smith (http://fredericklsmith.com) is published with Kensington and Bold Strokes Books. He was a finalist for the PEN Center Emerging Voices Fellowship, and his most recent title (with Bold Strokes) is Play It Forward.
Do you know of other men who should be included on this list? Please share in comments! I’d love to boost even more.
Blurb for Nobody’s Son: Who wouldn’t want a nice cup of tall, dark, and gorgeous? Shaun Rogers does. He’s working at the front desk of a clothing-optional gay resort when Conrad “Con” Brooks walks in. The sweet, funny, and smart IT guy is there to install a new network and security system, and sparks fly between the two men from the start. Trouble is, Shaun’s hiding his sexuality from his grandmother, the only family he has left, and that makes him reluctant to take the leap with Con.
Then a man claiming to be Shaun’s absent father shows up out of nowhere, throwing Shaun completely off balance. His life spiraling toward chaos, Shaun soon discovers that his “father” is hiding secrets of his own. When things come to a head between them, it’s Con who comes to Shaun’s rescue—but the incident could force Shaun into a decision he’s not sure he’s ready to make.
Buy Links: Dreamspinner Press || Amazon || All Romance eBooks
About the Author: Shae Connor lives in Atlanta, where she’s a lackadaisical government worker for a living and writes sweet-hot romance under the cover of night. She’s been making things up for as long as she can remember, but it took her a long time to figure out that maybe she should try writing them down. She’s conned several companies into publishing her work and adds a new notch on her bedpost each time another story is unleashed onto an unsuspecting universe.
Shae is part Jersey, part Irish, and all Southern, which explains why she never shuts up. When she’s not chained to her laptop, she enjoys cooking, traveling, watching baseball, and reading voraciously. You can find her hanging out on Twitter most any time @shaeconnor, but for the more direct route, you can email her at shaeconnorwrites@gmail.com or visit her website at shaeconnorwrites.com.
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