"Last Gasp" Review
The anthology by erastes, c_smith_author, mylodon and Jordan Taylor is out today! Tell me this isn't a gorgeous cover:
The book is about four gay couples in places and times on the brink of or in the process of change: 1840s Hong Kong, just before the Opium Wars ("The White Empire"); the Yukon in 1898, during the Klondike gold rush ("The Ninth Language"); Syria in the Edwardian era, when the country was still ruled by the Ottoman Empire ("Sand"); and Italy in the summer of 1936, just as the Spanish Civil War is breaking out ("Tributary").
You can read the summaries of the four novellas here. And an excerpt from The White Empire is here.
I've had the privilege of reading two of these stories as they were being written, and I read the other two today. I can tell you for a fact that they're excellent and powerful, tough without being harsh, loving without being sentimental.
Moreover, the men in the stories must deal with far more than attraction to another man. Edgar Vaughn in "The White Empire" is a character that you'll love to hate--a gloriously unlikeable snob who must choose between certain ruin if he fights his own government's opium trade or becoming a silent co-conspirator in the matter and allowing the native members of his mission to suffer and die in agony. In "The Ninth Language," Mitsrii, a member of the Gwich'in, is in the uncomfortable position of being indebted against his will to an ignorant but well-meaning translator whose people and culture are nevertheless destroying Mitsrii's. Charles Cusiter of "Sand" must cope with an innocent who simply can't stay away from the ladies, a country and culture that are unfamiliar to him, and debilitating illness. As for "Tributary"--well, Guy Mason is in mourning for an old lover and is suffering from survivor guilt for not having been at the front lines of the last war, while James Calloway must cope with a war wound that makes sex all but impossible and an obsessive love that he knows all too well isn't returned.
There are no easy choices, no pat, comfortable solutions. And it is so vibrantly, intensely alive that if it were possible to cut an e-book with a knife, I would swear that these pages would bleed.
The history--which is accurate--permeates the pages unobtrusively, the details forming a beautiful, complex setting for the stories. And, like settings for jewels, the historical details show the stories off to their best and most brilliant advantages.
The one thing I will note is that Jordan Taylor's story felt incomplete--as if it were the first chapter of a novel. I could not believe, as the story ended, that the Gwich'in lifestyle would be quite so easy to adapt to, and that love would not always be enough to fend off confusions and misunderstandings on both sides. I would have liked to know the rest of the story.
But that is a mere quibble. These tales are ingeniously crafted and skillfully told to the point where I have a hard time praising them enough. I can only hope that the anthology becomes the best seller it deserves to be, because these stories should be read and read and then read again.
***
Oh, and there's a Yahoo group some of you might be interested in: Speak Its Name. (All the authors of Last Gasp are members of it. Here's the description of Speak Its Name:
A group for the enjoyment, discussion, and promotion of LBGT Historical Romance fiction. (Mostly m/m at the moment.)
Many of our members write other genres, but the focus here is on historical stories. (We consider "historical" anything previous to the watershed of the Stonewall uprising -- June 1969.)
IF YOU SIGN UP FOR THIS GROUP, YOU ARE AFFIRMING THAT YOU ARE OVER 18 YEARS OF AGE AND A LEGAL ADULT IN YOUR COUNTRY OF RESIDENCE. We will not knowingly invite or admit overly impressionable persons of tender years. If you're under 18, don't worry--it's a self-correcting condition.
The book is about four gay couples in places and times on the brink of or in the process of change: 1840s Hong Kong, just before the Opium Wars ("The White Empire"); the Yukon in 1898, during the Klondike gold rush ("The Ninth Language"); Syria in the Edwardian era, when the country was still ruled by the Ottoman Empire ("Sand"); and Italy in the summer of 1936, just as the Spanish Civil War is breaking out ("Tributary").
You can read the summaries of the four novellas here. And an excerpt from The White Empire is here.
I've had the privilege of reading two of these stories as they were being written, and I read the other two today. I can tell you for a fact that they're excellent and powerful, tough without being harsh, loving without being sentimental.
Moreover, the men in the stories must deal with far more than attraction to another man. Edgar Vaughn in "The White Empire" is a character that you'll love to hate--a gloriously unlikeable snob who must choose between certain ruin if he fights his own government's opium trade or becoming a silent co-conspirator in the matter and allowing the native members of his mission to suffer and die in agony. In "The Ninth Language," Mitsrii, a member of the Gwich'in, is in the uncomfortable position of being indebted against his will to an ignorant but well-meaning translator whose people and culture are nevertheless destroying Mitsrii's. Charles Cusiter of "Sand" must cope with an innocent who simply can't stay away from the ladies, a country and culture that are unfamiliar to him, and debilitating illness. As for "Tributary"--well, Guy Mason is in mourning for an old lover and is suffering from survivor guilt for not having been at the front lines of the last war, while James Calloway must cope with a war wound that makes sex all but impossible and an obsessive love that he knows all too well isn't returned.
There are no easy choices, no pat, comfortable solutions. And it is so vibrantly, intensely alive that if it were possible to cut an e-book with a knife, I would swear that these pages would bleed.
The history--which is accurate--permeates the pages unobtrusively, the details forming a beautiful, complex setting for the stories. And, like settings for jewels, the historical details show the stories off to their best and most brilliant advantages.
The one thing I will note is that Jordan Taylor's story felt incomplete--as if it were the first chapter of a novel. I could not believe, as the story ended, that the Gwich'in lifestyle would be quite so easy to adapt to, and that love would not always be enough to fend off confusions and misunderstandings on both sides. I would have liked to know the rest of the story.
But that is a mere quibble. These tales are ingeniously crafted and skillfully told to the point where I have a hard time praising them enough. I can only hope that the anthology becomes the best seller it deserves to be, because these stories should be read and read and then read again.
***
Oh, and there's a Yahoo group some of you might be interested in: Speak Its Name. (All the authors of Last Gasp are members of it. Here's the description of Speak Its Name:
A group for the enjoyment, discussion, and promotion of LBGT Historical Romance fiction. (Mostly m/m at the moment.)
Many of our members write other genres, but the focus here is on historical stories. (We consider "historical" anything previous to the watershed of the Stonewall uprising -- June 1969.)
IF YOU SIGN UP FOR THIS GROUP, YOU ARE AFFIRMING THAT YOU ARE OVER 18 YEARS OF AGE AND A LEGAL ADULT IN YOUR COUNTRY OF RESIDENCE. We will not knowingly invite or admit overly impressionable persons of tender years. If you're under 18, don't worry--it's a self-correcting condition.