ManLove Monday: Ally Blue

It's Monday! Is this now your favorite day of the week, or what? I mean, why not have something to look forward to? Today I have a special guest, friend of the blog and m/m author, Ally Blue. Yippee!!! So happy to have you here today Ally!

I understand you got your start writing m/m by writing fanfic. Is this true? Who were you writing about?

It's true! I totally cut my writing teeth on band slash. Somewhere out there in the internet tubes are forty-something tales of angst and manlove starring none other than my favorite band, Radiohead. **ignores all the weird looks** Okay, so not the whole band, but still. Most people don't really get it, but I always was a rebel O_O
For those who are squicked by the idea of Radiohead slash, I also have a few with Brian and Stefan from Placebo. Them's purty. I made them into horny gay rock star vampires!

How did you make the leap from fanfic writer to publish author?

It all started with a novel-length fanfic story. Looking back, the story seems horribly amateurish, but that tale was what showed me that I could, in fact, write something long enough (if not actually GOOD enough) to be a book. That fact gave me the shove I needed to try my hand at a story with all my own original characters. I started the novel which eventually became my first published book, Forgotten Song. After I finished it (it had a different title at that point), it sat around for a few months while I wrote a bunch of short stories. When some of those stories actually were accepted for publication, it gave me the confidence to revise Forgotten Song rather extensively and submit it for publication. Loose Id accepted it, and a new career was born. One day, when I get to meet Thom Yorke (Radiohead singer and songwriter and the person I most hero-worship in the world), I am going to thank him for starting me down the path to a career I actually like and hope to FSM he doesn't ask me to explain how that happened...

Have they read it? OMG. Would that not be awesome?Aren't you going to see them soon, Ally? (lisabea damn well knowing that Ally has a countdown calendar.)

Hell yeah I'm going to see them! Friday, in Charlotte. It's like the highlight of my year, how sad is that?

Have they read the fanfic? No one knows for sure, but those of us who write (or, in my case, wrote) it think they have. After all, the fanfic started out on the biggest, most popular fan-run Radiohead website in all the interwebs, At Ease, and that thread quickly became THE all time most giant and long-lasting thread on that site's message board. Radiohead knows about the message board, they HAVE to know about the biggest thread in the history of said message board. Besides, when they played at Coachella in 2004, Thom called Jonny a "dirty boy" on stage. O_O We decided to count that as

evidence that they've read our stories *g*

What are you working on currently? What's coming out soon?
Right now I'm smack in the middle of writing the fifth book in the Bay City Paranormal Investigations series, titled An Inner Darkness. More monsters, more angst, more mansex, and a HEA for all *g* It's the last book in the series proper, though Dean Delapore will have his own book, Where The Heart Is, in Jan.'09. I heart Dean. He almost stole the second book right out from under Sam and Bo. What's coming out soon? Hoo boy, a LOT. May's a freakin' HUGE book month for me. Here's what's coming out in May:

Closer (Bay City Paranormal Investigations book 4) May 20th from Samhain

Fireflies in print, from Samhain

Temperature's Rising, an all-manlove short story anthology in print from Samhain; contains my short story Catching A Buzz

Easy in print from ManloveRomance Press, available NOW. Yay! Easy is
still available as an ebook from Loose Id.

I also have a romantic comedy-type book coming out in July from Samhain, called The Happy Onion. I'd link you but I haven't put up a page on my website yet and it's not on Samhain's Coming Soon pages yet either. Wait until you see Anne Cain's cover though, it's HAWT!

Ooohh she has some very nice covers, Ally. The cover fairy has sprinkled you with goodness. How the heck do you find time to get this much done AND have an EDJ?

LOL You should've seen me when I got the fairy cover from her (Fireflies, for those who don't

know). I was at RT last year with the CPs, got that GORGEOUS cover in my email from Anne and had a total squeeing spaz attack right there in the hotel room. I LOVE that cover to an entirely inappropriate degree. The great thing is, Anne is always, reliably that awesome. I think she can read my mind :D Time? What is this "time" you speak of? Har :P Seriously, I don't know. I really don't. I guess I get it done by not ever having any down time. Like when Oswald died the other day (my laptop, btw; yes I named him Oswald O_O), I was freaking out not so much because I couldn't do any of the many things I needed to get done, but because I have NO FREAKIN' CLUE what to do with myself when I'm not working. That's just wrong, y'all. One day, I still hope to ditch the EDJ and spend all my time slouching around the house in my underwear writing gay smut. Sigh. **daydreams**

I've been reading Untamed Heart and I'm impressed by your ability to put me right into the natural surrounding: the wilds of Alaska. How do you do your research?

Oh man, I get totally caught up in research. My favorite website in the whole interwebs is this one:

http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/RS_OneDay.php

Complete sun and moon data for any given day, past, present or future, anywhere in the world. I LOVE that website. LOVE it. God, I'm such a dork :B Okay, research. I usually start with pictures. In the case of Untamed Heart, I had to pin down exactly what part of Alaska I wanted to use as the setting before I could really research it. I knew the sort of terrain I

wanted, and I knew it existed in Alaska, I just had to find out where it was. I don't know if you know this, but Alaska is kind of a humongous state O_O Anyhow, to research an area I generally check out pictures first, then find official websites and learn about the weather at the time of year during which the story takes place. Then I dig into local culture, big events that take place there, population, that sort of thing. I try to find out as much detail as I can, even if it never makes it into the story. I truly believe that the more you know about a place, the more that place can come alive for your readers when you write about it. I love learning all about a new place. But, the research needed is also one reason I keep setting books in places I'm already familiar with (Asheville, Mobile and the surrounding area, the South Carolina coast). The more you already know, the less time you have to spend learning stuff *g* Interesting thing about Untamed Heart. It all stemmed from an interest in Alaska. It's Bear Gryll's fault (Man Vs. Wild? On Discovery Channel? Anyone else watch that?). He did an episode in Alaska, parachuting onto a glacier then hiking down into the most jaw-droppingly gorgeous rain forest I've ever seen in my life. I thought, "I must set a book there!". And that was the kernel which grew into the corn stalk of Untamed Heart :D


Who are your influences as an author?

Errr... You're gonna laugh, but probably my biggest influence is Clive Barker. Books of Blood completely changed the way I view fiction. Jacqueline Ess: Her Will and Testament is still far and away my favorite short story by anyone, ever. I don't find myself emulating his mechanics (some of them would give my editors hives *g*), but I do see his influence in my flow of words and ideas sometimes. Now if I were only as GOOD as him, I'd be happy camper. I think H.P. Lovecraft is another influence, though I'm not exactly sure how. That's weird, huh? LOL. I know it is. Actually, I figure everything I've ever read has influenced me in some way. Hopefully I've been able to take a little bit of goodness from every author whose books I've read. I have yet to exhibit the talent of, say, Stephen King, but hey, a girl's gotta have a goal, right?

Absolutely. H.P. Lovecraft? I swear you are the only m/m author I know who would put Lovecraft on your list. I like that about you.
Heh *g* Thanks! Oh man, did you know Guillermo Del Toro (sp? I dunno...) is doing a movie version of At The Mountains of Madness? One of my favorite Lovecraft stories EVER. That damn story kept me up all night the first time I read it, swear to FSM. I am awaiting this movie with great anticipation.

Tell me about the type of hero you prefer. I'm guessing it isn't the typical Alpha.

You're guessing right *g* I can't relate to that sort of guy very well, which is why I don't write them. I relate much more to the sort of man I'm attracted to (and in fact married) in real life: smart, witty, open-minded, generous, and honest. Which is not to say that every hero has to have all those traits. But I can like a hero who, for example, might not be the sharpest knife in the drawer but acts like an adult instead of a pouty child and speaks his mind instead of being passive aggressive. I can't relate to a hero who broods every minute of every day and expects His Woman (or man, depending) to read his mind. I hate people like that in real life and will not waste my leisure time reading about them. So there. Heh :P
Of course I know not all alphas are like that. It's just that so far, I've found very, very few authors who can turn your typical alpha into the sort of hero I can root for.
I like the cute little twinky types. Yes, I'm a pervy old lady, what of it?

I like a particular Alpha, as we all know, but I understand where you're coming from. I'm a smart mouthed beta kind of girl. I loved those two betas in Forgotten Song. They managed to save their own skin, but they were real guys. Young. Struggling. Just starting out. That's something that stuck with me about that book: your ability to tap into their youthfulness. It wasn't contrived at all. Any thoughts on that? Must be your fine taste in music, right?

Aw, thank you! You know it's funny you should mention my fine musical taste *g* Because that story, probably more than any other I've written (other than The Happy Onion) was very much inspired by music. Not any particular music, really... **thinks** Okay, maybe Beck. I heart Beck with a mad passion. Ben looks like Beck in my head O_O (BECK!! I love BECK! Devil's Haircut has been inspiring me lately..oops..sorry..derail...) But anyhow, yeah, Forgotten Song was sort of inspired by all those people out there with music in their souls. Those people who don't just perform it, don't just write it and sing it, but live and breathe music. You know the type I'm talking about, I'm sure. Beck. Thom Yorke. Patrick Wolf these days, though I didn't know about him at that point. I'm not sure I'm explaining myself very well, but there ya go :) Oh and BTW, I don't think of Nate as a typical alpha. He's an alpha, for sure, just not a typical one. IMHO. Of course it could just be that J.L. is so skilled in bringing him to life that she can get past all the typical alpha annoyances to make us see the soft nougat center under Nate's hard candy shell. (Hey. How'd she know I meant Nate?) Dang, now I'm hungry <_<>



While Ally runs off to find some nougat-y goodness, I've got a succulent snacking treat for you. But(t) don't click at work. OR if your small fry are hanging around. Or your large fry. Christine sent this one and it's quite the ride.

I'd like to thank Ally Blue for stopping by today. Woot for Ally Blue!!! Don't forget to stop by galpal Sula's place.

Next week: Jet Mykles.