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Julie Bozza is all Smiles

11/3/2014

4 Comments

 
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It’s such a pleasure to sit down again (virtually) with Julie Bozza and chat. My last interview with her came out around the time Book 2 “Of Dreams and Ceremonies” was released and “The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring” was still in the conceptual stages.

You can read that interview here.

Back then I asked you about Book 3 and you said:


“The third one will be set back in Australia, probably about seven years into their relationship. I want to explore who they are by then, of course, and how they work together. But I also want to explore some more about Dave’s relationship to the Dreamtime site at the waterhole they (re)discovered. I’m sure there’ll be plenty of Charlie, and Denise and her family. I think I’ll have Nicholas’s nephew Robin pay them an extended visit as well, so we can find out a little more about who he’s growing into.”

Now The Thousand Smiles is complete, I can see that's what the story is all about! Thanks for agreeing to another interview so I can some of those issues in detail.

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AB: Dreams and dreamtime are themes that weave through the series. This is probably just my interpretation but I found it fascinating that, in some ways, the sequences in England depict life there as having a dreamtime quality about it. Their way of life locked into the past physically even if their attitudes have moved forward. Then again who knew how the upper echelons of society viewed gay relatives in years gone by. They didn’t believe in airing their dirty linen in public and quite possibly they were a lot more tolerant than the general populous. Both the Aboriginal people and the Upper Class Brits were very conscious of following tradition and respecting the past and their elders. Am I way off the mark here, seeing that similarity?

JB: I think that the notion of a similarity between the two cultures is actually a rather cool idea, and it might help explain one of Charlie’s more ‘left field’ suggestions. I won’t say what it was, so as to avoid spoilers – but it was sheer instinct to let him be the one to voice the notion, out of the four people involved in that conversation. I questioned myself over it, but it felt right, so I went with it. I’m not sure what kind of feedback (if any!) I’ll receive on that choice.

I am currently reading a book about EM Forster and his work. It quotes an interview in which he is asked about how conscious he is of his ‘technical cleverness’ when writing. His rather impatient reply was, “We keep coming back to that. People will not realise how little conscious one is of these things; how one flounders about.” I do not claim to be as clever as Forster, of course, and neither would I characterise my writing process as floundering – but it did bring home to me how often the ‘clever’ bits seem to happen almost despite an author’s conscious efforts.
 

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AB: So let’s step back a bit and talk about “Of Dreams and Ceremonies” first. Obviously the big difference between this and the other two books is the setting. As a Brit who came to Australia for a number of years and then returned, did you see Britain with fresh eyes when you went back?

JB: I guess that’s inevitable, as you finally have something else to compare it to. Also, I lived in Australia for 34 years, which is quite a stretch! Plenty of scope there for change.

Some things were as I remembered, and in many ways I ended up appreciating them all the more for having been without. The green countryside, the ruined castles and Tudor mansions and quaint villages, the sense of a living history: these were things I rediscovered and loved. The fact that I could visit (and even work in!) the places where John Keats once lived and worked is just marvellous to me.

Other aspects of living in England were a little less welcome, but that’s OK. It was good to also rediscover and reflect on a few things that make Australia such a great place to live.


AB: Class difference has always been a big factor in Britain as exemplified in films and television, eg Downton Abbey. Is this dying out? Most Aussies resist any hint of class distinction. Is it something British people cling to or encourage because of the glamour associated with it? Seeing this as welcome colour in otherwise drab lives. Social butterflies.

JB: Class distinctions are something I don’t encounter in my daily life. Which may only mean that I circulate within a narrow segment of society! So it’s something that I’m far less conscious of than I would have anticipated before I came to live here. Class was certainly something covered when I was studying social sciences with the Open University back when I first returned to England, so I can’t pretend the whole issue has gone away.

On the other hand, perhaps there is more of a sense of meritocracy these days… Prince William has married a ‘commoner’, and Prince Charles at last married his long-term love, a woman who wasn’t considered ‘high class enough’ for him in his youth. If all goes according to plan, our next two Queens will be women who wouldn’t have made the grade not so long ago. Maybe that all helps take the value judgements out of the class equation.

I think the great inequalities in wealth is more of an issue – but these days it’s not only the upper class who are rich, and the rich certainly don’t include all of the upper class. I think that’s where the divide is now. 


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AB: Did you consciously have to pace the book at a different tempo and wrap it in different colours or does that come naturally when living in a different country?

JB: It’s interesting that you mention the tempo and the colours in this regard, as they are certainly things I’m aware of as being different between the two countries. However, I can’t say that I was overly conscious of this. It’s more instinctive than that, I suspect. It was a part of the process of thinking/feeling my way into a new setting and a new part of the overall story.

AB: Now onto the third book. The other type of Dreamtime. What interested you most about Aboriginal mythology?

JB: What interests me most is that it’s a completely different way of thinking about the world and about time. It’s so very different that it’s a real struggle to even describe that difference in the English language – and despite much mental wrestling, I am sure I don’t entirely grasp it even now. My main character Dave Taylor is likewise interested and he tries to understand, but he’s very aware that he is often seeing things through a ‘white fella’ filter. An element of a Dreaming ‘story’ will make logical sense to him in terms of how the Western society views the world and its history – but he tries to always remember that this is only his interpretation, and it’s not the reality from an Indigenous Australian point of view.

I hope that I have done some justice to this in my story. I certainly approached the whole issue with every last ounce of respect in me. 


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AB: Where did you get your information from, because it’s not something you can just Google?

JB: I have been reading books – though probably never enough! The Indigenous culture was (and still primarily is) oral, and many of the books I have read are very much trying to understand that culture from a Western perspective. There is one book in particular that very much focuses on trying to bring the genuine stories into the modern-day written culture, trying to expand the oral into the written. The book is Australian Dreaming, compiled and edited by Jennifer Isaacs, and produced with the assistance of the Australia Council’s Aboriginal Arts Board. That has been very useful, though unfortunately I feel the idiosyncratic voices of the storytellers have been lost in ‘translating’ them into ‘proper’ English.

I am also a member of the Independent Scholars Association of Australia, and their journals and conference proceedings often include material on the Indigenous culture, and the Western relationship with it, so that has been a good source of thoughtful and challenging perspectives over the years.

I can’t claim to have very much direct personal experience, but I must give a shout out to my parents. When we first emigrated from England to Australia, they were very conscious of Australia’s Indigenous inhabitants, and deliberately set out to educate themselves and us. We had items such as clapsticks in our lounge room, and not just for decoration. An aunt and uncle also worked on a mission in West Australia. We weren’t allowed to forget or overlook our fellow Australians, and those who had arrived a long time before us. 


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AB: Why butterflies?

JB: Well, to answer for myself, it all comes down to a random comment from a reader on Goodreads, who kindly said I could write about two guys chasing butterflies, and she’d still read it. She meant it as an example of an unlikely subject for dramatic treatment. My Muse decided to take her seriously.

The question then became why Nicholas would be so interested in butterflies. Anyone who has read the first book will remember there are two answers. One is that the transformations undergone by butterflies – from egg to larva to pupa to fabulous adult – are equated to him coming out, not just as a gay man but also as the person he most wants to be. The second answer is related to the first, in that he’s very aware of the short lifespan given to adult butterflies, and that relates to the fact that his health means he might not survive for his allotted ‘three score and ten’. He might finally, truly emerge from his chrysalis, only to find that his days are numbered.

In relation to this last book, I think there is a third answer, and that is (as expressed so eloquently by Sting), “Lest we forget how fragile we are.” 


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AB: A lot of Aussies never step outside the cities or travel west of the Sandstone Wall (aka The Great Dividing Range). Did you spend much time in the Outback?

JB: One of my formative experiences was a long camping trip through Australia when I was eleven. An extended family group, including my parents and me and my sister, travelled west to Adelaide and then up through Coober Pedy to Alice Springs. We’d been planning to come back the same way, but unexpected flooding meant we had to continue on north for a way, and then drive back down through Queensland instead. I still have vivid memories of the dawn sky, and the Milky Way at night, and the wide flat landscape, that you’ll recognise in my stories.

I haven’t done anything very similar since, but we lived inland in Canberra, and my mother-in-law lives in western New South Wales, so I suppose I actually spent most of my time on the far side of the Sandstone Wall.

AB: Did you base your characters on anyone in real life? Especially Charlie?

JB: No, I didn’t – though I did ‘cast’ Dave and Nicholas in my head, as that helps me to get to know them in three dimensions, as it were. I did have someone vaguely in mind for how Charlie looks, but basically I made him up as I went, drawing on my reading about Indigenous Aboriginal people and also perhaps on a dash of what a white fella once called Negative Capability. 

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AB: I was speaking to an American friend who read your book and she was surprised that Dave never warned Nicholas about snakes and other deadly creepy crawlies? Especially as the guide was so anal about everything else. As she put it: “This is Australia--where everything can kill you. And he doesn't say a peep?”

JB: I should think that Nicholas as a naturalist knows just as well as Dave – perhaps even better! – what the threats are, and what the actual risks are. The risks tend to get exaggerated, when little more than cautious common sense is required. After all, if it were true that ‘everything can kill you’, Australia would be no more successfully settled than Antarctica. I lived in Australia for over thirty years, went camping regularly with my family as a kid, including the long trip through the Outback – and in all that time, I saw one harmless snake in the wild, and one rather sedentary red-back spider. Oh, and a plague of mice, one night outside of Coober Pedy! I do have a horror of crocodiles, but Dave and Nicholas weren’t going anywhere they would be an issue. Dave talked about the safety precautions that were sensible for the sort of areas they were travelling through, and that reflects what I believe to be the realistic approach. 

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AB: One aspect I found surprising is the lack of mention that the main danger travelling out west is hitting or being hit by a kangaroo, with some roads having carcasses in varying states of decomposition every few miles. Did you feel this reality might be a bit hard for readers to stomach?

JB: Yes, and I also pretended that flies don’t exist, and that the hot weather in Queensland is bearable! I’ll happily admit I idealised the setting somewhat – and Butterfly Hunter was my first proper romance, so maybe I took that a little too far. I didn’t want anything too significant to get in the way of a happy trip (and al fresco sex). 

AB: Were you consciously trying not to make the book too Crocodile Dundee?

JB: The idea didn’t even occur to me, thank god! LOL! No, that’s a fun film, but I wouldn’t have wanted it hanging over my head as either a positive or a negative example.

AB: Family was an important part of Book 2, and the main fly in the ointment in Book 3 is the arrival of Robin on the scene. He had some interesting theories on life and love and celibacy. Was he based on anyone in particular?

JB: No, he wasn’t. Again, I made him up! I was very interested to explore something of another ‘letter’ in the wondrous GLBTQIA quiltbag, and I did some reading and browsing, thinking and mulling… There are a whole spectrum of sexualities, and I am interested in writing beyond the expected – as long as I feel I am simpatico enough to do justice to the characters and their ‘real life’ counterparts.

AB: Another theme that was important in this book is encapsulated in this paragraph: “Things are generally a little more complicated than that,” Nicholas replied in somewhat softer tones. He’d had the mercy to not even glance at Dave through all this. “I think you’ll find … there are infinite varieties of men and women and those in between.”

JB: I’m really glad that idea stood out for you, as it’s something I believe in wholeheartedly. I would like to think that I bring that notion to everything that I write, though I suppose it is more obvious in this story, where Dave and Nicholas have to try to at least accept if not entirely understand an identity and experience that is quite different from their own. 

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AB: As befits a story about the Seven Year Itch, in a way “A Thousand Smiles…” is a book about change. Their precious waterhole is threatened. Their relationship is threatened and Nicholas’s health is threatened. Was this a conscious thing?

JB: Interesting question! I never consciously put it that way to myself, but I suppose it’s inevitable from a storytelling perspective. As the third novel in a trilogy, it feels right to challenge or threaten each significant aspect of the whole shebang, and see what results. After such a narrative earthquake, as it were, I certainly consider things settled by the end of the story, though, and I hope readers will feel that way, too.

AB: There are times in the last book when the outside world intrudes, threatening the waterhole. How do you explain what protects it?

JB: This is the ‘mystical’ element of the story, that runs through all three books, which can’t be explained away with science and logic. I’ve made my ideas of what was going on a little more explicit in this book, but still it’s up to the reader to really interpret it. I am a pretty sceptical person, and an ardent atheist, but for some reason my writing tends to include hints of ‘more things in heaven and earth’. Maybe I just wish there were. But then one of the aspects of this story that interests me is having Dave, a sceptic and atheist like me, thrown into the midst of a situation where there really might be something more going on.

May I finish by saying, AB, that I really appreciate all the careful thought and analysis you put into these questions. It is rare to have romance novels treated as respectfully or seriously as other literary work, and I am very grateful. It is delightfully affirming! 

Buy links:
  • Manifold Press
  • Amazon US
  • Amazon UK
  • Smashwords
  • CreateSpace
Author's bio: Julie Bozza is an English-Australian hybrid who is fuelled by espresso, calmed by knitting, unreasonably excited by photography, and madly in love with Colin Morgan and John Keats.

Author's links:
  • Julie's blog
  • Goodreads
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LiveJournal
Thank you, Julie for taking the time to answer my questions.
Julie has kindly donated a copy of "The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring"
The winner will be chosen on November 11th from those who have left a comment.
4 Comments

Butterfly Hunter revisited

10/27/2014

0 Comments

 
Butterfly Hunter (Butterfly Hunter #1)Butterfly Hunter by Julie Bozza
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The way I discovered this book and Julie Bozza was eerily like the protagonists discovered the butterflies. I certainly didn't go looking. After hearing about the writer through convoluted means, I trusted my instincts rather than logic and followed a cloud of 5 star ratings that barely showed up against the plethora of five star ratings that stretch from horizon to horizon of the reading world. And I'm so glad I did.

Perhaps it was the shimmer that made her story show up, the unusual cover in a trope that depends on sex to sell.

There was sex, but it was very much the fade to black variety even if they do get to second base or even third base at times.

If I have a criticism of the book it is that at a couple of points during the sex scenes there was a gap that made me skip back a page because I thought I'd flipped over one too many. Is actual penetration that hard to include? Perhaps some nitty gritty real sex might have stolen some of the light hearted feel away but then again perhaps it could have grounded the story a bit more and made it more real. A sentence or two in the different scenes would have done me.

As an Aussie, I can vouch for the setting's authenticity. The attraction of the Australian outback is not easy to see. In the heat of the day, it's hot. Bloody hot. Shirts cling to your back from the sweat. Flies try to crawl into your nose, eyes and mouth seeking moisture. Ants are literally everywhere. Probably a good reason to sleep up on top of the Land Cruiser. Sometimes it's so hot even the birds are silent. That's when the insects start making a racket. Most city dwellers see the Australian outback as a harsh place and rarely venture out there which is a pity, because it is beautiful, and in certain lights, it's magic.

The trouble is you have to be there to experience it. Julie gives us a picture of the overwhelming magnificence of the southern skies at night. But I love the time just before dawn when there is an expectant hush in the air. I've only ever experienced the same thing when a baby budgie was hatching and its parents and siblings all grew quiet (a rare state in that breed) while tiny tapping sounds could be heard as the baby bird broke through the shell. It's the same in the bush. Everything goes quiet. The wind drops, the birds are silent and then the sun pokes its head above the horizon. Later, the heat of the day sucks all the energy out of the landscape, but the early morning light caresses the bush, making it unforgettable.

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There is no lush grass, no soft colors, the ground is hard and unforgiving until you find a waterhole.

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The wattle is our national symbol, but it can take on many forms.
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As m/m writers go, Julie has come the closest so far to capturing this unique setting.

As someone whose father and sister were entomologists and actually worked for the organisations briefly mentioned, it gave me an eerie feeling of being right there.

Hunting butterflies isn't hunting Tasmanan tigers or even kangaroos. There's no guns, no villains, no drama just a gentle unfolding of the story. In fact, the analogy of their life spans, their metamorphosis into something beautiful mirrors Dave's change perfectly.

Tough macho Aussie males brought up far away from gay culture would seek the protection and company of a girl who was a mate. Uncomplicated. Unthreatening. They wouldn't even be aware they were doing it. They would assume that what they had was a normal boy/girl relationship. I found that part of the story totally believable. The girls themselves are often different. On the remote properties there aren't a lot of other girls around so being accustomed to hang out with their brothers, they tend to grow up as tomboys, being able to shoot and ride as well as the men. So Dave would be like a brother to her. Someone she is fiercely loyal to. In turn, he would feel totally comfortable with her and assume their relationship was more.

I also thought the way the author handled aboriginal culture was appropriate in the circumstances and wasn't condescending in any way. Not every Australian takes the time or has the interest in accepting that relationship to the land, but for those who do, there's this special way of looking at things. Outsiders may not "get it" or they may see it as appropriating their culture, but in fact not "getting it" and ignoring that aspect is more disrespectful.

It is probably best if you read the story when you are in the right mood for it. It certainly made a welcome change for me.

View all my reviews
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Next week, I'm pleased to announce that I will be chatting to Julie Bozza about her new book, "The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring" which wraps up her fabulous Butterfly Hunter series. She will also be giving away a copy to one lucky commentator.

In the meantime, you might like to catch up with the last interview I did with her. You can read it here.


And the book which will be released on Nov 1st can be
pre-ordered from Amazon by clicking
here.

0 Comments

Giving Julie Bozza Butterflies

11/3/2013

0 Comments

 
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Julie Bozza has a new book out. Always grounds for celebration!
Butterfly Hunter was the first of her books that I read. By page 53 I was hooked, not only because of her great writing but because there were an incredible number of links between incidents described and places I’d been to. I wrote to Julie and mentioned these. She was nice enough to respond and since then I’ve added a few more questions.

First up was my response to Butterfly Hunter.

AB: Imagine the thrill I got when Dave and Nicholas walked through the Botanic Gardens and visited a few other haunts I used to frequent. Plus my father and sister were both entomologists and went on collecting trips like your characters did.  Are any of your other books set in Australia?

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JB: None of my other titles currently published are set in Australia. I am currently writing the sequel to Butterfly Hunter, but most of it is set in England, I'm afraid! I do, however, have a couple of ideas for future projects set in Australia that I will probably get to at some point. Certainly the setting seemed to be a popular one, whether readers enjoyed seeing their home country depicted, or reading about somewhere a bit different and 'exotic'.

AB: Do you read reviews of your books?

JB: I read some, and I do think about what they have to say, whether positive or negative. Though only to an extent - I hardly read a review of Butterfly Hunter (except for yours) once I started writing the sequel, as I wanted to be as free as possible to write it 'my' way. Also, it's challenging enough to follow up a successful title, without adding anything to the pressure, or risking a complete collapse of confidence. :-)

It was very interesting to me that someone remarked how wrong I'd got the forensic or police procedures in The Definitive Albert Sterne. Obviously someone who has real experience in the field! All I can say to defend myself is that you won't find anything in there that you wouldn't see on any of the CSI or police procedural type of shows, so at least I'm amongst good company. But no, I can't compete with the thriller-writers who have direct experience. I did an awful lot of reading as research, but no 'field work' as it were. LOL! I certainly read enough to be able to spot where Silence of the Lambs got it wrong - which was both a surprise and a relief to me as a writer...

Anyway, yes. I guess I'm convinced that experts in any field will almost always be able to pick apart the fiction set in their area. Unfortunately that's mostly how it works.

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AB: How do you handle negative comments? Does it affect what you write next? How you might handle a sequel?'

JB: As I've already hinted, if I feel there's something of substance in the criticism that I can learn from, then I take heed. However, over the years, I have also learned to have faith in my own instincts. I am not hard-nosed about 'doing it my way or not at all', but at a purely practical level the times where I've gone with my own instincts - whether or not my instincts are affected by external input - are the times when I've written best. Readers respond in deeper ways to writing which I have felt deeply myself. And sometimes that means trusting myself despite other people telling me to do something different. It's as you say yourself re the ending of 'Red and Blue': you see now that you should have listened to your own gut instinct. All I can add at this point is 'Amen to that!' So I don't suppose I have any answers to this that you haven't figured out for yourself.

AB: Do you read much M/M romance?

JB: A fair bit – though I'm afraid I don't read as much as I probably should within our genre - just so little time, and often reading for research rather than pleasure or interest. So I don't really have a feel for overall themes or styles. From the outside looking in, it seems quite a diverse range, though, especially given the 'rules' of the romance genre.

AB: Do you agree with my assessment that charm is of one of the main themes of The Definitive Albert Sterne? If so, was this in your mind when you developed the book or wrote it?

JB: Yes, I agree with all you say in your review about charm and how it works as a theme in the novel. But no, it wasn’t something I consciously had in mind. Which really interests me! As I was first reading your review, I was nodding along and thinking ‘Yes, absolutely!’ and yet I was also thinking ‘Gosh! I didn’t even know!’

It really interests me how the writing process – perhaps any creative process – draws on both the intellectual and the instinctual. I suppose the trick is to find a way of using both, to use the conscious mind but not let it get in the way of the subconscious. Some of the bits I’m proudest of in my novels and stories are things I wasn’t aware of at the time, but discovered later. Such things can really work well – and oddly I hardly feel I can take much credit for them!

One thing I definitely had in mind for Albert himself was the trope of ‘The Truth Teller’, the person who always says what he or she has on their mind, without filtering it in ways that society expects. I find such honesty charming and amusing – in fiction at least! Perhaps it’s about daring to shake off the shackles of politeness and tact. From there, it would have made instinctive sense to have Fletcher both charming and afraid of charm. And so on…

I love how you incisively pull this particular theme out of the novel and describe it so clearly. I hope you’re not too disappointed to find that I didn’t fully intend it!

AB: What are your own personal thoughts on charm?

JB: I agree with you that charm can be dangerous. It can certainly help you go a long way, and a lack of charm can really hold you back. I certainly don’t think that ‘nice guys finish last’, as most people enjoy having men and women around them who are cheerful, personable and friendly. But it has to be sincere, or come from a good heart. That’s the danger with charm, I suppose: it can be all flashy style with no real substance.

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AB: Was there some reason that you chose the time period that your books cover? For starters, did you need to go back and check what Forensic procedures were carried out in those days for the Albert Sterne books? Did the fact that it was a fairly new science influence your decision?

JB: The very first ideas that eventually grew into the novel actually occurred to me way back in the early nineties, so as I started planning it out, I was setting it in the recent past. I am always uneasy about setting books in the future – even in the near future – and as you’re aware it would have been particularly foolish in this case, with the science evolving so rapidly. 

I wanted Albert’s parents to have been fleeing the Second World War in Europe when they came to America, so that helped tie the story to a particular period in the past. I recall there was some slight rejigging of the timelines so that Fletcher could be an impressionable mid–teen when Robert Kennedy was killed. Otherwise, it panned out as I’d initially planned.

Despite the fact that I didn’t seriously start writing the novel for some while, I never really considered bringing it forward in time. I enjoyed the fact that Fletch had to do a lot of (literal) legwork, and Mac’s data searches were so much clunkier in those pre–Google days. I also liked to frustrate poor Albert with the fact that DNA profiling had been invented but wasn’t yet widely available. I enjoy watching the hi–tech shows, even when they strain credibility, but there was something cool about setting the story in a world where Fletch couldn’t just call Albert on his cell, and Albert could gather a whole lot of trace evidence but not be able to work miracles with it.

AB: Would you consider Albert had a form of Asperger's? It wasn't widely diagnosed until the mid nineties, but that's what his behaviour reminded me of on many occasions.

JB: I can see why you wondered about that – and if he’d been born later he may well have been assessed for such a disorder. But in my opinion, he doesn’t have Asperger syndrome. I think he’s a result of his early circumstances acting on a very private person who is very intelligent but not so emotionally intelligent. For better or worse, I think it’s just his personality.

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AB: Songs play an important part in Homosapien – a fantasy about pro wrestling. After I wrote my review which can be found here, Julie and I got into a discussion about the way men can write fantastic ballads where they pour out their feelings yet male authors often get criticised for not showing the emotions and not being romantic enough in their stories.

JB:  We are told that men aren't so great at expressing themselves and aren't as emotional as women, but how then do we explain all the centuries of novels, poetry, letters and so on that men have given us, right on through to the text messages my husband sends me when he's away? Not to mention the passionate 'real life' love affairs that have taken place in the public eye. I still don't go as far as I feel I legitimately could, in what I have my heroes say and do - but I feel there's far more room for manoeuvre than what is dictated by 'common wisdom'!

AB: As an aside, the one point that the two male authors at the OZmmMeet made in our panel about specifics relating to the genre was that men don’t think about their emotions. They don’t try to analyse them or express them. They admitted they have them though. Perhaps it is a case of not generalizing.

JB: The authors you mention have a point that I will have to ponder over for a while, absolutely. And yet… how could Pete Murray have written ‘Please’ or ‘Ten Ft. Tall’ without thinking about, analysing and expressing his own emotions and those of his friends…? And he is in all other ways such a bloke, bless him. I don’t know. Maybe I won’t ever know! But I’m sure I’ll be thinking about it for a long while to come.

AB: Once again that story is set in the past, but comments have been made about getting facts wrong.

JB: I dubbed this novel a ‘fantasy’ in the subtitle partly because I wanted to set it outside the existing world of pro wrestling, and explore various aspects of the situation without having to pay strict attention to actual timelines, and so on. (Also, I didn't want to risk incurring Vince McMahon's wrath over copyright issues!) However, I was very much drawing on things that were happening in the late 80s and 90s, a time of great transition for the pro wrestling world.

I know that someone asserted in response to your review that ALL pro wrestling fans are in on the whole thing and know that it's staged. I'm sure it's a much different proportion today than it was then, but surveys taken at the time indicated that around 75% of fans thought pro wrestling was real - in all senses. A real, competitive sport. And the surveys were constructed in such a way as to really explore that question. So that's a whole heap of people who either experienced it as real - or (like Fox Mulder) they very much wanted to believe.

The story I included in the novel about a man only realising it was staged when he happened to see an identical show staged in another town when he was away from home - that was real. My media studies teacher told me of this exact experience, and how disillusioned he'd felt!

The only other quibble I've come across is that it's unlikely David, as an American, would have ordered a 'doppio'. But that was pretty much my point, as he's a coffee snob as well as an intellectual snob.

So I very much appreciate you asking, but I'm still pretty happy with the novel and what it covers.

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AB: When you re-released in The Valley of the Shadow of Death, did you make any changes to the original?

JB: Nothing very significant. It was an opportunity to polish it up and have a fresh pair of eyes look at it, but the substance of it is much the same.

AB: With your earlier publications, do you ever get the urge to revisit an rework them (one day) knowing what you know about writing now?

JB: As with Valley, the publishing or republishing of an older title is a chance to have another look at the manuscript. However, I rarely make significant changes to them. For better or worse, I feel the book is what it is, and there's an 'integrity' to it that might get lost if a rewrite isn't done thoroughly and well. In any case, I am the kind of person who tends to look forwards rather than back, so I'm far more interested in the current or next project...


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AB: I gather the sequel to the Butterfly Hunter is about the transition to living in England and the challenges. Would you like to tell us about that?

JB: Thank you, I’d love to! LOL! The sequel is called Of Dreams and Ceremonies, and is indeed set mostly in England. Dave and Nicholas both want to settle in Australia, but that can’t happen immediately, so this time Dave is the ‘fish out of water’. He’s coping with a very different lifestyle to what he’s used to – and of course the relationship is still fairly new so they are not only learning more about each other, but they’re also having to make some mutual decisions about things they’re coming to with very different assumptions. I enjoyed writing that feeling of them both being very sure this relationship is what they want, but still trying to figure out how that will actually work.

AB: Do you know when this will be available through Allromance ebooks?

JB: The Press's general practice is to make titles available on AllRomance and via other distributors two months after initial publication, though that can vary depending on how things pan out.

AB: You mentioned at one point that there would be a third book in the Butterfly Hunter series. Are there other themes you want to explore in that?

JB: The third one will be set back in Australia, probably about seven years into their relationship. I want to explore who they are by then, of course, and how they work together. But I also want to explore some more about Dave’s relationship to the Dreamtime site at the waterhole they (re)discovered. I’m sure there’ll be plenty of Charlie, and Denise and her family. I think I’ll have Nicholas’s nephew Robin pay them an extended visit as well, so we can find out a little more about who he’s growing into.

AB: What else is on the horizon?

JB: At the moment I’m about halfway into writing a novel about three young men who, much to their own surprise, start up a long-term threesome relationship. It’s set in contemporary London, and takes place over about a year. They’re all actors, so part of the fun is making up or borrowing the stories they’re working with over the year. It’s an interesting challenge, as while the characters have different backgrounds, they are each coming to this with fairly conventional ideas about love involving two people in a monogamous relationship and so on. But they decide, bit by bit over time, that the unconventional threesome is well worth making some adjustments for.

Can I finish by thanking you, AB, for some very interesting questions and conversations? It’s been really great to engage with you at such a thoughtful level.

Buy link: http://www.manifoldpress.co.uk/2013/10/of-dreams-and-ceremonies/

Blurb: It seemed like a great idea at the time… Aussie Dave Taylor has followed Nicholas Goring to England, and the lovers have become engaged. But now Dave has to cope with living in a mansion full of family and servants, making wedding plans, getting his head around visa applications, and wondering why on earth he’d ever want to wear a ‘mourning suit’. He’s not sure if it will prove any easier, but right now Dave would love to just skip ahead to the honeymoon…

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Is It Real? Who cares as long as it's Entertaining

7/8/2013

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Homosapien ... a fantasy about pro wrestlingHomosapien ... a fantasy about pro wrestling by Julie Bozza
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

After reading, and loving, four of Julie Bozza's most recent books, I had been checking this one out, but the reviews and the fact I'm not a fan of pro-wrestling made me wary of buying it.

However, I am a big admirer of Julie’s writing and her recent post into why she wrote the book made me curious: http://juliebozza.com/?p=1077

And I'm so glad I succumbed to temptation, as her story actually deals with the aspects that turn me off: the fakery, the frenetic fanfares, the fans themselves.

If you’re expecting a traditional m/m romance, this isn’t the book for you, but if you’re looking for an amusing, heart-warming, thought-provoking book this is.

While Patrick, her narrator, is awed by the romance that blossoms between his dour, idealistic, intelligent boss and his hero, a flamboyant pro-wrestler, he also explores the true nature of pro-wrestling and discovers the potentially deal-breaking fact that the fights and characters are all scripted. Note, I didn’t say “fake” and the difference is very much at the heart of the book.

Sure, the guys are excellent stunt men and the sport is potenitally dangerous, however, I wouldn’t recommend that anyone should bet on the outcome of pro-wrestling matches, relying purely on technique or form. For if you did, you would be laying odds on whether you knew which way the soap opera unfolded. It would be like betting on what happened next in “Lost” or in the lives of Posh and Beck - a real life couple who carefully script what the public knows about their lives.

While the book doesn't deal with these sort of things I was reminded of many other instances that are manipulatively scripted while ostensibly being "real". For example, it’s becoming more obvious that shows like "Big Brother" are scripted. At least as far as what the producers care to show and what they don’t. Even the morning radio shows that revolve around the witty banter between two radio jocks is scripted to an extent. Just check out the comedy writers who are sometimes given credit. And another form of “script” is done in “real-life” diary blogs which sometimes even use made-up characters and include content based on comments from previous blogs all in an effort to gain maximum interest and patronage.

Because that’s what it all comes down to in the end. Bums on seats.

The pro-wrestlers' situations and storylines are manipulated to gain the most impact, whether shocking or affectionate. The viewers are also being manipulated. We love to hate just as much as we love to love.

In a way, pro-wrestling is the grown up version of clown routines at the circus. It is soap opera for men. There was even one section where the author told about how they’d performed live to differently aged groups of kids with cancer. The storyline/action changed appropriately.

Does this make it fake?

Should we care that it’s not “real”?

These are the sorts of questions that are covered in the book.

But the most telling conflict at the centre of the book is the way being a gay professional wrestler was seen as a mockery at first and then later brought out a lot of homophobic reactions from the red-neck crowds and fellow participants. This raised the question should this have been allowed to continue?

There was one brilliant quote in the book that summed up the author’s take on the situation. It came from Patrick after his eyes have been “opened”
”it occurs to me that the crowds are free to enjoy Butch and Sundance and their gay antics, because they are now beginning to know or at least guess that it’s all scripted. They don’t have to be uncomfortable about it, they can just cheer or (preferably, in this case) boo to their hearts’ content……because the mob just might find themselves enjoying all this queerness, and that might just painlessly widen out to an acceptance of real queerness before anyone notices.”
The writing style is worthy of comment as well. As a writer, I tried to picture other ways the subject could have been handled. For current day scenes, it even starts out in past tense and switches to present tense. We are given part of the story as reconstructed dialogue between two people and the narrator wasn’t present at the time. Patrick addresses the reader, yet fails to give insight into his own personal life at the time. Yet what happens to him is also ultimately affected by the pro-wrestling scene. These sorts of things might turn off some readers, but I loved the sheer audacity of it. Much like people either do or don’t like the flamboyance of pro-wrestling.

The themes of “Good versus Bad” and “Us versus Them” also formed a thread in the book.

None of these themes are “told” to us. We have to pay attention and see them ourselves, although the way Julie (or should I say the owner of WWW, Jack Dynes) switched to The Fallen vs The Righteous was an interesting twist. As Patrick says:
It’s all heat, whether it’s cheering or jeering, and heat’s a good thing. Heat is what they want.”
In the end, this is what the story is all about. Giving people what they want. Not necessarily what they need. Or it is, if what they need is a bit of passion in their lives. A bit of excitement.

I really enjoyed the book both on a visceral and intellectual level. Those only looking for the former might be frustrated that we aren’t given the story in traditional format, but I doubt the theme could have been explored so effectively if we were. At times, I was reminded of Jane Davitt’s Hourglass which deals with two men who appear in a TV show together.

Julie ends off with a statement:
”Wrestling’s more than just violence or a soap opera or a parody. It’s a postmodern phemomenon.
It is definitely worth thinking about this while reading it. See how many times we, as viewers or readers, are manipulated into reacting a certain way. With the instant feedback of TV ratings, being able to measure Youtube and Facebook “likes” and website “hits” those who manipulate or write the “scripts” can tweak them to gain maximum effect.

These sorts of stories deserve to be read more. Thank you, Julie for writing it.

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Charm: A Two-Edged Sword

7/1/2013

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The Definitive Albert J. SterneThe Definitive Albert J. Sterne by Julie Bozza
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book is about charm.

The use of it. The abuse of it. The lack of it. The strength of it.

Albert Sterne is not a charming man.

He is impatient, abrupt, arrogant, irascible, the list goes on.

Fletcher Ash, the only person who has managed to penetrate his defensive field, possesses charm in abundance. He gets on with everyone. His work mates. His superiors. He likes people.

On the surface, you’d assume that being charming is a good thing, yet one of the hardest hitting sections of the book involves a scene where Fletcher comes to realize that he’s been charmed by someone else.

The villain also charms his victims into a false sense of security before striking like a snake.

It is this shared ability to charm that allows Fletcher to gain an insight into the murderer’s psyche.

There are four linchpins in every murder mystery. Whodunit? What was their motive? How did they do it? And will they get away with it?

The same questions could be addressed to the book itself.

The first? Easy. Julie Bozza spent the majority of her life in Australia but has now returned to England, the land of her birth. Is this relevant? Yes, in that I gather from other reviews that she has some of her facts wrong regarding American FBI procedures. If she has, those errors didn’t bother me, as my awareness of them is based on what I’ve gleaned from TV. Can we be sure that what we see on TV is correct, anyway. Do they follow the same procedures in all cases? And what happens if you have people whose nature ensures they do things their way, not necessarily the correct way? I gather from correspondence that she researched it as much as she could (not just TV), finding in the process that even “Silence of the Lambs” got some facts wrong.

In the end, the procedural aspects didn’t bother me because I was too wrapped up in solving the mystery of the people themselves to be bothered about these sorts of things.

The plot itself revolves around one man’s obsession in tracking down a serial killer. Given the title, you’d think that man was Albert Sterne, but it’s his friend, Fletcher Ash who takes centre stage for most of the book.

For a large section, Albert isn’t even physically present, however, the nature of his personality and their relationship still impinge on Ash’s actions. As his frustration grows because of his inability to solve the crime and prevent more murders, Albert is the one constant he can depend on. It is Albert who gets him back on track when he goes off the rails. He is the one definite thing in Fletcher’s life. The constant.

Albert’s irascible nature actually becomes a relief because it is honest. It is who Albert is. He hasn’t charmed anyone. Not even Fletcher. If anything, he has held Fletcher at arm’s length. Struggling against allowing anyone into his life.
Ash could distract him at the most inopportune moments. A complete waste of energy. But he realized there was no way to undo the damage. He could only hope to minimize its effects, give it the necessary time to wear off.
What a gorgeous way to say he’s in love without saying the “l” word.

I enjoy books where you have to decipher the “shows” or the clues, for yourself. Books that are a mystery on another layer. We’re not told how much Albert loves Ash. We are told that on one level, he doesn’t want to be. But deep down, it’s another matter. If you examine the text, paying attention as you read, all sorts of clues crop up to what is really driving him. For example, Albert’s obsession with the color blue. The analogy of the weeds that infiltrate his garden. The ones he grudgingly accepts because of their blue flowers that remind him of Fletcher’s eyes. The way he cooks and prepares a haven for Fletcher even while verbally warning him away. The descriptions we get:
Ash’s face brightened again, then slowly began to outshine the spring sun.
How can a man who thinks like that be described as cold and unfeeling?Why is he like that might be a better question.

Fletcher has to resort to this type of detection to determine how Albert feels about him. This inability of Albert’s to share his feelings and his passion openly frustrate Ash. Hence his need to seek out what he thinks at first is a more honest relationship only to have his eyes opened to some unpleasant truths.

One of the benefits of eReaders is the ability to annotate as I go. I mark paragraphs that strike me as worth remembering, or quoting. By the time I finished reading, I had a stack.

Woven into the text were some thought-provoking comments on society and people in general. At one point, Fletcher has a conversation about minorities with Xavier, a black gay politician:
“A minority people wants to maintain solidarity, to create a home or an identity without internal divisions, so that it can face the rest of the world. They want to present a positive image. So dissidents, like gays within that minority are silenced twice over because they’re disruptive and they’re seen as a negative. You find that with blacks, with Jews, with Chinese Americans, whatever.”
And then he goes on to say later:
”We need to mingle to successfully co-habit this small world of ours, but mingle without imposing templates on everyone. We need to appreciate the individual, celebrate differences rather than persecute them…..a minority within a minority, like gay black men, needs to first find pride and dignity in its own identity, on its own terms….A small group needs to develop authentic self-determination and then they can choose to become part of mainstream society - a part of the wonderful diverse whole that deserves and demands as much respect as any other part.
Wonderful words, and yet Fletcher was later to question this man’s morals.

This concept of good co-existing with evil or at least cold-hearted pragmatism lies at the heart of each of the four cornerstones of this story: Garrett, Xavier, Albert and Ash. It is the struggle to balance these that I found really fascinating.

Does the end justify the means?

How do you determine where that boundary lies? How did Fletcher?
One telling phrase was
“But if I wouldn’t approve of your means and tactics in the hands of a right wing reactionary, then I can’t in all conscience approve of you.”
From a traditional story telling structure, this whole section in the centre of the book, where Albert Sterne is absent breaks all the rules. Yet even though he is not present, what happens here, the need for Fletcher to seek a different type of relationship and what he learns from it are all totally necessary.

Without it, the guilt, the change in direction, the recognition of what was lacking would not have resonated so soundly.

What other structural points make this book stand head and shoulders above the rest? Incorporation of dreams into text. We are slipped into them seamlessly. No italics to jerk us awake. We are as unaware of them as Fletcher is but soon learn to recognize the sign. See them change to reflect the action leading up to it and the inner turmoil that they are reflecting. These aren’t the typical m/m romance’s clichéd dreams of sex, these are psychologist’s bread and butter. Yearnings for connection, fear of failure.

When awake, Fletcher is acutely aware of the problems with their relationship. And so is Albert who recognizes that he
expected too much, as well, and neither could meet the other’s needs.
But they keep trying. They don’t have hissy fits. They may not lay all the cards on the table when they communicate, but that reflects their own natures and backgrounds.

I have yet to read the follow up story to this, which I gather is a prequel of sorts. I gather it explores their pasts to show how they became the men they are in this book and what motivates them to act the way they do.

Profiling is an important part of whodunits. Building a picture of the perpetrator from the crimes they commit. Trying to gain an understanding about who they are and why they did what they did. In some ways, I’ve done that with the characters already. It will be interesting to see how accurately I interpreted the clues in this book.

Did the story work? Did Julie get away with doing something different?

Even though it’s long, I loved the book and devoured it almost non-stop. For once, the head hopping didn’t bother me, because it was necessary. The sections inside the killer’s mind are gruesome, but I felt they were needed to heighten the sense that it was important that Fletcher solve the crimes before he struck again. It’s not pretty being inside the mind of an evil man, but this is a rare case in a whodunit where I think it is necessary. Not for the graphic details but to see the extreme version where charm is harmful.

It’s not an easy read. If you want a light-hearted book about two special agents catching a serial killer with lots of graphic sex, read the Cut and Run series.

In some ways, the realtioship between the two men reminded me of Dan and Vadim in Special Forces. But whereas that, too, was a story about a man with irresistible charm and another more dour and introspective, Albert is not Vadim. He’s more aware of and sympathetic to the fact that Ash has changed over time.
And even in Fletcher had been there, the fire of him all but irresistible, Albert would still have been wholly unsure how to respond. All he could do was watch that relentless happy optimism of Fletcher’s die. All Albert could do was hope this wasn’t revenge,
This isn’t a romance, but it is a love story. Not romantic love but deeper, more meaningful love.
“One of the reasons I love you,” he finally said slowly, “is that you always insist on me doing my best. We both know how often I fall short of the mark but on the important things, you insist and I try.”
Trust and respect mean more than the three easy words. In this case, two simple words broke through the barriers he’d erected
”It’s necessary.
I’m so glad others who have read this story liked it and appreciated it.



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A Shimmer in the M/M Skies

5/4/2013

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Butterfly HunterButterfly Hunter by Julie Bozza
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The way I discovered this book and Julie Bozza was eerily like the protagonists discovered the butterflies. I certainly didn't go looking. After hearing about the writer through convoluted means, I trusted my instincts rather than logic and followed a cloud of 5 star ratings that barely showed up against the plethora of five star ratings that stretch from horizon to horizon of the reading world. And I'm so glad I did.

Perhaps it was the shimmer that made her story show up, the unusual cover in a trope that depends on sex to sell.

There was sex, but it was very much the fade to black variety even if they do get to second base or even third base at times.

If I have a criticism of the book it is that at a couple of points during the sex scenes there was a gap that made me skip back a page because I thought I'd flipped over one too many. Is actual penetration that hard to include? Perhaps some nitty gritty real sex might have stolen some of the light hearted feel away but then again perhaps it could have grounded the story a bit more and made it more real. A sentence would have done me.

As an Aussie, I can vouch for the setting's authenticity. The attraction of the Australian outback is not easy to see. In the heat of the day, it's hot. Bloody hot. Shirts cling to your back from the sweat. Flies try to crawl into your nose, eyes and mouth seeking moisture. Ants are literally everywhere. Probably a good reason to sleep up on top of the Land Cruiser. Sometimes it's so hot even the birds are silent. That's when the insects start making a racket. Most city dwellers see the Australian outback as a harsh place and rarely venture out there which is a pity, because it is beautiful, and in certain lights, it's magic.

The trouble is you have to be there to experience it. Julie gives us a picture of the overwhelming magnificence of the southern skies. But I love the time just before dawn when there is an expectant hush in the air. I've only ever experienced the same thing when a baby budgie was hatching and its parents and siblings all grew quiet (a rare state in that breed) while tiny tapping sounds could be heard as the baby bird broke through the shell. It's the same in the bush. Everything goes quiet. The wind drops, the birds are silent and then the sun pokes its head above the horizon. Later, the heat of the day sucks all the energy out of the landscape, but the early morning light caresses the bush, making it unforgettable.

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There is no lush grass, no soft colors, the ground is hard and unforgiving until you find a waterhole.

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The wattle is our national symbol, but it can take on many forms.
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As m/m writers go, Julie has come the closest so far to capturing this unique setting.

As someone whose father and sister were entomologists and actually worked for the organisations briefly mentioned, it gave me an eerie feeling of being right there.

Hunting butterflies isn't hunting Tasmanan tigers or even kangaroos. There's no guns, no villains, no drama just a gentle unfolding of the story. In fact, the analogy of their life spans, their metamorphosis into something beautiful mirrors Dave's change perfectly.

Tough macho Aussie males brought up far away from gay culture would seek the protection and company of a girl who was a mate. Uncomplicated. Unthreatening. They wouldn't even be aware they were doing it. They would assume that what they had was a normal boy/girl relationship. I found that part of the story totally believable.

I also thought the way the author handled aboriginal culture was appropriate in the circumstances and wasn't condescending in any way. Not every Australian takes the time or has the interest in accepting that relationship to the land, but for those who do, there's this special way of looking at things. Outsiders may not "get it" or they may see it as appropriating their culture, but in fact not "getting it" and ignoring that aspect is more disrespectful.

It is probably best if you read the story when you are in the right mood for it. It certainly made a welcome change for me.


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