A warm Love Bytes welcome to author Aidan Wayne joining us today to talk about new release “Rule of Thirds”.
welcome Aidan 🙂
Queer Stories, Happy Endings
This is probably not a surprise, but, like many authors, I was a voracious reader growing up. I was lucky in that my parents loved books just as much as I did, so my need to read was fed pretty well. I was introduced to Tamora Pierce, Terry Pratchett, and Barry Hughart (whom I actually pay homage to in Rule of Thirds). I was given scores of nonfiction books on whatever they found interesting and I discovered things on my own as well. Animorphs, The Hobbit, Anne of Green Gables, biographies of people such as Pocahontas and Hellen Keller (and, for some reason, oodles of books on apartment decorating). I learned a lot about stories I liked (and ones that I didn’t) and, eventually, taught myself that if I didn’t like a book, I wasn’t required to finish it.
The allowance to not finish a book I didn’t like did not, however, apply to stuff I had to read for school. Which was a shame, because I tended not to like them. Mostly because so many of them are miserable. Characters live and suffer, survive and suffer, and eventually die–often alone, or in pain, or leaving behind more sadness. I got incredibly sick of reading about Why The World Is Bad And Wrong. Now that I’m older I appreciate the messages most of those books have but I still don’t like them. Because, well, it’s true that there are a lot of problems in the world. I read history books. I read current events. I am angry, and informed, and I read to escape. It’s nice to get into a book and turn off my brain to all the sadness. That’s when I started focusing solely on reading HFN or HEA stories. Not necessarily even romantic ones, but just. Stories where there’s some sort of positivity at the end. Because for me, if I like a character, if I put so much into believing in them and learning them and loving them, following their story, the absolute last thing I want in a book is to have it end without hope.
So I read. And read. And read. And when I eventually went, “What if… what if I…what if I wrote my own stories” I started writing what I wanted to read. That is, stories with diversity. Stories that focused on communication. That highlighted healthy relationships and discussed consent, understanding, and boundaries, for all interactions; platonic, romantic (and, eventually,) sexual. I wanted stories that weren’t about tragedy that couldn’t be overcome or miscommunication that led to (often avoidable) heartbreak. Not to say that a story shouldn’t have angst or conflict! Of course it should. That’s often what makes a story interesting. But I need the happy ending to feel satisfied. I need it. I often tell people that I don’t care if the character is bleeding out in a ditch–just that at the end of it, they better get a bandaid and a hug.
Okay, so that’s a basic explanation of my ride-or-die desire for happy for now/happy ever after stories. It might even make sense, since I know I’m not alone; a lot of people like happy endings. There’s…there’s sort of a lot of media dedicated to just that.
But why stories with queer characters? For instance, Rule of Thirds is about a man recovering from PTSD. Why make him queer? What’s the point?
*deep inhale*
Because we need more of those! We need more stories with queer MCs being regular people! People who play board games and drink coffee and hey–maybe have depression, or dyslexia, or use wheelchairs. Who might also be Jewish or Muslim or from India or Vietnam. Or several of those things all at once. Queer people are people. They have flaws and backstories and dreams and struggles. And they should be normalized in the same way straight, white, cis people are normalized. Which means that they should also get to be portrayed in media as happy and fulfilled, even if they struggle with anxiety or agoraphobia. Trans people can be happy. Blind people can be happy. Forget “can be” so many of them are.
As for making sure the reader knows my characters are queer in whatever way I go about it, well… if I didn’t, in the story, ensure said queerness was portrayed, then how many people reading the story would assume the ‘standard norm’ of cis and het? Probably too many. I don’t think putting a story out there and then tacking on “hey, by the way, they were actually___!” counts for anything. That’s not very good representation.
When I get asked what I write, I don’t usually start with an essay though. I say, “Queer stories with happy endings.” Because that’s what I believe in.
Blurb:
A traumatic past doesn’t have to mean not having a future.
When Jason Diovardi, military elite, is removed from active duty after failing too many psych evals, he has only one goal in mind: get back into the field. It’s all he knows and all he thinks he’s good for, which is why he grudgingly accepts two live-in AI Companions to help him begin to recover from his severe PTSD. Chase and Shade are a matched pair, and Jason hopes they’ll keep each other distracted enough to leave him alone so he can go through the motions and be cleared for fieldwork.
Jason doesn’t expect to actually get better, and the progress he makes with his patient and caring Companions sneaks up on him—and so do unexpected feelings between the three of them. Now Jason might even be able to admit to being happy. But has he healed enough to allow himself to accept what Chase and Shade are offering?
Hope. Love. A reason to live.
Buy links:
DSP Publications
Amazon
Barnes & Nobles
Kobo
Itunes
Aidan Wayne has been a jeweler, paralegal, neurofeedback technician, and martial arts instructor; and that’s not even the whole list. They’ve been in constant motion since before they were born (pity Aidan’s mom)—and being born didn’t change anything. When not moving, Aidan is usually writing, so things tend to balance out. They primarily write character-driven stories with happy endings, because, dammit, queer people deserve happy endings too.
Aidan lives with altogether too many houseplants on the seventh floor of an apartment building. The building has an elevator, but Aidan refuses to acknowledge its existence.
Social media links:
Website: aidanwayne.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/justsayins
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100019083091269
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aidanwaynewrites/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15164017.Aidan_Wayne