Category: Screeve

Back in mid-July, I went on holiday to Wales. Since then, I haven’t written anything until today.

When I returned from holiday, I went into a deep depression, and as I was coming out of it, I went to Sweden for work. It’s taken me a week since I got back to feel up to writing again.

It may be travel and illness that stopped me from writing, but I also know that I’m coming to the end of the Max and Min saga. I only have a few chapters left to round things off, and whenever I reach the end of a series, I always find a reluctance to finish it, as it means I have to let go. But, my dear readers, you still have at least another twelve chapters to go.

Max & Min Forever.

Sorry if I’ve left you dangling this past week. My work sent me to Sweden, and it isn’t easy to do much when you’re in a tiny budget hotel room in the evening. I didn’t even have a desk. But I had a great time. I was working during the week, but I was out with friends at the weekend. Some of you know I used to live in Sweden, and it was great to go back. I’d forgotten how much I miss living there. And I love those cinnamon buns; they are much better than the ones we get in the UK, even in Ikea.

But rest assured, normal service will now be resumed, and I will post another chapter about those beautiful brothers, Max and Finn, later today.

Well, it seems that Max and Min are controlling my life. I am writing about the boys’ life in Cockaigne, and the story keeps rolling around my head.

I woke up at 5:30 this morning with Max and Min. I couldn’t put their story aside, so I had to get up and start writing. I’m at a particularly moving part of the story. Max is having some difficulties at school, and I needed to continue to write about it to help him get through it. As you can guess, Finn has no problem adjusting to life in Cockaigne, but Max is more reserved and is struggling. Perhaps it’s time for Max to stick up for himself.

There is some fun and some pain to come for the brothers. I can’t wait for you to read about their continuing adventures and reading your comments. Cockaigne is a place where anything can happen, and you can be free to be who you want. I love it.

When I started writing queer stories, it was about sex. I wanted to write erotica. I still do. But as I have grown older, I want to write about what it’s like to be queer and the pleasures and adversity that come with it. Max feels that adversity, and I feel his pain as much as I feel Finn’s pleasure when I write about his life.

Tomorrow will see a new chapter of “Conversations with my Brother” as the boys return from Cockaigne.

This picture popped up on my Twitter feed, and I couldn’t resist sharing it with you. It reminds me so much of Max and Min when they lie in bed together after spending their day apart, an intimate moment they share at the end of the day, talking and making sense of the world.

The artist is Paul Cadmus, you can find out more about him on Wikipedia. He has created some fine homo-erotic paintings.

Seasons greetings to all, and thank you for visiting and reading Screeve. It has been an absolute pleasure to start writing again, and what I thought would be a short series of a few instalments has grown to 25. I love Max and Min, and their open and honest relationship is something I wish I’d had with my brother. But I can now experience that relationship through my stories.

Once I finish “Conversations with my Brother” I hope to finish the follow-up to the novel “Becoming Kes” in the Cockaigne Chronicles universe.

Next year is going to be difficult for all of us. The economic problems don’t appear to be going away soon, and we are heading to a severe downturn in the UK. Food bank use is increasing, and energy rationing is common for almost every household. I hope my stories will provide some release and an escape from reality, no matter how brief.

I wish all my readers the best and hope you get what you wish. And a huge thank you to those who rate and comment on the stories. All feedback is appreciated.

Some come easy, some come hard, and some never come.

I have a love/hate relationship with titles. Sometimes I write a great story, but I just cannot come up with a decent title or at least one I like. My newest story, “The Little Sneak”, stayed unpublished for over a week while I tried to come up with a title. It had a working title of “Max & Min”, the names of the two brothers, but I really don’t like titles that are just the names of the characters in the story; I think it is lazy and, more often than not, from experience, the stories tend to be terrible. But I just couldn’t think of a title! “The Little Sneak” was the best of a bad bunch, and I’m reasonably happy with it. But now I have a problem with what to call the follow-up.

The next part is already half-written and sees Min tease his older brother about masturbation. Poor Max, I feel his embarrassment.

I agonised for weeks to come up with a title for my novel, “Becoming Kes”, not the best, but it’s okay, I suppose. The half-written sequel novella is also titleless. And I have a series about some college guys going on a final school trip to France stuck in my titleless hell.

And then there are stories where the title is there from the start, or it just leaps from the screen as I’m writing, “A Black Cappucino…” was a title I had in my head from the start. Sometimes the title writes the story.

For every title hell, there is a title heaven, and the pain of coming up with a title never spoils the pleasure of writing the story.

A new year has arrived. Celebrations were muted again this year. But for me, it’s not about a party. It’s about new possibilities and a chance to make this year count. It’s time to stop wallowing in what we can’t do but embrace what we can do.

I wish you all a happy new year, and no matter what this year throws up, let’s make it a good and positive one.