Basic Training is out now!

I am delighted to announce that Basic Training, my new novel set amongst the Royal Marines, is now available from MLR Press.

Title: Basic Training
Author: Marquesate
ISBN# 978-1-60820-461-8 (print) $14.99
978-1-60820-462-5 (ebook) $7.99
Paperback 276 pages, 76,000 words
Publisher: MLR Press

Joining the Royal Marine Commandos is a challenge that only the toughest men should take on.

Platoon Sergeant Col ‘Bulldog’ Wilson’s world of work, gym, exercise and discipline is heaved out of its angles when the new recruits arrive with Chris Thompson amongst them. Twenty-one, handsome, tall, university graduate, triathlete, and … openly gay in an environment of institutional homophobia.

Col finds himself thrown into turmoil that is nothing like any conflict he’d ever encountered, nor any operational theatre he’d ever fought in. When this particular battle becomes personal, he has to ask himself who is the enemy.

Basic Training Excerpt

Wednesday, 3 September 2003
Lympstone, Devon, UK
“Sergeant Wilson,” the platoon commander called out and Col turned, saluting.
“Yes, Sir?”
“I’d like to see you in my office.”
“Yes, Sir.” Bloody one pip wonder. Twenty-nothing and barely passed out of the officer course, now proving himself on his first post. Commissioned, just because he’d been born with a silver spoon … but Col swallowed the grumble and made his way to the Lieutenant’s office.
“Please take a seat.” Col did, noticing the stack of papers on the officer’s desk. “I’d like you to look through some of the applications, especially the equality forms.” The second lieutenant produced a smaller bundle. “And in particular this one.” Col found a piece of paper under his nose and he took it, quickly scanning through.
“Triathlete, not bad.” Muttered to himself, “Graduate? What the hell’s a student …” and then he came to the next column. Reading it once, twice, a third time, just to make sure. “Homosexual?” He stared at the officer. “You must be kidding me.”
“Apparently not.”
“I hope the lad keeps that to himself.”
“One would hope so, wouldn’t one?” The lieutenant shrugged his shoulders and sighed. “I advise you to keep an eye on him. The recruit sounds extremely promising; high achievements in sports and intellectually above average. In fact, I was told they tried to recruit him directly into an officer career, but he refused to take the chance.”
“Why?” Col studied the form once more, then placed the bundle in his lap.
“According to the report from the recruiting officer, he was adamant that while a commission was certainly the ultimate goal of anyone, he wanted to experience the ranks, first.”
“And you believe that bullshit?” Col stood up. The ‘anyone’ was grating, and he felt targeted. Demoted, with no chance at this stage of his career to get close to a commission. But then he’d never been officer material. Too stuck in the dirt and best suited to the midst of the action. ‘Bulldog’ alright. They’d got his nickname spot on.
“Why wouldn’t I believe it? What other motives might be feasible?”
“I reckon the guy’s got something to prove.” Col shrugged, kept the forms under his arm. “And if he isn’t wise, and I don’t think he is, judging from that little tick in the wrong box, he’ll cause a hell of a lot of trouble.”
“Then watch him. Besides, we cannot be seen to discriminate against him nor anyone else, because of religion, gender, race…”
“Sexuality,” Col finished for the lieutenant. “I know, I know.”
“Indeed. If we don’t take care, we will get into trouble with the equality officers, and we cannot afford to bring ourselves into disrepute.”
“Of course not, Sir. I will keep an eye on the recruit.” Col saluted and left the office.
Christian Thompson. Twenty-one. Six foot. Green eyes. Brown hair.
He’d already memorised the vitals.

Basic Training Publication date 21.10.11

I had the publication date from MLR Press, which is next Friday, the 21st of October. I also got the galley proofs today and will be whizzing through them to make sure Basic Training will be available on Friday. It’s already on the Upcoming books page.

Lovely start to the weekend, aye?

Where it all happens

How much of an overblown-ego title is that, aye?  It’s an excellent excuse to show off some of what I did over the past year, though.

I may not have been able to write for two years until recently, but the second year was spent being mega creative in other ways. I completely re-did my living room including my desk area, and made my desk from scratch – as I always say: “I have the powertools and am not afraid to use it.”

May I present … *drumroll* the PacMan desk of joy!  I tiled the desk with three-and-a-half-thousand glass tiles:

 

The pic was taken before I had changed all of the floor to black tiles.

The reason why there are cut-outs at the sides and the back (which hides the cabling) is because … it lights up!

And now, with the next pic, you can see just why I am all fresh and new and loving to write, and, to flog the dead horse of an over-used cliché to death once more: reborn. Marquesate is back!

Coming Soon: “Deliverance” (Hooch and Matt’s story)

I am writing again!

Co-authoring in fact, and having a blast. Writing in the Special Forces universe, Hooch and Matt’s story will soon be available. We are close to the finish, and it is going to be novel length.

Deliverance is the story of Hooch, a US Delta Force soldier and Matt, his Jarhead lover. It is a spin-off from Special Forces and spans the years 1998 to 2011.

Both Hooch and Matt were created by Marquesate as secondary characters in the epic Special Forces (© 2006-2009), but they took on a life of their own. Hooch in particular became a firm favourite of many readers, especially after chapter 64 in Veterans.

When Marquesate met TA Brown, it was time to finally tell the untold story of these two men.

For Hooch and Matt’s story before 1998, and to understand context and references, you must have read Special Forces.

Deliverance is co-authored by Marquesate and TA Brown © 2011. All rights reserved.

Publication pre-announcement: Basic Training

At long last! I know it has been an awfully long time in the making, but here it is and it shall be available very soon, most probably in October.

Basic Training

Joining the Royal Marine Commandos is a challenge that only the toughest men should take on.

Platoon Sergeant Col ‘Bulldog’ Wilson’s world of work, gym, exercise and discipline is heaved out of its angles when the new recruits arrive with Chris Thompson amongst them. Twenty-one, handsome, tall, university graduate, triathlete, and … openly gay in an environment of institutional homophobia.

Col finds himself thrown into turmoil that is nothing like any conflict he’d ever encountered, nor any operational theatre he’d ever fought in. When this particular battle becomes personal, he has to ask himself who is the enemy.

• Publication date: October 2011
• Publisher: MLR Press

Basic Training was written in 2009, but because of personal reasons, the novel’s publication was delayed for over two years. Thanks go to MLR Press for their understanding and patience.

Recent reviews for Special Forces

Some might say I am a bit late with this (a bit…? Ahem…) but others, well, I (!) say better late than never, and there’s no cut-off point anyway, because readers continue to send feedback for Special Forces, which truly is a constant source of joy for me.

So, I finally did long overdue website updates today (must be the spring weather that’s giving me the energy) and not only did I create a special contact form for Forum account creations (I had to lock down account creation because of constant spam, up to over 50 accounts a day, despite Captcha and admin activation) I also added a page with recent reviews of Special Forces. It was a real pleasure to do so, making me want to re-read it all, of only I had the time.

“Beyond Her Majesty’s Men” review by Elisa Rolle

Better late than never (on my part) a heads-up to the lovely review by Elisa, which she published in December. She writes about Beyond Her Majesty’s Men:

“I absolutely loved this short story, there is practically no sex and despite this (or maybe thanks to this) it’s one of the most romantic and sweet story I have ever read, and if you considering it’s about rough soldiers, it was not an easy job to make it like that.”

You can read the full review on her LJ: http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/1195527.html

Thank you all for a wonderful fundraising effort

I am truly happy to report that Marquesate’s Fund Raising page raised a whopping £480.82 when it closed at the end of December 2010. Thank you, everyone, for your generosity and charitable spirit. From readers of the free epic Special Forces, the Haiti charity auction winner, to buyers and readers of Beyond Her Majesty’s Men, and finally to all the friends I made through my writing.

I believe strongly in the work they are doing, and like the International Red Cross, they are one of the biggest and most widespread charities that are nondenominational, and that operate everywhere in the world – especially in those places where most of us wouldn’t want to be, and where medical support is most needed.

I ran a charity auction for MsF and Haiti at the beginning of 2010 and the generosity of the winning bidder – and some losing ones – was overwhelming. All profits (£0.40 per ebook) of Beyond Her Majesty’s Men will continue to go to MsF. I donate the profits once a year.

If you read Special Forces for free, and if you feel you would like to give something to the brilliant work that MsF does, you can donate to Médecins Sans Frontières’s international sites. Thank you, once again.

Marq

Publication announcement: For Queen and Country

For Queen and Country is an 18k short story about two very different Officers in the Cavalry regiment.

The story has been published as part of the In Uniform anthology. It is currently available in ebook format on Rainbow eBooks and will be widely available in print and Kindle format on Amazon by the end of Octber 2010.

Dave and Andrew loathe the sight of each other, because one Tankie officer worked his way up through the ranks, while the other came straight from Sandhurst. The result of this animosity is explosive, full of rows, fights, snipes and eventually endless banter.

These two men are thrown together in an unfortunate incident in the middle of the jungle, which leaves them stranded and captured in an environment they know nothing about. They have to learn to work together to survive, and throughout their journey they might just begin to respect each other.

Short Excerpt from “For Queen and Country” © Marquesate 2009

“It seems your ‘friendly’ manner does not impress the locals.” Andrew commented drily.

“It might have occurred to you that I tried to get something for you, you idiot. Even though I have no idea why.”

“A strange and surprising sense of duty, perhaps?”

“Fuck you.” Dave growled.

“Really?”

Dave was suddenly presented with an unexpected smirk from Andrew, so uncharacteristic and out of context, it threw him off track.

“Are you out of your mind?”

“Hardly, but I do admit to enjoying a moment of light relief by seeing you out of your shallow depth, in this otherwise most pernicious situation.”

It took Dave a few moments to process what Andrew had just said. How he hated the bastard’s ability to wrap his insults in a package of posh words. “You’re an arsehole.”

“You are repeating yourself.”

“It’s worth repeating a thousand times.” Dave growled.

Marquesate’s “Military Gay Erotic Fiction” is featured on Queers on the Verge

You just have to love the name of the site, don’t you?

Got a feedback mail today, telling me that

Am reading your Special Forces fiction. I was expecting something closer to pornography, but this is storytelling at its best.

Now, that made my day!

Queers on the Verge: Cool Blogs of the week

Interesting video: Afghanistan Patrol Base Life

This video was published by the British Forces News channel. It shows you how living conditions are like in a base camp.

Photos from Afghanistan

The Spiegel is a German political and social magazine, that covers world events with analysis. They have an online version and on there a gallery of recent images from Afghanistan. You can see US, UK and German military. The site is in German, but it’s easy to click through the photo gallery.

It is well worth a visit. Amazing photos.

http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/fotostrecke-57510.html

Her Majesty’s Men writing style

This is really quite entertaining. Granted, I don’t know what algorithm they use, but it’s fun nevertheless. I copied all of HMM into the text analyzer, and this is what came up. Apparently the style is like Kurt Vonnegut’s.

I write like
Kurt Vonnegut

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Day 7 meme: writing music

Question 7:  Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to your characters?

As you might have guessed (ho-hum) I’ve given up on daily posting, my life is just too busy for that, but this doesn’t mean I shan’t go through the entire meme. Just … a bit slower than planned.

First question, do I listen to music while writing? No way! I need silence, if possible, and fortunately where I live it is pretty quiet. I find music distracting while I write, but at the same time I find music very inspiring while I think about stories.

Many of my stories start with a sudden flash of something, and I then tend to think about them in the car on my commute to and from work. I should think that all of my stories have specific music attached. For Her Majesty’s Men it is Rammstein, I wrote a post about this; for Code of Honour it is Snap, and I wrote a post as well.

I even wrote a couple of post with lots of video links to Special Forces “Soldiers” soundtrack and to Special Forces “Mercenaries” soundtrack.

May 6 meme: writers writing

Question 6: Where are you most comfortable writing? At what time of day? Computer or good ol’ pen and paper?

Let’s once again pretend it is still the 6th. I was a tad busy with following the UK election hoohah last night.

I am most comfortable writing at home, at my big PC, not the netbook, late at night, when it is dark outside and everything is silent. However, I have been known to write in a very busy tiny office while having Rammstein on the earphones (that was before the ipod), and have been known to write with pen and paper into my moleskin notebook during deadly boring meetings that went on for hours and I looked as if I was taking notes for myself while actually writing bits of story, usually dialogue. I have also been known to write onto loose sheets of paper while sitting on a bench in the sun in Canterbury’s oldest churchyard.

I’d say, I can write anywhere and with anything – as long as inspiration strikes and that can be in the oddest places. The weirdest one is probably scribbling on an exercise sheet while on the exercise bike in the gym.

Generally, though, my favourite time is 22:00 – 24:00 or later, and at home with my cat snoozing on the couch, and utter silence everywhere.