About The Book
As mentioned in my last post, I have a superstition against talking about my WIPs. It's time to get over that, though, because my book is in the hands of the editor and will be released, if all goes well, in March of 2026. I've gotten the preliminary cover sketches (SO GOOD I'm flailing). It's going to be a real book that I want people to buy, so I'd better get used to talking about it quick.
The first ideas for this project came in late 2020. I love pulpy genre fiction, mystery and suspense thrillers, intrigues and predicaments. I love romance, especially when it runs alongside a more action-based plot, and especially when it's messy and queer and breaks conventions. I love stories that play with truth and lies, with autonomy and coercion. This book is pure self-indulgence: I went "hey you know what would be fun?" over and over*, and eventually had The Citizen of Eastport.
*(Not a comprehensive summary of the writing process.)
Almost everything about the initial concept of the book has changed, but the core trio of characters is the same. A bar owner who knows the only safe choice is to stay out of local power games (my first vision was Casablanca's Rick in dyke form); an amoral, id-driven thief with an untapped capacity for fierce love; and an idealist whose self-control and dedication to the cause is its own dark side. And they love each other – or they will love each other – or they have an intensity of connection that some of them might call love.
Setting-wise, I wanted it to have a noir/hard-boiled feel, alleys and shadows and the grim acceptance of a certain level of injustice baked into the world. I wanted warring powers, organized crime and corrupt law and outside interests all fighting for turf. I set it in the future mainly for the freedom of world-building; there is futuristic technology but none of it drives the story, the way it does in true genre sci-fi. It is neither a dystopia nor a utopia: you could guess how we might get to there from here but the world is not a direct commentary on ours.
In following my joy I've given myself a bit of a categorization problem. It's not a romance, although there's flirting and sex and the relationships are essential to the story. It's not a mystery, although there is at least one murder. It's not a sci-fi novel in the strict genre sense, nor a dystopia nor a thriller. The best I can do is call it a future noir queer pulp intrigue. Does that sound fun? To me it's so much fun, and I hope others will think so too.