This week Daddy Jeffrey is checking in with his partner in kink, author James Buchanan. You may recall James from the Decade of Mr. Leather party at JT’s Stockroom I blogged about. Let’s find out what is on James’ mind, shall we?
Jeffrey: So, James, how did you like the Decade of Mr. Leather event we attended at JT’s Stockroom?
James: I have to say it was cool – low key. Nice to see how many of the title holders showed up, and they were a great looking bunch of guys. Fun set up with the various displays. The Stockroom really did it well. One of these Thursdays I’ll have to catch one of the instructional presentations they talked about. Generally I like the vibe at most leather events; despite the presence of Jack-boots and chaps they tend to be rather laid back. It’s also nice to be someplace where you can let your freak flag if not fully fly at least flutter in the breeze somewhat. After all it was a cocktail reception, not a fetish fair. A little bit of nosh, sadly no booze for me (next time you get to be the designated driver), cool people to talk to, some LA Leather history and really freaktastic décor.
Jeffrey: Tell me what you dug most about the event.
James: Seeing Nick the Fist slinging drinks and wearing a sweaty tee.
Jeffrey: Which sexual device on display did you covet most?
James: Not too many of them actually. Fucking Machines, Medical Rooms, St. Andrews’ Crosses – they’re just too hardcore for me. Great to watch in use, but not something I’d want to own in my home. I’m a very back to basics practitioner, not a pro or a really heavy player. Some rope, maybe cuffs and a flogger or paddle and I’m good. To me the more elaborate a scene gets, the more chance there is to fuck it up or for reality to fall far short of expectations. Now, when we were killing time in JT’s Stockroom next door some of the Gates of Hell variations struck my inner perv.
Jeffrey: Now that Sir James has been established as a dominant, why not tell us all something about how you let your kink fly?
James: Hmm, I like bondage. Rope bondage. I don’t get a chance to work as elaborately in Shibari as I’d like – my guy endures being tied up because then he can’t escape the pain. For him, unfortunately, it’s only a means to an end. The actual ropes, tying and ritual…well, frankly it puts him to sleep. Really kills a fucking mood when you’re halfway through a full body tie and your sub starts snoring. So right now a lot of it has to do with hardwood and smacked asses. That revs me up too. Paddles. My sub makes them, I smack his ass with them. He’s also done some custom models for friends of mine – you’ve got to try one of his creations. My personal favorite so far is what I call the “fly swatter.” Maple. A good three feet long. The face is only about six inches square, with holes. You’ve got two and a half feet of handle for that two handed baseball bat grip.
Jeffrey: I want to have an active stable of “dog boys” at some point. Is that something that would interest you?
James: Really? I would have pegged you for a cat person. Personally, I don’t need a stable of anything. Pain sluts, rope whores, boiz, some girlz, I can deal with a lot of variety, but not every kink is for every person. Give me a pain slut who can cook, clean and mixes a damn good Mojito, and…oh, wait, I have one of those. So how about a cabana boy who gets off on electro play and gagging who can give a mean massage while I type out my fantasies? I mean, I just got a TENS unit that I’m certain I could modify for some low key play. I think that’s what I’m missing in life.
Jeffrey: Speaking of leather, not only do you love it, you write about it.
James: And there’s a question in there? Yes, I do both. I adore boots and chaps. Wax play, impact games…I really do enjoy the life. I’m not as hardcore or extreme as others, maybe,
but then again, kink to me is not a playground game of “dare you.” When you really find a piece of yourself in a kink, as an author it’s hard not to bring it into your writing and explore it. Especially when it is something that gives you so much pleasure. I’ve played with all of it: writing from the point of view of submissives, switches and the very often untapped mindset of the dominant. Honestly, it is so much easier to write about why someone is submissive and explain it than to give the reader the vicarious thrill of dominating someone – that’s why not a lot of stories are written from the dom’s perspective. I want to open that door for readers. Let them lose themselves in the fluctuating dynamics of power. Charge them up or set them spinning. It brings an intensity and honesty to a relationship that most vanillas will never know.
Jeffrey: Your novel “Hard Fall” is a best seller on the M4M erotica scene. Details please.
James: Details, details, details. Like the back cover states: “There ain’t much complicated about Joe Peterson. He’s a Utah Sheriff’s Deputy. He’s Mormon. He heads up the local Search and Rescue…and he’s gay. So far Joe’s managed to keep that one part hidden down deep. Then Kabe, an ex-con and adrenaline junkie climber, lands in town on parole. When a German tourist falls off the mountain, Joe finds that he needs Kabe’s help with the case. Accident or murder? As Joe weaves the evidence together the strands of his life fray to breaking.” My “elevator pitch” for that novel was, “An inspirational gay BDSM romance wrapped around a mystery set in Mormon Utah.” Did that make you go, “What the fuck?” The reviewer Jeff Erno described the main character pretty well: “Joe Peterson lives in the small town of Panquich, Utah, where he is a deputy sheriff. Joe is a country boy, through-and-through, and he devoutly clings to the traditions of his Mormon faith. He has a penchant for rock climbing, and is by all intents and purposes what you may consider a pragmatic, conservative survivalist.” Except he’s gay. This was my I’m going to do everything they tell me I can’t do novel. Written in first person, it’s BDSM, but Joe Peterson is not a bar bear and Kabe’s not your average twenty-something twink. There are no dungeons or leather bars. The most elaborate bondage equipment they use is a “prussic,” a loop of rope the size of your spread out palm. It touches on identity, religion and staying true to your basic nature – sexual identity and cultural upbringing within the dominant/submissive mindset. And, by most accounts, I succeeded. Currently, I’m working on the sequel, “Requiem in Leather,” which will take place during Leather Week in San Francisco.
Jeffrey: “Hard Fall” received an honorable mention from the NLA-I Novel Awards. How great was that?
James: Very fucking cool. Not as cool as winning first would have been (hey, I’m honest) but out of the hundreds of novels that were entered, to take second is still damn good. And, truthfully, as a writer I often work in a vacuum. It’s me at my computer, churning my brain for the words I type on the page. I get feedback from draft readers, and then once I turn it over to my publisher I’ll hear what the editors and proofers think…but that’s still this condensed little universe. Even when readers write in and tell me how a book touched them, it’s special and very intimate but one on one. Reviews are nice, but that still is one person’s take on my work. A peer award – like this one – tells me I did it fucking right. A panel of judges told me I clicked with them. This book nailed what I was going for. I took a chance, I pulled it off and I got respect for that. Especially with that book. I mean, NLA-I was looking for novels that best and most positively represented the kink/leather identity. For a novel that has none of the standard trappings of BDSM other than the psychological dynamic between the dominant and the submissive to take second place is so fucking awesome. Especially since there were some DAMNED FUCKING GOOD authors who were nominated. I still look at the e-mail telling me where I placed and go, “whoa.”
Jeffrey: Tell those who may not be familiar what the NLA-I is.
James: National Leather Association International. It is a pansexual leather association open to persons across the gender, sexual and cultural spectrum. According to their website, NLA-I’s goal is “To support individual and organized political activism, visibility and education in order to eradicate stereotypical beliefs, misconceptions and media misrepresentation about the Leather/BDSM/Fetish family in the community at large.” By the way, the full mission statement is much broader. NLA-I works heavily on education, supporting causes impacting the leather community as well as sponsoring an ongoing domestic violence program to help educate both the vanilla (cops, prosecutors, judges, psychologists) as well as the greater kink community on how to recognize the difference between physical/psychological abuse and consensual kink. I belong to NLA-I (which had nothing to do with where my book placed – member rosters aren’t public) because of the focus on domestic violence education. When I was 17 I got into a massively fucked up relationship which lasted for close to 7 years and it took me close to two years of DV counseling to get my head back on straight (so to speak). I ditched the asshat, went to law school and found my dominant streak through – of all things – trial work. I give back by contributing to NLA-I DV projects and I’m on the volunteer list for the local level.
Jeffrey: My favorite genre is horror; you also write M4M erotica in that genre too.
James: I do. My first love is horror: Poe, Lovecraft, Kafka, the stuff Ray Bradbury had to have written while tripping on bad acid. Sex and fear are both visceral emotions – incredibly primal stuff that shifts our reptilian brains into overdrive. The link between them is so profound it’s hard not to write about it. And when I do horror, I do horror. It’s not fun-house paranormal with sparkly vampires and werewolves who could be lap dogs. I like trippy, creepy, symbolic shit that does steal from flashbacks to bad acid trips. But I’m also this massive information hound. I suck in this esoteric knowledge and then seed it through my horror (or my cop novels, or my BDSM books). If I start a horror story off with a biblical quote and then a necklace of seven glass eyes and bits of horn is ripped off…you don’t need to, but you can go find that reference and know why it’s there. I try and write it so you don’t have to know that crap to be creeped out – it will just add another layer of shudders if you do.
Jeffrey: Currently I am reading your collection of erotic horror shorts, “Shadow Harvest.” It makes me want to get my demon on!
James: Bitch, the demons in my head, the ones I put on paper, would scare the crap outta you if you met ‘em in person. I tend to write a good deal of my books in the gay romance genre, including the BDSM…the only place I do strictly erotica is horror. The whole point is to be, if not terrifying, then as freaking creepy as The Twilight Zone. God, I loved the original series. The ‘is it real, is it not, am I going fucking nuts?’ I love that. I spoiled Shutter Island for SG (my submissive guy) because I watched the boat scene with my writer’s inner-eye and told him, “oh, the fed is fucking nuts, this is all going to be his delusion.”
Jeffrey: Tell us something about James that we have not heard yet.
James: YOU, yes you, Daddy Jeff, have not seen my new bed. I’d say get your mind out of the gutter, you subby pervs…but you know, it’s half true. Jeff and I are buds, he’s slept on my couch, viewed the household renovations and been forced to watch the family vids. Anyway, there’s a new bed that’s replaced the wooden four-poster, which SG and I broke – when I had him tied up to it. King-sized cast aluminum with the bed curtain frame painted matte black. Found it for $250 at a high end thrift store. The basic structure is nothing to write home about EXCEPT it has all these crossed over spans of flat aluminum bars. The headboard alone has probably 30 anchor points…I haven’t sat down and counted yet. The top curtain frame will support me hanging from it. This thing is solid and built for play. And it hides as basic décor. Got to love that.
Let your kink fly and log onto James’ website!