Today the UM welcomes Lyn Gala to the clubhouse! We chatted about
Claimings, Tails and Other Alien Artifacts, squeed over the amazing Ondry bonus scene that Lyn Gala debuted here on BMBR, and are now super thrilled to have Lyn herself visiting us!
BMBR: Keeping with our book of the month, where did you get the inspiration for the Rownt culture?
LG: C.J. Cherryh is a huge influence on my writing. I love how her alien cultures are always so alien, and when I started doing coursework for a Masters in International Diplomacy, I came to appreciate her even more. I could see how various societal structures showed up in her work, only with particular aspects exaggerated or shifted.
I wanted to create a society that valued subs, so I wanted that trait to be rare in this society. That meant I needed to create a society that emphasized individuality and competition instead of service. However, if these creatures were hyper-focused on the individual, they wouldn’t have family structures the way we knew them. Even family members would be competitors, although parents would be proud when their offspring were strong enough to challenge them.
The second breakthrough came when I tried to figure out what animal to pattern them after. If they were that individualistic, a cat was such an obvious choice. I just didn’t want obvious. So I went with the least obvious choice I could come up with… a turtle. The choice turned out to be a blessing as the Rownt long lifespan and enormous penis came into play.
BMBR: Had you decided from the beginning that Ondry and Liam wouldn't be having sex in the "traditional and expected" manner? Did that plan evolve as you wrote or was that the plan from the start?
LG: The second I picked a turtle as the physical inspiration for the Rownt, I knew the couple wouldn’t be compatible. Not even close. That’s not to say they could have had sex if I had chosen another animal because I don’t see why incompatible species would have interlocking parts. That doesn’t make sense biologically. I have a het romance, Blowback, where one of the main characters is alien, but she’s part human and she was created in a laboratory. That’s the only way I could imagine an alien that had similar sexual organs. So yeah, if I have an alien culture, the couple is unlikely to be getting lucky the old fashioned way.
BMBR: In general, which character type do you enjoy writing more, the Dom or the sub?
LG: Generally I like to explore the sub when I’m writing slash stories. It’s the sub that’s breaking society’s rules about what it means to be “manly,” and I like characters that break the rules and find their own paths. However, I mainly like the way partners fit together. I like subs that push Doms into new territory. I like “caretaker” Doms that derive pleasure from controlling but also pleasing their partners. So I think this is a long way of saying that I don’t know how to answer this question.
BMBR: Favorite scene you've written so far?
LG: I have so many that I don’t know what to say to this. I love the scene where Liam finally admits that he was raped only to realize that Ondry will never blame him for that or even understand why a victim might feel the weight of guilt. I am a little in love with Rownt culture for not even understanding the psychological toll of rape. However, I am equally in love with the big action scene in Blowback where the heroes take down an alien invasion, and I love the scene in Fettered where Dylan’s friend gives him some pills, and he doesn’t realize how strong they are. He ends up wandering down the street trying to find his way to the club while utterly stoned. In Gathering Storm, I love the scene where Charleston catches Vinnie spying on him. I often write individual scenes as they inspire me, and I only go back and write the rest of the story later, so I have a whole host of these snippets that actually predated the book they appear in.
BMBR: A unicorn fan jumped in to ask: I'm in love with Jacqs from your book Turbulence. Is he based on someone you know in real life? And more importantly, will we be seeing more of him in future works?
LG: As a teacher, I’ve seen such a range of students come through my classes. I teach government and history, and that means that I get to talk to them about such real subjects that it allows me to know them in a way that a science teacher might not. I’ve seen a number of students who had honestly good hearts that were matched with such social ineptitude that I would cringe when they would piss off some classmate. They would make some political statement and then act bewildered when half the class wanted to kill them. Hopefully I taught some of those students to stop and listen first, and hopefully I taught a few of the other students to look beyond the surface. Honestly, I don’t know. However my sympathy for that set of character traits comes out in Jacqs.
I would like to do more stories in the Turbulence series. I think they’re going to have a lot of adventures, and I also think there are some mysteries to explore. People high up in the military had an eye on Jacqs from the beginning or he wouldn’t have landed on the Candiru instead of in a jail cell. The who and why of that is a great story, but I don’t know if I’ll get around to writing it. I tend to have entire universes in my head, but writing sequels is my kryptonite. I also think the relationship with Ben, Copta and Becca is interesting. Just because Copta is asexual doesn’t mean that she doesn’t want a long-term relationship. I can see doing a book with them as a triad.
BMBR: Any upcoming projects, Lyn? Maybe a sequel to a certain book with a certain character that is certainly popular?
LG: I always have a dozen or more irons in the fire at any one time. I currently have three books half or more than half written. Desert World Immigrants follows Verly Black, a disgraced captain who accidentally caused the deaths of a ship full of immigrants and Naite Polli, a wounded man who has always tried to fix things by working harder. Customary Miracles is about a geeky, unlucky-in-love author who has done the cheap sex thing until he’s tired of the game and just given up on men. He doesn’t think he’ll ever get his happily ever after until he meets an equally geeky professor of comparative religions from India.
However, I suspect you’re asking about Assimilation, War, and Other Human Oddities. Liam and Ondry are back and are happily nesting and trading. However, the humans are determined to take advantage of what they see as an “in” with the Rownt. Craig makes a cameo appearance. He’s the tech who showed Liam “Rownt porn” when he first came to Prarownt. However, Earth has sent some power players to try and reopen negotiations with the Rownt, and Captain Susan Diallo is their “go to” girl.
I was 80% done with this when my mother had a stroke and then needed emergency surgery for her gall bladder. Right now I’m trying to get back into the right mindset to finish this story. I don’t know if I’m ever going to finish the Desert World book because I’ve been away from it too long, and I don’t want to let the Claimings sequel fall into the same black hole.
Other than that, I have a lot of scenes written that might turn up in later books. Aaron is a tired soldier who has fought demons ever since a spell destroyed their ability to hide using magic glamours. He’s come to realize that not all “demons” are evil, but he’s realized this after killing too many. He’s worn down to nothing by the time an incubus hunts him down.
John is a lobsterman who was too injured to keep fishing. He made an unlikely switch to high-end prostitution (through a weird series of events), and now he’s been hired by a Hollywood type who likes to put men in harness and then try to tame a wild stallion. John likes it a little too much.
Vicissitude of Magic stars David, a mere mortal in the secret world of wizards. Faulkner believes that mundanes should be protected from the magical world; however, a spell turns this good guy into a bad guy, and David becomes the target of an evil monster that wears the face of a former ally.
Darryl is a black man raised by a white family after his mother died and his father crawled in a bottle. Now as an adult, an injury means he has time to visit his birth father, who has sobered up and asked for another chance. However, Darryl doesn’t know how to handle his jealousy when his father seems more comfortable with Evan, another recovering alcoholic his father is sponsoring.
I think it’s easy to say that I have ideas on ideas on ideas, and not nearly enough time to write them all. And add onto that the fact that I do still write fanfic. It’s fun to get in and just build sandcastles in someone else’s sandbox sometimes. It all means that if I had time to sit at the computer full time, I could never finish one-tenth of my projects. However, as a part-time teacher/part-time administrator and teacher trainer, I am completely screwed. And with my mother’s recent stroke, I am not even pretending that even half these will be written. My mother is definitely getting better, but I’ve had to do a little rearranging of priorities.
So, that is me in a nutshell.
Thanks once more to Lyn Gala stopping by and gracing us with an awesome interview and
exclusive bonus scene for our book of the month,
Claimings, Tails and Other Artifacts. We couldn't let her leave without unicornizing her. She shall hereby forever be known to us as
Starflower Fair Rump:
Starflower is always as happy as a clam.
She is handsome to look upon,
and she melts the snow and brings the warm weather.
