It was an interesting experience writing “The Bear at the Bar” for Dreamspinner’s A Taste of Honey anthology.

First off, I normally write sci fi and fantasy, sometimes with LGBT characters, but never as a romance.

Second, I really hadn’t done much writing for fifteen years, after my novel was soundly rejected by ten publishers in a row. That can kinda do a number on a guy.

But then last year, with my husband, Mark’s, support, I got bitten by the writing bug again.  I picked up the threads of a bunch of short stories I had either completed or started and reworked and finished them, sending them out into the world.

But “The Bear at the Bar” is special.  It’s the first new story I’ve written from scratch in 15 years. It’s the first MM romance story I’ve tackled. It’s the first time I wrote about bears. And it’s the first story I actually sold.

So it has a special place in my heart.

I saw the call for A Taste of Honey, and decided to tackle it, seeing if I could come up with a way to put my own spin on a bear MM romance, giving it a bit of a twist. I feel honored that B.g. Thomas, one of the editors for the anthology and a great author in his own right, fell in love with it and chose it for A Taste of Honey.

And I hope you like it too.

Click here for blurbs and ordering links.

Here’s a little excerpt to whet your appetite:

—–

Dex walked into Ransom on a Thursday night like he owned the place, grinning at the bouncer, who sneered at him even as he waved him past the door. Jealous. They were all jealous. The music was the usual thumpa thumpa beat—a mix of house techno and the latest hits this week from the youngest, cutest artists.

Dex was born for this life—tall, blond, blue-eyed, a beautiful athletic build with six-pack abs, and a body that everyone in the club acknowledged was gorgeous. And he hardly had to work for it at all.

And so what if he didn’t have a boyfriend? Who needed to be tied down like that? He was still well on this side of thirty and had a virtual lifetime of casual sex ahead of him.

He flashed a perfectly white smile at one of the go-go boys on the bar, and the boy blushed and grinned back. Dex had a certain kind of sexual power, and he wasn’t ashamed to use it.

—–

About the author: J. Scott Coatsworth has been writing since elementary school, when he won a University of Arizona writing contest in 4th grade for his first sci fi story (with illustrations!). He finished his first novel in his mid twenties, but after seeing it rejected by ten publishers, he gave up on writing for a while.

Over the ensuing years, he came back to it periodically, but it never stuck. Then one day, he was complaining to Mark, his husband, early last year about how he had been derailed yet again by the death of a family member, and Mark said to him “the only one stopping you from writing is you.”

Since then, Scott has gone back to writing in a big way, finishing more than a dozen short stories—some new, some that he had started years before–and seeing his first sale. He’s embarking on a new trilogy, and also runs a support group for writers of gay sci fi, fantasy, and supernatural fiction.

He lives in Northern California (that’s him on the left) with his husband of twenty-two years, and is thrilled that writing is once again a regular part of his day.