Literary Nymphs Interview
Author: Edmond Manning
Publisher:
Pickwick Ink Publishing
Genre:
M/M Romance
Release
Date: July 15, 2013
Do you write in more than
one genre?
In November of this year, I hope to publish a
non-fiction collection of essays, reflections on heart-opening experiences,
family, and drugs on airplanes. I guess that will make me a multi-genre author!
What if any, is the hardest
part of writing for you?
Getting started, I have ideas for books (heck,
I have ideas for the next six books I’d like to write…) so this issue isn’t
writer’s block. For me, it’s my vision. I have a vision in my head; the writing
is a long, narrative poem almost. And the first draft is rarely poetic; it’s
just “get the story out there.” I’m almost always disappointed by the first
draft. It’s not crisp enough, I over use the phrase “a little bit” everywhere
and there is not enough melody in the words. I get real happy with the second
and third draft…but it sure makes it hard to start writing a first draft.
What inspired the story?
I
grew up in a farm town. My cousins are farmers. They would often miss holiday
dinners or have to duck out early to go home and milk cows. I was always
fascinated by their love of farming. I can’t imagine a harder, more exhausting
job that is less appreciated in our country. They provide food and everyone
complains about their tractors on the road, the price of green veggies, how the
farm smell irritates.
I
wanted to create a book that showed the beauty of farmers, these strange and
powerful breed of men and women who love the earth the way they do – in a
tougher, cruder, more committed way than many of us. Granted, this story
focuses on a sexy gay farmer…but his love of the land is powerful stuff. That
love will give him the power to find the king inside him.
Blurb:
Adopted
from Thailand
and never one to fit in with the local bubbas, life has been rough around the
edges for Mai Kearns, even before he came out of the closet. Now, almost ten
years past the torture of high school, Mai still can't catch a break: he and
his parents stand to lose their beloved farm.
How
will a “King Weekend” help change Mai’s fate? What has narrator Vin Vanbly been
up to for the four weeks he’s been sneaking around Mai’s hometown? At the
urging of a ransom note from ‘The Lost Kings,’ Mai embarks on an impossible
treasure hunt chasing mystic poetry, Fibonacci Hopscotch, ancient prophecy, the
letter ‘x,’ and a confounding, penguin-marching army.
The
stakes are high: if Mai fails, the Lost Kings will permanently claim him as
their own. Finding the treasure may unlock the secret to saving his family
farm. But can this angry farmer risk opening his broken heart before the
weekend is over? Mai Kearns has 40 hours to get very, very curious in this
second installment of The Lost and Founds.
EXCERPT:
Setup: Illinois
farmer, Mai Kearns, accepted an invitation from garage mechanic, Vin Vanbly, to
participate in one of Vin’s unique King Weekends. Mai will spend forty hours
following every single demand from Vin, the master of sexual (and non-sexual)
manipulation. Vin promises by the end of the weekend, Mai will ‘remember the
man he was always meant to be.’ This scene takes place Saturday morning. Mai
and Vin spent Friday night elsewhere and now return to Mai’s farm around 10:00
a.m. As the first-person narrator, Vin has been whispering his unique love into
Mai’s heart and soul through stories about a land filled with kings…
***
I nudge my
truck into his driveway, the Kearns’ farmhouse
down there on the left, the dilapidated barns bashfully hiding behind it. No
suspicious cars in the driveway or yard, I’m delighted to see. Or not see.
Flattened grass, but it’s subtle. He won’t notice that. I pull into the grass
and park a good distance from the house. He doesn’t even ask why I don’t pull
in further. Instead, he pleads his case for easier treasure hunt clues. The
laminated map of DeKalb corn fields sits between us on the front seat. I should
stash this in my back pocket when he’s distracted. We may need this later.
As he argues, I allow my gaze to cross beyond
him, and I frown, staring hard. After a minute he recognizes I’m not listening
and turns to peer over his right shoulder, his gaze chasing mine.
Staring at
the dead tree right off the cornfield where I emerged last night, I ask, “Are those
wasps?”
He stares
for a moment, uncertain.
“What the
fuck?” He wedges open the passenger door handle.
By the time
he slams the truck door shut, he’s already striding hard down the driveway and
I race to catch his lead. I need to be at his side as he discovers the truth.
My God. It’s beautiful.
The
fluttering, bulky clouds of insects buzzing the dead tree are too large to be
wasps; that’s evident immediately. Kearns
walks hard toward them without knowing anything more. Oh God, I love this moment.
I can’t tell if he’s angry or if this is his fierce curiosity. Those two
pugilists stand eye to eye, poised to strike across an invisible but critical
line. His head snaps toward the house, then the barns, scanning everything in
view. Where’s his mom? His dad? How are they not out here?
We arrive.
He stops
abruptly to gape, slack-jawed. I grin madly at the perfect outdoor colors: the
sky paints thick blue everywhere, the corn glows a primal green, and the fat
August sun polishes everything with a cheerful, vibrant shine. In the
foreground, our new friends’ orange and black wings fold incessantly upon
themselves—orange and black, orange and black, orange and black.
“Monarchs,”
Mai says, his voice wavering. “Holy shit, holy shit. These…hundreds.”
He turns to
me and tears pour from him instantly, brain censors still jogging to catch up
with his astonished delight. “Thousands, I think there must be…” he says, the words
vanishing like ghosts.
I gaze into
the intangible orange and black webbing above us. They’re so beautiful. “Not
thousands.”
Later I will
share my estimates, but to his credit, it’s awfully hard to guess real numbers
with the immense orange and black flittering and fluttering, maybe four hundred
or more. This massive cloud creates autumnal foliage in an otherwise barren
tree.
Mai stops his
unconscious spinning while staring straight up. He levels his head at me and
now that gravity applies again, more tears leap down his face. “I don’t
understand.”
“Wait,” I
say, gasping. “Is this a Butterfly Tree?”
“How?” He
says the word almost painfully, like the mere idea of asking questions is
physical and arduous.
Without
words, I point to one of the three dozen watermelon wedges dangling from the
tree, the best bribe to keep butterflies close until late-morning sunlight
seduces them away. Within the next two hours, the numbers will halve, then
halve again. But it’s early enough they’re not quite ready to explore the big
world.
“Mom,” he
says with a dazed confusion, looking toward the house. “Where is she? How can she
not…”
He crouches
to study a few trunk-loving butterflies who choose to ride the bark. Standing a
moment or two later, he reaches into a lower-hanging branch to mildly push the
nearest watermelon with his index finger, creating an amusement park ride for
dozens of dizzy breakfast-eaters. He stares at the tree with intense
concentration for a full minute. Without looking at me, he says, “You did this.”
I wait until
he turns to me before I shrug. “You and I spent every minute together since 6:00
p.m. last night. But if I were to guess, this looks suspiciously like the work
of the Butterfly King.”
He ignores
me, walking around the tree, staring up into the dead branches, taking steps
back to peer higher. “I don’t understand. I—I have to get my mom. She loves
monarchs. I mean, really loves them.”
“I know. You
told me.”
The words
have the effect I had hoped. Mai turns to face me, noticing me as part of the
landscape.
“When you
were a kid, you and she agreed to help butterfly migration researchers at NIU.
For three summers, you two logged how many butterflies you each witnessed every
day, but she wouldn’t let you tag them as the researchers requested. She
couldn’t stand the notion of humans tagging a creature so pure and full of
grace.”
Mai doesn’t even
flinch. “I told you that. I told you how I spent my summers as a kid.” He wipes
his arm across his face. “Son of a bitch.”
Oddly
there’s no anger to this, no real recrimination.
Mai reaches
into a nearby rind and rubs his finger against the fruit, smearing it. He digs
his nail into the red flesh until a gooey trail slicks his finger to the
knuckle, allowing him to entice two butterflies onto his finger.
“I have to
get my mom,” Mai says, pleading.
“Wait,
aren’t you curious about the Butterfly King?”
Through
tears, he shoots me an exasperated look—“why are you fucking with me?”—but the
expression is replaced immediately with resignation. He looks down and touches
a slowly folding black-outlined wing, the very definition of vulnerability
married to intricacy.
“I have to
get my folks, Vin,” he says without looking up. “Please. This is…please.”
“The
butterflies will stick around for another hour or two. There’s time.”
I’m tempted
to explain his parents have already seen this, but he’ll know soon enough.
I say, “The
Butterfly King lives in New York City
and teaches diversity classes for Fortune 100 corporations. At home back in Harlem, he patrols the night with a wooden baseball bat,
protecting those who cannot defend themselves. When he protects what he loves,
the Butterfly King is fierce and furious. Even in his righteous anger, he
carries the grace of these gentle creatures. On patrol, he travels with other
men who follow butterfly wisdom. They keep each other safe. Kearns,
he knows how tough it is to lead an army.”
Mai flinches
at this last line but he can’t stop his eyes from chasing the dazzling air show
around us. The Halloween-themed flags twitter everywhere, graceful, jerky
movements as they bring a dead thing back to life.
One lands on
my shoulder. Welcome, little king. I even
love the word butterfly. It possesses
a meandering quality much like the creature it describes. But-ter-fly. But-ter-fly. On his finger, one glides away but a new one settles in, a twin
to the one who left.
With his free
hand, Mai wipes his eyes. “We were together all night. I woke up first.”
I remain
quiet.
He asks,
“Did he do this, the Butterfly King? Who’s helping you?”
I scrutinize
the landscape, craning my neck to scan the cornfields and the house. “I don’t
see the Butterfly King. Yet this looks like his work. Best not to get too
attached to the outcome. Best to stay curious.”
“You just
said it was him.”
“I said it might be him. May not have been him
personally, but his followers. I wonder what love he’s sending you, Kearns, what assistance he wanted to give you this weekend.”
“So, he’s a real person?”
“Monday, use
the Yahoo search engine and type these three words: butterfly plus king plus NYC. The New York Post mentioned him a
year or so ago wondering if he’s a myth. People in Harlem
know his true identity. But nobody shares his real name. He’s like Batman.”
Mai cringes
and tears pop out again, a new rivulet pouring over the still-fresh steam already
there. I believe he would give anything to have a secret identity, to be
someone other than Mai Kearns, homosexual DeKalb farmer of Thai descent. I’m
sure he resented this life trapped in cornfields right up until he realized he
loved it, and what the fuck do you do when you hate the life you love? Or love
the life you hate? Very confusing.
I stare up
and he instinctively follows my gaze.
Orange and black. Orange and black. Orange and black.
“There’s an
envelope up there,” he says.
A plain
white envelope dangles from a branch but not low enough to jump and grab.
Climbing is required, exactly what I instructed.
Mai glances
from the envelope to the tree trunk, presumably plotting a route to the letter
while avoiding dangling watermelon. I’m sure he wants to disturb as few
monarchs as possible. He may kill animals when necessary as a farmer, but he
loves life in all its forms. I know this is true. I listened to his stories,
the ones where he did not realize all that he revealed.
He leaps and
grabs a first-tier branch, yanking himself off the ground readily as if he climbs
trees daily. A few extra butterflies dance harder, shaken free and circling
around the space where he used to stand, like one of those cartoon clouds
indicating speed. Mai’s a strong motherfucker, give him that. He hoists himself
higher with unconscious confidence in his own strength. He cautiously brushes
aside butterflies or waits for them to take flight before he occupies their
space.
While he’s
distracted, I move beyond his vision and motion toward the house with my full
arms.
Come out. Come out!
The back
door opens as Mai gets to the envelope. I instructed them to do so silently,
and I’m sure Mr. Blattner conveyed my pleading letter to Mai’s mom when he and
the crew appeared on her back porch early this morning. I am pleased to not hear
the screen door creak open. I wonder if his parents even noticed someone
replaced that old spring. I must mention that to Kearns
tomorrow. We’ll laugh.
As he unties
the string connecting the envelope to the branch, I make one final sweeping
gesture to confirm this is exactly the moment: come meet the king.
I cross
again to stand on the ground in Mai’s vision again. Gotta keep his back to the
farmhouse.
I say, “Who
is it addressed to? What is it?”
As his fingers
unknot the string, he says, “Gimme a minute.”
“What’s it
say? What do you suppose is inside? Is my name on the envelope too?”
“Shut up,
Mary,” he cries. “Give me a minute to concentrate.”
I babble the
entire time he climbs down, forcing him into constant conversation, sometimes
warning him of nearby monarchs, saying, “Look, there’s one by your foot, see
it? See it? Careful with your foot.”
He drops to
the ground a moment later and I stand right before him to keep him focused on
me, careful not to touch him too intimately. His mom and dad now perch on the
picnic table in the yard, and I don’t want to embarrass Mai. Well, not any more
than I already intend.
He opens the
unaddressed envelope and unfolds the single sheet of paper.
“Read it,” I
say.
He reads it
to himself and passes the paper to me, but I refuse to take it. “Read it
aloud.”
With a
smirk, he does just that. “That which
haunts us will always find a way out. The wound will not heal unless given
witness. The shadow that follows us is the way in.”
I frown and
nod when he finishes, stroking my chin with my thumb and index finger, the
classic thinker.
Mai says,
“Vin, this is what I’m talking about your treasure hunt being too hard. It’s
too artsy, man. I don’t fucking know poetry.”
“How do you
know this is a poem?”
“It’s
centered and in italics,” he says, waving the paper at me. “Plus, I’ve read
your AOL page. You’re fruity for poetry. Your whole Lost and Founds mythology
reads like a fucking poem.”
“Ah, so you do know something about poetry. I think you
might be right. This wisdom sounds like the thirteenth century mystical poet,
Rumi. But why would the Butterfly King send a Rumi poem as a clue? Read it
again.”
Mai frowns
at the paper. “Seriously, I’m not good with poetry. It’s not one of my things.”
“Sure, sure.
But I wonder what it means, this message.”
“Vin, I
can’t—”
“The King of
Curiosity would care,” I say in a relaxed manner.
Mai cringes
and looks at the note again.
Nice—another
good reveal. His constant refusal to engage, to choose frustration and outright
anger as his reaction betrays another of his Lost King secrets. He’s afraid of
trying and losing. Afraid he may not be good enough. I want to squeeze him
right now and tell him he’ll always be good enough. However, I know that
despite good intentions, pleasant affirmations can’t make that true for him if
he doesn’t believe it first.
“I mean, the
King of Curiosity wasn’t fascinated by everything
in the world, but he did enjoy wondering about new things to see if they shed
new light on what he cared for.”
“Is this
really a poem from the Butterfly King? Did he come from New York to help you?”
“It might
have been him.” I put my hands on his shoulders.
Before Mai
can speak, I spin him hard to face the opposite direction. “Or maybe them.”
Mai wobbles
from my spinning him and peers across the yard. I hear his audible gasp as he
takes in the crowd, sees them, jumping back into me, falling in my arms. I
stand him up, keeping my hands on his upper back to steady him.
Thirty-odd
people stand in his back yard, clumped in groups of three or four, or spread
out with their hands on their hips. I can’t see their individual expressions
from this distance, but I would bet they are smiling.
Grinning.
I wonder if
he recognizes any of them.
***
Where can we find your website?
This excerpt came from King Mai, by Edmond Manning, courtesy of
Pickwick Ink Publications. The first book in this series, King Perry,
came out in 2012. You need not have read that first book to enjoy King Mai. You can reach Edmond for questions here:
remembertheking@comcast.net.
Edmond Manning has been writing for many,
many years.
After
graduating from Northern Illinois University (NIU) with an English Education
degree (graduated Valedictorian from the University Honors Program), Manning
pursued and completed a Masters of Science within the field of Instructional
Technology. These two curious backgrounds allowed for practicing a unique blend
of creative and technical writing, skills that were enhanced over a 22+ year as
an e-learning consultant.
During those consulting
years, Manning feverishly wrote fiction, completed three novels, and yet never
pursued publication because the writing simply didn’t meet his high standards.
Something was missing: a spark. Looking back, Manning prefers to believe that
he was living out Malcolm Gladwell’s maxim: you’ve got to ply your craft for
10,000 hours before you get good. Yes, that would be the preferred belief.
In 2008, Manning experimented
with writing a new type of fiction, and ended up with his first “kinging”
novel, published in serial format on a free website. (The original novel has
been removed from that site.) The intense reaction from hundreds of readers
around the globe suggested to Manning that something had indeed changed, so he
decided to create a new novel based off these wild, frothy characters.
