Dear Author Ellora’s Cave Settlement

About a year ago I posted about a lawsuit between romance publisher, Ellora’s Cave, and small time mid-western romance book blogger, Jane Litte. I know most of you probably won’t care, but I like to follow up for my own sense of blog continuity.

Ellora’s Cave (the publisher) sued Jane Litte (the small blogger) for defamation . Last week there was an announcement they’d settled.

This e-mail from Ellora’s Cave has been making the rounds:

From: patty@ellorascave.com [ec_biz]
Date: Thu, Oct 22, 2015 at 9:50 AM
Subject: [ec_biz] Settlement with Dear Author
We are pleased to announce that we have reached a settlement with Dear Author. The terms are confidential, so we will not be discussing that. We are very happy though to now put all of our time and efforts into Ellora’s Cave, the authors and staff without further distraction.
Thank you for your patience and support.
Patty Marks

With cases like this, very few ever know the terms of the settlement reached. I didn’t see a statement anywhere from the Dear Author camp…yet.

There’s really nothing to link to that doesn’t have strong bias (I don’t like to waste my time or yours on opinions and speculation by amateurs), so as they say, that’s a wrap for this one.

However, for those of you who aren’t sure what settlement means in defamation cases like this, here’s a link to a broad explanation I found with a simple search.

And, unrelated to the DA/EC case, this particular article about defamation law and free speech is helpful with respect to understanding how the process works. I would advise all bloggers to check this, and others like it, out.

Guys Who Struggle With Coming Out

This is really something that’s always been a serious issue. Some gay men are so “out” it’s not even possible for them to try to hide it. You can tell by the way they walk, or move their hands, or speak. If that’s a stereotype on my part, consider me guilty and call the PC police. It’s also a fact.

However, with most gay men that’s not the case and they struggle with coming out. In some cases, for many years. I think that’s what bothers me the most when I see glib so-called liberal straight people in book communities (not all) discussing gay men (they say we have so many options)…because in reality they don’t really know a thing about gay men, other than the twisted content they’ve read in novels written by non-gay people. And someone should tell them.

So here’s another set of memes where gay men make some very sad comments about being gay. 

“I probably hate being gay more than the people who hate me for being gay.” 

I think most gay men go through this, and most come out of it. But not all, and that’s where we need to work a little harder to show them there is hope.

You can check all the memes out here. 

Don’t be too surprised by them.

Vincent Price Bi-Sexual

It’s funny because I get this magazine in the mail called Reminisce. It was a gift from someone and the content is filled with retro articles that can range from old cars from the 1920’s to Halloween costumes of the 1970’s. In the most recent issue about Halloween, I spotted a photo of Vincent Price with two people from the 1970’s taking a photo in an airport, and in the caption I spotted a familiar name in the m/m romance community. As it turns out, the woman in the photo wasn’t the same one in the m/m romance community (I asked her), however, I’d always wondered if Vincent Price was gay…or bi-sexual…and if he was another Hollywood causality of his time.

Vincent Price’s daughter recently wrote a book and she gets into this topic very candidly. A quote from his daughter…

“But I would like to say something here because I might as well,” she continued. “I am as close to certain as I can be that my dad had physically intimate relationships with men. I know for 100 percent fact that my dad was completely loving and supportive of LGBT people.”

You can read the rest here. The book looks very good and she writes very well.

There are comments, too. The ONLY comments that bother me with pieces like this are the ones that say things like “it doesn’t matter,” or “who cares,” or even “sexuality is a non-issue.” That’s a difficult one for me because in my personal life I really don’t care if someone is gay or straight, however, people who make statements like that don’t “get” the broad scope…even if they have the best of intentions.

They don’t seem to understand that being gay isn’t just about sexuality. But most of all, there should be no shame associated with being gay (or LGBT+) and no reason to hide it, ever, from anyone. Not even if you were Vincent Price. So please don’t tell me it’s a non-issue and it doesn’t matter. In some cases it does matter. If Edie Windsor had thought being gay was a non-issue we might not have legalized gay marriage. Saying it doesn’t matter is an insult to all gay people everywhere.