Circlet Likes Technorotica

How wonderful - check out this very flattering review of my technophilia-laced collection Technorotica: Stories Shattering the Ultimate Taboo by Gayle C. Straun at the Circlet Press site:

Technorotica is a compendium of two previous M. Christian books, Better than the Real Thing and Rude Mechanicals, accompanied by an excerpt from Painted Doll (previously reviewed here) closing out the volume. Two of the stories previously appeared in Circlet Press’s The Bachelor Machine (reviewed here), while two others appeared in the Circlet anthologies Selling Venus and Up for Grabs 2. 

Some readers may initially feel that Technorotica constitutes one of those “best of” albums whose contents fail to gel into a thematic whole, perhaps appreciated more for its individual parts, especially since some stories explore such science fiction conceits as cybernetics and collective consciousness, while others plod the more real-world territory of matchmaking over the modem or even having sex with a blow-up toy ball. But therein lies the rub (pun intended), for by including such an array of stories, M. Christian reminds us that our sexuality is already augmented with things “unnatural;” that human beings, social creatures that we are, already get off using a variety of apparatus developed by our society–or, to put it another way, handcuffs and riding crops don’t occur in nature, y’all. The title character in “Billie” reaches the heights of bliss riding her Harley Davidson, while Pell in “Speaking Parts” is driven to distraction by the bionic eye of her lover-to-be Arc, a “masterpiece watch set in a crystal sphere, the iris a mandala of glowing gold.” Failed lawyer Stanley in “KSRN” dreams his dreams of wealth and power, of women like commodities, owned: “Their skin became polished, imported. Their bodies took on the lines of fine European manufacturers… Their breasts gleamed chrome, the highlights of their curves reflecting into the night, into his eyes–airflow eroticism, calling to him.” Meanwhile, the prostitute Fields in “State” acts the part of an android for high dollar customers who would probably be repelled to learn of her true humanity. 

Just as we homo sapiens have tweaked our consciousnesses with a variety of substances since the earliest days of our species, so, too, have we augmented our sexuality. As Lenore Tiefer titled her groundbreaking book, Sex Is Not a Natural Act, and it never has been. If there is a common theme tying together these stories, tying together the simple and sweet tale of a couple’s first use of a vibrator with that of a person who hires out her body by a form of remote control, then that’s it. Sex is not a natural act, and it never has been. 

The artist Mark Rothko famously quipped, “Certain people always say we should go back to nature. I notice they never say we should go forward to nature.” And that is where M. Christian takes us in this collection–forward to nature. Forward–to discover our natures.

Rude Mechanicals

Cyborg Lady 666 by SebastianvonBuchwald

Future Fire Likes Love Without Gun Control

Now this is a treat: not only did the folks at Future Fire ("social political and speculative cyber-fiction") like The Bachelor Machine, my collection of erotic science fiction, but they also just posted a nice review of my non-erotic collection of fantasy/science fiction/horror, Love Without Gun Control:

I honestly wasn’t sure what to expect when Love Without Gun Control  showed up to be reviewed. The cover is very retro-pulp-comic, a scene on Mars, all bright colors and simple lines, misleading as to the  content. It seems more like a graphic-novel cover, or a series of 70's porn. The book itself is quite thin, only 155 pages. I was pleasantly surprised. The collection opens with the eponymous story, ‘Love Without Gun Control’, published for the first time in this collection. Ultra-violent and rather bizarre, it is somewhat reminiscent of a D. Harlan Wilson story. A sort of modern-day Western romance, the story really does defy labeling as it shows the effects of one snake-oil doctor’s ‘love potion’, applied erroneously, and the destruction that can come from thwarted desire. A fun, rollicking ride with a very unique flavor.

The second story, ‘Needle Taste’, is a unique concept with an ambiguous ending. The story itself is a totally different beast from the previous tale, but the wistful tone holds up the strange story well enough until the end, when it feels a little... abrupt. If there’s a weak one in the bunch, it’s this one, simply on a relative scale. It is in no way a bad one, it just doesn’t have quite the force of the others.

...seeking a forever-quiet man in the whole buzzing, humming, singing, cackling city.

‘Hush Hush’ is my favorite story in the collection. The language is absolutely beautiful: weird, eery and slippery. The tale is half mystery, half internal journey. Whether he solves the mystery or not is really unimportant. What he learns along the way is not. This was a lovely to read for the language as for the story.

‘The Rich Man’s Ghost’ is probably my least favorite of the stories. It lacks the smoothness of voice, the weird beauty of most of the other pieces. The story is a little less Weird, too, and maybe that colors my opinion.

‘Wanderlust’ is one of the stories that I’m not really sure, at first, how I feel about it. On the one hand, the reader is kept in the dark until the very end of the story. I simply didn’t have a clue what was going on. On the other hand, the writing is very rich, so it isn’t necessarily a bad thing to enjoy the ride. A man who inspires absolute  ecstasy from everyone he meets comes across a bit thin at first, but their reactions if he stays around for longer than a few minutes are... interesting.

‘Orphan’ is chilling and haunting. A young man running from something, to something, carrying a horrible secret. There were a couple of places that could have used a clarity edit or that read a little  contrived, but overall, definitely a memorable piece worth reading again.

Really, though, I’d be hard-pressed to say that any story in this collection is best skipped over or read in a hurry. There’s just enough  variation in the stories to keep them unique, and enough cohesion to develop a voice that just draws me in more deeply, the farther I read. (The first story is an odd difference to the rest of them, but no less enjoyable.) The cover-art remains a sticking point, as it has no apparent connection to the content, and prose like this needs something lovely to wrap it up, and what it has is not something I would be wild about displaying on a shelf.

Read this one slowly, because each story is best savored and mulled over. And I’ll be keeping an eye out for more of M. Christian’s stories.

Ernest Hogan On Love Without Gun Control

Did I say cool - when I was talking about being blown-away by one of my favorite writers blurbing The Bachelor Machine?  What I mean to say is extremely cool as he just sent me a blub for my non-smutty collection, Love Without Gun Control.  Thanks again, Ernest - yer the best!

A few years ago I tried to read a tasteful literary magazine full of stories where nothing much happened, and the authors and characters were proud of it. The stories in LOVE WITHOUT GUN CONTROL are not like that. M. Christian lets the reader have it with booth barrels in story after story that set a new standard for Twenty-First Century pulp fiction. From far-out science fiction to gritty, hardboiled realities these are the kind of stories that make the reader hang on for dear life on a wild ride.

- Ernest Hogan

Rude Mechanicals

Guinea Pig #05 by Fredaugis

Rude Mechanicals

Aphrodite by Code1310

Patrick Califia Likes Rude Mechanicals

This is a very special treat: a blurb from the legendary Patrick Califia - a great writer and an even greater friend - for my technorotica collection, Rude Mechanicals.

Thanks, Pat!



Here is the latest collection of M.Christian's insightful and original work. Fabulous! I have yet to read anything Chris has written without feeling that my own assumptions were challenged, and I was pushed to think about sexuality, politics, gender, and literature in a whole different way. There aren't enough people who can write from the polymorphous perverse perspective that he seamlessly adopts. He is a genuine ally of sexual minority communities and has walked the walk and talked the talk in dozens of different erotic and edgy experiences. If you'd like to expand your horizons and spread your wings (or your legs, or somebody else's legs), you couldn't have a better guide than the wise, wry, irreverent, and twisted M.Christian.
-Patrick Califia, author of Mortal Companion, Hard Men, and Macho Sluts.

Excerpt: Better Than the Real Thing

Now here's a treat: the great folks at 4-Letter Words not just feature a lot of my books but also just posted a sweet excerpt from my new collection, Better Than the Real Thing.  Check out the story, "A Light Minute" over there ... but in the meantime here's a tease:

How are you today?  was all the message said.  It was their ritual, a tight tradition between them.  Sasha was an night timer, a sunset-to-dawn kind of girl.  Before she crawled into her “warm flannel cave and drew sleep up over her eyes” (she’d written) she always left that message for Alyx to find in her own preferred morning.

Happy, Alyx sent back with a flutter of keystrokes, love you.  Another ritual, much more recent.  Alyx felt it, though, with a tug of hesitation, a grip in her chest of uncertainty.  It might well have been totally true, that Sasha was the love of her life – but they’d never met.

So much was known – despite all that was unknown (the sound of her voice, the way she smiled) – that Alyx was very certain about the feelings she had for the tiny, dark-haired girl with the sweet little bulb of a nose, deeply tanned cheeks and vibrant brown eyes (I’m a Mediterranean princess who likes the night): a color print of her framed neat over her machine’s monitor.  Even without hearing her voice or really seeing her face (beyond the picture she’d transmitted) she knew that Sasha somehow fitted perfectly into her life.  Their conversations, though time-delayed, hummed and clicked with a familiarity that belied their three month relationship.

At first Alyx was hesitant about venturing into the electronic unknown.  The world was still much too loud, hard, and brilliant for her back then to learn the unfathomable language of baud, server, gateway, and the like.  Jo had left her – taken her pictures, blankets, clothes, books, and herself and left Alyx nothing but her little Santa Cruz bungalow.  That, and a series of pains when Alyx did anything – anything at all.  Till, that is, her brother smashed open her front door, emitting a torrent of painful light and crashing street noise and slammed down a small box next to her antique computer.  In a sympathetic whisper that sounded like a torrent of dishware pouring down a tin-shod mountainside, he had said, “If you won’t go out, maybe at least you’ll meet someone else.”

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Rude Mechanicals

Brian Poor

Rude Mechanicals