Interview with Santino Hassell

Look for the Sutphin Boulevard soundtrack here or here on spotify.

LenaLena: Santino, thank you for agreeing to be interviewed on Jessewave. You’ve been writing for more than a decade, moving from fan fiction to the epic free series In the In the Company of Shadows (ICoS), in collaboration with Ais, to the self published spinoff After Midnight. Sutphin Boulevard is your first contemporary romance published through Dreamspinner. How different was that process?

Santino Hassell: Hugely different. We uploaded ICoS serial-style on AdultFanfiction.net and our website and since it was just a project we did for fun, we never considered it would be shelved on Goodreads or eventually have a cult following. With After Midnight, I had a lot of help from friends in terms of how to put it all together and package it, but I still knew next to nothing about marketing. Publishing Sutphin Boulevard has been a different experience in that there’s this team of people by my side, I have a lot more friends who are knowledgeable about the industry to give me advice, and I’m starting to think about stuff like branding and marketing a lot more.

LL: Did you feel like a complete newbie again, despite your years of writing?

SH: YES. Even though I’ve been lurking around M/M Romance for a few years, and ICoS is almost 10 years old, Sutphin Boulevard is basically my debut as a contemporary romance author.

LL: So far you’d only written speculative fiction. Is writing Contemporary much different?

SH: In some ways. ICoS and After Midnight are about characters in a dystopian near future so they’re dealing with extraordinary external conflicts. In Sutphin Boulevard, Michael is confronting issues that are specific to his culture, NYC, teaching, and it’s more grounded in reality and I hope people will be able to relate to it even though the characters may be from entirely different backgrounds. It’s a book about real people going through real things.

LL: Was your move to Contemporary in any way influenced by the fact that it’s the most popular sub-genre of m/m?

SH: It was definitely something I was aware of. I wanted to do something totally different from ICoS even though I love it and I love our fandom, and I wanted to try my hand at genre romance whether it was contemporary or historical or paranormal. Although, originally Sutphin Boulevard was meant to be a light romantic comedy and it didn’t take that turn at all.

LL: I’ll say. You missed the ‘light romantic comedy’ mark by about a mile. Not that that is a bad thing. Michael’s story is intense, yet feels authentic at the same time.. Your working title for the book was ‘Breathe’, yet it ended up titled ‘Sutphin Boulevard‘. What is the significance of both titles and why was the latter chosen in the end?

SH: Originally it was titled ‘Breathe’ because being with Nunzio allowed Michael to just breathe and be at peace during this chaotic time in his life, but the book is also about where he grew up and how that weighs on him. My desire to make it a series of interconnected stories (the next few books are spin-offs, not direct sequels so you’re not waiting for more books about this couple’s story) was the major deciding factor, though.

LL: I know you got stuck writing Michael’s story at some point, when he was about to hit rock bottom. Was it easier to feel affinity with his descent into the downward spiral than how he got out of it?

SH: Yeah, I would say so. At the start of the book you have Michael and Nunzio realizing they have this super potent sexual chemistry that leads to them realizing their emotional connection is way more than they ever realized. But then as Michael is overcome with stress due to family and work, he stops depending on Nunzio for emotional support because he’s terrified of where their relationship is going and he doesn’t want to mess it up. So he makes poor choices because he has flawed coping skills. However, articulating his climb out of the spiral was a lot harder. I didn’t want it to be a “Nunzio saves Michael with love and also his dick” resolution, so I had to think about the best way to go about realistically resolving Michael’s developmental arc.

LL: I appreciate your restraint in the ‘magic dick solution’ area, I really do. You work in education, like Michael, and you’ve had your own struggles coping with stress. How personal is this story?

SH: Most of the external conflict is totally fictional, but I did write certain aspects with my experiences, and the experiences of co-workers, in mind. The turning point when Michael went from the MC in a romcom to the MC of Sutphin Boulevard was during a particularly challenging time of the school year when my coworkers and I were drowning our sorrows at Teacher Happy Hour every week (there’s a bar in Brooklyn that gives a discount to teachers!). I know that seems strange for people who think teachers are like pillars of the community who strut around in tweed all day, but in my experience… this was fairly normal. It’s a hard job and you’re often not appreciated, and when you have a crew of people who are similar in age, you find ways to unwind together.

LL: I loved the look behind the scenes of the high school, it really painted a vivid picture of a world I know very little about. Despite all his complaining, I think Michael’s love for his job really shines through.

SH: Totally. When it comes down to it, most teachers are in it because they’re interested in what they’re teaching and truly want to educate young people. The hard parts are the politics of working in a school, and things beyond our control like standardized testing and students who aren’t getting proper support. But those things don’t take the joy from the job if you really have passion for it. You just work harder.

LL: So I gotta ask. Any personal experience with locked classroom doors at lunchtime?

SH: LOL I will say… there is a scene from the book that I plucked from an actual incident, but it isn’t sexual. Michael is really stressed and is in his classroom with his head on the desk and his eyes closed and Nunzio comes in and starts stroking his hair because he can tell Michael is feeling overwhelmed (the excerpt was actually posted over at Diverse Reader yesterday). That is something that happened between a coworker and I.

LL: Is the ‘Write what you know’ adagio true?

SH: Sometimes yes and sometimes no. I share things with Michael such as our professions and coping mechanisms, but on the other hand he has a totally different culture and family dynamic than me, and I still felt I was able to effectively write about those things. My beta readers gave me confidence in that regard, though.

LL: Talking about Michael’s culture, you wrote a blog post about the importance of finding a Latino model for the cover. Diversity in fiction is important to you. Where do you stand on the argument between authors-would-write-diversity-if-the-readers-demanded-it-but-they-don’t and readers-would-read-it-if-the-authors-just-wrote-it?

SH: It’s hard to have a firm stance on that debate because I don’t know how much of that is authors not wanting to write it and how much more is publishers not contracting diverse books, but I do think the industry should be representing the world realistically and not just how it looks with one group of people. It would have been insane for me to write a series set in NYC with a predominantly white cast of characters. That’s not the reality I experienced while living there and I’m always surprised by shows and books and movies set in such a diverse city that are completely white washed.

LL: Would it be accurate to say you aren’t a big fan of the m/m gold standard of 1-2-3-fingers-cock (with-lots-of-lube) sex scenes?

SH: Everyone has different preferences so I tend to write with the character’s specific preference in mind. Do they just want to get it in even though there’s no lube handy? Do they want to have some foreplay? Does this dude need lots of lube or can he grit his teeth and bear it with saliva? I’m not really of the “your ass will gush like a blood fountain if you don’t use buckets of lube” camp, but I know some people really don’t dig it unless they’re super slicked up. Everyone’s different.

LL: Which one of your characters (of all your books) is closest to your heart?

SH: Surprisingly, Raymond. Raymond is the little brother of the main character in Sutphin Boulevard and he’s a lot like many young guys I know. The Peter Pans of the millennial generation. He’s not very motivated and tries to be all “I don’t give a fuck” but he has his own developmental arc in the book even though he’s a side character. He was the reason I decided to expand SB into a series.

LL: I heard the second and third Five Boroughs books are already written? Who will those be about?

SH: They are! Sutphin Boulevard is the most intense of the three so far in terms of the serious tone, while Sunset Park (book 2 of the Five Boroughs series, which comes out in December) is Raymond’s story, so it’s a lot lighter. It was also really fun to write. It tackles bicuriosity/sexuality and the woes of the millennial generation. But the third book shifts to a guy named Caleb, totally different from the Rodriguez brothers, who is struggling with his wants and needs due to his dysfunctional and wealthy Upper East Side upbringing. It’s also full of sex.

LL: Oh darn. I am sure all that sex is going to be a massive disappointment for your readers. What do you think about the rampant erasure of bisexuality in the m/m genre? All those Gay For You books that feature apparently straight men going gay, while technically, that makes them bisexual. As a bisexual man yourself, does that irk you?

SH: It does just as much as it does in real life. I’ve known I was attracted to all genders since I was pretty young, but I still get pushback from the LGBTQ community on my sexuality so it’s not just M/M. It is frustrating though. I’ve met men who identified as straight even while having sex with other men, but that’s generally different than the kind of emotional and romantic connection portrayed in GFY stories. There’s a difference between saying everyone identifies their own way and just largely pretending there is nothing between gay and straight.

LL: Over the years, several people have openly fixated on you, speculated extensively on your physical attributes, and even tried to discover your personal information (which you don’t want known due to your profession). Do you think this type of fetishization of male authors is par for the course in M/M and an innocent byproduct of being in a bit of a spotlight, or does it make you uncomfortable?

SH: I think it’s expected to a point? I mean, Christopher Rice is mega hot and I’m sure he has his fair share of people fixating on him and reaching out to him, but he’s basically a book celebrity and is a bit untouchable. On the other hand, I am largely unknown and totally accessible in a way that opens the door to certain types of behavior because the social media circle is pretty close-knit. So, I expect people to jokingly flirt because it’s the nature of the beast, but when people start having episodes of erotomania it’s time to unfollow and block and shut that shit down.

LL: What other WIPS are you working on this year?

SH: I’ll be starting the next books in the Five Boroughs series! Book four is about this guy named Charles–an artsy dancer hipster type with mega insecurities and a larger than life personality. The fifth book is about Drew and will be the grittiest of the five novels. There will be hot cops and lots of angry sex. Both characters are introduced in Sutphin Boulevard.

LL: Oh! I liked Charles, but Drew will be really, really interesting. So, Raymond’s story comes out in December, but you also have a book coming out in October. What can you tell us about that one?

SH: Stygian is totally different than anything else I’ve written. It’s my take on southern gothic romance with a taste of paranormal. Maladjusted punk rock guys rent an eerie mansion in northern Louisiana for a music retreat and get sucked into this web of secrets and emotional manipulation by not-quite human predators who prey on people vulnerabilities. It’s definitely a romance and there are definitely vampires in it, but they’re of the Stoker breed and not so much the romantic dreamy kind.

LL: Who are your favorite m/m authors?

SH: Jordan Castillo Price, Amy Jo Cousins, Megan Erickson, and Alexis Hall. Their styles and voices are so distinct, and I admire them all so much as writers.

LL: Sutphin Boulevard comes out today. Will you be refreshing the Amazon sales ranking page 98664 times today?

SH: LOL I’m going to try not to! But it’s tempting. When After Midnight came out I just hid all day and tried not to think about it. Won’t be going the hermit route this time around though. 😉

LL: Good! There is no need to hide when you deliver a book like this. Thank you so much for sharing some of the book’s backstory with us!

SH: Thank you for having me!