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Finalist - 2023 Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ+ Romance and Erotica
This debut gay erotic novel about a stowaway on World War II troopships is an "immersive and period-specific picaresque, which manages to capture its milieu in a way that feels simultaneously timeless and contemporary" (Kirkus Reviews).
Dockyard mansex adventurer Olli Turner has stowed away on the biggest ship the world has ever known, forced to set sail incomplete.
Built up rivet by rivet through his formative years, RMS Queen Elizabeth watched over Olli's sexual awakening. Staying with her seems to promise passage to a new world of landed men.
Yet in March 1940 war is churning. That short coastal voyage to Southampton he was expecting turns into a daring dash across the Atlantic and plants instead seeds of a years-long life at sea.
Conspiring undercurrents sabotage his troopship to troopship bounce as need for a place, however perilous, in arms of to-war men proves a powerful piece in this war's chess match of primal evils.
Author: Joseph Brennan
Paperback Published 3 March 2023 286 pages
"Set on the high seas during World War II, Loose Lips blends adventure, lurid intrigue and queer romance into an explicit slice of pulp fiction. Beyond the rough and raunchy prose is a fascinating and well-researched origin story that identifies in the homoerotic male-only milieus of wartime the emerging iconography, attitudes and values of twentieth century gay culture." - Levi Huxton, author of The Lodger, That Summer
"Brennan's erotic debut, a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award, is a salacious story of a young man swept into service at sea during WWII. ... The period details and connection to historic boat sinkings are intriguing, and Brennan's idiosyncratic prose is fascinatingly textured... The sex scenes themselves are graphic and kinky... There's an audience for this..." - Publishers Weekly
"February 1940: the son of a shipbuilder’s agent, young Oliver Turner experienced his sexual awakening at the Glasgow shipyard in the arms of the men labouring to build the RMS Queen Elizabeth. It’s only appropriate then that he should stow away on the completed ocean liner as a means of escaping his dreary existence in Glasgow for a life of high adventure. He’s caught almost immediately, but luckily the man who discovers him, Senior First Officer Robert Bell, is willing to stay silent in exchange for making Ollie his shipboard plaything—a desirable amenity on a long voyage... The resourceful stowaway doesn’t keep to one ship but finds himself serving across a fleet’s worth of vessels, picking up lovers along the way. Ollie quickly discovers that life aboard a ship during wartime is no picnic—even when there are plenty of willing sailors to share a bunk with... Fans of gay stories at sea should enjoy this immersive and period-specific picaresque, which manages to capture its milieu in a way that feels simultaneously timeless and contemporary." - Kirkus Reviews
"Loose Lips leaves no stone unturned, boasting vivid and erotic prose... The mixture of subject matter and genre stylings are truly unique. Thriller undertones swimming through this erotica novel keep readers guessing." - The BookLife Prize