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To Be Men book cover
To Be Men
Stories Celebrating Masculinity
2018
First Published
4.93
Average Rating
313
Number of Pages

Part of Series

Tired of stories about men as bumbling idiots? Of fathers as incompetents? Of masculinity as "toxic"? Tired of misandry? Ready for some real masculine role models? Stories about heroes and men who do the right thing? Stories about real men? The kind that provide for their families, love their wives and children, and make sacrifices. And save the world. A collection of seventeen stories and two essays, To Be Stories Celebrating Masculinity pays homage to men and masculinity. Fun. Action-packed. Thought-provoking. Whatever your tastes, you will find enjoyment in these pages. Each story embraces, in its own way, virtus—the concept of valor, manliness, excellence, courage, character, and worth. The sentient Colt 1911 destined for the smelter. A courageous werewolf who embodies virtus no matter his form. The wizard raising a family in the 21st century. Sherlock Holmes' newfound respect for women. A future untamed frontier where "women and children first" proves itself a timeless maxim. The hero who identifies as a M1A2 Abrams tank. A Vietnam War sailor defending his gay crew mate, because when bullets are flying, only what you do matters. The police chief in a noir-style world where Fae, dragons, and humans live, love, and break the law. These stories will delight and entertain you.

Avg Rating
4.93
Number of Ratings
14
5 STARS
93%
4 STARS
7%
3 STARS
0%
2 STARS
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1 STARS
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goodreads

Authors

Ann Margaret Lewis
Ann Margaret Lewis
Author · 5 books

Ann Margaret Lewis began her writing career writing tie-in children’s books and short stories for DC Comics. She then published two editions of Star Wars: The New Essential Guide to Alien Species for DelRey/Random House. Moving from licensed publishing, Ann began writing science fiction/fantasy, historical fiction, and Sherlock Holmes mysteries. Her first book, Murder in the Vatican: The Church Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes was the Independent Book Publisher’s Award Winner for 2010 and a finalist for the Catholic Arts and Letters Award. She followed that with another Sherlock Holmes novel entitled The Watson Chronicles: A Sherlock Holmes Novel in Stories. Her latest book, Warrior of the Kizan, is a space opera. And her work has appeared in the anthologies To Be Men (2019) and Luna (release 2020).

Jon Del Arroz
Jon Del Arroz
Author · 17 books

Jon Del Arroz began his writing career in high school, providing book reviews and the occasional article for the local news magazine, The Valley Citizen. From there, he went on to write a weekly web comic, Flying Sparks, which has been hailed by Comic Book Resources as “the kind of stuff that made me fall in love with early Marvel comics.” He has several published short stories, most recently providing flash fiction for AEG’s weird west card game, Doomtown: Reloaded, and a micro-setting for the Tiny Frontiers RPG. Writing and reading Space Opera is his life! Star Realms: Rescue Run is his debut novel. You can find him during baseball season with his family at about half of the Oakland A’s home games in section 124.

J. Trevor Robinson
J. Trevor Robinson
Author · 2 books

When J Trevor was young, he received a well-worn stack of mystery and horror novels from his older brother, and it instilled in him a lifelong desire to be an author. Heavily influenced by Stephen King's scares, Jim Butcher's action scenes, and the larger-than-life characters in Ayn Rand's books, he blended those influences with classic literature and pulp horror to write THE MUMMY OF MONTE CRISTO, coming in 2020 from Immortal Works Publishing. He has also self-published a young-adult horror novel THE GOOD FIGHT, and was published in the Amazon #1 bestselling horror anthology SECRET STAIRS as the sole romance story in the collection. He lives in Toronto Canada keeping the redhead gene alive with his wife and newborn daughter, born Friday the 13th. J Trevor Robinson has also been published as "Justin Robinson," but there are a surprising number of authors with that name.

Jamie Ibson
Jamie Ibson
Author · 8 books

Jamie Ibson is a new writer from the frozen wastelands of Canuckistan, where moose, bears, and geese battle for domination among the hockey rinks, igloos, and Tim Hortons. After joining the Canadian army reserves in high school, he spent half of 2001 in Bosnia as a peacekeeper and came home shortly after 9/11 with a deep sense of foreboding. After graduating college, he landed a job in law enforcement and was posted to the left coast from 2007 to 2021. He retired from law enforcement in early 2021 and moved clear across the country to write full time in the Maritimes. He published a number of short stories in 2018 and 2019, and his first novel came out in January 2020. He’s pretty much been making it up as he goes along, although he has numerous writer friends who serve as excellent role-models, mentors, and, occasionally, cautionary tales. His website can be found at ibsonwrites.ca. He is married to the lovely Michelle, and they have cats.

Jay S. Bell
Jay S. Bell
Author · 3 books

JAY S. BELL wears the secret identity of a Typical Boring Suburban Man by day, then transforms to a keyboard punching wordsmith by night. Born and raised in the suburbs of Dallas, Texas against a Forrest Gump backdrop of the Vietnam War, the moon landings, Watergate, hippies, and the JFK assassination. Bell describes himself as an abysmal student who abhorred reading until his father, in desperation, turned to the classics—Conan the Barbarian. “I tore through pulp fiction with an addiction bordering on insanity. Mickey Spillane, Louis L’Amour, Robert E. Howard, Edgar Rice Burroughs…the list is exhaustive,” says Bell. “I would walk a mile, uphill through the Texas heat, to the library and bookstore in downtown Garland, and carry back, uphill through the Texas heat, a stack of books from my armpit to my fingertips.” To say that fiction became a central focus in Bell’s life would be an understatement, though his taste ran hard toward creators like John D. MacDonald, Robert Heinlein, and Donald Hamilton, opting for Have Spacesuit, Will Travel over “The Classics” which left him bored to tears during his formative years. Fast forward to an early career in retail loss prevention, marriage, and firstborn son, Bell wrote his first, as he describes “horrible, no good, very bad” novel with his infant son sitting on his lap. He bravely showed it to a few folks, which encouraged him to stick to his day job. Which was fine by him because kid #2 came along and food needed to be put on the table. Twenty years passed. The kids grew up. Career changes happened. Bell moved from crime fighting to sales. Somewhere in there, his urge to write returned. In 2011, he got serious about it, joining writer groups and receiving feedback via online forums. “I wrote and wrote and wrote. And I loved it.” WELCOME TO COTTONMOUTH was born out of Bell’s search for an ensemble of flawed and quirky characters who could team up, Mission Impossible-style, to defeat enemies, foreign and domestic and anywhere in between. He definitely did not want another James Bond, Jack Reacher, the Gray Man, or the archetype of the action hero as a leading man. Further, he wanted a strong female lead who comes with baggage and needs a redemption arc of her own. COTTONMOUTH gives him a great way to tell many stories, breathe life into a variety of characters, and explore many different plotlines. Bell currently resides less than thirty miles from where he was born. He is a cancer survivor who worked his way up through two long and fulfilling careers, raised two kids to adulthood, has owned and been owned by many cats, and has been married to his lovely wife for over thirty years. “I’ll keep writing until saner people take my keyboard away and wheel me out to sit on the porch…where I will have a book cracked open on my lap.”

Scott Bell
Scott Bell
Author · 10 books

Scott Bell writes because that way he can daydream and claim it on his taxes. A Certified Fraud Examiner and professional Suburban Man, Scott has a wife, two grown kids, and at least one cat sleeping on his keyboard. (The cat, not the wife and kids. They have their own keyboards to sleep on.) When he's not writing, Scott fights a relentless battle against weeds, slow drivers, and ever-shrinking pants.

C. J. Brightley
C. J. Brightley
Author · 19 books

C. J. Brightley lives outside Washington, D.C., with her husband and their two young children. When she's not busy writing, she teaches karate, bakes too many desserts, and makes jewelry. She loves to connect with readers! Follow C. J. Brightley at https://www.facebook.com/CJBrightley and https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/1052635...

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