Books are in my blood—always have been. My grandmother was a librarian, my father was a printer and publisher, and my uncle was a pulp fiction fanatic who had boxes upon boxes of wonderfully trashy, over-the-top novels. Growing up, I was surrounded by the printed word, from my dad’s love of Louis L’Amour, Isaac Asimov, and classic sci-fi to the stacks of dime-store paperbacks my uncle hoarded like hidden treasure.
As for me? I grew up on literary greats like Gore Vidal and William Burroughs, devouring books that were praised for their sharp wit, biting social commentary, and bold storytelling. But I had a secret—I loved trashy books. The kind of lurid, scandalous, melodramatic pulp fiction that made respectable readers clutch their pearls. I couldn’t get enough of the exaggerated drama, the hard-boiled prose, and the wildly sensational covers that practically screamed “FORBIDDEN PLEASURES WITHIN.”
And now, for the first time, I’m writing my own gay pulp fiction series—Prisoners of Sodom. It’s gritty, sexy, unapologetically bold, and dripping with all the things I love about classic pulp: scandal, passion, betrayal, and a setting so intense it becomes a character in itself. I can’t wait for everyone to read it.
What is Pulp Fiction? And Why Mine is Unapologetically Gay and Scandalous
Pulp fiction was the beating heart of mid-20th-century popular literature—cheap, fast, and bursting at the seams with sex, violence, and high-stakes drama. Named for the low-quality wood pulp paper they were printed on, these books were mass-produced entertainment, the kind of stories you could devour in an afternoon and still feel the lingering sting of their boldness long after. They spanned genres—crime, sci-fi, westerns, horror—but the best of them had one thing in common: they didn’t hold back.
Pulp books weren’t afraid to be too much. They were gritty, exaggerated, full of morally ambiguous antiheroes and shocking twists. And the covers? Pure art. Think hand-painted illustrations of brooding detectives, femme fatales, scandalous affairs, and danger lurking in every shadow. These books were meant to grab your attention and never let go.
But classic pulp fiction had one glaring flaw—it was overwhelmingly straight. Sure, there were coded queer characters, villains dripping with barely veiled homoerotic subtext, and a handful of rare underground gems that dared to put queerness front and center. But mainstream pulp, for all its sensationalism, never truly embraced the raw, unapologetic gayness it deserved.
That’s where Prisoners of Sodom comes in. My take on pulp fiction is everything the classics were—gritty, melodramatic, scandalous—but with an unabashedly queer lens. This series is full of desperate men, dangerous temptations, and forbidden desires trapped behind prison bars. It’s pulp the way I’ve always wanted it—lurid, sweaty, and unapologetically gay.
Why Prisoners of Sodom is More Like a TV Series Than a Novel
I’m a huge fan of serialized television—the kind of shows that sink their hooks into you and won’t let go. Recently, I binged Orange Is the New Black and loved its sprawling, character-driven storytelling. I also attempted to watch OZ, but—yeah, no. That show was intense. Too intense for me. But what both of those shows got right was their ability to create a living, breathing world full of complicated, flawed characters whose lives constantly intersect in unexpected ways.
That’s exactly what I want to capture with Prisoners of Sodom. This isn’t just a single novel—it’s an experience, a long-running project I plan to write for a long time to come. There’s simply too much going on to cram it all into one book. The power struggles, the betrayals, the alliances, the raw, desperate need for love in an environment that crushes hope—it all demands room to breathe. So, rather than trying to fit it into a traditional novel structure, I’m approaching it like a TV series, with multiple “episodes” that build on each other, each packed with tension, drama, and of course, plenty of heat.
To do this story justice, I’m writing in third person, which lets me step inside the minds of more than just my two main characters. There are so many moving pieces, so many lives entwined, that limiting myself to a single perspective just wouldn’t work. But romance readers, don’t worry—at its core, Prisoners of Sodom is still a love story. Mario and Austin’s relationship remains the beating heart of the series, even as the world around them threatens to tear them apart.
So if you love steamy, character-driven drama with twists, betrayals, and passion that burns white-hot, picture Prisoners of Sodom as the kind of TV show you can’t stop watching. Only this time, it’s in book form—and unapologetically gay as hell.
Ian O. Lewis and Luke Jameson 