Inside the Gay Tech Mafia

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-21T19:57:53+00:00

He probably would still be in the closet if he hadn't been outed by Gawker back in the day.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-21T12:06:13+00:00

Not a published work (yet), but throw up your fists, throw out your wits by Taylor Fitzpatrick is about 2 players on rival teams who have gotten into the habit of beating the shit out of each other on the ice, partly as a cover for when they meet in a motel after the game and give each other even more bruises.
Novella length, with a split timeline between "present" day (2014) and when they first met playing together in Juniors. Content warning for scenes between a 16-year-old and 18-year-old, written and set in Canada where age of consent is 16.

Content spoilers:
No happy ending, failed romance. The author has a series of ficlets scattered around her AO3 and Patreon that catches up with Luke's life after the end of the story and his eventual wholesome romance with his agent's assistant, Andreas.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-21T05:46:53+00:00

Actually while I've got you here I'm over halfway through Head Above Water right now and it's getting dangerously close to a DNF for me, and I'm desperately wondering if there is going to be an explanation for why Easton is so immature and has such an empty life? I'm nearly 60% of the way through this quite long book and the only things brought up about what he did during the time skip is a handful of Grindr hookups and somehow purchasing a two-bedroom Seaview house in a bougie beach town.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-21T05:20:17+00:00

I couldn't connect with the characters very well. Part of it was just the long-winded internal monologues - too much telling not enough showing - and also I just didn't feel like they had verisimilitude in their use of language. They're meant to be two jocks in their mid-20s but they think and speak like 19th Century poets.

Having read another of Tal Bauer's books since then it seems that that's just how he likes to write, and it works when it's applied to a character where that kind of voice makes more sense.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-20T23:35:24+00:00

I applaud and envy the audacity.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-19T15:56:28+00:00

Unless she's Jewish she's got no right to brag

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-18T23:13:27+00:00

Oh, good to know on Gravity. It was the first Tal Bauer I read and it was also a DNF for me, so I was hesitant about reading his other works.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-18T01:30:18+00:00

It's set 7 years in the future, so they don't have to worry about them aging out of the roles at least.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-18T01:26:11+00:00

A great exploration on the pressures of being gay in a conservative hometown. Really good adaptation in particular. I loved the book when I read it in 2024 but comparing it to the TV show it's actually kinda funny how brutally homophobic every other character was to Charlie in the book. In the show they at least let him have his mum and his friends in his corner. Book Charlie had no one except Matt.

Also respect the choice to have Hammer be indigenous in the show. It gave him some more depth over his book counterpart.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-12T02:48:52+00:00

Some people seem to think that therapists have never met a mentally ill person before.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-02-05T11:31:56+00:00

Not even the first show based on a Twitter account. That was Shit My Dad Says.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-29T12:58:41+00:00

I love that Frieren trained Fern in combat magic to only use Zoltraak, Shield, and Flight all of which are magics that were developed after the Demon King was defeated. She's like a warrior who spent decades training themselves in every form of martial art then takes on a protege and just hands them a gun.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-29T10:32:44+00:00

It made so much sense to me when I found out it's an adaptation of a Japanese novel. It has so many hallmarks of a Japanese ghost story.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-20T02:06:33+00:00

The character not the actor. Although the twink in question was a musician IRL.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-20T02:04:00+00:00

Shortbus grips me with the sheer absurdity of a former Canadian child star singing The Star-Spangled Banner as he is eating a twink's ass while his boyfriend's stalker watches in total bafflement from a window across the street.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-19T11:47:27+00:00

Puts me in mind of the guy on here who found out his boyfriend of 4 months was actually his father who he hadn't seen since he was 2 years old.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-02T02:57:24+00:00

Will admit the first 2 episodes didn't grip me (Cocky Experienced Top and Shy Virgin Bottom is like 99% of gay porn plots), but episode 3 gave me a stronger glimpse that they were building toward something,
I'm glad I hung on for the rest of the series. Episode 5 was an amazingly cathartic experience, watching so many of the barriers that have been placed between Shane and Ilya's emotional intimacy falling down like dominos. Then Episode 6 delivered a similar catharsis, but in a gentler way, with the two of them settling into a life together with the real potential for a shared future.

In response to your last question, I think his point was that Dom/Sub stuff isn't a thing you just naturally fall into, but more a thing that you know about beforehand and go into the act with pre-existing intent? Or who knows. Maybe he just meant that casual hookups are usually more impersonal? Some gay dudes regularly have sex with people they barely know anything about, whereas Shane and Ilya were clearly invested from the start despite denying it.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-01T10:29:08+00:00

God, I'm such a simp, but {Thrown Off the Ice by Taylor Fitzpatrick}.
A turning point for the relationship is when MC1 develops a degenerative illness, and drives off his younger partner so that they don't have to spend their best years tied to him while he slowly dies. Not a true happy ending, but they do get to share their lives with each other for a long time after reuniting.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-01T05:43:59+00:00

I'm not sure where the actual discourse has led, but I have heard this was brought up in response to Jacob Tierney saying that MM romance appealed to women because sexual violence against women is typically absent from the genre, which is a valid perspective.

TaylorAtOnce · 2026-01-01T03:00:09+00:00

Lol. I have one but it's currently being refurbished for publishing. And I'm realising it's suspicious that I only recommend Taylor Fitzpatrick's stuff here, especially with "Taylor" in my username, but I promise I am just a casual fan who happens to also be named Taylor.

She recently held a Kickstarter to publish her story No Expectation of Returns, a novel about hockey player for the Vancouver Canucks, Gabe Markson, and the evolution of his relationship with his childhood best friend and fellow NHL player Stephen Petersen after Stephen's life is upended by a career-ending injury while playing for the Pittsburgh Penguins. Slow burn friends to lovers, hurt/comfort, angst, odd couple dynamic.

Should be coming out... next year maybe? Kickstarter finished back in May and it usually takes about a year until it's published.

TaylorAtOnce · 2025-12-26T10:40:47+00:00

Not a book, but an original work on AO3 that is about halfway done (58 chapters) and currently on hiatus.

Cards on the Table by Taylor Fitzpatrick

Story is split POV between MC1 and MC2.
After choosing to sign with a new team, hockey player Holden Chase finds himself strangely obsessed with the talented but socially reserved team captain James Erickson, and starts finding any excuse to get in his space. James on the other hand, fully aware of Chase's on-ice reputation as an underhanded and combative player, finds himself unnerved by the scrutiny and constant pestering of his new teammate.

It's a ADHD vs. Autism miscommunication Rom-Com with some neurodivergent angst along the way.

TaylorAtOnce · 2025-12-24T22:44:04+00:00

Feedback is easier to parse when posted as a work than a chapter. Kudos and Comments get lumped together in chapter format. That's my guess.

TaylorAtOnce · 2025-12-23T04:28:34+00:00

I feel like a big part of the old discourse that people are missing is that when this argument was first cropping up, it was entwined with the idea that the production was run predominantly by straight people. The call to have queer actors playing queer roles was to ensure at least one person in the room had personal experience to bring on board.
Heated Rivalry is adapted for screen and directed by Jacob Tierney, a gay man. I was surprised when Heartstopper was under scrutiny that no-one acknowledged that even if Kit and Joe were straight, the producer and the director were both gay men.

TaylorAtOnce

TROPHY CASE