Inspiration

I got an interesting email the other day, asking me if, when I'm writing my Hotel Bentmoore stories, I use the images of other men to "inspire" me when I'm portraying my hosts. I suppose the short answer to that is yes.
I don't copy the whole body, of course. I don't picture the whole form in my head and use that to model my host. But I'll try to figure out what it is about a man that turns me on, and inject that into my host character.

When I was very young, I had a major crush on Christian Slater. I mean MAY-JOR. I had a huge poster of him on my wall; I bought every magazine I could find with his picture.
What was it about him that turned me on so much? Mainly, the mischievous smile. Slater's got that perfect mouth that holds limitless secrets and endless fun. It's playful, it's coy, it's sneaky, and it's just plain breath-catching. So I gave one of my hosts a coy, mischievous smile.

As I grew older, my tastes changed. I started watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer (shut up, you're never too old for Buffy) and discovered David Boreanaz.

David's dangerous. He's meticulous, he's serious, and he gets the job done. He'll tell you exactly what he's about to do and why he's doing it, and he'll tell you with his eyes. So I gave one of my hosts the same haunting, deep eyes.



And then...and then Queer as Folk came along, and oh my God, there was Gale harold.

Harold is quiet. He's a thinker. He'll spring up on you when you're least expecting it and make you dizzy with need. You'll realize you're in his clutches and under his complete control only when it's too late.
Yeah, I tried to make one of my hosts like that.

There's another kind of sexy I'd like to try to copy, the boyish/hyper/emotional/crazy kind of sexy that only this guy can show so well:

But I don't know how that would translate for a Hotel Bentmoore host. I mean, hosts are supposed to be Doms, always in control, always anticipating the next step. 'David Tennant sexy' is more of an adventure, impulse, 'jump-first-and-look-after' kind of a thing. But maybe I'm only picturing it that way because I'm used to seeing him as Doctor Who. Maybe I need to start seeing him more like this:

Poster Boy for Leather