The Bonds of Brotherhood

Okay, everybody, listen up.

That means you over there in the corner, too.

We have a guest. So play play nice. Buy her a drink. And have fun.

Today, I'm pleased to welcome Trish McCallan to Under the Tiki Hut. Trish is the author of FORGED IN FIRE, a novel about members of a U.S. Navy SEAL team.

Take it away, Trish!

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I discovered a fantastic new television series earlier this week. Or, I should say, a new-to-me series. The show, which is called White Collar, has been on at least two seasons, but I don’t have cable and only recently stumbled across it on Netflix. The show is smart, with fantastic characters and dialogue. It also has a bit of a romantic subplot—or at least it does in the first season since one of the heroes of the series is hard at work trying to figure out why the love of his life has fled him and what it will take to get her back. Now I love a good romantic subplot, but what I love so much about White Collar isn’t the relationship between the men and their women— it’s the relationship between the men in the series. It’s the bonds of loyalty and trust, it’s the lengths they will go to help each other. It’s the phenomenal subtext in their dialog and their expressions and their actions. It’s the way they broadcast their feeling for each other through that dialog, and with their expressions and by their actions, but without ever actually talking about their feelings for one another.

White Collar nailed how men bond with each other, and how those bonds are expressed.

These bonds of brotherhood fascinate me. The way men show their feelings are so different than woman. They show their affection with a hard slug to the stomach, or a snarky verbal dig. They show it with rounds of one-upmanship and scoffing at each other’s sexual prowess.

My favorite shows and books focus just as much on the relationship and subtext between the men in the series, as they do on the love relationships between the heroes and their heroines. Maya Banks' KGI series, Suzanne Brockmann’s Troubleshooters, Lara Adrian’s Midnight Breed, and JR Ward’s Black Dagger Brotherhood series—I count these among my favorites, which is no surprise because they all have one thing in common, the heroes are members of a elite warrior brotherhood. A brotherhood that will back each other to the death, that will go to the wall for each other, that will grieve with heartbreaking silent intensity when they lose one of their “one,” that show in every way imaginable the depth of their love for each other, but without ever actually saying the words.

When I started writing FORGED IN FIRE, my high-octane romantic thriller, I wanted to explore the bonds that exist between the men in a warrior brotherhood, just as much as I wanted to explore the love story. I wanted to create the same kind of closeness between my male characters as JR Ward created in her Black Dagger Brotherhood, or Maya Banks created with her KGI series. I wanted the reader to turn the last page of the book knowing how my heroes felt about each other, even though they never once mention the word “love,” at least in relation to one another. From the volume of email I get regarding the heroes of the series, I’m guessing I managed to accomplish this.

It’s also pretty obvious from the popularity of series like The Black Dagger Brotherhood and the Troubleshooters, that I’m not the only woman fascinated by how men interact with each other.

So tell me, are there any series or shows you’ve read or watched that highlight this phenomena? Any books or shows you’d recommend?