Works by
Ronald L. Donaghe
(Writer)

Biography/Memoirs

• Letters In Search of Love and Other Essays (1998)
  Some of these essays were in response to requests by the late John Preston and other editors for inclusion in their anthologies; others explore that same period — one of the darkest in my life, as well as one of the most valuable.

• My Year of Living Heterosexually: And Other Adventures in Hell (2000)
  Compared to the dangerous, rage-filled military of today, where even the hint of homosexuality will get one badly beaten or savagely murdered, mine were almost halcyon days as an openly gay Airman First Class, where my boyfriend and I could be together and everybody in my flight knew about us.
  
  They could have been halcyon days, that is, if it hadn’t been for the madness of the war and the schizophrenia of the American public over that southeast Asian conflict; and if it hadn’t been for the wife I left back home and the child we had. What should have been idyllic days of my youth spent proudly serving my country as a gay soldier were misspent, instead, trying to make sense of what had gone so terribly wrong, so fast: one day I was a gay college student, the next a self-loathing homosexual trapped in a straight marriage, and the next a GI in the military machine during Vietnam.
  
  Come to think of it, I wouldn't change a thing.

Fiction Series

Common Threads in the Life
Follow the lives of the Reece family, and the lives of Joel Reece and Tom Allen as they make a life together among their family members, their community, and the world they inhabit.

1. Common Sons (1980)
   Joel's rural life of high school and farming in Common, New Mexico, is changed forever when Tom comes to town. The son of a preacher, Tom reaches out to Joel in friendship, and their bond to each other becomes as tight as brothers. Joel's openness to his own feelings and acceptance of himself (a healthy trait instilled by his loving parents) allows him to explore some new and confusing feelings he has for Tom. His confusion clears, however, after a reckless drinking bout ends with a very public kiss from Tom. But Tom's torment of sin and self-incrimination are far from over. Common Sons, the first in a series entitled "Common Threads in the Life," is a moving tale of self-discovery, love, and finding the courage to come out and come to grips with the truth in the face of hatred and adversity.

2. The Blind Season (2001)
   The long-awaited sequel to Common Sons is finally here! More in love with each other than ever, after five years together, Joel Reece and Tom Aen decide it's time to start a family of their own—and that's where the trouble starts.
   
   After being together for five years in the small town of Common, New Mexico, Joel and his 'husband' Tom decide to start a family. The only problem is they're both men. Knowing that two gay men will never be able to adopt, they decide to find a surrogate mother to carry their child. They do not bargain, however, for the beautiful and determined Sharon Minninger¡ªa runaway from a Mennonite community near Nuevo Casas Grandes, Mexico¡ªwho offers to carry the child. Her influence on their lives is far more than they every dreamed. Nor do they expect the backlash against their decision to be fathers to be as virulent as it is from some of the less open-minded citizens of the small southwestern New Mexico town. But they do have powerful allies in what comes down to a battle over the child that is eventually born.

3. The Salvation Mongers (2000)
   A broken-hearted and enraged Kelly decides to pose as a recruit at Lion’s Mouth Christian Ranch to discover why his beloved William committed suicide after experiencing religious conversion. In the isolated high mountains of the desert, where there is no way out, Kelly soon discovers the awful truth. But can he resist the powerful brainwashing or survive long enough to tell others? Or will he inevitably lose his own self-destiny in this deadly game of religious salvation?

4. The Gathering (2006)
   The Gathering is the fourth book in the Common Threads in the Life series, which began with Common Sons, and continued in The Blind Season and The Salvation Mongers. The Gathering is set in 1999, four months before the coming new millenium. The Reece family had planned to gather to celebrate the new era by gathering on New Year's eve. Instead tragedy strikes, and the family gathers for a very different reason.

The Continuing Journals of Will Barnett
Grow up with Will Barnett as he writes the first words in his journal at age 14: "Uncle Sean sure is pretty, but there's something wrong with him anyway," and continues to write and to mature. A coming-of-age series...

1. Uncle Sean (2001)
   When fourteen-year-old Will Barnett meets his Uncle Sean, whom he has not seen since he was six years old, Will is instantly captivated by his uncle's beauty and begins at that moment to fall in love. That such love is dangerous and forbidden, young Will is only vaguely aware. While trying to understand what his feelings mean, he is driven to write about his Uncle Sean and begins with these words: "Uncle Sean sure is pretty, but there's something wrong with him, anyway."

2. Lance (2002)
   Will Barnett writes: "So, as I told Uncle Sean, Lance just needs somebody to love him. And that somebody is me."
   
   When Lance and Will meet on a windswept ledge on the edge of a desert mountain, neither young man knows the trials they will each face. Lance, the troubled, violet-eyed young man will find the love and support of a family he never had. But more importantly the pure love of a man—for Life. But he must make a heart-wrenching choice: to embrace that love, or take the opportunity of a lifetime, which may well mean giving up his chance at love.

3. All over Him (2003)
   Is it all over for Lance and Will now that they are going to separate schools? Or will their love for each other survive and bring them back together?
   
   When Will and Lance decide to separate for two years while Lance goes to art school in San Francisco and Will moves to Austin, Texas, to attend university there, neither of them can imagine the powerful temptations that await them in each city. Lance moves in the lofty circles of artists and actors, while Will fights lingering temptations of his own, sharing an apartment with his beloved and beautiful Uncle Sean. Both young men stand at a crossroads and must decide if the love they have shared was merely a teen romance or the real thing.

4. The Early Journals of Will Barnett: Uncle Sean, Lance, and All Over Him (2004)
   From the time Will Barnett was fourteen until he entered college, the one constant in his life was writing in a journal, first about his Uncle Sean and the feelings he had for him, then his love affair with Lance, a violet-eyed boy he met on a windswept ledge in the desert of southwestern New Mexico. The Early Journals of Will Barnett, consisting of Uncle Sean, Lance, and All Over Him is now collected into one volume.

The Twilight of the Gods
Fantasy trilogy, oddly consisting of four books.

• Cinátís (2004)
  A mysterious plague is sweeping up from the south in the country of Omoham, driving the Omoham'EYE northward. In their path, whole villages are decimated or deserted as people flee in fear of the plague. When rumors of the plague reach the northern city of Cinátis, near where Jeru's parents are farmers, his parents decide it is time to sell their crops and head for their ancestral home of Lauxis. But instead of going with them, Jeru, the youngest of three sons, sets out on a quest to find his two older brothers, Joshu and Samu, who left earlier in the summer, and he heads south directly into the path of the fleeing citizens and the oncoming plague. He vows to find out what this plague is and what its cause is.
  
  Jeru takes up a divined staff that his brother Samu has made for him, which will enhance his power of stone felding. Not more than a day into his journey, he meets Eríl from the hidden race of Té and, together, they set out on an adventure that will not only change their lives, but is destined to change the world, itself. Their path is subtly determined by the shrewed witch Ka-té and the other sitting witches of the seven cities of Omoham.
  
  Their journey is further complicated by a mysterious force known in legend as "the darkness of the shining moon," wherein a great battle between the forces of White and the forces of Green will determine the future of the world.
  
  Having discovered the cause and meaning of the plague that has decimated his country, and having been prepared for a legendary destiny, Jeru takes up his staff and goes headlong into war against the invading Ch'turc. But no sooner is that war at an end when Jeru, his mate Eríl, and a small band of earth-gifted must face a legendary foe in the battle of Green and White foretold in The Book of Té.

• Gwi's War (2009 release)
  The beautiful brown haired Gwi has been taken prisoner into the evil land of Ch'turc, but there, using her intelligence, she becomes a novitiate of the Priest Nostra and is assigned to the Priest Necron, known as the Lord of Death—hated by most, feared by all. Seeing what Necron does to the newborn children suspected of carrying the seed of Na-té, Gwi vows to stop him and becomes a great leader. However, she is not "earth-gifted" and wields no earth powers. She must therefore form an unlikely alliance with the untouchables of the city of L'ikk.

• War Among the Gods (2012 release)
  What wars have been fought, what resolution of ancient conflicts that have been settled between the Ch'turc and the Omoham'EYE is nothing compared to the conflict that arises within and above the world when the gods settle their own ancient disputes.