Ah, Amy, I think we'll have to wait quite some time for WWE -- otherwise known as soap opera for men -- to write the storyline you're hankerin' for. But your point about intimacy between males is spot on. Simplistically speaking, the term "homosocial" refers to non-sexual relationships between males. I think of the 'Band of Brothers' BOB phenom. We're so eager to see inside the boys' club because the male dominion is fascinating. To get a glimpse of their brand of intimacy is very cool, but we often can mistake it. And, frankly, it can be fun to homoeroticize it, if you like that sort of thing. 
When folks start talking about the homoerotic nature of JR Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood novels in general, I think rather of the homoerotic relationship between two Brothers in general. But the larger relationships are fascinating in their 'homosociality.' Don't you sometimes get the idea that the Brothers really could do without women? Maybe that's why the heroines sometimes seem like such 'soft' placeholders, at least to me. But, as you know, I'm all about the heroes anywayz, and don't need much of a heroine to slip into her skin and enjoy the ride...
Portia, I've read Madeynne's A Gentleman's Wager," and agree that it's a very fine novel. The 'thornier' edge really ups the emotional and sexual antes for the reader, and I'd second your rec.
Okay...this is as close as I can get to scraping up a love triangle:
Stephanie Plum can't make up her mind! Will she go with Ranger, or will she go with Joe?...she loves them both., I think...they're both hot, and both want her. 
She leans to Joe....he came into her life first..... Not exactly hot sex, (or any sex, for that matter) but the tension is there! Does that count? Oh, and not to mention goofy characters!
Fourteen, going on fifteen novels later, we aren't any closer to marriage.....none of the characters age....and life goes on as usual - zany! I know, too tame for this discussion board! - But entertaining, none the less, for a once a year laugh!
becke, I remember when, I guess the time Ranger came around?, and everyone was like, ooo, Ranger. And I was, Ranger? And that's when I found out about Stephanie Plum. Show me two guys fighting over a woman and you've got me hooked.
My husband loves "Philadelphia Story," btw. Maybe he has love triangle fantasies, though I'd have thought they'd have been more like: him/Katharine Hepburn/Grace Kelly. But maybe that's a blog post for another day...
Now that I'm thinking on this, in the erotic love triangle area, Kate Pearce's "Simply Sinful" is a good example of shifting power centers, and characters working to choose both emotional and sexual fulfillment and boundaries.Very romantic and sexy. Her "Simply Sexual" works in this way, too. Terrific reads.
Hi, Michelle and friends,
Thanks again, Michelle, for the shout-out to my novel, Phyllida! In these discussions of "who has the power in a love triangle" I find that comments on my novel's m/m/f "emotional" menage follow one of two trends:
Some readers are soooo disappointed that Andrew and Phyllida and Matthew don't have a threeway (yet) 
and there are others who are just as emphatic that a threeway would ruin the marriage.
In this novel, I deliberately set out to subvert the genre of the Regency marriage-of-convenience plot by having a rakish, super-masculine--and gay--hero. The "joke" would be that, just as the typical straight libertine finds himself, to his surprise, falling in love with his wife and choosing monogany, so my gay hero would be surprised by his unexpected love and sexual desire for this one woman.
But this starting point led inevitably to the shape of the resulting "emotional menage." Once Andrew meets his manly "true love," the only solution that satisfies him, and is, paradoxically, fair to both partners, is for him to choose both. Obviously, divorcing or leaving his wife is out of the question; but giving up his lover in the name of heterosexual monogamy goes against his nature--and would make a really rotten story
As I see it, everybody in this marriage shares the power equally, even though only one person enjoys sexual relationships with the other two. Both partners, wife and boyfriend, have entered this relationship knowing what they were getting into. They each chose it, rather than having a surprising or unpleasant truth forced on them after the fact.
I think the sticking point for many women readers is that we don't like the idea of "sharing" our husband/lover with somebody else. It's much more fun to imagine the heroine having two men, or at least playing one off against the other. Again, my starting point, the gay aplha male, is the reason for this "uncomfortable" story. It was a way to give my heroine what is usually "forbidden" or unattainable. The fact that a man like this will necessarily have a boyfriend is simply the "price," if you want to call it that, of choosing the most expensive item on the menu.
At the end of the novel, I hope I left readers with the impression that this emotional menage is not static, but evolving, as all good marriages do. My feeling is that Phyllida's power in this marriage is increasing over time, but it will take a while for this unusual arrangement to reach its equilibirum.
It's possible that the emotional triangle will become a physical one as well--or not. Ideally, each reader can make up her own mind as to what would be most satisfying, and imagine that.
