Guest Blog: Snog for Sommer

The talented and wonderful Lynn Townsend asked if I'd be willing to host her this week, and I have never been one to say no to anything Lynn wants!

***

Hey Elizabeth, thanks so much for having me here, I appreciate it. 

I'm participating in the Snogs for Sommer fund-raising drive and blog hop, and as a fan of both Sommer's work and my own, I thought I'd give you - and your reads - a head's up.

In support of Sommer Marsden, who's one of my personal erotica writing heroes - check out here (http://paidbytheweird.blogspot.com/2011/08/whats-your-name-little-girl.html) where I wrote about my first interaction with Sommer... (I didn't name names at the time, because I didn't want to be that weird, freaky, stalker girl. These days, I'm perfectly cool with being an avid Sommer Stalker... join the club, we'll get jackets.)

Anyway, Sommer is a dear friend and you can read all about the Snog hop and what we hope to do for Sommer...

I'm currently working on the third book of the Rainbow Connections series (Blues, book two, will be published in late March, 2015, which seems just about forever and a day away, doesn't it?) so I decided that I'd give out a little snippet of Blues for my fans to read while we raised support for Sommer, and what better to do as a give away, but to let people have a chance to read Blues early?

So, come on over to my blog (http://paidbytheweird.blogspot.com/2014/09/) and read the current kiss... and enter for a chance to win an Advanced Reader Copy of Blues.

In the meanwhile, here's a little kiss from Roll, book one.

* * * *

"I thought I heard you get up," Vin said, sliding up behind him and wrapping warm arms around Beau's stomach. "Hungry?"

Beau suppressed the urge to leap out of his own skin.

"Don't you people believe in leftovers?" Beau gestured at the industrial-sized appliance in annoyance, trying to calm his heart. He was certain that Vin could feel his heart throbbing erratically in his chest and not entirely certain what emotion it could be attributed to. Was he startled, guilty, or just excited to be up, in the dark of night, with a handsome man's arms around him?

Vin dropped a kiss lightly on Beau's shoulder, eliciting shivers. Beau let the door to the fridge slip shut and turned in Vin's embrace.

"Camilla takes it over to the homeless shelter, after dinner," Vin explained. "We always have more than we need."

Great. Add a heaping helping of feeling greedy to his already full plate of less than pleasant emotions. "You've missed out, babe," he said, "if you've never raided the fridge for a leftover turkey sandwich."

"I'm not missing out right now," Vin said. He nipped at Beau's ear. All of their own accord, Beau's arms went around his boyfriend, pulling him closer. Vin backed him up, braced against the cool steel of the fridge and gently, slowly, traced a line of kisses from Beau's ear to the corner of his mouth. The faint rasp of Vin's stubble against his upper lip drove Beau crazy.

Two thin layers -- Beau's sweatpants and Vin's silk pajamas -- weren't nearly enough to disguise the feel of Vin's erection pressed firmly against Beau's thigh. Beau slid his hands down Vin's naked back, relishing the satin flesh under his fingertips. Vin continued to tease Beau's mouth, delicate licks and nuzzles that didn't come close to slaking the growing need.

"Oh, would you kiss me already, for Christ's sake?" Beau demanded, grabbing a handful of Vin's unruly hair and pulling his mouth down.

Beau's stomach let out a gurgling complaint.

"How about I get you some pie before you wake up the house," Vin said, laughing. "I know where Camilla keeps her stash."

Beau warred with his two hungers. "Kiss, first," he said.

"Now there's a deal."

Guest Blogger: BA Tortuga - Fistfights and Foreplay

Y'all, I've got the amazing BA Tortuga on my blog today, and when she contacted me to ask for a guest blog spot, I'm pretty sure I squee'd in delight. I'm not entirely sure who's doing whom the favor, here, because I've never read a single BA story that I didn't love, and she's one of the very sweetest, nicest, most fun people I've been privileged to work with since I started the whole writing-and-editing gig, which given how awesome everyone else I've met has been, is really saying something.

***

Fistfights and Foreplay- Or how you can’t write Texans without a fight sometimes

Hey, y’all! I want to thank Ms Liz for having me. I love working with her, laughing with her, and sharing the geekiness. :D

You might have noticed my tagline is because sometimes fistfights are foreplay. Well, they tell you to find something that’s in all your books, a running thread.

Mine?

Fistfights.

I’m SO proud. ;-)

Today I bring it up because my new book, Terms of Release, is about my old stomping grounds in East Texas, and has more than its share of fistfights in it.

Sage, one of my heroes, has a bit of a checkered past, and a lot of folks gunning for him. He tried hard to make like smoke and disappear, but there are times when a man has to stand his ground. He gets his share of beat up, but he also throws down with his brother in law, a handful of rednecks trying to kill him and his friend Wilma outside a diner, and ends up on the bad side of a tornado, where he has a scuffle in the hospital.

What is it about East Texas and fistfights? I’d say it’s in the water. I’ve never been to a wedding or funeral where someone didn’t get to fighting, and my daddy works as a bouncer in the bar on his free time. For fun.

Does this mean we’re less evolved than the rest of the country? Probably. It also means that emotions run high in Texans, making us damned fun to write about. If it’s not worth fighting for, well then, it’s not worth it. Period.

Says the woman who can’t go to Wal-Mart anywhere within a hundred mile radius of Dallas without getting into a screaming match, at the very least.

Grins.

Sage and Win from Terms of Release, they have a lot that’s worth fighting for, and it takes a lot for Sage to work up the courage to brazen it out. That’s only one of the reasons I love this book so much. I hope y’all do, too.

The Terms of Release is releasing March 24, 2014 from Dreamspinner Press and I’m proud enough to bust.

Official Blurb:

They say a man can always come home. So after doing hard time, Sage Redding heads to his family’s northeast Texas ranch to help his ailing daddy with the cutting horses.

Adam (Win) Winchester is a county deputy and the cousin of one of the men killed in the incident that sent Sage to prison for almost a decade. While Win's uncles, Jim and Teddy, are determined to make Sage and the entire Redding family pay for their loss, Win just figures Sage has paid his dues and maybe needs a friend. Maybe he needs more than a friend. In fact, Win’s counting on it.

No one’s denying Sage is an ex-con who went to prison for manslaughter. Regardless of the love he has for his father, he’s returned knowing things will likely go badly for him. Maybe a man can always come home, but he may not be able to stay.

Paperback buy link (first 20 copies come signed): http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=4820

Ebook buy link:
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=4776

Where to find BA:
http://www.batortuga.com -- website
batortuga.blogspot.com – blog
@batortuga on twitter
https://www.facebook.com/batortuga

Guest Post: Lynn Townsend

My darling Lynn's first full-length novel, Roll, was released yesterday, and even if I wasn't her beta reader and editor, I couldn't be more proud or excited. This is really a fantastic, sweet book about two college-age boys, with brilliantly real characters (not just the main characters, but the entire amazing cast of supporting characters as well). So of course I jumped at the chance to host an "interview" with one of those characters.

Everyone, meet Vinyl Elvis Reyes, known to his friends as Vin:

Aren't you a little old to be an undergrad?

I'm not that far behind, really. I'll graduate when I'm twenty-five. But, if you want to know the truth, I had some... issues, when I was a kid. My mom died when I was really young and it traumatized me -- a bit. I was in a foster home for a while, and then my grandparents came and got me. I should have started school right then, but... Grams calls it catatonic. I didn't talk. I had nightmares all the time, so my sleep schedule was erratic. I went through periods where I didn't eat. Schoolwork was right out of the question. My grandparents decided to hold me back that year.

So, I was six before I started school at all. And I still wasn't talking. Kindergarten was fine, you know. Coloring and crafts. After a while, teachers stopped asking me questions because I'd just stare at them until I started crying, which kinda freaked them out a bit. My grandparents had enough money that no one really wanted to piss them off. So, I passed. And I went on to first grade, which was more of the same.

By that time, my grandparents had me in like six different kinds of therapy. Emotional. Speech. Learning disabilities. I was on a couple different drugs for a while -- people thought I was autistic. There wasn't anything wrong with my brain -- yeah, shut up -- and from my screaming at night, it's not like I couldn't speak. I just didn't. I had a therapist for a while who liked to pinch my upper arms; he figured I wouldn't tell anyone, and if I did, then Bam! Cured.

Obviously, eventually, I started talking -- shut up! -- but I was so far behind that I failed out of fifth grade. I had a teacher that year who wasn't scared of my grandparents money and insisted I actually do the work...

Sooo.... I'm behind. A bit.

Who's your role model? Why?

I don't really do the role model thing. You know, if you go digging deep enough, most people are kinda assholes underneath. But there are some people I admire. One of them is David Pritchard. My driver slash bodyguard slash flunky. First off, have you seen the man? Oh my my my, he is fine. Couple years back, we got into a rough one -- some idiot actually tried to mug me. Me? Seriously. I couldn't believe it myself.

But that guy, he can really rock and roll. There's something about men of action, you know. And it's not like it is in the movies. David moves fast, and he's not playing pretty. If he can gain an advantage by pulling someone around by their hair, he'll do that. Watched him break that mugger's nose by swinging him around by the pony-tail and introducing him to a telephone pole. Fight went out of him real quick.

David's an okay guy; it's not his fault my grandparents think I need looking after. I pay him extra to keep his distance. He only really insists when I'm alone. Thus, the need to cultivate rather a lot of friends to hang out with.

To be honest, I think he watches me a lot closer than I'm really comfortable with. He seems to show up really fast when I need a ride.

What's your greatest fear?

Being alone. Stupid, huh? With all the friends I have. But I don't have anybody else. My grandparents are old, my mom is dead, and no one knows what happened to my father. My grandfather had a brother, my Great Uncle Ethan, but he passed on about eight years ago or so. I never knew him particularly well anyway. My grandfather has business partners and my grandmother has all those ladies charities that she works with, but I never seemed to have all those uncles and cousins and siblings that everyone else seems to have. Grams gets upset about it sometimes, seems to think that I won't ever have any children and that the company will be taken over by a board of directors when I'm gone.

You have no idea how sad that makes me, worrying about the company.

I've heard you've always been "out of the closet." Tell us about that.

You know, when I was a kid, I used to watch this show, Sabrina the teenaged witch, because I had a huge crush on an actor named Nate Richert? He played Harvey Kinkle. I used to entertain all sorts of daydreams that Sabrina had accidentally cast a spell on him that made him straight, and then if I actually met him, the spell would break and he'd be my boyfriend.

Take that look off your face and try to tell me you didn't think the same thing about Seeley Booth in Bones...

To be honest, I think my grandparents were so relieved that I'd started talking and mostly acting normal that it never occurred to them to worry about it that I was gay. It wasn't like I came out of the closet. I was never in there. When I crushed on someone, I just said so. I didn't really learn discretion until later.

So, what's your favorite band? Movie? Food?

Only if you don't make fun. I'm a big fan of James Blunt. He's got such a smooth voice, and it just... and Maroon 5. Have you seen Adam Levine's videos? That guy is trippy. I'm also a fan of a band called Rusted Root. One of my friends works at the campus radio station, she does some cool shows; she's a lot more musically educated than I am, but her show's on from 8 to 10 on Wednesdays. You should give it a listen.

Movies.... hmmm. I really like Stranger Than Fiction. Of course, anything with Emma Thompson in it tends to earn a watch-through from me, even that horrible thing where she plays a grouchy Mary Poppins... Nanny McFee or something like that.

Food? I'm easy. If it doesn't run away and I don't have to cook it, I'll eat what's put in front of me. Although I'll admit to a preference for anything that has barbeque sauce on it.

***

Roll is available now from Torquere Press, Amazon.Com, and other distributors, and will be available in print soon from Amazon.Com.

A farm boy from Tennessee, Beau Watkins spent high school living the dream: the cute girl, the popular, jock lifestyle, a loving family. As a freshman at an out-of-state college, he's determined to find out who he really is behind the Fake It 'Til You Make It attitude. He joins Rainbow Connection, the gay student alliance, hoping to find himself. Instead, he finds Vin Reyes. Raised by his grandparents and heir to a prosperous company, Vin has been out of the closet since he figured out what that meant. He has it all: fashionable clothing, fancy cars, huge houses, a real party lifestyle, and even a bodyguard. Most of all, he has a secret.

Uncomfortable with Vin's generosity, Beau fights his growing attraction for the president of Rainbow Connection, chasing instead a series of shallow affairs. Vin's never been denied anything that he wants, though, and now he wants Beau. But it's not until an old rival puts Beau in the hospital that Vin realizes that Beau means more to him than a simple love affair. Can the two of them bridge the gap between their worlds and roll with the all the punches life will throw at them?

Guest V. L. Locey - Love of the Hunter

We have a guest post today, from the fantastic and lovely V. L. Locey! I first encountered her as the author of the hysterical Two Guys Walk Into An Apocalypse series (the first installment of which is in He Loves Me For My Brainsss) but she also has some amazing books out focusing on mythology, and she's here today to tell us a little about her latest!

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Ever since I was a young girl I was fascinated with mythology. There was something magical and special about the legends of Heracles, Achilles, Perseus, and Odysseus. I would spend hours reading books about the Greek pantheon. I cannot recall how many times I have watched the first Clash of the Titans movie. More times than a grown woman should, that's for sure. I am a huge fan of Edith Hamilton, and use her novels as some writers use a dictionary or a thesaurus. It always struck me as sad that some people couldn't enjoy mythology as I did, but given how it's presented in classrooms from elementary school through college, it's no wonder so many hate Greek mythology.

I've tried, through my writing, to bring the gods to life. I've gone in and blown the dust bunnies off Zeus' marble nose and ran my Swiffer over Hera's peacock feather fan. With Love of the Hunter, my M/M mythological romance, I've taken things a step further and have rewritten one of the classic Greek legends. In this book you will see how Apollo, the most Greek of all the gods, meets and falls in love with Orion, the famed archer. This new adult romance is a dramatic one, make no mistake. There is a reason they call these tales Greek tragedies. Love of the Hunter is filled with pain and suffering, but the sadness is tempered with a love so deep it was immortalized in the heavens forever.

Here's a small sample from Love of the Hunter:

***

"You are a shameful man!" Orion glowers then gives me another shove. I fling out an arm to block him lest he strike out again. The man is strong, and his punches rock me soundly. "What possesses you to speak to your sister – your twin – in such a reprehensible manner?"

"What is said between her and I is not your concern!" I yell in his face then stalk past him, my shoulder meeting his. Orion grunts. I do not, although the contact pained me badly. My cape snaps around my ankles as I enter my bedchamber. My lover follows me. The wolves leave in the face of my anger. The door slams shut. I rip my cape from my shoulders and throw it to the corner. Turning, I come nose to nose with Orion. Undaunted and brazen my lover is. That is why he stood and fought Helios instead of begging forgiveness.

"What is said between you and her is my concern for it centers on me!" he shouts, his green eyes alive with his ire.

"So you defend this sick attraction she has for you? Why?" I demand to know. "Are you fucking her? Is that why?"

I let him hit me. I see the huge fist coming, and I allow it. The crunch of my nose breaking is liberating. Golden ichor gushes from my nostrils. I fall back into the wall, my arms getting caught in the thick teal drapery that hangs from the posts of the bed. I grasp a post for balance. My tongue darts out to catch a bit of the godly blood flowing down over my lips and chin.

I find Orion staring at me as if horrified.

"Apollo," he pants, his meaty fist dangling by his thigh.

"Nay," I cough, swallow, and then grab the curtain up to run it under my nose. The flow will stop in a moment; I am a god after all. "You did well. There are times that I require a sound punch to the face."

"I will not hear you speak of Artemis so." Orion steps closer. I hold the drapery tightly to my face, my eyes watery as I peek over the bloody material covering my nose and mouth. "She has been a veritable blessing during the long hours that you are gone. She tends my back, brings me well-cooked game, sings and laughs with me. She tells me stories and washes my hair."

"She loves you, Orion." I raise the drapery back to my nose.

He stares at me dully. He blinks at me as if I had just said something incomprehensible. "Nay," he says, his eyes leaping from me to his feet then to me again. He shakes his head.

"Aye," I mumble into the material over my face.

"Nay, she is naught but a sister to me," he says.

I drop the teal silk. A small trickle is all that remains of the bloody nose. "That is how you see her. It is not how see looks upon you," I tell him gently. I fear a feather landing on him would send him to the floor.

He drops to the end of the bed. The thick mattress compresses under his massive body. I sit down beside him. We both stare at our feet. I sniffle occasionally.

"Orion, she has loved you for quite some time. Do you not recall her saying she had watched you before meeting you? I know her -- she is smitten."

"But she knows I am your lover," he mutters. I sit straighter and glance over at him.

"Yes, she does." I reach over to take the hands hanging like dead fish over his knees in mine. "And that I cannot abide. You are mine. I will not share you with anyone. I will not allow her infatuation with you to grow. I should have been firmer about it before this, but I worried about leaving you here sickly and alone."

"You do not need worry for me," he says, bristling at the jab at his masculinity. I squeeze his hands.

"Orion, you are still pale. Even if you were returned to robust health, I would worry when you were gone from my side," I tell him, lifting his hands to my lips. I kiss each scarred knuckle. His jade eyes rise from his feet to meet mine. "Look upon our hands," I say, rolling his over then showing him mine. "I have no scars upon me. You do." I press my lips against a raised white welt that runs across the back of his right hand. "You are only half god. Your blood is not gold, it is red. Death will come for you and take you from me. This is unavoidable. So I worry. I will worry each time I cannot place my sight upon you. It is not a slur against your manhood or virility, it is simply the knowledge that I cannot die and you can. I would postpone your demise as long as I possibly can."

"Your tongue is gilded and golden, Apollo," he smiles weakly. "How does a man talk a man who just hit him in the face from his anger? How do you make me long for nothing aside from being in your arms?"

"I am the god of poetry and rhyme, my love," I counter seeing his gaze shift from my mouth to my amber eyes. I nod.

He leans in to capture my mouth. We fall back onto the bed, our mouths moving over each other’s slowly. We lay side by side, kissing, exploring, touching and cupping, stroking and teasing. We strip each other slowly, kissing each exposure of flesh.

***

You can pick up your copy of Love of the Hunter at the Torquere Press website: http://www.torquerebooks.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=83&products_id=4070

Yours in love and laughter,
V.L. Locey


I love to meet new friends and fans! You can find me at-
Facebook- https://www.facebook.com/pages/VL-Locey/124405447678452
Twitter- https://twitter.com/vllocey
Goodreads- http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5807700.V_L_Locey
My blog- http://thoughtsfromayodelinggoatherder.blogspot.com/

Guest Post: Lynn Townsend

Y'all know Lynn, right? I mean, I talk about her all the time around here. She's one of my favorite writers, quite aside from being my friend, and we've found that we work together spectacularly well. Which is good, since I've become her de facto editor whenever Torquere takes something she's submitted.

Speaking of which, she released a new short story this week -- a really fun one about a guy who's spending a lot of time in a graveyard and... well, I'll let her tell it:

***

My husband doesn't usually read my work; he says it promotes marital harmony, and honestly, I'm not sure he's wrong about that. I do tend to argue with him when he compliments me - it's a bad habit, I'm working on it!

Sometimes, though, when I'm stuck, I'll bounce ideas off him. He's good with that. I tell him what's going on in my story and where I'm stuck, and he'll come up with some suggestions; one of them nearly always involves the use of high-yield explosives, so... sometimes he's less help than one might hope.

For this particular story, I don't even remember what we were talking about; but I described the scene where Dariel's thinking about his sister, who snuck out and was killed in a car accident...

To which he said, "Well, he's a more concerned older brother than I ever was... when my little sister wanted to leave at night and I was supposed to be looking after her, I usually gave her a ride. On my way to wherever it was that I wasn't supposed to be."

I'm an only child. Sibling relationships are weird to me and I don't understand them.

Find out more about Dariel's family in Blood Cries Up:

Since the death of his sister, Dariel's been haunting her grave. Then he meets Zach. It's love at first sight -- unfortunately Zach is a ghost. An accidental possession results in Zach moving into Dariel's body, but before they can fully figure that out, they learn that there's more to Zach's death than the suicide it had seemed -- much more. With the help of the cemetery cat, Dariel and Zach will have to confront the diabolic Isaac Caine and return Zach's soul to its proper resting place.

Author Bio: Lynn Townsend is a geek, a dreamer and an inveterate punster. When not reading, writing, or editing, she can usually be found drinking coffee or killing video game villains. Lynn's interests include filk music, romance novels, octopuses, and movies with more FX than plot.

Contact:
Blog: http://paidbytheweird.blogspot.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LynnTownsendwriter
Twitter: https://twitter.com/tisfan
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Lynn-Townsend/e/B005OQA0AA