News and Art

As always I have no excuse whatsoever for my long silence.

But! I do have a reason -- several reasons, in fact! -- for my abrupt return!

Item the First:
I entered a contest over on Tumblr (feel free to look me up, but be aware that I use my Tumblr account primarily to talk about fanfic and lust obsess over Marvel movies and comics). Where was I? Oh, yes: I entered a contest. And, somewhat surprisingly, won.

What I won was an art commission, and so after looking carefully at the artist's work, I asked her to make me a painting of Taisiya, the kitsune-like fox-demon from Foxfur. She sent it to me this week, and it's so gorgeous I actually, literally started crying when I saw it. (Click on the picture to embiggen.)

She does fantastic work, especially her animals, and if you're at all in the market for original art, please let me highly recommend popping over to her Tumblr page and shooting her a query.

Item the Second:
A Princess Bound was released last month, and is now available in both ebook and print formats! (That link goes to Amazon, but it's also available from other retailers.) Among a lot of really amazing stories, the collection contains my tale, "The Dancing Princess".

Item the Third:
Just last week, I signed a contract with Hot Ink Press for "(Why Don't You) Come Between Us", a m/m/m story that invaded my brain and demanded to be written. It's currently scheduled for publication in January 2015, so you'll be hearing more about that as the date draws nearer! For now, and briefly -- it's a story about polyamorous relationship negotiation. And also really hot sex, of course!

Invitational

It's all about who you know.

In my case, who I know is, mostly, Lynn. I think at least half the people I know are through her, quite honestly. Case in point:

Lynn likes music. Lynn likes music the way dragons like gold, quite honestly; she doesn't just enjoy it -- she hoards it. Though unlike dragons and gold, you can share music without having to let go of it yourself, and so she's also extremely enthusiastic about sharing it. And so I think it was at the 2012 MarsCon (in January, so early in the year, but I'm still a little surprised that it was that recent) that she dragged me to a performance by Jonah Knight, who writes steampunk/goth/horror music. It's good stuff. He's got a great voice for doing slightly spooky songs.

Jonah ran a kickstarter campaign later in the year to finance a new album, and one of the higher-price perks on offer was a personal performance. Lynn waffled over the money for a while, then decided that it was her birthday and Christmas present to herself, and ponied up -- and so for their Christmas party last year, Jonah put on a concert in their living room and then we all did a geek-themed gift swap before going out for Chinese. It was a lot of fun, and resulted in my newest favorite novelty Christmas song, "Bacon and Beer", which -- alas! -- is not yet available on any of his albums. Dammit. And also while I was there, he gave me permission to use one of his songs for my book trailer for He Loves Me For My Brainsss.

He was at MarsCon again in 2013, of course. And at RavenCon a couple of months later. And when I went to a wedding in June, he was the musical entertainment at the reception for that, too, much to my amusement. He sat down at my table during his break and we chatted about this and that -- but it always surprises me when people I've only met a few times remember me. I tend to think of myself as fairly forgettable.

A couple of weeks ago, Jonah unveiled his latest project: he and some friends are starting a publishing company, Antimatter Press. Specifically, they want to explore ways of breaking away from the traditional publishing models, and I really like some of their ideas. From their Vision Statement (which I really wish was on their website):

Because of our desire to experiment, when we buy a story, we will buy all rights. For example: we may release a story in audio form paired with a song. We may have a story illustrated. We may adapt a story into a short film.

I went and looked at the call for the first anthology and pondered it, but wasn't having any ideas. It's a little out of my usual venue -- I mean, I mostly write romances, yeah? So I pushed it to the back of my brain.

And then this Monday, he sent me an email, specifically asking me to contribute. In fact, asking me to contribute, specifically, a GLBT romance that fit the submission requirements. The notion, apparently, is to gather specific genres of stories together and release them as packages. e.g., urban fantasy, mysteries, romances, etc. He'd invited Lynn first, knowing her well... and then when he'd asked her for other recommendations -- well, she'd put me on that list.

I still didn't have any ideas, but allowing it to be a romance helped. And then I thought about the "local history" requirement some, and an idea just... jelled. I wrote about 600 or so words on it Monday night, and another 650 or so last night. Which is pretty good, considering that I'm doing my writing in the last hour of the night, after I get my youngest put to bed and before I chivvy the eldest off the computer for the night. It's coming together nicely, and I'm actually pretty excited about it.

Sarah bared her teeth in what Jason had come to recognize, even after only a month of graduate school, as an expression of commingled disgust and fury. It terrified him, and he didn't feel the least bit of a wuss for admitting it; it terrified most of the department. Physicists were supposed to be weedy geeks, not Amazonian women who ran ultramarathons and could probably bench-press Jason without even gritting their teeth. "Those... people," she spat. "Those people!"

Jason nearly sagged in relief -- whatever she was angry about, it wasn't his fault -- before recalling that he was still in her crosshairs. "Um, which people?" he tried.

Sarah actually growled at him, a wordless thing that almost prompted him to ask if she'd been messing around in the bio lab's lycanthropy samples. He managed to keep the remark behind his teeth, barely.

It's really nice -- flattering, even -- to be specifically requested and invited to participate in a call like this. Even if it came, mostly, from Lynn.

Whoops! Wednesday

I keep being surprised by Wednesdays. You'd think I would get used to them rolling around once a week, but the Day Job's schedule has been crazily erratic lately, which kind of throws me off, sometimes, when it comes to getting routine tasks completed. Like remembering when to take the trash bins to the curb, or when I'm supposed to do my walk-around checks on safety equipment at the Day Job... or when I'm supposed to post to my writing blog.

(I keep worrying that I'm going to lose track of the custody schedule and forget to pick up my kids, but that seems a little more solidly embedded. I guess even my scatterbrain has a priority system in place.)

But here we are: Wednesday again!

What shall I talk about...? Oh! News!

I almost forgot about this in the excitement of Human Aspect's release, but Foxfur was accepted by Torquere! It's currently (tentatively) scheduled for a mid-November release. I'm very excited -- this will be my first actual novel release! When we get a little closer, I'm sure I'll be offering up some more excerpts, and maybe even a contest!

I've also had some whispered words from little birds about my shorts that are out for consideration, "The Dancing Princess" and "Squrk Squee". In both cases, the news is promising but unsubstantiated and unofficial, so I'm not announcing anything yet -- but I'm still pretty pleased with what I've heard! Keep your fingers crossed for me!

So that's the current news.

If you happened to pick up Human Aspect (or any of my other books) and enjoyed it, please, please, please consider hopping over to Amazon.Com or Goodreads and taking thirty seconds to rate/review it, or even share a link on your favorite social media page. Word-of-mouth does more to sell books than any other advertising and promotion method. I'm tempted to say more than all other methods, combined, even, though I don't have specific numbers to back that up. But I do know that even a mediocre review is better than none at all. Thanks!

Aspect

Recently, I was cleaning out some old folders and files, re-organizing and clearing away the cruft, and I found myself looking, once again, at a story I wrote some years ago called "Human Aspect".

Its original incarnation was actually sort of a fan-fic response to a novel that Lynn was writing, a high fantasy piece in a world of her own design. At one point in it, the main character meets, for the first time, his paternal grandmother -- a feisty old woman with once-red hair and an eyepatch, who had run away from her home village to be with her lover, a non-human from a race of shapechangers that most humans considered little better than brutal beasts. (Think orcs. But with shapechanging.)

It was a tantalizing bit of world-building, and I desperately wanted to know more about this old woman and even moreso, her lover -- why had he run away to be with her, if these shapechangers considered humans to be, essentially, prey?

And so I wrote this story about a shapechanger who could turn into ("Aspect") a mountain lion and his rival cousin and the human woman he became obsessed with. I pestered Lynn about it endlessly, forcing her to invent details she hadn't even considered so I could plug them in. I invented a lot of my own, as well, and when it was done... I had one of the best stories I'd ever written, actually.

Good enough that I really wanted to see it published. Of course, since Lynn was also seeking publication for her novel, and since fanfic is generally prohibited, I had to go back and change a lot of those details that I'd pried out of her into something else of my own devising, so it would still be my story.

And even then, finding a home for it was a challenge. It's high fantasy, half coming-of-age, half-romance, but it's rather dark, and the main character is, arguably, the bad guy. At least, right up until the end, anyway. It's not short enough to put in an anthology, but it's not long enough to make into a standalone novel. Very difficult to place. So I shelved it.

But when I stumbled across it again, I recalled that Torquere had opened up their Prizm (young adult) line to allow for m/f pairings in addition to LGBTQ ones, and every genre. So I took a chance and threw it over the fence... and they're going to take it!

In celebration, I offer a glimpse and a snippet:

The humans had not ventured deep into the forest or far from their settlement; by the time Dauch caught sight of them, the scents of tilled land and crowded livestock were thick in the air. Dauch crouched in the lower limbs of a nearby tree -- humans never looked up -- and watched.

They were two, a male and a female. The female seemed nervous, almost as if she could scent Dauch, though he was upwind and humans were all but noseblind. The male intrigued him -- perhaps a few years older than Dauch himself, he was short, but his shoulders rivaled Morah's for breadth. Their garments were absurdly restrictive, though the male's sleeves had been rolled up to display bulging, rippling muscle.

He could not understand their speech, though its tone was clear enough. The female was uneasy, and the male attempted to reassure her. He wheedled, the woman resisted. Dauch wondered why he didn't just strike her into submission.

But he kissed her instead. After a moment, the female gave in, relaxing into the male's embrace. Their scents grew warm and strong with desire. The female sank to the ground, and allowed the male to loosen her clothes.

Dauch watched, fascinated. Beneath her ridiculous clothes, the female was plump and smooth. Her limbs were sleek and strong, her hips set broad. Her scent fairly begged for a child to be planted under her copper-colored mound. Dauch could not understand how the male could be so close and not obey its call.

But the male only kissed her, again and again. Dauch's hands curled and uncurled. Even without scent, could he not see that it was time to mount? Not even dumb animals were so stupid!

The male lowered his mouth to suckle at her breast like a hairless babe. Dauch nearly snorted his contempt, but the female tossed her head and cried out like no nursing mother Dauch had ever seen. What peculiar human ritual was this? Dauch crawled further out on his branch, curious.

The branch nearly gave way under him, shifting with a loud crack! Dauch froze.

Cool Stuff

Today, apparently, was the day of extremely cool stuff happening to me as a writer and editor.

The first thing that happened was that I logged into Facebook and saw a post from the editor of the forthcoming Duty and Desire, which includes my short story, "Dead on Her Feet" (not to mention Lynn's "Snake Dance"), noting that freaking Publishers Weekly had a review of the anthology -- which is awesome -- and that they called it "highly recommended" -- which is beyond awesome. It might only have been awesomer (shut up, spellcheck, I'm a writer; I'm allowed to make up words) if one of the mentioned stories had been mine, but I'll be honest: my story in this anthology serves as more of an aperitif or a sorbet to cleanse the palate between meatier selections than as a featured course in its own right. Don't get me wrong, "Dead on Her Feet" is a very sweet little story and I quite like both the writing and the characters, but it doesn't contain a whole lot of punch.

Then I did some more work on editing the stories for the zombie anthology I'm editing, He Loves Me For My Brainsss. Which only served to remind me how frakking amazing and talented the authors are in this book. Seriously, I'm editing my little heart out, but mostly what I'm telling my authors is that they need to go to family therapy with commas and semicolons, which is honestly a ridiculously minimal problem to be having at the initial editing round. These stories are fun or funny or touching, the characters bicker and snipe and love each other deeply (sometimes all at the same time), the plots are witty and engaging and even surprising. And the authors themselves are remarkably responsive; I don't think I've yet written one of them and not at least gotten an acknowledging email back within a couple of hours. Tops. It's possible that this is going to spoil me for all future anthologies.

And finally, while I was working on that, I got an email inviting me to come to MarsCon in January. When the email notification popped up in the corner of my screen, I nearly ignored it. I saw "MarsCon" in the title and figured I'd gotten on the email list -- I've been going to this con for several years in a row -- and I assumed this was an email to remind me to register. But that little "new mail" icon burns at my soul and I can't leave it alone for long, so I went to open it, just to clear the notification icon... and it wasn't a mass mailing. It was an email inviting me to come to MarsCon as a guest, to participate in some of the late-night, adults-only panels. Last year, I attended a few late-night discussion panels as part of the audience, and I had a blast. The late hour (and age-restricted attendance) lent itself to some spicy, intimate, downright fun discussions. And this year, they want me to sit on the other side of the table? Holy eff, yes. I waited long enough to be sure that my kids would be safely stashed somewhere (the Almost-Ex agreed to swap custody weekends with me) before I sent back my barely-suppressed squee of agreement and made my hotel reservations.

(Funny but true: as the crow flies, it's less than a mile from my house to the convention hotel. But because of the wonky way the streets are laid out here, it's more like a five-mile drive. It's still very close by, and it seems ridiculous to get a hotel room when it's that close... but the last couple of years have taught me that if I have to get in the car to go somewhere I can change clothes or drop off my purchases, then it's not close enough. Especially if I'm going to be helping to moderate the late-night panels, I want to be able to just stagger back to my room and collapse rather than have to go out into the cold and drive home afterward.)

Add to that my continuing excitement over Seductress' release last week, and my anticipation for the release of Weird Science in two days (stay tuned for the usual Wednesday post, which will feature buy links and some celebratory excerpts!), and today was just a very, extremely fantastic day to be a writer/editor.

Masks Off! / The Backlist Strikes Back!

Several things to report today. First, I got news over the weekend that my story, "What You Are" was accepted for inclusion in Torquere's Masks Off! anthology (coming out in August, I believe) -- it's a collection of stories about shapeshifters (e.g., werewolves) and masquerades. *obligatory acceptance squee!*

"What You Are" is about Cory, a man living in two closets, equally afraid of being outed as a gay and as a werewolf. He sees a charity masquerade ball as his chance to let at least part of himself free -- but then the leopard with the sexy voice tells him, "I know what you are," and Cory is forced to flee, yet again.

I'll be sure to let you know when I have more details!

And in other news...

The brilliant EM Lynley is hosting a tour all this week called The Backlist Strikes Back! It's a collection of LGBT romance titles that have been out for a while and, perhaps, not gotten all the love they should. My Safe Harbor is featured today, but there will be other authors for the next whole week, so definitely remember to check it out as the week progresses! I've already seen several books to add to my TBR list, and I bet you will, too.

Dutiful

Picture via ABC News

I got the news last week that my short story "Dead On Her Feet" was accepted for Duty and Desire, an anthology of military-themed erotic romance! Any acceptance is good for a squee, but this is the second piece I've written that will appear in an actual, hold-in-your-hands dead-tree book, which makes it double-squee!

Better yet, I'll be sharing the Table of Contents with some really talented writers, including my dear friend, Lynn. Check out this Table of Contents:

The Long Ride Home by Delilah Devlin
Night Witch by Sacchi Green
Shattered by Shanna Germain
The Grunt and the Ditty Bop by Craig J. Sorensen
Fighting for Fresno by Ericka Hiatt
Homecoming by Kelly Maher
Passing Out Passion by Lucy Felthouse
Against the Wall by Catherine Paulssen
The Thunder of War by Anya Richards
Sergeant Rae by Toby Rider
Dead On Her Feet by Elizabeth L. Brooks
Out of Time by J.K. Coi
Done by Charlotte Stein
Wilco by Christine d’Abo
Christmas Presents by Mercy Loomis
Snake Dance by Lynn Townsend
Home by Michelle Augello-Page
For Better or Worse by Kristina Wright

This is from Cleis Press, so the stories are female-centric, either m/f or f/f. My story, "Dead On Her Feet" is about Jamie, a soldier on her way home after two years in the Middle East. Shall I give you a small taste? Sure, why not (though bear in mind that I haven't gotten editing comments back yet, so what I'm offering here may change before press):

Thirty-four hours on the move, now, and counting, dead on her feet, but this was the last flight, and her ears were popping with the descent. Maybe another hour, now, and then she'd step out of the Atlanta airport into the lush thick humidity of proper Southern air, maybe even one of those summertime afternoon deluges and she would stand there and just let the rain soak her right to the skin. And then she'd take a bus a couple of hours down into Georgia, to a tiny little town that no one had ever heard of who hadn't been born there, and then it was only a couple of miles from the bus depot to Casey's mama's house. To Casey.

Eyes still closed, Jamie's hand stole up to her shirt pocket where she kept the most important things: her passport, and the receipts for all those planes and busses, and her ID cards, and the cash she'd drawn to pay for food... and the picture of her and Casey at his sister's wedding two years back. She'd looked ridiculous in that bridesmaid's dress with her fresh-from-basic close-cropped hair and those mannish muscles on her bare shoulders, but Casey had looked so very, very fine in that tux, and he'd pulled her close while they danced and told her she was the most beautiful woman there, and they'd snuck off down to the basement and almost not made it back in time to see the cake cut, and luckily the tux jacket had covered where she'd got lipstick on his cummerbund.

Duty and Desire is due out sometime this fall -- I'll post a more precise date when I have one, and of course the cover when I get it.

Swampy Waters

It's a good thing I finished my werewolf story when I did; immediately after I submitted it to the anthology I'd written it for, I had a world of work dumped on me.

A miscommunication dumped an editing job into my lap that had a shorter than usual schedule, resulting in my having precisely one week to edit a full novel. And then another short-schedule novel arrived in my inbox, this time for proofreading. There was Assumption of Desire's release last week. (By the way, countrygirlxxoo, you were my winner -- I messaged you but still haven't heard back... email me for your copy of the story!) That naturally involved spending a couple of days haunting Goodreads and Amazon.Com and other sites looking for reviews and ratings. I also signed up for a couple of promotional blog visits -- I spent yesterday at Torquere's blog (check it out; you definitely don't want to miss the hot pictures I posted!) and will be on their LiveJournal tomorrow!

(Assumption is being very well-received, in case you were wondering -- it's currently at a solid 4 stars on Goodreads, and 5 stars at All Romance Ebooks, where one reader review calls it "[a] quick, enjoyable read, with just enough drama and comedy for the short length." And if you follow my Facebook page, then you probably saw that it made one of Amazon's Top 100 lists!)

The Day Job dumped a bunch of work in my lap, too, of course, and then the home life has been mildly complicated by birthday parties and sleepovers and the approach of Easter with its need to acquire a variety of treats with which to fill my kids' baskets.

So I've been a little swamped, and the writing has taken a back seat to all the other stuff. Even on the nights I've had free and clear for writing, I've been too tired to write, and unwilling to start a new project when I can't really devote myself to it.

But there's a light at the end of the tunnel. The one-week edit is complete, and I'm pushing onward through the proofing job. The Day Job stuff is more or less in order, and there's a stack of candy and toys in my closet, hidden under old clothes. So I'm starting to give some thought to another submission call I heard a few weeks ago, this one for some super-shorts, under 1500 words, which strikes me as a fun challenge: how do I include plot and characterization and heat in only three pages? I've been noodling around an idea or two during idle moments, so we'll see how that goes.

So no real writing news from me this week. I'm fixin' to get ready to write, as they say, but not writing much at the moment. Still, the news on Assumption is good, and you definitely want to stop by Torquere's LiveJournal tomorrow, because I'm thinking of calling for prompts...

Getting Hairy

So far, no one has entered the contest for a copy of Assumption of Desire, which will be released in one week! I got my copy last night and read through the story again to check for any remaining errors, and I'd forgotten how much I like this story. It was hot and sweet and funny. I'm honestly a little shocked that I wrote it. And all you have to do to enter the contest for your own copy is comment on this post or on my Facebook page!

***

In other news... Well, no actual news yet, but I heard through the grapevine that the rejection notices had gone out for a military-themed anthology that I'd submitted a short to. Since I didn't get one, I'm guessing that I'm in... or at least on the short list to make it in. I'll be sure to let you know when I have something more definite!

***

And finally... I've been bitten by a werewolf.

No, really. I was flipping through a few submission calls, looking for something short I could work on while I let everything else percolate, and I found myself looking at a call for shifter-masquerade stories for a Torquere anthology. Now, I don't generally do shifter stories -- they've been done about to death and it's so hard to come up with something that will both satisfy reader expectations and be unique.

But I turned the notion over in my head for a bit anyway, like you do. And I wondered, why would a shapeshifter even want to go to a masquerade? And I started thinking about the purpose of masks, both literal and figurative. And then this quiet, diffident, and very closeted werewolf moved into my head and started telling me his story.

It's been one of those charmed stories, honestly. My schedule has been crazy for the last week, but each time I've sat down to work on this story, I've dumped out at least 1500 words. I'm at 5500 words now, and just hitting the climax (erm, so to speak). Another couple of good writing sessions and it should be ready for the polish and scrub, and then I can submit it!

Which would make it yet another story in a genre I haven't played with much, before. Here's hoping it turns out well!

Now Departing

I'm pleased to announce that I've had a story accepted for an anthology from Cleis Press from editor D. L. King. I'm especially pleased because this will be my first honest-to-gosh print publication!

Cleis also published Lynn's debut story, "Golden Moment", in their Steamlust anthology, and her "Garden Variety" will feature in Lustfully Ever After, so clearly they know good writing, which makes me especially excited to be included.

The upcoming anthology will be titled Seductress: Tales of Immortal Desire and is a collection of stories about succubi. My story is "Succubus, Inc." and it's quite a departure from my other published work in several ways: first, it's (mostly) from a female point of view; second, the erotic component is (mostly) hetero; and third and most critically (to my mind), it is most definitely in no way a romance. (If you're curious about those "mostly"s, all I can say is, you'll need to read it!)

And if that doesn't tempt you, I defy you to check out this table of contents and not find at least three titles that intrigue you:

1. Harvest by Aurelia T. Evans
2. A Surprising Summons by Kaysee Renee Robichaud
3. Succubus, Inc. by Elizabeth Brooks
4. In the Service of Hell by Michael M. Jones
5. Before a Fall by Kannan Feng
6. Street Hustle by V. K. Foxe
7. Star Crossed by Evan Mora
8. Zach’s Last Ride by Sasha Bukova
9. Deliverance by Jay Lawrence
10. Minions Have Needs Too by Anya Richards
11. Sweet Tooth by Nan Andrews
12. The Girl on the Egyptian Escalator by NJ Streitberger
13. The Sorcerer’s Catch by Angela Caperton
14. The Chapel by J.S. Wayne
15. The Lonely Huntress by Mina Murray
16. Neither Love Nor Money by Giselle Renarde
17. Textual by Robin Tiergarten
18. Succumb by Cynthia Rayne
19. Moon Like a Sickle, Wind Like a Knife by Jean Roberta
20. Phone Hex by Elizabeth Thorne
21. Soaring by Kate Dominic

At least half of them have me curious and anxious to get the book in my hot little hands!

I don't have a cover yet, alas, or an official release date ("sometime in October" is all I can offer for now), but I'm sure both of those will come to me eventually, and when they do, I'll be sure to pass the news on to you!