Locking Horns (The Greenwood) – coming soon plus WIN!
It’s less than two weeks till the release of Locking Horns, the latest installment in the Greenwood saga. Locking Horns continues the adventures of immortal forest spirit, Herne the Hunter, and his fellow semi-stag shifter lover, Tam. I’m kicking of the festivies here today with a teaser excerpt. There’s also a chance to win a copy of the book over at Stumbling Over Chaos. Go there now 
PLUS, there’s going to be an opportunity to win your choice of the previous Greenwood books (Bound for the Forest, Bound to the Beast, and Lord of the Forest) and a $10 GC here at my website and on my mini Locking Horns blog tour. Check back here soon for details
This story can be read as a sequel to Bound to the Beast, a prequel to Bound for the Forest, or as an introduction to the Greenwood series. Click here for my A to Z of the Greenwood
Blurb: England, 1804. Herne the Hunter has roamed the forests for hundreds of years and he’s known love with fellow half stag-shifter Tam for the past two centuries. The passion between them sizzles hot as ever, but times are changing. Greenwood magic is fading and this threatens both Herne and Tam’s immortality and the bond between them.
After Herne discovers the Greenwood fairies are dying, and dockworkers felling oaks to build warships might be to blame, he wants to fight the modern world with his warrior’s sword. Tam, who embraces all things new, desires a dominant partner, not a brute who wants to drag England back to the Dark Ages. Soon the Wild Hunt, Herne’s ancient army of doom, are back, tempting him to unleash his wrath, and the rhythm of Herne and Tam’s lovemaking seems broken for good. When Tam’s plan to reinstate a spring ritual goes awry, only Herne can save him. Herne must choose between his past and future, and they both must decide what matters most—eternal life or eternal love.
Buy from Loose Id on 25th June!
Teaser excerpt:
Tam’s words trailed to near nothing as Herne pressed forward and seized his lips in a ravishing kiss. He yielded at once, drawing Herne’s hot tongue inside, savoring the scrub of hard stubble against his softer skin. Even after all their years together, Herne’s taste and commanding demeanor sent a wondrous shock coursing through him. Herne’s raw masculinity had been wrought in a lost era of tribal lords, when he’d battled the might of Rome. His power as a spirit—gifted to him by the Mother Goddess, creator of all things—rolled in torrents from him too.
Herne crushed Tam against him, sweeping to such depths that Tam could scarce breathe. Tam didn’t care. He slipped his tongue against Herne’s and worked the kiss with an affection that sang sweeter each season they passed together. The demispirit of the holly, while not always in perfect agreement with his lover, had been created to cherish the oak.
When Herne finally broke the kiss, he cupped Tam’s face and growled in hunger. Tam gasped for air, and his cock ached. He needed Herne to pull him closer, to fuck him to oblivion, and he couldn’t contain the lust that flooded his veins.
An exquisite pain ripped through his head, and the pressure released. As Herne caressed him, his antlers surged upward from his skull. When Herne had made him a demispirit, he’d shared his crown. Though not as majestic as Herne’s, Tam’s horns were now as impressive as those of a buck in his prime, covered in a velvety down.
Panting, Tam scuffed his foot and straightened, adjusting to the weight on his head. When he leaned closer to Herne, their bony appendages interwove with a noisy clack.
Click here to win a copy!
Locking Horns (The Greenwood) Coming June 25th, from Loose Id. A new novella continuing the adventures of Herne the Hunter! Set in the Greenwood universe.
Goodreads Book Giveaway
Bound to the Beast
by Kay Berrisford
Giveaway ends June 30, 2013.
See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.
Valerie Zambito – Island Shifters: An Oath of the Blood. Excerpt and giveaway!
Today, I’m excited to host something rather different – an excerpt from Island Shifters: An Oath of the Blood, a fantasy adventure book by New York writer Valerie Zambito.
Valerie will be awarding several print copies of her book to randomly drawn commenters during the tour (US only) and a grand prize of a $25 Amazon GC to one randomly drawn commenter during the tour! Check out all the stops here.
BLURB:
When your family, your home, and the very land you stand on are destroyed, what do you do? If you are a shifter of Massa, you turn around and fight. You fight, because the blood oath will have it no other way.
The idyllic lives of four elemental shifters living in the exiled land of Pyraan are shattered when a tour of legion duty gives witness to a brutal enemy invasion. Despite the heroic efforts of the shifters, the land falls to the invaders. As the only survivors, the four friends are forced to flee south into the lands from which they were banished to warn of the invasion. Heartbroken and weary, the shifters soon learn that the safe haven they hoped to find is cloaked in danger. Throughout a journey fraught with prophesy, betrayal and peril, an enduring friendship prevails, love blossoms, and a riveting saga unravels.
Scroll on for an excerpt
Sign up for the Dirty Birdies Flock Hop!
“This is a hop for authors, publishers, bloggers… basically anyone who loves dirty books, has a website or blog, and wants to join in!
The hop runs from 25th – 27th June, and the theme is eye candy. So, whatever you want to do around that theme, be it a blog post, a character interview, an excerpt, the choice is yours. Just make sure it’s dirty!”
Click here for more info and to sign up
Meanwhile, there’s still a chance to win a copy of my m/m fantasy romance Lord of the Forest here at Night Owl Reviews!
Blogging over at Night Owl Reviews – plus WIN Lord of the Forest!
I’ve been blogging about how the the joys of spring inspired my Greenwood series! Click here to read my article over at Night Owl Reviews, plus comment there for a chance to win a copy of my m/m fantasy romance, Lord of the Forest.
Incidentally, Lord of the Forest has been reviewed at Night Owl this week, and selected as a top pick! Read the full review here.
Meanwhile, there’s still a chance to celebrate a Hot Little Month and win our $75 GC grand prize. Find out more here – plus read an excerpt from Lord of the Forest.
One Hot Little Month! Ashes of the Day by PG Forte – plus win a $75 GC!
Today’s One Hot Little Month excerpt is from PG Forte, author of magical tales of love from yesterday and today and tomorrow, including sexy menage Finders Keepers, m/m romance Edge of Heaven, and the vampire tales of the Children of the Night series. Our excerpt is from the lastet Children of the Night book, Ashes of the Day. You can read about the previous volume, Now Comes the Night, and the other installments, in my recent interview with PG here.
Ashes of the Day is one of the books included in our One Hot Little Month blog tour – find out more about this group of fantastic reads here. For a chance to win our grand tour prize of a $75 GC, click here to enter! Or enter through Facebook.
Blurb: Only blood can break your heart.
Ashes of the Day, Children of Night, Book 4
New Year’s Eve, 1999. The world is braced for Y2K, but that’s not the only ticking time bomb in Conrad’s life. Damian wouldn’t be the first vampire to find a way to die, but Conrad is determined he will not be one of them.
Present day. Damian struggles to trust that fate could possibly be kind enough to give him a love as perfect as Conrad’s. Conrad balances on the keen edge of his own fear that one more slip of his formidable control could drive his lover away—permanently.
Julie learns the hard way it’s not just interspecies relationships that seldom work out. Even between vampires, love is not a smooth course.
Meanwhile, intrigue and conflict within the nest continue to grow, fueled in no small part by Georgia’s slipping hold on a deadly secret. Marc works to consolidate his position as leader of the ferals—and discovers that being a walking anomaly has certain advantages. Including some that are totally unexpected.
Product Warnings:
Contains more love triangles, more power struggles, more tears and teeth gnashing, and even more graphic scenes of manlove between moody, domestically inclined vampires than in previous editions. Definitely not recommended for anyone suffering from ALSSD (Auld Lang Syne Sensitivity Disorder) or with aversions to ballrooms, evening clothes, sarcasm, or close-quarter stiletto combat.
Scroll on for an excerpt
One Hot Little Month! Deep Deception by Cathy Pegau – plus win a $75 GC!
Today, I’m thrilled to be hosting an excerpt from Deep Deception, by Cathy Pegau, the first f/f romance I’ve featured on this blog Deep Deception is one of the books included in our One Hot Little Month blog tour – find out more about this group of fantastic reads here. For a chance to win our grand tour prize of a $75 GC, click here to enter! Or enter through Facebook.
Blurb: Colonial Mining Authority agent Natalia Hallowell doesn’t always play by the rules, but she wouldn’t compromise a case either. Put on administrative leave under a cloud of accusation, with no support from her boss, Natalia seeks a little anonymous companionship at her favorite bar. But she’s surprised when the woman who catches her fancy starts buying her drinks.
Desperate, Genevieve “Gennie” Caine has no choice but to seduce, drug and tie Natalia to the bed to get her attention. With the Reyes Corporation after something she has, Gennie needs Natalia to open an investigation and distract them long enough for her to get off Nevarro.
Natalia doesn’t trust Gennie–despite the growing attraction between them–but the corporation’s suspiciously high profits and abnormal business dealings convince her that they must be hiding something. She has no idea just how deep the deceptions run…
For more tales of intrigue on Nevarro, check out Rulebreaker and Caught in Amber, available now!
Scroll on for an excerpt!
From Close Quarter to Slow Waltz! Interview with Anna Zabo plus WIN a $10 GC!
My guest today is Anna Zabo, who’s stunning debut Close Quarter was published last year. Anna’s kindly agreed to answer a few little questions and tell us about Slow Waltz, the sequel to Close Quarter, which you can currently download FREE from Loose Id. If that’s not awesome enough, Anna is giving away a $10 GC to a lucky commenter on her Slow Waltz blog tour
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Q. Hi Anna! Please tell us about your exciting new release.
Hi Kay! Thanks for having me!
My latest release is Slow Waltz, a Spring Fling short story from Loose ID. It continues the adventures of Rhys and Silas from Close Quarter. All the danger that haunted them has passed and they still have a few days before they reach New York City. But now that Rhys is no longer running for his life, he’s beginning to wonder if magic and great sex are enough to build a relationship on…
Here’s the blurb:
New lovers Rhys Matherton and Silas Quint finally have a chance to breath easy and enjoy a well-earned respite on board a transatlantic cruise to New York City. But the lack of danger gives Rhys too much time to think about the enormity of falling in love with a man who isn’t human. He’s not sure love at first sight can last, especially when your lover is fae. Sure, the sex is fantastic, but that’s not enough to hang the rest of your potentially immortal life upon.
To distract himself, Rhys suggests he and Silas take a set of lessons to learn to waltz. The plan backfires when they are paired with two older women—one of whom reminds Rhys of his recently deceased mother. Instead of being able to ignore thinking about his future with Silas, he’s actively questioned about his lover. And it seems the whole boat knows who he’s sleeping with.
As Rhys learns the steps of the waltz, he has to decide if he’ll continue to dance around what he feels for Silas or if he’ll finally learn to trust in his partner’s love for him.
From May 7th until May 12th, Slow Waltz is FREE from Loose Id! You can find it in all your favorite e-reader formats here.
Also from May 7th until May 12th you can purchase Close Quarter from the Loose Id website for two dollars off the cover price (again, available in all your favorite e-reader formats). Get it here.
Q. Though Close Quarter and Slow Waltz are set in the present day, their world has an interesting history. I LOVED Silas’s 
backstory. What inspired this rich retelling of Fae myth?
Despite Silas being Roman, belive it or not, the world-building with the fae actually started with Welsh fairy tales!
I’ve always been fascinated by fae/elves/whathave you, but it seems like most of the fantasy or paranormal books I’ve read with fae tend to have two courts: a light and a dark or a summer and a winter…and that’s based mostly on the Scottish fairy mythology. There’s other fairy myths out there, so I started reading some books on Welsh fairies.
And, you know, they’re not exactly benign happy folks. They’re kind of scary. Neutral and apathetic at best; bloodthirsty tricksters at their not-so-best.
And that got me thinking about how fae culture in different countries must be different. I decided that in my paranormal world, there would be many different courts and each would be somewhat different from each other. When I started writing Close Quarter, I wanted an old fae, because I had an old vampire. The Roman Empire seemed a good place to start, so Silas ended up being ancient Roman.
Then, I had fun researching fairy and vampire myths and legends in Rome and also in Eastern Europe because of Vasil, the erstwhile waiter who gets caught up in Rhys and Silas’s story and sees things he shouldn’t. But he’s from a mountain village, so he’s used to the intersection of the mundane and the mysterious…the unexplained still happens where he’s from.
I’ll admit to taking a lot of liberties here and there and creating my own mythology with my fae, but I do try to keep a kernel of the culture from whence they came. There’s glimpses of the not-so-best aspects in Close Quarter when Silas mentions how the courts tend to treat the half-fae. Those elements will play out later.
Then I threw in angels and daemons. And phoenix, but they’re only mentioned briefly.
Q. Do you have any other plans for stories set in this universe?
Oh, do I, yes!
First up will be a novel about what happens to Vasil. He’s off to Istanbul to learn to use his new-found skills from a Turkish half-fae. And because he keeps dreaming of a woman on fire, held against her will between water and earth, in ancient Constantinople…
Then, there will be a novel that follows what happens to Rhys and Silas once they get to New York. They face two courts willing to war over the possession of Rhys and Rhys’s ex-boyfriend. And the only person they can turn to for help is a lawyer…
I also have an Urban Fantasy I’m working on set in the same world. There’s no romance in that one, though…and I’ve brought the setting home to Pittsburgh, with all it’s hills and rivers and interesting secrets, where an exiled Welsh half-fae must hunt for his missing fae niece…without using any of his fae powers, least the Wild Hunt come hunting for him. Again.
Q. Please tell us about a typical writing day—if there is such a thing—in the life of Anna Zabo.
I have a day job as a technical writer during the week. When I write in the evenings, I usually lie on my rather large couch, which is L-shaped, so I have good back support. Then the cats fight over my legs and eventually pin me down for a couple of hours. I used to write at a desk, but then the cats would sit on my lap, and 20 lbs of sleeping cats started to make my knees ache.
If it’s the weekend, I pack up the laptop and head for a local coffee shop called The Coffee Buddha. It’s an entire house, so there’s a big porch to sit at when it’s nice out, and several rooms upstairs where you can hole up and write for hours. And they have some of the best coffee drinks I’ve ever had. It’s become quite the community hangout! Also, you have to ask for the Internet password, which is lovely. It means I can be free of the evil distraction of checking my email and twitter and facebook and chatting with folks and going down the rabbit-hole of research… so when I’m there to write, I write!
Q. As a writer, what’s your ultimate ambition?
I want to give to readers what so many authors gave to me: a wonderful experience between the pages. One that wrung my emotions, made me cry, made me laugh, and made me hope and wonder. And long for all those characters once the pages were closed.
If I can get half that, I’ll feel pretty good.
Q. Any other WIPs you’d like to tell us about?
I’m working on a contemporary m/m where a software engineer has a hot, passionate fling dominating a businessman while on vacation. Two weeks later, the same guy is introduced as his new boss…
No paranormal there. Though, I do think software engineering is a bit of black magic…
I also write fantasy, and I’m working on a secondary world historical fantasy based loosely on the 100-years war period. A mad king, conniving families, a young invading king, a woman warrior, and a herald who lays the dead to rest.
Q. It’s the zombie apocalypse and the only force left to stop the undead is the fae from your books. How will they win?
Well, Rhys and Silas both have swords of silver and diamond, forged in phoenix fire. If they work on vampires, they should work on zombies just fine. And Silas is already proficient at aiming for the head. And there are some other fae out there with better weaponry.
Plus, on actual land, Rhys and Silas are quite the force to be reckoned with, if there’s no qualms about rearranging the landscape. Silas is a forest fae, after all. He’s got pants at his command…
And I’m not sure they’d actually get infected, since fae are generally immune to human disease. So at least the woudn’t have to worry about zombie fae…
So probably enlist the help of trees and vines to stop the zombies, then go on a beheading spree.
***
Anna’s blog tour and giveaway!
I’m holding a giveaway for a $10 (or currency equivalent) gift card to either All Romance Ebooks, Amazon, or Barnes and Noble (winner’s choice) for folks that comment on any of my itty bitty blog tour. If you comment here or at any of the two other stops on my tour, you’ll be entered in a random drawing to win a gift card. (One entry per blog stop! So if you comment on all three blogs, that’s three entries.)
I’ll be drawing the winner on my blog, AnnaZabo.com on May 13th.
The dates and stops are:
Tuesday, May 7th, I’ll be at Jessica Freely’s blog
Thursday, May 9th, I’ll be at Kay Berrisford’s blog. (That’s here!)
Friday May 10th, I’ll be over at Attention is Arbitrary
Saturday, May 11th, I’ll be at MC Hana’s blog.
Come visit!
***
I don’t know what I’m having more fangirl squee over – more from the Close Quarter universe, or Anna’s mention of the Wild Hunt!! It all sounds amazing
Don’t forget to comment to be in with a chance to winning the $10 GC and head over to Loose Id download your FREE copy of Slow Waltz now Plus, there’s still a chance to win Be My Alien by Julie Lynn Hayes and MA Church here.
Be My Alien! Julie Lynn Hayes and M.A.Church interview Reed and Taz.
I’m thrilled to welcome back Julie Lynn Hayes and M.A. Church, who’ve dropped by to have a chat with the characters from their awesome new release from Dreamspinner, Be My Alien! If you’d like to be in with a chance to win a copy, Julie and Michelle are kindly donating one to a lucky commenter, so please join in the fun
***
Thanks so much for having us here today! Oh wait, who are we, I can hear some of you ask? Let me back up a mo and start again.
I’m Julie Lynn Hayes, she’s M.A. Church, heretofore to be known as Michelle. Just call me Julie. We’re here today to talk about our first joint project, Be My Alien, which will be released by Dreamspinner TODAY.
Let’s start at the beginning. I totally blame Michelle for hooking me on aliens.
Michelle: *snort* I corrupted her, or so she says.
Julie: *laughs* That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it. It wasn’t until I read your most excellent book, Nighttime Wishes, that I first encountered your fixation on beings from other worlds, and… wait, hold on a second. What are you two doing here?
Reed: Don’t blame me, I was just following Taz. He said we needed to come here, and I guess he’s right. Look, you’re talking about us. That’s a bit cheeky, don’t you think?
Julie: What? Cheeky? Hey, Reed, I was going to say nice things, how does that make us cheeky? Michelle, a little help here?
Michelle: Oh no, don’t drag me into this. Besides, I think you’re doing just fine on your own, Julie.
Julie: Gee, thanks. *sneaks a peek at these two lovely men* Wow, what gorgeous guys we’ve created, I have to admit.
Taz: Reed, I appreciate these two humans and their efforts to talk about us, but I feel that we can handle this ourselves, don’t you?
Reed: Indeed I do. So why don’t you two ladies find something else to do? Maybe go to a strip club or something?
Julie: *look at Michelle, and she shrugs *
Michelle: Well, if they screw this up, it’s on them. I say we go look at pretty men. You’re driving, though.
Julie: *walks out door mumbling under her breath* Don’t I always?
Michelle: *pokes Julie in the back* But you like driving. Am I going to have to listen to this all the way to Atlanta???
Purses are grabbed and a door slams shuts.
Reed: *whispers* Good Lord, are they gone?
Taz: *looks around the corner* Yes, thank the stars. I swear, those two… So… *Taz rubs his hands together, a gleam in his eye* Looks like we got free rein now. You ready to start?”
Reed: Yes, more than ready. They’ve gone about things the wrong way. Did you even hear mention of the title?
Taz: No, not a word.
Reed: *shakes his head* Women!
Taz: *cocks his head and regards Reed* My mother is a woman, Reed.
Reed: *snorts* I know, I met her, remember? So’s mine, by the way, and thanks for asking…
Taz: But I didn’t ask?
Reed: *sighs* It’s just an expression. *mumbles under his breath* Damn, need to get that book. Bad. Hey, babe, where do you think we should start?
Taz: How about like this? *he climbs onto Reed’s lap and lays his head on Reed’s shoulder, purring*
Reed: Oh damn, seriously? *takes a deep breath* I thought we’re here to talk? You know, about us?
Taz: *purrs louder* Go ahead and talk. I can hear you. *begins to rock in Reed’s lap*
Reed: Oh jeez Louise, that’s distracting… *clears throat* Um, okay… we met… we met… oh yeah, it was almost Valentine’s Day. I was working late ‘cause I didn’t have anything better to do. You know how it is when you’re single and it’s been a while… that day means less than nothing.
Taz: It didn’t mean anything to me either.
Reed: Well, to be fair, you never heard of it ‘til you got here.
Taz: Oh yeah, I guess that’s true. *squirms a bit on Reed’s lap* I’m just lucky I was in the right place at the right time.
Reed: I think I’m the lucky one, babe. That’s what they call karma.
Taz: Karma? What has this to do with driving?
Reed: *groans* Later, I’ll explain later. So anyway, I had to meet a customer at the Empire State Building after work, and that’s where I met Taz. He knocked me off my feet, literally.
Taz: What can I say, you caught my attention? My night hadn’t been going very well. I had just been dumped, then I saw you. I really didn’t mean to knock you down, you know.
Reed: Oh, I wasn’t complaining. I ended up on the floor with an arm full of sexy male. *blush* Well, at the time I thought I had an arm full of sexy male. Little did I know just what I was holding.
Taz: *giggle* You should’ve seen the look on your face the first time my stripes showed up! I mean, you freaked out, but still, for a second there… I don’t have the words!
Reed: *shakes head* It was probably the same kind of shocked look I had when that tail of yours put in an appearance.
Taz: *rubs cheek against Reed’s jaw* That reminds me, when are you going to let me—
Reed: Whoa now. Let’s not go there, babe. You give that away, Julie and Michelle will both want to skin you. It’ll be a race to see which one of them gets you.
Taz: Silly women. Neither one of them gets me. I’m all yours… *licks his way up Reed’s neck*
Reed: All mine, you’re right. Um, um…. Oh yeah, the title. Be My Alien. Pretty cute, don’t you think?
Taz: Mmhmmm, you’re very cute.
Reed: Not me, the title *blushes*
Taz: Oh, that’s not bad. Those two earth women seem to be able to put words together rather nicely, don’t they?
Reed: Better than me at times. Oh babe, you gotta quit that, or I might…
Taz: I’m wearing those special—
Reed: Oh lord, from the shop? *groans* Oh yes, my shop. I have my own business, I should mention that. A Touch of Class. Here in New York. I mean there… I mean… Taz, please be careful, you’re right over my—
Taz: I know, Reed… I know… *silences him with a kiss*
Taz: Oh yes. We told them how we met. Did we tell them about ourselves though?
Reed: What do you mean?
Taz: Well, I’m from the planet Trygos, the most important planet in the Trygos galaxy, and only one of two planets capable of sustaining life. The other planet is Haatmiess. When Trygosheans put someone down, they say they’re like a Haatmiess, which is considered a major insult. My full name is Fabrintazo, Taz for short. I’m about 5’11″ in your earth measuresments, and I have a wiry, muscular build. My hair is a mixture of red and orange and brown and it’s long and luxurious, and reaches below my shoulders.
Reed: That’s very true. He often twists it into a braid and lets it flow loose over his back. He’s very acrobatic and he loves heights. Which scared the hell out of me at one point in the book. Taz has cat green eyes and purrs when he’s pleased. *smiles* I make him purr often.
Taz: Yes, you do. Reed’s full name is Reed Hatcher and he’s about my height and build. He has very light brown hair that tends to bleach out in the warmer months and he has the most beautiful hazel eyes. Oh! And he has this cute little dimple in his cheek too. The one on his face, not the other one. Though that’s cute, too.
Reed: *blushes* Babe, too much information.
Taz: *grins* And he’s a business owner, too. A very important man in his world. *nods head* And in his business, he has a back room that sells very special things. I like the back room.
Reed: I actually have a degree in elementary education, but I never taught. My parents moved to Florida and I ended up here in New York.
Taz: Thank the stars you did! *frowns* Should we tell them about Vorlod?
Reed: What’s to tell? The bastard’s no longer here on Earth and can’t bother you anymore.
Taz: Well, he was the reason I was here on Earth to begin with.
Reed: We should save that story, though, don’t you think? Can’t spill all the beans, now can we?
Taz: *glances around the floor* I don’t think we spilled anything.
Reed: *rolls his eyes* You’re right, we didn’t. What was I thinking?
Taz: *eyes him suspiciously* Are you having fun with me?
Reed: Not yet, babe, but I intend to, I promise you.
Taz: *grins even broader, stripes appearing on his neck* Then let’s go now and, how did you put it, avoid the rush hour?
Reed: *tries not to laugh* Close enough. *fastens their lips together, he rises, Taz clinging to him, and they make their way from the room. *
* * * *
Hope y’all enjoyed meeting the characters from Be My Alien!
Blurb: Reed Hatcher’s life is work, work, work. He owns a successful men’s boutique in New York City, but a love life is out of the question—for many reasons. It’s almost Valentine’s Day, and business is brisk. On an unexpected visit to the Empire State Building, a sexy man literally falls into Reed’s lap. His name is Taz and he’s just been dumped by his date. One look and Reed is hooked. He offers to buy Taz some coffee and they leave together.
Reed is attracted to Taz and takes him home to his apartment. But Reed discovers there’s more to Taz than he realized—especially when Taz’s stripes begin to show. And he has a tail? Turns out Taz is not quite like Reed. In fact, he comes from another planet, far far away, and he’s only on Earth for a vacation.
Reed never believed in aliens before, but he’s facing one now, and dear God, what is he going to do? Just when he decides he loves Taz and together they can handle anything, the alien that dumped Taz decides he wants him back and steals him away.
Can Reed live with the memory of what he almost had, and the love he found and lost? How can he ever face the moonlit skies again?
Scroll on for an excerpt and a chance to WIN!
Boywhore Loveliness: Not a How-to Guide by Salome Wilde
My guest blogger this week is Salome Wilde, blogging on the appealing topic of Boywhore Loveliness Over to Salome!
Boywhore Loveliness: Not a How-to Guide
by Salome Wilde
I’ve written a fair amount of short erotica. Pansexual and multiracial, diverse genres and subgenres, comedy and tragedy, HEA and HFN, and even stuff so weirdly exotic it beggars classification (teapot orgasms, for example). Whether it whisks its way into an editor’s heart upon submission, languishes awhile before finding a good home, or ends up shared only among friends, I enjoy each story I write for its own sake. I know what I like and, often, how to get there—particularly when the word count is short, the content is forthrightly erotic, and the style is open to my creative whims.
More recently, I’ve begun to dabble in romance, and 40,000+ word counts. I’ve always loved m/m erotica, but romance is a new challenge. My first co-written novella (with Talon Rihai) was an adventure in going from friends-to-lovers meets hurt-comfort short story into the realm of the novella. With unflagging encouragement from the editors at Storm Moon Press, we accomplished the needed 50,000 words and enjoyed getting there, primarily through slice-of-life chapters featuring our beloved main characters and their friends and family. Reviews for the work have been mostly favorable but definitely mixed, with the harshest (and most useful to a writer) critiques coming from those who don’t like the slice-of-life approach, preferring more tension building and traditionally romantic intensity.
I get that, and my co-author and I will be the first to admit that After the First Taste of Love, volume one of a trilogy, had a bit too much of what we call “info dumping,” otherwise known as telling-not-showing, and we’re learning as we read and write. We know we’ll never please everyone, but as we learn the ropes, we hope to win more hearts—the way we have each and both won wet panties with our short fiction and the way we work what Talon rightly calls the irresistible pleasures of “testosterone and tenderness.”
In addition to the second volume of our trilogy, I’m slowly working on a m/m historical mystery-romance set in NY’s Lower East Side, dealing with diverse ethnic immigrant populations as well as heavy plotting. But in between that, Talon and I have yielded to our most unhistorical weakness for prettyboys in love, and boywhores in particular. It is Kay Berrisford herself who suggested the title for this guest post, and it couldn’t be better.
Early in 2012, I was practicing my mediocre digital art skills, and I drew an image I titled “Pretty Boywhore: Suck It.” It not only pleased Talon and me, but it inspired ample discussion of the hotness of boywhore fantasies. Eventually, it inspired commitment to writing a boywhore novel. For models, we found few. Rentboys, definitely. Dom/sub scenarios in which prostitution was involved, yes. But actual romances among male hookers, not so much. But Talon and I have always enjoyed working without a net, and when we presented the “novel about pretty boywhores in love” to Storm Moon Press, we got a resounding “YES!” and a contract for Turning Trick, forthcoming at the turn of the year (2013/2014).
Creating the characters was a pleasure for us, as Talon built Jen (only one of his multiple pseudonyms), a short, scrappy, tattooed and pierced, mixed-race beauty, the product of a rough childhood and a determinedly happy young adulthood in NY. Into Jen’s life comes my character, Patrick (a.k.a. Trick), a short (but not as short as Jen) pale strawberry-blonde with startling aqua eyes and the bumps and bruises of living on the streets after running away from home. Add to the mix Ko, the six-foot, broken-nosed transhooker with a heart of gold who took Jen in years before and, at the start of the novel, introduces him to Trick, her newest rescue. Jen is determined not to get emotionally involved (with anyone, ever); Trick is inexperienced, insecure, and ready to find a home. Toss in a stalker for plot and tension, and there you have it. The novel asks, Will Jen fall prey to love with Trick or will Trick’s needs drive them apart and into danger for them both?
Within such focus, our task as writers is to plot slowly and carefully, build tension and background as we go, and emerge with a novel full of fiery tempers and hot sex and, eventually, HEA…or at least HFN. But then the question of responsibility comes in. “Boywhore loveliness” is all well and good, but what about all the hurt and abuse in the boys’ backstories? What about the dangers of stereotyping, and of glorifying sex-for-pay at the cost of emotional honesty?
Certainly, as a writer of erotica, I’ve seen plenty of “go for the gold” stories that ignore politics and complexity of character. And I’ve also read 
tales that do not shirk from responsibility to big issues (e.g. the criminalization of homosexuality in the first half of the twentieth century in Josh Lanyon’s Snowball in Hell). I respect these novels, that blend scorching sexual heat with awareness and sensitivity to the world in which they are written. But, dammit, I want my HEA, however unrealistic, and I want to see pretty boys whoring it up and having the time of their lives.
Hence, for this writer at least, there must be compromise. There will be flashbacks and sharing of abuse from the past, tension and complications in the present. And there will be sex: from Trick learning the ropes to threesomes with johns to genuine lovemaking—however much Jen may try to squirm his way out of it. Ultimately, we hope readers will find moments of emotional truth as well as pleasures of escapism that the concept of “boywhore loveliness” demands.
I thank Kay for the opportunity to share my thoughts with you here, and I welcome conversation in response. What do you want in a m/m romance about “boywhores”? What do you not want? And have I missed any good novels in the “genre”?
© Salome Wilde, 2013
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Heh, I never realized I could be so inspiring 
Thanks for a thought provoking and fun blog, Salome
Hope this inspires an interesting discussion – plus there’s still a chance to WIN one of Lori Toland’s amazing m/m reads. Visit her post here to find out more.
Tortured Heroes: Herne the Hunter versus Robin Hood
This was supposed to be part of the Tortured Hero Blog Hop. It was cancelled, but I blogged anyway
I’ve written books about my two favourite tortured heroes. Lucky me! But who’s the best out of Robin Hood and Herne the Hunter—and I don’t mean who’d win if they got in a fight. Who’s best at the depths-of-his-soul angst and the brooding looks? Let’s see.
Robin Hood
The Legend: If we’re talking tortured in the literal sense of being dumped in a dungeon and tormented, Robin wins hands down. Right from the earliest medieval tales, Robin was prone to being captured by the sheriff, beaten up, etc. But angst? Hmmm. Not so much. Robin tended to know what he wanted—the sheriff’s gold—then head out, fight, and take it, facing dangers on the way without too much soul-searching. Even as late as the 1938 Errol Flynn movie, The Adventures of Robin Hood, he tended to be a fairly happy guy, who tackled adversity with a smile that flashed as bright as his blade.
More recent movie and TV versions, of course, have given Robin plenty to angst about. Many have portrayed him as a knight returned from the crusades—where the trauma of war has scarred him—only to find his lands confiscated, maybe his loved ones slain. And then he usually gets to have love/hate relationship angst with Maid Marian (or, if you’re wearing slash goggles, with his mates.) In other words, modern tastes have made Robin suitable tortured, both physically and in the angsty brooding fashion we love. Hurrah!
My Robin: At the start of Lord of the Forest, I’ve killed off half his friends, and he’s wandering the country a lone warrior, lamenting that he’s never found true love. And then he falls for a guy who looks set on betraying him, a royal spy. Oh yeah, angsty baby.
Find out more about Lord of the Forest.
Herne the Hunter.
Herne the Hunter has been a tortured soul from pretty much the start. The earliest mention of Herne comes in Shakespeare’s “Merry Wives of 
Windsor.” We learn he is a ghost who haunts Windsor Park, and is seen walking…
“…round about an oak, with great ragg’d horns;
And there he blasts the tree, and takes the cattle,
And makes milch-kine yield blood, and shakes a chain
In a most hideous and dreadful manner.”
Hmmm. Not a happy bunny. Then again, few ghosts are. However, Herne’s origins can be traced much further back into history, to the gods of Norse, Teutonic, and Celtic religion—including Woden, whose many incarnations have included a carrier off of the dead, and who was said to have hanged himself on the world tree (Yggdrasil). Several later literary depictions (allegedly based on oral traditions of the myth) also portray Herne as driven to suicide for various reasons, including unrequited love and the violation of his daughter.
Overall, Herne is never smiley, and a haunting, brooding presence in pretty much every story he appears in.
My Herne: At the start of Bound to the Beast, my Herne, an immortal who shifts to sport the antlers of a stag when his blood is stirred, is brooding over a broken heart. Said heart was broken fifteen-hundred years ago. Oh yeah, Herne really knows how to brood.
Then he’s got the Wild Hunt to worry about. There was so much angst to discuss in Herne’s “Legend” section that I never got around to mentioning the Wild Hunt, the army of the dead he leads across England on the eve of great disasters. Although ordered to lead the Wild Hunt by the Mother Goddess, my Herne is haunted by wars and plagues that he feels responsible for, and he wishes to never lead the Hunt again. When he’s summoned back to the Greenwood, and the Hunt are waiting, his soul is in for yet more searching.
However, thanks to some pesky fairies, he’s also been bonded to a village lad, Tam, who might just start healing that ancient, broken heart…
Find out more about Bound to the Beast.
The winner
It’s got to be Herne – but I’m giving extra points to Robin for having the angstiest lover in my book (Cal in Lord of the Forest is way more screwed up than Tam!) But to celebrate, I can announce that the sequel to Bound to the Beast, Locking Horns, which takes up the story of Tam and Herne in 1804 as they head to the Greenwood to investigate the demise of the fairies, is due out this July. Check back for more details soon!
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Fancy a tortured hero story for free? You can now download my (Kay Berrisford’s) m/m fantasy Prisoner of the Mountain Watch for FREE from All Romance and Amazon.
Blurb: Once a great warrior, Ivenhal now leads a lonely existence, banished by his people because he’s lain with other men. When he captures an enemy elf, his life takes an unexpected turn.
Stories that steal your heart! Interview and giveaway with Sasha L. Miller.
My guest this week is the lovely Sasha L. Miller Sasha has written a variety of wonderful m/m stories, including Stolen Hearts, With A Touch, Retirement, and Battle of Will. Sasha has kindly popped by to answer a few of my questions — plus one lucky commenter can win either their choice of Sasha’s back catalogue or a three month subscription to Less Than Three Press’s amazing serials. How cool is that?
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Q. Hi Sasha – thanks for popping by. Firstly, please tell us a bit about yourself. How long have you been writing?
Hi Kay! Thanks for having me. ^__^ I’m a bit of an odd duck, in that I got a late start writing. I was a voracious reader all the way through high school and into college, but it was only in college that I started writing. One of my professors (who was very religious and thought I was a good, upstanding young woman, seriously, so many people think that and I have no idea why ;3) asked, “do you write? You should, you’d be good at it.” I uh, took that to heart and started writing terrible, horrible, and awful original slash. Thankfully, I’ve gotten better. Or so I like to think. ;3
Writing is both a hobby and a living for me. ^__^ I’m quitting my day job at the end of May to focus full time on LT3 and my writing, but even the day job is writing. Alas, nothing salacious there; I’m a junior technical writer for a software company.
Q. As a writer, what is your greatest inspiration?
Hmm, good question. Music is probably my biggest inspiration. At least half the stories I write were in some way inspired by a song or two. I also 
have about a dozen songs that I have stories ready to be written for, languishing in my queue. ^__^
For example, Stolen Hearts, one of my very favourite books, was inspired by the Breaking Benjamin song Breath, in a very literal way. There’s a line in the song that goes, ‘you take the breath right out of me / you left a hole where my heart should be,’ which inspired me to literally rip one of the MC’s hearts out and replace it with a charm in the book. /is a jerk
Q. Any exciting new releases/WIPs to tell us about?
Currently, I’m finishing up a currently untitled short story that’s very different from my usual fare. It’s a contemp/paranormal crossover sort of thing, wherein the MC (a vampire) goes on vacation and meets a hedge witch. Shenanigans (of the sexy variety) ensue, and the MC is all upset when his “forget me” tricks don’t work on the hedge witch because of the witch’s magic. That’s aimed for mid-June.
There’s also Battle of Will, which is a novel being run as a serial on Less Than Three Press. It’s a lovely enemies to lovers stories, full of stubborn idiots, magic, politics, war, and lots of violence. The two MCs were on opposite sides of the war, right up until Ackley (MC #1) casts a spell that has the unintended consequence of binding him with Beorn (MC #2). They can’t physical hurt each other without hurting themselves, and can’t go further than a dozen yards or so. Add in Beorn’s a Crown Prince on one side of the war and Ackley was a bodyguard to a prince on the other side, and they’re all sparkles and sunshine about the new situation. ;3
Q. You’ve written across a variety of genres—which is your favourite to write? And which is the hardest?
My favourite is fantasy, far and above all else. I love me some magical shenanigans. They’re my favourite, and I find it helps me concentrate on the story when there are multiple things to balance (characters, plot, magic systems).
Hardest would definitely be contemporary. I know people love reading and writing it, but I always find it incredibly boring to write. I can’t keep focused on it. ^__^;;
Q. Please tell us about a typical writing day—if there is such a thing—in the life of Sasha L. Miller?
I don’t have typical writing days, alas. :3 Mostly it’s cram in a few words here and there on weeknights, with heavy-hitting days on the weekends. Writing typically involves lots of google tabs, shutting off the internet and then cursing because the google tabs don’t work, fixing tea, coffee or alcoholic beverage, and then finally focusing and getting words down.
Q. What did you do to celebrate your first ever release—and how did you celebrate the latest?
I did a lot of terrible dancing. Especially when the paperback arrived; I was happy enough to dance then and there, right in front of the wide open windows facing the occupied bus stop. :3 Now I just flail around the internet, usually with one of my terrible summaries (see question three above for examples) and a beer in hand (I’m a heathen; Corona is my favourite).
Q. You’re trapped in the dungeon of a castle in a faraway fantasy kingdom. Which two of your characters would you most like to be trapped with (and help you escape?) Who would you least like to be there with you?
Hmm, let’s see. The two I’d most like to be there would be Nevi from Retirement and Ackley from Battle of Will. Nevi’s a pretty awesome thief (he lived to see retirement, after all ^__~) and Ackley’s got some pretty versatile magic (though definitely unattached from Beorn, b/c good grief those two are good at distracting each other, for better or ill).
Least likely… probably the boys from With a Touch, Eneko and Lain. They’re awesome peeps, but their skills lie in finding things and telling truth from lies, which are not really conducive for escaping. (I’m totally imagining a big, blow out the walls sort of escape. ;3)
Thanks so much, Sasha I’ll listen out for the massive, magic explosion!!!
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If you’d like to win either your choice of Sasha’s back catalogue or a three month subscription to Less Than Three Press’s amazing serials, please leave a comment here, remembering to include your email when promted. Emails won’t be displayed or stored for any other purpose. Comp. closes 26th April. Thanks for dropping by
Choosing a Sub-Genre in M/M Romance. Guest blog with Leigh Ellwood plus WIN your choice of her back catalogue!
I’m thrilled to welcome award winning writer, Leigh Ellwood — my guest blogger of the day Leigh is kindly donating an ebook from her extensive back catalogue to one lucky commenter. Her latest m/m release is Bittersweet, which you can find out more about below. Over to Leigh!
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Choosing a Sub-Genre in M/M Romance: What to Write?
Hello. I’d like to thank Kay for hosting me on her blog today. I am Leigh Ellwood, and I write erotic romance. My works vary in pairings – and I do have quite a few M/M titles for you to enjoy. Most are contemporary, but I have been known to delve into paranormal and sci-fi.
Which brings me to what I’d like to talk about today: deciding on the sub-genre of a new story. When I sit down to begin something new, I may have the germ of an idea in mind. Often in that idea I know whether or not to include paranormal or fantastic elements. I may have a hero in mind with special powers, or a job that is more suited to a futuristic setting, and that makes shaping the story easier. Sometimes, though, the idea will focus on two characters and the conflict that keeps them apart, one that is applicable in any setting.
How do I choose the sub-genre of a story? I may look at my backlist and study what readers enjoyed more, and I might look at what readers are buying. As much as I’d like to write what is considered trendy, I can’t seem to crank out stories at a fast pace, so I fear getting behind the times. I end up writing ultimately what I would enjoy reading, and I hope you like the stories as well. Whether it’s an historical, shape-shifter, or contemporary drama, the romance must remain the center of the story and feature heroes who are believable and sympathetic, men you’d welcome into your lives.
My most current M/M, Bittersweet, is a follow-up to another novella, Taste This. Naturally, I didn’t have trouble deciding on the sub-genre, though the writing came slowly. My next M/M work will be another overdue follow-up to a contemporary story. As for the next original work after that, the sky’s the limit!
What is your favorite sub-genre of M/M romance? I’d love to hear what you enjoy reading. One random commenter will receive an eBook from my backlist.
Blurb: After years of imprisonment on his home planet, the disgraced Tobin – former captain of the starship Jiu’Kr – is called upon to undertake a mission to save his people. Their salvation, to his great joy, lies on Earth.
Kelly Landry has tried to be productive since he and Tobin parted. He finds solace in his bakery, Taste This, and in helping those in need. He’s not ready to pursue another relationship, much to the disappointment of would-be suitor Brad Summers, because a part of him wants to believe his sexy alien lover will return.
When Tobin does come back for him, however, it’s not the romantic reunion Kelly expected. Tobin is a risk taker…will his actions keep him and Kelly apart for good?
Buy Bittersweet from All Romance ~ Kindle ~ Kobo ~ NOOK.
Leigh on Twitter – @LeighEllwood
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Bakeries, sci-fi, and hot m/m – a yummy blend, I’m sure Thanks for dropping by, Leigh.
To win your choice of Leigh’s extensive back catalogue please leave a comment here, incluing your email when promted. Emails will not be displayed or stored for any other purpose. Giveaway closes 19th April. Thank you
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Want more m/m reads? You can now download my (Kay Berrisford’s) m/m fantasy Prisoner of the Mountain Watch for FREE from All Romance! Plus there’s a chance to win m/m books by the amazing Cassandra Gold here.
Going Down! Guest blogger Cassandra Gold on “After the Happy Ending” – plus WIN one of her back catalogue reads!
I’m thrilled to welcome Cassandra Gold, author of m/m hits including The Cost of Secrets. Cassandra has a new release, Going Down, and she’s kindly dropped by to blog about it – plus offer one of her amazing pre-2013 releases to one lucky commenter! Over to Cassandra
After the Happy Ending
After reading a happy ending, have you ever asked yourself, “What now?”
Recently, I found myself asking that question. With the staggering divorce statistics, it’s difficult for a pessimist such as myself to assume that the HEA is the be-all, end-all of most stories. You might be wondering how on earth a person with that attitude could be a romance author.
Well, I may not be a believer in the fairy tale HEA as such, but I am a believer in the power of hard work. Relationships aren’t easy. Even when you love someone, sometimes they’re going to drive you crazy. Life changes like job losses, illness or death in the family, or any number of other trials might put a strain on the relationship. Eventually the giddy blush of first love will wear off, and things will become more difficult. That’s when the hard work comes in.
Instead of giving up when things get hard, I’d like to think my characters would decide to fight for their relationship. With that thought in mind, I wrote my most recent release, Going Down. It tells the story of what happens after the happy ending, when the going gets tough.
ISBN: 978-1-61124-411-3
Blurb: Tattoo artist Laurie Watson has felt the distance between himself and his live-in boyfriend, Win, for a long time, but he’s finally had enough. He’s determined to figure out how to work out whatever’s gone wrong between them. Unfortunately, when he gets home, he finds Win talking with his ex.
Figuring he’s missed his chance to fix things between them, Laurie flees. The temperamental elevator has other ideas, however, and Laurie and Win are trapped between floors.
No longer able to hide from their problems, Laurie and Win will either make up, or break up for good…
Excerpt:
…Talk to him. Tonight. Talk to him. Tonight. The words echoed through Laurie’s mind with every step he took toward the apartment he and Win had shared for the past two years. His feet felt increasingly heavy the closer he got. If Win wasn’t in love with him anymore, did he really want to know? Maybe it would be better to pretend he didn’t notice, to make Win be the one to force a confrontation.
No. Laurie was a lot of things, but a coward wasn’t one of them. His boldness had won Win over in the first place. It only seemed fitting for the same trait to be what ended them.
And now that the pessimistic thoughts had started, Laurie couldn’t turn them off. Deep in his heart, he felt certain tonight would be the end of the best time of his life. A physical ache spread through his chest, making breathing difficult. He was grateful to reach the lobby door. He yanked it open and trudged inside.
Bypassing the mailboxes, he crossed to the elevator and punched the up button. The doors slid open with their usual sluggishness. Inside, he hit the button for the fifth floor and waited. Once the doors closed, nothing happened for a few seconds. Then with a lurch and a whine, the elevator began its anemic ascent. It sounded worse than usual. Within a day or two there would probably be an “Out of Order” sign, and he and Win would have to take the stairs for days until the super got the stupid thing fixed.
If he and Win still lived here, anyway. One of them might not, after tonight. That would probably be Win. No doubt his family would be thrilled to welcome their prodigal son back into the fold the instant he was free of his low-class tattoo-artist lover.
Laurie closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He needed to try to be positive. He hadn’t lost Win yet. Giving up usually wasn’t his style. “I can’t start now,” he murmured aloud. “Win’s worth fighting for.”
Win was worth fighting for. The life they’d built was worth fighting for. Laurie loved Win. Loved their life. Loved the way they’d carved out a place for themselves, away from Win’s rich, controlling family and the dysfunctional, abusive leeches Laurie refused to claim as his. Not so long ago, it had been him and Win against the world. It could be that way again.
Resolve replaced resignation. Laurie stood straighter, ready to do battle. He had made Win love him once—he could do it again. He’d let a lot of the things he used to do slide in recent months for reasons he wasn’t sure of. That had been a mistake, but not an unfixable one. No excuses tonight, just action…
Gay romance with a heart of gold!
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Thanks, Cassandra! If you’d like to your choice of Cassandra’s pre-2013 releases, including the following stunning reads, please leave a comment. You need to fill in the email box on the prompt form, but your address won’t be published. Giveaway closes 22nd April. Click on the covers for more info or check out Cassandra’s book list
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Want more m/m reads? You can now download my (Kay Berrisford’s) m/m fantasy Prisoner of the Mountain Watch for free from All Romance!
Thanks for your support on the blog tour – plus Prisoner of the Mountain Watch out tomorrow for FREE!
The runners up for the Lord of the Forest blog tour draw were Juliana and Ilona. The main winner was Sue - congrats
Thanks to everyone who entered. I wish I could give everyone a prize, and in a way I can, because my m/m fantasy short story Prisoner of the Mountain Watch is available to download for FREE tomorrow Check back soon for more details.
Lord of the Forest is OUT NOW!
You can read an excerpt and buy it now at Loose Id . Also at Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and All Romance
Lord of the Forest. Meet Cal–royal spy turned good guy?
Lord of the Forest is OUT NOW!
You can read an excerpt and buy it now at Loose Id . Also at Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and All Romance. Tweets, likes, and other shares of the pages would be much appreciated if you have a moment. Thanks
Today, my blog tour has reached the lovely Tara Lain’s, where you can read a sexy excerpt from the new release. Meanwhile, time to share a little bit more about the book.
I’ve already blogged about Robin Hood, the hero of my new m/m novel, Lord of the Forest. But what about his “other half” in the story—Cal, the protector of the Greenwood.
Why didn’t I choose one of Robin’s traditional friends, Little John or Will Scarlet, etc.? The most compelling reason was because they are just that – Robin’s friends. I could have written a cosy Sherwood friends-to-lovers story, and there’s still plenty of space for those in the m/m market, but I didn’t want to do that. I wanted to give Robin a challenge, to throw in his path a man who causes him a thousand problems his loyal band never could. Secondly, I wanted this to be a Greenwood story—set in the same integrated world of English myth and history I created in Bound for the Forest and Bound to the Beast (if you’ve not read those two, don’t panic—Lord of the Forest is actually set first.) However, those of you who’ve read Bound for the Forest will remember that the hero of that novel, Melmoth Brien, is descended from a long line of protectors of the English Greenwood. Cal is also of that bloodline—and a bit like Melmoth Brien, he’s not exactly been doing a great job.
Cal, you see, is a tricky character—almost a total opposite of Robin Hood. He’s grown up at the royal court, to where his mother fled when their Greenwood estates were seized. He trained as a knight, but turned out to be hopeless at that, instead nurturing other talents, and becoming a royal spy.
Robin Hood values trust and friendship above all things—and Cal? Well, Cal’s never had a friend he could rely on, and has always got by on his sharp wits and tongue, and handsome looks. He’s a good looking guy, but hardly the earth-blooded woodsman type that Robin usually goes for. When they join forces to fight the barons and the rising forces of dark magic, Robin hardly knows which side Cal is on. In truth, neither does Cal…at least at the start of the story. By the end, he might just be willing to die for Robin and sacrifice all to save the forest—or is he? The race is on for Robin to work out Cal’s true nature, one way or the other, before it’s too late.
You can read Robin’s first impressions of Cal in chapter one of the book here. Buy Lord of the Forest from Loose Id.
Want to find our more about the Greenwood universe – check out my A-Z. The Greenwood books can be read in any order.
For more info. on Robin, visit my blog on his character in ths story and Who Was Robin Hood? Want to find our more about the Greenwood universe? Check out my A-Z. The Greenwood books can be read in any order.
If you’d like a chance to WIN your choice of either of the other Greenwood novels, Bound for the Forest or Bound to the Beast, in paperback or ebook—PLUS a $20 Loose Id or All Romance voucher—all you need to do is leave a comment HERE at any of my stops on my Lord of the Forest blog tour. Click here to see all the stops. You can enter the draw as many times as you like at the different blogs I visit on my tour, or if you’re uncomfotable posting your email anywhere, you can email me at kayberrisford@yahoo.co.uk. You will be entered Two runners up prizes will be a choice of any of my back catalogue titles in ebook format, excluding Lord of the Forest. Draw closes 4/12/13.
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To enter at this blog, please leave your comment below, including your email when prompted. Your email will not be displayed or used for any other purpose. Thank you
Lord of the Forest now available on Amazon and All Romance – plus a note on the kink!
Lord of the Forest is now available at Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and All Romance. All likes and shares of the product pages are much appreciated – thank you! You can also read an excerpt and buy it now at Loose Id.
Also – a note on the kink level in the story, because a few people have asked. Although there is a BDSM and fetish warning on Lord of the Forest, Robin and Cal’s is not a traditional D/s BDSM relationship. MINOR SPOILERS. There is a small nod to this kind of play in one scene, but that is all. The warning is there because of the kinky nature of the enchanted forest and the rituals and practices this entails, and because of some medieval dungeon scenes. Hope that clarifies everything without giving away too much
If you’d like to learn more about the Greenwood universe of Lord of the Forest, Bound for the Forest, and Bound to the Beast, please visit my A t0 Z
“Even the trees whisper of Robin Hood.” Meet the hero of Lord of the Forest.
Lord of the Forest is OUT NOW!
You can read an excerpt and buy it now at Loose Id . ETA: Also at Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and All Romance. Tweets, likes, and other shares of the pages would be much appreciated if you have a moment. Thanks
Today, my blog tour has reached Babes in Boyland, where you can read a sexy excerpt from the new release. Meanwhile, time to share a little bit more about the book — and the man himself!
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“Even the trees whisper of Robin Hood.”
Meet the hero of Lord of the Forest.
Robin Hood has a famous name—the most famous in the land, even in 1217. I decided to pick up Robin’s story after he’s been living the outlaws’ life, robbing from the rich and giving to the poor, for well over a decade. He still feels young, but the responsibilities are taking their toll. Many of his friends have been killed or settled into family life. Though he’s lain with many of his band (hey, this is an m/m Robin Hood, right?) he’s never found true love. He longs for a family of his own, something he believes he can’t have, and has taken to roaming the country as a loan warrior.
My Robin’s quest is for three things—and these encapsulate the three things that make him tick as a character. Firstly, he’s got a fight to fight, a battle to win. The greedy barons are trying to impose a new body of laws on the people of the English forests. Not only will the folk Robin cares for suffer—and Robin is keenly driven by the need to fight for justice and put things right—but because the native peoples have been from the forests, the evil spirits of the Greenwood are growing powerful. To hit back, Robin joins forces with Herne the Hunter, the fair folk, and Cal—the heir to the bloodline of the protectors of the English Greenwood (if you’ve read Bound for the Forest, you’ll already know a little bit about the protectors–though it’s by no means essential to know anything before reading Lord of the Forest.)
Robin’s second quest, which he pursues during the story, is to answer the question that millions have asked—who is Robin Hood? Or, in Robin’s case, why me? He wonders why it is him that magical forces of the Greenwood seek out, and the fairies and plenty of others are asking the same question. What was special about Robin Hood, which made him stand out from the hundreds of other outlaws who operated in England at this time? In the course of his journey, his questions will be answered.
Seeing as this is a romance, Robin’s last quest—that for love—is his most important. At the start of Lord of the Forest, Robin has almost given up hope. He loves his friends, Little John et al, very much indeed, but none of them have turned out to be “the one.” He hardly expects to find love on his quest in the Greenwood—Herne is not exactly in the mood, and Cal, the protector, seems to be far drom Robin’s “type.” For a start, he’s a forester. Foresters were the medieval equivalent of a police force, who the Norman rulers used to enforce their strict laws. And he might just be a royal spy to boot.
Robin values trust, loyalty, and friendship above all things, but his attraction to the erstwhile protector of the Greenwood is undeniable. But how can a traitor like Cal be worthy of one of the greatest heroes of all time?
Check back on Thursday, to learn a little bit more about Cal, read chapter one and meet Robin for yourself, or buy the book now and find out
For more info. on Robin, visit my blog on Who Was Robin Hood? Want to find our more about the Greenwood universe? Check out my A-Z. The Greenwood books can be read in any order.
If you’d like a chance to WIN your choice of either of the other Greenwood novels, Bound for the Forest or Bound to the Beast, in paperback or ebook—PLUS a $20 Loose Id or All Romance voucher—all you need to do is leave a comment HERE at any of my stops on my Lord of the Forest blog tour. Click here to see all the stops. You can enter the draw as many times as you like at the different blogs I visit on my tour, or if you’re uncomfotable posting your email anywhere, you can email me at kayberrisford@yahoo.co.uk. You will be entered Two runners up prizes will be a choice of any of my back catalogue titles in ebook format, excluding Lord of the Forest. Draw closes 4/12/13.
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To enter at this blog, please leave your comment below, including your email when prompted. Your email will not be displayed or used for any other purpose. Thank you
Locked door horror with J.L.Hayes. WIN Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night!
I’m thrilled to welcome back Julie Lynn Hayes–author of Revelations and the Belgian Chocolate Remedy writing today as J.L.Hayes–who’s here to tell us all about her exciting new novel Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night and giving us an exciting taste of the world of horror! Julie is also kindly offering to give away an ebook copy of Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night to one lucky commenter Over to Julie.
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Horror Comes in Many Flavors
I unabashedly admit to being a horror story aficionado, whether in print or on the small or large screen. I love to be scared, although I have to say I seldom am. Maybe because I don’t find it so realistic that I fear someday I’ll be up against a chainsaw-wielding maniac or a random slasher or a madman intent on creating hybrid creatures for strange intent. I found Blair Witch more realistic than most, because I can totally see myself getting lost in the woods like the hapless victims of that film.
Alfred Hitchcock was the king of horror films, and he did it in a way that was graphic for its time, but would not be considered so now. And yet, who doesn’t remember the shower scene from Psycho? After seeing that, it was years before I’d take a shower while alone in the house. And there are parts of the film that make me 
jump, not from fear but from being startled, which is not the same thing. Hitchcock could elicit horror from supposedly everyday normal things. Remember North by Northwest? Cary Grant standing on the highway in the literal middle of nowhere, waiting for a bus, when a crop plane innocently appears and quickly changes into a menacing presence that causes him to flee for his life!
Nowadays, the sky is the limit on what you might find in a horror film. I’ve seen all seven Saw films, and I would hate to find myself caught up in any of John Kramer’s horrific scenarios, but hopefully I’ve never done anything bad enough to qualify as one of his
SAW 5
victims. Prepare to see the grossest of the gross, ditto with the Hostel series, of which I’ve seen all three. For something slightly different, there’s the Human Centipede. I haven’t seen the second one yet, but I hear it’s better than the first. In the first film, a doctor performs a strange experiment on three unwilling subjects, surgically connecting them to form his “human centipede”, mouth to ass, and connecting their digestive systems as well. What a macabre experiment, but the film was not badly made at all, surprisingly, subject matter aside.
The latest trend in horror films seems to be zombies. They’re popping up everywhere, and even beginning to show up in young romance films, like Warm Bodies. Whodathunkit?
When it comes to horror stories, the undisputed master is Stephen King, who’s been entertaining us with his gruesomely delicious tales for years. I have a number of his hardbacks on my shelves, although I’ve fallen behind in recent years, not having the time to read, or money to purchase. One of my favorites is It, which has a very creepy feel to it. Someone who can make you feel horror from the printed word is a master indeed.
What about the horror villain? Or should I say the hero? For often times in a horror story, the villain is actually the hero. Well, the main protagonist, anyway. And often times, the most interesting character. Can you blame Clarice Starling for being fascinated by Dr. Lecter? And Dexter Morgan—who doesn’t love Dexter? Sweeney Todd, too. Gretchen Lowell. If you haven’t guessed, I have a thing for serial killers. Michael Myers. Leatherface. Jason Voorhees. Fascinating character studies, even if their manners leave a little to be desired.
While I’ve primarily written books and stories in the m/m romance field, I don’t consider myself limited to that genre by any means. And so I decided to branch out when I learned that one of my publishers, MuseitUp, was going to run a locked door series of horror stories. I thought I’d try my hand, although I wasn’t sure how good I’d be at it, or if I could even do it. I surprised myself by not only finishing a story and subbing it, but having it accepted. Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night releases April 5th, and is my first foray into horror, but hopefully not my last. While it is not necessarily horror in the splatterpunk, gory tradition of some modern writers and filmmakers, I think you might say that it is more psychological.
It follows the not uncommon trope of strangers drawn together by the hands of Fate. In this case, travelers who have taken refuge at an inn because of inclement weather. And what happens to them there as their stories converge.
I believe that it would be really hard to write for a genre that you do not enjoy, although some people might argue with that. Sure, you can get things technically correct, but there is a certain feel that I believe only someone who reads it can impart. I’ll let the readers be the judge of whether I have succeeded or not, for I am a true horror fan. In fact, I love serial killers so much that I’m developing one of my own, and look forward to presenting him in time.
Thanks for having me today, Kay! It’s been a pleasure, as always!
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Thanks so much Julie! Read on to find out more about Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, plus leave a comment to win!
Blurb: On a dark and rainy night, a group of travelers takes refuge at the Black Raven inn, seeking shelter from the storm: Two knights who are brothers, and who believe in diametrically opposed doctrines. A brother who questions the path his sister has chosen to take. A mysterious doctor whose presence gives the innkeeper’s daughter chills. A handsome dwarf, half owner of a traveling troupe of actors. Will they find more than they bargained for?
What is the mystery of the locked door?
Scroll on for an excerpt
Lord of the Forest – cover art reveal!
My amazing new cover art for Lord of the Forest – by Anne Cain.
Lord of the Forest is out Tuesday 9th April, from Loose Id. For details of my blog tour and a chance to win a copy click here.
Lord of the Forest blog tour grand announcement – WIN a copy and loads of prizes!
Want to snap up a free copy of my m/m retelling of the legend of Robin Hood, Lord of the Forest? Head over to Stumbling Over Chaos now! ETA – THE DRAW FOR AN EBOOK COPY OF LORD OF THE FOREST IS NOW CLOSED, BUT THE BLOG TOUR DRAW (below) IS STILL VERY MUCH OPEN
Lord of the Forest is out now! Read an excerpt and buy it now from Loose Id. ETA: Also at Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and All Romance.
If you’d like a chance to WIN your choice of any of the current Greenwood novels, Bound for the Forest or Bound to the Beast, in your choice of paperback or ebook—PLUS a $20 Loose Id or All Romance voucher—all you need to do is leave a comment at any of my stops on my Lord of the Forest blog tour. You can enter the draw as many times as you like at the different blogs I visit on my tour. There will be more chances to enter here at my blog over the next couple of weeks, or if you’re uncomfotable posting your email anywhere, you can email me at kayberrisford@yahoo.co.uk. You will be entered Two runners up prizes will be a choice of any of my back catalogue titles in ebook format, excluding Lord of the Forest. Draw closes 4/12/13.
Check out the schedule below! Among other things, I’m going to be blogging on my fave Robin Hood movies, and explaining why I’ve written three books that travel backward through time
30/31 March – Jianne Carlo’s Blog
4th April – Dirty Birdies
5th April – Elin Gregory’s blog
8th April – J.A. Rock’s blog
9th April – RELEASE DAY – Babes in Boyland
10th April – Elisa Rolle’s blog – This will entail a seperate draw for the new release, and is not included in the same contest as the rest of the tour. ETA. ELISA ROLLE’S DRAW IS NOW CLOSED AND WINNER CONTACTED.
11th/12th April – Tara Lain’s blog
12th April – Louisa Bacio’s blog
Thanks to all you lovely visitors to this blog for being so supportive over the past few months. I really appreciate every click, and GOOD LUCK in the contest love k x
PS – there’s still a chance to win a copy of J.L Hayes’s Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night- check out her blog and draw here.
Those Meddling Kids, Macaws, and The Good Boy! Interview and giveaway with Lisa Henry and JA Rock.
I’m thrilled to welcome back two of my favorite writers, who’ve joined forces to create what’s sure to be a masterpiece!!! *does happy dance* Lisa Henry has written m/m BDSM hits, Dark Space, He is Worthy, The Island, and Tribute, while J.A. Rock has blessed the world with the equally awesome By His Rules, Wacky Wednesday, and Calling the Show This week, sees the release of their joined work, The Good Boy, from Loose Id, and Lisa and J.A are kindly going to be giving away a free copy of their new release to one lucky commentator
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Q. You guys have written a book together! Hurrah!! I’m hugely excited about The Good Boy – so, please, tell us all about it! (btw, I thoroughly approve of this warning: “Contains BDSM, some puppy play, and a very obnoxious macaw!”)
J.A.: We are hugely excited about it too! It’s a tale of a wealthy, introverted young man who loses everything when his Wall Street bigwig mother is arrested for running a Ponzi scheme. He makes a deal with a family friend that goes horribly wrong and leaves him broken and unwilling to trust again…until he meets someone who helps him find a strength he didn’t know he had. And yes, there is puppy play, and boy do we love our macaw, Mr. Zimmerman.
L.H.: What she said.
Q. So, how did it happen? What prompted you two to write a book together?
J.A.: I needed $2,516 to fund a trip to Seychelles for spring break. I was walking home from work when I saw a flier on a telephone pole: CO-WRITTEN GAY BDSM ROMANCE NOVEL CONTEST. FIRST PRIZE: $2,516. I begged Lisa Henry to write an entry with me, and I begged her to let me keep all the money if we won. She was totally down with that. We didn’t win the contest, but we did learn a lot about ourselves and that winning isn’t everything. My parents gave me the money for Seychelles. And then we submitted the book to Loose Id.
Lisa, how do you remember it?
L.H.: You forgot the part where the evil owner of the so-called haunted amusement park could have gotten away with it, if it wasn’t for us meddling kids.
J.A.: I knew that asshole wasn’t really an astronaut ghost.
Q. What is the best thing about co-writing?
J.A.: Having someone to share the experience—and the burden—with. There are always those moments in writing where you get stuck or you’re too tired to go on. When you’re co-writing and can’t go on, hopefully Fresh Brain McGee over there can pick up where you left off. I am less nervous about The Good Boy’s release than I have been about any release so far, and I think that’s because every release feels a little like jumping out of a plane. And it’s easier if you get to jump with someone. Unless Lisa doesn’t feel that way about releases, in which case, I can only hope she’ll cast me in a metaphor I don’t agree with.
L.H.: The writing elves who sneak into my computer at night so when I wake up in the morning, there is magically a whole new bunch of words there. Some of them are curiously misspelled, like “gray” and “color” but you get what you pay for, I guess.
And the collaborative process is great. It’s like every day becomes a new brainstorming session, and suddenly you’ve got all these great ideas, and all this energy. If I hit a rut in my own writing, I tend to get stuck there for a while. But with a co-writer, chances are she’ll see the fix before you’ve even realised there’s a problem.
Q. When you got going, what surprised you most about your writing “other half”?
L.H.: From what I can tell, she lives in a bear-infested wilderness and steals the internet. I suspect she is the sort of person my mother warned me not to hang around. But really, what surprised me was how easy it was to write with J.A. We have the same sense of humour, we like the same kinks, and we’re both as disorganised as each other, so it’s a judgement-free zone.
J.A.: Except for the part where I judge her for her Aussie words. (My sense of humor is spelled without a second U, Lisa.) Actually what might have surprised me most was that I think Lisa kind of sells herself short on the organization thing. I mean, okay, neither of us can sit down and plot a novel ahead of time, but we can have a draft together in a month. Lisa’s on top of shit. Writing with Lisa was easy because I feel like we both brought it—there weren’t power struggles, but it felt like we were equally enthusiastic and equally involved.
L.H.: Oh my god. On top of shit? You don’t even know me at all. You remember how earlier I had to stop writing because I had an appointment at my hairdresser’s? Yeah, turns out that’s tomorrow.
J.A.: Oh, wow. That is bad. On top of writing shit, at least. Come on. How else did we write 97,000 words in five weeks? I’m not suggesting you’re the kind of person who pays your bills on time, or files your taxes efficiently, or remembers to feed your dog. Just that when you say you’re gonna write a scene, you write it. LET ME BELIEVE IN YOU.
Q. Any exciting WIPs to tell us about – either together or apart?
J.A.: Ooh! Ooh, Lisa, tell her!
L.H.: You know, a week ago this would have been a very different answer. Then J.A. sent me an email with “Guess what, I’ve got a good idea if you’re interested…” and five days later I’m looking at this 25 000 word WIP that we’ve created, and wondering why I can never write this quickly on my own. It’s called Under.
How’s this for an impromptu blurb: Daniel Whitlock might be the best-looking gay guy in Logan, but that’s not saying much. And no way is Joe Belman going to get involved, since Bel’s a cop, and Daniel Whitlock is a…what the hell is he?
Crazy. A killer. A liar. A tweaker. A freak. Unless you believe that bullshit defence his lawyers came up with at trial. Maybe Daniel’s none of those things. Maybe he really was sleepwalking when he burned a guy to death. So Bel cuffing him to a bed is just for his own safety, right? And everyone else’s. It’s not like Bel’s going to go there…
And now I’ve just realised that this is a terrible blurb. For starters, it has the word “bullshit” in it. Also, the tone is way off. Our story is creepier than the blurb implies. This is why J.A. is now formally in charge of blurbs.
J.A.: I love the blurb, “bullshit” and all. Hey, I put “gives legendary head” in the blurb for my first book and now I have to live with that choice for the rest of my life. But you’re right, Under is definitely more creepy than kinky right now. Gay BDSM Steven King.
Q. What more important to you in BDSM romance – representing fantasy or real life?
J.A.: I am more interested in representing real life, though I do appreciate a mix. In By His Rules, I played a little to that fantasy idea of BDSM—that there are leather clubs everywhere with fully equipped dungeons that you can just walk into with your vanilla buddies like it’s Bring a Friend Friday at your local gym. Do you know how hard it is to get into a BDSM club if you’re not a member? Or how much money it costs to use a legit dungeon? Fantasy! And yet I like the fantasy, so sometimes I’ll use it. Though I prefer the more everyday-living side of BDSM. Even The Good Boy, for all its darkness, is, I think, pretty down to earth in its kink.
For a long time BDSM was underrepresented in fiction. Now it seems like what’s underrepresented are realistic depictions of BDSM. Obviously, there is no fixed “reality,” because BDSM is different for everybody. But it’s human beings armed with all kinds of crazy equipment—rarely does everything go smoothly! Yet we have all these books where it’s this dark, sensual, transcendent experience, and the players are always at the top of their game and the vibrating harness never malfunctions. Sometimes it is transcendent. And sometimes your butt plug starts to slide out in the middle of a shopping trip with your Domme and you have to hide behind a coat rack and Whac-A-Mole it back in through your shorts. I’m not saying that’s ever happened to anyone in this room, but…that’s real life.
L.H.: I’m a switch. Sometimes I want to write the fantasy, and sometimes I want to write the reality (but still packaged in the fantasy of a happy ending, right, since this is romance?). One thing J.A. and I did agree on when we were writing The Good Boy was that we were super sick of all those mysterious billionaire Doms who do nothing but hang out at sex clubs looking for their next sub. What we wanted was an everyday Dom: a normal guy with a normal job and normal worries and responsibilities. Because there’s still this weird things in a lot of BDSM romance where the Dom has to be mysterious and dark and wealthy, even though it’s just as likely that the guy who delivers your mail likes to clamp someone’s nipples on his day off.
How do all those billionaire Doms get to be billionaires anyway? They never go to work.
J.A.: It rains Dom dollars from heaven.
Q. It’s the zombie apocalypse. You can pick two characters from any of your books to help you fight them – who would you pick? And who’d get chosen last?
L.H.: Zev from The Island, because…hello! The man is a killer. If the zombies are coming, I want someone who won’t hesitate to do what needs to be done. And Brady from Dark Space, because he’s running on so much anger that he doesn’t know when to quit fighting. So while he’s doing that, maybe I could run away.
I would choose Mr. Zimmerman from The Good Boy last. His offensive language and bright colours would only give away our position. You guys remember he’s the macaw, right?
J.A.: Can I pick characters from Lisa’s books? I feel like mine would be useless in the zombie apocalypse. Okay, fine, I’ll take Keaton from By His Rules, so that I could watch him try to reason with the zombies. I’ll bet at least a few of them would see the error of their ways and bend over his knee for a spanking. And then Brin from The Good Boy because I know he would show up in the ultimate warrior outfit, probably with some kind of steampunk assault rifle that plays 80s club songs when you pull the trigger.
I agree about Mr. Z.
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Yay! Thanks for answering guys (I so want to see Keaton reasoning with those zombies, and see more of Brady too–all so awesome. Can’t wait to meet Brin and Mr Zimmerman–oh, and Daniel and Bel!)
Here’s the blurbs for The Good Boy–and please scroll on for an excerpt and a chance to WIN!!
Introverted college student Lane Moredock is in a bad place. His mother has been arrested for securities fraud, his father is on the run, and everyone, including the SEC, suspects Lane knows where the missing millions are. Lane, with no money and nowhere to live, makes a desperate deal that lands him in trouble and leaves him unwilling to trust a so-called Dom again.
Photographer Derek Fields lost money to the Moredocks, and is as sure as anyone that Lane is guilty despite his claims. A chance meeting with Lane shows him there might be something more to the young man than arrogance and privilege, and Derek wonders if Lane might be just what he’s been looking for: a sub with the potential to be a life partner.
As Lane slowly begins to open up to Derek and explore his needs as a submissive, the investigation closes tighter around him. Lane might be everything that Derek wants, but first Derek needs to trust that Lane is innocent–and Lane needs to trust Derek with the truth.
Excerpt:
Ferg looked at Derek. “You ready?”
“If you are.”
“More than.”
Lane was behind the counter. There was no one else up there.
Derek made a decision. “One minute,” he told Ferg. “I’ll meet you outside.”
He went to the counter. Nodded at Lane, then glanced up at the menu. “Could I have one Triple Tuna Taco to go?”
Lane rang it up without looking at him. “Four twenty-three.”
Derek handed him a five. “I could use an assistant.”
Lane froze.
“For this photo shoot I’m doing, with the shelter dogs. Someone to help set up, dog wrangle, and hold the damn reflectors. You seem good with dogs. If you’re interested, let me know. I’ll pay you as well as I can—which isn’t well, but it’s something. I can work around your schedule here too.”
Lane looked at the card but made no move to take it. “I’m not interested.” He gave Derek his change. Derek tried not to stare at the bruises on his wrists.
“Well, keep the card. In case you change your mind. The shoot’ll be going on through the end of the month.”
Derek pushed the card a little closer. He had a vision of Andy, the gold dog in Christy’s kennel, refusing to take the treat until Christy was out of sight.
Across the room, someone slammed a tray down. Lane flinched. His pulse jerked in his neck, and his hands still shook.
“Lane,” Derek said softly. His first time saying the name out loud. He liked it.
Lane looked at him, finally meeting his gaze.
“You okay?”
Lane didn’t answer right away. Then he nodded slowly.
Bullshit.
“Maybe go outside,” Derek said. “Ask for a break for a few minutes. See if that helps.”
Lame advice. And why was he giving the kid advice at all? Except that Derek had seen subs panicked, stressed, or confused, and his first instinct was to help. Even if Lane wasn’t his sub. Even if Lane wasn’t a sub period. Even if last time Derek had seen him, he’d accused him of not caring about Acton Wagner’s suicide.
A lot of help that must have been.
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If you’d like to be in with a chance of winning The Good Boy, please leave a comment here, including your email when prompted. Your email will not be displayed or used for any other purpose. Comp. closes 2nd April. Thank you! ETA – CONTEST NOW CLOSED.
PS – For a chance to win my m/m retelling of the Robin Hood legend. Lord of the Forest, pop over to Stumbling over Chaos. For a chance to win a $20 GC and more books, check out my blog at Jianne Carlo’s.
Lord of the Forest – release date! Plus my A to Z of the Greenwood universe.
Not Robin Hood, but Sir Galahad, as depicted by G.W. Watts (1817-1904)
I can now (with 95% certainty) announce that Lord of the Forest will be released on the 9th April–two weeks from today! To celebrate, I have attempted to list it on Goodreads (you can now add it here.) If any librarian out there could take pity on me and list is as part of the Greenwood series, that would be awesome–it wouldn’t let me do it 
EDIT – thank you Megan Derr for fixing this
Lots of exciting stuff coming up here this week. Tomorrow, I’ve got Lisa Henry and J.A. Rock guesting, and there will be a chance to WIN a copy of their brand new release, The Good Boy. Thursday, Chris is kindly going to be hosting a giveaway for Lord of the Forest over at Stumbling Over Chaos. Then on Friday, I’m going to be announcing the details of my Lord of the Forest blog tour.
In the meantime, please check out my brand new A to Z of the Greenwood series, which provides a lowdown on the universe, settings, and characters in all the books. If you have any questions about the series, it’s a great place to ask, as I can directly incorporate the answer into the guide. I’ve avoided any major spoilers. However, if you want to remain completely oblivious of anything to do with the next book, then maybe steer clear. If you’re curious about some of the characters and settings or want to refresh your memory about Bound for the Forest and Bound to the Beast, then do please drop by
Prisoner of the Mountain Watch – Cover Art Reveal.
I’m proud to unveil the beautiful cover art for my forthcoming short story, Prisoner of the Mountain Watch, which will be available to download for free on 15th April (Date TBC). Design is by the very talented Ria Chantler. ETA. DOWNLOAD IT NOW FOR FREE!
Megan Derr has kindly put Prisoner of the Mountain Watch on Goodreads, so you can now add it there.
Blurb: Once a great warrior, Ivenhal now leads a lonely existence, banished by his people because he’s lain with other men. When he captures an enemy elf, his life takes an unexpected turn.
Countdown to Lord of the Forest – who was Robin Hood?
Next month, I’m going to be launching my m/m version of the Robin Hood legend, Lord of the Forest, set in my magical Greenwood universe of history, legend, and myth. Details of my blog tour and chances to WIN Greenwood books in ebook and paperback plus a $20 GC will be posted here very soon. However, I thought I’d start the party here today by asking the burning question…
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Who was Robin Hood?
Image of an archer from Winchester Cathedral.
It’s the question that everyone can answer—and yet nobody knows. Robin Hood is about as famous as you can get, and has been for nearly eight hundred years. He’s the English forest outlaw who robs from the rich and gives to the poor. He’s the good guy, the ultimate hero. But who was he—and did he exist? The debate will probably rage on for another eight hundred years.
The earliest mention of Robin Hood can be found in the Pipe Rolls of Yorkshire (no, not Nottinghamshire!) in 1230, where a “Robertus Hood, Fugitivus,” is referenced. After that, his celebrity spread fast among all levels of English society. In 1377, a character called Sloth in The Vision of Piers Plowman, claims he doesn’t know the Lord’s Prayer, but he knows “rhymes of Robin Hood.”
These early tales, most of which were never written down, bore little resemblance to the sweeping films and TV series of recent times. The character development was scant, the focus being on action, fighting, trickery, and disguise. There’s a good reason for this: the stories were not designed to be read on one’s own, but performed out loud, or even acted out. Robin is often a great fighter, though not always the best. Though he usually won archery contests, he could often be beaten in other forms of fighting, notable by his good friend, Little John.
Robin’s band of friends are a strong presence from the start, coming to the rescue when things go badly for our hero. Marian doesn’t turn up till over two hundred years later (1508). There were other, earlier love interests for Robin, and it is possible Marian was added because it had become custom to perform Robin Hood plays at May time. For Robin to have a queen of the forest tied in nicely with May spring rituals. Moreover, a French Robin and Marian—neither of them relations to the English Robin Hood—had presided over May Day festivities on the other side of the channel since the thirteenth century, so our Marian might have travelled across from France.
In the earliest representations, Robin was never a nobleman. He fought the strict laws against hunting and forage that the Normans imposed on the common folk of England. These laws were challenged in 1217—when Lord of the Forest is set. My Robin bands up with on-and-off Robin Hood alumni Herne the Hunter and others to fight the greedy barons. To be in honest, in the earliest tales, Robin doesn’t give much back to the poor, but instead represents an ideal of resistance and hope against tyranny. Romantic tales of Robin as a knight returning from the Crusades to find his lands usurped, while providing a great narrative structure, come much later. The evil sheriff, on the other hand, was there from the start, and is Robin’s foe in the earliest surviving manuscript, Robin Hood and the Monk (1450.)
But did Robin ever exist? No doubt there were many outlaws who resisted the brutal rule of Norman law in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.
Rochester Castle – snapped by me yesterday!
Like tales of Robin, which are far from restricted to Sherwood and Nottingham, these men and women hailed from all over England. The people of the New Forest were among those who had plenty to resist. As many of you will know, the Greenwood in my books is based upon the New Forest, about fifteen minutes drive from where I live in Southampton. When William the Conqueror converted the region into a royal hunting ground in 1079, thirty-six villages and churches were apparently swept away, and brutal laws were imposed for the next few centuries to prevent commoners’ grubbing food from the land. The most famous of these laws decreed that folk could only hunt in the forest if their dog was small enough to fit through the verdurer’s stirrup (and if too large, parts of the poor dog could be lopped off!)
The New Forest apparently turned to magic to get its revenge. As those of you who’ve read Bound for the Forest might recall, William II (Rufus) the Conqueror’s heir and then king, was killed by an arrow during a hunting trip in the forest apparently unleashed by the fairies, and the blood harvest did not stop there. Rufus’s brother and three other relatives of the Conqueror were also slain in the New Forest, allegedly in suitably ritualistic fashions. Duke Robert was killed by an arrow through his throat, and his son was hanged from an oak by his hair!
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A modern (and rather surprised!) Green Man, found in Kent.
The Green Man—a half-man tree-shifter, usually depicted in carving as a human face interwoven with foliage—was a common image in English art and architecture in the eleventh to fifteenth centuries. A pagan symbol, he was arguably a form of resistance to new religions and forms of law. Somewhat like Robin Hood then, and I’m not the first to wonder if they were related.
That’s the joy of the English forests. Magic is never far away! Robin Hood has also woven his way in and out of fairy tales. As early as the sixteenth century, historians were suggesting his origins were pagan, and that he might be a close cousin of Robin Goodfellow–a.k.a Puck. Was Robin a fairy? Or could he be a Green Man, who emerges from the depths of the forests to aid needy folk and gain vengeance on those who harmed them?
My Robin in Lord of the Forest doesn’t know where he’s come from either, having been abandoned in Inglewood as a child. He also questions why Robin Hood is the most famous name in England, when his friends have also long fought for justice. After a long struggle, he finds his answers. So did I, in the same way people have been discovering the truth of Robin Hood for eight hundred years—by making up a new version of a very old story, and having a great deal of fun to boot!
Check back soon to find out more about the characters in Lord of the Forest, the dates for my blog tour, and lots of chances to WIN Greenwood books, plus a $20 GC!
Goodreads Book Giveaway
Bound for the Forest
by Kay Berrisford
Giveaway ends April 14, 2013.
See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.
