Nine Star Press

Scarred by Mia Kerrick: Quick Review

January 21, 2019 by Denise

Even in paradise, beautiful faces can hide scarred souls.

ONE tropical island.

Placida Island’s gentle ocean breezes and rolling surf beckon to those who wish to reside in remote tropical serenity.

TWO men living in self-imposed exile.

Wearing twisted ropes of mutilated skin on his back and carrying devastating damage in his soul from severe childhood abuse, Matthew North lives alone in a rustic cabin on the shore, avoiding human contact.

Gender fluidity his perceived “crime” against family and friends, Vedie Wilson flees his childhood home so he can freely express his identity.

THREE persecutors seeking their warped view of justice.

Vedie’s past refuses to stay in the faraway city he left behind when family members, intent on forcing him to change, threaten the precious peace he’s found.

TOO MANY scars to count.

Their beautiful faces masking deeply scarred souls, Matt and Vedie live in hiding from the world and each other.

Can they unite and embrace each other’s painful pasts, leaving the scars behind, to find love?

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I have a bit of a fetish for broken characters. Not just broken. Like totally effed up characters. And if both main characters are broken? Yaassss!

And that is why I wanted to read this book. And I am so glad I did.

Warning though. This book is brutal. The author does not shy away from abuse, both physical and sexual, including of a child. It is far from gratuitous. The way it is told as journal entries makes you want to weep, but it is not voyeuristic.

Matt lives in self imposed seclusion because of a severely traumatic even in his childhood. But not 100%. He goes out to eat by himself, goes to the store, etc. He just doesn’t have anyone in his life. No one. No friends, he sees his parents briefly once or twice a year and works from home. So when the new bus boy at the restaurant he frequents talks to him, flirts with him, propositions him, he is compelled to say yes.

Vedie (I love this name, seriously) basically ran away from home, even though he is 21 years old. He has been non-binary ever since he could remember. Sometimes he felt like a boy, sometimes a girl, sometimes neither. That didn’t fly in the tough neighborhood in Boston he grew up in. So his mother threw him out and he runs because his brothers and cousin think they can beat him into being only a boy.

Matt and Vedie very slowly develop a relationship. One that is undefined. It is sometimes sexual, often times platonic and nearly always unspoken of. Matt cannot speak of his feelings and Vedie wants to not only talk about it, he wants to hear it. Both of these men so desperately need love from another person.

I devoured every word of this book. The way Vedie’s personality and speech patterns change with what gender he is presenting at the time are so well done. And while “boy” Vedie can be a bit over the top in his overt machismo, it goes back to his days in Boston and having to show people he was a boy.

There are some excellent secondary characters- Sheila, Vedie’s co-worker and her girlfriend, who love Vedie as he is even if he doesn’t realize it. Matt’s parents, who I thought I would feel sorry for but I absolutely didn’t. And Joey who I wanted to punch in the face.

I hate to say that there wasn’t a ton of “plot” because that sounds awful, but there was a TON of story. I don’t know if that made sense. But I got to immerse myself in Matt and Vedie and not have to worry so much about x, y and z.

If you were a fan of Violence Begets, put this on the top of your TBR.

4.75 Pieces of Eye Candy

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Bump by Matthew J. Metzger: Exclusive Guest Post and Excerpt, Blog Tour and Giveaway

November 20, 2018 by Denise

TCO is very excited to have Matthew J. Metzger on the blog today with an EXCLUSIVE Guest Post and Excerpt from his latest release, Bump. The Guest Post speaks so much to where David, the MC, as well as the author is in their life. And the Excerpt…that’s going to draw you in! Make sure you enter the giveaway!

David’s pregnant.

He’s always wanted to have children, and being a stepfather for the past two years has been a great adventure. There’d even been a plan to start looking into adoption and turn their family of three into four.

But now there’s a bump, and David doesn’t know what to do. He’s spent years escaping the grip of his own body and burying the past—but there’s no way he can hide from his history if he lets the bump get any bigger. It’s not just his baby; it’s also his breakdown.

He doesn’t know if he can do this.

Title: Bump

Author: Matthew J. Metzger

Publisher: NineStar Press

Release Date: November 5, 2018

Heat Level: 1 – No Sex

Pairing: Male/Male

Length: 70900

Genre: Contemporary, contemporary, trans, bisexual, established couple, interracial, veterinarian, disability/car accident, depression, family issues, homophobia, children, pregnancy, body dysphoria, #ownvoices

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She knew. They all knew, his judo friends. They were all his university friends. But David had found that a strange thing happened over the years, once the passing had kicked in.

People forgot.

They just—forgot. In the beginning, there was a sharp tinge of awareness about everything, like everyone saw that he was trans before they saw that he was David. Like they’d remember his identity prior to his name. But after his first surgery, when he’d jumped from obviously trans to obviously a man, the people around him just seemed to forget. There had been…moments. Incidents where it became obvious they no longer quite remembered. The night out after he and James had passed their blue belt, where James told him to hurry up and stop waiting for the cubicle and just use the urinal. The day Vicky had rummaged through his bathroom cabinet in search of condoms to steal for her own use, and had a go at him.

“You could get someone pregnant!” she’d raged, and David just stared in stupefaction at her.

He looked obvious now—but people forgot. People saw what they wanted to see. And so he knew—knew—Vicky wouldn’t guess right.

“I’m not ill,” he said.

“So explain—”

“I’m pregnant.”

The above is a scene from my latest novel, Bump. David accidentally gets pregnant and has to deal with everything that means, from the practical aspects of simply having a child, to the mental strain of being a man and being pregnant at the same time.

David, of course, is trans.

But permit me a guilty twinge there—because David doesn’t like to identify as trans. He’s just a man. Just David.

He was tired. Tired of work, tired of Sam, tired of being pregnant, tired of being able to be pregnant. He was tired of being a trans man instead of just a man. Tired of being David now, instead of David always.

David is a first for me as a trans author—but he’s also possibly the closest to where I am in my own life. David is thirty-two, transitioned a long time ago, and is purposefully and happily closeted when it comes to his colleagues and even his partner’s family. He’s not involved with any LGBT community, and doesn’t want to be. He’s a man, rather than a trans man.

(So I always feel a little twinge of guilt when I tag this as trans.)

But it’s not something I’ve seen much of in trans fiction, especially with trans men. There is this idea that we are trans first, trans always, trans and—often—nothing else. And that always sits strangely with me because in meatspace, away from my pen name and tweeting, I am increasingly like David.

I got a new job recently, and went from out and proud to happily back in the closet. My neighbours don’t know. Of the six people closest to me in the world, only two of them are queer—and neither of them live near me. I will go weeks or even months without being in the same physical space as a queer friend. Increasingly, I have friends who don’t know I’m trans at all. I have stopped thinking of myself as trans, and have to actively remember not to shave the day before a gym session in case I lose my ability to pass.

I am slowly drifting apart from my label.

I am forgetting.

It sounds impossible, doesn’t it? Yet when I am away from my phone and preparations for my final surgery, I am starting to forget where I came from. Recently I started to write a lesbian romance, and needed to name a character. I gave her the first name that popped into my head, and carried on. Three chapters later, I realised I’d given her my deadname. I’d not seen or heard it in so long, it felt like a whole new name I was finding for the first time.

So yes, I am trans. Bump is a trans story. But—

It’s more and less than that at the same time.

It’s the labels have started to dissolve, and what identity feels like afterwards.

Chapter One

“Thank you,” David said. “Yes. I’ll check my diary and make an appointment. Yes. Thank you. Goodbye.”

He hung up and—very calmly—dropped the phone out of the car window. Wound the window back up. Reversed a little to give himself room to wriggle out from behind the BMW in front.

And—just as calmly—made sure to run over the phone with the rear tyre as he drove off.

His palms were sweaty on the steering wheel. His heart was thundering low in his stomach. David hadn’t had a panic attack in nearly ten years, but the feeling was as familiar as ever—the creeping darkness at the edges of his vision, the hyperawareness of his own skin, the tightness across his ribs like he was having an asthma attack. He tightened his grip. He needed to get control of himself. He was thirty-two years old. He could—would—handle this like the responsible adult that he was.

He refused to break down screaming at the wheel of a car, for God’s sake.

Thankfully, the phone call had happened just around the corner from his usual parking spot. He slid the car into a free space and bent forward to rest his forehead on the wheel. He raked a deep breath in, held it for a count of ten, and let it out slowly.

All right.

So the test result was more or less his worst nightmare. And he’d probably be having nightmares too.

But it could have been worse. Practically speaking. It was a fixable nightmare. He could fix it. It didn’t matter right now. He didn’t have to deal with it this minute. He could talk to Ryan tonight, make an appointment in the morning—just not the one he’d promised the nurse on the results line—and fix everything.

Slowly, his heart rate started to come down out of the rafters. The tight band around his chest didn’t ease, but it got a little easier to breathe.

“Fix it tomorrow,” he mumbled.

He straightened, squared his shoulders, and opened the door.

David never bothered trying to park right near the school. It was always a melee of mums and Mitsubishis, and he was terrified of someone’s kid running into the road right under his bumper. It was cool outside, threatening rain. The short walk helped clear the rest of the panic out of his head, and refocus. Ava didn’t need to know about it. Everything was fine, all happy and normal, no problems whatsoever, nothing.

The school gates were crowded as always, but David had an advantage. In a sea of white mums, he stood out a mile. He leaned against the metal fence, peering through the railings, until he caught sight of two frizzy baubles of hair stuck out either side of a pair of wide, searching eyes.

He waved, and the eyes lit up.

“David!”

“Sorry, excuse me, sorry, thanks, sorry—”

He wrestled his way to the front just in time to stoop and catch Ava as she hurled herself at his thighs. He hoisted her up and turned to carry her through the crowd. She babbled in his ear about finger painting, pizza, and a new gold star on her behaviour chart, and then clung obstinately when he dropped her to the pavement again.

“Only babies need carrying during the daytime,” David said. “You’re not a baby anymore, are you?”

It had been an infallible obedience tool ever since she started school. She let go with a sulky expression and jammed her sticky hand into his.

“Can we have pizza?” she repeated.

“We’ll ask Daddy.”

“Daddy never says yes to pizza,” Ava said mournfully, in the same tone of voice one might use to say someone had died.

“Daddy doesn’t eat pizza,” David corrected. “That doesn’t mean we can’t have pizza sometimes. You had pizza on your birthday, remember?”

She brightened up. “It was Jamie’s birthday today!”

“That’s nice.”

“So we can have pizza for Jamie!”

“I don’t think it works like that.”

Her buoyant mood was calming, even if Ava was more of a hurricane than anything else. She was five and three-quarters (never just five) and brimming over with energy. She didn’t even have the decency to get tired by seven o’clock like normal five-year-olds. She went to bed at the same time as her parents—and usually rocketed back out of it again by six o’clock the next morning.

Still, her effusive enthusiasm helped. There was nothing to panic about. He could fix things, and everything would be back to normal next month anyway.

“Tell me about your new gold star,” he said as she scrambled up into the back seat. “Do you need help with your seatbelt?”

“No,” she said, giving him a look definitely inherited from her mum. “I’m five. And three-quarters. I can do my own seatbelt.”

“Show me,” David said.

To be fair, she could. Albeit with a lot of faffing about. Once he heard the click, he promised a new star for her chart at home and closed the door. In the short time it took him to walk around the car and get into the driver’s seat, she’d started a whole new deluge of noise masquerading as conversation, all about how rainbows were made.

David’s chest slowly unlocked as he drove home to the background noise of a five-year-old on rainbows and a fifty-year-old on the radio. He could hand her off to Ryan once they were back, lock himself in the bathroom, and have a cry in the shower under the pretence of a long, hard day at work. Maybe even have a soak in the bath. He felt bad palming Ava off on her dad, especially on a Thursday, but—

Christ.

He just didn’t have the energy. Not after that phone call.

Home was a roomy bungalow with a long, narrow back garden, a decent view over some fields, and the ugliest bay windows in the front David had ever seen. According to the locals, it was in a village near Wakefield. According to everyone else—including David, who wasn’t even from Yorkshire and was therefore regarded as an immigrant—it was in Wakefield. The rest of the street was occupied by elderly white people called Gerald and Betty whose lives revolved around gardening, Antiques Roadshow, and Women’s Institute bake sales.

Ryan and Ava had been acceptable when they first moved in. Cute toddlers were tickets to acceptance in these sorts of villages, David suspected. And he’d found out the other week that half of them thought Ryan was ex-army, which meant all the old blokes liked him by default. But when David moved in, that popularity had taken a definite dive.

David didn’t really care. He was from Salford. He could think of a lot worse than some tuts and disapproving scowls from ninety-six-year-old Pamela next door. She was there, peering out from behind her lace curtains, as he pulled into the drive. He waved, and the curtain dropped.

“We’re going to be nice and quiet,” he told Ava as he opened the door to let her out of the car. “Daddy went to see Nathan this morning, so he might still be tired.”

Ava nodded, dragging her bag out after her.

“If Daddy’s asleep, can we have pizza before he wakes up?” she chirped as David unlocked the front door.

“Nope, Daddy will want dinner too.”

“But—”

“Aha!”

Ryan’s booming voice bounced down the hall towards them as David opened the door. Ava squealed and shot into the kitchen, jumping up at her dad like she hadn’t seen him in a thousand years rather than eight hours.

“Hello, my little star!” He planted a loud kiss on her cheek and grinned up at David. “What’s this? Two stars! Well, well, well. What have I done to deserve this, eh?”

Then he smiled, a brilliant flash of white streaking across his face like torchlight. And David—relaxed.

That was all it took sometimes. Just for Ryan to flash him that megawatt grin, and all the fight seemed to drain out of David’s body. Even the internal fight. Ryan had that—that air about him. When he smiled, when he laughed, when he was happy, it was like the whole world had to be happy as well. It was like everything faded away and was replaced with a warm contentment, a feeling of security, the sense that no matter what happened, he had Ryan with him.

He hadn’t fallen in love with Ryan at first. He’d fallen in love with that smile.

In a lot of ways, Ryan was a ball-ache of a boyfriend. Complete slob. Rap fan. Thought curries every night were compatible with a sex life. David had become a de facto stepdad not three months into their relationship from the sheer number of times Ryan simply forgot which weekend he was supposed to have Ava, and had had to ring David on his way home to swing by the school and pick her up.

But Ryan made him feel—

Warm.

And David could use warm. Unceremoniously, he hoisted Ava up by the armpits, plonked her on the kitchen tiles, and sat in Ryan’s lap looping both arms around his shoulders and burrowing his face shamelessly into that thick neck.

Matthew J. Metzger is an ace, trans author posing as a functional human being in the wilds of Yorkshire, England. Although mainly a writer of contemporary, working-class romance, he also strays into fantasy when the mood strikes. Whatever the genre, the focus is inevitably on queer characters and their relationships, be they familial, platonic, sexual, or romantic.

When not crunching numbers at his day job, or writing books by night, Matthew can be found tweeting from the gym, being used as a pillow by his cat, or trying to keep his website in some semblance of order.

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Good Boys by Keelan Ellis: RDB, Excerpt and Giveaway

June 5, 2018 by Denise

Having risen through the ranks of the Baltimore City Police Department to the elite Homicide unit as an out gay man, Paul Solomon has always prided himself on his integrity and self-reliance. As the last vestiges of his failed eight-year-long relationship fall away, Paul finds himself adrift, forced to rely on others to help him find his footing again.

When Paul and his partner, Tim Cullen, are called to the scene of a double murder of two high school students on the city’s west side, Paul finds the lives and deaths of the two boys hitting closer to home than he’d expected. With his personal life in upheaval, he struggles with the perspective needed to untangle the web of secrets and lies that led to their demise.

While working his way through the complicated case, Paul starts getting his life back together. After a date with an enigmatic young man takes a dark turn, he reaches out to an old flame who brings some much-needed lightness to his life. But Paul finds that relationships, like murder investigations, are never as simple as he’d like.

Title: Good Boys

Series: The Solomon Mysteries, Book One

Author: Keelan Ellis

Publisher: NineStar Press

Release Date: June 4, 2018

Heat Level: 1 – No Sex

Pairing: No Romance

Length: 66100

Genre: Contemporary, contemporary, crime, law enforcement, mystery

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Chapter One

Before he even opened his eyes, Paul knew something was wrong. He could feel the heat of the morning sun on his face in a way that never happened in his west-facing bedroom, but for a few seconds, he couldn’t figure out why it was wrong. The bed felt familiar enough and smelled familiar too.

Oh, shit.

He sat up slowly, rubbing his face and pressing the heels of his hands into his forehead as if that might somehow hold back the monster headache pushing its way into the backs of his eyes. His stomach lurched as he carefully swung his feet onto the floor, and he took a few calming breaths until it passed. He made his way to the bathroom, at one point losing his balance slightly and bumping into the wall.

In the shower, he leaned up against the slick tiles and angled the showerhead so the water hit him. He tried closing his eyes, but little pinpricks of light blossomed behind his lids. When dizziness set in, he opened them again. Bits and pieces of the night before crept into his consciousness, and he sincerely wished he could block them out for a little while longer. No such luck. The stack of flattened boxes waiting for him in the entryway—and the expression on Andy’s face as he told him he needed to move out—started the whole thing. They’d fought. There were tears, followed by wine and then scotch. Paul was pretty sure what happened next wouldn’t surprise a single goddamn person in the entire world. The worst part was it wasn’t the first time it had happened, and he’d been no less regretful any of the other times. One might think he’d learn his lesson eventually.

Paul stayed in the shower until the hot water was gone, swallowed three Advil, and stared at himself in the mirror. At thirty-eight, he still had his dark curls, but his beard was starting to come in gray where he used to have some copper strands. That morning, he could see the future in his face. He looked ten years older, at a minimum. He picked up his razor and shaved carefully, still managing to nick his jawline with his unsteady hand.

Oh well, maybe I’ll actually resemble a real cop today. Too bad I don’t have any short-sleeved dress shirts. Not that his work wardrobe was any great shakes, but Andy had started buying him ties back when he first joined the homicide squad, and he had excellent taste. In their better days, he’d sometimes tie them for Paul before he headed out the door for his commute to the city. But that was years ago.

Ten minutes later, he was downstairs in the kitchen hunting for his stainless-steel travel mug. He wasn’t late, but he didn’t want to hang around the house and was hoping to make it out the door without a conversation. He poured himself coffee, dumped in some cream, and was just congratulating himself on his success when he walked right past Andy on the way to the door.

“Good morning,” Andy said, sounding much more like a co-worker than a boyfriend of nearly eight years.

Paul couldn’t detect any anger or even regret about the previous evening, but there was no warmth in Andy’s voice at all. He looked at the man sitting on the living room sofa, seeing him more clearly than he had in a while. It was impossible to tell that he was hungover, even though he’d had at least as much to drink as Paul. He was wearing a beautiful wool-silk blend sweater with a pair of slim, dark jeans that had surely cost more than Paul’s entire suit. No tie today, so he must be working from home. His blond hair, just now starting to be touched with silver, shone in the sun coming in through the window. At forty-four, he was in amazing shape and still as gorgeous as the day they’d met. Paul wondered, as he often did, why he couldn’t make himself feel the way he once had about him.

“Hey,” Paul said, “I’ve got a lot of shit to catch up on at work, so I should get going.”

Andy rolled his eyes, winced slightly, and touched his temple. “Don’t worry. I’m not up for a conversation this morning. I wanted to make sure you understand that nothing changes just because we fucked, okay? That was goodbye sex. You still have to move out.”

Anger flared in Paul’s chest. As if he didn’t know that already. Despite his desire to get out the door, he found himself warming to an argument. “Yeah? No shit. Did you think I thought we were getting back together or something? Jesus, we broke up six months ago. If that was an option, it would have happened before now. Did you imagine I was hoping the third time was a charm?”

“Paul,” he said, softening a little, “I can’t do this right now. I get that you’re pissed and you don’t want to deal with it, but I can’t move on with you in my house. It’s too confusing.”

My house. Andy had bought the house in northwest Baltimore County less than a month after they’d started dating. Paul had been promoted to detective a year earlier. Six months later he’d moved in. Two years after that, he’d made it to the homicide division. He’d become a murder police. That had been his goal since he’d joined the department. He enjoyed the job—found it satisfying—but the commute and the crazy hours of a Baltimore City detective were hard on a relationship. You could see the evidence of that everywhere. It had taken a toll on his relationship with Andy, but they both knew it couldn’t all be blamed on the job.

“Yeah, you said that last night. I’m on it, okay?”

“That’s what you said three months ago.” Andy sounded more tired than angry. “Please. I really need you to follow through this time.”

“I said I’m on it. Today. I promise.” Paul hesitated before reaching for the doorknob. “Should I say I’m sorry about last night?”

“Are you?” Andy asked, raising his eyebrows slightly.

Paul gave him a little smile and shook his head. “Not really.”

Keelan Ellis is an author of romance and detective fiction, who is always seeking to expand her literary horizons. She is a lover of music and food, and has an intense love/hate relationship with politics. Her stories reflect her passions.

Author Links

Website: http://keelanellis.blogspot.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kellisauthor

Twitter: https://twitter.com/KeelanEllisAuth

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Tiki Torches and Treasure by J.C. Long: Release Day Blitz with Excerpt and Giveaway

November 6, 2017 by Denise

Title: Tiki Torches and Treasure

Series: Gabe Maxfield Mysteries, Book 2

Author: J.C Long

Publisher: NineStar Press

Release Date: November 6, 2017

Heat Level: 3 – Some Sex

Pairing: Male/Male

Length: 60000

Genre: Contemporary, contemporary, gay, romance, private detective, cozy mystery, law enforcement, Hawaii, humor

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Gabe Maxfield has reached a comfortable point in his life. His past troubles in Seattle are all but forgotten, he co-owns his own business, Paradise Investigations, with his best friend Grace Park, and he’s happy in his relationship with sexy cop—his neighbor—Maka Kekoa. Maybe the best part is, no one’s pointed a gun at him in weeks.

Knowing his luck, that is bound to change. Lack of clients and money forces Paradise Investigations to take a job helping Edwin Biers search for a treasure he promises will be worth their while. Gabe has a knack for finding trouble, though, and find it, he does.

Chapter One

I was drowning.

Salt water burned my nose as I flailed my arms and legs in the ocean, trying desperately to reorient myself. Every time I started to surface, the ocean waves broke over me again and again. I was done for.

When I finally surfaced and the water drained from my ears, I could hear my companions laughing at my expense—my best friend, Grace Park, sounded like she was going to asphyxiate herself from laughing too hard. My boyfriend, Maka Kekoa, at least had the decency to attempt to hide his laughter from me.

“I’m glad my near-death causes you such amusement,” I growled, glaring at them as best I could with salt water from the Pacific Ocean stinging my eyes. “I knew surfing lessons from you two was a bad idea.”

The three of us were floating in the ocean a ways off from the shore of Waikiki Beach in Honolulu, Hawaii, the city I now called home. Well, I was floating in the ocean, which was where I seemed to spend all my time in these lessons. Maka and Grace effortlessly straddled surfboards, Maka also keeping a tight grip on mine so it didn’t get swept away by the waves.

“Don’t get frustrated,” Maka told me supportively once he’d schooled his face to mask his laughter. “No one does it well on their first try. It’s kind of like sex.”

I didn’t take much comfort from his words.

“How about the four-hundredth time?” I grumbled, swimming to the surfboard. I managed to heave my body onto it, feeling the sun warm my skin. I’d gotten tan in my month of being out and about in the constant sunshine of Hawaii, and my hair had gotten longer, almost enough to give me the surfer image. Now if I could just stay on the damn board.

“Don’t be grouchy, Gabe,” Grace chided, splashing water my way. She looked beautiful in the morning sunlight, her dark skin glistening. She wore a teal bikini that showed off her trim, fit form, toned from a lifetime of exercise and the surfing she’d taken up in Hawaii. She was half Hawaiian and half Korean, which is what drew her to Hawaii after we both graduated college in Washington.

“We’ve been at this for two weeks, and I have improved exactly zero percent.” I probably sounded like a whiny kid complaining to them, but I couldn’t help it. I hated not being good at something. “I think I’m just not meant to be a surfer.”

“Everybody’s meant to be a surfer,” Maka said, as if I’d made the most ridiculous remark ever. Grace nodded her head in emphatic agreement.

“Easy for you to say,” I scoffed, flailing my arms wildly as a wave nearly displaced me from my board again. “You were a professional surfer, remember? And you,” I rounded on Grace, “were basically born incapable of being bad at something. Me… I’m just me.”

It felt strange having a pity party in the ocean on a beautiful mid-October morning. Hawaii was paradise in a lot of ways—the sunshine seemed constant, and at a time when Seattle would already be plunging into a chill that heralded winter, it was warm and pleasant in Hawaii. I wasn’t a morning person, though, and Maka and Grace insisted we have these lessons before work. That meant we were usually in the ocean by a quarter to seven.

“You’re more than ‘just you’ to me, babe,” Maka assured me with a wink, making me blush.

Maka was full-blooded native Hawaiian, and he had the complexion to prove it, bronzed by a life spent frolicking in the sun and waves. He had broad shoulders and narrow hips and was taller than my five foot eight, with perfect black hair and lush, full lips that were utterly kissable. His deep brown eyes always seemed to twinkle, as if a powerful light danced behind them.

“Ugh.” Grace rolled her eyes and pretended to gag.

“You’re jealous,” I teased, sticking my tongue out at her.

“Jealous of you having to eat the same meal every night, so to speak? I don’t think so.”

“Hey, if I could eat prime rib every night, I would,” I said.

“Did you really just compare me to ribs?” Maka asked flatly.

“Huh? What? No—I was referring to eating the same meal every night…” I trailed off, realizing how it must have sounded to Maka, even though I didn’t mean it that way.

“If I’m anything,” Maka went on firmly, “I’m loco moco.”

I gaped at him for a moment. He had a problem with being called prime rib, but wanted to be a rice bowl topped with a hamburger, a fried egg, and gravy.

“Actually,” I said after a moment, “I can see that.” And I could. Loco moco was something you wanted to splurge on, something that was decadent, almost sinful. That description fit Maka to the letter.

I tried to give him a smoldering look, but a rogue wave rocked under me, catching me off guard and dumping me once more into the sea.

“Can we please call it a day now?” I pleaded once I was back on my board.

Grace looked like she was in no hurry to bring my suffering to an end, but Maka took pity and checked his watch.

“Actually, we should call it a day. I still need to shower and get to work. It’s going on nine, now; I can only justify going in so late a few times a week, or the chief gets pissy.”

“We also have office hours,” I reminded Grace for what felt like the tenth time that week. She was really good at what she did—we were private investigators—but she didn’t have the mindset necessary to run a business. That had been handled by her partner before me, and Grace was still getting the hang of being in charge of both sides of the business. Well, partially, since we equally shared ownership and those responsibilities.

“This is what we have a secretary for,” Grace pointed out, though she reluctantly began paddling to shore, Maka and I following suit.

“Poor Hayley’s only been with us for a week,” I panted, tired from the lesson and making it back to shore. “Give her a break.”

“Best way for her to learn is to just throw her into the pool,” Grace said once we were back ashore.

I didn’t respond immediately; I was too busy sucking in sweet, sweet oxygen and hoping my wobbly legs didn’t give out as I trudged through the hot, sun-baked sand to the place we’d left our towels.

“I guess it doesn’t matter so much,” I said when I could. “Business has been pretty slow since we hired her. Not good, considering the office we’ve got now. Rent’s a bitch.”

When I’d agreed to be Grace’s partner at the private investigation firm she’d been co-partner in, Paradise Investigations, I helped finance a move to a new building, worlds nicer than the one she’d been in before.

We’d had a keen interest in us the first week or so after the move, considering how we were constantly in the news regarding the murder mystery I’d solved to get Grace off a murder charge. The interest had died down in the following weeks; as it stood now, we hadn’t taken on a new client in five days, and we’d finished the current projects three days before, which meant three days of no billable hours, and thus no money coming in.

“We could always fire her,” Grace suggested, tossing me my towel. “It’d be one less salary we needed to pay.”

“That doesn’t seem right,” I said, though I’d probably consider it after another week of no income being earned. “I’m sure we’ll get by.”

“We could always take an ad out on TV,” Grace suggested suddenly.

“Isn’t that tacky?” Maka wrinkled his nose a bit.

Grace shielded her eyes from the sun, squinting at Maka. “It’s not like we’re lawyers.”

“Even if it isn’t tacky, we can’t afford it,” I reminded her as I wrapped my towel around my waist and gathered my board under my arm for the trek back to our cars. “We’re going to have to pray someone comes in and offers us a job that isn’t finding a lost cat or staking out seedy motels—something we can get some money out of.”

Grace grunted, her spirits somewhat dampened by my pragmatism, but I knew she would get over it. This was our relationship, often consisting of her being flighty and dreamy and me being the cord that pulled her—sometimes forcefully—back down to earth.

“Okay, I’ve got to go,” Maka said when we reached his car. “Already running late.”

“See,” I said, pausing long enough to take a quick kiss on the lips—though I wanted much, much more than a quick kiss—before continuing. “This is yet another good reason we should just stop these morning surfing lessons.”

“Not gonna happen. Seeing you dripping wet is worth being late to work.”

And again, in the space of ten minutes, I blushed.

“You two are disgusting,” Grace muttered.

“Shut up, Grace.”

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J.C. Long is an American expat living in Japan, though he’s also lived stints in Seoul, South Korea—no, he’s not an army brat; he’s an English teacher. He is also quite passionate about Welsh corgis and is convinced that anyone who does not like them is evil incarnate. His dramatic streak comes from his life-long involvement in theater. After living in several countries aside from the United States J. C. is convinced that love is love, no matter where you are, and is determined to write stories that demonstrate exactly that. J. C. Long’s favorite things in the world are pictures of corgis, writing and Korean food (not in that order…okay, in that order). J. C. spends his time not writing thinking about writing, coming up with new characters, attending Big Bang concerts and wishing he was writing. The best way to get him to write faster is to motivate him with corgi pictures. Yes, that is a veiled hint.

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Fate Heats Things Up by Sarah Hadley Brook: Release Day Review

September 18, 2017 by Denise

Scott Dwyer meets hot, new fireman Adrian Campbell in an embarrassing incident one evening and can’t stop thinking about him. While bartending at the local hangout for Station 39, he sees Adrian with his colleagues about once a week. He thinks Adrian might be interested in him, too, but every time they find a chance to talk, something gets in their way.

When a rash of arson fires begins the same week Adrian starts at the station, the rumors fly about whether or not he is responsible for them.

Things are heating up in town, but will they heat up between the two men as well? Will Fate ever allow them to be together?

Release Date: September 18, 2017
Category: Erotica
Genre: Contemporary
Word Count: 15600
Sex Content: Explicit
Pairing: MM
Orientation: Gay
Identity: Cisgender

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This was a short novella, you could almost have called it a short story, but it did have a good amount of story in it. Scott and Adrian seem to spend weeks eyeing each other, considering talking to each other, maybe asking each other on a date, but then never do. In fact, I found myself wondering why Adrian-who seemed to be the more dominant of the two-never asked Scott for his phone number. He kept having to leave for a fire call, and yet didn’t stop and say, let me get your number, and I’ll text you. But it definitely increased the tension between the two, seeing if the other was genuinely interested.

In the meantime, the backstory of Adrian being new to the area, and people starting to wonder if he was responsible for the string of arson fires that had begun the same week he started was a big conflict for Scott to deal with. Scott kept “forgetting” to tell Adrian that he had overheard someone say they thought it was him. In fact, I’m not sure if he ever actually told him he’d overheard that conversation.

For a short story/very short novella length book, it was worth the time invested. I wouldn’t call it erotica, per the category, but definitely had sexy scenes in it. All in all a satisfying story.

3 pieces of eye candy

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King of the Fire Dancers by S.T. Sterlings: New Release Review and Excerpt

August 22, 2017 by Denise

When he’s propositioned by a wealthy stranger, it seems Coy Conlin’s impoverished life is about to be upgraded. But before he can share the news with his family, he comes home to find his grandmother murdered and his little brother missing. To make matters worse, he’s thrown in prison along with every other shifter under the Sovereign’s orders.
August Seaton left his laboratory job at the Asuda Registry to become a Registry officer. But after a mission with his partner goes horribly wrong, August ends up with Coy’s dead grandmother on his hands, and Coy thinks he’s the murderer. Worst of all, his partner discovers his secret.
August is a shifter. And now he’s Coy’s cellmate. Coy and August must survive each other, abusive guards, and a scientist hell-bent on forcing Coy into a breeding program.
Teamed up, the pair escape prison and journey across the country. With the Registry hot on their trail, they have enough things to worry about. Falling for each other wasn’t supposed to be one of them.

King of the Fire Dancers
Author: S.T. Sterlings
Series: Shift Happens
Release Date: August 14, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-947139-59-6
Format: ePub, Mobi, PDF
Cover Artist: Natasha Snow
Category: Romance
Genre: Sci-Fi/Fantasy
Word Count: 89700
Sex Content: Explicit
Pairing: MM
Orientation: Bisexual, Gay
Identity: Cisgender

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Chapter One Excerpt

There were two things that Coy Conlin was exceptionally skilled at. The first was dancing. The second, and more unconventional, was turning into a dragon. Both were in his blood and took years of trial and error to perfect, but the former wasn’t a danger to those around him. It wasn’t easy maneuvering a dragon body, especially not one as big as his. Dragons had claws, scales, and fangs. He even had the misfortune of retaining his proneness to seasonal allergies, which sure as hell took explosive sneezing to a whole new level. Still, thanks to his grandmother—a dragon shifter like him—he’d mastered shifting and everything that it entailed from a young age.
Like hunting.
His prey was a slender boy with white skin and blue eyes. The boy raced past, auburn hair catching the wind and blowing about his head. He scurried through the dried grass, his pale, gangly legs kicking up dirt as he rushed to hide behind a large tree. Laughter disguised as a growl escaped Coy’s mouth. As if a mere tree would provide the boy sanctuary.
Coy hated flying. Dragon or not, he preferred to keep his feet—and claws—securely grounded. But, humans were often smarter than they looked, and he knew that if he continued to creep along the ground, the boy would feel the vibrations caused by his heavy footsteps. And so, he pushed off, sharp talons grazing earth as he hovered above the coarse ground. His wings, as wide as sails on a cutter, pierced the air and sent forward a powerful gust of windblown, dusty dirt. He flapped them again, creating a mini dirt storm between himself and the tree and, most importantly, his prey.
A shower of prickly leaves and thin, brittle branches fell to the ground. Seconds later, the boy emerged from behind the tree, arms up and over his head, shielding himself from the downpour. Amidst the cascading debris, Coy caught the look of determination on the boy’s face. Wedged tightly in the boy’s grip was a rock, jagged and angled, the tip pointing toward the sky. A rock? Really? A puny, misshapen hunk of slate? What good would that do against a ninety-foot-long dragon with scales as black as onyx and five times as hard?
A rock.
The little idiot.
The boy let out a wail of a battle cry and charged forward, gripping the rock in his hand like a warrior wielding a sword. There were hundreds of ways Coy could have reacted, and most would have ended with the boy dead on his feet. Instead, he stood there, a beacon of massive power and pride, and allowed the boy to attack. He didn’t feel the impact of the rock smashing against his leg, though he did see the resulting blood. It wasn’t his. It would have taken much more than a rock to puncture his scales.
It was the boy’s.
The force behind the thrust of his hand had caused the rock to ricochet off a section of scales and created a shallow cut in the center of his reddened palm.
Coy had been specific with the rules—no blacking out, no crying, and no bloodletting. If any of those happened, the game ended immediately. And, although the human tried to hide it, he was definitely bleeding.
“No, wait. I’m okay. I swear it. I’m fine. Look. It barely—”
The protest fell on deaf ears—literally. Coy couldn’t hear—or see—anything during the transformation. It was as if he were alone in a black, soundproof room, nothing but darkness and depth and the feeling of endless falling. His heart rate quickened, slamming against his chest like a musician’s calloused hands pounding against a hand drum. He inhaled through his nose, focusing on the rhythm and physically and mentally controlling the pace of his heartbeat. He calmed his mind, grasping at emotions pulsing like lightning, smoothing them out until his vision began to return. First, blurs of colors: reds and browns and a single blob of white standing directly in front of him.
Then, all at once, everything returned.
“It’s barely a scratch,” the boy muttered, folding his pale arms over his chest.
“Too bad,” Coy replied, rubbing at his jaw. It felt good to use his vocal cords again. He was incapable of speech as a dragon, just limited to snarls and hisses…and fire breathing. That last one came in handy. “Rules are rules, Ari.”
Ari—Coy’s adopted brother—frowned. “You didn’t even give me a chance.”
“A chance to what?” Coy rolled his shoulders in an attempt to relax some of the tension in his muscles that came from shifting. “Find another rock? What was that supposed to do?”
He trudged away from his younger brother, crushing dead grass beneath his bare soles. He spotted his discarded sarong lying by a fragment of slate, the latter’s golden-brown surface highlighted with speckles of fiery red. The color was reminiscent of his own skin, warm brown with red undertones—the exact opposite of Ari’s. Even if Ari had somehow managed to slightly injure him with his dumb rock, the bruise would have been difficult to see. One of the many perks of having brown skin was that it didn’t display bruises well. Growing up, that played to his advantage with the number of fights he got into.
Ari pouted. “It was the only thing I could think of.”
“Yeah, well.” Nude, Coy bent down to retrieve his sarong. “That type of thinking is going to get you killed. Or worse, you’ll get your ass kicked.”
Ari rubbed his bloody hand against his sweat-soaked tunic. “How can getting beat up be worse than dying?”
Coy watched as the blood stained the faded fabric. Ari had already outgrown most of his clothes. What he had left was either tainted or torn. Coy would have to take up private performances at this rate just to make sure he could afford to buy Ari clothes.
“If you’re dead, you won’t have me around to rub it in.” He grinned at Ari and then motioned toward the open wound on his hand. “Better not let Dinina see that. You know how she gets.”
He wrapped the thin, cobalt-colored sarong around his waist, securing the two ends into a knot. They’d spent half the morning outside, which meant he’d spent just as long in his dragon form. He’d be exhausted later, but it was worth it. He always had fun hanging out with his little brother. Still, he felt like he was forgetting something.
And then he remembered.
“Shit!” he shouted, the sound so loud and sudden that it startled an unkindness of ravens perched in a nearby tree.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” Ari asked, blue eyes wide with concern.
There were several things wrong, and all of them could be summed up with two words.
“The Registry.”

**SPOILER ALERT** I really liked this.

Coy Conlin is a dragon shifter who enjoys a career as a popular fire dancer at a circus, and recently acquired a wealthy, ah, patron. He makes enough money from their dalliance to quit dancing (if he chooses) and live quietly with his grandmother (also a dragon shifter) and his adopted brother Ari, a human. They live in the kingdom of Asuda, where shifters are the minority and are monitored by the Registry, who perform regular and kind of demoralizing interrogations and bodily inspections of all the shifters in the kingdom. Shifting is tightly regulated, and shifters are chipped.

Registry officer August Seaton is a new recruit and while Coy is appreciative of the guy’s looks, you might guess that these two will embark first upon an adversarial relationship before anything else fun and sexy can happen. That’s okay, I can wait! Coy is justifiably resentful towards the Registry, but his instincts lean towards a teasing and sarcastic nature. Despite Coy being a part-time dragon, and a large human to begin with, he’s more likely to verbally spar and bait his opponents than resort to violence or physical resistance. Coy has some family-related trauma from his youth that still haunt his dreams and while we know August’s childhood caused him to grow into a friendless near-recluse, we don’t find out why right away. August, like many humans, believe that shifters are sub-humans, but he also feels compassion for them.

The king experiences a tragedy that results in all shifters being imprisoned indefinitely. During the sweep Coy’s grandmother is killed and August allows Coy to believe that August killed her (he didn’t because that? Would be unforgivable). Until roughly the midway point of the book, we see Coy in prison, how he and the other shifters are mistreated and further dehumanized, and his hatred for the Registry — and August in particular — fester and grow. The two are then thrown together and the remainder of the book involves an escape attempt and the two men learning to trust each other as they grow closer.

I won’t say the first half is dull or moves slow. It’s necessary and we learn about the attitudes towards shifters, and how Coy and August interact with the world, themselves and each other. Coy’s not simply an angry guy, he’s a bit of a tease and a flirt and knows how to charm people for what he wants. August keeps to himself and being a lonely shut in, it’s easy to see how he is manipulated by his partner, Fate, and others. Their initial interactions are understandably tense and it’s not until the second half that the action really takes off. Once they spend time together, August loosens up just a bit, and he and Coy have an easy and fun bantering relationship. I laughed a lot and just really enjoyed how they were with each other. It wasn’t until I was 80% in that I realized this is actually part of a series — which is good because it was nowhere near getting wrapped up at that point. As you might suspect, these two really start to care for each other, throwing them into confusion as they each deal with their preconceptions about the other and of course their own personal traumas keeping them from wanting to give themselves to another person. This is a slow burn and we only get a teasing amount of gratification before it ends and we’re left waiting, wondering when the next book will be out. Talk about angst! I can’t wait to see what happens next.

3 pieces of eye candy, with the caveat that I think I might be a bit stingy considering the smile on my face when I finished. I’m wary of committing when I don’t know when I’ll get the next fix, er, book. Basically I’m holding this review hostage until I get the next installment and I can make a more informed decision!

S.T. Sterlings is a university librarian, a part-time instructor, and a full-time fangirl. She is originally from Virginia but currently lives in Southern California with her two sons and her maniac of a dog.

Website: http://www.ststerlings.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ststerlings

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