Expounding on Behind-The-Book at the Loose Id blog, and quoting Robert Frost... recalling my visits to West Virginia, the Blue Ridge and more.

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Time for a Change?

Hey, it's official. All the Change books are back!

I'm thrilled to announce that Loose Id has published my previously released books. Each have been refined and re-edited, and they are sharper and more fun than ever.

Johnny and Grissom are once again burning up the pages in A Change of Tune, available as of June 3rd.

Drew and Ridge, from A Change of Pace, can be found in the omnibus volume called A Change of... , available June 10th. This book also contains A Change of Scenery, which features Con and Stephen. What a sweet deal - two for one!

I hope Change lovers will be glad to see the boys back. If you haven't tried them, give it a go. I think you'll be glad you did.

Is being an author work – or is it art?

Hmm.

Readers might consider a much-loved book to be an artistic creation of the author’s mind and imagination, the spinning of a tale that comes from profound or exotic inspiration, travels or experiences. When I was a kid and read books that opened up the world to me with adventure, romance, history, action, and more, I figured authors had to be a breed apart, individuals who had lived more than I could hope to, people who were well-educated, distinguished and so very much smarter than I was.

Mind you, I planned to get as smart and educated as they, but while reading their books, I settled back to enjoy learning about how people lived and loved in historic and modern England, how gunfighters were not always bad guys, and how Encyclopedia Brown could solve the trickiest mystery. And he was just a kid!

I always figured I could write as good or better a book as many that I read, but never quite got around to getting it done (beyond taking the huge leap to send in one MS to Harlequin back in the day).  Upon receipt of the (vastly-deserved) rejection, I threw that idea back in the closet.

It wasn’t until I found and got hooked on M/M around 2007 that I found a new reading love – one that pushed me to write, this time for real. The first three books just flowed out of me, which I found amazing. It wasn’t until I ran headlong into my first editor (I had an editor!) that I realized how much work went into crafting a book suitable for publication. And how rough my product was.

Suddenly I was looking at my brilliant creation as a work product, something that took a boatload of effort to get from its humble beginnings to a saleable item for which people would pay hard-earned money, and my book had to go through an entire process to ready it for the customer. As I’ve written more and changed publishers, the process has gotten even more professional, especially for me. Working with pros inspires me to become better, each time.

Ultimately, I’ve realized how much work goes into writing. Sitting down at the computer is just the beginning step. It takes discipline to write, especially when I’m not feeling very creative – so I like having deadlines. The support of the writing community is helpful, since writing in and of itself is a solitary venture.

Joining Loose Id has pushed me that much farther to excel, to do more and do it better. Having a supportive group of pros along the path makes it easier to turn my labor into my very own work of art.

Need 36 hours in a day

Wouldn't it be great if we could add more hours to the day when we needed them? Say, when the day job and the writing job have deadlines at the same time?

Guh. My day job is breathing down my neck, and it's making it tougher to focus on the imaginary worlds my characters inhabit. Haven't written as much as I'd like in the last year, and Antonio's story is out there, waiting. But, I have managed to produce a novella for Loose Id that's a sequel to The Trouble With Angel.

If Wishes Were Horses came out at LI on Valentine's Day. It began as a one-page short when I was blogging a couple years ago, generated by a visitor's prompt. I then promised it to a reader when she was feeling blue, but shoved it into the closet and forgot about it. I'm happy to say I came through on the deal, and Tracy got her story. She wanted to see Angel and Brandon and the kids again, and I enjoyed writing every word.

Blurb:  Hot-tempered Angel and sexy, easy-going Brandon are pretty happy. Brandon's baseball career is over, Angel's no longer missing LA, and the guys are living in a vintage house in southern Oregon. Well, Angel thinks the house is just damned old. 

Marisa and Trey have adjusted to the men as substitute parents, and Angel and Brandon have figured out how to have regular sex even with kids in the house. Angel's even loving his marketing job at the winery. 

But when Brandon gets an offer of a new job back in California, is their new life going to fall apart? Tough and scrappy Angel is afraid that their hot sex life and the family they've built won't be enough to keep Brandon in the confoundedly cold Pacific Northwest. And being afraid pisses him off.Brandon's really keen on the job, and not at all keen on the cold. Will hot and sunny California call Brandon home again?

Meanwhile, I'm now in edits at Loose Id for my three original Change series books, and these early efforts of mine are getting overhauls. I'm really glad, actually, because I want them to be fresh, sharp and more interesting than the first time around. A Change of Tune will be out first, then A Change of Pace and A Change of Scenery will come out together in a single book.

And I'll breathe a big sigh of relief when they are done.

So the world keeps spinning, people keep making news and I'm cranking away on writing stuff that doesn't seem to amount to a hill of beans when compared to the serious happenings going on around the globe. I guess it's all the more reason to grab a book and escape whenever we can.

We need to be reminded why life is worth living, and living well. Because it's short. Sometimes too short.

A kick-ass, sexy new website

Today I published my new website. It's fun, sexy and I think user-friendly. Seeing everything laid out like that is making me want to get back to writing regularly. Now I won't have any excuse!

It didn't take me too long to set it up; I'm  pleased with the 1and1.com interface. It's making my small list of books look pretty good.

Stop by, enjoy and comment if you're so inclined.

Ciao!

Brainy is out at Loose Id - and I'm HAPPY

Brainy and the Beast is available at last! It was released on Loose Id today, and you can buy it here. Yay!!

Henry Travis and Nick Shelton meet over the hood of Henry's 1960 Mercedes 300, and life gets interesting in a hurry - for both of them.

Nick is a brash, outdoorsy guy, and Henry is kind of cerebral and most certainly not into mechanics. He's more into his salt water fish and his research.

Um, maybe not so much...?

This marks the first time I've written a story in the first person, and I really enjoyed the differences from third person. I could really tell Nick's story, obviously, and it was a challenge to convey Henry's viewpoint throughout. I felt challenged as a writer, and do believe this is the best thing I've written to date.

I hope you'll enjoy Brainy and do let me know what you think.

Where the heck have I been?

Working the EDJ, that's for sure. It's been crazy, and I haven't been writing lately.

Also trying to place my latest book - and guess, what? Success! Loose Id has contracted for my book, Brainy and the Beast, and I'm very happy. It should publish this April.

Stay tuned for more...