Time Travel

This Week over at Writers Evolution we're talking about the eras we would like to visit.

There is no guest blogger this week, but you can find guest bloggers Jaime Samms here and Amber Green here.

The question now is do I want to start the week off with a free read or the weekend? Thoughts.

Guest Blogger - Jaime Samms

Thanks so much, Simone, for inviting me to your blog, today. Every time I sit down to write a new blog post, I find myself staring at a blank page wondering what I'm going to say that readers haven't heard a thousand times already. It's worse that actually writing, by far, becasue at least with writing a story, you get to make stuff up, have fun and tell someone else's story for a few hours, and people get that. As far as me and my life go, I'm pretty much an open book.

Unlike some of the characters in my latest release, I don't keep much back, and that means there's rarely anything new to say! lol! My guys, though, they can be full of secrets and half-truths.

Blurb: Tyler's life perked up when he met Jake. So what if long-time friend Marty can't stand him and his landlady has no use for his new beau. Tyler's determined not to see the dark side of his lover. It's his own fault for believing people don't go around keeping secrets and lying.

Tyler should know better. He's an ad executive. He knows the packaging is what sells, and Jake is quite a package. His lover is no slouch when it comes to false advertising, either, and when Tyler finds out the truth, It hurts. Weathering Jake's lies and secrets gets easier with the help of new friends, Libby and Steven. In fact, Tyler figures that maybe a lot of things would get easier with Steven.

Tyler should have known better. Not even someone as seemingly perfect as Steven Jessop is completely as advertised. This time, though, Tyler has to make a decision. After all, sometimes, even if what you see is not what you get, what Tyler's uncovered in Steven might just be what he's always wanted.

Buy Link: http://www.freyasbower.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=10&products_id=267

Excerpt:

Tyler blinked at him. "Is there some reason I shouldn't want to go to a party?"

"Because it is a party." Jake perched on the arm of Tyler's couch and looked down on him. "You don't do parties. You're the one told me that."

"I know, but Maynard mentioned it. It sounds decent."

Jake studied the label on his beer, picking at the corner of it. "Now you go to parties because your boss tells you to."

"He didn't tell me to. He just mentioned it."

"Is he going to be there? That why he mentioned it to you?"

"Oh my god. You've got to be kidding me," Tyler chuckled and sipped his beer.

Jake just looked at him.

"Seriously? Are you jealous?" Tyler asked.

Still Jake said nothing.

Tyler grabbed Jake's arm and yanked him down. "Come here."

For an instant, Jake resisted, but Tyler licked his lips, lifted his eyebrows and pulled a little harder. Jake slid down, squeezed his cheeks into the crack between Tyler and the arm of the couch and took Tyler's chin in a loose grip. "Doesn't it bother you?" he asked after another swig, keeping his searching gaze on Tyler.

"What?" Tyler frowned.

"That he uses the fact you like dick to scope out new clients."

"What?" Tyler hitched back a few inches, putting some space between them.

"Think about it. You do know who's throwing this party?"

"Jessop. I don't know his first name. I don't even know what he does. Maybe Maynard just mentioned it because he thinks I've been working too hard lately. Unlike someone I know, who gets all the easy clients and the padded expense account." Tyler set his beer down and wiggled closer, hooking his finger into Jake's tie and prying it loose.

"If you think those clients are easy, my dear, you've got another think coming. I just have a knack for handling self-absorbed, insane people. You, though. Maynard's working you to the bone and not giving you enough credit. Jessop is a dream account. If he doesn't give it to you…." A hard edge visible just in the shadows of Jake’s expression told Tyler there was something he wasn’t saying, though what it could be, he had no idea.

"Anyway." Tyler gravitated a little toward Jake, touched his face, ran his fingers over the angles. "Not talking about work right now. It's a party. We never go anywhere. It's time, don't you think?"

Jake grinned, leaned close so everything blurred together. so that The sullenness turned to lust, and defensiveness to desire. "You never complained about that before."

The bass rhythm of Marty's music reverberated through the apartment. Tyler's heart sank. He did so much better when he slept.

Jake nearly growled as he grabbed hold of Tyler's chin and forced his attention away from the shared wall and Marty's insomnia. His face darkened, and his fingers tightened around the neck of his beer bottle. "You need to move."

"Jake—"

"Come on." Jake took his hand and stood. "Let's go into the other room." He shot a glare at the wall.

Without letting go, Tyler pulled him back down. "If it bothers you so much, we could just go to yours."

"I told you. They're renovating. The whole building is a mess." Jake cast a venomous glower at the far wall.

"Right." Still, Tyler didn't get up, and Jake sat back down next to him. Tyler was tired of his attitude towards Marty, his insistence they stay in all the time—everything. In four months, Tyler still hadn't seen Jake’s apartment. He was determined to get his way about something. He fixed his gaze on Jake. "About the party, then?"

"You just want to show me off, admit it." Jake puffed out his chest slightly and tilted his head.

The edges of his mood seemed to smooth over with the motion, though they didn't disappear completely. Tyler had yet to find whatever it would take to get Jake to really, truly relax.

"Come on." Jake trailed a few experimental kisses along Tyler's jaw. "Say it: 'I admit I want to show off my hunky new boyfriend.' You know it's true."

A slow smile spread across Tyler's face. "Maybe."

"Tell you what." Jake set down his beer and slid closer, fingering Tyler's collar, and undoing the buttons of his shirt at a slow but steady pace. "You let me have my way with you tonight, and I'll take you to this party tomorrow. You can schmooze Jessop to your little heart's content." He ended with fingers on Tyler's nipple and gave a sharp squeeze and tug.

Tyler gasped and jerked, hardening in a rush of hot blood. "You drive such a hard bargain."

The words rasped over a sudden need, and he licked his lips in anticipation. Jake might be a demanding lover, but he was also an attentive one, and he knew exactly how Tyler liked things. His heart sped up at the thought of Jake taking over and being in control for an evening.

"And yet…." Jake ran his tongue tantalizingly over Tyler's lips. "You’re such an easy sell."

Buy Here

Memorial Day & Resolutions

This week at Writers Evolution we are talking about how are we doing on our resolutions, you can see mine there.

Beyond that, it is Memorial Day, a day to honor and remember the US's fallen soldiers. This weekend has become one of barbeques and the first step towards summer. And as we go about our day today, please take time to remember those who are gone and will never return.

This poem has come through my email boxes many times and I wanted to share.


IT IS THE SOLDIER

It is the Soldier, not the minister

Who has given us freedom of religion.

It is the Soldier, not the reporter
Who has given us freedom of the press.

It is the Soldier, not the poet
Who has given us freedom of speech.

It is the Soldier, not the campus organizer

Who has given us freedom to protest.

It is the Soldier, not the lawyer
Who has given us the right to a fair trial.

It is the Soldier, not the politician
Who has given us the right to vote.

It is the Soldier who salutes the flag,
Who serves beneath the flag,
And whose coffin is draped by the flag,
Who allows the protester to burn the flag.

----- Charles M. Province

(Photos top to bottom - Arlington National Cemetery, Deceased Soldiers coming home, Tomb Of The Unknown Soldier, Battlefield Memorial)

I wish everyone a safe Memorial Day.

I come from a military family and am surrounded by friends that I've made while in the service and afterward. I miss them when they deploy, I hurt for what they have seen and gone through, and I mourn when they do not return. Today is a day to remember the sacrifices that have been made by fallen soldiers throughout our nations history and to honor them.

Simone.

Guest Blogger - Amber Green

Amber Green is my guest blogger this week with a brand new book out!

Khyber Run is out this week.

Transplanted from an Afghani battleground to a Florida playground at age ten, Zarak Momand spent the next several years trying to remember Pakhtunwali, the Pakhtun Way, and instill the Pakhtun warrior spirit in his younger brothers. A generation later, he’s a burned-out Navy hospital corpsman who has lost touch with everything that matters: his brothers, his heritage, and possibly his soul.

Then he’s kidnapped by USMC scout-snipers hell-bent on seeing justice for a murdered brother marine. The murderer has deserted. They have ideas where to find him and plenty of unofficial support--but this is Afghanistan, where the easy answers are wrong and the best-laid plans don’t stand a chance. Codenamed Zulu, Zarak navigates the ambiguities of fourth generation warfare, where there are no front lines and where the moral high ground shifts from situation to situation. He can rely on no one but Oscar, a sexually compelling marine who is every bit the warrior young Zarak had once hoped to be.

When finally told the deserter murdered his estranged baby brother, Zarak sees his way clear. Pakhtunwali allows a man to pierce the wall of hospitality--even the code of sanctuary--to demand justice for a murdered son or brother. For the first time in years, his Pakhtun self and his American self are in full accord. With Oscar at his side, and with the memories roused by their travels in these legendary mountains, he finds his spiritual center.

Secretly crossing the border into the Khyber region of Pakistan, Oscar and Zulu lose their companions, their technology, and their horses. In compensation, they find Z's extended family, Taliban assistance, and gratified lust in the night.

But is Oscar’s rough passion a betrayal between brothers? And what happens when the deserter would rather die than go back?

Excerpt:

Chapter 1

I woke muddled, thinking the ship's engines sounded wrong. Red light glared on my eyelids. Breathing meant gagging on the seagull-shit taste of a hangover. And that sound was not my ship's engines. More like a sardine can's engines or…a plane?

Opening my eyes took effort. A plane. From the rear of the fuselage, I faced up an aisle between rows of knees hugging sea bags. Not sea bags: MOLLE-packs. Red lights in strips overhead barely illuminated a couple hundred hunched forms in desert camo, a row of males in body armor along each bulkhead, facing inward, and two rows of females jammed into back-to-back seats in the center. Male or female, each of them clutched one of those carbines the sponges called an assault rifle.

Why am I in a plane packed with camo-assed bullet-sponges?

The plane's deck angled down sharply. Screams rang in my ears, going dull. My ears cleared, painfully, and the shrieks sharpened.

Crashing. That's what we're doing.

The deck roller-coastered up, then yawed faster than physics should allow. Whiplash. I saw stars. The stench of vomit wrung my empty guts.

A dive and another yaw brought more screams ringing off the bulkhead, prayer in Spanish close by, retching farther away.

How did I stay in my seat, with gravity halving and doubling and snatching me starboard to port? When the plane steadied long enough to let me look down, I saw bands of dull silver duct tape strapping my thighs to my seat, and another red-streaked silver band over my belt.

Something hung on my lower face. I had some kind of mask. No. Somebody had duct-taped a puke bag to my face. It sagged obscenely against my chin, like a giant used condom.

Pulling it off hurt. The stench blasted from it.

Where do I put this? I looked around, blinking, trying to make sense. The screamers in the middle seats were mostly army. The hundred or so men squatting in the seats lining the bulkhead were marines. Some laughed at the women. Others hunkered down, as if waiting for shrapnel to find them. A few threw curious glances at me, the only squid in sight.

A cluster of pops rapped at the bulkhead, like popcorn in my mother's big pot. One of the sponges grinned at me. "Small arms fire. Welcome to Bagram."

Bagram? A map of the giant air base flashed in my eyes, then a dim memory of riding my father's shoulder, hiding my face in his turban while a trio of Shuravi -- Soviets -- stomped an ominously silent laborer. Couldn't be…

"He means hold on," added another sponge.

I dropped the puke bag to grab my seat. The plane tilted, again nose-diving but this time braking hard. Instead of falling to the deck, the bag shot forward, splatting against a female's ear.

"I'm hit! Aaah!"

"God! Brains! Oh, God!"

"Aaaaaaaaaaaah!"

The plane swerved and jinked, each jerk redoubling the shrieks. The smell of fear, sharp and sour, fought with the smell of vomit.

One of the marines chuckled, despite the sweat beading on his face, and pitched his voice low enough to hear under the shrieks. "You know you're going to have to police that up, Squidward."

"No-go, sir. The doc's our volunteer."

Volunteer? WTF? I twisted to see who'd called me a volunteer, but his rifle caught my attention first. A bolt-action rifle. A sniper's weapon.

Behind the rifle, teeth flashed in a grin. He didn't seem to exist, except as a rifle, a hint of helmet, and a grin. Then the grin vanished.

The deck flipped overhead. The unsecured marines bounced, sending bellows among the screams. I hung from my seat, still taped in place.

The deck flipped again, then slammed up at us. A marine fell across my lap. I caught his weapon before it could bean him. The cool metal slapped into my hand, rousing memories like an old lover's name.

Find a different excerpt here: http://www.loose-id.com/Khyber-Run.aspx

Buy it from Loose-Id today.

This Week..

This week over at Writers Evolution we are talking about if you're a closeted writer or not.

On Wednesday, author Amber Green will be my guest blogger.

Sometime this week there will be a retelling of the faire along with pics and most likely a delayed Monday Minute Fiction. Maybe I'll post that Friday to warm up the weekend.

What's In A Name?

I'm over at Grand Rapids Region Writer's Group talking about naming traditions among various cultures and how they can be used in writing.

It's Monday

It's Monday. I'm revamping my website, hopefully that will be done in the next 48 hours. Over at Writers Evolution on the men in our lives who got away - this should prove to be an interesting week.

The Chatting With Joyfully Reviewed crew were very welcoming on Sunday when we sat chatting about the upcoming GayRomLit Retreat in New Orleans this year. And the books - lots and lots of good books to read. I can't wait!