Cover Reveal: Bound To You by AR DeClerck

I'm participating in the cover reveal for AR DeClerck's next science fiction romance, Bound To You. I was one of the beta readers for the first draft, and it is one awesome ride! The cover perfectly captures my mental images of Jacks and Lia.

Here's the blurb for it.

Jackson Baine is a man with a gift, and he has never had a problem with selling it to the highest bidder. His newest job is with one of the biggest terraforming companies in the universe, and the money he stands to make will allow him and his crew to retire on any planet in any galaxy they choose. His biggest problem: Ferrell Terraforming has assigned him a company liason to see to his needs and protect their interests. But that’s not his only problem. Lia Bernardi is smart, beautiful and strong, and she entices Jacks in a way no other woman ever has. She is a distraction he cannot afford on the surface. 

Anatolia Bernardi is ready to climb the corporate ladder, get out from under her egotistical boss, and impress her overbearing father. All she has to do is turn one dead, empty planet into an oasis. Her company says Jacks Baine is the key, and it’s her job to make sure he’s productive and happy. Both of which, she soon learns, are harder than she’d thought they’d be. For some reason Jacks can get under her skin and break down every wall she’s constructed between herself and the world. 

On the surface of a long-dead planet Jacks and Lia will be forced to face the startling realization that the past never really goes away.

The book releases 4/24/15. You can preorder it at Amazon.

AR DeClerck lives in the Quad Cities, IL. She is a wife and mother of two daughters. She has two dogs and a cat, and always has her nose in a book. She’s either reading one, or writing one. She writes romance in many sub-genres, and has always had a soft spot for sci-fi romance. She credits her love of reading and writing to her mother, who always keeps a book handy.

Find AR on Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads.

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Cover reveal for Keir by Pippa Jay

I am beyond excited to be participating in the cover reveal for the re-issue of Keir by Pippa Jay. Keir was the first SFR I read in 2012, and I fell in love with him on the first page. He's everything I want my hero to be: tragic, wounded, and struggling to find a reason to live.

Isn't it awesome? Yes, Keir is blue.Here's the blurb.

A demon waiting to die...

An outcast reviled for his discolored skin and rumors of black magic, Keirlan de Corizi sees no hope for redemption. Imprisoned beneath the palace that was once his home, the legendary 'Blue Demon of Adalucian' waits for death to finally free him of his curse. But salvation comes in an unexpected guise.

A woman determined to save him.

Able to cross space and time with a wave of her hand, Tarquin Secker has spent eternity on a hopeless quest. Drawn by a compulsion she can't explain, she risks her apparent immortality to save Keir, and offers him sanctuary on her home-world, Lyagnius. But Quin has secrets of her own.

When Keir mistakenly unleashes the dormant alien powers within him and earns exile from Lyagnius, Quin chooses to stand by him. Can he master his newfound abilities in time to save Quin from the darkness that seeks to possess her?

Keir is Book One of the Redemption series and part of the Travellers Universe. Previously released by Lyrical Press Inc. 7th May 2012 and a SFR Galaxy Award for SciFi Romance for Best May-December Romance (2012), Aspen Gold Readers Choice Award 3rd place finalist (2013), Readers' Favorite International Book Award finalist(2012), The Kindle Book Review’s Best Indie Book Awards Nominee for Best SciFi/Fantasy (2013).

Please add it to your Goodreads shelf HERE, or sign up HERE for my no-spam newsletter for special previews on cover reveals, new releases, the latest giveaways and discounts, and upcoming news.

Here's Pippa's bio. (And check out the rest of her stuff! She's got a great variety out right now and is one of my favorite authors, in addition to being a friend.)

After spending twelve years working as an Analytical Chemist in a Metals and Minerals laboratory, Pippa Jay is now a stay-at-home mum who writes scifi and the supernatural. Somewhere along the way a touch of romance crept into her work and refused to leave. In between torturing her plethora of characters, she spends the odd free moment playing guitar very badly, punishing herself with freestyle street dance, and studying the Dark Side of the Force. Although happily settled in the historical town of Colchester in the UK with her husband of 21 years and three little monsters, she continues to roam the rest of the Universe in her head.

Pippa Jay is a dedicated member of the Science Fiction Romance Brigade, blogging at 

Spacefreighters Lounge, Adventures in Scifi, and Romancing the Genres. Her works include YA and adult stories crossing a multitude of subgenres from scifi to the paranormal, often with romance, and she’s one of eight authors included in a science fiction romance anthology—Tales from the SFR Brigade. She’s also a double SFR Galaxy Award winner, been a finalist in the Heart of Denver RWA Aspen Gold Contest (3rd place), the EPIC eBook awards, and the GCC RWA Silken Sands Star Awards (2nd place).

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A is for Acheron

I randomly decided to do an A to Z blog challenge for the month of April. My theme is things and places I love. The intent is to give readers a peek into what makes me tick and what my life is made up of outside my writing.

In March of last year my bestest writing buddy and friend beat me over the head until I read Born of Night by Sherrilyn Kenyon. Three weeks later when I was done with The League series she started beating at me to read Dark-Hunter. I finally did in June.

And it was love at first sight! I fell HARD for Acheron. To me he is everything I love about a good hero. Tragic past, heart of gold, doesn't let his past rule his future.

Not to mention he's 6'8", and an Atlantean god. I've always had a thing for Atlantis, and at 5'7" myself I'm not exactly short. I like looking up at men, instead of being practically eye level.

To show you how far my love of this guy goes, I discovered a couple weeks ago in the Menyon Cafe Press store there's a phone cover for my phone with Ash's symbol on it. I'm getting it...

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I Have A Theory

Image courtesy of dan/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I'm not ashamed of the fact I'm a romance reader. I enjoy it, obviously. I write it too.

As a writer I follow several industry blogs, and the two I read most often are the Steve Laube Agency blog and the Books & Such blog. Both agencies work almost exclusively in the CBA market, but there's a wealth of industry information shared and great tips for writers no matter what genre/market you write in.

On November fifth, Wendy Lawson of Books & Such did a post called The Trouble With Different.

To preface this, Wendy is talking exclusively about Christian fiction, but the general concepts of what she says are true in both markets. Being too different is hard. Read Sherrilyn Kenyon's publishing journey if you don't believe me. Once there was a time when no editor would touch what she writes.

Now, on to specifics of what Wendy said that I can't stop thinking about.

Sometimes the norm is that way because we’ve watched sales. For instance, we know romantic fiction sales will be strongest if the protagonist is a woman. So if you choose to be different by going with a male lead, you’ve already got a hurdle to cross with the sales people on the acquisitions committee.

While this statement is true in the CBA, it's not always true in the ABA. There's a vast number of authors who write at least equally in his POV. I'm exploring ABA romance, for the first time, and finding my hero POV needs much easier to fulfill.  I have always preferred his POV in a romance. The older I get, the more I prefer it. Weird, huh?

I commented on the post, which I do from time to time because the agents here usually reply. I said this:

I also gravitate to reading books largely in his POV. Part of my issue with first person, especially in a romance, is I’m locked into HER head. And I don’t care about her. Whenever I try to make it about her, the story shuts down. They stop talking. It doesn’t work. All the spark that is me and my voice disappears. If I write mostly in her POV I’ll never make it to the acquisitions committee in the first place. But my ABA romance told in 70% his POV is going further than my inspy HR forced into largely her POV ever did.

The 70% his POV is My Name Is A'yen. I have four POV's. Only one is a woman.

I've been thinking about this for almost two weeks now. What many CBA agents may not be aware of is the explosive growth of the M/M romance in the ebook market. It's so popular that Googling it gave me pages to go through.

Why is it so popular? And it's popularity pre-dates Fifty Shades by nearly five years. I won't rehash the history of the genre's rise, but it appears to be tied to slash fan fiction, which is dominated by women. Having been active in a fan fiction community for several years, the Hardy Boys, I know it's a fact women dominate it. And fan fiction communities tend to center around books with strong male protagonists.

In one of the articles I read the writer quoted Dr. Sarah S.G. Frantz, from a blog post she did in 2006.

...romances are actually about watching the hero figure out and confess his feelings, if they're about watching him move from the "masculine economy of use" to the "feminine economy of exchange," then watching TWO men have to figure it out for and with each other is more than twice as wonderful as watching one man figure it out for and with a woman.

I think she's on to something. For decades romances have been heroine-centric. To the point where I had a contest judge in 2011, who's published in Christian romance, tell me in my entry that readers don't care about him. It pissed me off, because it's not true.

What if the rise of M/M romance is directly related to the romance reader's desire for more hero-centric stories? Look at Sherrilyn Kenyon. The single most popular Dark-Hunter is Acheron. I'm in love with him. I read DH for pieces of him. I read DH for the men. And so do millions of others. As the series progresses, it focuses more and more on the heroes. Every single person in my life, real and online, knows when I crack open Acheron there will be a Do Not Disturb sign on my life, until I'm done with 700+ pages of Ash goodness.

Look at the rise of paranormal romance. It's centered around strong heroes who not only share the POV division equally, but quite often tip the division in their favor. There's a reason for this, and I think it has more to do with a hunger for his POV than it does with the novelty of vampires and shapeshifters.

This romance reader does not like heroine-centric stories. I'm sick of them, because they're everywhere. Especially in CBA romance where his existence is almost an afterthought most of the time. But on the other hand, M/M romance isn't something I read because much of it crosses lines I'm unwilling to cross in the graphic department. So what's a girl to do?

My answer: Write hero-centric traditional romances and hope I can hit things just right to fill an unmet need in the romance market.

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Falling In Love With His POV

Most of our reading habits are formed when we're children. My childhood included lots of Nancy Drew, every horse book I could get my hands on, The Boxcar Children, and The Hardy Boys. I collect Nancy and the Hardys.

In mulling over my POV preferences after being disappointed with Gabriel's Ghost, I had several light bulb moments. I talked about one last week, and today I'm going to explore the other big one.

I started reading Nancy and the Hardys when I was around eight or nine. The Secret of the Old Mill is my favorite classic Hardy Boys book, while Campaign of Crime, Strategic Moves, the Phoenix Conspiracy trilogy, and Brother Against Brother are my favorite Casefiles.

Frank is my favorite brother. Especially in the Phoenix Conspiracy trilogy. A side of him comes out that's never been seen before and it's amazing. I own nearly a full set of Casefiles too, and way more of them than any other format.

My first forays into the writing world were in Hardy Boys fan fiction. Of course I was writing in largely his POV. And I loved it. I still love it. Hardy Boys is the only fan fiction I've read mountains of, and it was because I knew I was getting majority his POV. Most HB fan fic skews heavy to Joe, but that's okay. There's very little female POV.

I think my early love of the Hardy Boys--something I have not outgrown--is a big part of why I love his POV so much. It's probably a big part of why I write heavily skewed to his POV. I practiced the basics of writing fiction in something that's 90% male POV.

I dabbled in Thoroughbred fan fic too, after I stopped writing HB fan fic. But even then I was fascinated with a secondary boy character named Tor. I won a TB fan fic short story contest with something written in Tor's POV.

What I'm calling my SFR/paranormal mash-up, The Slipstream Files, was partly inspired by the Hardy Boys. I realized this a couple weeks ago when a HB fan fic friend was in the hospital. My main characters are two brothers, and I realize now their relationship is somewhat patterned after my favorite fan fic portrayals of Frank and Joe.

I wonder if the arrival of Luke and Cole has anything to do with the new Hardy Boys Adventures series and the fact I'm actually enjoying it...

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Obsession

From Sherrilyn's site

It's been a long time since I got sucked into an author's voice, style, and universes to the point where I want to read every single thing the author has ever written So long I can't remember who it was.

I discovered Sherrilyn Kenyon last month. I know, I know. I'm probably the last romance reader in the universe who'd never read one.

To make matters worse, I also discovered Gena Showalter last month. I read her first. Checked out The Darkest Night at the library and happily fell in love with Maddox and the Lords of the Underworld.

While I'm reading that one, one of my friends is reading Born of Night, and badgering me without mercy. You HAVE to read Born of Night! It's like A'yen and you're going to love it. If I didn't know better I'd think you got the idea from this book. (I wrote My Name Is A'yen when I still had no clue Sherrilyn Kenyon even existed.)

I devoured The Darkest Night the week of March 17th. I remember it because we spent the weekend at Hodges Gardens and I finished it there. To shut my friend up I agreed to get Born of Night next.

Oh. My. Goodness. Maddox was good, yes. But Nykyrian is so much better!!! I have a thing for brooding, tortured heroes with horrible pasts who need a good woman to see past it and give him a reason to live again. I love Nykyrian Quiakides. He hits all my hot hero buttons, and then some.

Plowed through that one in about three days. Back to the library for Syn. Then back for Devyn. Then Caillen and Darling. Darling's I read in three days. Yes, all 614 pages in three days. The men of The League cost me a lot of sleep. But they also helped me solve the problems I was having with To Save A Life.

I am definitely a Sherrilyn Kenyon fan. It's like she can read my mind about what I want a book to be. But, as a writer myself, I know I have a penchant for mimicking an author if I read a lot of that author in one fell swoop. I was in editing mode at the time, so had no problems inhaling five SK books in 21 days. But now I'm in creation mode again and need to mix it up.

The friend I mentioned who got me hooked on her? She's taunting me. Accidentally on purpose. I think it's a conspiracy. She's inhaling the Dark-Hunter series and badgering me about reading them, even though she agrees with me that I need a break. That's what friends are for right? I'm doing the same thing with her about the rest of The League. Between her Goodreads updates and the pictures of the Styxx manuscript on Sherrilyn's FB page, my resolve is being tested to its limits.

What's a girl to do? Try NOT to think about grabbing the first Dark-Hunter book, for starters. Second, read some more Gena Showalter. I inhaled Last Kiss Goodnight last week and want to explore the Alien Huntress universe. After I get to the know the Lords of the Underworld a little better. Lucien's book finally came back to the library, but I had to request Reyes'. Now if only it would get here faster!

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