12 Days of Charity 2014

Posted on December 1, 2014 | Comments Off on 12 Days of Charity 2014

12daysgraphic
It’s charity time again! For those who don’t know, every year I kick off December by spotlighting a dozen (or more) charitable organizations for your holiday giving consideration. I’ll be tweeting each day and updating this post with the additional charities as they pop up. (Okay, well, I often fall behind in updating, but they’ll get here eventually!)

This year, I decided to mix in several Atlanta-area and other local charities along with national/international organizations. Larger groups often get much more attention than smaller ones that can often make an even bigger difference locally. You’ll notice a theme emerging: several of the groups I’m highlighting are focused on helping the large number of homeless LGBT+ youth, which is a big area of concern for me, and for a lot of you, too.

Day 1: The Armorettes

I always select an AIDS-related charity for December 1, World AIDS Day. This year I’m highlighting The Armorettes, also known as the Infamous Camp Drag Queens of the South, a drag troupe based in Atlanta that has raised more than $2 million over the past 35 years to support people living with HIV/AIDS. The troupe performs twice a week and conducts various other fundraisers throughout the year. (They also inspired the drag troupe in my upcoming novel, Unfortunate Son.)

Day 2: Médecins Sans Frontières

Doctors Without Borders needs no introduction. This international humanitarian organization provides emergency medical aid wherever it’s needed, anywhere in the world. Its medical volunteers provide quality care to people in crisis, regardless of race, religion, or politics, often in dangerous areas and situations. Simply put, MSF saves lives.

Day 3: Dream Power Therapeutic Equestrian Center

My friend Alicia clued me in about this group. Dream Power offers therapeutic, sport, and recreational horseback riding to physically and mentally challenged clients of all ages. Around since 1993, the center serves metro Atlanta and nearby communities and is a member of the Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship International.

Day 4: Partners In Health

Suggested by my friend Amy Jo, Partners In Health works to bring modern health care to the poor throughout the world. The organization started its work in Haiti in 1987 but has expanded to efforts in far-flung locations including Peru, Mexico, Rwanda, the Dominican Republic, Lesotho, and even the Navajo Nation in the United States. Partnerships organizations include PACT (USA), Possible (Nepal), Project Muso (Mali), Last Mile Health (Liberia), Village Health Works (Burundi), and Wellbody Alliance (Sierra Leone).

Day 5: Lost-n-Found Youth

Lost-n-Found Youth is a relatively new organization, in existence only since 2011, that’s done a huge amount of work already and has a set of ambitious goals yet to go. The organization’s goal is to get homeless LGBT+ youth in the Atlanta area off the streets and transitioned into permanent housing. LNFY operates a help hotline, a six-bed housing facility, and a host home program and is working to renovate a new location to expand its housing options.

Day 6: Reach Out and Read

My friend Ariel suggested Reach Out and Read, which works to promote literacy among young children from disadvantaged backgrounds. The organization is made up of medical providers who integrate literacy into pediatric practice by promoting children’s books and providing advice to parents about the importance of reading aloud. Founded in 1989, the organization now offers nearly 5,000 program sites nationwide that serve more than 4 million children.

Day 7: Pridelines Youth Services and the Alliance for GLBTQ Youth

My friend Lori suggested these Miami-area organizations. Pridelines was created by gay youth for gay youth and works to support and empower LGBT+ youth in South Florida. The Alliance for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender and Questioning Youth offers programs coordinated with service organizations throughout the Miami-Dade County area.

Day 8: The Wounded Warrior Project 

The Wounded Warrior Project’s mission statement is simple and straightforward: “To honor and empower Wounded Warriors.” The organization works to provide assistance to military service members and veterans who have suffered physical or mental injuries and to help them recover and adjust to life off the front lines. Founded after 9/11, WWP has served tens of thousands of service members and their families and continues to provide ongoing support.

Day 9: Project Fierce Chicago 

Founded in 2013, Project Fierce Chicago is working to provide identity-affirming transitional housing and other support services to homeless LGBT youth in the Chicago area. After a successful initial fundraising campaign, the organization is currently shopping for a location to set up housing for up to a dozen youth. (Also check out the Less Than Three Press anthology that’s raising funds to help!)

Day 10: SAGE

SAGE (Services and Advocacy for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Elders) focuses on assistance for older GLBT adults in the  United States. The organization works on many fronts, ranging from political advocacy to service provider training to direct services related to health and wellness, arts and culture, and more. Founded in 1978 as Senior Action in a Gay Environment, SAGE offers its programs at national and local levels, including 27 local affiliate groups in 20 states.

Day 11: Ali Forney Center

The Ali Forney Center offers housing and support services for LGBTQ youth in New York City. Founded in 2002, the organization provides medical and mental health services and career and educational counseling, as well as basic necessities like hot meals, showers, and clean clothing. A drop-in center and both short-term emergency housing and longer-term transitional housing are available.

Day 12: Forty to None Project

Last but certainly not least, and tying together a theme, is this organization that my friend Jeff pointed me toward. The Forty to None Project, part of Cyndi Lauper’s True Colors Fund, works to bring an end to gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender youth homelessness nationwide. The name comes from the 40% of homeless youth who are LGBT+, with a goal of bringing that number down to zero.

Comments Off on 12 Days of Charity 2014

Posted in 12 Days of Charity

New Contract: Wayward Son (Sons Book 2)

Posted on November 29, 2014 | Comments Off on New Contract: Wayward Son (Sons Book 2)

For those who missed my celebration on social media, I’ve just signed the contract for Wayward Son, to be published in May/June 2015 by Dreamspinner Press.  This will be my third (!!!) novel and is the second in the Sons series, the sequel to Unfortunate Son, which releases on January 12, 2015. Wayward Son is also my first novel-length ménage (M/M/M) story.

Here is the (very, very preliminary blurb):

After his move to Atlanta and away from the influence of his conservative parents, Mikey O’Malley finally feels free to be himself: art student, aspiring animator, and out gay man. He has friends, a new job, and not one, but two men interested in him. Cory Lassiter and Jimmy Black have been a happy couple for years, occasionally bringing a twink into their bed, but only for a brief roll in the hay. When Mikey meets the pair, the attraction is immediate, and it runs three ways. Mikey just can’t believe they’d have room in their lives for a permanent addition.

When Mikey’s newfound life is shattered by a lawsuit that accuses him of molesting a child years earlier, Mikey’s determined to face his troubles on his own, but Cory and Jimmy are just as determined that he not have to go it alone. To reconcile his need for independence and his desire for love, Mikey has to learn that being a man isn’t just about standing on your own two feet. It’s about letting yourself lean on the ones who love you.

Now: on to book 3! 🙂

Comments Off on New Contract: Wayward Son (Sons Book 2)

Posted in contracts, m/m/m, novel, unfortunate son, wayward son

Xena Semikina on Friendship and Avalanche

Posted on November 28, 2014 | Comments Off on Xena Semikina on Friendship and Avalanche

My guest today is Xena Semikina, here to talk about her novel Avalanche and its unique look at a unique bond.

Thank you very much, Shae, for hosting me today. It’s the final stop of my blog tour for my book Avalanche. As usual, I will start with a short blurb to introduce my book to those who are joining us for the first time and then I will move on to today’s topic.

AvalancheCoverBlurb for Avalanche

This is a novel about friendship, maybe in its unusual, extreme form. The two main characters, Mike and Nick, meet in the Alps on a scientific expedition. They become very close, but struggle to place their relationship in the context of their lives. They fear that the bond between them will not survive outside their research hut, and that the outside world will present challenges impossible to overcome. But then a tragic accident changes their lives forever… This story is an investigation into the nature of ties between people, the limits of loyalty and the power of conventions.

Does life make any sense?

In my book Avalanche I elevate friendship to the status normally afforded to love. Since time immemorial love has been variously described as ‘powerful, ‘divine’, ‘sublime’, ‘devastating’. Everybody knows it can make you move mountains or it can kill. If it’s love, and not friendship, that can make you experience these mighty feelings, it must be something specific to love that does it. Is it the sexual desire that gives you these special powers? With this story I challenge the idea that the act of sexual penetration is capable of something like that.

This is my last stop and to mark the occasion I will take a quick dive into the very core of the story’s conflict. My characters are aware that the reason why it’s so difficult for them to build a life together is because their union challenges no more no less than the established order. They call into question not only the traditional concept of family, as a homosexual couple would do, but also the nature itself, the very fabrics of procreation. They can’t justify the passion they share, they can’t explain to people around them what is really going on between them, and eventually they find themselves in a world of their own that makes sense only to them. However, from this vantage point they are able to see what others do not, and from their perspective it’s the world around that has gone mad and life itself doesn’t make any sense.

This is an extract from chapter 28. In this scene Mike has to leave Nick for longer than usual to attend to his family duties, in other words to play games he no longer believes in. Nick is still battling through his leg injury and Mike has severe misgiving about leaving him on his own. Nick, on the other hand, is concerned about Mike, who has too many problems to grapple with and at this point in time is too mentally and physically exhausted to juggle them all. Here we are in Nick’s POV.

‘Will you be okay?’ slipped off Nick’s lips. He knew it was a rhetorical question.

       ‘Of course,’ Mike smiled. ‘I’m inspired enough to produce a masterpiece of hypocrisy.’

       ‘Where do you draw the inspiration from?’

       ‘Life… The stupidity of it. You simply can’t find another arrangement where absolutely nothing makes any sense. Parts simply don’t stick together to make the whole, but somehow it exists.’  

       If that was the quality of life, Nick’s defeatist feelings were absolutely right. They were struggling for nothing. There was little point in sorting out one set of problems, when life would immediately introduce another one. It was like a defective gene, which could never produce a healthy protein. The question was: ‘Was it worth it?’ Was there a better arrangement for them?’ He was looking into Mike’s eyes and he felt like they were reading each other’s mind, as though everything he was thinking of was in fact their joint musings.    

       He didn’t know if he had really tried his hand at telepathy, but what happened to him on Saturday he couldn’t describe as anything other than premonition. He was completely deranged by anxieties by then. It could have made him hyper-sensitive, or indeed simply deranged, he reasoned. Whatever the reason was, sitting here, in this cafeteria under the spring sun, he suddenly got a clear feeling that a misfortunate event was about to occur. His feeling didn’t carry any further message, but his mind did the rest. He feared the worst…

***

Avalanche is available on Amazon US at $2.90 and on Amazon UK at £1.81. ePub is available at the Apple store and Kobo at £1.99 and the equivalent in $ (sorry, don’t know the exact price as I have never caught a glimpse of the US respective stores).          

Blog tour stops for Avalanche

1) 20 November 2014     Lane Hayes          https://lanehayes.wordpress.com/blog/

2) 22 November 2014     Kim Fielding       http://www.kfieldingwrites.com/category/blog/

3) 24 November 2014     Anne Barwell      http://annebarwell.wordpress.com/

4) 26 November 2014     Sophie Bonaste   http://sophiebonaste.blogspot.co.uk/

5) 28 November 2014     Shae Connor       http://shaeconnorwrites.com

About Xena Semikina

Xena is a novelist and a lawyer in criminal practice, with a distant background in computer science. Writing has always been her passion, which she has been pursuing actively for well over a decade. She has written four novels and has published one, entitled Avalanche. She lives in London with occasional trips to the South of France and the North of Russia.

Xena can be found on Twitter @Xena5000 and Facebook as Xena Semikina. Her blog can be found here: http://xenasemikina.wordpress.com/

Comments Off on Xena Semikina on Friendship and Avalanche

Posted in guest blog

Butts on Sale and More!

Posted on November 26, 2014 | Comments Off on Butts on Sale and More!

The holiday sales are ramping up all over the place, and today, MLR Press is celebrating Thanksgiving with 25% off everything in their store. That includes the first of the “butts” anthologies, Butt Pirates in Space, which includes my short story “What to Expect When Your Boyfriend is Expecting.” Great timing if you haven’t had the pleasure, since the third anthology, Butt Babes in Boyland, is coming out December 3 from Wilde City (which also has the second anthology, Butt Ninjas from Hell.)

Butt Pirate in Space CoverStrap yourself in and strap something on as you’re transported across galaxies and lifetimes by Kiernan Kelly, Kage Alan, Angelia Sparrow, T.C. Blue and Shae Connor. Whether it’s an interspecies pregnancy between two hormonal males, a swashbuckling group of pirates, or free gifts that talk, you’ll soon learn why in space, no one can hear you cream. Open wide for…

BUTT PIRATES IN SPPAAACCCEEE!

BUY LINK

Also! Dreamspinner Press is offering 25% off everything in the store through Sunday, November 30. You can find my DSP backlist HERE, including my two holiday stories, “Of Holiday Spirits, Wake-Up Calls, and Happily Ever Afters” and “Sharing Christmas.”

Happy shopping!

 

 

Comments Off on Butts on Sale and More!

Posted in 2010 advent calendar, 2011 advent calendar, anthology, butt babes in boyland, butt ninjas from hell, butt pirates in space, of holiday spirits, on sale, sharing christmas, short story, the half-life of pumpkin pie, what to expect

Thanksgiving for One

Posted on November 24, 2014 | 1 comment

turkey_nongpimmyFor various reasons, I’m spending Thanksgiving weekend alone this year. I had offers, primarily to go to my parents’ and eat dinner with extended family. But my sister’s off with her boyfriend’s family, and we decided to do our turkey dinner at Christmas this year, so I made the choice to take the long weekend off. After everything that’s been going on the past few months, I think I’ve earned a break.

I did find myself with turkey dinner envy, though, so it looks like I’ll be cooking one anyway (and might even have a guest come over to help me eat it). Thanksgiving dinner is my favorite meal of the year. After years of experimentation, we’ve finally figured out how to roast a perfect turkey every time, and we have our list of traditional side dishes, both required and optional. Here’s how things usually go around Thankgiving at Casa de Shae…

Appetizers: Varies from year to year. Favorites: smoked egg dip with fresh veggies, cheese and crackers, cream cheese and olive dip, and sparkling grape juice. Just depends on how much trouble we want to go to, and whether or not we have an actual breakfast.

Turkey: Stuffed with wedges of citrus and onion, skin brushed with olive oil, and with chicken broth and ginger ale in the pan. The ginger ale adds a touch of sweetness, and the extra liquid keeps the meat moist.

Other meats: Mom usually insists on having ham. What usually happens is we have ham for dinner the night before and serve the leftovers with the turkey dinner.

Dressing/stuffing: We make both, though neither goes into the bird. Dressing is the Southern cornbread style, made from scratch by a recipe developed by my grandmother. It’s served with giblet gravy. The stuffing is Stove Top out of the box, preferred by my dad, who’s a damn Yankee (born in New Jersey).

Potatoes: Sweet, not white. We usually roast ours (in a pan with a little water in the bottom to keep them soft), but sometimes we’ll have sweet potato casserole, which is my sister’s favorite.

Other sides: These vary from year to year. My favorites are fresh green beans, collard greens, and creamed corn (homemade, not that stuff in a can). Mom likes those too, but she always wants to have an olive tray (black and green olives and sweet and dill pickles) and fruit salad, too. Dad likes creamed onions and creamed lima beans, and my sister’s a fan of green bean casserole.

Cranberry sauce: Jellied straight out of the can for us!

Breads: Crescent rolls, usually. My grandmother could have eaten her weight in those. Real butter, naturally.

Beverages: Iced tea and apple cider.

Desserts: Pumpkin and apple pies. Sometimes pecan too, because Mom likes it. Lots and lots of Cool Whip.

Post-dinner entertainment: Naps, usually. We aren’t football watchers. We do usually record the National Dog Show and watch that later, though!

Image courtesy of nongpimmy / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

1 Comment

Posted in musings

Pro-Choice (Sex Positivity Blog Hop)

Posted on November 21, 2014 | 1 comment

spbhbadgeSex is, quite literally, everywhere in our society. Turn on the television and you’re bombarded with images of shirtless men and near-naked women selling everything from beer to shoes to toilet paper. Go into a shopping center and the stores are plastered with the same kinds of images. Most music videos are minor sex shows. The internet? Well, as Avenue Q told us, the internet is for porn.

At the same time, though, a huge swath of people in this country give lip service to the idea that sex is dirtybadwrong. They clutch their pearls, and their Bibles, and they wag their fingers, and they exclaim, “Think of the children!”

(Meanwhile, many of these same people are having affairs, or watching porn, or abusing children, or any of a number of other things that fly directly in the face of their public stances.)

Society in the United States has a completely unhealthy relationship with one of the most natural parts of being human. We love sex, but we’re ashamed of it. We fight our own needs and desires as if they’re demons and then wonder why we’re all stressed and unhappy. We tell kids “don’t have sex or else!” but refuse to teach them even the most basic information about how to stay safe when they inevitably give in to their raging hormones. We ignore the avalanche of statistics and studies and science that explain what’s wrong with how we view sex and how to fix it, because OMG dirtybadwrong.

And then, if you’re still a virgin when you hit college—or God forbid, still a virgin when you graduate—you’re a weirdo, or you’re gay (because OMG the horror of that!), or there’s just something fundamentally wrong with you.

We are one messed-up bunch.

But I don’t think any of you need me to tell you that.

I grew up in a staunchly conservative Christian household. My parents were, and still are, very traditional in many ways. My mother’s parents were even more conservative than mine are, and my dad’s father was such a staunchly conservative Catholic that he disowned my father for marrying a Protestant. (His mother was less so, but she wouldn’t go against my grandfather.) Unsurprisingly, my mother was a virgin when she got married. My dad wasn’t (he was a Marine, after all), but both of them have been completely faithful since they started dating. Fifty years later, they are still happy, still in love, still attracted to each other, and, yes, still having sex.

(No, the idea of my parents still having sex doesn’t gross me out, though naturally I do not want details.)

Unlike many of their peers, my parents have always had a very healthy attitude toward sex. Despite the way they were raised, despite the things people around them said they should and shouldn’t do, they gave me and my sister clear and comprehensive information about sex. Abstinence was the first line, of course. Don’t have sex, and you don’t have to worry about the possible consequences. But unlike the ineffective programs that stop there, they also gave us good information about how to have safe and healthy sex.

When I was 10, my mom gave me a set of books that explained everything about sex, from basic biology all the way through some fairly detailed mechanics. It even included masturbation as an option. This was before the AIDS era, but other kinds of sexually transmitted infections were covered. All of it was handled in a straightforward, not fear-mongering manner.

At age 10, I was already headed into the early stages of puberty. I understood those feelings I was getting sometimes, and by the time I was 11, I was figuring out that masturbation could be pretty fun. I knew what it meant, too, but despite what some people would probably think, that wasn’t because I’d had comprehensive sex ed but because of the world I lived in. The books Mom gave me didn’t introduce concepts I wouldn’t have heard about otherwise; they helped me make sense of things I already knew about. The books taught me the facts, not the often-ridiculous stories kids share on the playground.

The books also kept me from having sex.

At first glance, that last sentence might sound like a bad thing. But for me, it wasn’t. I was absolutely, positively, not ready to have sex when I was a teenager. I might have been able to handle it in college, but even then, sex would have messed me up pretty badly. Or, I should say, the inevitable breakup of the relationship during which I might have had sex would have been infinitely harder on me had sex been involved.

Part of it was the atmosphere I grew up in. My parents were pretty awesome, yeah, but we still lived in the rural Deep South. We were surrounded by people whose attitude toward sex made me wonder if they’d ever had sex—or decent sex, at least. And any woman who had sex outside of marriage was clearly a harlot who deserved to be shunned by polite society.

Men got a pass, of course. They were men, after all, and men have needs.

(Sorry. Had to pause to roll my eyes there for a minute.)

For a number of reasons, some healthy and some not so much, I didn’t have sex until I was in my early 30s. By then, I knew myself better. I’d survived my twenties and gotten my career on solid ground. I’d learned a lot about myself and my body on my own. And, probably most important of all, I’d come to terms with the fact that I would never have a perfect body, and that if a man didn’t like me the way I am, then he wasn’t worth my time.

For me, what it took to develop a healthy relationship with sex was to… not have it. But because of our messed-up societal view of sex, my choice made me an anomaly. A weirdo. I couldn’t possibly have just decided I didn’t want to have sex. Something must have been wrong with me.

Sigh.

So, yeah, one little look around at society will show you that, when it comes to sex, we’re all losers. No matter how or when you choose to have sex, or not have sex, someone (usually a lot of very loud someones) will take you to task for it. Yes, sex can carry some risks, but so can pretty much any part of life. We don’t stop eating because we might choke.

So what’s the answer?

The answer is up to you. How and when you choose have sex is about you. (And your partner[s], of course.) Sex isn’t dirtybadwrong or any of the other crap people might try to throw at you. Sex is fun. It’s a beautiful way to celebrate your body and your attraction to another person. (Or persons! It’s all good!)

Sex is your decision. Whatever you choose to do, or not do, don’t let the haters and hypocrites get you down.

They’re probably just jealous anyway. 😉

1 Comment

Posted in blog hop

Layla M. Weir, Winter Wooing, and Ransom

Posted on November 17, 2014 | 3 comments

Today my guest is Layla M. Weir, here to talk about her new novel release, Held for Random. Take it away, Layla!

Hi Shae! Thanks so much for having me!

My new novel Held For Ransom came out on Friday, and today I’m having an all-day release party at my Facebook and blog:

http://laylawier.wordpress.com

https://www.facebook.com/laylamwier

If you’re reading this, feel free to stop by, chat, enter contests, and watch me liveblog my failure to write! \o/

Okay, so: about the novel! Held For Ransom is a spinoff, of sorts, to my short story “Waiting For the Light” in last year’s Snow on the Roof anthology, although the two share little other than their setting. When I wrote “Waiting For the Light”, I had to put it somewhere, so I decided to set it in central Illinois, where I lived for four years in the early 2000s while my husband went to grad school. Held For Ransom takes place in the same area (fictional Heatherfield County, Illinois) while featuring a different cast of characters. (Certain characters from “Waiting For the Light” just might cameo, though — keep your eyes open!)

I have a longtime fondness for books, movies and TV shows about small towns populated with lovable eccentrics. I also love big ensemble casts. Now that I’ve got the cast assembled, I’m pretty sure this won’t be the last time I write about Heatherfield County.

In Held For Ransom, the little town of Osmar is gearing up for their annual winter carnival when a mysterious, motorcycle-riding drifter rides into town and sweeps the carnival’s organizer, DJ Lanning, off his feet. Ransom just might have the key to saving the carnival from financial disaster, but his pretty face is hiding more than a few dark secrets. What is the tragedy in Ransom’s past that haunts him even today? While he’s busy saving the carnival, will Osmar — and DJ — end up saving him?

In today’s excerpt, DJ and Ransom flirt while Ransom finds himself being sneakily wooed … into volunteering for the Osmar winter carnival:

“So, tell me about the winter carnival,” Ransom said.

DJ looked like his train of thought had just derailed again. For an instant he looked crestfallen, then rallied. “Ah, yeah, it’s kind of a disaster. Did you actually put up the flyers?”

“I did. All over Aldona.” Ransom smiled. “What did you think I’d do, throw them in a trash can as soon as I was out of sight?”

“Well, I wasn’t sure,” DJ said defensively. “It’s hard enough finding people in town who are willing to do anything to help. Oh, everyone wants to, but they evaporate as soon as there’s actual work to be done. Mom had a knack for getting them all pointed in the right direction.” A shadow crossed his face. “Mom used to run the carnival. It was her baby.”

“Now that she’s gone, they’ve got you doing it,” Ransom said. It was a familiar story, the light-side version of his own, he supposed.

“Yes,” DJ said, a world of exhaustion in that tone.

Ransom grinned at him and hoped it looked sympathetic. It was relaxing, somehow—DJ’s world of small problems, and the way he was so bound up in them, as if they were the most important things in the world. And Ransom could help, after all. That made him warm—giddy, almost. And he made a decision. Tonight he wanted to lose himself in DJ’s light-side world. Just for a little while. He didn’t want to think about the road, or the coming snow. He didn’t want to think about the world outside at all. “Hey,” he said, and reached out to touch DJ’s lips lightly with his forefinger. He hoped he hadn’t read the signs wrong. If so, he was about to get thrown out on his ass, and he’d probably deserve it. “It’s okay.”

DJ shut up and looked baffled.

“It’s okay,” Ransom said again. “You want to know why I came back?”

“Yes,” DJ said. He still looked confused. To speak, he had to part his lips, sending a small electric charge through Ransom’s fingertip as they brushed it.

“Because you were so involved with it,” Ransom said quietly. “I wanted to help. I still do. I don’t know a small-town carnival from a hole in the wall, but it really moved me that you were so obviously invested in making it work. I want to help, I really do.”

“Well,” DJ said, and took a deep breath. “We need volunteers for the booth construction, the bake sale, if we can manage to get it pulled together in time—well, basically everything at this point. Do you know anything about advertising? Because Mom always handled that end of things—”

Ransom hushed him with the fingertip again. “Okay, I get it,” he said, laughing. “There’s a lot to do. To each according to his needs, right?”

“Did you just quote Marx?”

“I have depths,” Ransom said, grinning.

HeldforRansom200x300Two weeks before Christmas, the small town of Osmar is gearing up for its annual winter carnival, but the death of the event’s long-time organizer might mean the end of the festivities. Everyone is turning to her son DJ to save the carnival, but DJ can barely save himself. He’s spinning his wheels in Osmar—working part time at the gas station, living in his parents’ house, and trying to figure out what to do with his life. DJ is caught in a large, loving web of well-meaning family and friends, but they can’t fix his life for him. 

Into this mess comes Ransom, a handsome mystery man on a motorcycle. Ransom is traveling around the country, making up for his past sins by doing “good deeds.” He and DJ have a one-night stand that neither can forget, but that’s just the start, because Ransom has a plan to save the carnival, and DJ has a plan to save Ransom… and possibly himself.

Buy Links:

Dreamspinner Press: http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=5679

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Held-Ransom-Heatherfield-Layla-Wier-ebook/dp/B00PAX6AMY

About Layla:

Layla M. Wier is a writer and artist who grew up in rural Alaska and now lives on the highway north of Fairbanks, where winters dip to 50 below zero and summers yield 24 hours of daylight. She and her husband, between the two of them, possess a useful array of survival skills for the zombie apocalypse, including gardening, blacksmithing, collecting wild plant foods, and spinning wool into yarn (which led to her first Dreamspinner Press novella, “Homespun”). When not writing, she likes reading, hiking, and spending way too much time on the Internet.

Where to find Layla:

Blog: http://laylawier.wordpress.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/Layla_in_Alaska
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/laylamwier
Tumblr: http://laylainalaska.tumblr.com

Link to all stops on the Held for Ransom blog tour (Nov. 12-Dec. 1)

3 Comments

Posted in guest blog

Planning Ahead: My 2015 Writing Schedule

Posted on November 14, 2014 | Comments Off on Planning Ahead: My 2015 Writing Schedule

2015_StuartMilesPutting together a writing schedule is a brand-new thing for me. I had a sort of de facto schedule for the second half of 2014, just because I had several deadlines that forced me to write stories in a specific order. I’m going to try to carry that on into 2015 and see if a schedule will help keep me on track.

Here’s my tentative writing schedule for 2015. Keep in mind this doesn’t include publisher edits, release dates, or event attendance—it’s just getting stories written, beta read, and ready for submission.

January–March: Nobody’s Son (Sons, Book 3)

March–June: Help Wanted (M/F contemporary)

June: Cabin Fever (anthology novella)

July: Snow Come Down (Christmas novella)

August–December: Under the Lights trilogy (NA, M/M, football)

I have firm deadlines for Nobody’s Son and the Cabin Fever novella. Everything else is super flexible at this point, except that I do want to have a novel ready to pitch at RWA next July. Right now, that’s slated to be the M/F title, but that could change. I’ll likely have at least one more short to fit in there too!

All this PLANNING stuff brings up an excellent question. We hear the plotter vs. pantser discussion about the writing process all the time, but what about when it comes to your writing schedule? Do you plan things out, or do you just write whatever comes to you next?

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Comments Off on Planning Ahead: My 2015 Writing Schedule

Posted in goals, schedule, writing

This Little Pig Jig

Posted on November 10, 2014 | Comments Off on This Little Pig Jig

bigpigjigOn Saturday, I went to a south Georgia festival known as the Big Pig Jig. I’d seen signs for it along the interstate for years—it’s in Vienna (pronounced Vie-anna, this being the Deep South), which is about an hour from where my parents live. But I’d never stopped in to check it out.

The big reason I made time to stop this year is that I have a story in the pipeline that’s about competition barbecue cooking teams, and I wanted to get a closer look at how those work for research purposes. This event is the state pork cook-off of Georgia (yes, such a designation exists), but as it turns out, my timing was way off. When I got there, the judging portion was underway, so I missed the cooking parts, and I didn’t even get to sample the results.

This year's festival theme was "Gone With the Swine." Porky's speech bubble reads, "Frankly, my dear, I don't give ham!"

This year’s festival theme was “Gone With the Swine.” Porky’s speech bubble reads, “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a ham!”

(Well, I could have, but I would’ve had to hang around for another two hours for that, and the “festival” part of the event was a great disappointment and certainly not worth that amount of time.)

What I ended up doing, since I was there, was some “local flavor” research instead. I took some pictures, as this post will attest, and I grabbed a copy of the event brochure for some more background information. I’m also going to look up the cooking teams whose signs I photographed and see if they’ll answer some specific questions. The competition part is the backdrop of the story, of course, since it’s a romance between members of rival teams, so the information will need to be right but not necessarily extremely detailed.

teamsigns

On the other hand, the winner at the Big Pig Jig gets to compete at Memphis in May, which is home to the World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest. Maybe I should make plans to go in 2015 and finish up my research there. Mmmm, delicious, delicious research… 😉

showingourbutts

Comments Off on This Little Pig Jig

Posted in research