Ghosts, Old and New

Ghost, a cautionary tale of why one should never fall in love with an incubus, especially if one is an angel, came out yesterday.  It's been one of my favorite "in progress" stories for the last five years, so seeing it out there and finished is bittersweet.  I'm glad to finally share Ghost and John with readers, but at the same time I feel I'm losing a little of them myself.  I'll never sit down again with these two, never again slip into their heads and live through them.  It's that moment of depression at the end of writing a book that I always wonder if other writers experience.

Ghost also marks a pause - it's the last "big" story that was backed up in my creative pipeline for New Berlin.  The third and final volume of The Hunting will be released this summer (exclusively on Smashwords), and after that there will probably be a lull in New Berlin for a bit while I sort through ideas and partials and figure out where my demons want to take me next.  Some old ghosts have been slipping through my cracks, reminding me of characters and plots that predate New Berlin and are still hungry for physical form.  So I may pursue them a while and let the city breathe new life into itself.

Assurances that I do intend to return to New Berlin, whether it's tomorrow or in a few months.  There's one character's story in particular, the most important character really, whose existence inspired the entire idea of New Berlin.  You haven't seen him yet except in glimpses.  His name is Sericus Vane.  He owns a nightclub on the East Side where he employs demonic performers for bizarre stage acts.  He's gathering fallen angels to his club, partly in preparation for the war to come. And partly because he is looking for one angel in particular, an angel from his past, on whom he intends to exact ruinous revenge.

But the details of this revenge are murky.  So I am scrying in my crystal ball, seeking them out, and grasping for the heartstrings of the story.

Meantime, I hope you enjoy Ghost.  My favorite incubus and my favorite angel thus far.  May they herald in a beautiful, green Ostara.

xoxo,
Blake

Don't You Ever Write About Straight People?

My mother used to ask me that.  She never actually told me that I shouldn't, as a female, be writing about gay males.  Though she believed on and off again that homosexuality was a sin against God, it probably bothered her more that I'm pagan than that I write about gay rocks stars.  Still, she was a voracious reader of romance novels, and I think she wanted to read something of mine without being weirded out because two guys were "doing it."  Also, she seemed to think I'd make more money if I wrote about straight people.  ;)

My answer to whether I ever wrote about straight people was usually evasive.  I always have written heterosexual romances.  But my first novel being a gay love story, it seemed logical to me to continue in that vein when I was working on a story I planned to publish.  LGBT culture attracts me, or maybe a better way to put it is that it speaks to me, to something in me I can't quite define.  I'm primarily straight in this life, but I've always felt that in another life I was a shy gay man who never got his shit together enough to be happy in his own skin.  I'm left with an eroded past self, the ghost of which is still present through all the other layers of me.  Not quite accessible.  But still seeking expression.

And really, I try to just write the characters as they appear to me.  If a gay werewolf pops into my head, he's getting a gay romance.  If a kinky-but-straight witch starts swimming through my brain, she gets a kinky-but-straight romance.  Simple as that.  The gay ones just get published more often, because I'm a creature who loves familiarity, and hates taking chances.

Also, it's always seemed like a lot of work to publish a straight romance.  So many writers use different names to separate their gay work rom their hetero work.  And obviously that's fine, but I just didn't think I had the energy for yet another personality.

Then my mom died.  And I have so many fucking regrets about her death, about her life, that this one thing--don't you ever write about straight people?--suddenly seems like such a simple thing.  I can't go back in time and be a nicer person when she was driving me crazy.  I can't go back and dig the time out of my schedule to take her on more day trips, or stop griping at her for her love of Hallmark movies turned up to deafening volumes.  But I can write a goddamn romance novel she might actually have enjoyed reading.

Although she'd probably be unhappy that my protagonist is a little bit of a junky, and a lot of a bitch.  But what can I say?  I like my girls crazy, damaged, and nasty AF.

And so that is the explanation for why a male/female romance novel is suddenly appearing under my name.  Ironically it's a story I wrote almost ten years ago as a cute little novella.  It went up online at FictionPress, and some people said they liked it.  Enough people that I always thought I'd like to redo the story as it deserved, someday.  And now someday is today.

Tomorrow actually.  Wolves' Blood releases tomorrow on Amazon for all you kindle readers.  And ironically it fits perfectly into the New Berlin universe.

I hope some of you enjoy it.  And don't worry; I am not turning into a different kind of writer.  Just letting ya'll see a different side of me.  Meantime, hard at work on the next New Berlin story, about a stoic fallen angel and the glittery cross-dressing exotic dancer he falls in love with.  And possibly the final installment of The Hunting will sort itself out before next year.  You never know.  Miracles happen.

Cheers, and peace out, yo.

Coming Soon: Another New Berlin Novel

And here is the proof that Iron and Bone, which has spun out from a short story into a novelette into an official novel, is actually going to arrive in the world someday.  Ladies and gents and whatevs, we have a cover:

Here's a teaser from chapter one (though you will have to momentarily bear with  Matthew's version of an exciting day ;)

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IRON & BONE (excerpt)
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The office had three gray walls, no natural light, and just enough space for a filing cabinet, a desk, and a rolling chair. The chair had two broken casters, and no longer rolled.  Whenever Matthew moved in the chair, it made a soft, dragging sound.

The only other sounds in the office were the clicking of Matthew’s fingers across the computer keyboard, and the susurration of his own breath.  He was a quiet breather; the noise was all but inaudible.

He had once asked if he might bring in a small radio to play while he worked.  His employer had rejected him curtly:  Absolutely not.  Whether he was worried the radio would distract Matthew or if the man simply found music distasteful, Matthew didn’t know, and had better sense than to inquire.

So he worked in silence, tallying the receipts from his employer’s four shops, including The Gem Shoppe, where his tiny office was located opposite from his employer’s much larger one.  Eight hours a day of compiling figures into Quickbooks and running reports of monthly profits and losses.  It was dull work, especially now that tax season was over. Matthew found himself missing the volume of paperwork that passed across his desk in early spring, all the 1099s that had to be mailed by end of January, and then the start of federal forms, February and March consumed by the search for every single tax deduction that could possibly lower his employer’s due.  He never felt so happily busy as he did during tax season, the mad rustle of paper its own cheerful song.

It was Monday now, and nearly noon.  Matthew had sorted the receipts for two stores already, The Gem Shoppe and Green Herbal.  Three more store remained to be sorted before the close of business.  It was the same every Monday.  He arrived at five minutes to nine, and the store was already unlocked. In the main display room, the crystal specimens were set out on stretches of black velvet, and in Matthew’s office, five identical boxes of receipts waited.

There was no sign of his employer, but Matthew knew Mr. Dietrich was there; he was always there.  Usually in his office, but sometimes surveying the contents of the walk-in vault.  Matthew seldom had reason to be in the vault, and preferred it that way.  There was a chill in the room that made his bones ache. The silence there felt different than other silences.  It had a waiting quality about it.  Matthew couldn’t begin to imagine what the vault was waiting for, but he doubted it was anything good.

There was still time before lunch to begin a new box of receipts.  He opened the next in line, which had come from Mr. Dietrich’s pet shop, Familiar. Matthew had a difficult time picturing his employer as the owner of a pet shop.  It didn’t seem to fit the man.  When he was still new, he’d made the mistake of asking about that, about why Mr. Dietrich spread himself so widely in his business ventures.  The gem shop, the pet shop, the health food store, the café, and most bizarrely, the matchmaking service.  Was there a connection between them, he had wondered?

Victor Dietrich had fixed him with such a cold look that Matthew felt a ball of ice form in the pit of his stomach.  “My interests are my own, Mr. Goode,” the man said in his hard, flat voice, “and your job description does not include questioning those interests if you wish to have a job at all.”

Matthew had never mentioned it again.  Because of course he very much wished to have a job, even if it wasn’t particularly a dream job.  The wage was adequate (though barely).  And he liked the regularity of his days, knowing what to expect, and that he would not be pressured into taking on extra work.  His previous employer had been a small business owner who expected him to grow with the business, to take on more and more responsibilities and make decisions that affected growth and direction.  The pressure had been incredibly stressful. He much preferred Mr. Dietrich’s ways, frosty and controlling.  Mr. Dietrich would never permit, much less expect Matthew to begin setting policy on his own.

Matthew created a new Exel sheet, copying the format from the week before, and began entering the pet shop’s sales.  Briefly and solely for his own curiosity, he glanced at the “items” sold on each receipt.

One black kitten.

Six cane toads.

Two crows.

One white kitten.

It was, Matthew had decided a long time ago, a very odd pet shop.

The bell over the front door chimed, echoing down the short hallway where Matthew’s door stood open (per Mr. Dietrich’s order). He glanced out the door, forgetting for a moment the quandary of how one might make a pet of a three week old Komodo dragon, and hoping for a customer.  Not that Mr. Dietrich would ever let him speak to the customers, of course. But sometimes he called Matthew out to ring up sales.  Mr. Dietrich had a deep aversion to processing credit cards.

It wasn’t a customer.  It was McCarthy.

Matthew’s heart executed a peculiar vault and flip worthy of any Olympic gymnast, and then settled into a fluttery beat.  The office seemed suddenly warm, spring creeping in from outside as if it simply couldn’t be kept out any longer; perhaps it had come in with McCarthy.

What Matthew knew about the man called McCarthy he could count on three fingers.  First, that his favorite color must have been black, just like Mr. Dietrich, because that was all either of them ever wore.  But where the color (or lack thereof) made their employer appear somewhat corpselike, McCarthy seemed to have been born to it.  The soft black leather of his high-collared coat perfectly matched his hair, which was drawn into a long braid that hung halfway down his back.  Black jeans seemed molded to him, showing every inch of long legs, muscled thighs. His gloves, too, were black, and also the aviator sunglasses perched on the bridge of his fine aquiline nose. All that darkness ought to have made his white skin look far too pale, and it waspale; but the stark contrast was outlandishly appealing.  Matthew thought.

Second, whatever work McCarthy did for Mr. Dietrich, it was dangerous.  Every time he appeared at The Gem Shoppe he had some new scar, or limp.  Frequently his lovely coat, so soft it seemed to fold around him like wings, had been damaged.  Though he seemed to have an endless supply of them, changing one out for another by the next visit.  Like the ruined coats, his scars had usually also disappeared by the next time Matthew saw him.

The third thing Matthew knew, and perhaps the most important thing, was that he would never in his lifetime meet a man more perfectly devastating to his senses than the man called McCarthy.  Or a man more terribly out of his league.

The front door fell shut.  Tinted glass cut off the impression of warmth and overcast skies, and the brief lift in the air flattened again.  The gems on their shelves went on sparkling, impossibly bright. McCarthy ignored the gems and the empty show room and stalked toward the hall, shiny black boots utterly silent.

Matthew looked quickly back down at his desk, trying to remember which entry he’d been in the middle of so that he could resume his absorption in it.  He couldn’t for the life of him recall.

“Good morning, Matthew.”

A cool shadow fell across the desk.  McCarthy smelled like the threat of rain, and he was tall enough to fill the doorway completely.  His voice was dark as midnight, smooth as silk, warmer than his shadow.

Without looking up, Matthew said, “Good morning… McCarthy.”  As always, with that little pause.  Because after six years of working at The Gem Shoppe, he still wasn’t sure if McCarthy was a first name or a last name.  McCarthy had never volunteered more, and neither had their mutual employer.

Good morning, in fact, was the extent of their typical conversation, with the occasional notation on the weather.

McCarthy’s shadow lingered.  Matthew wondered if he was about to comment on the approaching hurricane, early for the season.  Perhaps McCarthy had weekend plans that would now be ruined by wind and rain.

Yet the other man remained silent.  When Matthew glanced up, he found McCarthy frowning down at the stack of receipts on the desk.

His eyes were indigo.  Matthew had only been near enough to him to make out their true color once or twice.  From any distance, they simply looked black.

“Christ.  The dragon sold already.”

Matthew blinked, and then remembered the pet shop. “Ah, yes.  The Komodo.  For nine thousand nine hundred ninety-nine dollars.  Plus tax, of course.”

McCarthy lifted a gloved hand absently to his jaw. “He should have doubled it.  The thing’s too much trouble to restock.”

His jaw was smooth and unmarked now, but Matthew recalled a week earlier when McCarthy had come in with a vicious festering wound there that appeared in the shape of a bite.

McCarthy shook his head as he stepped back out of the office.  An errant lock of coal black hair brushed his cheek, softening for a moment the unyielding lines of his face.  Matthew’s heart startled again.  He tried to formulate a response, any response, but between the lock of hair, the scent of leather, and the notion that McCarthy might actually have gone off to some sweltering island to procure that lizard, he was stuck.

He was still stuck when McCarthy paused again, just outside the door, and glanced back.  “By the way—happy birthday, Matthew.”

Matthew blinked again, rapidly.

“Thank you,” he said a full minute later, but by that time of course, McCarthy had gone.

The Hunting, Vol.2

The second volume of The Hunting trilogy is officially up!  (Or will be in 24 hours...)  Releasing January 9, 2018, you can preorder a copy on Amazon.

PACK:  The Hunting, Vol.2

Opposites attract, and love is blind.  What other hope is there for a werewolf who can't seem to fall out of love with his werewolf-slaying ex?

Jackson thought the hard part of getting back together with his estranged boyfriend would be convincing Eric not to kill him outright.  After all, Eric has spent his entire adult life being brainwashed by the Paranormal Division; he's trained to kill monsters without mercy or sentiment.  And whether Jackson chose to become a werewolf or not, the fact that he ran away and hid for two years afterward has left Eric in a perpetually pissed off mood.

And yet—he didn’t kill Jackson.  He chose, instead, to leave the Paranormal Division and run away with his wayward ex.  But that wasn’t the hard part.

The hard part is living together after.  When they’re on the run from a secret and deadly branch of the government.  Camped out in the middle of nowhere with no decent coffee for miles.  When Eric won’t touch Jackson.  Won’t talk to him.  Will hardly even look at him.

When Jackson is pretty sure that Eric thinks running away with him was a mistake.

But the Paranormal Division is hot on their heels, and there’s only one place Jackson can think of where he and Eric will be safe to figure out their next move.  The problem is, it’s the same place where he spent the last two years hiding.  And it’s a wolf’s den.

For two years, Jackson lived with the Beneventi family.  From them, he learned how a man and a werewolf can live at peace in the same skin.  He ran with them, hunted with them, and called them pack.  To a wolf, pack means family.  And not every member of his adopted family has forgiven him for trying to return to his old life and his old lover.  Michael Beneventi thought he’d laid claim to Jackson, and now he’s fully prepared to take out any challenger, even a federal agent with a dangerous attitude and the knowledge and skill to put down any werewolf.

It’s up to Jackson to stitch together the two sides of his life—or tear them apart once and for all.  If he wants to keep Eric, he’ll have to fight for him.

But then… there’s always the thought that Eric never really left the Paranormal Division at all.

____________

And if you missed it, don't forget to check out the first volume of The Hunting!

Cheers!

Pack Means Family

At long last, The Hunting continues - Volume 2, Pack, will be released for Kindle in January 2018.  It's taken a lot of drafts, a lot of coffee, and a lot of mumbling to myself, but Eric and Jackson's story has finally sorted itself out.

To be fair, nothing is simple when you're talking about a werewolf going on the run with his estranged boyfriend, who very formerly made a living killing monsters like the one his lover has become.  Not to mention his old employers are on their heels - the Division, the most secret and deadly branch of the FBI.  They want Eric back.  And if they can't have him, they'll put him down just like they intend to put his boyfriend down.  Throw in an old indiscretion of Jackson's, resulting in a dangerously jealous young werewolf dead set on knocking out his human rival...  And things are about to get messy.

Pack runs about twice the length of The Hunting, and forms the midsection of what is intended as a trilogy.  Volume 3, Blood, is in the works now and will be out closer to spring/summer of next year.

While The Hunting books are related to and partially set in New Berlin, they form more of a Division subset which gets a bit darker than stories like, say, Sweet.  I have plans for several Division focused novels to be released over the next year or two, werewolves and some undead forays as well.  And then it'll be full circle back into New Berlin proper, where the witches, incubi, and angels have been biding their time.

Pack will be available for presale mid-December.

It's Halloween

Or almost Halloween.  Technically it's the first day of Mabon.  I was born at Mabon, which maybe accounts for some of my darker and more woeful inclinations.  Call me Demeter.  Or Persephone?  But I'm trying to look on the lighter side lately, because sometimes the dark is just too dark.  So even though I'm releasing my first zombie story in less than two weeks, it's kind of a lighter zombie story.  There are even jokes.  I can't say whether the jokes are funny.  But they're in there.  So...

Strange is a short story set in New Berlin, though it stands independent of any previous stories.  It's a look at the dangers of Craigslist roommate ads, and what might happen if a workaholic chef invited a hoodie-wearing, cash-rent-paying zombie to live in his spare bedroom.  It might be weird sometimes, right?  Like, who gets the last piece of bacon?  And is that blood on my beautiful kitchen floor?  But it might also be really convenient, say in the event of a home invasion, to have a roommate with superhuman strength and an insatiable appetite for human flesh.  Naturally though it would be a really stupid idea to start crushing on your dead roommate.

So, yeah, werewolves suck (you guessed it, I'm stalled on the second volume of The Hunting again), and zombies are in.  Strange comes out October 3rd.

And there will probably be more zombie stories to come, because they are somewhat of an obsession of mine.  I can't promise they'll all be light, because, you know, Mabon and the influence of the Dark Mother.  But there will probably be more.  And then maybe some vampires and/or witches.  Possibly we'll go back to a werewolf or two.  Eventually--eventually--there will be a return to the fey and incubi and fallen angels.  Because the angels are really the point of this whole city, if I didn't keep getting so damn sidetracked.

But for now.  Strange.  You can buy or borrow it from Amazon October 3rd.

Meantime.  Happy fall.  Go harvest something.

Swwweeeeet.

Sweetness is coming.  Like, ferr realll.

After five drafts, lots of red wine, and even more Cheetos to help me through the dark times, I've finally finished a new novel.  Sweet - a paranormal romance (light on the paranormal, heavy on the angst relationship issues) about a fairy, an incubus, and all the reasons best friends should/shouldn't fall in love.

The fully edited and polished version will be available on Kindle and in print somewhere about mid-August.  But if you're impatient like meeee, you can read a slightly more raw version for free here on FictionPress right now.  The free version will (*frowny face*) go buh-bye when the paid one comes out.  But, yes, of course there will be free days to nab the final kindle version later on.

I leave you with an image of the brand new cover...  And then I go curl up on the couch and finish watching The Bachelorette: The Men Tell All, because it's been a hellish day and only drama regarding cute men and red wine and yet more Cheetos and THE THOUGHT OF A NEW NOVEL will make me feel human again.

Do You Believe in Magic?

I do.  Because after six long, LONG years... I have a new story that I'm in love with.

Today marks the publication of The Magician's Assistant, a novelette about darkness, desire, atoning for bad decisions... and, yes, real, bone-deep magic.

It all starts when a young man named Rain answers an employment ad.  Seeking, the ad reads, a discreet young man to assist master magician in live performances.  Apply in person...

But when Rain arrives, he finds himself interviewing for far more than a job.  This magician is no charlatan.  He's as hard and cold as his magic, magic than can send a sword through a man's heart and leave it beating.  To take that sword, his assistant must possess unique qualities.  Obedience.  Loyalty.  Trust.  And maybe... love.

If Rain can give all that, and somehow persuade the magician to offer it back, he might just find the life he's been searching for.

The Magician's Assistant is available for purchase from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Kobo Books, iTunes, and just about everywhere else ebooks are sold.

And now, being properly exhausted, I shall leave you with an excerpt.

**Adult material - not for readers under 18**

“Are you quite comfortable?”

Rain smiled slightly.  His spine stretched unnaturally against the drag of his own body, his toes just barely brushing the floor.  Chains ground against his wrist bones, and already the strain made his shoulders ache, set his arms on fire.  “Not… exactly.”

The magician nodded.  He adjusted neither chain or hook.

And that, at least, was exactly what Rain had expected of him.  His smile hardened.  So the magician wanted to hurt him?  Good.  He could handle it.

The magician circled him, chin tipped down.  His hair fell forward to shadow his gaze.  “The sword,” he said, “is a tool in many tricks of illusion.  But this is not a trick.  I do not practice illusion; my business is magic.  Do you believe in magic, boy?”

“Yes, sir.”

“In truth?”

“I believe, sir.”

“Then if I were to put this blade through your belly, you believe that I could do so without causing harm to your body?”

Rain sucked in a labored breath.  “Yes, sir.”

“There is only one matter remaining then.  Trust.”  The corner of the magician’s mouth lifted in an acerbic half-smile.  He bent to retrieve the mended scarf he’d set aside earlier.  It trailed silken and sin black from his hands.  “Do you trust me, boy?”

Rain stared at the scarf.  In four years, he had never been blindfolded.  It was his only hard limit, the one thing he would not allow.  He would do anything, give himself over to anything—as long as he could see it coming.

This was his last chance to walk away.  Even with the shut door and the chains locked around him, the magician was giving him one final chance to leave unscathed.

But he couldn’t.  Because there was the word, trust, and that was what it all came down to.  Did he trust this man?

Arctic eyes gazed back at him with scarcely veiled amusement—and challenge.  The gaze and the half-bitter smile told him he was a fool to trust.  Rain thought he might be just that, because for the life of him, he couldn’t walk away now.

“Yes, sir.”  He let his eyes slide shut.  “I trust you, sir.”

The air stirred in hot currents as the magician stepped in close.  Silk whispered against Rain’s cheek and then settled into place over his eyes.  He could smell the other man on the fabric, a scent of orange and clove that teased him, that made him wish for the touch of impossibly warm skin against him.  His heart beat hard and fast.  But the magician didn’t touch him.  Not yet.

It was cold steel that found his skin.  Cold steel that touched and kissed him.  Not slicing, not stabbing, though his body reacted as if it did,  muscles contracting in an instinctive effort to pull him out of harm’s way.  Instinctive and futile, as the chains clanked and pulled tight at his wrists.  The sword went on as if he hadn’t moved at all, the tip of it grazing the ridge of his hipbone, rising to slowly count his ribs.  Light as a breath, the blade traced over his chest, circling each nipple with a deliberate closeness that made Rain’s breath catch.

“And still you trust me?” the magician murmured.

Rain forced a hard exhale.  “Yes.”

The rapier stroked a straight line down from the center of his chest, sharp point coming to rest in the indent of his navel.

“And now?”

A flush crept up Rain’s neck.  His groin flooded with heat.  “Yes.  Always.”

“Good,” the magician said, and pushed the sword forward...

___