Em's Turn...

Posting this song just because I can... love the lead singer.

Just `cause Green Day is awesome.

MY WINNERS ARE!!!

The winners of the With Love Valentine Blog  Hop for 2012 are:

Firstly I would like to thank everyone who stopped by my blog to take part in this wonderful event - thank you to those of you who joined my list of followers, I truly appreciate you all.

Using the age old way of picking things - Yes get someone else to pick a name out of a hat, (or Tupperware container if you will). I got someone else to pick out the winner as I knew too many of the people in my list. I thought it would be fairer if someone else pulled out the fated names. So without Further ado the winners are:

FOLLOWERS

Cathy M

COMMENTS

June M

On another note here is a great review for my own Valentine story.

Randy's Bookbag Reviews

ANGEL MARTINEZ - Part One...

  Okay, listen up everyone - I want to introduce to you another of  one of my all time favourite Authors and lets just say are you in for a treat as Angel has sent me a couple of postings so I will be pimping her again next Wednesday as well... I can guarantee that you will enjoy everything that comes from this fabulous author.

Science Fiction – It’s What’s For Breakfast

I know, I know. The stereotype persists after all these years. SF reader = adenoidal-ly challenged adolescent male. After all, when you see footage of SF conventions, what do they show you? Socially challenged young males who’ve taught themselves to speak Klingon. Oh, and the occasional hot babe in leather. They spout off models of fictional spaceships with greater accuracy than most sports nuts can spew baseball stats and discuss with pompous erudition the relative merits of one game’s weapons system over another. Lovely.

But the real world of Science Fiction (yes, a contradiction, I know) is the novel, which deals with, at its heart, human issues. SF often uses alien or futuristic settings to discuss cultural and social issues because by removing us from our familiar surroundings, by showing us something new, we may be able to view these issues in a new way.

In order to do this, or any of the other hundred things SF novels can do well, the novel must (MUST!) be a vehicle for character. (As Virginia Woolf wrote, “The great novelists have brought us to see whatever they wish us to see through some character. Otherwise they would not be novelists, but poets, historians, or pamphleteers.”) This is true of garden-variety romance, of literary novels and must be the basis of SF novels of any type, or the author risks having the story come across as meaningless, self-serving, symbolic bombast.

Thanks for the lecture, Angel – mind telling us where you’re going? Patience, grasshopper, I’m getting there. When I began Gravitational Attraction, it started out as the germ of an idea, a kernel of SF tech built around gravity wells, but these were just notes and sketches. There was no novel, no story to share with anyone, until the characters began to sprout. Quite a cast of them. Wanna meet some? Sure you do. ;)

Isaac Ozawa: Once a candidate for a fighter pilot slot at the prestigious Altairian Academy, Isaac was given a medical discharge when his neural implant turned out to be glitchy. Kicked out of the service, deserted by his lover, Isaac settles for a comm. officer’s slot on a commercial courier and tries not to dream of flight.

Turk: Found on a drifting, deserted ship, Turk keeps his secrets close. Uncertain whom he can trust, unsure of reality itself at times, he clings to duty and to promises made to his host commanders and his own people. He knows he carries something dangerous in his brain and suspects he may have done something terrible. And Isaac? Beautiful, bitter Isaac disturbs him profoundly.

Travis Humboldt: Pilot of the Hermes, retired Marine, Travis uses his gruff, good-natured exterior to cover old hurts and new confusions.

Nidar: Turk’s cocky, irreverent cousin, potentially his greatest rival. Turk’s been away from home too long, so does he return to find his cousin an ally or an adversary?

For the rest? You’ll just have to read the book. Character-driven SF – the most important meal of the day.

Gravitational Attraction – M/M Science Fiction

By Angel Martinez

At Silver Publishing – launching 2/25/12

Blurb:

A mysterious distress call draws the crew of the Hermes to what appears to be an empty, drifting ship. Empty that is, except for the blood and gore spattered corridors and one lone survivor locked in a holding cell. Drawn to the handsome, traumatized man, the crew’s comm officer, Isaac Ozawa, makes Turk his personal responsibility, offering him the kindness and warmth he needs after the horror he experienced. Turk longs for Isaac, a desperate, hopeless ache he knows he’ll always carry with him.

But Turk harbors dangerous secrets, his brain a military experiment gone wrong. When an amoral, power-hungry admiral kidnaps Isaac and uses him to convince Turk to become the cataclysmic weapon he’s hungered for, it will take Turk’s strength, the ingenuity of the Hermes crew, the help of the enigmatic Drak’tar, and Isaac’s own stubborn will to save them.

Valentine Blog Hop

Prizes & Fun Galore...

Good morning and happy early Valentines Day to you all....

What does Valentines means to me? well I have been with my Husband for ten years and this will be the first time ever he will be home and not working away... so I am cooking him a very nice dinner (not so much on the romantic side as Mum and Emily will be home as well - LOL).

There will be so many awesome authors (263 to be exact) taking part in this blog hop that you will be all up for heaps of prizes and great reads just remember to leave a comment with your choices and details... Come check them out at the Blog hop events page.

Valentines Day Blog Hop Events Page

Now that I have shared with you the important stuff I will start Rambling about me.....

Toowoomba  Boys 2

This is my Latest and is going to fit in well with the whole Valentine theme. This Novella became available yesterday and I have been snoopy dancing a lots since then. Hunting for Clay is the second instalment in my Toowoomba Boys series. I hope you all enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

MLRPress - Hunting for Clay

BLURB

Two years have passed since Hunter and Clay met on that fateful morning in Tello’s Diner. Getting passed the fact that Clay was stalking Marlowe was the easy part. Clay Montgomery’s life changed for the better the day he found the man who was meant to be the other half of him. Hunter understood him well, and knew how to give him exactly what he needs to be happy. Hunter Weldon knows what he wants, and just how to get it. For two years he has loved the man in his rams and now it is time to up the ante.

EXCERPT

Chapter One

  Hunter poked his head around the doorframe, making sure Clay and Marlowe were nowhere in sight as he headed to the bedroom Marlowe shared with Angelo. H had all been e needed to talk to Angelo without his cousin or Clay finding out. In the two years they had all been sharing a house he had learnt that his cousin could not keep a secret if his life depended on it; especially since he and Clay had become best buddies – the whole Clay stalking Marlowe thing was now put behind them. So much had happened in the last two years since Marlowe had finally won the heart of his straight boy. Hunter often cringed when he remembered how Marlowe and Angelo’s relationship had almost been destroyed before it even had a chance to begin. It took Clay to help them sort it out. Angelo possessions had slowly been transferred to their house, until in the end Angelo was living with them.

  Knocking Quietly on the door, he waited until Angelo told him to enter. Marlowe and Clay were gossiping in the kitchen. Hunter shook his head. Where else would they be? The kitchen seemed to be their favourite place when they were both home and not working. Marlowe was probably still teaching Clay all about his job because he was now getting more than he could handle and was trying to woo Clay into joining him. Uncle Skye had already given the go-ahead to hire him

  “Come in,” Angelo’s voice sounded muffled.

  Slipping into the room he gestured to the bedspread being used. “Marlowe?”

  Angelo grimaced. “Actually it was Dimmy; he thought it was hilarious. He got his friend to send it to us.” The cover was white and covered in multi-coloured hearts of various sizes. “Marlowe loves it.”

  “Lucky you,” Hunter grinned.

  Angelo rolled his eyes. “I can ask Dimmy to get you one.”

  “You wouldn’t dare.”

  Angelo raised one eyebrow in the Oh, wouldn’t I? look.

 “Okay, What are you really doing in my room? I know you didn’t come in to take the piss out of me because of our bedspread.”

  Hunter ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah, I kinda need your help. I am trying to organise Clay’s present for Valentine’s Day.”

  “Um, you do realise Valentine’s is still a month away, right?”

  “Yes, dumbarse,” Hunter growled. “But I want to make it special since he is feeling kind of down. Seeing as Valentine’s is also his birthday, I wanted to make up for his Family telling him he still wasn’t welcome at home. Well he is, but not with me.”

  “You’re feeling guilty, aren’t you?”

  Hunter shrugged. “Maybe. His family was fine with him being gay until he moved in with me. I think they were hoping it was some kind of phase.”

  “It’s not your fault. At least his parents aren’t as crazy as mine. I can see my brother running away soon. Dimmy is nearly eighteen now and he won’t put up with their crap any longer.”

  “Will we need to clean out the spare room?” Hunter asked.

  He watched as Angelo took some time to think about it. “I don’t know, but maybe we should do it just to be on the safe side.”

  “I suppose it would be good to set it up for a spare room regardless. You never know who might turn up.”

  Hunter didn’t say anything else, and as he walked out of Angelo’s bedroom he bumped into Clay walking through the lounge room with the dog lead in his hand. “Are you going somewhere?”

  “Mar and I are taking the dogs for a walk,” he said as he kissed Hunter’s cheek and kept walking out to the kitchen. “We will be back in an hour or so.”

  “Okay. Angelo and I are going to clean out the spare room.”

  Clay froze in his tracks. “Why?”

  “He thinks Dimmy may want to come and stay for awhile. So I suggested we clean out the spare room.”

  Clay nodded. “Do you need me and Mar to stay and help?”

  “No babe, you take Ziggy and Droogie for their walk. Angelo and I can bring it all into the lounge and when you guys get back we can sort through it and figure out what we want to keep or get rid of.”

  “Okay, I’ll let Mar know.” Clay blew him another kiss before leaving.

  “He’s in a happier mood,” Angelo commented as he joined Hunter in the lounge room.

  “Dog walking. Those two are obsessed with walking those dogs.” Hunter shook his head as he headed up the hall to the small spare room. It was a job he was dreading as it was filled with the excess stuff from all of them. Groaning he picked up the first box and carried it back out to the lounge room.

  “I can’t believe you let Clay sucker you into getting another dog,” Angelo teased.

  Hunter snorted. “You started it. I just got sick of listening to them argue who was ging to hold the damn lead.” He winked at Angelo. “And besides, Clay has ways of being very convincing when he wants something.”

  Angelo burst out laughing. “That is TMI, my friend.”

  “You’re only jealous.” Hunter grinned as they got to work.

DON'T FORGET - Leave me a comment and be in the chance to win a an $25 Amazon Gift Certificate or if you prefer a $25 Bookstrand Gift Certificate. (as they are the only two I know how to do). Feel free to join the followers of my blog for another chance to win.

OTHER WORKS BY ME 

Toowomba Boys 1

What's the Goss???

Okay, due to unforeseen (yes I have known about it for a month) circumstances, somebody - who I will not mention, (you whistle and I will point - at me), forgot to write Jettermane (again). So I will have to write it for tomorrow (just so Cinders doesn't kick my arse).

Today I had Emily at the Chiropractor and getting the hubs ready to head off to Coffs Harbour to work - he may or may not be back for Valentine's Day... not that it matters as due to work he is always away on that day or has been for the last 10 years (or pretty much close to it).

Though I do have some good Goss:- Toowoomba Boys 2: Hunting for Clay is now available at MLRPress.

MLRPress - Hunting for Clay

A BIG THANK-YOU!!!

To Cinders...

 Cinders helped choose a name for the main character in the next of The Sentinels of Varnuse: Beneath The Rising Tide

Allow me to introduce:- Kia Pamuya;  a Water Dragon shifter. So far that is all I know about him as we all know that I cannot plot to save my life.

Next in line I am hoping (if you are listening, Cinders). I need  pictures for Malacyte & Haydrian.... Just remember they are the same sort of being as Raevyn & Simian. Actually I probably need a picture for Simian as well. damn and Vayne, Arron. 

It is strange how a picture can get the ideas buzzing in your brain... It is also great to have faithful followers who are willing to throw ideas your way in what they would like to see and which characters they would like to come back into the storyline.

I have even started to go back through When The Walls Come Tumbling Down... Fleshing it out and filling in the gaps, and boy have I found some huge gaps... I never saw them when I wrote them, but now when I know better they seem so damn obvious.


I promise to try and be better than I was at the beginning but I know me - LOL.


ALSO: Guest Bogging at Jadette Paiges Blog (Hunting For Clay)

Today's Ramble...

Totally have a mind blank...

Okay, I really do have a mind blank so I thought I would just ramble on a bit about the next instalment of my Toowoomba Boys. This is the cover, & even though it doesn't say it on there it is the second book in the series. It will be available from MLRPress on the 10th of February.

By the title I am guessing that you already know it is about Clay & Hunter. I delve more into Clay's family background. I also introduce more characters in this story - Dimmy~Dimitri Linford (you might remember being mentioned as Angelo's brother in Angels on Top), Jayden Montgomery (Clay's younger Brother), Arthur & Graham Danevport (are also brothers- I must have a thing for brothers.) Damon Malone is a character that is quite a bit in this book working with Hunter & for Authur. 

Damon's story will be told in the next instalment: Toowoomba Boys 3: Dancing with Demons. (Inner demons not actual demons). I am working on this one right now...

Check this out and enjoy the wonderfully talented chocolateminx made a trailer of the MLR Valentine releases.