Whoa, right?  Care for a little excerpt?  Thought you would...

The phone rang, dragging Nate from his thoughts.
“I’m gonna put it on screen,” Ranger called out from the kitchen.
“Sure.”
The wall flashed to life, and a dark-haired man with dark eyes, appeared. The stranger reminded Nate of the doctor at the lottery exams—lab coat, stethoscope, well-groomed—but this man was older and seemed to have an edge to him.
“Hey,” Nate greeted. “What can I do for you?”
“Am I speaking with Nathaniel Curtis Stockton?”
“Yeah.” Nate took a swig of his drink.
“Wonderful.” The man smiled but the expression didn’t reach his eyes. “I am Doctor Rafael Trask. I am one of the lead scientists in a series of special clinical studies being performed. I understand you failed the medical section of the lottery exams?”
“Yeah.” The guy’s voice sounded cool … exact. Combined with the discord of his face, Nate sensed an air of danger surrounding the man. Creeped out, Nate was hesitant to say too much.
“Well, first off, let me say, we are not associated with the lottery. But should you participate in our studies you may have another chance at traveling to and settling on Mars. We also offer outstanding compensation. Despite whether you are or are not picked for travel, you will pretty much be set for life.”
Ranger strolled into the room and sat beside Nate, twirling the comm-wand between his fingers. “What are these studies?”
The man’s eyes narrowed. “Who are you?”
“His husband,” Ranger answered. “Whatever he’s to be involved in, wherever he’s going, I’ll be at his side. What’s all this about?”
Doctor Trask leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers together. He looked down his nose at the camera on his comm device, appearing to contemplate what Ranger had said and giving Ranger a once-over. The doctor reminded Nate of a vulture.
“Okay,” Trask said. “Like I was about to mention to Mister Stockton, we are trying to find cures for people who did not pass the medical aspects of the lottery exams due to their diseases. We are also looking into the sterility epidemic and chromosomal changes in the female population.”
“Could you hold a moment?” Nate asked, grabbing the wand from Ranger and muting the call. He pointed the wand at the screen. “Do you think this is legit?”
“Yeah. It could be.”
“It might be the answer to our Mars problem.” Nate smiled, feeling a glimmer of warm hope spring up within him again.
“Perhaps. Should we see what’s what with it?”
Nate unmuted the call. “What if we say we’re interested?”
The doctor lifted a corner of his mouth. “I will digitize a package of information to you, and then we will be in touch with further instructions.”
“Well,” Ranger said, “count us interested.”
“Wonderful,” the doctor drawled.


AND HERE ARE THE BUY LINKS!
Evernight Publishing
Amazon
Amazon UK
Barnes & Noble
Kobo
Smashwords

Well, it's been a LOOONG time since I've been down here--but I've got a new book to tell you about that's worth the wait!  When you write the naughty ghost stories, you meet writers of all manner of interesting fiction. One of the smartest, funniest, deepest authors of romance I know is Katherine Wyverne, and she's got a new book out called A MUSE TO LIVE FOR.  I'm just dipping into it now, and it's fascinating.  So I'm turning the blog over to her today!

So, without further ado, here's the author herself!

A Muse to Live For is the third installment in my loosely interconnected “transgender trilogy”, which includes also Woman as a Foreign Language and Spice & Vanilla. While WaaFL and S&V are very obviously connected (they have two characters in common), the threads connection Spice to Muse are much subtler, so much so that I consider it almost a game with my readers to find them.

Unlike the other two books, which are Contemporary Romance, Muse takes a plunge back into the past and is set in the 1880s.

This is part of why it took me so long to write it (almost a year, on and off). Much as I am familiar with Victorian England from having read so much Dickens, and Conan Doyle, and the Brontë sisters, and a number of other books written or set in that period, whenever one begins to write, one discovers how many details they are still missing. How much did a shave cost? How did you ride a cab? Where would a poor Irish immigrant likely live? How do you wear a bustle dress? How do you fix one if it’s worn?

It became so fascinating to research all these things (and much more) that I spent more time in Victorian London than I had ever intended, and once more, a short story became a novel (story of my life).

The main reason for choosing a period setting however was not the fancy costumes and moody atmosphere, but a desire to write a story about an artist of that amazing period, when the Pre-Raphaelites, the Symbolists and the Impressionists were changing the face of art, and to write a transgender character before transgender became a thing, before there were any labels or any sense of belonging to a group.

It is the deepest trip I ever took into the emotions of any two characters, through obsession, depression, love and wonderful fulfilment, and both characters have some autobiographic relevance to me. It’s my favorite story to date.


And here's an excerpt!

Gabriel

There is this to be said for my profession.

I can sleep in.

That unspeakable time of day, the early hours of the morning, when the whole world trudges along the streets with dead eyes and heavy feet, on to another day of toil, is spared to me.

I see the tiredness of the world at the other end of the day. But by then it’s dark, and there is not much to see, and the tiredness has a different flavor. To me, that’s mostly the flavor of a man’s spendings, which I mostly spit on the pavement. You get used to it. You get used to almost anything, given time.

Darkness or no, I must be seen of course. I am the one in the stolen foggy spotlight of the lamppost’s golden halo. But the darkness outside stares back blankly, and mostly I like it that way. I have seen enough of the world to last me a lifetime. My business needs the night, in any case.

I wish I could say my bed is warm and comfortable, but mostly it’s lumpy, damp, and cold. But it’s mine and quiet, here at the top of the silent house. If you’d ever spent any time at all in the slums of Whitechapel, you’d know this is downright luxurious.

Mrs. Gride doesn’t like noise. She says it makes her temples ache, which is all stuff of course, but still, we all creep about as quiet as mice. No, much quieter than mice. They do not listen to Mrs. Gride’s injunctions about walking along the drugget, talking in a low voice and making no sounds. I can hear them chewing and scrabbling behind panels and wainscots at night, when the house sleeps, and I come home to my lonely room. Usually they are the only ones to welcome me back. I’m always the last one to return. I feel a bond of likeness with them. We all live at the edge, behind screens. It doesn’t stop me from throwing shoes at them when they cross the room too boldly, or go close to my wardrobe. I have little enough as it is. The mice will have to nest elsewhere. I am not a charity institution after all.

In the morning the bed has a narrow strip of warmth in the middle, a stripe exactly as wide as my body, and I must not move, lest I stray on the flabby, cold linen outside, but still, eventually I find the nerve to reach out and fetch my cigarettes, and light the first of the day. I smoke it in bed, my one and only indulgence. I have become adept at smoking in bed without shedding ashes on the sheets or setting myself on fire.

I watch the thin, ghostly, white smoke curling and floating towards the pale grey skylight, swirling into a puff of breath. It’s likely to be the most beautiful thing I’ll see all day.

I have a small pile of work to do for the girls downstairs, so I finally heave myself out of bed. I don’t ask money for these small jobs. By tacit agreement, I help out, and the girls close an eye on my strangeness. It works very well for all involved.

Later, much later, in the light of a single candle, I shave at my little mirror (an evening ritual, for those like me). As usual I give fervent thanks that nature hardly gave me any beard to shave. Then I shed my trousers and my waistcoat and my shirt and wear my other things.

The stockings, which need mending again, but will do for one more night, in the dark. A small chemise. Then I put on my boots, with small heels and about a thousand fucking tiny buttons that are hell to work with stiff, cold fingers. They are old, second-hand or third, like everything I own, but well-greased and waxed and buffed to a sheen. It’s cold out there, and wet.

And then my tight, tight corset. It needs some fancy bending to lace it up by myself, but I am limber. I pull the laces as tight as I can around my waist, feeling the shape of me change, like some creatures are said to change in the light of a full moon. The core of the corset is whalebone and steel, stiff like armor. It knows my true shape better than my body does. It hardly needs padding at the chest, hard as it is, but it suits me to pad it anyway, for the weight of it, with two silk cravats I keep for the purpose, so old, worn so soft by use, so waxy with the damp of my skin, that they almost melt to my chest. My skin is all tingling now, and it’s not the cold. Silk and steel hug me so close, so much tighter than my day clothes. I am almost naked, and yet every bit of me is more defined and clear, like I have come into sharper, truer focus in the searching eye of a telescope.

I paint my lashes and my eyelids, black and black, to make my eyes shine. I paint my lips red. That marks me as the whore I am, and I don’t mind.

I am what I am.

My wig hangs from the corner of the wardrobe. Freshly brushed, the blonde hair shines in the candlelight and waves like a ghost in the faint breeze as I open the wardrobe door. Maybe the ghost of the woman whose hair it is, who knows. She might well be dead. I don’t know what would be creepier, to wear the hair of a dead woman or the hair of a live one. Still, I’m stuck with the wig for now. I am not pleased with the color, which does not mix with my dark hair. But I got it almost cheap in Middlesex Street. It was the sort of bargain where nobody asks too many questions.

I wear my violet skirt over a small horsehair bustle and a blouse and tight bodice. I don’t button this all the way up, but I put on a shawl, for the cold. The wig, which in summer would hitch and sweat, is almost a comfort now. I look at my mirror one last time as I tie my hair in a loose chignon at the nape of my neck, and stab it through with a horn comb. No pins. I learned the hard way not to trust a man around a hairpin. The mirror is too small to see much. My pale face, the dark circles of my eyes, the red lips, the ghostly locks. All the rest I can only imagine.

But that is my life. Imagining myself, conjuring myself into existence … especially the parts that don’t fit in the narrow, narrow picture.



Intrigued?  I was! Thanks, Katherine!

A MUSE TO LIVE FOR is an Evernight Editor's Pick, and here's where you can buy it--

Find A Muse to Live For at Evernight.

Or on Amazon.

Katherine’s Blog:
https://katherinewyvern.blogspot.fr/
Katherine’s Website:
http://
meetingivory.wixsite.com/katherinewyvern
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/katherinewyvern
Facebook Author/artist Group:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/884796268383313/?ref=bookmarks
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/KatherineWyvern
Or follow her on Instagram @katherinewyvern

An author needs her cat.

Bella's sleeping next to the keyboard now, but she was helping me with social media and email earlier.  She and I are very pleased to announce that THE GHOST OF HER EX has officially been released by Evernight Publishing today, and it is an EDITOR'S PICK.

Bella would not have been pleased if THE GHOST OF HER EX were not an Editor's Pick.  She was certain the quality was there, you know? She came into my life just as I was finishing drafting the book, and she's pretty invested in anything that makes me turn on the nice, warm desk lamp next to my computer.  She has asked me to tell you that you should buy the book so that I will be encouraged to turn on the nice, warm desk lamp and make more books.

Anyway, I have to say that desk lamp or no, I've never had so much fun writing a book as I did with THE GHOST OF HER EX.  I had a lot of things I wanted to do with it, and I think I managed them.  Mainly, I wanted to write a book about what it's like to be in your sixties and still believe in love.  I am, and I do.  But there's lots else in the book that I had fun with.

First of all: ghosts.  I love ghost stories.  I love them so much that I watch cheesy ghost reality TV shows.  My own house is haunted and has been investigated by an author friend of mine who specializes in non-fictional ghost stories, a local ghost-hunter.  We have two ghosts here.  They usually leave us alone, but sometimes, around Halloween, lamps fall over, chandeliers swing, cell phone batteries drain unexpectedly...  There's an old Celtic belief that the veil between the living and the dead is thin at this time of year, and I know it's true.  We live on a creek that has a little foot bridge over it and I love to go out there at night in late October and listen to the water and watch the moon.  That would make a ghost-believer of anyone.

But THE GHOST OF HER EX isn't a darkly serious ghost story.  It's really, really funny.  When I got the idea for it, I was thinking about old hippies (I am one) and the classic movie and TV series Topper. THE GHOST OF HER EX is kind of Topper on acid: a cast of eccentric sixty-somethings who are tired of being respectable.  There's a pot dealer named Santa Claus. (He drives a Land Rover instead of a sleigh.)

And the whole thing is based around a liberal Episcopal parish in upstate New York.  My main character, Emily Rauch, is a sixty-something church organist.  I've wanted to do a romance with church musicians in it for a while.  Church employees are some of the funniest souls on earth.  They have to be.  Most people come to church when they are celebrating something enormous: the birth of a child, or a wedding--or when they are in awful crisis after an illness or a death.  So if you work for a church making music, and I have, you get a slightly twisted view of the world.  You're trying to do something demanding under weird circumstances: great joy or sorrow.  It makes for surprisingly dark humor.  People who see church employees as pious, eyes-to-Heaven types get it wrong.  I loved the old Vicar of Dibley show, a British sit com about a woman priest.  There's a lot of that in this book.

Plus if you're a choir member or an organist?  In-jokes galore, but they fly by fast so read 'em up carefully.

Also: a mother-daughter sub-plot that I'm really proud of AND an Amazon Echo (Alexa) as a minor character.  I hope you'll give THE GHOST OF HER EX a read!

THE GHOST OF HER EX is due out before Halloween! 

I wanted to do a bunch of new things with this romance.  First off, I wanted to write a main character who was really close to my own age.  Emily Rauch is in her early sixties, a newly-retired music teacher who is free at last to devote herself to playing the pipe organ and conducting choirs, the things she loves the most.  I like writing characters who love love--but who also love creating things: good food, music, or art. 

The setting is my beloved Hudson River Valley, and the time (for the first time in any of my fiction) is now.  Which means I'm writing about technology for the first time, too.  I have a lot of fun with an Amazon Echo in this book; Alexa is a minor character.

Anyway, Emily Rauch is finally moving in to the tiny house she had built because she's now an empty-nester: divorced from her now-deceased husband, her daughter flown and very successful.  Em's got her dream house, her dream job...but she's haunted by her past--literally, it turns out. 

There are a few really fun men vying for Emily's attentions--a sunny but shy Episcopal priest (uh-oh--fishing off the company pier?) and her bad-boy ex from choir school, suddenly reappeared. Is the local pot dealer, a beardy retired fire chief everyone calls Santa Claus interested, too?  Emily wants to be too cynical to fall in love again--but is anyone, really?

And then, of course, there are the ghosts, and two of them just don't want to pass on to the next sphere quite yet and seem to be...attracted to our heroine...a little too attracted, perhaps...

The big old pipe organ in the spooky pic off above is about the age of the one Emily plays in the book.  That is, in fact, my dashing husband playing, not Emily.  There's quite a bit of classical music in this romance--some rock and roll, too--and another organist friend is recording a video of the music from one of my favorite scenes in the book, which involves a mash-up of an organ piece by Widor (you've heard it if you've ever been to church on Easter) and a certain Mexican folk song about a bug.  Blame it on the ghosts!

I've written enough books that I know some of them are a slog to get through.  This one kind of wrote itself.  The characters introduced themselves to me early on, and they were very emphatic about what they wanted.  And they also weren't afraid to be totally, completely silly....

So I'm just starting to get the word out: THE GHOST OF HER EX--on EVERNIGHT PUBLISHING--coming to a Kindle (or any e-reader) near you very soon, and hopefully in paper not long after that!!!

So maybe Emily Rauch's house looks a little like this.  Actually, I swiped the snap from a building company called Tumbleweed Houses, and I had it on my computer while I was writing The Ghost of Her Ex, my newest sexy ghost romance, coming out soon from Evernight Press.  

Emily's sixty-three, and finally making a new start now that she's retired from her elementary music teaching job.  At last she can play the pipe organ full time--and with her daughter Amy well-launched in a career, she doesn't need the big barn of a place her late ex-husband restored anymore.  

But there's a problem: the ghost of her ex has moved to the tiny house along with her.  Theirs was an amicable divorce--civilized, good co-parenting.  Al had realized he was gay and tried to make a new start of his own.  Tragically, the AIDS epidemic cut his life short.  For twenty years, he's been looking in on Emily's life, something she has mixed feelings about...even though part of her still does love him

Things get complicated when Brad Yates, Emily's bad-boy main squeeze from music school shows up.  He's just been through his second divorce, is very much the worse for wear, still impossible--and still very interested.  

Did I mention that Emily's boss at her church gig also has a crush on her?  Or that her daughter has a complicated love life, too?  Or that this book is--I know it doesn't sound that way--the funniest thing I ever wrote?  There is an out-of-control funeral, a pot dealer named Santa Claus...a great, big pipe organ...and a blizzard.  An Amazon Echo is also a minor character.

Here's a little excerpt, from when Emily reconnects with the old boyfriend...

          “Brad?” she said.  
            He was silent.
            Is he okay?  “Brad?”
            More silence.
            “Oh man,” he finally whispered. And then he sighed.  “Well.  Quite the little place you’ve got yourself here.” 
            “I like it,” she said.  “Serves my…needs.”.
            Brad nodded.  “Wow, wow, wow. I didn’t even need one of my magic blue pills.  Kudos, m’lady.   Pardonez-moi a moment.”  He got up.
            “Thanks. I can’t imagine you’d possibly need to take…” 
            “Sometimes I do.  Sure didn’t tonight!” He dropped something into the waste basket: splat.  
           Oh. Ew. So.  Now what?  She glanced at the clock beside  her bed.  It was twenty to seven.  And she was incredibly hungry.  Brad got back into bed beside her.  Please, please, please don’t fall asleep, she thought.  Just—um—go home.  And then she couldn’t help it.  She giggled.
            “What’s funny?” he said.
            “I don’t even know!” (But she did.)
            He sat up, and reached for his shirt. 
           Emily suddenly felt very naked, too.  “‘Scuse me a minute,” she said, and got up to get her bathrobe from its hook on the bathroom door. Downstairs, the air blower for the furnace kicked on.
            “Ah, sweet, sweet Em. You’re going to think I’m a total cad,” said Brad.
            “A cad?” She knew perfectly well what was coming next.  Brad hadn’t changed, after all.  Emily tied the belt of her robe, sat down beside him and smiled.  What a relief!
            “It’s almost seven, isn’t it?”
            “Getting there,” said Emily.
           “I have an unfortunate…prior engagement,” said Brad.  “Hey, how about you and me and dinner next week at Le Bouchon, in Cold Spring?” he said.  “Do you eat there ever? It’s really quite good.  But now I’m afraid I have to…”  He was pulling those ridiculous briefs back on.
            Emily smiled.  Of course you have a prior engagement.  Of course! Exactly what were you planning on doing if we’d ended up back at your place?  “Are you okay to drive, Brad?  I mean, we did smoke and all.” 
            “I’ve been experimenting with the evil weed a bit since I retired.  We didn’t have so much.  I only live a couple of miles from here now.   I’m loving Beacon; it’s right on the Hudson Line, so I can get into the City for music things.”
            Yikes. So he really is local, now.  Well, duh.  The Y.
            “Well.” Brad pulled on his jeans, got up, and fastened the belt.  He leaned back over the bed and took Emily’s face in his hands.  “That was wonderful, Em. Next week, then. Table for two. I’ll call you.”  He kissed her. 
            If I un-block your phone number.  We’ll have to see about that.  She fought the desire to laugh again.
            She walked him back downstairs, and watched from her window as he tip-toed his way across the ice patches in her driveway, got in his car, and drove off.

Reader, I signed the contract yesterday!  Can't wait to get THE GHOST OF HER EX into your hands!  Thanks again, Evernight Press!

I was blown away with Katherine Wyvern's Woman as a Foreign Language.  It was seriously one of the best books I read last year in any genre.  Katherine's got a new book out with a link to WAAFL--Spice and Vanilla!  So I thought I'd give her some blog space today to tell you all about it.  Therefore-- without further ado--Here's Katherine!


Thanks for having me here today to talk about my new book! This story is loosely related to my previous release, Woman as a Foreign Language, and like that one, is very much a reflection on identity. It is a story about split personalities, shattered personalities, hidden personalities, and changing personalities.

There is Di, whose whole sense of self revolved about her tough, outdoorsy life, training and riding horses. When a  near-fatal car accident turns her into an invalid, it is more than just bones that are broken, it’s her whole sense of worth.

Raphael is a whole collection of personality traits all by himself, and all these personalities come into disastrous conflict as his female self, Lucie, blossoms into a complete new person who needs to find expression…

And there is Hugh, who might appear as a pretty solid no-nonsense Dominant type of guy, but has a whole hidden turmoil of emotions under his tough skin, one that even his sub of over fifteen years knows little about.

It was a beautiful challenge to unravel all these tangles and weave them together again as Di discovers a new sense of self, Raphael and Lucie find a balance and a modus vivendi, and Hugh’s hidden demons find a way out in the light.

(Be warned: cross-dressing, gender-queer, explicit M/M and M/F sex, anal sex, spanking, flogging, bondage, forced orgasm, sex toys.)

And here's a (quite steamy!) excerpt:

Raphael stroked in perfect tempo. He was one of the most technically exact musicians Hugh had ever played with, after all. Too exact, in fact.

It would do him so much good to let go a bit, to just go with the flow, be wild and imprecise and purely passionate. Then he would not need so much of this.

Tick—tock—tick—tock—tick—tock, went the metronome, and Raphael stroked and stroked. It was a good while before Hugh could tell, from a small furrow between those blond eyebrows, that the unchanging, slow rhythm was beginning to frustrate him. He smiled a bit wider and said nothing, devouring his beautiful quarry with his eyes. He watched, entranced the fluid play of flesh and skin as Raphael’s long pale cock, a nice ruddy purple by now, sank and reemerged into and from his fist, the velvet-like foreskin lapping beautifully over the shinier, silky glans, the testicles bouncing softly to the rhythm as the scrotum was pulled up and released. It was hard to resist the temptation to throw the whole scene to the devil and just take that cock in his mouth and suck it empty.

This is without exception the best use a metronome was ever put to.

Raphael’s body was developing a number of small, charming tics and twitches. He briefly lifted his left knee from the mattress then relaxed again. His right wrist was pulling on the strap from time to time, and his breath was coming in slightly ragged bursts.

Still it took a long time. Too much control, thought Hugh, smiling. Tsk-tsk.

Tick—tock—tick—tock...

**************************

You can also find an exclusive excerpt on Katherine's website.

Find Spice & Vanilla at Evernight.
Or on Amazon.
 
See what Katherine is up to on:
 
Katherine’s Blog: https://katherinewyvern.blogspot.fr/
Katherine’s Website: http://meetingivory.wixsite.com/katherinewyvern
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/katherinewyvern
Twitter: https://twitter.com/KatherineWyvern
Or follow her on Instagram @katherinewyvern

"Write what you know," they said.  "It'll be fun," they said.  And actually, it has been, mostly.  Except the stuff I know is so damn weird.  For example, pipe organs.  I'm married to an organist.  My mom studied organ.  And you can just stop the "that's what she said" jokes right now.  People who live around church musicians have heard 'em all, you know.

Thing is, there's something kind of cool about an instrument the size of a tiny house (or a not-so tiny house) that can out-scream a stack of Marshall amps, and is playable by just one person.  Something kind of scary, too, and every cheesy horror movie in the world knows it. 

I kept hearing chatter from my publisher and my writing colleagues that older heroines might be a good idea, too...hmmm...

So I came up with the idea that is driving my current WIP, which stars a woman who is haunted by the ghost of her ex.  Emily--who curses like a sailor--happens to be an organist in her 60's.  She has just been tracked down  by her old flame from conservatory, a hard-drinking and smoking bad boy--well, he's a bad old fart now, but you catch my drift. It's a funny book, I'm loving my characters, and if  you think the sexy parts of romance don't apply to folks their age, you'd better have another think.

Other attractions: Alexa from the Amazon Echo as a minor character, a pot dealer named Santa Claus, and a marathon-running, cookie-baking dreamboat of an Episcopal priest, also a widower, who is a deeply good man and utterly clueless...mostly.  Oh, and a tiny house.  Emily lives in one.  The book's set in my usual territory, the Hudson River Valley, which has a very high proportion of ghosts per square mile.

There's another ghost besides Emily's ex, but explaining that would be spoiler alert territory.

By the way, Emily plays a 19th century pipe organ, brand name Jardine.  Pictured above is an old picture of the Jardine at St. Patrick's Cathedral, NYC.

Here's a sample, from early in the book.   Al, the ghost of Emily's ex-husband is about to turn up...

     At home, Emily defrosted a bowl of the minestrone soup she’d made the week before and emptied the last of the chardonnay into her wine glass.  She ate the soup standing up.  Staring at her reflection in the black kitchen window, she washed out the bowl in her barely-big-enough-for-a-pot sink, splashing water on the cuffs of her turtleneck.   Oh, fuckity fuck.
     Someone put a hand on her shoulder, then.  His touch was neither icy—nor human. “Al?” she said.
    “Hey, Em,” Al smiled and stuck his hands in his jean pockets.
    “Hey.”  She tipped back her wine and ran a damp hand over his shaved-smooth head.  It felt cool and dry.  As always, his brown eyes were warm.
    “So, what the fuck, I guess,” she said.  
    “About?”
    Emily had never been too sure how frequent Al’s eavesdropping really was. “You’re unaware of my ill-considered and impulsive actions, then?”
    “You mean that stuff last night?”
     “Yeah.  That stuff last night.”
    “A little surprising. You never seemed to be a pothead when we…”
    “Believe it or not, I smoked in choir school. But the pot back then was like—I don’t know—catnip.  I mean, compared to what’s around now.  There were only a very few of us who inhaled.  Dorchester was like The Marine Corps  for church musicians.  Brad always had pot.  He and I could have gotten so, so thrown out of there. God, Brad!”  The room blurred. What are these stupid tears?  Emily blinked them away, shaking her head.
    “In answer to your probable next question.  I hit the road after your second toke.  It was pretty clear where things were heading.  Have I ever snooped into your more intimate…”
    “What more intimate?  There hardly ever were any!”
    “I always thought that was strange.  You are a woman of…appetites, Em. You like to eat and drink and…”
    “…and fuck,”  Emily shocked herself by saying that.  Dropping an f-bomb when you were just randomly turning the air blue was one thing.  But this was no fuckity-fuck-fuck.  This meant actually doing the deed…
    She hadn’t shocked Al. “Indeed. And fuck.”  He nodded, his lips tight.  “I left you in the lurch.”
    Emily sighed. “Yup. Yup.   Guess you did.  But we talked that stuff to death two decades ago.  Shit, Al!  It’s just…just….I don’t know what it is.  Alexa, play Widor organ music.”
    “I don’t know any songs by Widor,” said Alexa.
    “Alexa, ARGH!!”  Emily made neck-choking gestures toward the black cylinder on her counter.
    “Bee-boop,” said Alexa.  Her illuminated blue ring danced and turned itself off.
    “I know our  lovely and talented daughter meant well with that thing,” said Al.  “But The Echo sucks at classical music unless you get lucky.  Works better just to ask for radio stations.”
    “You’re too good at that stuff.  Do you haunt many Echo owners?”
    “Just Gordon,” Al laughed ruefully.  “That young husband of his bought an Alexa for him. Alexa, play WQXR.”

I'm about two thirds of the way through the book, and about to write a pretty juicy sex scene--but I'm not identifying the guilty parties!

So--progress report!  Stay tuned for another cool blog entry from Katherine Wyvern early next week.  She's got a new book out called Spice and Vanilla, and I can't wait to read it!

What do you do when the woman you want to be … is a man?

One of the best books I read in any genre last year was Woman as a Foreign Language, by Katherine Wyvern.  It's a story of a young, gender-queer woman emerging from an abusive childhood to find joy and love--and it's full of surprises.  Witty, sharply-observed, and often delightfully steamy, it is an honest, believable story about two extraordinary characters, told with a shifting POV.  Everything works.  When Katherine told me she was looking for a little love on the blogs, I opened the door to The Room Downstairs right away.

And here's something you have to know: Woman as a Foreign Language was Runner-Up for Best Contemporary story in the Evernight Readers’ Choice Awards, and is available on the Evernight site at a 25% discount with the coupon code WINNER2017.  More on the business end in a bit.

And so,  without further ado, here's the author herself!

Thank you so much for having me on your blog today to talk about my latest release, Woman as a Foreign Language. WaaFL came out last September, and has had some really wonderful reviews since then.

This is a very, very tender (and hot!) contemporary love story between two gender-queer characters living extremely isolated lives in a crowded town.
Unlike some of my other books this story has a very minimal setting. No flamboyant Sci-Fi or Fantasy world. It is in fact extremely intimate, and totally character-driven, and concentrates on those tiny shifts in our state of mind that slowly paint the picture: we are in love.

This book even has a musical score, to help you get into the mood.

I have this feeling that our perception of love owes so much to love songs. I think it’s how we learn to talk about love, even as children, long before we know much about love. Sometimes, when we hear a song that “rings true” it can become the way define our feelings. I really wanted to use this in the story, because music is one of the few things that these two characters, Nina and Julian, have in common, being in everything else extremely different. And you know that quote, “and then suddenly all the love songs were about you.” There is something magical about music, and the magic seems stronger when we are in love…

If you are curious about this, feel free to drop by my website and check out a list (with links) of all the songs in the story.

It took quite a bit of research to put this story together, and also I was so attached to these characters, that once I was done with the book I realized I still had a lot to say on the topic. All this spill-over turned into Spice and Vanilla, WaaFL darker, naughtier, whip-and-leather sister, which will be published in May. It’s not WaaFL’s sequel, but it treats similar themes, and Julia/n and Nina both make a brief appearance. Stay tuned!
 

   ***************************************************************************************************
Sounds like a great read, right? Here's an excerpt--and when you've finished reading it, it'll be easy to buy the book right from Evernight, the publisher!    You'll need to fan yourself a little first.

Here's Woman as a Foreign Language on Amazon, with another downloadable excerpt.

See what Katherine is up to on:
 Katherine’s Blog: https://katherinewyvern.blogspot.fr/
Katherine’s Website: http://meetingivory.wixsite.com/katherinewyvern
Katherine’s Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/Katherine-Wyvern-Author-122569301260917/
Or follow her on Instagram @katherinewyvern
 

Ah, the blog tour.  Here's what I love about it: no tedious packing.  No getting lost on strange, dark roads.  No waiting for trains on icy platforms, lugging overstuffed suitcases that teeter back on forth on their squeaky wheels.  No getting in nasty airplanes after unspeakably rude TSA agents have questioned your very being and made you remove your lucky Navajo turquoise bracelet which is, after all, the ONLY THING THAT IS KEEPING THE DAMN PLANE IN THE AIR.

None of that.

No, on the blog tour,  you merely allow all the lovely, lovely bloggers to interview you and then  you send them recipes and articles and pictures...and top ten lists and such.  And you observe the lovely fruits of your labor over a delicious cup of latte from your most excellent espresso machine in the mornings. All in the comfort of your own study. Civilized.  Thank you, lovely lovely bloggers!

And thank YOU! Could I get you a latte, reader?  Have we met?

 I am Aletta Thorne,  author of THE CHEF AND THE GHOST OF BARTHOLOMEW ADDISON JENKINS.  I am new to the world of grownup ghost stories, but I have been a writer for years. And I was a chef for a while, too.  (The chef in me wants to whisper two words to you: sous vide!  A certain adoring husband presented me with a sous vide machine for Christmas, and the ghosts in our house are now very sad because they cannot eat the results of that present.  Ghosts can smell and...oh, do all KINDS of things, as my main character of my new novel discovers.  But they don't eat food.  Even if it has been prepared in a highly trendy and delicious fashion!)

And who are you?  Do  you like ghost stories?

Now that my maiden (ahem) romance has been published, I'm hard at work promoting it, of course--but I'm also starting work on another.  It's about a widow who has downsized to one of those tiny houses, trying to disentangle herself from the ghost of her husband--but it's all very complicated because they're best friends.  They'd had the world's most amicable divorce a few years before he died.  And they were really liking each other once they weren't married anymore...I have no idea what to call the thing, and I'm still researching locales in my beloved Hudson River Valley where a tiny house would be allowed.  Did you know that most of the things violate local zoning laws?  I didn't!  They things writers have to know!!

This new book feels like it's going to have some funny parts in it, but it's already a more somber tale than my first one.  My first one has all sorts of getting hit over the head with a loaf of whole wheat bread and sticking a wire pot scrubber in your bra to keep it from the health department guy inspecting your kitchen.  And honestly, I never know exactly how things are going to work out as I write.  My books frequently surprise me!

But anyway, welcome!  I hope your interest is piqued by what  you've read about my ghost story that's all done and published and ready for your Kindle!  Why not have a look right now? 

Well, hello.

Aletta speaking, and I must say it's a nice thing to be able to do that.  I don't care much for the spotlight, but I do like to be heard. 

I'm Aletta Thorne, and I write naughty ghost stories. The Chef and The Ghost of Bartholomew Addison Jenkins is a spicy serving of paranormal fiction based on my own days as a chef--and on the fact that I do, indeed, live in a haunted house.

Ah--but I was never haunted by a ghost as seductive as Bartholomew Addison Jenkins!  The question is this, though: would I have made the same choices my heroine Alma (named after Alfred Hitchcock's wife) did?

The heart wants what it wants, I guess--and happy endings can come out of the most inauspicious beginnings. 

A number of other blogs have featured my new book--an Evernight Publishing Editor's Pick, no less--so I won't run on too long at the keyboard!  But here's the scoop...

Autumn, 1982. MTV is new, poodle perms are the rage, and life just might be getting better for Alma Kobel.  Her ugly divorce is final at last. Her new job as chef at Bright Day School’s gorgeous old estate is actually fun.  But the place is haunted—and so is Alma’s apartment. Bartholomew Addison Jenkins’ ghost has been invisibly watching her for months.  When he materializes one night, Alma discovers Bart—as he likes to be called—has talents she couldn’t have imagined…and a horrifying past. What happens if you have a one-nighter with a ghost?  And what happens if one night is all you want—and you end up ghosting him?  Some spirits don’t like taking “no” for an answer.

Interested yet?  How 'bout a little sample?

“You’ll turn over the record. Oh, because you…”
“I do like to keep up. Who poured you wine from the … refrigerator? Although, I don’t understand why people of your age prefer it so icy.”
Alma followed Bart into the living room, still wondering why things didn’t seem odder than they were. She remembered the Casper the Friendly Ghost cartoons she’d seen as a little girl. This ghost was acting—well, perhaps a bit more flirty than friendly. He only glowed a bit as they walked through the dim hallway that connected her rooms. You can hardly even tell he’s translucent. What had he seen of her, though? She was glad her frustrating night with Sid had been at his place.
As Bart bent over the turntable and flipped the record, the reading lamp by her couch highlighted the silver buttons of his coat. She curled up on the couch and put her wine glass on the glass-covered orange crate she’d turned into a coffee table.
Bart sat beside her, suspiciously close. He put an arm over the back of the couch, and Alma shook her head again. That’s the old sneaky-arm trick—like a high school kid. It’s kind of cute. She pulled her legs up under herself, and they quietly listened to the music.
“You’re right,” she said after a few minutes. “‘Fountains’ is really good, too. I almost never listen to that side.”
Bart made a quiet harrumphing noise.
Do ghosts clear their throats? Apparently so.
 “Dear lady,” he said. “Although I do try not to snoop, as you would say, I have indeed observed your solitude. Let me assure you, your life will soon be happier.” He slid even closer to her.
Okay. Now the ghost is absolutely coming on to me. This is really happening. Oh, hell—why not? He’s not bad—for a dead guy.
 “Um, Bart?” she said. His eyes really were a startling color—almost bronze… “You can’t actually be…”
Bart set his fingertips on her cheeks, looked into her eyes, and sighed. Then he smiled. “You think this is a ridiculous situation. It’s not ridiculous,” he said. “Not at all. Allow me to demonstrate … with your permission, m’lady.”
 Somehow, that was funny, and Alma giggled. “Granted.”
Bart’s hands were impossibly soft and gentle—and his touch had some of the same fire-and-ice buzz that she’d felt before in the kitchen when he’d tried to get her attention. He guided her lips to his, and gave her what would have been a tiny peck—from anyone else. It shot a bolt of fire straight through her.
“Oh,” she said. It took a minute to get her breath.

There are two ways for you to find out what happens next, and they would be the BUY LINKS! Click here...or here!