Some changes have been made to my schedule of upcoming releases for the next few weeks. The corrected schedule looks something like this:

May 9th ~ nothing (sorry!)
May 16th ~ Working Man Book 9: Speed Trap
May 18th ~ The Positions of Love Book 6: Cowboy Position
May 25th ~ With This Ring (another Vic & Matt story)
End of May ~ Forever After (paperback collection)
June 6th ~ Tricked Out
Mid-June ~ Working Man Book 10: Tech Support

* Also, my story “For the Boys” will be released on May 16th in an e-book anthology entitled Some Gave All

As far as I know, Best Gay Bondage Erotica is still scheduled to be released by the end of May.

This week I’m wrapping up a short story entitled On Company Time, which is slated for release in an Amber Pax collection (scheduled in August). I also have to do edits for Working Man Book 9 and proof the galley for The Positions of Love Book 6.

Today I received the contract for All Shook Up, my historical novella that will be published in July by Amber Quill (in their upcoming Pax collection, Heart Songs Volume 4). I also finished making copies of a sell sheet for my last three paperbacks, which I’ll mail to bookstores this weekend before postage goes up.

And that’s all the news that’s fit to print at the moment.

I’ve sort of fallen out of practice with posting excerpts from my backlist here, but since my novella Trin is now available in print in bookstores both online and off, I thought I’d pimp it a bit.

This was my first e-book, and my first book published by someone other than myself. In the summer of 2006, Aspen Mountain Press contacted me about possibly working with their then-fledgling company to release my books in electronic format.

I’ll admit I had my doubts ~ anything that sounds too good to be true probably is ~ and I decided to submit this story to them as a way to test the waters, so to speak. I’d written Trin years earlier but just never did anything with it because it was sort of on the short side. That summer I felt bad for not releasing a book in 2005 and decided to self-publish Trin, but was willing to negotiate the electronic rights to this new company.

This is a hard story to like, I’ll be upfront about that. It’s set in a harsh world with uncompromising characters, and there is not “happy ever after” for anyone involved. There isn’t much sex in the story; it’s more about obsession, lust, and that special kind of idol worship that blinds us to reality. It isn’t romance, isn’t erotica, isn’t sci-fi, and isn’t horror. It’s very hard to define, but will appeal to some readers of all those genres and more.

However, most readers probably won’t like the story because it doesn’t set well with them. It doesn’t fit easily into any category, and the ending leaves more questions open than it answers. Still, I feel Trin is one of my best stories to date. I just know it’s not for everyone.

Surprisingly enough, the editor at Aspen liked the story and sent me a contract (the first of many). I self-published the trade paperback, but I didn’t purchase distribution for it because I didn’t have the money at the time. But it is one of my best selling e-books, so I finally decided to take the plunge and pay for distribution so bookstores such as Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com can stock it.

Buy Trin in e-book format or in paperback.

Read more …

Things that make me happy:

• My cats even when Jelly runs around like a kitten on speed at 2 AM
• My new car … I like the way the headlights blink when I hit the unlock button, as if it’s happy to see me
• The healthy 2008 quarter 1 royalty statement I just received from Amber Quill. Woo!
• The tingly way your mouth feels after you brush your teeth.
• The fact that Comedy Central runs two episodes of Futurama on Friday night … even though I have them all on DVD.

Things I’m doing this weekend:

• Going to visit my parents ~ to show off the new car, of course.
• Creating brochures for The Bonds of Love. Since bookstore sales from Crushed are going so good, I’m hoping to pimp Vic & Matt a bit, too.
• Finishing my latest WIP, On Company Time. I’m a little over 9k into the story and have about another 4k-5k left to write, methinks.

I’d been thinking about it for a while now, mostly thanks to the plethora of new car commercials that besiege prime time, but on Sunday night around 10:30 I thought you know, I should look around, see what’s out there. My car was 9 years old and had served me well, but it was time to say goodbye.

So yesterday, I bought a car.

Of course, I spent a few hours online looking at what was out there in the marketplace and what I could reasonably afford. Then I called a dealership in the morning and was like, this is what I want. I’ll be by at lunch to take it for a test drive. When I was done, I said I’d be back after work to sign the papers.

And last night, I drove it home.

Ain’t it pretty? It’s a 2008 Honda Civic LX, Atomic Blue in color with a green pinstripe that you can’t really see in the pictures. I had only a few requirements for a car ~ it had to be a manual transmission (I’ve preferred them since my first car), it had to have air conditioning and a CD player, and it had to be blue. Everything else is just details.

This is my third car, but only the second car I’ve ever bought. My first car was a 1982 Toyota Corolla, brown in color, with a license plate that read NAPHALI (that was also the car’s name). When I finally bought a new car, I got a 1999 Saturn SL, blue, named Setsuna (yes, I know it’s the name of Sailor Pluto, not Sailor Saturn, but still, I liked it). The license plate was a nod to ‘N Sync ~ DRTY POP.

This new car is named Jericho (don’t tell me I’m the only one who names my cars), and tomorrow I’m going to the DMV to get new plates that read WRTR GRL. I also have to buy a replacement title for my Saturn, as some idiot lost it (or, as I suspect, the bank I financed from years ago never mailed it to me).

When I bought my Saturn, I drove it home the same day, too. I know it’s a big purchase but I don’t like to waffle on anything ~ I make up my mind to do something and I do it. My sister thinks I rush into things, but I shop for cars the same way I shop for clothes. I go in, pick out what I want, and take it home. Easy as that!