Today it’s Frankenstein Day, yes another strange holiday, but one that should be celebrated. Before I started writing this blog post I googled Frankenstein Day and how to celebrate it.
The suggestion coming up was to dress up like The Creature in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, read Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, or try to figure out why The Creature did what he did (I remember an entire lecture on this subject when I attended the University, interesting).
If you haven’t read Frankenstein, I suggest you do. There are several different versions, I’ll be linking to one below where the ebook is free on Amazon (the price seem to vary from retailer to retailer). If it’s ‘the right one’ I don’t know.
The one I have is a paperback with a dark gothic cover with worn corners. It’s one of the physical books I’ll keep. I’ve given away box after box of books these last years – ebooks take up so much less space – but some I can’t part from despite trying to be one of those minimalistic people LOL.
But, as amazing as Frankenstein is, I find Ms Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley even more so. Her mother was an advocate of women’s rights and one of the founding feminist philosophers, her father was also a philosopher as well as an anarchist. Imagine being a little girl in the beginning of the 1800s and grow up with those values. Mary Shelley rocks! LOL
So read the book!
But, I thought we would have ourselves an M/M celebration of the Frankenstein Day here on the blog. Many books have been inspired by Frankenstein and one of them is Cold Fingers by Amy Spector.
It’s hard to talk about this book without giving the entire plot away. Cold Finger is not your standard romance, but it is romance. It’s a homage to classic horror, a brilliant gothic tale, and it’s both funny and creepy as hell.
I can write horror. I have no problem going gory, crazy, creepy, insane or truly evil, but what I can’t do is creeping around large dark houses. I scare myself to death and Cold Fingers…I almost died LOL.
If you’re uncertain if you want to read this, go download a sample. Most sites allow you a 20% sample, and this book has one of the best prologues I’ve ever read. Don’t let all my horror talk scare you off, Cold Finger is a paranormal romance book.
So if you’re uncertain if this is a book for you, read the prologue as your celebration of Frankenstein Day. It’s awesome!
Ah, I’m sure Ms Spector won’t mind if I post it, so here you go:
Love is the feel of cold fingers.
I remembered the words as well as if I had said them myself. The imagery of them had haunted me, had kept me awake at night.
“And how do you feel about him now? Was seeing him again a disappointment?”
Dr. Anthony’s question brought me back to my surroundings and away from my memories of damp grass and the smell of freshly turned earth.
“Disappointment?” I asked, unable to imagine why she thought seeing the man again could ever leave me disappointed.
“Yes. You know. Did he live up to all your memories? Or did those two years give him a rosy tint?”
I thought about that; Dr. Anthony watched quietly from the chair across from me. She was a pretty woman. Not young, or at least older than myself, but wasn’t youth relative? Wasn’t everything? When I was ten, I distinctly remembered thinking my mother was practically at death’s door. She was thirty-two: the same age I was now.
“No,” I answered, grabbing a tissue to shred from the box placed strategically on the coffee table between us. Placed no closer to me than to her, as if at any moment either one of us could break down.
“No?”
“No. He was as perfect as I remembered.” And seeing him again had caused a weight that had been pressing down on me to disappear. It was as if I had been holding my breath since the moment Vic disappeared from my life.
Dr. Anthony tapped her pen against her notebook, studying me as if trying to read something in my face.
“But you didn’t always feel that way, did you, Christopher?” She tilted her head slightly, eyes still watching me. “You were the one who broke it off.”
“I know,” I snapped and then laughed, giving her a guilty smile. “I know I was the one who ended it. And I remember why.”
“So do I.” Her perpetually calm voice was beginning to grate on my nerves. It didn’t normally. “But I’d like you to explain it to me again. Why did you feel the need to end it?”
I dragged my hands through my hair, pulling a little and concentrating on the sting. “I thought he was a necrophiliac.”
“Yes. So, you no longer think that’s true?”
I thought about it. I played those old memories through my mind, the ones I had revisited and revisited a million times before, and the ones from the last few weeks.
“No.” I fought the smile I felt tugging at my lips. “Now I’m positive.”
And when you read the rest of the story, you’ll remember those words LOL.
A paranormal romance.
Christopher Minnick is at a bad place in his life. Turning thirty and newly out of the hospital, the last thing he wants to do is attend a birthday dinner, even one thrown in his honor.
When he is introduced to a friend’s godson, things just might be starting to look up.
Or are they?
Victor Polidori seems like the perfect man. He’s clever, attractive and interested. But, even as Christopher finds himself falling in love, there are some things that just don’t add up. And when bodies start disappearing, Christopher knows he must get to the bottom of it.
Will Christopher find his happily ever after or is it true what they say? All the good ones are either married or straight. Or they’re necrophiliacs.
*** Includes special link for BONUS Hidden Chapter short story Mrs. Greenberg Sells a Watch (Grant Cooper Book 1/Cold Fingers Book 1.5) ***
This story is also part of BURIED DESIRES – A Horror Double Feature.
Ofelia Grand 