Guest Post | Nell’s Autumn Moodboard

Guest-Post

Hi again, I’m back. But this time I’m not here to talk about a new release because the day job is kicking my behind and I’m struggling to find time to write which means no new releases for me until December. But Ofelia, being the lovely human being that she is, invited me anyway, saying It doesn’t have to be a new book, you can talk about something old. And she’s right. The older books don’t cease to exist just because a new book comes along, so here I am.

I bring three of my older books that have one thing in common: they all take place in the fall. The leaves are just turning in Of Autumn Leaves and New Beginnings, while the last crumpled leaf falls from the trees at the start of In My Arms Again. In Us Again, the leaves are yellow on the ground as two men finally get what they want.

Fall is my favorite season and by that, I mean the cozy part of fall, not the ghosts and Halloween. I want warm sweaters, hot chocolate, and apple-flavored anything. The wooly socks and knitted scarves. Give me changing leaves and crisp air. Hearty stews, red wine, tea, and reading by the fire. You get the picture, I’m sure

And if you don’t: I made a mood board. Wanna see?

Fall moodboard

“He’s cold. I’d give him all my warmth if he would just open his eyes and smile at me and call me Care Bear again.”

Us Again

Second chances :: size difference :: oh-my-god-you-almost-died :: hurt/comfort :: reunited :: difficult past :: gentle giant :: meet cute

Will a late-night phone call lead to a second chance at love?

When Alex gets a call in the middle of the night, telling him his ex-boyfriend is in the hospital, he only hesitates for a second before rushing to Sammy’s side. But the Sammy in the hospital bed is fragile, and not the same man who told Alex to leave seven months ago.

Alex wants to help Sammy get better and is desperate to find out what went wrong between them. Maybe even get a second chance with the man Alex hasn’t been able to get over.

But will Sammy let him back into his life?

M/M Contemporary / 9511 words

Buy links:

JMS Books :: Amazon

“Yes. I’m used to being watched, but never like this. It’s different when I feel his heart beating next to mine, and his breath as though we were on the bed with our limbs entwined and his mouth next to my ear, instead of across the table from each other.”

In My Arms Again

historical fantasy :: fated mates :: star-crossed lovers :: finding home :: lone wolf :: hurt/comfort :: age difference :: pegasus

Trapped in a growing sense of restlessness, Oxen the hunter is lonely. Feeling like he’s waiting for something—or someone—he’s unable to focus on getting ready for winter. But when a handsome and very ill stranger collapses on his doorstep, everything changes.

The stranger, Vinge, is from a Pegasus family but has never been able to transform. As soon as he awakens, both men feel an instant connection, and it grows deeper as Oxen nurses him back to health. Something profound within each man calls out to the other, but neither of them knows what it is.

The questions surrounding Vinge and their deepening relationship are many. Why is Vinge so familiar to Oxen when they clearly have never met? Why are they both reluctant to take the first step to a real commitment?  And what will it take for the true depth of their connection to be revealed?

M/M paranormal historical fantasy / 21809 words

Buy links:

JMS Books :: Amazon

“He rests his cheek against mine. I draw a sharp breath. I expected a kiss, but somehow this is even more intimate.”

Of Autumn Leaves and New Beginnings

bisexual representation :: finding home :: 40+ :: instalove :: family :: communication :: mature men :: non-bitchy ex-wife

Sometimes love finds you even when you’re not looking for it.

At 47, Oren Walker isn’t looking for love. When he knocks on Pete Higgins’ door, all he wants is to thank him for helping his mom after she broke her femur. He never expected that one look at the man would make his knees weak and heart flutter.

Pete is happy—albeit a bit lonely—after divorcing his wife of 20 years and isn’t looking to replace her. But when Oren shows up, all grateful and handsome and in that fancy suit, the longing for the deep connection of a relationship flares up inside him.

As the leaves turn yellow, Oren and Pete spend a lot of time in honest conversations. Their attraction grows. Will the two men recognize the promise of new beginnings, and take the chance to find the happiness they both deserve?

M/M contemporary / 17809 words

Buy links:

JMS Books :: Amazon

About Nell

Nell Iris is a romantic at heart who believes everyone deserves a happy ending. She’s a bonafide bookworm (learned to read long before she started school), wouldn’t dream of going anywhere without something to read (not even the ladies room), loves music (and singing along at the top of her voice but she’s no Celine Dion), and is a real Star Trek nerd (Make it so). She loves words, bullet journals, poetry, wine, coffee-flavored kisses, and fika (a Swedish cultural thing involving coffee and pastry!)

Nell believes passionately in equality for all regardless of race, gender or sexuality, and wants to make the world a better, less hateful, place.

Nell is a bisexual Swedish woman married to the love of her life, a proud mama of a grown daughter, and is approaching 50 faster than she’d like. She lives in the south of Sweden where she spends her days thinking up stories about people falling in love. After dreaming about being a writer for most of her life, she finally was in a place where she could pursue her dream and released her first book in 2017.

Nell Iris writes gay romance, prefers sweet over angsty, short over long, and quirky characters over alpha males.

Find Nell on social media:

Newsletter :: Webpage/blog :: Twitter :: Instagram :: Facebook Page :: Facebook Profile :: Goodreads :: Bookbub

Fridays at Ofelia’s | Call Me Charles by Holly Day

Guest-Post

Hello everyone, Holly here. Tomorrow is release day! Call Me Charles will be let loose into the world. I wrote it to celebrate National Motorcycle Ride Day, which is tomorrow! 🥳 

In it, I’m talking about an old fishing hut right next to the sea. It was Hubert’s grandparents’, but now it belongs to him, and it’s on a gravel road outside the city.  

I grew up in a coastal town, and lately, I’ve been missing the sea a lot. I used to walk by the sea every day with my two dogs – we only have one now, but back then we had two. 

If you walk past the beach where I used to walk and continue on, walk for another 15-20 minutes or so, then you’ll come to a gravel road. There is no traffic there, no tourists in the summer, no beach, just a lot of blackberry bushes and two old fishing huts. If you continue farther, you’ll come to a place we call Algots brygga (Algot’s jetty). Very few people know how to get there, and it’s most often deserted no matter what time of year you show up. 

I spent my childhood summers there – bathing, snorkelling, fishing for crabs, and diving for blue mussels.  

But let’s back up a little, let’s walk back to the tiny fishing huts. They’re right by a small bay, behind them are low trees bent by the wind and loads of blackberry bushes. It’s like those tiny huts are cut off from the rest of the world, and all they see is the sea. Those are the inspiration for Hubert’s home. 

Charles is in an apartment in the city, and at first, he doesn’t really understand why Hubert would want to live where he does, but it’s growing on him. 

Tear

Excerpt:

Hubert had to duck to enter the house. Once he’d cleared the doorway, he motioned for Charles to follow. When they were inside, Hubert unzipped his motorcycle boots and pulled them off.

“Ah… that’s nice.” He smiled. “This is it.” He spread his hands and turned around. Charles took in the tiny kitchen. It was like something out of a fairy tale with a few cupboards, an oven, and a refrigerator. By the window was a small table with two chairs. Through the doorway, he could see an equally tiny room with a two-seat sofa and a TV.

“It’s… cute.”

Hubert laughed. “I love it, but I know it’s not for everyone.”

Charles hadn’t meant it was something bad. “Don’t you get claustrophobic?”

Hubert grabbed his shoulders and turned him around. Through the window, he could see an occasional glitter on the surface of the sea when the moon made it through the clouds. “It’s too dark to do it justice, but no, I don’t get claustrophobic. I can see to the end of the world.”

Charles stared. Growing up in a coastal city, he visited the beach many times during a year, but to live right by the sea… New houses weren’t allowed to be built this close to the coastline. “Is it old?”

“Yeah.” Hubert grinned. “My grandparents lived here. Grandpa was a fisherman. The houses you pass on this road are all old fishing huts.”

“Wow. And you live alone?”

“No.”

Oh… Charles looked around trying to find a clue about who he lived with.

“I’m surprised Jake hasn’t shown. He usually comes as soon as he hears the engine of the bike.”

Jake? Charles tried to control the shivering, but his entire body quaked worse than before.

A sound of a cat flap closing echoed in the kitchen.

“Ah, here he is.” Hubert bent to pick up a black cat. “Charles, this is Jake, the ruler of this house.”

Jake was massive. One of those tomcats with a thick neck and paws big enough to put a small dog to shame. “He’s beautiful.” Charles held out his hand so Jake could smell him. He did a nose bump which Charles assumed was as good approval as any. He’d always wanted a pet, cat or dog didn’t matter, but he lived in a no-pet building.

“He is. I got him from the local shelter when he was about a year old. He was a bit feral, but with time he’s become a social guy, and he keeps the mice away, which is good.” Hubert put him down next to a bowl heaped with dry food.

“Let’s get you into the shower.”

Charles shivered harder when his brain presented a picture of steaming hot water. “A shower would be lovely.”

“Yeah. As you might have assumed, it’s not big.”

Charles didn’t care as long as there was warm water. Hubert opened a cupboard Charles hadn’t noticed, it was in the wall, the door had the same wallpaper as the rest of the room. With a towel in his hand, Hubert opened a door and gestured. “I won’t go in there with you. We’d get stuck.” His eyes sparkled. “Spaciousness wasn’t something poor people prioritized a hundred years ago.”

It was crazy to imagine poor people once had been able to live right next to the sea, but they had. There were many roads like this outside the city, lined with old fishing huts. Most of them were used as summer cabins. Nowadays, Charles didn’t think anyone was allowed to change the look of the fishing huts, they were under a preservation order.

“Did they live here for long? Your grandparents, I mean.”

“Grandpa built this before they got married, and they lived here their entire lives.” He shrugged. “Grandpa died from a heart attack while on a walk, and grandma spent a few months in a nursing home. She got a bit too confused to be left alone toward the end.” He met Charles’s gaze. “They lived a good life.”

Charles nodded. Melancholia spread in his chest despite not having known Hubert’s grandparents. It was the last generation who’d lived real lives. His grandmother had moved to a neighboring farm to be a maid when she’d been eleven. Nowadays, people didn’t let their kids out of their sight, and if they did, the poor monster was covered in bubble wrap and had a GPS attached to their forehead. A middle ground had to be a better option.

“Charles?”

“Yeah?” He shook his head and looked at Hubert.

“You’re spacing out—more than usual. Get in the shower and get warm, okay?”

Charles nodded.

“I’ll go fetch the paddleboard.” He ended the sentence with a growl and stomped away, which made Charles smile.

“Thank you.”

Hubert stopped and turned. He sighed and shook his head. “I’ve fantasized about bringing you home many times, but I’m gonna kill those bastards if I ever see them again.”

Charles stared. “What?” Bringing him home?

“Get in the shower, Charles.”

Charles did.

Blurb: 

callmecharlesCharles Bowman was having a bad day even before his friends showed up to kidnap him for his birthday. He lost his nametag, missed the bus, and was late for his shift in the sandwich shop, but that isn’t the worst. The worst is he’s accidentally been poisoning Hubert, the owner of the candy shop across from the sandwich shop, with gluten despite Hubert ordering gluten-free sandwiches. 
 
When Charles finds himself soaking wet on a deserted road in the chilling October night, the worst gets an entirely new meaning. But right as he’s about to give up, Hubert comes driving on his motorcycle. Being responsible for gluten poisoning aside, Charles has never been as glad to see his knight in black leather, but is going home with Hubert a good idea? Or will the worst get even worse? 

Pre-order links:

Contemporary Gay Romance: 15,071 words 

JMS Books  :: Amazon :: books2read.com/CAllMeCharles

About Holly 

According to Holly Day, no day should go by uncelebrated and all of them deserve a story. If she’ll have the time to write them remains to be seen. She lives in rural Sweden with a husband, four children, more pets than most, and wouldn’t last a day without coffee.  

Holly gets up at the crack of dawn most days of the week to write gay romance stories. She believes in equality in fiction and in real life. Diversity matters. Representation matters. Visibility matters. We can change the world one story at the time.  

Connect with Holly on social media: 

Website :: Facebook :: Twitter :: Pinterest :: BookBub :: Goodreads :: Instagram 

 

Fridays at Ofelia’s | The Truth Of Sweet Things

Trick or Treat

Today, fellow JMS author A. J. Morrow is on a visit, and I have to say, I love the cover of her upcoming story, The Truth Of Sweet Things (that you can pre-order over at JMS Books and get a 20% discount) Welcome A. J.

Hi there! 

I’m A. J. Morrow, author of The Christmas Arrangement, The Truth Of Sweet Things, and A Christmas Exchange (as well as several other projects in the works). When writing, I try to focus on a little bit of escapism–short, fluffy novellas, the type that make you feel warm inside. I especially love holiday stories, and those set in autumn. You can’t beat the atmosphere in the colder months!

My upcoming work, The Truth Of Sweet Things, is a short story I wrote after a long weekend back in my hometown, which reminded me of all the happy memories I have of the fall. It inspired me to write about the season–even if the focus is on a character who hates it. Of course, the main character, Becca, soon learns to get over this when she reunites with her teenage crush, Amy–an avid lover of the season, and a newly out lesbian.

One of my favourite parts of the writing process is getting to know your characters and settings. I try to keep certain things (like town names/places) vague so that the reader can imagine the places they’re familiar with, but I do still aim to get a good sense of the environment and people within the story. Hopefully, the atmosphere of fall–the browning leaves, the slight chill in the air, the pumpkins and novelty coffee and the long walks with people you love–will be one of the main take-aways from this story.

This story has taught me a lot about the art of short stories–usually, my shortest works are about twenty thousand words long, so this was very new to me! I really enjoyed writing this piece–shorter fiction is very different in structure and style to longer works, so it was a fun experience, and hopefully I’ll be able to take what I learnt into future stories.

More than anything, I’m just excited to get this story out there, and to see people’s responses to it.

The Truth Of Sweet Things comes out on the 6th of October.

Blurb:

Book cover the truth of sweet things by A. J. Morrow

Becca hates Fall and everything that comes with it; her best friend, however, disagrees

and decides to set her up with her sister, Amy, who she’s sure will change Becca’s

mind. Amy is charismatic and smart–and the woman Becca has been in love with since

high school. When Amy texts her out of the blue, will Becca come out of her shell

enough to pursue this relationship?

Excerpt:

‘Becca glanced at her watch. She was early, but the cold was bitter that day so she decided to head inside already.

The coffee shop was small and quiet–homey, even–with wooden tables and low hanging lights. Paper Halloween decorations were hung over the windows and across the counter, the orange of them matching the orange leaves visible outside. Becca slid into a chair on the far side of the room and took the menu from in front of her.

She stared out the window, letting her mind wander. As her eyes traced over a cluster of leaves dancing in the wind, she felt her anxiety melt back into the chair. It was warm inside the shop, warm and heady, and Becca was already tired from a day at work. When the waitress came over to get her order she stuttered an answer, somehow surprised that she had been noticed.

The drinks arrived quietly in front of her, the waitress smiling at Becca, who must have been quite visibly nervous. Becca took a sip of her hot chocolate and then turned back to the window, watching to see if Amy would actually turn up.

For all her intense watching, she didn’t actually notice when Amy did arrive. She was exactly on time–which fit her character, Amy was known to be punctual–and when she slid into the seat opposite her, Becca jumped.

In the time she’d been waiting, the sun had slipped out of the sky, taking most of the sunlight with it, but when she turned to look at Amy, Becca realised that she didn’t need it. Even in the dim, newly October light, Amy was magnificent.’