Fridays at Ofelia’s | Blue Jay

February 12, 2021February 4, 2021 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ 1 Comment

Today, we have A. Zukowski here on a visit, talking London and their book Blue Jay. Welcome!

Writing genderqueer-ness in a journey through my city

London pride postbox Blue Jay is about two people: genderqueer AMAB Chris and bisexual Alex. Chris first emerged in book 2 of the London Stories series—Liam For Hire—as the main character’s best friend. Chris is funny and sad, aloof and caring—my favourite kind of character. They deserve a whole novel about them, to give them closure with love and sunshine! Writing the novel took a long time and a lot of soul searching. I built the story around Chris’s wry sense of humour, fierce independence, and aversion to all things romantic. Alex is a tough one to write since he tends to hide the strong emotions behind his tough façade.

I didn’t want to only make the queer character appear more ‘feminine’. Instead, I tried to challenge gender norms through language. All the pronouns they/them/he/him/she/her are used to refer to Chris throughout the book. I struggled to write them more than I could imagine, but the creative process also brought out the gender variance within me. The novel shows my struggles and my refusal to conform as much as that of the protagonists. The other character Alex is bisexual. Alas, I am more familiar with his socioeconomic background and mental health issues.

London-Street-Art

I love writing about London; pre-Covid, I was always walking the city streets, dreaming up stories that happen there. These places provide the perfect backdrops to the angsty, raw, and gritty urban scenes in this book. You won’t find the locations on a tourist map but they have their own histories and eccentrics.

When I was training as a screenwriter, my mentor (who used to produce for the BBC; she has retired now) asked me how I wanted the audience to feel after watching my plays. The readers of Blue Jay should cry and laugh (or smile) alongside the protagonists. I want them to feel uplifted, romantic and hopeful. All at the same time. I want to find all these emotions in a romance set in London that has dark stuff, too.
^_^

Blue Jay Cover Third part of the London Stories.

Boxing was all Alex had ever known, his entire being now shattered beyond repair. One night and four years in jail changed everything. These days, Alex prefers the shadows and dreams of nightmares. Will he find rainbows and glitters in the run-down flat he’s moving into?

Chris has been selling their looks and body for too long. It may be time for a life change, but one thing is clear. The fairest of them all will make a lousy lover until they stop acting the smart-mouthed and blasé cynic. Their story begins with an elegant tango up the narrow stairwell…

A match made in London.

Blue Jay is a hopeful and romantic story with genderqueer and bisexual characters. It can be enjoyed as a standalone.

Best of 2019 ~ Love Bytes Reviews, Electric Me
Delightfully dimensional main characters ~ Joyfully Jay
One of those stories that slowly grows on you and tugs at your heart ~ Divine Magazine
Profoundly emotional, eye-opening, thought-provoking story ~ Love Reading
I have absolutely loved this series…all about redemption, second chances and love. ~ Love Bytes Review

Tags: genderfluid, genderqueer, contemporary romance, LGBTQ, bisexual, prostitution, sex trade, depression

Beaten Track Publishing
93,600 words/290 pages
ISBN: 978-1-78645-368-6

Book links: Beaten Track (publisher): https://www.beatentrackpublishing.com/bluejay
Amazon: http://mybook.to/bluejay
Ebook: https://www.beatentrackpublishing.com/shop/proddetail.php?prod=bluejay_format
Paperback: https://www.beatentrackpublishing.com/shop/proddetail.php?prod=bluejay
Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/957426?ref=b10track

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/45288523-blue-jay

Extract

Chris has returned from the hotel after a quick wash. These days, they can’t get away from the appointments fast enough. Even luxurious hotel rooms hold little appeal.
Washed up. That’s what they are; they sigh silently.
For an escort who works late a lot, this lighting arrangement is highly inconvenient. Chris curses and walks up the stairs as fast as they can, almost running.
Forward step in a tango. Cruzada. An Argentine cross.
Bang! They bump into someone massive at the first turn. The impact knocks them back down several steps.
“Hey, you okay?” says a gruff voice.
“Shit.” Chris stops and feels their way around the walls to find the light switch.
It’s gone one in the fucking morning. Who is standing in the stupid stairway, blocking my way? When their hand touches the other person’s, they recoil. Long and strong fingers connect with theirs, sending a shot of electricity through them.
Chris finds the switch; they and the stranger are bathed in the bright light from the bare bulb once more. They squint, uncomfortable with the glare of the yellow hue. They really should get their eyes tested—if there was anything they could actually read.
“What the—” Chris exclaims.
The guy must be about six feet six and built like Hercules. He shoulders a large black holdall. Chris is stunned silent by the bulging biceps and arms, and exposed flesh covered by tattoos. The physique of the stranger contrasts with Chris, who’s tall and slim like a catwalk model.
Crap. The man had better not be a burglar.
Chris stops a shudder, not wanting to betray weakness. They weigh up their limited options. They highly doubt they can take on the hulk in the middle of the night. Summoning their best act of caution and confidence, their hand reaches for the pepper spray in their trouser pocket. Out of necessity, self-preservation has become part of their routine.
“Where are you going?” they ask, praying the man has a legitimate reason to be in the building.
“I’m looking for Flat Five.”
Holy shit. What does he want in my flat?

About A. Zukowski

I am a London-based British writer who grew up in the gay village and red light district of Manchester, UK.

I was trained in screenwriting at the University of the Arts, London; National Film & Television School and Script Factory, UK, followed by a series of misadventures as a film journalist, writer and producer of short films. My stories are based on personal and emotional experiences, and feature strong LGBTQ-identified characters.

The Boy Who Fell to Earth (2017 #1 London Stories) http://amzn.to/2Ao90X4
Liam For Hire (2018 #2 London Stories) https://amzn.to/2T1Zod8
Courting Light (2018) http://mybook.to/CourtingLight
Turn Again to Life (2020) http://mybook.to/turnagaintolife

Social Media

Twitter: @saszazukowski
Blog: http://azukowskiblog.wordpress.com
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/16509569.A_Zukowski
FB: http://www.facebook.com/a.zukowski.353
Booklikes: http://azukowski.booklikes.com/

Cover Reveal | Kisses and Cabins & There Will Be Aliens

February 5, 2021 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ 3 Comments

Cover-Reveal Exciting news! Today we’re doing a double cover reveal. Both Holly Day and I got shiny new covers this morning, so we figured we’d do a thing.

These two stories are vastly different. Kisses and Cabins is a short contemporary friends to lovers story, and There Will Be Aliens is – well, there are aliens LOL

Holly wrote There Will Be Aliens for Extraterrestrial Abductions Day that’s on March 20th. I wrote Kisses and Cabins because I wanted to do something short and uncomplicated. It was after I’d written Soul Eater so I needed to clear my mind.

Double Cover Reveal - small
We thought we’d each share a really short excerpt about how our main characters meet. In my case they’ve been friends for over thirty-five years so it won’t be the first time they meet, but the first time in the story.

Excerpt Kisses and Cabins:

“Yes?” The cold March air teased his bare skin. Outside stood Lukas Holland, his best friend since kindergarten. “Luke, what are you doing here?”

They hadn’t seen much of each other lately. Kace didn’t know what it was, but Stacy, Lukas’ girlfriend, disliked him—a lot. Could be because he was queer, or maybe because he worked at a gay club without being ashamed. She’d said something about it once. You tell people you work there? And then she’d widened her eyes and shaken her head, not at him, but at Lukas.

“Can I come in?” The slurred speech and the way he stumbled told Kace he was drunk before he smelled the fumes.

“What’s up, dude? You’re drunk on a Monday afternoon.”

Excerpt There Will Be Aliens:

Then the man nodded, and as he took a step forward, the female jumped down on the other side of the strange wide outdoor chair. She ran.

“Shall I go get her?”

Zenon nodded at Brox. “Anek, follow in case there are more earthlings around.” He took a step forward, and when the man tried to hit him, he caught his arm and secured him—though careful not to touch any of the pale skin in case it was covered in poison—and slung him over his shoulder. He’d expected him to weigh more. He was short but didn’t look unhealthily thin, so he should’ve weighed more.

“Where are you taking him?” Ghurva gave him a curious look—no one he’d ever met could give curious looks except Ghurva. Another sign he wasn’t like most Negudade.

“I’m bringing him.”

Are you ready to see the covers? *drum roll* Here they are!

kissesandcabins - small

Kace Channing has been best friends with Luke Holland for thirty-five years. He can’t imagine his world without him. But, over the last twelve months, they’ve hardly seen one another. And life without Luke seems empty.

When Luke shows up on Kace’s doorstep, asking for a place to stay, Kace is happy to say yes. But he isn’t prepared for the kiss that follows, or ready to admit that he could kiss Luke forever. What they already have is too important.

And when Luke, the least outdoorsy person Kace knows, tells him he’s buying a cabin in the woods, he tries to talk him out of it. But Luke’s made up his mind. He says they need it, the two of them.
But won’t kisses and cabins ruin their friendship?

therewillbealiens - small

Carlo Russo is having the worst day. Not only has he lost his job, caught his boyfriend cheating, and had one too many shots with his best friend Grace, now he’s seeing aliens too. Big, black, tail-equipped aliens. After a futile struggle, he and Grace find themselves on a spaceship leaving Earth.

Zenon Scoreceds Qhainqons doesn’t know what it is about the earthling male. Their mission is to bring back ten females in hopes of them being able to provide their planet with children, but he wants the male. What he’s going to do with the male, he doesn’t know, but he’s claiming him as his payment for going on the mission.

Carlo doesn’t approve of kidnapping, but the aliens aren’t too bad, and once the language chip is installed, he finds it entertaining to talk to them. Zen in particular. They’re standoffish and never show any emotion, but Carlo has no problem cuddling up next to Zen at night.

All Zenon wants is to spend time with Carlo, but it’s his job to get them all home in one piece. Will he be able to keep Carlo safe from all the dangers lurking along the trip? He has to because Carlo is his, and he’s not letting him go.

Guest Post | Playing Chicken

January 25, 2021January 22, 2021 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ 1 Comment

Guest-Post

Today we have the lovely A.L. Lester here to talk about her surprise release, Playing Chicken. Make sure to read to the end so you don’t miss the giveaway!

Thank you so much for having me here to day to talk about my new short story, Playing Chicken! It’s a meet-cute bit of fluff that I accidentally wrote as a distraction from Real Life ™ over the last couple of weeks. I have recently joined the UK Romance Novelist’s Association’s Welsh chapter (Cariad Chapter—cariad means love in Welsh) and we are doing a Thing next week around St Dwynwen’s Day, the 25^th January. Dwynwen is sometimes talked about as ‘The Welsh St Valentine’ and I have written all about her on my own blog, so I won’t repeat that here!

Playing Chicken is not my usual style at all. I usually write longer, historical-paranormal romances and recently non-binary characters have been making more of an appearance in my stories. At the moment as my main project, I’m writing a trilogy set in my Lost in Time paranormal universe, which is going to have a fair amount of angst and baddies.

It was pure relief to write something cosy and sweet and just…kind.

The setting for the story is actually a friend’s house. They have an old gamekeeper’s cottage isolated in the middle of a Welsh forest, and you have to drive half a mile down a muddy track to get to it. It’s wonderful. I’d love to live there! So impractical in my current situation, but for Marc and Mal and Anghared the deerhound, it’s perfect.

Chickens

My life is much less full of animals now than it was a decade ago. I used to run a market stall selling eggs at the farmer’s market locally, and I bred hens. At one point I had two hundred chickens. We still have a dozen to lay eggs for ourselves, but that’s it, these days. It was lovely to revisit my poultry-keeping past and write about not-Marc’s chickens. I envisage them as Buff Orpingtons, huge and fluffy. Poor Marc doesn’t quite know what to do about them, but they are very gentle-natured and I’m sure he’ll be fine!

Excerpt:

His first aid kit was rudimentary but covered the basics. Antiseptics, dressings, butterfly strips. It should do the job. He hauled it out from under the driver’s seat, eyeing the squeezed-in boxes disfavourably. That was going to be today’s job, he supposed.

He was so taken up with his mission that he forgot there should have been a chicken in the porch until he turned back toward the house. He blinked in disbelief. She had a friend. Two friends. They were sat in a row on the back of the garden bench underneath the parlour window. As he watched, they jumped down, one by one and stood in a line, as if waiting for him. The two new ones were very clearly the same breed as Chicken Number One. Big, fluffy, orange. One had more exciting headgear than the other two and was a bit bigger, so he guessed that was a boy-chicken. Cockerel. Cock. He sniggered quietly and then stopped himself as the first chicken…he could tell it was the original one because it had a bit of black in its tail and the others didn’t…looked at him disapprovingly.

Obviously cock jokes were out. The telepathic chicken didn’t like it.

“Sorry,” he said. “I was just getting the first aid kit for Mal. I’ll stop.”

He performed a shuffling dance around them to get back indoors. “You’re like the Midwich Cuckoos,” he told them. “You are not coming into my house. Stay outside. It’s bad enough having a porch full of chicken shit.”

Mal was on his feet looking at him in alarm when he stepped through the parlour door, and the dog was standing beside him, hackles up.

“Who were you talking to?” he asked in a panicked voice. “Is someone out there?”

Marc shook his head. “Chickens,” he said. “I seem to have chickens living in the porch. It’s fine. He narrowed his eyes. “What makes you think there might be someone out there? Who hurt you?”

Mal sat down on the edge of the chair and ran his hands over his cheeks, pulling a face. The dog sat beside him and put her chin on his knee, staring up at him, and he absently began to pet her ears. Marc knelt beside him and opened the first-aid box.

“My ex’s dad,” he said, quietly, after a moment or two. We’d split up anyway. Ages ago. But he saw me in Welshpool a couple of days ago and wanted to drive the point home.’ He shivered. “I’d only gone down into town to pick up some food and bits.” He winced as Marc turned his face toward the light and began to wipe the cut against his hairline with antiseptic. “I’d left Anghared up here, else he wouldn’t have got near me.”

The dog gave a small woof as she heard her name.

“Would he, girl? Stupid man.”

“So how did you end up in my barn?” Marc said, gently fixing butterfly strips over the cut. It had come open again and was bleeding a bit, but it looked like it would be fine. “Come on, let’s look at your ribs too, while I’m at it.”

“They’re fine, honestly. Only bruised.” Mal pulled away and Marc just looked at him. Mal sighed. “All right, all right.” He began to unzip the big hoodie he was swamped in and winced again. Marc raised an eyebrow, silently asking for permission and then reached out to help when Mal nodded. There were a lot of layers to get through and it took a while to gently extract him. The cold was still coming off him in waves and he was shivering badly as he said, “I’ve been staying up in the woods. But I felt too bad to get home. Anghared found me, didn’t you girl? And we needed somewhere out of the cold. I’m freezing, still.”

He was shuddering, which was probably a good thing in retrospect, Marc thought. He hadn’t been shivering at all when he’d first come inside. Incipient hypothermia. He had a quick look and a gentle feel of the ribs. They were badly bruised but he couldn’t feel anything shifting around, so he’d call that good. Mal’s skin was icy cold under Marc’s fingers.

“Bath?” he said. “Or body-heat?”

“Ugh,” he screwed his face up. “Do I have to?”

“Yes,” said Marc firmly. “I don’t want you to die on my first day home for two and a half years. If that’s all right.”

Playing Chicken

Marc returns home from London to his isolated Welsh cottage for good, having found his ex boyfriend shagging someone else in their bed. Who’s the thin, freezing cold man with the bruised face he finds in his barn? Will the tenuous connection between them grow, or fade away?

A 9,000 word short story to mark the Welsh St Valentine’s Day, St Dwynwen’s Day, the 25^th of January. With chickens.

Tag line: A short contemporary gay romance to mark St Dwynwen’s Day – the Welsh St Valentine. With Chickens.
Genre: Gay, romance, contemporary, meet-cute, short story
Length: 9,000 words
Release Date: 18 Jan 2020
Buy: http://books2read.com/playingchicken

Giveaway

To celebrate the release of Playing Chicken, Ally is giving away a copy of her New York Times Book Review featured story, Taking Stock. Click here to join!

About A.L. Lester

Writer of queer, paranormal, historical, romantic suspense. Lives in the South West of England with Mr AL, two children, a badly behaved dachshund, a terrifying cat and some hens. Likes gardening but doesn’t really have time or energy. Not musical. Doesn’t much like telly. Non-binary. Chronically disabled. Has tedious fits.