Friday Reads | Every Move He Makes

January 29, 2016February 12, 2019 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ Leave a comment

Friday!!! What are you reading this week? I’m at the very end of Every Move He Makes by Barbara Elsborg and I have to admit I had forgotten I sometimes like reading about secret agents. Not because I find them very realistic, maybe they are I have no idea what everyday life looks like for an M16 agent, but I like snow, arsehole characters and gritty stories.

When I started writing this post I was certain I had read Barabara Elsborg before but when I went to check her list of works (47 books listed on Goodreads) I realised I hadn’t. I’ll have to have a look at her other books after this.

books2read.com/EveryMoveHeMakes *

Keeping an eye on his charge isn’t easy. Keeping his hands off? Impossible…

It took attending his own funeral to force Logan to accept a new life as an undercover MI6 agent. That doesn’t make his latest assignment any less aggravating. Babysitting a Russian pop star with delusions that someone’s trying to kill him.

Other than an inexplicable attraction Logan ruthlessly suppresses, he couldn’t have less in common with the irritating, arrogant rich kid. He’s even prepared to walk away—until very real bullets start flying.

After his mother’s death, Zak Kochenkov’s life unravels in an impenetrable haze of grief, drugs and alcohol—until one bodyguard candidate stands out. Except his hopes of having some fun with that guard’s body evaporate when he realizes Logan is buttoned up tighter than a clam.

The first thing Logan learns is that his charge won’t do as he’s told. And there’s some secret behind his haunted eyes that shakes Logan’s resolve to keep him at arm’s length. Because he knows if he lets passion close his eyes, that’s when danger will find them both…

Warning: Contains a sexy bodyguard with a tortured past, and a spoiled rock star with a tortured conscience. Stir (don’t shake), and prepare for spontaneous combustion.

* By clicking the Books2Read link you’ll be taken to an external page. Links to Smashwords, Kobo U.S and Amazon contain affiliate links that earn me a small commission at no additional cost to you. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Friday Reads | Sign of Spring

January 15, 2016February 12, 2019 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ Leave a comment

It’s Friday! Last Friday I didn’t do a Friday Reads post, I was at the hospital giving birth to my daughter. Scrolling back through my posts I realise it’s been a few weeks since I did do a Friday Reads post, I’ve been a little occupied lately, but now I’m almost back to normal. A bit more sleep deprived and absentminded but mostly normal – if I ever could claim to be.

But now to the reading. I signed up for Goodreads M/M Romance Group’s Whips and Kisses challenge. It’s a game lasting from the 1 of January to the 30th of June. You roll a dice, move to a square, and pick a book from the category written on that square. All in all the game board has 144 squares. Yesterday I ended up on Genre: Contemporary and since Sign of Spring by Kate Lowell was listed there, and I already had it on my e-reader I picked it.

I haven’t read anything by Kate Lowell before but lately, I’ve seen her Nuts About You (Nutty Romances #1 *) showing up all over my Goodreads feed so maybe I should.

Sign of Spring is an M/M Romance about Robin, a burned out nurse, and Justin, his road trip companion. If you are in the mood for a short sexy read, you should definitely check this one out. It’s a typical opposite attracts tale with a little breath play, which isn’t really my thing since not being able to breath makes me panic, but it was still kind of hot. And it’s free! It was written as a part of 2013’s Don’t Read in the Closet event.

books2read.com/SignofSpring *

We’ve all heard those stock phrases. “When one door closes, another opens.” “There’s always a silver lining.” “When life hands you lemons, make lemonade.”

But, what if you’re the lemon?

After crashing and burning at his job in the Palliative Care Unit, a young nurse takes a cross-country road trip, hoping a break from his routine will be the transfusion he needs to heal his bruised heart. What he doesn’t expect is to fall head over heels in love with a chance met acquaintance, a man who lives in the moment, treating each day as an adventure.

An idyllic afternoon in a field of poppies leads to confessions by both men, but can their relationship survive the return to reality? Are the poppies a symbol of death, or a sign of rebirth?

* By clicking the Books2Read link you’ll be taken to an external page. Links to Smashwords, Kobo U.S and Amazon contain affiliate links that earn me a small commission at no additional cost to you. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

How Og the dog came to be

December 14, 2015February 12, 2019 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ Leave a comment

OgtheDog

Do you see the handsome fellow in the picture? It’s my dog Ove. He is a nine-month-old German Shorthaired Pointer. We got him earlier this year and as always when you get a new pet the biggest problem is what to name the little creature. In our case, it was fairly easy. In Swedish ‘vovve’ is ‘dog’, or rather ‘vovve’ is ‘doggie’ and my two-year-old said “ove”—she still does whenever she sees a dog. Ove is a male name in Sweden, though not a very common one, but it seemed fitting for the dog. So Ove it was and Ove this is.

When I was emailing with my friend, Jonathan Penn, he asked what the dog was called. I told him what I wrote above. So it would be as if I named a dog Og, he asked. And it would.

When I came to write Once in a Snowstorm I figured our lonely lumberjack needed a dog to keep him company in his secluded cabin, and remembering what Jonathan had written back in the summer I named him Og. In the first draft, I did say that Og was a German Shorthaired Pointer, but I think that paragraph got deleted sometime during the process because when I went back to check now I couldn’t find it. In my head, Og still is a German Shorthaired Pointer, but I guess you can make him whatever breed you see fit.

Og’s first appearance in Once in a Snowstorm:

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Soft approaching footfalls interrupted his slumber, or were they footfalls, or…? They were closing in rapidly, and they didn’t sound…human. Aiden didn’t have the energy to open his eyes and look. It was probably all in his imagination anyway.

But he couldn’t ignore when something wet and cold touched his face.

Aiden grunted and turned away, squinting in exhaustion at his would-be attacker. Through the blur of icy lashes, he saw a brown face and honey-coloured eyes watching him with interest. The light-brown snout came towards him again, but Aiden managed to put up an arm before the wet whiskers made contact with his skin. What is a dog doing in the middle of the forest?

The bark startled him.

“Og! Get back here!” That’s a human voice. Aiden tried to speak, but not a sound passed his lips. The last of his energy seeped out in the snow. He reached up and grabbed a hold of the dog’s collar, not wanting it to leave him. Then he closed his eyes.