Here's to Fresh Starts!

     Howdy folks! Hope everyone had a great week. I must confess I was on a high most of the week from last week’s news still radiating around me. 

     I have finally finished the Goodreads project! Yay! It came in a little over 51k words. Looking back I realized that I wrote it in a little under three weeks. No wonder I was a little brain dead. However, I’m pleased with the way it turned out. It is going to be a free read, so I hope everyone will take advantage and have a gander. I’ll let everyone know when it’s posted! 

     It was brought to my attention that I didn’t put up an excerpt of the story from the last anthology, ‘Snowed In’. Ooops! Sorry people. I am putting a download link at the bottom of this post. It is a kitchen story, imagine that! LOL 

     Speaking of kitchen/food related stories, Man Love Romance (MLR) has an open call for a foodie story. Um…I think I can handle that. So that is my next project. I started on it yesterday. This time one of the main characters is an award winning Pastry Chef. I mean, who doesn’t like chocolate, a hot man, and sex? So it’s off to work I go!  

     For those who are going to be attending Gay Lit Rom (GLR) let me hear from you! 
     
     Have a great week y’all! 

      Max





Hot Peppers Excerpt PDF

Hot Peppers Excerpt .DOC

What A Week!

     While I’m humping away at this story for Goodreads, which has definitely taking on a life of its own, as I think I've mentioned previously. This week, however, has been stupendous for me. I was sent a contract for a story I wrote for Cleiss Press, then another one for a BDSM Vampire story for Ravenous Romance. I was thrilled. I was doing a happy, happy, joy, joy dance, feeling all inspired. Then…then I got a call from Kris Jacen, Executive Editor for Man Love Romance offering me a contract for a story that I never thought would be published, POW. 

     I was doing back-flips at that point, well in my head at any rate. This will be my very first standalone book! What really blew me away is that she actually took the time out of what I know to be a very hectic schedule to personally call me. Wow, is all I can say. To be published by such a power house as MLR is even more mind blowing to me. 

     For those of you who have read my work, you will know that I tend to be a little in-your-face, hard hitting and even a little gritty at times. Hey, it’s just who I am. This particular story is especially that. The inspiration came from a CNN news story about forced male rape. Needless to say my mind went in all kinds of directions with this one.  

For those of you who are not familiar with
Michael Stokes, check him out.
He makes men look so damned sexy.

     Marines: Who doesn't like a big hunky-the few-the proud- the Marine? So, of course I went there. This story deals with a group of Marines who were captured by a Taliban Warlord and his Grandson. There is physical violence. Graphic sexual situations, and yes that does include several rape scenes, but the real thrust of the story is about survival, love and healing. I want to make a point here, if you will allow: It is the love, the healing and the human spirit that makes this work. The rape scenes are harsh and even brutal at times, but that is not the focus here. For those who are turned on by rape scenes, then I think you are going to be disappointed, so look elsewhere. 

     We men are strange creatures, and gay men are, or can be, even more peculiar. I think that this book brings all that and a lot more to the surface. The facets of what a gay man goes through, how he feels, and it is this that I wanted to show within this work. The difference between love and lust, the many types of love and the realization and understanding of how those feelings are interwoven into friendships. (By the way, it does have a very happy ending.) 

     I cannot thank Ms. Jacen enough for giving me the opportunity to push the envelope here. 

     Okay, I’m back to doing back-flips! (Mentally of course!) 
     
     Till next week,    
     
     Max

     As always, please feel free to make a comment, good, bad or indifferent!

Another Busy Week

     This has been a very busy week for me. I’m chugging along with the Goodreads story, which is almost done. I did another thread hop on Goodreads that has a small snippet posted. Have another story in an anthology with Ravenous Romance coming out very soon. F. Leonora Solomon is a dream to work with. Thank you, pretty lady. 

Charlie and me!

     The highlight of my week was being able to hang out with Charlie Harding before his Shoot-Out show last night. He will be doing ‘Charlie Harding Presents’ for Wilde City Press. From what I gathered from him, he will be doing selections and putting them together in what I am assuming will be an anthology type thing. Can’t wait to see what he comes up with. 

     I still have several submissions out there hanging in the internet Ethernet-sphere. Trying to be patient, which is not something I’m very good at I’m afraid. 

     Don’t know if anyone read that little excerpt I posted last week, (which I initially forgot to put the link up for) since no one left any comments. Arrrgh. At any rate…I’ll wish everyone a great week! 

Max

As always, please leave a comment, good, bad or indifferent!

Goodreads Update

     Good morning all, I hope everyone doing well. 

     I wanted to give everyone a little update as to how this challenge for Goodreads, ‘Love Has No Boundaries’ is going. Well, in a word, stupendous. I am almost done and so far I’m very pleased. 

     Our main characters have led me on a wild and somewhat emotional ride. They completely trashed my first outline and have decided to do their own thing. Oh well, sometimes that happens. 

     Here is a small snippet – 

     Jerome came out of the bathroom and stretched. The muscles in his arms and shoulders bulged, his heavy pectorals stretched tight. Jay could feel the muscles constrict in his own stomach with want. With his back to the bed Jerome dropped the boxers giving Jason a full view of his ass. A light dusting of hair feathered in towards the center becoming a little heavier towards the valley of his tight butt. 
     
     Setting the alarm, turning off the light, Jerome said, “’Night.” 

     “’Night, Sir.” 

     Now, for those of you who are looking for something a little more…substantial, I give you…wait for it… 

      …another excerpt of a piece that I wrote some time ago. 

Warning: IF you do not like heavy BDSM and graphic sexual content between men, skip this, it isn’t for you. For those of you who are brave enough to enter into the dungeon of real, heavy-duty Leatherman, I welcome you. 

     As usual, please leave a comment, good, bad or indifferent. Have a good one everyone, 

Max

Burning Heads (PDF Version)
Burning Heads (Word Doc Version)

Another Challenge

     I hope everyone had a great St. Patty’s Day, and enjoyed the little yarn I spun for the occasion. Had a few comments, (thank you to those who did leave a comment) and all were good. Thank you one and all. 

     Now, as if I didn’t have enough to do, I signed up for this years Goodreads ‘Don’t Read In The Closet – Love Has No Boundaries’ event. It was Aisling Mancy who is to blame for all this. I don’t know if I need to beat him just yet, but I’ll let you know. 

     So…this is all based off a photograph. I picked this one, because it was something that was a bit of a challenge and it spoke to me. I rarely write BDSM, not because I can’t and I don’t know the subject matter, it’s just that I rarely find anything that inspires me enough to do a story on it. This one did however. 

     It was posted by Jason Huffman-black, so I hope I do it justice for him. I almost immediately started formulating the storyline and the characters started coming to life. As soon as I get the last bit of polish on this last novel, I plan on tackling it with gusto. 

     I’ll check back with everyone and let ya’ll know how it’s coming along. 

Max

Happy St. Patty's Day!

     Happy St. Patty’s day weekend everyone! As promised, I have a special treat for you. Today is the day that I promised that I would be posting a new story for free! 

     CR Guiliano’s story will be posted a little later so that you can see two different styles, and yes, have TWO free stories to read with your green beer or cocktails. Woo Hoo! 
     
     Again, please leave comments on how you liked or didn’t like the stories. 

Enjoy 

Max

Lucky Charms Word Version
Lucky Charms PDF Version

This Saturday...

     Sorry people about not keeping up with this blog thingy here, but I'm still a newbie in trying to figure this out, and that editor at Ravenous Romance has been keeping me hoping lately, not that I'm complaining mind you. Anyway, this coming Saturday I will be posting two new stories! YEAH!

     One of my own and one from another author,C.R.Guilano. It was our goal to have two fun St. Patrick's Day stories. One written by a female and me, a male. It isn't that we are pitting males against females, it is just to show different styles. Josh Lanyon has written about this before, so we are just going to do a story in the same genre and same type of theme and see what happens. It is all for fun, so I hope ya'll will enjoy it as much as we have had doing it.

     Check back on Saturday to get two free stories!

      And for whatever deity is on duty, leave a comment please. Good, bad or indifferent, let us hear from you. 

Thanks everyone, 

Max