E books
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Material Girls
Since making the switch from YA/NA to Adult romance (including erotic) I’ve worked on creating female protagonists who are in different phases in their lives. Both Hui and At Last will be out this month (December). The Player is also scheduled for release in late December.
For Imani, the chance to show the world that she is truly a Prima ballerina means making a heartbreaking decision:
African american ballerina falls for North Korean ballet dancer in the ebook HUI 
Imani takes flight on stage, in a scene from the ebook HUI For Victoria “Torii” Theas, falling for a paraplegic male ends up blurring the line between being in a romantic relationship and becoming a caregiver, in the May/December, adult erotic contemporary At Last
Ethan and Torii, the lead characters of AT LAST -
Love thy Neighbor
Meet Victoria “Torii” Theas, the female lead of At Last
Victoria “Torii” Theas from At Last And here’s my depiction of Ethan Forché, Torii’s love interest:
Ethan Forché, the male lead from the ebook At Last I’m putting up the entire first chapter of the ebook today. Here’s a brief excerpt of the beginning:
CHAPTER ONE
“Can you please hold the elevator?”
The female voice sweetly asking Ethan Forché not to let the doors close caught him off guard. Pressing the open button while the thing buzzed in annoyance, Ethan angled his wheelchair sideways so that he didn’t block the entrance. One of the perks of having underground parking meant he could park his car close to the elevator. It was a welcome convenience, since his apartment was on the first floor. After an out of breath “thank you,” the woman walked in, positioning herself in the middle of the back wall.
“Hi, I’m Torii Theas.” An outstretched, manicured hand waited to shake his. Their flesh to flesh contact was brief and business like, but it gave him enough time to notice the golden undertone of her brown skin.
After managing to find his voice, he gave her a smile. “Ethan . . . Forché. It’s nice to see you again.” Oops. That was probably the wrong thing to say. The last time he’d seen her she’d been clothed in just a bed sheet after the police broke down her door. Ethan got up to the second floor just in time to hear her cursing up a storm while demanding the cops release her boyfriend.
Yeah, it was all just a stupid error on his part. Really stupid. Now they awkwardly shared the same elevator. He was still sweaty from a hard fought game of basketball while she was very professional looking with her attaché in one hand and parted on the side, bone straight brunette hair grazing her shoulders.
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Another delay on the ebook HUI
I’ve made a decision not to release HUI until this month (Dec), so I must apologize for the delay.
African American ballerina falls for North Korean ballet dancer in the ebook HUI 
I just think I need to do more, or basically push myself to do better with this important story line. Yes, at it’s core HUI is a romance. But there are other pressing issues that I must balance in addition to telling this tale of a black ballerina. To that end, I don’t know how I missed this article and the beautiful, inspiring cover:
From left to right: Ashley Murphy, Ebony Williams and Misty Copeland Beyond Role Models Straight talk from Ashley Murphy, Ebony Williams and Misty Copeland
Published in the June/July 2014 Pointe Magazine
Link to the full article: http://www.pointemagazine.com/issues/junejuly-2014/beyond-role-models
Take a good look at their pointe shoes, because hues that are closer to the skin tone of a dancer of color are just one change ushered in by diverse students and performers in the world of ballet. I have a scene on the process of re-coloring a ballet shoe in the book.
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Long Story Short
I need to get out of this funky mood (the footage from Ferguson and also the interviews of young people explaining why they’re upset are on repeat in my mind). So besides my rant post, I’m listing a few more things I’ve been doing.
Short reads in the adult erotic romance department but packed with emotion are coming next month. Click to view an excerpt of a romance between a paraplegic male and his upstairs neighbor:
Click image to read an excerpt:
Make Me Yours. African American divorcee falls for her Somali Bantu college professor. Spin off novella from the RUSH: Suicide Kings series This is a new cover I’d created for Rory (a character introduced in the ebook RUSH) who’s paired with an exotic dancer named Roxie. I wasn’t as comfortable with my original cover, so I created this one about a month ago. Click the image for an excerpt:
Anatomy of a Seduction – Rory and Roxie’s erotic romance. This is another spin off of the RUSH:Suicide Kings series Much like with my writing, I tend to create lots of covers and then whittle them down to the ones that I like the best. Another example is this one I did for HUI by editing two different photos:
But I decided to go with this one instead:
Oh, and one more thing:
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Paranormal in Living Color
Life interrupted, so I wasn’t able to finish editing HUI since I work full-time and write part time. But it will be out very soon. Here’s how I deal with the eye-strain of pages and pages of text:
From left to right: Karnage Xian – Gargoyle Ronin – Warlock Andre Santana – Werewolf 
Julian Larouche – Victorian Era Vampire 
Ronin – a Firedrake Warlock 
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My Kind of Diversity
I’m going to repost this 2013 link from BUZZFEED, because it lists a number of Asian leading men who may not be familiar to American audiences:
http://www.buzzfeed.com/mattortile/asian-leading-men-who-deserve-more-airtime
I’m still cleaning up a number of books (reviewing sentence structure, getting rid of overdone or purple prose, checking for typos). I have to oversee every aspect of self-pubbing and I re-write scenes like crazy. Sometimes I’ll write a scene several times over, only to cut the whole dang thing and use just a couple of sentences.
Just a few more promos to post, because creating them helps me visualize characters and their traits:
Imani and Hui, from the contemporary romance set in the world of ballet, HUI 
Werewolf Andre Santana, Gargoyle Karnage Xian and the Other -
Black Swan
I’m not going to put too many words to the promo photos I’ve created for the novel Hui. Hopefully they convey a bit of the love the two characters share in the upcoming ebook:
Korean ballet dancer falls for African American ballerina in the ebbok Hui 
Imani and Hui in ballet practice 
Korean ballet dancer falls for African American ballerina in the ebbok Hui -
A new Hui excerpt and more digital promos
Listening to: Music by Ed Sheeran “I See Fire”
I worked on a few more promos this weekend, and I’ve got another excerpt from the ebook HUI
Imani and Hui from the ebook HUI 
Korean ballet dancer falls for African American ballerina in the ebook HUI Excerpt:
“When I dance with Ming-ju, I think of how I am dancing with you.”
His statement shocked her. “You . . . you pretend it’s me and you dancing?”
“Yes.” Considering the way he was expectantly staring, it was time to reveal her feelings. “I think you already know how I-I . . . I mean with the way I jumped your bones in the shoe manager’s office-” Blushing, Imani dropped her eyes and her voice as she continued. “I wasn’t exactly subtle about how much I like you.”
“I like you too, I-mani.”
That sultry smile of hers was back, as their abrupt kiss kept replaying in her mind. “If we had to know how to pronounce your name, you need to know that my name is sorta like Emma, only it’s spelled with an i and not an e. M’mani.” When they moved towards each other Imani glanced around, noticing something was different. “Where’s your bodyguard and that other guy, the interpreter?”