• #BlackGirlMagic,  Contemporary Romance,  E books,  Excerpts,  New Adult,  Novella

    Thirsty

    I made more promos for The Saint of BOYStown, a New Adult IR (Interracial romance).

    Here’s a scene from the novel:

     

    Tanner Joseph
    Tanner Joseph, from the ebook The Saint of BOYStown

     

    Lovers Tanner Joseph and Nathalie Childress, from the ebook The Saint of BOYStown

     

     

    Pictured: Nathalie Childress and Tanner Joseph, from the IR romance The Saint of BOYStown
    Pictured: Nathalie Childress and Tanner Joseph, from the IR romance The Saint of BOYStown

     

    Pictured: Tanner Joseph and Nathalie Childress from the IR ebook The Saint of BOYStown

     

    Pictured: Justin Ybarra, Tanner Joseph and Cody Childress, from the IR ebook The Saint of BOYStown.

     

    There’s a lot going on in this book. There’s race, romance, economic disparity (and not just on the black folk side) That’s all I’ll reveal for now.

     

    Excerpt:

    Go away Tanner. Go far, far, away. He doesn’t. Instead of pulling out a chair like a normal person would, he leapfrogs over the top of the backrest and plops down next to me, with a tray full of food I’d never eat. I’m allergic to vegetables. I won’t eat rice with gravy, but I will snack on rice with butter. Tanner quizzes me on the lack of eats on my tray, to which I repeat that I’m veggie intolerant.

    His eyelashes flutter downward and his fingers steeple as he says grace. There are teachers and other students watching, just as shocked as I am at Tanner’s transformation. When he stops giving thanks he starts in with questioning me. “No, really? You really can’t eat vegetables?” he asks, mixing everything on his plate together before shoveling the stuff in his mouth. It’s such a Cody-like move. I give him a nod of assurance that my lie is the truth. I also can’t stop gawking at all the different foods he’s mixed together.

    One side of his face balloons as he tries to eat and talk. “Yeah, Cody convinced me and Justin to eat this way.”

  • #BlackGirlMagic,  Contemporary Romance,  E books,  Excerpts,  IR erotic romance,  New Adult

    Release Week

    This is release week for two of my novels. In the meantime here are a couple of excerpts from The Saint of BOYStown and SENSEI

     

    The SAINT of BOYStown small copy1Aa

     

    The Saint of BOYStown

    That’s not Cody lying in bed, looking for all the world like a male version of Sleeping Beauty. His muscles are nowhere to be found, because his body has shrunk, almost like he’s deflated. His breathing is so shallow that its hard to tell if he’s really taking in air on his own. Mom is already here, doing what a nurse usually would.

    As I watch her washing Cody I’m ashamed at how bratty I’ve been to her. She takes his arm, wiping a wet cloth over his skin ever so tenderly. The soap suds are close to the same color he is, but even with the sterile whiteness of the bed sheets, the peach tinted lava of the soap and Cody’s fading tan, I hope he can feel the love in her touch. I pray he can hear her voice, how she sings so sweetly to him, peppering a made-up melody with lyrics like “my beautiful boy.” She encourages him and herself by bragging about how everything’s gonna be just fine. Mom gives him a run-down on all the well-wishers and prayers from the community. I wish I had her kind of quiet strength. When she notices me standing in the doorway, she smiles and motions for me to come in. I hang back, feeling like I’m intruding on this private moment between a mother and her comatose child.

    “Talk to him, Nat,” she says. “I’m sure he’d like to know how you’re doing.”

    I don’t want to. All I want to do is transport the three of us back to Aunt Gina’s living room, when we were laughing and hollering at LeBron James and the Cavalier’s game seven win over Golden State. See, I want to have that kind of mind-over-matter type will, a “I refuse to go down” philosophy, the same power that LeBron and his teammates had. I want to will Cody to wake up.

    ~~~~~End of Excerpt~~~~~

    COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL

     

     

     

    promo2-for-sensei-with-japanese-saying-edited

     

    SENSEI

     

    “I didn’t mean to disturb you,” Takeshi said. “I thought you might be thirsty.”

    With a half-smile and a deep throated “thank you,” she took the bottle, giving him a quick appraisal in the process. He was decent looking. Large hands, broad shoulders, big feet . . . Oh bloody hell, he was attractive in a ruggedly handsome sort of way. But that bowl haircut was totally wrong for his face. Nyesha guessed his age to be somewhere in his mid to late thirties, and just like she was checking him out, his attention was on her face, in addition to getting an up-close view of her bare breasts.

  • #BlackGirlMagic,  Contemporary Romance,  E books,  New Adult

    Thank You!!

    This is a post to thank all those who’ve downloaded  the free excerpt of The Saint of BOYStown on Amazon.com. When I created the character of Nathalie Childress, I knew she was someone special. I start the book off with Nat in the first chapter, because that’s how strong the “voice” of the character is.  I’ve included another excerpt below that I think readers will enjoy. It goes more into Tanner and Nathalie’s budding romance in the face of tragedy.

     

     

    Bonus Excerpt:

    “Do you always come up here to talk to yourself?” I ask him.

    “Yeah, most times I do. It makes me feel  . . . uh, closer.”

    I look around. We’re the only two people for miles. “Closer to who?”

    Tanner shrugs. “Ah, you know.”

    “No I don’t”

    “Did you do something different? Your face-”

    Oh crap. My little underwater stunt took off all my carefully placed dirt and grime. My face is clean, so he’s able to get a good look at me, especially since the sun is in my eyes. I try to play it off. “I think I’m coming down with something. I think I’ve got a fever.” I muster up a half-hearted cough. “You should stay back. I don’t wanna spread my germs.”

    “It’s okay.” He walks closer to the edge and starts talking, almost as if I’m not even there. “I converse with God up here. I do it a lot since the accident. I’m guessing it was God who told me not to get in the car with Cody. I’ve been trying to get God to talk to me again, to answer some questions I have.” This whole conversation is mighty uncomfortable, especially for me, but I don’t interrupt him. “My therapist says it’s called survivor’s guilt.” He does a little shrug, as if it’s no biggie.

    “I’ve heard of that,” I add, wishing he’d stop glancing my way, partly because he’s on the edge of a freakin’ mountain. “Wonder why Mason hasn’t experienced what you have?”

  • Contemporary Romance,  E books,  Excerpts

    March Madness pick

    I’m putting up a Sneak Peek of The Saint of BOYStown on Amazon.com

    In 2015 I put up excerpts on this site and Scribd. What I didn’t do is release it. But I’ve got a digital trail dating back two years.

    The lead character is a teen female and bi-racial, looks more like the African American side of her family, her brother is in a coma due to a car accident, and she’s slowly falling for her brother’s friend. Oh, and she’s really grieving because she’s having a hard time dealing with what her brother, who was treated like an idol at her school, has done.

    Somehow I managed to hit on all of the above in the first chapter.

    I say all this, because I’ve decided to make The Saint of BOYStown one of my March Madness picks.

    The Sneak Peek is free for 5 days, starting tomorrow or basically, when it finishes publishing on Amazon.   IT’S LIVE! 

    Or you can click any of three images below and read the same excerpt via Scribd:

     

    The SAINT of BOYStown small copy1Aa

     

    The Saint of BOYStown promo copy copy

     

    Little Big Men copy
    Justin Ybarra, Tanner Joseph and Cody Childress, the three princes who are adored, in my New Adult BOYStown series

     

    The next book in this series features Justin Ybarra:

    The PRINCE of BOYStown small copy

  • #BlackGirlMagic,  Contemporary Romance,  E books,  Excerpts,  IR erotic romance,  New Adult

    An AA heroine with vitiligo

    In keeping with my theme of diversity (with a focus on underrepresented women of color in publishing), I’ve got a New Adult romance featuring a young woman who discovers just how strong she really is:

     

    Young lovers Bree and Stone, from the ebook The Gorgeous Nothings

     

     

    Pictured: Bree Silvestre, lead character in my New Adult romance about a sexual assault on a college campus.

     

    Excerpt:

    If a six foot-something man could shrink to two feet, that’s what Tyshawn did. My words seemed to make him fold into himself. His shoulders slump, and his face is crestfallen. “Bree, please . . . I just need to explain.”

    “No, you-you get back. Get back or I’ll scream. You were there, and you didn’t do a damn thing except laugh. You saw me on the ground, but you didn’t do anything to help me-”

    “I didn’t know you needed help! Jamie said you had too much to drink, and he was gonna help you get home.”

    “And you believed him.”

  • #BlackGirlMagic,  Adult Novellas,  Contemporary Romance,  E books,  New Adult

    Trigger Warnings

    Free Sneak Peeks go into effect tomorrow, Oct 31st until Wednesday, Nov. 2nd for the upcoming ebooks Ivy League and The Gorgeous Nothings, Bree and Stone.

    I’ve got a couple of books that I’ve decided to label with a trigger warning.

    Here’s the definition of a trigger warning:

    A statement at the start of a piece of writing, video, etc., alerting the reader or viewer to the fact that it contains potentially distressing material (often used to introduce a description of such content).

    The Gorgeous Nothings deals with sexual assault on a college campus. Since the assault happens to the lead character, I think its only fair to warn readers who may find the subject matter upsetting, especially if they have experienced rape. The Sneak Peek doesn’t contain the assault scene, that’s why there’s no trigger warning on it.

     

    Pictured: Bree Silvestre and Stone Ulrich, from the IR erotic romance The Gorgeous Nothings

     

    I’m debating whether I should put a trigger warning on SENSEI, since the lead character experiences both rape and sexual trafficking. However, in SENSEI, I don’t use first person or have the main character describe in detail what happened to her.

    As I familiarize myself with Amazon’s publishing process again (it’s been almost a year since I uploaded a manuscript), the Sneak Peeks serve a number of purposes for me. While Sneak Peeks are for marketing purposes, I’m able to correct format errors and process any changes Amazon has made. All my books, from the covers to the blurbs, are created in-house.

     

    IVY League is a love story that begins in college and continues on Capitol Hill. Kenya Paul is a liberal and active in the LGBTQ community. Brandon is conservative, and has just been elected to the House of Representatives when they re-connect in Washington, DC.

    ivy-league-kenya-and-brandon_edited
    Pictured: Kenya Paul and Brandon Wingate, lead characters from the IR romance IVY LEAGUE
  • Contemporary Romance,  E books,  New Adult

    My favorite scene from RUSH

    RUSH, the story of a motorcycle gang member who falls for a Somali Bantu refugee is now live on Amazon.

    The ebook RUSH is available for sale on Amazon

     

    My D’oh! moment:  I have the US participation in Somalia listed as Operation Freedom when it was Operation Restore Hope. I plan to correct that today.  Okay, the edit is done. Now KDP has to update the Look Inside feature and the ebook itself.

     

    Here’s my favorite scene from the book:

    Kerai, my second mother is watching TV in Ba’ba’s room. It is a bedroom they share at night, but it is his room when he comes home from work. She is very active, giggling and hollering at me to come in and close the door. “Aaliyah, what is it they are doing? He is having mani?”

    On the TV, two people are rolling around on a bed. I sit down on my father’s bed, looking around the room at all he has. I did not know he enjoyed reading so many books. When I see the covers, they are of American celebrities with very big smiles.

    “Aaliyah, watch them!” Kerai grabs my arm, looking over at me and laughing. “Oh, they are naked!”