Jaime Samms's Blog: Stories Between Men, page 3

Sunday Snippet – Defoe’s Notes: 1

I’d love to say, ten years ago, I would never have expected to be here. But. Cough*bullshit*cough. Yeah right. Not kidding myself. Maybe there would have been a place for me in the organization if I had been willing to agree they were right and I was wrong. But then, they also brought me up …  Read more Sunday Snippet – Defoe’s Notes: 1

Sunday Snippet – Cookies, Sugar?

“Have you tried the kitchen, sir?” Mr. Wilson lifted one eyebrow and peered over the tops of his glasses. His needlework hovered between them, his hands still for the moment. “Well” Alban twitched his lips to one side and glanced over his shoulder. “I don’t want to disturb him.” Mr. Wilson snorted. “Disturb Barclay? If …  Read more Sunday Snippet – Cookies, Sugar?

Time to Hunker Down

And not just because it snowed enough for a snow day yesterday, either. Though that desn’t hurt. More importantly, though, its time for me to start taking this writing thing seriously again, and I need your help, I have my office back, which will help with getting words on the page more reliably. I hope. …  Read more Time to Hunker Down

Pre-Order yours Today! Safe and Sound

I’m so excited to see this book on the pre-order page at Pride Publishing. I’ve been waiting a long time to get to Rikki and his love story. Until now, I wasn’t sure what kind of man could hold such a volotile, damaged soul in his hands without doing further damage. That man turned up …  Read more Pre-Order yours Today! Safe and Sound

Roofers, Imminent Travel, Deadlines

Sitting at my desk in the basement writing this morning, it took me a good ten minutes to figure out the sense of unsettled weirdness scratching at my concentration was actually a guy on my roof scraping away old shingles. (I actually went upstairs at one point to find Hubby to try and figure out what the hell he was doing!)

They didn’t come knock on my door or anything (they called last night to let us know they would be here, but did I remember that? Oh hells no). They just parked sideways in my drive, tucking their dump trailer right up against my side door and began pounding away. It wasn’t long before they’d pounded right through my focus and blew a hole out the other side.

So what the hell. I switched to work, and got a fair amount done. That’s easier and doesn’t require quite so much single-minded focus on my part. While ducking in and out of email, though, I was reminded of the date and that I will be travelling inside of a week to dog-sit for my mother in law. After that, I leave straight from there to go to GayRomLit.

Travelling makes me anxious when I have a nice family send-off to ease me into it. There will be no one to send me off.  My sister in law will pick up the dog after I leave and she gets off work. Only the puppy will be around to wave good bye.

I’m sort of terrified.

All this distraction is sort of messing with my ability to concentrate on  a story about a ballet dancer who’s been told he can’t dance ballet any more or he risks ruining his body.  You know. Because I’m trying to write something a little less angsty than my usual fare. Oh bother. I don’t think it’s working…

Not to mention this critter, who is so unnerved by all the banging and thumping he can’t decide if he wants to sit on my feet, my lap, or my laptop. Right now, he is jammed into the 7X10 space on my desk behind my laptop screen and under the bookshelf and every three minutes or so attempts to creep out a little further to lie on the laptop keyboard.

In any case, I’m hoping not to have to chalk this day up to another measly 500 word day. Anyone got any miracle cure for the nasty distraction bug sitting in my brain? I could use some help here.

Birth of a Series

A few months, I guess almost a year ago, I wrote a short little ficlet for a blog about a janitor meeting a dance studio owner as he did his job, and the two of them giving in to a mutual attraction. It was a fun little story about a guy, his birthday, and a dance.

Sweet. Simple. Done.

Except the characters wouldn’t leave me alone, and so I revisit them and realized the two guys were a lot more complex and had a greater story to tell me. I listened. I wrote. My publisher liked, and a story was born, contracted, and is now in edits. Boo-yah! 

I asked a friend, who knows about dance, to beta read the story for me to make sure I wasn’t embarrassing myself. She gave me some wonderful advice, and at the end of her long-assed (and very useful) email, she offered a small, throw away comment about one of the secondary characters.

I ignored the comment.

For about…sixty-nine seconds. Then realized the character had enough page time to intrigue here because he also intrigued me. He infiltrated my thoughts in that grey hour between awake and asleep, and Bam!

A series was Born.

And that’s how it happens, folks. A small, inconsequential comment from a friend. Idea implanted. Second Story begun.

A dare from Hubs that I can’t use the phrase “this thing has the aerodynamics of a toaster” in a story (FYI: See Moving Day) Challenge accepted. Challenge met.

Or Mary Calmes throwing a photo up on Facebook and Jambrea Gaff goading me:

 Damn you, Mary Calmes! You single-handedly keep my list of things to write growing, and Jambrea, we will chat about this poking and goading thing you do that stirs up the plot bunnies to a frenzie to nibble on these idea Mary seeds. It isn’t healthy for the poor bunnies and needs to stop…

This blog post dedicated to all my dear friends who keep my spirit uplifted and my desire to keep writing from flagging. I heart you all.

 

Summer Sale!!!

It surprises me how many of my titles at Dreamspinner fall under this banner! Half my back list is on sale! I remember when I started out, my first publication with Freya’s Bower was submitted on a challenge to write an engaging, interesting, but sweet M/M romance.

My, how far we’ve come!!!!

Even my new release, Bound to Fall, is on sale, though it’s on pre-order until the 26th. Check out the sale. though. I know I’m off to order the Collars and Cuffs series, the latest of which, Make Me Soar is also on pre-order. 

 

The Apple from my Tree

So just this past couple of weeks, my 15-yr-old daughter watched the final season of Merlin in Netflix. I was walking past her room on my way to brush my teeth when I heard the wailing. I went inside to find out what was wrong, and this is the conversation that happened.

Me: “What’s wrong?”

Her: ” They can’t end it like that!!!!” *wails*

Me: “You do know the legend, right?”

Her: “….”

Me: “Honey, Arthur dies.”

Her: “Nooooo!”

Me: “Also, Gwen runs off with Lancelot.”

Her: *thinks* “Well, that’s okay. They should do that. Then Merlin and Arthur can get together.

Me = proud mama.

Random Day! Quick flash of Fiction

This is not a story. Not even  scene, really. It’s a beginning, inspired by this picture.

It may or may not one day become a full story, but for sure, it enters the Idea File.

Wes swayed slightly. God, he was drunk and he knew it. Funny how drinking in the pool never seemed to show until he got out. He plopped onto the high stone wall around the house from the rest of the crowd. It had been a mistake to come. Whatever was going on with Dailey—and he had no idea why the guy did this to him—it was fucking him up.

“You okay?” Daily’s voice caught Wes off guard and sent a shiver down his spine.

“F-fine.”

“Cold?” Dailey came closer and the shiver intensified.

“Nope.”

Dailey chuckled. “Drunk?”

A hiccup escaped and Wes’s cheeks flushed with a soft spread of warmth. Great. Now he was going to walk around red-faced, drunk and horny. “Yep.”

“Here.” A soft swath of terry cloth slid over Wes’s shoulders and he closed his eyes. “Better?”

Wes nodded, found his chin contacting something solid, warm, and his breath huffed out.

“There you go,” Daily whispered, and the words washed over Wes’s face, heated breath, shadowed sound. He parted his lips. Fingers cupped the side of his face and a thumb brushed his mouth.

“Nice,” Dailey whispered. His other arm snuck over Wes’s shoulders. “Come here.”

Wes leaned closer to the other man, opened his eyes and gazed up. Dailey was too close to see, really, but his mouth. It was right there. Dailey lifted his chin, blinked, trying to catch Dailey’s eye, to make sure this was the right thing to be happening.

“You’re very drunk,” Dailey said softly. He planted a gentle press of lips to the bridge of Wes’s nose. “Come inside. I’ll make sure you find a safe place to crash.

“Uh-huh.” He let Dailey take his hand and lead him into the house, through the kitchen, past the living room where a couple of bodies writhed on the couch—no, more than a couple. Wes stopped and backed up a few steps. Three guys?

“Come on.” Dailey recaptured his hand. “That’s not for you, pet. Come with me.”

“Pet?” He squinted at Dailey.

Dailey only grinned back. “Don’t worry. I won’t let anything happen to you. Not anything you don’t want to happen, anyway, and definitely not while you’re drunk. Come sleep it off.”

Wes nodded, complacent as long as Dailey was touching him. He followed down a muted hallway to the end and into a small bedroom. There wasn’t much in it. Just a chest of drawers and a bed.

Dailey led him inside. “You’ll have to lose the wet trunks.”

“Oh.” Wes hooked his thumbs into the waistband, remembered he wasn’t alone, and glanced over his shoulder.

“You’re okay,” Dailey assured him with an encouraging smile.

Wes shucked the shorts, letting them plop wetly to the floor. Dailey scooped them up, tossed them over the edge of a basket beside the dresser and closed the space behind Wes with his body and the towel. He rubbed Wes down, sweeping the cloth up his legs, over his ass, and finally, perfunctorily, over and around Wes’s junk.

Predictably, his cock noticed the nearness, the touch, even clinical as it was, and insulated by the towel, but Dailey ignored his burgeoning erection.

“Into bed,” he ordered, giving Wes a sharp clap on his butt. “I’ll close the door and make sure no one comes back here. You’ll be perfectly safe.”

“Should I be worried?” Wes crawled into the bed and gazed up at his friend.

“I don’t think Myron would invite anyone over for this kind of party if he thought they might take advantage, but there are a few newer faces. I’m not taking any chances.” He caressed Wes’s cheek. “Not with you. If he says I can keep you, no one gets to touch you but me.”

Wes blinked at him, trying to figure that sentence out. “I don-t—”

“Don’t worry about it,” Dailey said, “Just rest. I’ll watch over you.”

“Okay.”

With another soft kiss to his cheek and a smile, Dailey left the room, closing the door with a quiet click behind him. Wes stared at the spinning celling for all of about a minute before he passed out.

Wet Dream? Or Help me be Inspired.

what has him so lost in thought the rain doesn’t matter?

Wet Dreams. Now here is an opportunity for way Too Much Information to be shared. But it is the topic for the #dreamer April, after all. I guess aligned with April showers and that. It sort of makes sense.

[image error]I think this isn’t a topic I’m wildly excited to talk about. At the end f the day, I suppose I’m just shy?

So instead, I thought I would look for images, and I got so sidetracked. I’m sure you can imagine.

Caught in his best (only?) suit.

In the end, I picked three images that made my imagination spark, and now I need opinions. You tell me. Which story should I write?