K.C. Burn's Blog, page 15

Contest and Guest Blog

I'm guest blogging at the lovely Raine Delight's blog today.  I'm talking a bit about me, and I'm giving away a copy of my new release, Trompe L'oeil,  to a commenter, so please stop by!

It's Release Day! Trompe L'oeil is here!

My third book with Loose Id is out today, and I happen to love the number three, so this feels especially momentous, although I'm sure I'll be able to find something special about every new release   This one, though, was such a challenge to write that I feel a huge sense of accomplishment in seeing it finally out.  I believe I broke a few… not rules, precisely, but I definitely bent a couple of guidelines for erotic romance.  Not in regards to the kink (and I know that was your first thought) because my books don't have a whole lot of that, but in terms of story structure, so I'm glad Loose Id and my fabulous editor, Raven McKnight saw their way clear to picking it up.  And yeah, I'm going to post the cover again, because April Martinez did such a beautiful job of capturing the most important story elements.  Hope you like it as much as I do!

But He's Gay! – blogging at Flirty Author Bitches

I'm at Flirty Author Bitches today talking about people who've said "but he's gay" to me and how ridiculous it is.  Stop by if you can!

Cover Art Is Here!

I have some gorgeous cover art for Trompe L'oeil, from the talented April Martinez.  I just love it!  It pulls in so many facets of the story (yes, even the towel is part of it), but the bits I'm happiest about are the brushstroke effects to mimic the appearance of the painting, and a fabulous image of the Toronto skyline.  Just awesome!

Gay Day Chatting with Prizes!

I'm going to be at Ethan Day's Yahoo Group today, along with a bunch of talented M/M authors for a Gay Day chat.  There will be prizes aplenty, including my upcoming release from Loose Id!

The following authors will be generously offering giveaways you can enter to win:

Geoff Knight – Drive Shaft 2

Andrew Grey – Personal Training

Clare London – Just-You Eyes

Jaime Samms – Finding Home: Ageless Book 3

S.J. Frost – Readers Choice from Backlist

Devon Rhodes – One Wild Wish

Stevie Woods – More Than Chains To Bind

Angel Martinez – Fortune's Sharp Adversity

Lily Sawyer – Somebody to Love

Pia Veleno  – Make You Sweat

KC Burn – Trompe L'oeil

Kate McMurray – Blind Items

Tara Lain – Volley Balls

Jambrea Jo Jones – A Fistful of Emmett

P.A. Brown – Readers Choice from Backlist

The amazing Authors below will be popping in and out to chat & post excerpts from their latest books:

P.A. Brown – Bermuda Heat

Geoff Knight – CURSE OF THE DRAGON GOD

Z.A. Maxfield – Rhapsody for Piano and Ghost

Lynn Lorenz – Cemeteries & C'est La Vie

Jambrea Jo Jones – Alliance

 

The day will run from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. CST in the Ethan Day Yahoo Group where we'll be posting excerpts, running contests for free books, and chatting about all the new and upcoming releases from your favorite authors.

The Missing Cents – blogging at Loose Ends

I'm talking about the disappearing and frequently misused cent symbol at Loose Ends. I'm pretty sure it's more interesting than the previous sentence makes it sound… I hope Stop by if you can!

Pseudo Sci-Fi aka Better Off Ted – blogging at Contact Infinite Futures

I'm at Contact Infinite Futures today blogging about one of my favourite shows, Better Off Ted.  If only it was still on the air!  However, 2 seasons is worth looking up on Netflix, I promise, as I think I illustrate in my post.  Stop by if you can!

Sources of Inspiration: The Hellhole Apartment

This here is my first retro-blog.  I chose this blog to republish partly because it references Blood Relations, which just became available at Barnes & Noble, and partly because I drew inspiration from this same apartment in my upcoming release, Trompe L'oeil, which is on the coming soon page at Loose Id – YAY!

My first apartment was a hole, for various and sundry reasons.  But I'm a writer… which means it also gave me a lot of inspiration (when I wasn't cowering in the corner thinking I should call the cops or wondering just how many cockroaches qualified as a public health hazard).

The apartment was in a old, large house that had been cut up into small, separate living spaces.  As such, my kitchen and bedroom were on the ground level, but I had to go down a flight of stairs into the basement to get to my bathroom.  My bathroom wasn't shared… exactly.  But it did house the only entrance to the fuse boxes and meters for all eight apartments.  Yep, every time someone needed to read the meter or change a fuse, I had to let them into my bathroom.  Nice, eh?

The guy in one of the basement apartments greeted everyone with a hearty "Hey, Neighbour!"  He had long hair, thinning on top, and always wore a bandana and a black rock band t-shirt.  He looked like the quintessential aging biker.  To add to his "allure", the ledge by the stairwell leading into his apartment was lined with empty Jack Daniels bottles, ALL of his windows were boarded up and he had a security camera over the front door.  Which he either had hooked up to an alarm or he monitored obsessively — as I discovered when the landlord (in my bathroom) accidentally removed the wrong fuse.  Mere seconds passed before "Hey, Neighbour!" guy was pounding on my door, demanding to know why his camera was out.

If that wasn't enough to get the creative juices flowing, the two guys in suits who came to my door asking about him sure did.  I suppose they could have been Jehovah's Witnesses trying to save him, but let's say I'm skeptical.  Speculation did, however, run rampant through my brain after that.

If we go with Occam's razor and assume the simplest explanation is the truth, "Hey, Neighbour!" guy probably had a small home grow-op.  My husband (then boyfriend) was convinced he was a draft dodger, as well.  Could be.  It was Canada, and he was the right age.  Or maybe he was just a harmless, eccentric and/or paranoid older man whose appearance made people (like me) jump to conclusions.

But that's the beauty of writing fiction.  I could easily take "Hey, Neighbour!" guy and make him a serial killer, or make his apartment  the entrance to a secret lab for spies or a detention center for werewolves or vampires.

I've incorporated memories of that apartment into many of my stories, in a few subtle ways.  Adam's apartment in Wolfsbane and Frazer's apartment in Blood Relations carry echoes of my first apartment.  If I write a horror story, I'll be sure to include the cockroaches — all I'm going to say here is that I now know what a cockroach infestation SMELLS like.  Eeeeeewwwww!

What I liked best about that apartment?  There was so much creative mileage I was able to get from it.  "Hey Neighbour" guy had other incidents…  the old guy who lived in the other basement apartment… the landlord… the cougar… it's like the gift that keeps on giving (but thankfully sans bugs).

Retro Blogging

Two blogging incidents have happened recently which have made me decide to retro blog (which I will explain momentarily & hope it's not a term that describes a real thing).

1. My schedule at Contact Infinite Futures changed, putting all my scheduled blogging in the 3rd & 4th weeks of the month, which leaves potentially 3 weeks per month blog-free — surely that's not a good idea, right?

2. Due to a catastrophic technical failure, the Flirty Author Bitches site had to be relaunched — sans my spectacular bon mots, words of wisdom and uh… romantic hero cage matches.  Since I'm completely paranoid, I have all my blog entries back up.  And since I don't want to deprive the world of my words of wisdom (yes, I can hear the eye-rolling from here) I will repost some of those FAB posts here as… retro blogs.  So, retro blogging is essentially me cheating by posting stuff I've already posted and through no fault of my own has since been deleted from the FAB site.

I'm also toying with the idea of 100 word blog entries, but I haven't yet decided.  So, next week, I'll post my first retro blog.

Goodbye Borders – blogging at Flirty Author Bitches

I'm saying goodbye to one of my favourite bookstores at FAB (http://www.flirtyauthorbitches.com) today – stop by if you can.