Cat Porter's Blog, page 6

Book Anniversary!

It's been one year since I published book 2 of the Lock & Key series, RANDOM & RARE and to celebrate, the book is now on a limited time sale for 99 pennies. If you haven't given this perhaps unusual book two in a series a try, you might want to give it a go this weekend!

Here's your opportunity to get to know Dig much better, yes we know the man meets a bitter end, but there are things about him and Grace that Grace did not share with us in book 1, Lock & Key, and there are things that Dig didn't share with anyone. Wouldn't you like to know how the power of one man's love reaches across time and moves the lives of those he cares about most forward in a beautiful, unexpected and bittersweet way? This book has been called emotionally explosive, heartbreaking, and mind blowing. Dig in, because #DigForever.

Iron & Bone is almost here!

Only two more days until Iron & Bone, book 3 of the Lock & Key series releases on December 29th! I'm so excited to share Boner's story with you, and I thought I'd offer you Boner's Prologue from the book right here for a taste of this special man's haunted soul and the ride ahead.

This book can be read as a standalone.

I wish you all the very best of the holiday season and for a magical 2016!

xox Cat


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PROLOGUE from "Iron & Bone" - copyright 2015 Cat Porter


Running.

We’re always running from something. We convince ourselves we’re free, but we aren’t, not really.

Running from the bad things, running from the good things—they both have power over us. Both haunt, fluttering over us with vague glories, tinting us with deep failures.

Plenty of failures.

I doused my failures with gasoline. Held them at bay with knives, guns, my hands, my bike, my brothers.

My iron will.

But not my heart.

No, my heart was the flame that would light the match, ignite the blaze.

My heart made me hang on.

Because my mother’s quiet faith and stubborn determination made me believe in a better day, someday.

Because, once upon a time, my cousin would hold my hand. Her trembling would ease, and so would mine.

Because my best friend had seen me through the worst, the darkest part of myself, the both of us dirty, bloody, bruised in the back of a truck heading out of Colorado and into the unknown. Because he’d killed for me, and I’d killed for him.
Because my friend Grace had come home and had risen from her ashes. She’d breathed new life into me, making me believe that there could be brighter days instead of the endless pages I had surreptitiously torn for myself from the notebook of my life.

I’d been running but essentially standing still for years. Left behind and edging forward on my own, I’d created my niche in my club, and I was content. I didn’t need a hell of a lot, and I really didn’t give it much thought. My way of life had become rote, straightforward, a day-by-day of not too much, not too little, and just enough.

Then, out of the blue, sixteen years later, on a weed-filled cracked sidewalk in a tiny Nebraska town on a cloudy afternoon, surrounded by suitcases, boxes, and crates crammed with her stuff—all of it obviously quickly collected—there she was.

The pixie, the angel, the herald.

Jill.

Grace introduced us. Tania, Grace’s friend, held a baby—Jill’s baby—settling her into a car seat in the back of Jill’s shit-box car.

Her face was flushed, her strawberry-blonde hair knotted into two loose buns at the back of her head. Her shoulders were set in a rigid line. Dogged. Determined. Relieved.

She was running.

She’d been running a long time, too.

Her body stilled when she saw me.

It’s you, isn’t it?

Yes, it’s me.

Ah, Jill, you’ve come back to haunt me. To pull things from me, damnable things. I don’t want to look at them or touch them or feel them. Their spiky edges will tear my skin. I’d tightly bound them all in chains long ago and thrown away the keys.

I can keep you bound though, where you need to be, alongside the others and all my smoke. Otherwise, I will have to pay with what is left of me.

Pay with my scarred body.

Pay with my ripped, already severed soul.

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Sale!

- Shipwrecked and left for dead? check
- Addicted to opium? check
- Forced to marry and didn't even realize it? check
- Addicted to his wife? check check check!!
- Friends to greedy and needy for each other Lovers? checkity check check!
- Sassy heroine who can take care of herself and her man when the chips are down? Absolutely!

‪#‎NotYourMothersHistorical‬ ‪#‎AddictedToHisWife‬ ‪#‎FriendsToLovers‬
‪#‎ForcedToMarry‬ ‪#‎GreedAndNeed‬ ‪#‎TasteMe‬ ‪#‎DontBeGentle‬ ‪#‎FillMeNow‬ ‪#‎BrandonAndJustine‬ ‪#‎TooMuchBrandy‬

WOLFSGATE my historical romance is currently on a Kindle Countdown sale now available for $1.99

Try a historical if you haven't read one ever or picked one up for a very long time.

Double news!

I have some news to share with you. (Deep breath) Here goes:

As you know, I’ve been working on book 3 in the Lock & Key series, and as I was finishing (rather thought I was finishing) I got frustrated. Very frustrated and very disappointed. Why? Boner kept talking to me. (Like Dig kept interrupting me when I was trying to write Butler’s story for book 2 last year? Like that.) Reading my long first draft, I realized there was so much more to tell, that Boner deserved more than the sidelines I had relegated him to, and there was no My little epiphany came to me literally like a flash of lighting as I stared at my computer screen, and I got numb from excitement, relief, and a touch of fear: I needed to give Boner his very own book.

IRON & BONE is now Boner’s story and BLOOD & RUST will be Butler’s. Their stories are interconnected, much like the journeys of LOCK & KEY and RANDOM & RARE are. So, now there will be two “duets” or movements within the same series.

This in no way means that there will be any delays in releasing the next book. I’m still on target with my deadline for I&B, and Butler’s story is essentially finished and needs beta reading, revising, and editing which means it will be ready to launch not long after I&B. Both covers are almost done and gorgeous. Right now I’m working on making Boner’s story the best it can be in this new IRON & BONE. (Calling Dr. Christina Yang!)

The wonderful part is this: instead of one book, you’ll get two books done in the in-depth way I like to create them. Furthermore, instead of waiting a long time between books in a series, you’ll get both within two months of each other which is exciting, because the stories are connected.

Then I have another bonus story coming up after that, which is related to the Lock & Key series, but I’m keeping my mouth shut about it for now!!
I have a lot of work ahead of me to get this done right, and I want you all to know your support and girlfriend-power mean so very much to me. Thank you for taking this journey with me.

And there I though South Dakota was finished with me. Not by a long shot.

xoxo Cat

First Birthday!

Happy First Book Anniversary LOCK & KEY!

To celebrate, "Lock & Key" book 1 of the mc Lock & Key series is currently on a limited time sale at all book sellers for 99 cents!

Thank you all for your support and friendship this past year, everyone! It's been a life-changing time.

xox, Cat

Bonus Scene for Grace & Miller!

I've had many readers express their disappointment that LOCK & KEY's Grace and Miller got thrown apart way too early on in their story by crazy events. With that in mind, I wrote a bonus scene for my readers, giving you more heat, more teasing, more sexy sweet from my favorite hero and heroine, now on my website at www.catporter.eu (Under the "Extras" menu.)

This is actually an extension of a scene that already exists in Lock & Key. What if Grace and Lock hadn't gotten interrupted that soon by that kidnapping Demon Seed biker at the restaurant in Montana after visiting Grace's dad? What if they had at least another ten or fifteen minutes of flirty time together?

I hope you enjoy it! (I'll get back to writing book 3 now...)

The Dead Guy

I’m soooo excited to finally share with you book 2 of my Lock & Key series, “Random & Rare.” Here is a peek at the Prologue of the novel which is a continuation and evolution of Grace’s journey and the journey of the One-Eyed Jacks Motorcycle Club.

I didn’t mean to write book 2 this way. I had actually started writing another character’s story. But Dig, oh Dig, he just wouldn’t let me go. And not just because I was in love with him!

I had mentioned to a reader on Goodreads last summer that I was considering writing book 2 about Dig in some way, and another reader commented “I don’t want to read a book about a dead guy.” That saddened me. Then it ticked me off. Then it lit a match inside me. (Thank you, reader!)

A few days later one of my friend’s who had read “Lock & Key” emailed me demanding to know if Grace and Lock would ever get their baby. “What??” I asked. “After everything they went through, that’s what you have to say?” “YES! I need to know!” she shouted in her email. I had only rolled my eyes.

But that too lit another match inside me.

So I concentrated on that little flame, and let it burn. I let Dig lead me, because his voice was still loud inside my head. He was being demanding- he still had promises to keep to Grace and to his brothers.

“Random & Rare” is not a “Lock & Key” redo in Dig’s POV kind of story. Of course certain events are revisited, but this story goes beyond that, it’s different, it leads us new places, in new ways.

As I wrote this story, I realized how much I needed to write it for these characters before I could tell the next story in the series and thus bring the journey of these lost souls in a small town in South Dakota full circle.

Personally, I believe that love is forever, powerful, defiant, living and breathing and keeps on giving beyond time in different forms, in different ways, when we least expect it and, hopefully, when we need it the most. That's been true in my life.

A friend remarked to me after beta-reading “Random & Rare”: “You know, we know going in to their stories that Spartacus or Leonidas of the 300 will not survive, but we still want to take that journey with them.” We also know Leo DiCaprio is going down with that damned Titanic, yet that doesn't stop us from watching that flick over and over again either. And there's a reason for that.

I hope you come along on this journey with me and these characters, tears, laughs, all of it.

Hugs & kisses, Cat






++++©2015 Cat Porter's RANDOM & RARE++++

PROLOGUE

I’m dead.

I know, trust me. But it doesn’t matter. Well, maybe to you it does. There’s a point to all this, though. There has to be. I’m trying to figure it out myself. I want to shake this off, leave this mire. I do.

But I can’t.

I can still feel her—her smile against my back, her warm breath on my neck, her arms squeezing my middle, her legs at my sides, her whispers in my ear. Those sensations will be forever indented on my soul and imprinted on my heart. Just like the rhythm of my engine, they vibrate together. And that’s the way it should be, because Grace was my once-in-a-lifetime good thing. And I like to believe that’s what might move this redemption of mine along.

Is her unhappiness keeping me here? Oh, it’s there, way deep underneath. I can hear it, pinging inside her soul, tripping through her heartbeat. She hides it well. Can’t hide it from me though, because I caused it.

Promises made, promises broken, promises glued back together. None of it means much now. The time for regrets is over. But they still mean something to her—just like her happiness does, and it should. Unlike me, she’s alive in the living, breathing, bleeding world. The lack of that joy in her life has kept me tethered and burning all these years. I want that back for her. She deserves it.

I took that away, didn’t I?

We men have big dreams. Some of us aim high, too high from time to time.

Grace never let go, always believed. She made me believe in that hungry emotion called love. She held my bounty in her fists. I’m glad I went first. I don’t think I would have made it alone, brotherhood or not. Without her, I would have become an even nastier, more brittle soul than I already was.

I might not be breathing and bleeding anymore, but I’ve felt her pain, her hurt, and her disappointment since it all went down. Then that fucker sent her on an odyssey, sent her spinning out on her own Greek fucking tragedy. That shit had started with me, and he made my old lady finish it. Great fucking legacy I left my wife. That’s not what Grace was made for, yet she has proven that she’s made of sterner stuff. She’s a survivor.

Yeah, yeah, I know. If she hadn’t gotten involved with me, she probably would have moved on and lived a better life, a clean life. She would have gone to some swanky out-of-state college; gotten a fancy job where she wore designer skirts and high heels every day; married some intellectual, white-collar metrosexual asshole who barbecued on the weekends, drank white wine with her while they had great conversations where they dissected current events in the backyard of their McMansion; gone on Caribbean vacations every goddamn year; and had two to four kids and a Lexus hybrid to ferry them around in.

I could have left her to that.

With me?

With me, she got drug deals, strippers, shootings, drunken brawls, nasty, selfish, filthy men, and a whole lot of wondering where the hell I was late at night while saying a prayer or two that I’d come back home to her in one piece. But she also got brutal honesty, the back of my bike on runs through glorious country, fierce love, sweet fucking, friends who would kill for her, die for her; and promises I still burn to keep.

But no, I have no regrets—despite the pain I caused, despite the heartache, bitterness, and scabs I left behind. Fuck no.

My Grace. Yes, she’s someone else’s now, and he’s a good man. And I’m glad, because I left him behind, too. But a patch of her heart will always be woven with mine.

From the first moment I laid eyes on her, I knew I didn’t deserve her, but a part of me needed to try, needed to believe that I was worthy of breathing that air, of claiming the brass ring that could be us. I took my shot and won big. I’m paying my penance for that, if that’s what this is called. But she doesn’t owe a thing to anybody. She came back and created a bright new life over our ashes, and I’m glad because she deserves to soar.

Is there more for me to give her? I honestly wish there were, somehow, instead of being that gash in her soul.

Once, I loved her, really loved her.

And she loved me, and it was so fucking beautiful.

Once.

Is time fluid?

How can that rare beautiful be rendered irrelevant, intangible when I still feel so damn much? Does all that energy, that glory, that significance simply dissolve? Turn to smoke? To nothing?

It can’t. It just can’t.

Bikers & Nobles

I wrote a historical novel, "Wolfsgate," about a privileged group of wealthy nobles in 18th century England, and I wrote a contemporary novel, "Lock & Key", about a group of bikers in South Dakota. I’m a nut, right? Well, most definitely, but that’s not my point here. These two genres are a bit more connected than one might expect. I think the similarities and the differences between the two is a remarkable two-sides-of-the-same-coin idea, and I’ve enjoyed flipping that coin very much.

People choose to join a bike club to be on the fringe of traditional society, the standard acceptable “norm.” They wish to live free by their own rules in the way they speak, dress, behave. However, it’s not chaotic, for they are a brotherhood, an organized club, and a club has its own set of rules of governance and behavior that needs to be followed.

If your an 18th century noble, your life, albeit a privileged one, is about maintaining the formal rules and restrictions of traditional society, the very opposite of a biker’s life. If you don’t dress according to the latest fashion or attend the right social events or make clever enough conversation, you could suffer the horror of finding yourself outside the acceptable circle, be scorned, humiliated or even exiled.

What I find fascinating is that within this complex, tight social structure much that cannot be said outright is instead implied, hidden in metaphor or symbol, poetry or very witty repartee. One learns to speak indirectly about the “messy stuff” bubbling under the surface such as your true desires, dark wants. Inevitably in this society of the concealed, the restrained, the held in check, the way one articulates such desires and wants can be highly charged and quite provocative, therefore, lots of fun. Yet it also proves to be a frustrating and bittersweet struggle. In high society at least, a noble must always put on his “game face,” do his duty, and suck it up, as it were. There is a struggle there that I find fascinating, because underneath that necessity to be civil and “beyond reproach,” one’s desires (from the every day, to the crude and rule-bending) may be battling to be fulfilled. All this suffering churns in secret underneath the gilded niceties.

The biker culture, of course, is completely against all of that. This is a culture based on the unfettered, free-spirited ride of your life however and whenever you choose; there is no need for “gilded niceties.” Generally speaking, one’s mode of operation is all above the surface, bluntly laid out in a raw, perhaps even crude way, but just as thick and powerful. Ah, those human emotions do not change with the centuries! Over indulgence, however, is a danger in both the free-wheeling society and in the culture of denial and restraint.

An interesting parallel I discovered between the two lifestyles is that of self-indulgence. So many of the upper class in the 18th century suffered from terrific problems with gambling. In addition, among the rich of this time there was a great sense of frivolity in spending money, drinking, and sexuality underneath the veneer of proper gentility. Of course, there is no such veneer in biker culture where all of that behavior is out in the open without any pretense or the strain of denial. However, the 18th century aristocrat usually had to submit to an arranged marriage in order to preserve his structured way of life. Quite a great contrast to the “live wild and free” credo of the biker. Yet for both bikers and nobility it was interesting to find that there are specific rules as to members’ titles and names and how they are used.

Arranged marriages may have been the norm in the 18th century, but there was plenty of adultery going on, both acceptable and unacceptable, secretive and overt. Such marriages, of course, do not play a role in contemporary western society. I wouldn’t want to say that morals are necessarily looser in today’s world, but hook-ups and non-permanent/short-term relationships are perfectly acceptable and free of any stigma of shame today. There is a pecking order of women in biker society in which interested women often brazenly strive to secure a place, but boundaries that require respect by all, such as members’ official women (the “old ladies”), do exist.

In the biker world you have a group of Alpha males who are traditionally physically aggressive and have proven their gladiator skills in the arena of the road and club politics. They proudly show off their muscular physical attributes and their history-laden colors and tattoos, and especially their ultimate pride, their bikes. High ranking club officers are the chosen few, the elite, and respect must be shown to them. They get their way in this tribe, and God help you if you cross them.

In the 18th century the upper echelon, the wealthy highborn “gentlemen” are the chosen few. But these elite do not have too many skills to match their high social ranking or status. It is because of their bloodlines and bank accounts that they can get their way, and God help you if you cross them. Such is the case with the character of William in "Wolfsgate." As the servant, Martin rightly points out, who would believe that William the highborn gentleman, had ever committed such a crime? However, they would immediately and easily believe it of him, the low-class peasant. William’s word would be considered “law” against the word of a servant or, in fact, a woman. And the humiliation would be unthinkable for Justine to ever disclose the truth; She would be the one to suffer, certainly not William.

In both stories there are characters with a drug addiction. In "Lock & Key" the issue is cocaine, in Wolfsgate it is opium. I found sites where users described their experiences with these drugs and the after effects. I especially needed to find out how these particular drugs affected a user’s sex drive. Sadly, for L&K’s Butler cocaine make his sex life extremely difficult, whereas for Wolfsgate’s lucky Brandon, the aftereffect of a morphia opiate causes a surge in desire and physical capabilities. These crucial facts added an enormous amount of emotional detail and colorful plot possibilities for both characters and their stories.

Both worlds have their own slang language. The contemporary American, of course, is very familiar to all of us. 18th century English has it own set of curse and sexual slang, much of which is unfamiliar to us today. The “f” word was just beginning to be used as a curse word, although it was coined around the 15th century, it wasn’t used to describe sex just yet, but more as a vulgar intensified version of “damn” as it was used in a published poem in 1790. The terms “swive” and “amorous congress” were used to refer to sexual intercourse. There is one moment in particular in "Wolfsgate" where I just had to use the “f” word for brutal, shock impact in a rough confrontation between the heroine and the villain. While revising, I had taken it out, replaced it, put it back, taken it out again. Nope. It had to stay.

Another interesting point about language is illustrated in the use of the word “awesome” in the text. The word (which originated in the 16th century) as classically, formally defined in the Oxford American Dictionary means “extremely impressive or daunting; inspiring great admiration, apprehension, or fear.” This word was once often used to describe God’s unimaginable power or the intense, wild forces of Nature or the divine magnitude of love, for example. I found this word perfectly suited in describing Brandon’s apprehension and profound emotional response to the birth of his son. Today the word “awesome” has degenerated into a glib expression meaning “very cool” or “fantastic.” In our time, the word’s meaning has altered significantly and, unfortunately, its power has been lost, its original, startling context demeaned.

My research for both these contrasting books was a wild combination of story necessity and my personal obsessions from years past. As we begin doing research writers often groan inside about such a tedious chore. But every time I push myself further and move through it, I find glorious details that always bring the very heart and soul of my stories to life in fresh, unexpected ways.

Wolfsgate is here!

Hello! I thought you might enjoy a synopsis of WOLFSGATE, my novel set in 18th century England....

Brandon, a young aristocrat returns to Wolfsgate, his ancestral home after two years of being thought dead and lost at sea and another two years of being held prisoner by his addiction to opium. Upon his return he learns his uncle and cousin are responsible for his addiction and they’ve also married him off to his step-cousin Justine, who they are able to manipulate, in order to control his fortune for themselves.

Justine, however, has other plans. She manages to bring Brandon back home, help him through his addiction, and together the two of them struggle with a web of lies and deceit while an unexpected, intense attraction for each other explodes between them. They both realize how much they need each other to overcome past hurts and losses and to deal with the uncertainty of their present.

The desire for revenge battles with the desire for a new beginning as past loves and overwhelming compulsions beckon and blur the lines of trust and truth. Is satisfaction to be found in revenge or revenge in satisfaction? The wrong choice could spell disaster.

Excerpt from WOLFSGATE

In honor of today's Cover Reveal of my upcoming novel WOLFSGATE, here's a snippet of Brandon for you...


His hands gripped her wrists and fastened them to the table once again. She blinked up at him, trying to focus on his face. “Don’t ever talk to me about separating again,” Brandon said, his voice steady, sharp, like a commanding army officer. “This is where I want to be. With you. Inside you.” He nestled his cock deeper inside her. Her back arched against him, a cry escaping her lips, her body immobile under his firm grip. “This is all I know right now. And I like it.”

Her eyes widened, her breath burst in and out.

“Don’t ask me what I might want or what I might think I want,” he continued. “It’s very courteous of you really.” His voice was like acid in his own ear, sizzling with bone-melting clarity through the sensual fog. He dipped his face closer to hers and smelled the scent of lavender mixed with her sweat and the heady aroma of their desire rising from her throat. He inhaled that holy scent locking it in his memory.

“I do appreciate it, but my brain doesn’t function according to the niceties any longer. All I know is that right here and right now, it’s you and me and this damned house. We shall continue to live here together. We shall restore Wolfsgate, get me healthy, deal with my cousin and my uncle, and enjoy each other. Do you understand, Lady Graven?” His tongue flicked against her trembling lower lip. “Do you agree?”

She only nodded. Her neck slackened, and her head dropped back against the wood table once more. Brandon nipped the side of her face. He would hold off confronting her on her alleged virginity just yet. Frankly, he didn’t think he would be able to control his emotions if he heard the truth, whatever the hell it was. Bloody hell, he’d just taken her on the goddamn kitchen table. No, the virginity conversation could wait for now.

This felt too damned good at the moment.