Supernatural Secret Service agents Owen Sharps and Calvin Springfield meet on the train to their new assignment in St. Louis, and sparks fly between them. But it's 1897, and they need to be very careful—falling in love can be dangerous for men like them.
It's their first case together, investigating mysterious disappearances—including the two agents who preceded them. Grim evidence leads them to look for a darker purpose. Old ghosts haunt the railroad line, zombie rise, signs point to ritual sacrifice, and they suspect someone is trying to open the gates of hell.
Can Calvin and Owen stop the mayhem, thwart the vampires, and find true love, or will everything go up in smoke?
Peacemaker is a high-stakes steampunk MM romance thrill ride filled with found family, paranormal Pinkertons, intrepid reporters, mysterious disappearances, nefarious land brokers, hellhounds, zombies, vengeful spirits, dark spells, absinthe magic, a ruthless vampire railroad baron and a love that won't be denied.
Before Colt and Winchester, there was Sharps & Springfield!
Cat gives this Audiobook 5 Meows overall...
I enjoyed this story. It's a little different than most others I've read because it's set in the past.
There are horse-drawn carriages, a few gas cars, they are staying in a train sleeper car instead of hotel.
Just lots of fun and uniqueness. Still intriguing characters with supernatural powers. One is a medium one reads objects.
They have to hide their being way and that's a big part of the story. It's also slow burn.
There is magic, Mayhem, intrigue, shifters, witches, you name it and it's probably here.
This is an Audio review and Jon Solo is always good. I love the different voices for each man and the emotions come through well.
If you like slow burn, lawmen, supernatural, and an allover great story, I highly recommend this.
Morgan Brice is the romance pen name of bestselling author Gail Z. Martin. Morgan writes urban fantasy male/male paranormal romance, with plenty of action, adventure and supernatural thrills to go with the happily ever after. Gail writes epic fantasy and urban fantasy, and together with co-author hubby Larry N. Martin, steampunk and comedic horror, all of which have less romance, more explosions. Characters from her Gail books make frequent appearances in secondary roles in her Morgan books, and vice versa.
On the rare occasions Morgan isn’t writing, she’s either reading, cooking, or spoiling two very pampered dogs.
Series include Witchbane, Badlands, Treasure Trail, Kings of the Mountain and Fox Hollow. Watch for more in these series, plus new series coming soon!
It can be read as a standalone, but the protagonist also appears in my novel, The Mayor of Oak Street (ages 12-21). The main story of this book takes place 40 years later and we find out what happened to him in flashbacks.
Nathan’s traumatic past challenges but cannot stop the arc that brings him to Mateo.
Nathan doesn’t know how to stop dwelling on the failures and tragedies that have plagued him since he was a twenty-one-year-old happily in the arms of the handsome young doctor he had pined for since he was twelve. Many years later after the latest tragedy, who could mend Nathan’s heart? If not a handsome young doctor, would an ER nurse do? After a chance meeting with Mateo, a lot of Nathan’s reminiscing is now devoted to how that encounter made him feel. Will he seize the day or continue wallowing in the past, having lunch with his best girlfriend from high school, and writing poetry?
Cat gives this Book 4 Meows with a 3 purr heat index...
This is a beautiful, poignant, albeit angsty story of love and loss.
It is the tale of a man growing up in the 60's 70's 80's and beyond.
There is a lot of history that I was able to relate to having grown in the same Era.
I found the actual story touching and I retesting.
It does bounce around a lot from Nathan recalling, travels and lovers from the past. I do wish the chapters that did this had been labeled like x years ago or summer/fall etc of _ year. It would have made the book less jarring.
I also never quite figured Nathan's exact age and though the age difference doesn't matter I just wanted to know.
There us so much going on and I really was intrigued by the past and the present romance.
The ending I guess you could take as a HEA but for me I think more HFN.
If you like big age gaps, history, poets, nurses, teachers, hurt/comfort, lots of feels, some heat and an allover beautiful story this is for you.
Excerpt
“Are you okay?” he asked in a slight Spanish accent. His questioning eyes moved directly to the stain on my T-shirt where the juicy tomato from my lunch had squirted. Looking like blood?
I became acutely aware of my attire: baggy sweats that may have had other stains, a baseball cap with a tattered rim, and faded crocs. He wore neat magenta scrubs that matched the color of his full shiny lips. His nametag said Mateo.
The scenario must have been embarrassingly clear to him. I had wandered off from one of the many senior facilities that dotted the landscape of the neighborhood. If I exaggerated the confusion that I, in fact, frequently felt, he might take my arm, walk me back to the facility, put me in a bath, gently wash my back, and tuck me into bed. The more I looked into his onyx eyes, the more I wanted him to do just that.
“I mean, you looked a little lost…and sad.”
“Don’t worry, Mateo.” His eyebrows separated and bounced at the sound of his name. Then he smiled and touched his nametag, realizing how I knew it. “I’m lost in a memory is all.” I chuckled. “I suppose I do fit a profile.”
“You’re okay, then?”
“Yep.”
“My bad. I didn’t mean to profile you. I have experience with that, and it’s no fun.”
I imagined that he was doubly profiled, first for the color of his skin and then a second time when people caught a hint of his accent.
“No harm done. I appreciate your concern.”
“It’s kind of my job. Sometimes it is difficult to switch out of that mode when I leave work.” He lowered his eyes, making me realize I must have been staring intently. How could I have not? He was an amalgam of all the men I had been attracted to my entire life: Mediterranean, Black, Latino, shorter than me, rectangular solid frame, soulful eyes, thick hair. But with an added twist. A dusting of freckles graced his cheekbones and the bridge of his nose.
In a thoughtful gesture, he stared at the sidewalk and raised his hand to his chin, rubbing his index finger over his left cheek, revealing another physical trait that rang my buzzer: little tufts of black hair between his major and minor knuckles, a tiny forest to let my tongue wander through.
Thank God, he couldn’t read my thoughts. Or could he?
“I should let you get on your way,” he mumbled, still not looking at me. He stared at the smashed apricots on the ground with, I imagined, quite a different take than mine.
I wasn’t ready to let him go just yet.
“Do you work in one of these facilities I might have escaped from?”
“Now, look, I didn’t mean…” He took a step back in what appeared to be a desire to flee.
“I’m teasing. I haven’t seen you around the neighborhood.”
He tapped his nametag and twisted his neck to look at it. “Kaiser. It says right here. Kaiser Permanente.”
“I have trouble reading fine print.” I let out a small laugh, but he didn’t join me.
He took another step back. “Just moved here less than a year ago.”
I guessed he was mid-thirties, and with his Spanish accent and African features, maybe Puerto Rican? Cuban? I imagined he lived with a wife and multiple niños. They spent Saturdays having barbecues in the park and Sundays from dawn to dusk at church events. He looked far too sweet to be anything but a family man. Now I was profiling.
“From?” I asked.
He let out a protracted sigh, as if the conversation had gotten way more involved than he had intended. His forehead crinkled again, hesitating to give me an answer.
“The city. Getting too crazy over there.”
Then he raised his head and his eyes met mine with the twinkle of a forest elf. Perhaps he wasn’t annoyed with me after all. Perhaps I had been wrong about sizing him up, though my conclusion that he was a family man was much easier to handle. Yet, he wore no ring.
About the Author
Vincent Traughber Meis is a fiction writer, a world traveler, and a former ESL community college teacher. When he’s not traveling, he divides his time between writing and working in the garden. Most of the characters in his novels and short stories come from across the LGBTQ+ spectrum and are racially and ethnically diverse. He has published eight novels: Eddie’s Desert Rose, Tio Jorge, Down in Cuba, Deluge, Four Calling Burds and The Mayor of Oak Street, First Born Sons, and Colton’s Terrible Wonderful Year. Tio Jorge, Down in Cuba, and Deluge have all won Rainbow Awards. The Mayor of Oak Street and First Born Sons have won Reader Views Reviewer’s Choice Awards. His short stories have appeared in several collections both in print and online, and have reached finalist status in several short story contests. A collection of short stories, Far from Home, was published in October 2021. He lives with his husband in San Leandro, California and Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.
The Science of Attraction Jay Hogan (A Mackenzie Country Story, #3) Publication date: February 22nd 2024 Genres: Adult, Contemporary, LGBTQ+, Romance
I am Mackenzie Country born and bred. Farming the high country runs in my blood, like my father, and his father, and my great grandfather before him. My future has been mapped out for me since the day I was born. Or at least it was, until Liam Skelton walks onto Lane Station, lights a fire in my heart, and turns my whole world upside down.
Bossy, tatted, and out and proud, Liam is everything my father abhors.
And I want him.
Badly.
But having a chance with Liam means risking everything. My family. My future. And my life in these mountains that I love.
Still, the heart wants what it wants, and mine wants Liam.
With so many things against us, maybe we don’t have a chance.
Maybe we’ll crash and burn.
Or maybe we’ll find a way to have it all.
Julian Lane unsettled me in a way not many men did, and it was troubling, to say the least. I’d had a couple of long-term relationships in my life, but I’d never lived with anyone or wanted more. Being a fairly self-contained person, I liked my own company. I spent most days working intimately with people’s complex needs. It was intense, challenging work, and at the end of the day or the finish of a contract, my home was my sanctuary, and I guarded it with my life.
The idea of a man cluttering up that space with their things, inconvenient demands, or just the mere fact of their presence sent horrifying chills racing down my spine. I rarely got flustered by a guy, and certainly not the way Julian unnerved me with his capable air, glittering grey eyes, and that profound sense of knowing his place in the world.
Julian had the air of a man who knew who he was and where he belonged. You wouldn’t need to jolly a man like Jules along to make him feel wanted, soothe an ego bent out of shape, or play down your success so as not to threaten his by comparison. Men like that were rare and held an intoxicating allure for someone like me.
But Jules was also my client’s son, and that alone should’ve made him forbidden fruit even for a bit of harmless crushing. Should’ve. But there’d been something about his smile that first day. Something about the way I’d caught him looking at me when he didn’t think I was watching. And maybe the way I felt when he looked at me, as well.
The whole thing was fucking with my head.
Author Bio:
Heart, humour and keeping it real.
Jay is a 2020 Lambda Literary Award Finalist in Gay Romance and her book Off Balance was the 2021 New Zealand Romance Book of the Year.
She is a New Zealand author writing mm romance and romantic suspense, primarily set in New Zealand. She writes character driven romances with lots of humour, a good dose of reality and a splash of angst. She's travelled extensively, lived in many countries, and in a past life she was a critical care nurse, nurse educator and counsellor. Jay is owned by a huge Maine Coon cat and a gorgeous Cocker Spaniel
Find Jay in all the places:
https://www.jayhoganauthor.com/landingpage.
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Sometimes love is just lying there, waiting to be found.
Blurb
When Miles Wickford happens upon a locket one day during his morning walk, little did he realize how his life would change.
Elias Grafton is frantic when his beloved locket is taken from his antique shop. He fears it may be lost forever.
Miles is intrigued by the power the locket possesses but can’t in good conscience keep what doesn’t belong to him. Although it can’t hurt to try it once or twice, can it?
A locket brings these two men together. And fate, or the locket’s magic, leads to so much more.
Sometimes love is just lying there, waiting to be found.
A Locket’s Tale is a small town MM romance featuring older guys, a lost locket, and just a hint of magic.
Excerpt
It was an ordinary day, much like every other in my life. I awoke at seven without an alarm, my body tuned to the rhythms of my life. After a quick shower, followed by coffee and a bagel, I set off on my morning ritual five-mile walk through my neighborhood and around Milford Pond before returning home.
I was a freelance editor, and this was how I started each day. It helped clear my mind. A brain reset, if you will, before delving into the next manuscript.
I sometimes varied my route slightly, just for a bit of variety in my otherwise oh-so-similar days, and this Friday was such a day. On my return home, I turned right on Folsom Street, which would take me by a small park, complete with a playground for the neighborhood children.
The park was empty at this hour, children already in school this sunny but cool October morning. As I ambled down the sidewalk, I heard a dog barking in the distance as something caught my eye on the pavement ahead of me. A ray of sunlight reflected on its surface. A coin perhaps.
But as I approached, its form became more distinct. Is that something on a chain? I stopped mere inches away and bent to retrieve it. A silver locket in the shape of a book. And yes, a matching chain. Curious. I looked around but saw no one who might have dropped it.
I examined the locket, noting the fine filigree work on the front surrounding an oval gem—lapis lazuli was my first thought—where one might expect to find a photo. Instead, the oval contained a cabochon of what appeared to be lapis lazuli. I opened it, hoping to find something that might help to identify it or the owner and was surprised to see words delicately engraved upon what looked like pages.
Despite my squinting, I couldn’t quite make out the words, so I closed the locket and placed it in the front pocket of my jeans. I’d employ the help of a magnifying glass to decipher the message once I returned home. And so I set off to complete my journey, wondering what secrets this jewelry might hold.
* * *
Entering the back door of my Craftsman home, I shrugged off my jacket and hung it on the peg just inside the kitchen entry. I filled my favorite Yeti tumbler with ice and water, then proceeded to my office to begin the day’s work. But first, a closer look at the locket.
Pulling it from my pocket, I placed it on the desk blotter and grabbed a magnifying glass from the top drawer. I examined the front and back, but again, found no distinguishing marks, so I opened it to study the message engraved inside.
Place this locket about your neck,
Then close your eyes and think
Upon a book that you adore
And let the story sink
Into your brain. Now make a wish
And you will find, indeed,
You’re in said story for a day
Or more or less. Take heed!
“Hmmm, that’s interesting,” I said aloud to the empty room. “But it still doesn’t tell me who this trinket may belong to.” I shrugged, glancing at the small digital clock on my desk only to see it was later than I realized. “I’ll give this more thought later.” I opened the project management app on my iMac. “But now I really need to get to work.”
About the Author
R.J. Peterson is a retired graphic designer. An avid reader—preferably while sipping a vodka martini or bourbon on the rocks—he's had a long and varied career, including library page, car wash attendant, travel agent, and graphic designer in the marijuana industry. In addition, he worked in the banking industry for twenty-five years. He loves to travel and has been on 55+ cruises. When not on a cruise, he and his husband live in New England.
He never planned to be a writer, but a fateful day in January, 2021 changed it all. He woke with a story stuck in his head and started typing. The more he types, the more ideas he gets.
Title: The Distance Between Us: A Hidden-Identity Romance
Series: Cruz Into Love Series, Book 1
Author: Anne Trowbridge
Release Date: February 19, 2024
Genre: New Adult Romance
Max and Lily are neighbors, but the distance between them couldn’t be wider. Lily’s a bubbly burst of sunshine who’s stuck in every guy’s friendzone, but Max is stuck in a prison of anxiety born from childhood trauma and a debilitating stutter. When Max’s brother Jake intervenes and presents him with a way to get to know Lily on his own terms, Max is terrified…and thrilled. But how can they ever truly be together if she doesn’t even know who he is?
This book is the first in a trilogy about the three Cruz brothers and their struggles to survive—and maybe even thrive—after the day their family detonated, leaving behind a debris field of pain and chaos. While the stories are connected, each one can be read as a standalone, and none of the books ends on a cliffhanger.
Fans of stories in which pain, longing, angst, humor, and hope weave together to create an emotional journey with both laughter and tears will love this book!
Cat gives this Book 3 Meows...
Hi Ya'll! Come join me while I tell you about this book I just read.
The title is The Distance Between Us by Anne Trowbridge and the summary drew me in because... Sunshiny neighbor and one with social anxiety really sounded good.
BUT I never bonded with either main character. There is a secondary character I loved. I happened to like Mitch best and we got like one page of him but yeah, I really want his story.
The plot was intriguing with the secret identity trope and neighbors to more. I even liked heat it's clean and sweet. Just for me, some things seemed repetitive and others rushed. All in all, the story is cute, and sweet with a happy ending.
I recommend this if you like neighbors to more, clean stories, hidden identity, social anxiety and an allover sweet romance.
Anne Trowbridge loves writing romances that hit major emotional beats in swoony, angsty stories in which the couples really earn their happily-ever-afters. They are closed-door spice level. Expect banter, angst, and deeply emotional connections that resonate!
The baseball romances in her The Curveball Incident Series explore the fallout after one disastrous, wild pitch hits an unintended target, forever altering two men’s lives.
Her Ticket to Love Series spotlights independent women finding love—and also some heartache, adventure, and laughter—on fabulous trips.
The new Cruz Into Love Series is a trilogy about the three Cruz brothers and their struggles to survive—and maybe even thrive—after their family detonates into pain and chaos.
She lives in New Jersey with her husband, two kids, and two dogs. When she’s not reading or writing, she’s teaching language arts to middle schoolers, which really should involve medals for bravery. She grew up all over the Midwest and somehow still loves to travel and see new places.
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Can you love yourself enough? Are you capable of it?
Blurb
Step into the small & intriguing Midwestern town of Larton where Lloyd Wood struggles daily with reviving his failing restaurant while refusing to relinquish any control, even in his family life. When a business guru arrives and promises to set the restaurant right, Lloyd is tempted by the promise of a miraculous turnaround.
Toby, Lloyd's son, seeks conformity compulsively. Each day, he audits and buries his true self deeper, yearning to fade into obscurity, anonymity. His desperation leads him to a program that vows to obliterate his authentic self, setting Toby on an unintended and riveting path of self-discovery.
Meanwhile, Dawn, Lloyd's wife, finds solace in a new church where love is not just a sentiment but a commodity. Lost in her family's shadow, she embraces a new identity amidst her new church family whose intentions seem questionable at best.
As the Wood family strives to escape their own truths, the chasms they create around themselves deepen and, one by one, threaten to swallow the people they care about most.
'Be Not Afraid' explores identity, family dynamics, the destructive paradox of denial & with a distinct strength in voice questions our capacity to accept what we cannot change...or can we?
Excerpt
TOBY AND DAWN WAITED in the doctor’s office. She’d picked him up from Jonah’s that morning, and he had been quiet in the car and at the house, and then quiet again to the doctor’s office in town.
The sign above the reception window read Dr. E.M. Gille, MD.
‘How you feeling, hon?’ Dawn said. She had a magazine in her lap, and she was rubbing Toby’s back. ‘How’s your stomach? Want to describe it to me?’
‘No.’
‘If you describe it to me, it’ll be easier to tell the doctor.’
‘It’s fine right now,’ Toby said. He was watching the TV on a stand tucked in the corner. The news was on. Another eyewitness had seen an angel outside town.”
“A nurse came into the waiting room. She was in pink smocks and stood on thick soles. She said, ‘Toby Wood.’
Both Toby and Dawn followed the nurse to an exam room, which she knocked on before allowing entry.
She examined Toby and made him describe the pain.
‘It just hurts sometimes.’
She stunk like cigarettes.
The nurse said the doctor will be right in.
Toby sat on the examination table. The sanitary paper crinkled no matter how he moved or how he settled.
He and Dawn waited for the doctor.
‘Does it hurt now?’ Dawn said.
‘No, Mom.’
They waited, and sometime later, a knock announced the doctor. He was clean shaven with close-cropped hair white as bedsheets. His brows were thick and bushy. His skin was cream and pink and aged. He wore a button-up and tie under his white coat. His teeth and eyes were bright.
‘Heya, Toby,’ he said. He didn’t look at Toby when he said it; he was reading Toby’s chart. He sat and scooted his stool close. ‘You’re having stomach pain.’
It wasn’t a question; it was a statement the doctor read aloud.
Toby quietly confirmed.
The doctor pressed with his fingers into Toby’s stomach and tested areas and asked if that hurt.
Toby said it did not.
‘Pain comes and goes. It’s not that bad.’
‘Out of ten, what would you say?’
‘A two, one and a half. It’s really not that bad.’
‘A two? One and a half?’
‘Tell the doctor when it hurts, hon.’
‘It comes and goes, Mom.’
‘Do you take any pain relievers?’
‘No,’ Toby said.
‘No, he doesn’t,’ Dawn said too.
‘Okay,’ the doctor said. He made notes.
‘He doesn’t always come to me when it hurts. I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what it is.’
The doctor’s tone was soft. ‘Well. Sometimes our bodies respond physically to factors within our environment, anxiety, stress, all these can stew in the body and hollow us out,’ the doctor said to Dawn.
She nodded intently.
‘Are you studying too hard? Maybe big tests coming up? Staying up too late with the video games?’
‘I study too hard,’ Toby said. He said it very quickly, almost before the doctor had finished speaking. ‘That must be it, the stress of studying,’ Toby said.
‘Still.’ The doctor rolled the stool close to Dawn. He continued, ‘A boy his age should not have recurring stomach pain. I’d like to send him for testing.’
‘That’s what I said, I didn’t like the frequency of it. Didn’t I say, Toby?’ Dawn said.
‘Testing?’ Toby said.
‘I’d like to rule some things out.’
‘It’s not that bad, really. It’s only sometimes,’ Toby said.
Dawn said whatever test was fine and she agreed, and she asked if it could, maybe, be this or could be that, or, she said, she didn’t really know, Doctor.
‘Could I have you step out for a minute, Mrs. Wood?’
Dawn stepped out, and the doctor shut the door. The doctor had Toby come off the exam table and sit in a chair, and the doctor rolled over on the rolly stool.
He did not speak right away. He was deep in thought, and then he said, ‘Is there anything you have not told your mom, anything you’re worried about that, maybe, you can’t tell mom or dad? Stress is not good for the body. If you’ve kept something to yourself, I won’t say a word to your mom or your dad if you’d like to share it with me. Do you have something you’d like to tell me that you can’t tell them?’
Toby was quiet a very long time. ‘I’m just studying too hard.’
The doctor nodded and waited for more from Toby.
There was no more.
‘Well. Then. Take study breaks, okay? Allow yourself time to relax. Time to be. But I do want to run some tests. Whatever is triggering the pain, we’ll find it out. Okay? I promise, son, we will unearth with absolute certainty what is causing this physical reaction. Even if it takes a while, we’ll uncover the root of it. I can promise that. Okay?’
The doctor went from the room and scheduled Toby’s lab tests with his mother and the receptionist.
Toby sat in the room.
Alone.
He was listening to the doctor’s words over and again.
We’ll find it out. Okay?
I can promise that.
His stomach hurt.
AJ Saxsma, born in Illinois in 1987, is a queer writer. He lives in Los Angeles with his husky. His literary work has earned awards from Almond Press UK and has been published in several genre magazines. As a screenwriter, his work has been an official selection for the Independent Horror Film Awards, Hollywood Screen Film Festival, Los Angeles Cinefest, and Los Angeles Horror Competition. He's also written the narrative scripts for four video game projects produced by Oculus for the Oculus VR system.
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