JL Merrow

Summer is here, and the loving is easy! Slake your thirst for romance with Summer Lovin’—an anthology for lazy days and summer sunshine.

Go skinny-dipping in a disused quarry. Hang out with the boys in the band. Meet a bad boy made good, and one with a shy smile that hides a dark secret. Or maybe get your heart pillaged by a Viking re-enactor.

With gentle humour, hot sauce and a hefty scoop of romance, enjoy a quintet of sultry stories of men loving men from Clare London, Chrissy Munder, JL Merrow, Josephine Myles, and Lou Harper.

The mercury’s not the only thing that’s rising!

This novel-length anthology is now available in ebook for the bargain price of $2.99 from Pink Squirrel Press:

Smashwords | Amazon.com | ARe

Includes my story: Lost and Found on Lindisfarne

It was a hot summer’s day on the Holy Island of Lindisfarne. The lanes were dusty underfoot, the languid breeze was heavy with the scent of the North Sea, and a Viking had just offered to buy my daughter…

When single father Chris meets a Viking re-enactor on Lindisfarne, he thinks it’s the perfect recipe for a holiday fling – and nothing more. Chris had a relationship with a free spirit like Ian before, and it didn’t end well for him or for his daughter Kelis.

But Chris hasn’t reckoned with the Viking way of taking all you’re willing to give – and coming back for more.

And to celebrate the release of Summer Lovin’  the other Pink Squirrel anthology, Winter Warmers, will be reduced in price to $0.99 for the rest of August!

Get ‘em while it’s hot!

It hardly seems like any time at all since the deliciously decadent Jo Myles and I got together for the Hot Pressure blog tour to celebrate the release in ebook of our novels, The Hot Floor and Pressure Head. And now, eleven months later, we’re getting together again to celebrate both of them coming out in paperback.

And what better way to celebrate than by giving away a signed print copy of EACH of the books to one lucky winner? To be in with a chance of winning, please leave a comment on this post, whether on WordPress, LJ or Goodreads. Simples! The draw is open worldwide, and will be made on Thursday, August 15^th, round about lunchtime, GMT. Good luck!

And here’s a reminder of the blurbs:

The Hot Floor

Two plus one equals scorching hot fun.
Dumped by his boyfriend and reduced to living in a grotty bedsit, Josh Carpenter has gotten used to expecting the worst. Now he lives only for his job as a glassblower…and occasional glimpses of his sexy downstairs neighbors, Rai Nakamura and Evan Truman.
Every time he overhears the diminutive academic and the hunky plumber having loud and obviously kinky sex, Josh is overwhelmed with lust…and a longing for a fraction of what they have.
To his amazement, Rai and Evan find his embarrassing tendency to blush utterly charming, and the three men grow closer over the course of the long, hot summer. Despite Rai’s charming flirtation and Evan’s smoldering gaze, Josh is determined never to break his new friends’ loving bonds.
On the night a naked Josh falls—quite literally—into the middle of one of Rai and Evan’s marathon sex sessions, the force of their mutual attraction takes control. But just as Josh dares to hope, he senses a change. Leaving him to wonder if the winds of love are about to blow his way at last…or if history is about to repeat itself.

Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

Pressure Head

The Plumber’s Mate, Book 1
To most of the world, Tom Paretski is just a plumber with a cheeky attitude and a dodgy hip, souvenir of a schoolboy accident. The local police keep his number on file for a different reason—his sixth sense for finding hidden things.
When he’s called in to help locate the body of a missing woman up on Nomansland Common, he unexpectedly encounters someone who resurrects a host of complicated emotions. Phil Morrison, Tom’s old school crush, now a private investigator working the same case. And the former bully partly responsible for Tom’s injury.
The shocks keep coming. Phil is now openly gay, and shows unmistakable signs of interest. Tom’s attraction to the big, blond investigator hasn’t changed—in fact, he’s even more desirable all grown up. But is Phil’s interest genuine, or does he only want to use Tom’s talent?
As the pile of complicated evidence surrounding the woman’s murder grows higher, so does the heat between Tom and Phil. But opening himself to this degree exposes Tom’s heart in a way he’s not sure he’s ready for…while the murderer’s trigger finger is getting increasingly twitchy.

Samhain | Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

No, it’s not the sequel to Pricks and Pragmatism; it’s the title of my blog post over at Neil Plakcy’s blog.  

He’s running a series of guest posts celebrating secondary characters, and today I’m talking about Gary, my cuddly campanologist in Pressure Head.

Neil, by the way, is a great guy, who I first met in Bristol way back in 2010 when we were promoting the I Do Two charity anthology. He’s the writer of (amongst other things) the Mahu Investigations gay detective series.

Yes, Pressure Head is now available in actual, physical, dead tree form! You can rest your coffee on it. You can prop open a (not very heavy) door with it. And if the mood should strike, you can even read it!

Look out for a giveaway in a day or two, but for now, I’ll leave you with this snippet of a lovely review from RT Book Reviews:

a stay-up-till-4am read; it’s the likable narrator, along with a cast of characters that would do Agatha Christie proud…[a] brilliantly witty, funny and charming book – 4 stars, MH Morrison, RT Book Reviews.

Samhain | Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

It’s Heidi Cullinan’s birthday this month, and to celebrate she’s invited a whole bunch of her fellow mm authors to give away a free ebook to a lucky commenter – every day!

Today it’s my turn, and you can win an e-copy of Damned if You Do:

To enter, head on over to Heidi’s facebook page. Good Luck!

The draw ends at around 1.30am GMT on Weds August 7th.

Damned if You Do

Some sins are worth the price.

Sexy male succubus Rael has an insatiable appetite for men that gets him into all kinds of trouble. And he’s just found his favorite flavor: hunky blond detective Lars Thornsson. When those cool Nordic looks combine with Rael’s smoldering dark charms, all Hell could break loose.

Lars’s job at the Paranormal Enforcement Agency means he’s supposed to be policing demons, not falling in lust—or love—with them. But there’s something about this feisty little sex demon that hits all his buttons.

With no shortage of deadly sinners in his city, from serial-killing succubi to drug-dealing demons, all Lars can do is try to keep his private life from interfering with his work. But Rael has a knack for getting mixed up in cases that threaten both their domestic harmony and their lives.

For the first time, all FOUR Rael & Lars stories, including the fourth, NEW, novella, A Glutton For Punishment, are available both singly and in one volume, Damned if You Do (ebook and print).

Yep, here I am, patiently *cough* waiting for my author copies of Pressure Head to thud onto the doorstep, when I see by the magic that is Google Alerts that there are already copies listed on ebay!*

And it’s not even due out in paperback until 6th August. I haz a jealous.

I think this calls for some Weird Al Yankovic:

*AFAIK, the sellers are legit. Purchase at own risk, however!

Pressure Head is also available to pre-order here:

Samhain | Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk.

Just a heads-up: I’m changing things around a bit at my website, so I’m afraid you may notice a few broken links/odd formatting while construction is in progress. Apologies for that, and normal service will be resumed ASAP!

If you’ve been reading other blog posts about the 2013 UK Meet you’ve probably met this guy already, but I couldn’t resist putting in my own pic of the statue of Alan Turing in Sackville Park in the centre of Manchester. I find it unbearably poignant that the statue includes the poisoned apple he used to end his own life – and hugely uplifting that the statue is regularly enhanced with nail polish, flowers, etc by members of the GLBTQ community. When we saw him, he was sporting eyeshadow courtesy of the Sparkle trans* crowd, who had their annual event in the park over the same weekend as UK Meet. Manchester was buzzing – and very glamorous!

This was one of the stops on the gay history walking tour around 50-60 of us went on, which also took in locations from the original Queer as Folk. Last stop was at Gaydio, the UK’s FM gay radio station, where our guide, the lovely John Ryan, works. He played us snippets from a documentary about Manchester’s gay history, in which members of the community tell their own, often very emotional story.

If you’d like to listen to the full documentary, you can download it (and others, including one about the women’s scene) at Your Story.

I should probably write a little about the Meet itself, but I’m still reeling from the incredible experience of meeting so many readers, bloggers and writers of GLBTQ fiction! It really was wonderful to see you all – everyone was so friendly and ready to help out. Thanks to everyone who attended for making the Meet such a success.

One person I regret not getting much of a chance to talk to is Julie Bozza. I’m definitely going to be checking out some of her books, which look very interesting indeed. She’s done a great write-up of the Meet and many of the panels which I recommend you take a look at if you want to know what you missed (or, you know, if like me you were too lazy/disorganised to take your own notes)!

… in less than 12 hours now! After all the planning, the emails and the site visits, it’s finally here (or will be soon)!

Can’t wait to see everyone there!

…is what I’m talking about today over at Words of Wisdom from the Scarf Princess on the last stop of the Damned if You Do blog tour.  Why not pop along and tell me about inspiring people you’ve met?

All comments over at WOWSP will be entered for a chance to win a $10 Riptide gift certificate! Good luck!