It's the love, dummy

This blog is part of Naughty Edition Review's Pride Month Celebration

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I live in Oakland, California, right over the Bay Bridge from San Francisco.  I’m usually pretty leery of what goes on over there, in large part because it’s sport for the folks on the western side of the bay to try to make themselves look important by putting us down.  But something remarkable happened in Fog City on February 12 of 2004 - right on time for Valentine’s Day.  Then mayor Gavin Newsome ordered the clerks in city hall to start issuing marriage licenses to male/male and female/female couples.

I was raised to believe that people are people, born with the same hopes and needs and rights as everyone else.  As a result, I was always for equal justice for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender men and women.  I was proud to make my home in a part of the country where LGBT Americans could live openly as who they are.  So, I was excited that San Francisco was marrying same sex couples, even if the exact status of their marriages outside the city wouldn’t be clear.

Looking back from nine years later, I don’t remember exactly what I expected to see going on in SF city hall.  I was probably thinking of something like the Pride Parade - a lot of flamboyant fun.  Instead, the images on my television were so…well…ordinary.  People; some young, some old; some slender, some plush; some pretty, some not so much.  Different heights and different ethnicities.  But all just regular folks.  Some were dressed in tuxes and wedding dresses.  Some brought their children with them.

The citizens of San Francisco made it into a great party.  Florists sent flowers.  Bakeries sent cakes.  I had half a mind to go over there wearing a sign “I’ll cry at your wedding,” because I spent a lot of time watching the television with happy tears in my eyes.  All these ordinary people were finally exercising the right that I had when I’d married my husband.  Who knew how long some of them had waited for their special day?

My thinking had a tectonic shift from watching those weddings.  I’d always been for equal rights, and I’d figured what consenting adults did in their bedrooms was their business.  Now, I realized that what I was talking about was love, not sex.  Sure, physical intimacy comes with love, but it doesn’t define love or encompass all of love’s complexity.  Think of all he innocent things people in love do to show affection.  Flowers, cards, touches, pecks on the cheek - acts you can do in front of the children.  Now, these couples could enjoy all of those little treasures with the blessing of the City and County of San Francisco.

Sadly, the marriages ended in San Francisco after a few weeks, and same sex couples weren’t allowed to marry again in California until June of 2008, when a state Supreme Court ruling made marriage equality the law.  Then, even more tragically, on election day in November of 2008 the state constitution was amended by ballot initiative to disallow gay and lesbian couples from exercising their full rights as citizens.  Proposition Eight, or as we like to call it, Prop H8.  My state has swung back and forth and ended up in the wrong place, but in my heart, I know the setback is only temporary.

In the meantime, other states are moving toward justice and love and away from fear and ignorance.  In Massachusetts, loving same sex couples have been free to marry since shortly after Gavin Newsom’s gutsy move.  Now, twelve states and the District of Columbia have come over to the side of fairness.

The sky hasn’t fallen.  The marriages of heterosexual couples are still intact.  The more we see happily married men with men and women with women…and their children…the more we discover how perfectly ordinary the whole thing is.

As soon as we have equality back in California, where it started that Valentine’s Day weekend in 2004, the church I attend will have weddings for our same sex couples who want to commit to each other until death do them part.  I’ll sit in my pew and bawl like a baby.  I can’t wait!

If you'd like to enter to win a copy of my MMF romance novella, Time Pirate,

http://www.changelingpress.com/product.php?&upt=book&ubid=2057

leave a comment here or follow me on Twitter at:

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I'll announce a winner on Monday, June 10

Time Pirate is out!

Jax figures having two crewmates, each dedicated to keeping her happy in the sack, is a pretty good deal for a female pirate. Little does she know Marc and Kyre have a past of their own -- a sexual history hot enough to singe her around the edges. And the guys are more than willing to let her join in the fun.
Kyre has a cabin on a paradise of an undeveloped planet. Now that he's rediscovered his old lover, Marc, he plans to make a home for them. Can he convince Jax she belongs there, too, as part of a permanent threesome?

http://www.changelingpress.com/product.php?&upt=book&ubid=2057


Read an Excerpt


This is my first MMF erotic romance.  It was so much fun to write.  I love those guys!  And the heroine, too.  If you'd like to enter to win a copy, come back to this blog tomorrow.  I'll be giving away a copy as part of Naughty Edition Reviews' Pride Month Celebration.

http://naughtyeditionreviews.com

You can now find me on Story Finds X

Check it out!

The Next Big Thing

So, fantasy author, Beth Barany told me about a new meme, The Next Big Thing.  Of course, I had to play.

Here's some information about what I'm writing now...


What is the working title of your next book?

That’s kind of embarrassing, actually.  It’s Straw into Gold.  I pictured my heroine working for a demanding boss and my hero would come to her aid and eventually help her get out of there.  Then I realized that would make my hero an ugly elf named Rumpelstiltskin.  Instead, I picture the demanding boss more like the evil stepmother and stepsisters and my hero is both the fairy godmother and the prince.  I haven’t figured out a good title for a Cinderella story, though, so for now, I’m stuck with Straw into Gold.  If anyone would like to suggest a title, I’d appreciate it.  Comment below or write to me at authoralicegaines@yahoo.com

Will your book be published or represented by an agency?

I have a wonderful agent, and she’s currently sent the first book in the series, Kiss the Frog, to my publisher.  I’m hoping they’ll publish it.  If not, I’ll get around to self-publishing it one of these days.

Where did the idea come from for the book?

I mentioned that it’s the second book in a series.  All the heroes are princes of an Eastern European country I made up named Danislova.  My coworker, who’s also my muse, and I thought up Kiss the Frog in one of our brainstorming sessions.  I gave the hero two brothers, and this hero is one of them.

What genre does your book fall under?

It’s a hybrid of category contemporary romance and erotic romance.  I started out to write the first book as category, but my true nature couldn’t be stifled, and it ended up pretty erotic.  What can I say?  That’s how my brain works.  No snickering, please.  :)

How long does it take to write the first draft of your manuscript?

I start a book on a Saturday, and the first draft is finished on the twelfth Monday after that for a 60,000 word book, or the fifth Monday for a 25,000 word novella.  I write 5,000 words per week until the book is done.  How long it takes to get the book polished enough to submit depends on how strong the first draft is, but I can predict when the first draft will be done almost down to the hour.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

I really can’t say.  It’d be something lighthearted, even funny in places, contemporary, and extremely sexy.

What actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Ryan Gosling and Jennifer Anniston

Who or What inspired you to write this book?

I’d written so many short pieces over the last few years, some of them only 5,000 words long.  While they were fun, I had a real need to write something longer.  For a full-length book, Kiss the Frog, isn’t all that long, but if you extend the stories out for three princes, you get to stay in my world for quite a while.

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

My hero serves as Danislova’s ambassador to the UN during the day, but he has a secret passion for singing.  He studies with one of New York’s best teachers, but he keeps his singing to himself.  Not even his brothers or his father know about his love of music.

Also, I may set some of the story in Danislova, which is a beautiful country, full of mountains and meadows.  When Kurt’s at home, he lives in the royal palace.  His father is a fun character.  All of us in my critique group fell in love with Friedrich.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

A prince from an Eastern European country pretends to be a struggling cabaret singer in order to win the heart of his own Cinderella.

Now available from Harlequin Spice Briefs -- hot historical short, The Devilish Duke


Miss Rosalind Weaver is on a mission. She must convince the Duke of Fallon to marry her, or her father will give her away to the next highest bidder, a man she cannot stand. She thinks all the Duke desires is reassurance that she can give him an heir, but she soon learns he wants a more thorough test of how she will fare as his wife--in the bedroom....


http://ebooks.harlequin.com/655E3DE9-9218-47DA-8BA9-D18FADC3C943/10/141/en/ContentDetails.htm?ID=A756A9A4-435D-4B1F-8A90-3D1BB1746E64

Available now: Marked from Changeling Press

In a world full of poverty and disease, a poor woman's best chance for an existence free of hunger is to serve as a warlord's concubine. It's Marker's job to use his bite to claim women as Lord Haddem's. One of his recruits holds great sexual power over him. He must have her, but if they're discovered, Haddem will have them both killed.


Kamya hopes to find a protector in the warlord's court so that she can help her parents. Can she use Marker's desire for her to achieve her aims? If she gives in to her lust for him, she could get them both killed. What kind of future can they make for themselves in such a savage world?

Excerpt from Cabin Fever: Mating Season

After tossing back the covers, she swung her legs over the side of the bed and sat up to give herself a long cat-stretch. The illuminated dial of the clock on the bedside table showed two-thirty. Even a workaholic like Nolan Hersch would be asleep now. She could ambush him. If he couldn’t get it up again, he’d have to admit defeat. But if he could…yum.


She rose, pulled her nightgown over her head to remove it, and went in search of her prey. She had to cross through the main living area of the cabin to get to his room, and she noticed out of the corner of her eye that the piles of the clothing they’d worn hours ago still lay where they’d fallen. With any luck, he slept in the nude. If he didn’t, she’d get him that way quickly.

The bedroom doors didn’t have locks on them, so she opened his and slipped inside. It creaked a bit, but he didn’t move or make any sound except for the steady rhythm of his breathing. Sure enough, when she lifted the covers and slid in next to him, she encountered only flesh, all the way down to his butt, which was as firm and rounded as it appeared beneath his slacks. What she hadn’t expected was the softness of his skin. Like velvet. Yards and yards of velvet on a body of his size.

He’d taken up the middle of the mattress, and she had to perch herself on one side to keep from falling off. With her hand on his shoulder, she burrowed her nose into the hairs at the nape of his neck. He had his own scent, kind of a combination of soap and spice with a masculine musk beneath. A prime breeding specimen, this one. Thanks to her pills, she wouldn’t breed, but she’d do everything else.

When she wrapped her arm around him, he didn’t stir except to issue a little snort. Still not ready to give up her explorations of his body, she held perfectly still until he settled back into sleep. Now she could let her hand wander over his chest, memorizing the curve of his muscles with her palms. She’d felt their firmness against her breasts earlier. She hadn’t had a chance to circle a finger around his flat nipple, though, so she did it now.

He did exactly what she would at the caress of a nipple—exactly what she had done, in fact, with this man, several times. He tensed, no doubt experiencing a jolt of pleasure like the many he’d given her. If she continued, he wouldn’t be able to stay asleep much longer, so she might as well get to the meat of things. As it were.

Skimming her hand lower, she passed the flat plane of his belly. Did he come by this body naturally, or did he have to work at it? Everything came easy for him, so he probably ate what he wanted and did what he wanted and ended up buff, anyway. She ought to hate him for that, but then, she didn’t have to marry the man. She only needed to wear him out sexually.   Finally, she arrived at her destination...