Long and Short Reviews welcomes Parker Williams who is celebrating today’s release of On the Same Page, which he co-authored with KC Wells. Leave a comment or ask Parker a question for a chance to win a copy of the book.
1) Olly from LM Somerton’s ‘Edge’ series.
What can I say about the brat that is Olly? When we first meet him, Olly is shy and scared. He’s been through something traumatic, and he doesn’t know how to move forward. Enter the new constant in his life, his Dom Joe. Through the love of Joe, Olly is able to let bits of his true self peek through to find what lies beneath the surface. What is it? An irredeemable brat! How so? Let’s take a peek, shall we?
Olly giggled and snapped another picture with his new camera. It was the best present he’d ever had, especially as Joe had given it to him. The zoom was good enough that he could get great shots without getting too close to his targets, which was very useful because he was determined to catch as many people as possible in compromising positions. He didn’t feel in the least bit guilty. If his friends did things in public that inspired Olly’s creative imagination that was their look out. Okay, maybe some of them weren’t exactly in public but it was hardly Olly’s fault if they left doors unlocked or windows open, was it?
He held his breath and crept backwards away from the greenhouse where he’d just managed to get a picture of Jacob, the gardener, snoozing with his feet up on an upturned bucket, his old stripy deckchair wedged into a corner between stacks of terracotta pots. Jacob gave an enormous snore and Olly couldn’t stop himself laughing. Jacob blinked awake and gave Olly a baleful look, then redirected his gaze to a nearby hosepipe. Olly yelped then fell backwards over a wheelbarrow. He scrambled to his feet and ran, just missing a drenching as Jacob set the hose on him.
Excerpt From: LM Somerton. “A Birthday at The Edge.”
2) Wes from Silvia Violet’s Wild R series.
OMG, what can I say about Wes? He’s a lanky cowboy with a horse shifter lover. And Wes DOES love Tristan with his whole heart. The two of them together on page is hot, but there is such tenderness there. Wes, like Olly above, has no problem being a bit of a brat (or a lot of a brat), but his love and dedication can never be questioned. How good are the two men together? Here’s a little snippet for you featuring the two men at Christmas.
“Wes! Come help me!” Tristan shouted.
Wes pushed himself up from the couch where he’d been doing research for his latest case. “Just a sec.”
When he stepped into the hall, he froze in disbelief. Tristan was stuck in the doorway with at least three shopping bags in each hand. “What did you do?”
Tristan looked at him like he was a simpleton. “I went shopping.”
Wes sighed as he held the door open so Tristan could push through. Then he followed his lover to the living room where Tristan dropped the bags in the middle of the floor and plopped down beside them.
“I thought you went for a run. What the hell were you doing shopping on the day after Thanksgiving?”
Tristan again stared at Wes like maybe he’d been replaced by an alien, one without much brainpower. “Buying Christmas decorations, of course.”
“Christmas decorations?” Wes did not want to consider the possibility that all those bags were full of Santas, reindeer, and glittery balls. Tristan’s balls were all Wes required this Christmas.
“Sure. I thought we could put them up this afternoon.” Wes’s horror grew as Tristan pulled out a red and green sweater. “Look what I got for Cole.” Tristan held up the offensive garment and Wes fought the urge to shrink backward. On the front was a wolf in a Santa suit surrounded by sheep wearing elf hats. It said “A Wolf in Santa’s Clothing.”
“That is… hideous.”
Tristan laughed. “I know. Isn’t it fantastic?”
“Tris, look… I don’t—”
“Check these out.” He held up lights shaped like reindeer. “They even blink.”
Wes knew arguing with Tristan was useless but he felt compelled to make a small effort anyway. “I usually just put a wreath on the door.”
Tristan gave him an innocent look, the little bastard. “Really?”
“Tristan.”
“Oh, it’s just a few little things,” Tristan said, clearly unconcerned about Wes’s frustration.
“Tell me you don’t have an album of cats meowing Christmas songs in there.”
Tristan put his hands on his hips, which looked ridiculous with him sitting on the floor surrounded by Christmas decor. “How insulting! Do you really not know I prefer the barking dogs? I find cats too… slinky.”
Wes groaned. “You’re going to be even more impossible than usual from now until Christmas, aren’t you?”
“I’m going to be festive.”
“A tree, stockings, maybe a few other small items. That’s festive enough. I can’t live in the middle of North Pole Central.”
Tristan rolled his eyes. “Stop being such a scrooge.”
“Tristan, I will not—”
Tristan’s sly, sexy grin derailed Wes’s train of thought. “I’m sure I can change your mind.”
“You’re always so damn sure you can get your way.” And all too often he was right.
Excerpt From: Silvia Violet. “Wild R Christmas.”
3) Bo from Eden Winters’s Diversion series
Oh, Bo. See, in this series, most people seem to love Lucky. I do too, but Bo? He’s something else entirely. There are so many layers to Bo, an onion is positively green with envy. He can be suave and sophisticated one moment, a total badass the next, or a wide-eyed innocent. Bo sheds personas like a normal person sloughs off clothes. The only person who knows the true Bo is Lucky.
With descending darkness and declining temperatures chasing away any possible witnesses, Bo and Lucky strolled hand in hand to their vehicles, although Lucky did keep their joined digits low and close to his body to minimize undue attention. Wasn’t anybody’s business if a fine man like Bo took leave of his senses enough to want to hold hands with Lucky. No fire, no brimstone, no falling sky resulted from the public display of affection, and no coworker popped out from behind a tree, pointing and yelling, “Aha! I knew it! Wait until I tell Walter!”
Bo’s heartwarming smile and a quick squeeze of his fingers conveyed his approval, though Lucky kept a watchful eye on the trees and shrubs.
They made their way to Bo’s truck and climbed inside. “Are you cold? Want me to turn on the heat?” Bo asked.
“Fuck the cold,” Lucky replied. Their eyes met, and they moved as one, mouths meshing over the console. Bo’s insistent tongue forced its way into Lucky’s mouth at the same instant Lucky aimed for Bo’s. Lucky wrestled Bo into the backseat amidst groping hands scrabbling for purchase, and his lover’s mouth latched onto his neck on that precise spot.
Bo sprawled on his back, one leg on the backseat, one on the floor. Lucky knelt on the seat between Bo’s spread legs, bracing his weight on his knees and one arm.
“Oh, God!” Bo exclaimed, plunging his hand into Lucky’s pants and wrapping chilly fingers around his full erection. He threw his head back against the side window, arching his neck and giving Lucky room to explore.
Excerpt From: Eden Winters. “Corruption.”
4) Dante from Again by Mary Calmes
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Okay, let me say right out of the gate this was a hard choice. Mary has so many characters I absolutely adore, including Rand from the Timing series. But my favorite, the one who holds my heart, is Dante Cerreto. In this book, he’s working hard to get his family back together, including his daughter. He seems all nice and sweet and pure, but Dante shows up in another book, and we find out he’s got quite the dark side to him. But in Again, he’s a man who wants to get back what he’s lost, and he’s never going to let it go again. Here’s my favorite snippet with Dante. Now, Noah (Dante’s former husband), is in Las Vegas for the wedding of a friend. He brought his current boyfriend with him, and when Noah goes to talk to the boyfriend, all hell breaks loose as they find the man in flagrante delecto.
I had no idea that the blender that my life was had been switched to puree.
“Shit!” Keith yelled.
It took a minute for me to see what I thought I was seeing.
“Outstanding,” Dante announced loudly, happily.
What?
Who?
I stopped, rewound, and replayed it in my head.
When I opened the door, Keith was on the bed, naked, and an equally naked man was on his knees in front of him with Keith’s dick buried in his throat. Now, Keith was scrambling around the room gathering pants, shoes, socks, lube, and condoms. The other man—Wes, I thought, pretty sure it was Wes—one of his buddies, was frantically doing the same thing.
“Oh my God!” I shouted, finally finding my voice.
“This is so awesome!”
I turned and looked at Dante.
“What?”
Excerpt From: Mary Calmes. “Again.”
5) Thomas and Peter from K.C. Wells’s ‘Trusting Thomas’
This book broke all my feels. We have Peter, a young man who wanted to belong to someone, and was beaten down by the person he (wrongly) chose. It left him with scars, both physical and emotional. When we first meet Peter, he’s being kept in a cage. He’s rescued and taken to Thomas Williams, co-owner of Collars & Cuffs, who agrees to care for him.
Only…
See, Peter doesn’t know what is expected of him. He doesn’t understand things like safewords, or the sub having the power. He only knows the pain that comes with agreeing to belong to someone.
One of the most powerful scenes in the book, is when Peter meets Leo Hart, the other owner of C & C. Peter figures that every Dom must be like Curtis, the abuser who hurt him so badly. When Leo introduces himself to Peter, things go to hell.
“Good morning. I’m Leo Hart, Thomas’s partner. Thomas invited me round.” A look crossed the boy’s face. Leo could swear the boy looked disappointed—and saddened. He sighed dejectedly and his shoulders slumped. With shuffling footsteps, he crossed the room and slowly lowered himself to his knees before Leo. He reached with trembling hands to grasp the buckle of Leo’s belt and began to open it. What the fuck?
“SO ARE you going to tell me why you’re looking so happy this morning?” Thomas teased as he peered into the oven, where cooked bacon and sausages were warming. Alex let out another delighted giggle. Thomas had to smile. Alex had changed so much since their first meeting back in June. Mind you, so had Leo. The two men were obviously good for each other. He hadn’t seen Leo this happy in a long while. In fact, in the two and a half years since the death of Leo’s former lover and submissive, Gabe, Thomas had often thought never to see his business partner happy again. He glanced toward Alex, who was pouring out the coffee into large mugs and smiling to himself. “Not going to tell me, huh?” He chuckled.
Alex met his eyes for the briefest moment before lowering them hastily, smirking. Thomas shook his head. The lad did not like making eye contact, which was probably just as well, seeing as he was now Leo’s submissive. Thomas was glad things seemed to be settling down between the pair, even if he’d had to step in—twice—to sort out Leo’s messes.
“Thomas? Could you get in here, please?” Leo’s call reached him from the lounge. It held a note of agitation that made both Thomas and Alex look up in surprise. Thomas put down the oven cloth he held and walked into the lounge, with Alex close behind him. Thomas came to a dead stop. Peter was on his knees before Leo, who held him firmly around the wrists. Leo’s belt was unfastened. Peter simply knelt there with his head bowed, but Thomas could see the boy was shaking.
“I see you’ve met my houseguest, Peter,” Thomas said dryly.
Leo’s face was a picture of embarrassment. “Your ‘houseguest’ was apparently all set to give me a blow job,” he muttered. Thomas quirked his eyebrows. The lad hid his face against Leo’s belly. As Leo gazed down at him, his expression changed. He let go of Peter’s wrists and gently helped him to his feet.
Thomas addressed the lad. “Peter, why would you do this?”
Peter blinked. “Isn’t that why you brought your friend round here? So I could service him?” His voice quavered.
Thomas was horrified. For a moment he was too shocked to speak. What had this poor boy been subjected to?
“No, Peter. That’s not what’s going to happen. I would never ask that of you. Ever.” He spoke quietly but forcefully. He wanted there to be no misunderstanding. “Why would you think I expected you to do that?”
Peter lowered his chin. “That’s how I was taught, Sir,” he murmured.”
Excerpt From: K.C. Wells. “Trusting Thomas.”
K.C. puts you through the emotional ringer with this book, and it’s painful to see Peter being drawn out of his shell, even though you know it’ll have a happy ending. There are so many things that happen (wait until you see the shaving scene) that you want to take Peter and put him in wool batting to keep him safe and loved forever.
So there you have it. Five of my favorite characters from M/M Romance. If you haven’t checked out these books, I hope you’ll consider it, because they all are amazing, and you’ll probably enjoy them as much as I did.
When a Dom invites a shy bookstore owner to live out his fantasies, more than one life will be transformed.
Words are Heath Snow’s life. He can’t remember a time when he didn’t have his nose buried in a book. He couldn’t make a living as a writer, so he did the next best thing—he bought a bookstore. But when he’s not selling books, he’s living vicariously through the characters he encounters. Real men can’t hold a candle to the hot men in his favorite genre.
The Pride display in the bookstore window may be what captured Xavier James’s attention, but the man enthusing about books interests him more. The BDSM book lying next to the cash register is a pleasant surprise, and when he draws attention to it, Heath’s flushed cheeks and bright eyes pique Xavier’s curiosity even further.
Xavier is about to learn that some things are more important than work, and Heath is about to step out of his comfort zone, into a place where fantasy and real life coexist.
About the AuthorsParker Williams loves the written word. The discovery of MM romance, as well as a chance encounter with an amazing author, changed the course of his life as he began to write the stories his men were whispering to him. With the help of some amazing friends and a community of writers he’s proud to be part of, Parker continues telling stories of love, hurt, comfort, and sometimes tosses in a little angst for fun.
K.C. Wells lives on an island off the south coast of the UK, surrounded by natural beauty. She writes about men who love men, and can’t even contemplate a life that doesn’t include writing.
The rainbow rose tattoo on her back with the words ‘Love is Love’ and ‘Love Wins’ is her way of hoisting a flag. She plans to be writing about men in love – be it sweet and slow, hot or kinky – for a long while to come.
Buy the book at Dreamspinner Press or Amazon.
Excellent. I have some new books to add to my list. Thanks for the chance.
Aw, shucks. Olly is blushing.