The Chase and The Catch Tour Stop!

The Chase and The Catch Blog Tour – Excerpt and Giveaway!

Welcome, friends and watchers of Crystal's Many Reviewers! My thanks for having me by today. :)

We've officially broke past the halfway mark on this tour, so, again, my apologies to the few that might have read this preamble already. In an effort to catch up those who are looking in for the first time, TheChase and The Catch blog tour has primarily been an excerpt and giveaway post. The reasons for this are threefold, one: I have a hard time coming up with new things to say, and my friends have limitations on their patience when I continuously harass them for new ideas. Two: I like to believe that it's the novel we're all here for. We want to know what it's about. Who the main characters are. And what exactly it is that these characters want to say with their story. Thirdly, and finally, I'm just really like to give away free stuff. (It's also given me the opportunity to learn how to photograph jewellery which, if you didn't know, involves wrap-around continuous lighting, white balance, aperture [I still barely know what that means], and ideally a photo box. In other words, I got to 'edumacate' myself and feel all accomplished. XD

Back to my point, as it's far too easy for me lose at times, as ideal as these types of posts can be, I like to switch them up a bit as I go to keep the audience amused, if at all possible. So, I thought I'd use each of these excerpts to introduce a new character of The Chase and The Catch.

Today's introduction, though a supporting character in the story, is one of the most important factors to the main character's backstory. Please allow me to introduce Logan, one of John Liege's most adoring fans…

The Chase and The Catch

Excerpt

He'd hit the mattress with enough force to make it bounce like a ship on rough water. And if he'd been asked, John would have sworn he'd been asleep before the final, imagined wave had settled. It wasn't until a hand to his left reached out and clasped his own, that John realised that he'd forgotten to take his meds.

"Oh, fuck," he whispered, as the voice of Sam, his ex, filled the cab of the 2008 Tahoe they'd both been so proud of buying.

"I don't know how we ever managed to live without seat warmers," Sam purred, squeezing their fingers together.

John lifted his eyes to the rear-view mirror. He spoke to himself, "Wake up and take your meds." But the words came out, as they always did, "This traffic is ridiculous."

"It's a huge convention," Sam shuffled deeper into his seat and settled his knees against the dashboard...

"Don't look," John mumbled, doing everything in his power to stop the inevitable slide of his gaze to the right of the vehicle. Yet even as he told himself to keep his eyes forward, Sam's grin brightened when they made eye contact. Damn, but that man had always looked so fine. Lucky... he'd been lucky... so very lucky to have Sam.

"Did you know they actually sold out?" Sam continued, eyes scanning the exterior of the vehicle as if he was seeing the city for the first time. "Jesse asked if I could get her and Lily tickets and no word of a lie, even your agent couldn't get us any extras."

"Well if they hadn't waited—"

Wait... John's mind ticked off the seconds. Wait for it...

"until the last minute—"

John turned into the pillow and whined. Almost...

"like they always do when they need a favour—"

The car in front of them released its brakes, rolled forward several inches, and John followed suit, mumbling a curse. He hated driving in traffic. Despised it.

"John, look!" The grin in Sam's voice was contagious.

Don't look, he told himself. As if that would work. As if that could somehow make it stop. As if anything, anywhere, could ever make it stop.

His gaze trailed Sam's finger point. A cheap Bristol board sign, his name, "John Liege! I Love You!" the blue hair—that crazy fucking blue hair—and the break of the sun from behind a turtle-shaped cloud...

"D'aww, you have a fan—"

Neither of them registered the movement. They should have. They'd both been looking. Not that getting advance warning would have helped. Still, no slow motion made time pause, no scream from the other bystanders advised of impending disaster; there was only the sudden brilliance, the weird cloud, and then the sound of glass shattering directly in front of them. There was Sam's shrill scream as he put up both arms to protect his face from a billion tiny squares of glass, and John's own choked cry as he did the same. There was the hollow thud of a body as it came to rest on the dash. Blue hair. Blood. And a death grin...

*~*~*

Blurb

After one of his fans committed suicide, John lost everything: lover, confidence, drive. When he is given a chance to get back on his feet, he is happy to take it—even if it's just writing an actor's autobiography. It might not be romance, or even fiction, but it's something, and there are worse people to work for than the charming, successful Parker Chase.

That doesn't mean working for Parker is easy, however. A staunch supporter of living for the moment, Parker goes against everything John believes in. He feels out of place in every moment of Parker's Hollywood life, stuck in a game of wits that at times seems almost contrived...

*~*~*

Copyright © 2014 by A.F. Henley

Published by Less Than Three Press

51,000 words

Gay Contemporary Romance

Purchasing Links:

Amazon US || Less Than Three Press

Please note: Novel contains some explicit content.

WOW! How have I missed this author’s work before?  5 Rainbows

This is a story about John and Parker. John is an author from Canada that has been through a tragedy, he’s not blocked by it. But he’s having some issues getting focused. So he has decided to take a job writing a Biography, even though he’s a romance writer by trade.  But to do this he must travel to the person’s home, out of his self imposed shell. Parker is a famous Hollywood actor. With a reputation that supersedes him. He’s known as a self-centered, pompous jerk among his friends. 

John is a hopeless romantic! Even though the events of his life have thrown him some curve balls he still believes. When he gets to Parkers house he soon finds that he is attracted to Parker but won’t act because he knows someone like Parkers just wants one-night stands and John isn’t built that way.  As the days pass and Parker turns on the charm John finds it harder and harder to say no. Parker is intrigued by John, can someone really believe in these forever moments?  

I loved this story!! It’s only about 155 pages so a fast read. (Thank goodness work was slow today!) I couldn’t put it down. I enjoyed reading that John is a romantic and sticking by his beliefs.  The mental games played by both MC’s. The slow build between the two was smoldering. The twist at the end didn’t see that coming, well played Henley, well played! Will be going through this authors back list and catching up on everything I’ve missed.

Also, as this author bio- reads he’s from Canada, so they aren’t spelling, grammar mistakes. It appears he chose not to conform to the American way. Well done!

Now for the giveaway!

On behalf of the tour, I'd like to invite you to join my giveaway by taking part in the Rafflecopter below. The prize consists of a Swarovski crystal spider clip, a $20 gift certificate to the Less Than Three Press book market, and a signed, print copy of The Chase and The Catch (when available). Click through for terms and conditions, further details, and your chance to win!

** Please note that this giveaway is being offered tour-wide and there will be one awarded winner for the entire event.

a Rafflecopter Giveaway

Again, my huge thanks to Crystal's Many Reviewers for having me by today. It's a pleasure and an honour to be a guest on your site. :D

AF Henley <3

~*~*~

Henley was born with a full-blown passion for run-on sentences, a zealous indulgence in all words descriptive, and the endearing tendency to overuse punctuation. Since the early years Henley has been an enthusiastic writer, from the first few I-love-my-dog stories to the current leap into erotica.

A self-professed Google genius, Henley lives for the hours spent digging through the Internet for 'research purposes’ which, more often than not, lead seven thousand miles away from first intentions but bring Henley to new discoveries and ideas that, once seeded, tend to flourish.

Henley has been proudly working with LT3 since 2012, and has been writing like mad ever since—an indentured servant to the belief that romance and true love can mend the most broken soul. Even when presented in prose.

Find more here:

Website || Amazon Page || Publisher's Page || Facebook || Twitter