Wednesday 2 March 2016

EyesOnBooks Tour: Guest Jo Tannah with The Way You Look Tonight


Making A Choice and Getting Off A Curse

First of all, just let me say ‘Thank You’ for joining my first ever blog tour. It’s a strange feeling being asked to talk about my own book, but it’s great. It’s quite overwhelming to be frank about it  but in a good way. Being here with you today is all at once flattering and scary. Now for The Way You Look Tonight.

TWLT is the second instalment to The Standards series. The first one, What A Difference A Day Makes found here on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/What-Difference-Day-Makes-Standards-ebook/dp/B00U6DZKS8, was published more than a year ago as part of an anthology. When I got the rights back, I re-edited then self-published it. Both these stories are based on lyrics to the same titles of Standard music. The lyrics inspire and set the pace of both stories.

One difference between WADADM and TWLT is with the song choice. For the first book, I was locked in on the song and had no doubts. For TWLT, I debated between this title and using My Way. The latter song came up several times in the story when I first drafted it and initially had a bigger influence on the story itself and on Jamie’s character. However, I didn’t want to get stuck with a curse.

I have said that the love of Karaoke in the Philippines has reached great heights it’s now considered a national pastime. In fact, it competes with boxing or playing and watching basketball. Take it this way: no Pacquiao fight is complete without karaoke.

So what has that got to do with the title? Well, the song, My Way, is in the story and I truly love it. In fact, it used to be my father’s favourite as sung by Frank Sinatra. However, Karaoke and My Way = Curse. You could get killed singing the song on karaoke and because of the deaths, My Way has been banned from any and all karaoke song lists here in the Philippines. I didn’t want that curse to extend to my story so had to make a decision and cut it to the minimum mention and that’s it. One reworded phrase only. By the way, My Way is the key to the tragedy in the story.

I had to make a choice. Stick with The Way You Look Tonight and write a sweet May-December romance or use the cursed song as title, allow it to set the pace of the story and turn it into a morbid tragedy?

IndiGo Blitzes: DC Juris with Best Laid Plans




Best Laid Plan by DC Juris
Published 27th of January 2016 by Torquere Press
Length: 20K
Contemporary Romance

Disowned by his family for being transgender, Kale drained his bank account and set out to go as far as the money would take him. He planned to make a new life for himself. But when the money stopped, he found himself homeless, his plans pretty much screwed.

Perry set out to pay a male hooker to slake his lust. Instead he found a handsome young man who insisted he wasn't a prostitute. A little bit of convincing, a flash of money, and one random Tuesday turned into once a week, and Perry found himself in dangerous territory. After all, the plan wasn't to fall in love. Previously published by Breathless Press.

LINKS


Excerpt

Kale peered into the car without getting any closer. He didn't recognize the older man behind the steering wheel, didn't really know anyone in this town yet. "Can I help you with something?"
"Probably." The guy grinned. "How much for a blowjob?"
A fiery blush steamed up Kale's neck. "Oh. I'm not um..." He glanced down at his clothing—red button-up shirt, jeans, boots. He wasn't dressed like a hooker, was he? Then again, what did male hookers dress like?
"Fifty bucks?" the guy asked.
"No, you don't understand." Kale shook his head. "I'm not um...working. I'm just..." Just what? Just a runaway disappointment.
"Fine. Make it a hundred. C'mon. Get in."
His eyes went wide. A hundred dollars? For a blowjob? A hundred dollars would get him a room at a motel and a meal for the night. And a blowjob wouldn't take all that long. But he'd never done anything like that before with a stranger. The guy looked pretty clean. How bad could it be? Just a few minutes' work, turn his head, spit, and take the money. "I don't swallow," he blurted.
The guy shrugged. "I don't care."
The words hit Kale with full force. The guy didn't care. Not about him, his story, why he was out here on the streets in the first place. Not about his past, present, or future. Not about anything beyond his mouth. Kale frowned.
"You coming or not?" the guy prompted.
"Show me the money."
He held up a hundred dollar bill.
If the guy would pay a hundred dollars for a blowjob, how much would he pay for something else? But Kale had seen way too many Lifetime movies about runaways-turned-prostitutes who got into cars and were never seen again. He puffed out his chest and straightened his shoulders, tried to look like he had some kind of guts. "Okay, but we're not going to a skeevy hotel or your house or anything. Got it?"
The guy shrugged. "Whatever."
Kale looked up and down the street and reached for the door handle. The car, like the guy, looked clean and tidy, smelled nice. He smiled at the green, tree-shaped air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror, and tried not to think of that scene in the movie Seven where the cops found hundreds of the things hanging in the sloth victim's apartment.

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Author

Romance author, sic-fi fan club Captain, cosplayer, reigning Queen of Monkeyland, and random menace. Yep, we're talking about DC Juris. She’s a cupcake-making, football-watching, rubber-duck-collecting, drag-show-loving, full-of-fabulous-with-a-capital-F kinda gal. She's also an ordained minister and an amateur photographer. She lives in Upstate NY with her husband, three dogs, and two cats. When she's not writing, you can find her in her favorite chair watching Star Trek and Supernatural repeats on Netflix, or surfing the web for porn. Er...research. Surfing the web for research. She may speak softly but she lives and loves loudly. Just ask the neighbors. ::wink::

@dcjuris on Periscope



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