Blaine D. Arden and Other Worlds Ink visit today on the Aliens, Smith and Jones (Primrose Files) blog tour! Don't miss the author's visit and chat about inspiration! Enter in the giveaway for 2 chances to win a set "A Triad in Three Acts" &"Oren's Right"! Good luck!
Blaine D. Arden has a new MM sci fi book out:
“It’s not all about serving coffee and typing reports.”
Working for a secret organisation specialising in alien cover-ups, Connor Smith is no stranger to the abnormal or dangerous. His love life on the other hand… not so exciting. Until he reluctantly agrees to a blind date and meets the perfect bloke, Jason.
Things are finally falling into place for Connor, so of course that’s when he attracts an alien stalker.
Noah Jones, ex-alien, has been stranded on Earth and forced to live as a human since 1648. Alone and detached from the world around him, Noah has spent centuries observing and recording humankind. In all that time, he’s only experienced a connection with a human once… until he finds Connor.
Even knowing Connor is in a relationship, Noah can’t ignore their potential bond, or stay away.
While dealing with missing alien artefacts, a dangerous and shadowy group of collectors, and the ever-present Noah, Connor finds his orderly life crumbling around him. At least he still has the perfect boyfriend…
When Noah goes missing, Connor is forced to face the feelings growing between them and the mounting evidence that Jason isn’t who he says he is…
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Giveaway
Blaine is giving away two sets of "A Triad in Three Acts" & "Oren's Right" with this tour – enter via Rafflecopter:
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Excerpt
The Dross Woods, four-bloody-something in the morning, hunting for six-armed, two-legged white creatures.
Agent Connor Smith, personal assistant of Chief Security Lieutenant Natalie Tallis of Primrose UK, yawned. The lingering mist clung to his ankles as he tightened the straps of his field gear. He took his tranq out of its holster and flicked his torch on. The dense, tall trees hampered visibility, and the smattering of shrubs didn’t help, either. The path, at least, was wide enough for two.
“How many were there again?”Agent Simpson, team Alpha’s leader, asked. His dark, bald head gleamed in the early dawn as he moved to stand next to Connor.
“Ten, I think.”Or eleven. Connor hadn’t been awake enough to pick up everything during the interview with the Cleaton brothers, two aging sheep farmers, who had called it in. Why have a sheep farm so close to this vast and dense piece of forest? It was asking for trouble.
“They kept them in the stables, right? So, what happened?”
“Broke out,”Connor said as he trailed into the woods after Simpson. Though Connor outranked the stocky but agile team leader, Simpson had at least a decade of field experience on him. Simpson’s torch lit up the uneven, knobby-rooted ground, and Connor used his to search the shrubbery next to the path. He wished he’d brought an extra coffee, because he was not awake enough for this. Hopefully, the pale colour of the creatures made them easier to spot.
“So, broke out?”
“Have you seen the thing they called stables? It’s nothing more than a rickety old shed. Even one-armed creatures would have had no problem breaking out, let alone these... Noren, I think the brothers called them.”
“All I understood was that we’re here to catch us some aliens.”Simpson veered left, following the whimsical bend in the path, and looked back. “It was a late night.”
“Right, you were chasing another missing artefact. Lieutenant Tallis filled me in. File’s probably making its way to my desk as we speak.”Connor squinted, aiming his torch at the shrubbery to his left. A mix of red, yellow, and purple flowers brought some colour to the otherwise dreary looking forest. “It’s the eighth time this has happened. It’s becoming a problem.”
“Don’t I know it. So, did they say how big these fellas are?”
“Chest height or about. Why? Spot something?”Connor pointed his torch along Simpson’s.
The shrubs shuddered and shook until Simpson stepped forward. A twig snapped, followed by meowing. A cat. Just a cat.
Connor shrugged at Simpson and they moved forward again.
Somewhere a shout rang out: a high-pitched screech that caused goose bumps.
“One down!”someone called through the commlink—team Bravo’s Forente or Briers, Connor guessed. “There are at least two others here.”
“That way,”Simpson said, pointing to their right, onto a narrow path overgrown with creepers.
Connor nodded, but Simpson had already turned away.
Step by step, they followed the narrow path, the darkness only broken by the light of their torches. They were hampered by the creepers as they moved along—listening, stopping, and listening again—as well as having to push low branches out of their way every other step.
One by one, more teams called in their catches.
“They seem to like sheep,”Forente commented after his first catch. “I heard one bleat, and the next thing we know, one of those Noren is coming right at us.”
“Good to know,”Simpson said. “Keep up the good work.”
“How many is that now?”Connor eyed the shrubbery in front of him, squinting as he pointed the torch at it. Eerie how dark a forest could be at daybreak. He preferred the smell of fresh moss to the damp, woodsy smell that now hung around him.
“Seven. I think.”
So, three to go, and he and Simpson had yet to run into any.
Something rustled behind them, and Connor turned, aiming his tranq. He hoped it wasn’t another cat. More rustling, but no movement in the shrubs. The foliage was denser here—they must have reached the middle of the woods by now.
Satisfied a Noren wasn't stalking them, Connor went to catch up with Simpson. when a sudden crunching of leaves to his right stopped him again. Something whitish moved behind a tree, too large to be a rabbit. He wished he’d paid more attention when Tallis had told them what to look for. Not that she’d been any more awake than he was. Simpson wasn’t the only one who’d been working late. The—
Another crunch, nowhere near, though. If there were two Noren around, he'd need Simpson. He tapped the commlink. “Simpson?”
“That was me. The path circles back onto itself.”
That was a relief. “There’s one behind a tree in front of me.”
“Right. Want me to move around it?”
“Good idea.”Then he remembered the comment about the sheep. “Wait. You don’t have to. Draw it out, bleat if you have to. All I need is a clear shot. I can’t take a shot as long as it’s hiding behind that tree,”Connor said, keeping an eye on the tree the Noren hid behind. He hoped it was just the one, even though they didn’t seem violent towards humans.
Simpson’s imitation of a sheep sounded nothing like the real thing, yet the Noren thought it genuine enough, since it came out from behind the tree, straight into the dense shrubbery next to it.
“Bugger.”Connor tracked the movement, but the shrubbery blocked his view. “I don’t have a shot. It fled right into the bushes.”
Simpson didn’t reply. Instead, he made his way around Connor, judging from the flashes of torchlight jumping around, and repeated his sheep imitation.
The leaves shuddered, and Connor narrowed his eyes, hoping to get a clear shot.
Simpson bleated again, and this time the Noren came running out of the shrubbery. Connor aimed and pulled the trigger. The Noren went down hard. Hit in one. He knelt next to the creature, taking the cuffs out.
“Nice shot, Smith,”Simpson said when he reached them.
“Thanks.”Connor cuffed all three sets of arms. It seemed like overkill, but he knew better than to take any risks. He was about to activate his earpiece to ask how many were still on the loose when a shrill whistle sounded, calling them back.
“Well,”Simpson said as he helped Connor pick the Noren up, “I guess that’s that.”
“All in a day’s work, Simpson, all in a day’s work.”At least, for a personal assistant at Primrose.
Author Visit
From Inspiration to Cameo
“The pub was smoky, smelly, and loud. The small stage added to the atmosphere, and the band was good, very good. Still, Connor couldn’t stop thinking about Noah. His head was filled with what ifs and if onlys.
Connor found the distraction he needed in the band’s next song. The darker tones of the band’s progressive metal style reached deep into him, and when the singer chimed in, Connor instantly fell in love with his voice. Dark, rugged, hoarse, and simply drool-worthy. Jason hadn’t lied about him, neither his voice nor his looks. He was handsome, gorgeous even, in a rugged kind of way, but Connor didn’t mind a bit of rough. He would definitely be going to more of their gigs.”
***
What inspired the character of Noah Smith?
When I started writing Aliens, Smith and Jones, way, way back in 2008, I was very into Torchwood, a spinoff from the Doctor Who series. To those who know me it won’t be a secret that l was, and still am, very much a lanto Jones fan. Am, because there’s been something on my bucket list since its conception, but despite repeated trips to the UK, and even Wales, it never quite worked out. Until now. I’ve recently, finally, visited Ianto’s shrine at Cardiff's Mermaid Quay.
Aside from my obsession for all things Ianto, Torchwood strengthened my desire to show the world how beautiful love between men could be through my writing. It would still be two years before I’d find our precious m/m genre, and two more years before my alien found a publisher.
Torchwood also sparked ideas, most of them about aliens and how aliens and human interacted. I scribbling a number of snippets about different species of aliens finding their way to Earth. Most of them ended up unused, but this one grew roots.
Torchwood’s Jack Harkness, also featured in Doctor Who, was the driving inspiration for my alien, Noah. Though, comparing Noah to Jack Harkness would be like comparing apples and oranges, or something like that. The only thing they have in common is that they’re both old…centuries old. Jack has quite a few centuries on Noah, too, if I remember correctly.
As I watched the series, and rewatched it, I wondered what it would be like for such a centuries-old alien, trapped on Earth, to find a human “soulmate”. This idea led to a set of what-if questions.
What if this species can’t survive on Earth in its original form? What if its perception of age is different, so it doesn’t look like as old as it is? What if love is experienced differently by this species? What if its soulmate is already taken?
In answering all these questions, and some linked how-would questions, I found out most of what I needed to know about my alien… but what about its soulmate?
That’s where Torchwood, Doctor Who, and Ianto Jones play an even bigger role.
What inspired the character of Connor Smith?
I liked the idea of a Torchwood Institute kind of organisation. A secret organisation that deals with stranded aliens, and alien tech, on earth, while the rest of the world sleeps easily, not realising there have been aliens on earth for at least a century. And of course, as a conflict, I liked the idea of having the alien’s soulmate work for the one organisation that it would prefer to steer clear of even more. And Primrose was born.
With Primrose’s birth, came the character of Connor Smith, suit-wearing PA of a security Lieutenant. But Connor would be a fully trained field agent, too, partly based on Ianto Jones being a receptionist, and then some, and partly because I wanted to take a job description, and turn it on its head. I had a lot of fun playing with the idea that Connor’s work wasn’t all about typing reports and serving coffee. Quite the opposite.
Of course, to be honest, there was a more gratuitous part of having Ianto Jones as a character inspiration as well: I very much enjoyed the image of Ianto in his suits.
Now, what’s all this about a cameo?
Torchwood became my number one show for quite a while. After I watched all of the episodes, at least twice, I discovered there was more Torchwood to get. I found books, radio plays and audiobooks, and enjoyed listening to those immensely, especially when read by Gareth David-Lloyd (the actor playing Ianto Jones). Actually, I’ll happily listen to anything he reads.
Or sings…
For those who haven’t had the pleasure, Gareth also sang in a band called Blue Gillespie. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to be performing any more, but I’ve been lucky enough to attend two of their gigs, dragging the hubs, and even the kids, with me. Their music is raw, and has been described as going from heavy blues to progressive metal. It’s not my usual style of music, but there is something about their songs, and Gareth’s voice, that keeps me listening.
While I didn’t want to name them in the book, I felt they deserved at least a mention. So, to loop back to the quote from Aliens, Smith and Jones that I began with, Blue Gillespie with singer Gareth David-Lloyd earned two paragraphs, and became the backdrop to a date.
So far, this is the only book that I wrote that more or less sparked from one single source of inspiration: Torchwood. More or less, because I will never quite understand where the blind date sprang from.
For those interested, Blue Gillespie’s music can be found here. And my favourite song of theirs is Making Sound.
Author Bio
Blaine D. Arden is a purple-haired, forty-something author of queer romance mixed with fantasy, magic, and suspense who sings her way through life in platform boots. She is an EPIC Award winning author, and her scifi romance “Aliens, Smith and Jones” received an Honourable Mention in the Best Gay Sci-Fi/Fantasy category of the Rainbow Awards 2012.
Born and raised in Zutphen, the Netherlands, Blaine spent many hours of her sheltered youth reading, day dreaming, making up stories and acting them out with her Barbies. After seeing the film “An Early Frost” as a teen in the mid-eighties, an idealistic Blaine wanted to do away with the negativity surrounding homosexuality and strove to show the world how beautiful love between men could be. Our difference is our strength, is Blaine’s motto, and her stories are often set in worlds where gender fluidity and sexual diversity are accepted as is.
Author Website: https://blainedarden.com
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