KB Alan

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This is an excerpt from my latest release, Alpha Turned. You can see the books page on my site here, or at the publisher’s site. I hope you enjoy!

“Larry?” he answered, instead of saying hello.

She laughed. “Caller ID?”

“Yes. I’ve been afraid to be more than one ring away from this damn cell phone all day. I was worried about you. I know it’s difficult, having to deal with the separation anxiety while trying to come to terms with all of this. I wish I could make it better for you.” He sounded genuinely distressed and Hillary relaxed, knowing that she could love this man despite the fact that he was a werewolf, despite the fact that he was a strong, controlling Alpha. In this case, the wolf’s nature would aid her because he would find it very difficult to do anything but help and support her any way that she needed him. And she would do the same for him.

She didn’t try to explain her thinking to him, merely said, “I want to see you. I need to see you, but…I don’t think I’m ready for the whole pack, especially while I’m feeling so…torn. Like a part of me is missing and only you can put me all back together again.”

His strangled moan was muffled. “Baby, I’ll come to you, that’s not a problem, but I need you to be real clear on what you want from me when you see me, so that I don’t screw this up. Do you want me to bring Aaron and Tracy so you can ask us more questions? Get to know us better?”

“Hell no!” she blurted. “I can’t wait any longer, Zach, I need you. I’ll meet you back by that restaurant. There was a little B&B there, right? It’s off-season, so they should have a room for the weekend, right? Will you stay with me?”

The breathing on the other end of the line was harsh. “Honey, I think, it might be better not to be surrounded by humans. My cousin, Peter, has a cabin about fifteen miles east of there. It’s not super fancy or anything, but it’s fairly isolated. Because, Hillary, I just don’t think I’m going to be able to stay very quiet when I’m with you, at least not the first dozen times or so.”

Hillary’s breathing had sped up at the torment in Zach’s voice. She managed a whisper. “Okay, email me the directions. I’m going to pack. I’ll leave in an hour.” She hung up the phone before he could say anything else and went to shower.

Less than two hours later, Hillary pulled up to the cabin. The directions had been very specific, and she recognized the SUV in front of it. The door opened as she parked, and Zachary stood there waiting.

He seemed very tense as Hillary approached. She knew that he was being cautious, not wanting to make assumptions, not wanting to rush her. She walked up to him and kept going until she was fully against him, her face going naturally to the curve of his neck, his cock pressing gently into her stomach. She wrapped her hands around him and held on tight. His hands tried to pull her even closer, one arm around her shoulders, one settling possessively in the small of her back.

She took a deep breath, determined to be as honest with him as he had been with her. “Zach, I want this so badly, but I don’t know…I’m guess I’m afraid I’ll freeze up or hurt you…”

He squeezed her tight before moving one hand up to cradle her cheek. “Honey, the worst that could happen is that I have to run out and jump in the cold spring. Not a big deal. I’m not going to lie and say I’m not dying for you, but I’m already a hundred times better than I was an hour ago. As long as we’re together, and as long as we talk to each other, we’ll be fine, I swear.” His fingers sifted through her hair and he pulled her head back gently so that he could kiss her.

Hillary sank into the kiss, pushing away any thoughts, letting the incredible feelings be everything. His lips were soft against hers, teasing her with their fullness. She waited for him to give her his tongue, but he played with her, using only his lips and the occasional nip. Finally she remembered that she was an alpha bitch, she didn’t have to wait for him. She thrust her tongue into his mouth and was immediately rewarded by his groan of pleasure, by the tightening of his fingers in her hair and the grinding of his cock into her stomach. She smiled, interrupting the rhythm he had taken up, then pulled back.

His eyes were glassy and she knew a moment of deep satisfaction that this was her man, that she could do this to him just by being herself. She promised herself in that moment to try as hard as she could to remember who she was and what she had to offer, rather than remembering the victim she had been so long ago.

“Zach,” she said, as he continued to stare at her unblinkingly.

“Huh?” he asked, reaching his hand out to brush her lower lip with his thumb.

She darted her tongue out to lick her lips and taste his thumb, then stepped back. He jerked forward, nearly grabbing her before he caught himself.

“What’s wrong? Where are you going?” His eyes were a little bit wild now, no longer glassy.

She smiled gently at him, her breathing still coming hard and fast from just one kiss.

“I thought I would get my bag and that you might let me in,” she said, picking the bag up from the porch where she’d dropped it while they spoke.

He blinked then grimaced. “I’m sorry, baby, let me take that.” He took the bag and ushered her into the cabin.

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An interesting thing has happened with the release of Alpha Turned, something that didn’t happen with Perfect Formation. Readers have written to me asking if I will be writing more books in this world. Even more, they’ve actually been asking me to do so. How cool is that? Of course, I realize that Perfect Formation didn’t really have a lot of secondary characters, and no world building, so it’s not like I’m unhappy nobody responded that way to it, I’m just fascinated that people liked this world enough to ask for more. Also, it’s not like I hadn’t thought about it – of course I did. I didn’t specifically set anything up, except for the introduction of Alexis. I definitely wanted to write her story, but not for a while. She has some growing up to do. And I had a sneaking suspicion that the unnamed teacher who gets shot might want to have his say.

I have a few other stories I’m working on, so I decided to wait and see who spoke up the loudest and demanded the most attention (I’m talking about in my head here, not the readers, just to be clear, lol). I wasn’t surprised when I got some tentative pulls from the teacher. What did surprise me was the lady who said, ok, he’s good, but he’s mine. Myra, the National Alpha. For some reason, she completely blindsided me. I love it when that happens. I’m still working on my other pieces, but I’ve started daydreaming about Myra and…hmm, it’s probably time to name the poor guy. Adam? That might be right. So far he’s mostly a lovely vision (it’s not my fault he happens to be naked in this very important scene!!), but I think I like Adam.

For now, I will jot down some notes and let my daydreams work things out a bit, while I play with my Fae (different story/world). This part of it is all normal for me (no laughing), it’s pretty much how all of my stories started. But the fact that readers asked is fantastically encouraging. So, thank you!

The Smutketeers were kind enough to pop my interview cherry. Technically, they’ve popped my contest cherry, too, as we’ll be giving away an ebook copy of Perfect Formation to one commenter, and I’ve never done that, either. They were very gentle…it only hurt for a second. 😀  Check it out here!

It’s release day! Again! Somehow it feels really different than when Perfect Formation was released, and yet just as exciting and amazing. I mean, my book is being released! I don’t think that’s ever (knock on wood) going to get old.

Alpha Turned is actually the first book that I wrote. I was about two-thirds of the way through it when I started Perfect Formation, which ended up getting published first. And the two books could hardly be more different. Alpha Turned is a paranormal featuring werewolves, while Perfect Formation was a contemporary threesome that included a fair amount of kink (yummy Caleb knows his way around a pair of cuffs, I’m just sayin’). Zach is a hot alpha werewolf but I’m afraid it would never occur to him to tie Hillary up, and I’m pretty sure she would cut off something vital if he tried. I’ll be really interested to hear how readers who loved (They sent me the emails, I’m not making this stuff up!) Perfect Formation respond to Alpha Turned. I’m guessing they’ll love Zach as much as I do – he’s a hottie who will do anything to make his woman happy, even if it means standing back and letting her do her thing. And Hillary really is ready to do her thing. It’s been four years since she was turned into a werewolf in a violent attack that left her wondering if turning furry would make her as evil as the crazies who attacked her. She’s been concentrating on making a life for herself and *gasp* making friends, but when a werewolf comes into her town she knows its time to deal with this aspect of herself that she’s pretty much been ignoring. Luckily that leads her to Zach and I’m sure you can guess that all sorts of yummy things ensue. Poor Zach has to fight his instincts which are screaming at him to take Hillary as his mate. But helping her to become comfortable with who and what she is takes a much higher priority. No, really, it does. Luckily the instincts are just as strong in Hillary and she let’s Zach’s calm strength lead her to a better understanding of her new life. Plus, there’s all sorts of yumminess – did I mention that?

For those readers who just aren’t into paranormal, I promise (you know, in case you were desperate to know) I’m working on a contemporary. Of course, I’ve also got a bit of Fae going on. And then, in a remarkably stupid move, I said to myself one night, “Well, at least I don’t do Sci-Fi”. All you writers out there are sure to understand that the Sci-Fi plot bunny was kind enough to make a visit the very next week. So far I’ve managed to hold the mangy thing at bay, but we’ll see. I like to think of it as offering a little something for everyone, as opposed to being mildly schizophrenic. You can decide for yourself and feel free to let me know what you think. 😀

I hope you all enjoy Hillary and Zach as much as you enjoyed Taryn, Caleb and Richard. And if you haven’t read Perfect Formation, but want a little spicy contemporary for your weekend read, it’s gotten some pretty good reviews 🙂

So, as you may have noticed, I have a new book coming out. (Just give me a second here to SQUEEEE. Ok, better now.) I got the release date for Alpha Turned, made the book page, and had to include an excerpt. Well, I suppose I don’t have to include one, but I believe very strongly that every book should have an excerpt on the authors website. Which should be easy, right? Well, no.

For some reason, I have a really hard time picking them out. I keep wanting to explain what the reader should already know, if they had started at page one. I cut and paste one section, then delete and try another. Seriously, it’s like a sickness. Of course, when I read other people’s excerpts, I completely understand that it’s just a taste and that I don’t need to understand everything that’s happened. But I have a hard time letting go, I think.

For Perfect Formation I just used the excerpt my fabulous editor picked out. Actually, she made a couple of suggestions and I just agreed with one of them. It was my first release and I had no idea what I was doing. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it’s the same scene the publisher used on their website, and as a reader I like to have a couple of different ones to read. So I was determined to use a different choice on my site this time. I finally decided that since the one the publisher is using is in the heroine’s point of view, I would give my man Zach his chance, here. Maybe next time I’ll give out advanced copies with the expectation that the readers pick out a scene they think should be the excerpt? *Sigh* I’m pretty sure this is supposed to be the easy part. 😛

I’ve noticed that some readers are more into descriptions than others. And that the same is true for writers. Apparently, I’m one who’s not too into them myself. I know this, because recently I had to fill out a form for my publisher called a Cover Art Request form. It’s simple enough, you fill in some basic info about the book, title, author name, whether or not it’s part of a series. That kind of thing. Then you describe your characters. Of course, you have to be careful that all the descriptions given are consistent with those in the book (duh).

Since the book this is for, Alpha Turned,is actually the first book I wrote, it’s been a while since I read it, let alone wrote it, and I needed help remembering everything. I first went to my OneNote notebook, where I have notes about characters, timelines, etc. I found descriptions of some of the secondary characters, descriptions of the hero and heroine’s wolves. Lots of other things, but no physical description of the two main characters. Oops.

So, I opened up the manuscript and carefully searched. Turns out, I’d never really described them at all. Oops, again. Of course, it’s easy enough to go back and add these things, and it’s actually a good way to get me back into the story in time to do my edits. But it got me thinking.

I’m much more used to being a reader than a writer, and I’ve noticed that I tend to not care much about descriptions when reading books. I’m not one of those people who likes to play the “name the best actor for this role” game with book characters because I never really give their looks too much thought. I don’t visualize them in that way. Turns out I’m pretty much the same with my own characters.

In my more recent manuscripts, I started out by doing some basic character descriptions on my notes page. Not because I wanted to be able to visualize, but so that I could make sure I stayed consistent. See, since I’m not really picturing my characters in my head, when it comes time to describe them for some specific reason, I’ve sort of forgotten what attributes I’ve already given them.

I’m sure that I probably had a point in mind when I started this, but it’s long gone now. I guess it comes down to this. Writers (and this means me, damn it) need to be able to do enough description to keep the readers who do like to visualize happy. But not so much that those who don’t, feel like they’re skimming through whole pages. (As I do when reading Tom Clancy. That’s more about technical stuff than descriptions, but the same theory applies.)

Of course, I’m sure some readers love two page descriptions of regency era drawing rooms, and that’s the other thing I need to remember. There are all types of readers, just as there are all types of writers. There’s no way I’m going to please all the readers, all the time. What one enjoys will irritate another, and so on, and so forth. Somebody please remind me of this when I get a bad review.