Blurb:
Growing up with a strictly
religious father in a house with little joy, or love, left Grady Stoltz eager
to get out. At the first opportunity that presented itself, they left home with
a young man who swept them off their feet, used their preferred pronouns, and
accepted that they were gender fluid and wished to shed the name Grady and all
of the constraints of their former life. Dubbed Gypsy, they never expected to
return to that farm or the rural community they’d been raised in, but life took
some unexpected turns, and they found themselves returning four years later. A
little older, a little wiser, and the new owner of a house full of memories and
regrets.
Cleaning the place up is only the first step towards deciding if they wish to sell it, or if they wish to stay and try and make a life for themselves in a place they’ve never felt as if they belonged. Haunted by the memories of the father who could never accept them, the mother they lost at a young age, and their own shortcomings and failures, they are in a very dark place when Rogue arrives.
Charismatic when performing in front of an audience, yet shy and vulnerable when faced with the prospect of being alone in a crowd, Rogue seeks shelter with Gypsy on their middle of nowhere farm, hoping for a new beginning and a chance to see if the tiny spark that had flared between them once before, can be kindled into a roaring flame.
Two battered souls, one tattered farmhouse, an old dog, a cranky chicken, several misspoken words, and one crazed ex-husband combine in an explosive combination of truth, lust, dreams, and vengeance. Will the force of it tear Gypsy and Rogue apart, or will it leave them closer than they ever dared to hope?
Cleaning the place up is only the first step towards deciding if they wish to sell it, or if they wish to stay and try and make a life for themselves in a place they’ve never felt as if they belonged. Haunted by the memories of the father who could never accept them, the mother they lost at a young age, and their own shortcomings and failures, they are in a very dark place when Rogue arrives.
Charismatic when performing in front of an audience, yet shy and vulnerable when faced with the prospect of being alone in a crowd, Rogue seeks shelter with Gypsy on their middle of nowhere farm, hoping for a new beginning and a chance to see if the tiny spark that had flared between them once before, can be kindled into a roaring flame.
Two battered souls, one tattered farmhouse, an old dog, a cranky chicken, several misspoken words, and one crazed ex-husband combine in an explosive combination of truth, lust, dreams, and vengeance. Will the force of it tear Gypsy and Rogue apart, or will it leave them closer than they ever dared to hope?
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Excerpt:
Memories. It
seemed like once they got going, they never stopped. Staring into the night,
the past seemed to flood back like the deluge that was still falling from the
sky. They remembered the long drive through Pennsylvania and West Virginia, the
old diner at the far tip of Virginia where they’d had lunch and napped on a
picnic table with Fester before heading on their way. They remembered the flood
of traffic around Knoxville and ending up in the wrong lane, scared they were
going to get hopelessly lost before a trucker at a gas station had told them to
follow her, she was heading that way and would signal them their exit when they
got to it.
That first night in the
city, with their sneakered feet on the clean gray sidewalks of Chattanooga,
they’d shivered and stared with wide eyes at the sprawling downtown that ended
in waterfront and a looming aquarium they were already curious to visit. Fester
had trotted happily at their side, sniffing eagerly at each new patch of grass
or bench they encountered.
Their stomach rumbled and they rubbed it lightly, torn between
feeding it first or finding a place to stay. The heavy weight of exhaustion and
the need for a shower won out, and they’d headed for the nearest motel,
managing to secure some corner room that was as much a storage place as it was
a space to sleep. Seemed like most of the motels were booked full due to
something called Riverbend, not like it mattered, they only planned to be there
for a night. Tomorrow they’d call the number Rogue had given them, the promise
of a small room above the performing arts studio was making them giddy with
relief. It would be so nice to get off the road and finally learn what they’d
be doing. Rogue had been kind of vague, but then, that just tended to be him.
Didn’t matter anyway, whatever it was they’d have to do it and do
it well because their options were slim and there was little hope left for
them. They’d already had their pride dented enough by Randy, there was no way
in hell they were crawling home to their pops with their tail between their
legs to kneel in a corner, praying aloud until he’d deemed they’d prayed enough
to atone for their sins. Going back to Randy wasn’t an option either, they
crawl for no one, not ever again.
“Know your worth,” Rogue had told them one night, words slurred a
bit from too much drink. “Know it and never accept less.”
Sometimes
they wondered if he knew his, or if someone somewhere along the line had caused
him to feel it was diminished.
Twitchy,
alone in a strange place and no idea how to navigate the city, they’d found
sleep very difficult to come by that night. Between nervousness and hunger,
they’d tossed and turned, gripped the pillow and pulled it up against them,
still unused to sleeping alone.
Finally, they’d lifted Fester up on the bed
beside them, grateful this was a pet friendly hotel or they’d have been forced
to risk sneaking him in like they’d done in Pennsylvania. Thankfully, he was a
quiet dog, rarely prone to barking, or they might have found themselves out in
the cold.
A storm surged through the city, lightning illuminating the room
with every flash, the thunder so loud it had only added to their difficulties
sleeping. Tears came without warning, whether from loneliness or exhaustion
they didn’t know. Maybe it was just a combination of everything that had taken
place in the past two weeks, but the tears wouldn’t stop, even when their face
was buried in Fester’s thick folds. As they rubbed their face in his fur he
whined and thumped his tail on the pillow, trying to lick their tears and tell
them that everything was going to be okay.
Greetings, and thank you so much for welcoming me to your
blog today to discuss my first new release in over a year, Gypsy’s
Rogue. There was a time when I wasn’t sure this particular project would get
finished. There was a moment when Gypsy and Rogue were talking on the enclosed
porch and the scene just never progressed past that. For nine months I was
stuck on that scene, left the manuscript, worked on other ones, came back and
wrote a few lines, erased them, tried again. It became a running joke in my writing
group. They’d ask each time I submitted something new, if Gypsy and Rogue were
still on the porch, and over and over I said ‘yeah’ a bit depressed about the
whole thing. Finally, one of my writing group members asked what the problem
was, and as I tried to explain, I realized that the problem wasn’t with them at
all. It was with me.
Gypsy and Rogue were telling me over and over that they
wanted something meaningful, something that wasn’t going to easily be broken,
and I, as the author, was determined to tell the story I’d envisioned. One in
which Rogue was a person who would drift in and out of Gypsy’s life for a few
days here, or a week there when he wanted to take a break from the road, but
that he would never be someone who stayed.
He didn’t like that much, and he made that very clear to me
in his steadfast refusal to cooperate with any writing from that point forward,
until I gave up trying to tell the story I’d thought I’d set out to tell, and
instead, told their story, the way they gave it to me, and boy what a change
that was. They came alive from that point forward, and the book that had been
stagnant for nine months suddenly spilled out onto the page and was finished in
under a month. What a joy that was and what a lesson it taught me. To listen to
my characters and never, ever try and push my agendas onto them.
About the Author:
LAYLA DORINE lives among the sprawling prairies
of Midwestern America, in a house with more cats than people. She loves hiking,
fishing, swimming, martial arts, camping out, photography, cooking, and
dabbling with several artistic mediums. In addition, she loves to travel and
visit museums, historic, and haunted places, caves, monuments, national parks
and quirk spots.
Layla got hooked on writing as a child, starting with
poetry and then branching out, and she hasn’t stopped writing since. Hard
times, troubled times, the lives of her characters are never easy, but then
what life is? The story is in the struggle, the journey, the triumphs and the
falls. She writes about artists, musicians, loners, drifters, dreamers,
hippies, bikers, truckers, hunters and all the other folks that she’s met and
fallen in love with over the years. Sometimes she writes urban romance and
sometimes its aliens crash landing near a roadside bar. When she isn’t writing,
or wandering somewhere outdoors, she can often be found curled up with a good
book and a kitty on her lap.
Layla Dorine can be found at:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/layladorine
Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/layladorine/
Tumblr: https://layladorine.tumblr.com/
Author Website: layladorine13.wix.com/layladorineauthor
Author on Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/9814124.Layla_Dorine
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