Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Welcome BH Dark!

by Christie Kelley

Hi Everyone!

Today, I'm pleased to welcome two very special guests, Eve Green and Cassandra Elliot, the heroines of the new novel, Close Encounters by B.H. Dark.

But first, the back cover blurb:

Odilia is a nice planet. The sky is purple, the grass is yellow, the property prices aren’t that bad. But reproduction is painful, solitary, and asexual. Which is why the Odilians find the recently discovered “X-rated” disks from Earth so fascinating. And why the money-making scheme they’re hatching is so brilliant.

The plan is simple: abduct four Earthlings and juice them up on a heady pheromone cocktail. Then plop them in a variety of titillating holographic scenarios and market the results as reality entertainment—for vast profits.

The four chosen humans are strangers to each other, but not to life’s disappointments. Leandros, a lounge singer who’s never committed to anything longer than an Elvis medley. Eve, an interior designer who’s living a life much more beige than bold. Beau, a laid-back car mechanic who wants more from life than oil changes. And Cassandra, an innocent debutante who’s learned most of her sexual know-how from self-help books.

As unwilling—okay, sort of willing—stars of the Odilians’ budding intergalactic porn empire, the four of them consider their options. Relax and enjoy the ride?

Try to escape?

How about fall in love?


Welcome Eve and Cassandra. Please tell us a bit about yourselves.

Eve: Well, I used to be an interior designer from Boston, but now, well, we're apparently the stars of an intergalactic porn empire.

Cassandra: Oh no, Eve. Do we have to tell these nice people about all of that?

I think our readers would be very interested in hearing about your current situation, if you’re comfortable talking about it.

Eve: Cassie, I think we should tell them. After all, this might be a chance to get help to escape. I mean these people are on Earth. You are on Earth, aren't you?

Umm, yeah.

Cassandra: Okay. I guess that does make sense. But it’s really quite embarrassing. You see, we--we were abducted by aliens. And the aliens are like asexual or something, so they think that watching humans have sex is great entertainment, and they’re filming us.

Eve: Yes, apparently we’re a part of some intergalactic reality show. Kind of like American Idol or Dancing With The Stars.

Cassie: Except we don't sing or dance. We--well, you know. Perform. In different holographic scenarios.

Eve: I kind of danced once. I was in a nightclub at least. A holographic nightclub called Studio 69. Although mostly I was doing the horizontal bop.

Wow, that's pretty amazing.

Eve: It’s hard to believe. I’m not really the kind of person who would have wild crazy sex with a virtual stranger on a dancefloor. But this place sort of does that to you.

So they have you on holodecks, or something? There are others on the spaceship with you?

Cassie: Yes, there are four of us. We were abducted with two men, Beau and Leandros. We’d never met them before.

Eve: Yes, right up until the minute we were sprayed with pheremones and forced to have sex with each other, we were total strangers. Things like that tend to make you get to know someone really fast, though.


What are your relationships with the men like? How are they handling the situation?

Cassie: Beau is wonderful. He's brave and kind, and he's very smart. Which surprised me at first because of his looks. Long hair and ripped jeans and a great body. I--I mean, I'd just never met anyone like him before. He's the main reason I haven't fallen apart completely.

Eve: Leandros is totally different from the types of men I know too. He's a lounge singer from Vegas, and I'm sure you have an image of what a person like that would be like. I know I did. But Leandros is nothing like that image--well, aside from the clothes. He does like his shirts unbuttoned. But the look actually works for him. He's helped me survive this situation too. He's protective and funny and well, sexy as hell, really.

It sounds as if you both have crushes on these guys.

Eve: Given what we are doing with them, it would be hard not to feel something. So yes, I think it's safe to say I have a crush.

Cassie: I've read that men and women can separate sex and love. But I'm not sure I'm the type who can do that. I'm not sure if Beau is or not. I think--I think he feels something more than attraction for me.

Eve: He does.

So what will you do when you get off the spaceship?

Eve: I don't know. Try to go back to my normal life, I guess.

Cassie: I don't think I’m ever going to be normal again.


B.H. Dark is the pen name of award-winning authors Julie Cohen and Kathy Love. Close Encounters is their first release and available from Samhain Publishing.
http://www.mybookstoreandmore.com/shop/product.da/close-encounters

Also please check out B.H.'s blog at…
http://bhdark.blogspot.com/

43 comments:

jo robertson said...

Two words: Oh. My.

Four words: Is the rooster mine?

Seven words: Welcome to the Lair, Julie and Kathy.

Tawny said...

LOL - Love this concept. Its so clever and unique. What a fun story and how great that you two wrote it together.

Question - I know you've both got books out by yourselves, so how is it working together? How different is it than brainstorming with a CP?

(sending Julie a wave and hug - long time no see!!)

and Jo - congrats on the GR.

Anna Campbell said...

Hey, Jo, great catch on the rooster!

Welcome to the lair, Julie and Kathy. Goodness, what a concept! Must have been fun coming up with that!

Beth Andrews said...

Welcome to the lair, Julie and Kathy! Love the concept of your story - sounds super hot and sexy and fun *g*

I'm also curious as to how your 'writing together' relationship works versus your 'critiquing' relationship. How did you come up with the idea to write a story together?

Since you have two lead female characters, did you each write one character's point-of-view or go back and forth for every scene?

Helen said...

Well done Jo

This book sounds hot and sexy must have been fun to write.
How did you come up with the idea and is it harder or easier working as a pair of writers.

Have Fun
Helen

Keira Soleore said...

Just seeing Julie Cohen's name on this blog has me chuckling. I was breathless with laughter through most of her latest book (had to order it from amazon.uk). As this "interview" indicates, the new partnership's set to be a scream. Can't wait to read the actual book. Welcome again, Julie, and welcome newbie Kathy to The Lair.

Jo-mama, you've done it!! Now, you have the bird under your wing. Just remember, this isn't the one you roast. The one to roast is in your freezer.

jo robertson said...

LOL, Keira, then it's a good thing Dr. Big picked up our turkey today. I might be really tempted to flash-freeze the rooster and have a go at it!

B.H. Dark said...

Yo Banditas! It's the Julie half of B.H. Thank you for having us, and congratulations Jo for getting the golden rooster!

Hi Tawny! Hopefully I'll see you this summer at the RWA conference...? B.H. is planning to go. ;-)

In answer to your question--Kathy and I often brainstorm together about our own separate books (and have since we were teenagers in school together!) but it was a little different when we were writing together. When I brainstorm on MY book, I can choose the solutions that work best for ME. But in this case, we had to choose the solutions that worked best for US. Kathy and I have a lot of similarities in how we write, but we also do a lot of things differently. Especially after my hardline Harlequin training on relentlessly focusing on the relationship! :-)

We had to do some compromising. Fortunately we respect each other's ideas and opinions and trust each other.

(Though I never did give in to Kathy on the double wedding. That is just cheesy.)

Joan said...

JoMama! You got the bird! Congrats you!

Welcome Julie and Kathy. Your book sounds very interesting and I like the characters very much already....even the heroes and that's just from Eve and Cassie's description.

I admire people who can write as a team. I'm to self focused to do that. If you divided up the heroines did you do the same with the heroes? Who wrote who?

Kathy Love said...

Hi All!

Thanks for having us today, and thanks, Chris, for posting all of this. I love the added images!

I agree with what Julie said. See, that's how we work together. ;-) No, really, we have written together before, back in our misspent youth. So it wasn't find it difficult at all. We do have different strengths and we play well off of each other. I rarely disagreed with one of Julie's suggestions.

I was right about the double wedding, however. I mean we wrote scenes like Bone-anza and Studio. I don't think a double wedding would have added much more to the cheese factor.

But Julie had a vision. Hee hee.
Love you, woman!

Kathy Love said...

Btw, one of Julie's strengths is editing--and clearly I needed her before posting.

B.H. Dark said...

Kathy:

NO DOUBLE WEDDING.

Though actually it would have been fun to write a double wedding orgy.

B.H. Dark said...

Ahem.

Yes I love the rocket and alien images too! Thank you, Chris!

Anna C said: Goodness, what a concept! Must have been fun coming up with that!

I believe we were drunk. Maybe. Just a little. :-)

Kathy Love said...

Well, since we have discussed a sequel...

B.H. Dark said...

A sequel. Hmm. True. The two couples are right in the middle of their double wedding.

"Do you, Leandros and Beau, take these women to be your lawfully wedded wives..."

"Dang, I sure do," says Beau.

"You know I do, baby," says Leandros.

Suddenly, from the deepest zones of outer space, in zooms the Odilian porn ship! Spraying pheremones willy-nilly all over the couples and the guests and the vicar!

"I feel...so sexy," breathes the vicar, loosening his dog collar. In the audience, Cassandra's Auntie Bessie is pulling up her skirt and showing everyone her best Sunday panties.

"Oh no, not again!" cries Cassie.

"I told you something like this would happen if we had a double wedding," says Eve.

B.H. Dark said...

(Oh and I forgot to mention, Beau's hound dog Bo starts humping everyone's leg.)

See? This is how we wrote the book.

Exactly like that.

Jeanne (AKA The Duchesse) said...

ROFLMAO. A sequel. Now THAT would fly off the shelves.

Welcome to the Lair, ladies! Great to see you here. I'll send a particular wave and shout out to Julie since she rescued me at the Airport in...was it Atlanta? Dallas?...even tho' she only knew me as a fellow WRW/MRW member. The last time I saw you, Julie was at the dead body class I did for MRW.

Sorry, side trip down (faulty) memory lane!

WELCOME! I think the concept of the book is fun and lends itself to real...creativity. Snork.

Speaking of creativity, Jo, congrats on the bird!

Kathy Love said...

Hi Jeanne,

I think you are mixing us up (which is a common occurrence).
:)

How are you? And congratulations--very, very late on your book sales!

Jeanne gave a great talk for the Maryland Romance Writers about working at a funeral home. It was fascinating. Not a job I could handle, but amazing stories.

Jeanne (AKA The Duchesse) said...

Okay, I'm in backwardsland this morning! YES, KATHY, good morning and thanks for the plug on the class...

Jeepers, I need more coffee. I KNOW you're Kathy. *shaking head* Sigh. Must. Have. More. Coffee.

Jeanne (AKA The Duchesse) said...

BTW, Kathy, was it Dallas or Atlanta?

Susan Sey said...

Wow, this sounds like a wildly creative concept & really fun read! I hope the reading public gets on board for you guys!

B.H. Dark said...

Right, I was all excited by the double wedding, so I'm going to answer a couple questions now. Kathy probably will too...so you'll have to guess which one of us is lying.

Beth asked Since you have two lead female characters, did you each write one character's point-of-view or go back and forth for every scene?

*Waving to Beth!* Kathy and I would talk through the storyline in advance, but we mostly split up the writing so that she wrote one couple and I wrote the other. Then we'd show each other what we did. We mostly stuck with one couple each, but there are some scenes when we didn't.

With the scenes where all four of them are together, we wrote it via Instant Messenger or over the phone. It was so much fun.

Afterwards, we went over it and edited it to blend our voices a bit better. Nobody has guessed yet who wrote which parts, and sometimes I forget too.

B.H. Dark said...

Hi Helen!

Is it harder or easier working as a pair of writers?

Definitely easier! You have a built-in reader and crit partner for one thing. For another, if you get stuck, the other person can jump in. For a third, you only have to do half the work!

We wrote the first draft of this book very quickly, 100,000 words in something like 6 weeks, laughing like crazy the whole time. It was awesome.

B.H. Dark said...

Hi Keira! I think it's a good thing the mere mention of my name makes you laugh. I think. ;-)

I'm really glad you enjoyed my book. BTW--don't do Amazon.uk, do the Book Depository (you can google it). They do free shipping worldwide!

One great thing about BH Dark for me personally is that I get books on the shelves in the US...it's been awhile since my last Harlequin.

B.H. Dark said...

*waves to Joan*

Hey, Jeanne! You had me wondering about airports and dead bodies...I'm glad Kathy figured it out. Nice to meet you, and congratulations from me, too!

Hello Susan! I hope the reading public gets behind us, too...hopefully not carrying torches and baying for our blood, LOL.

Now I think I've caught up and I can go back to work on my own book. Which isn't about a pheremone-fuelled double wedding, worse luck.

Christie Kelley said...

Jo, congrats on the GR!

Christie Kelley said...

Jo! There will be no talk of flash freezing the GR. Maybe you'd better send him over here because I'm going to my mom's for Thanksgiving so he's safe.

Christie Kelley said...

Kathy and Julie, I'm glad you like the images I added. I was having way too much going through istockphoto looking for aliens and rockets. I thought the green guy was the best.

Jeanne (AKA The Duchesse) said...

I particularly liked the alien myself. Green looks so GOOD on him...or is that her?

Christie Kelley said...

Jeanne, I don't want to know which it is :)

Buffie said...

***we interrupt regular programming to bring you this announcement**

Hugh Jackman has just been named People's Sexiest Man Alive for 2008

Buffie said...

Wow, talk about an interesting concept!

I love how you describe your writing/working relationship. I bet it was fun to have a friend along for the entire ride.

Christie Kelley said...

buffie, I saw that article about Hugh Jackman and couldn't agree more!

Kathy Love said...

Did we mention that both of the heroes in Close Encounters look just like Hugh Jackman?

Well, I mean, they could. It's your imagination after all.
:)

Kathy Love said...

You know Jeanne, I can't remember either. I think it might have been Dallas.

Jeanne (AKA The Duchesse) said...

Sigh. Hugh Jackman. Slurp.

Sorry, having a moment. Got to admit that I think all of the nominated GQ Sexiest Men Alive are pretty attractive. I wouldn't compare our Prez Elect to Hugh in sexiness, nor even to Michael Phelps with that long, lean whipcord of a body. I'm not a big Leo DiCaprio fan - too little-boyish, not enough MANish for me. :> But OH! John Hamm, the actor from MadMen. May I say again, SLURP!

Fedora said...

Boy, this sounds hilarious! I can't wait to read this, Julie and Kathy! And how neat that you've co-written! Do you have more joint projects planned?

Joan said...

Hugh Jackman has just been named People's Sexiest Man Alive for 2008

Could just as easily have said "Damon Primax, Senatorial Spy" as my whole image of my Damon is a scruffy, tousled Hugh!

Slurp, indeed....

Pat Cochran said...

Welcome, ladies!

After reading your "explanation,"
I understand your "laughing like
crazy the whole time!" I so look
forward to reading the whole book!
It is a quite interesting concept
that you are presenting! LOL!!!

Pat Cochran

B.H. Dark said...

I have written several heroes based on Hugh Jackman. Thank God he's finally getting the recognition he deserves. ggg

Thanks Buffie and flchen1 and Pat!

And thank you Banditas for having us!

the Julie half of B.H.

(PS Kathy...we got away with nobody asking us what B.H. stands for!)

Kathy Love said...

Yes, thank you everyone! This was fun. And special thanks to Christie!

Phew, you're right, Jul, no questions about the B.H. That was luck.
:)

elainec said...

My confession? I don't feel like doing my decorating this yesr! It takes about two weeks usually to get everything out (I have tons of stuff, including three trees). We aren't having lots of company this year and I feel overwhelmed at the prospect of all the work for only two of us to enjoy. Guess I need a shot of Christmas spirit.

Janet Mullany said...

Hi Julie and Kathy, and I can't wait to read the book!