Congrats to Jenre, who won her choice from LA Witt’s backlist!

Congrats to cturtlechick, who won Why Jay Ran Away (Contact, Book 3) by Jade Archer! Why Jay Ran Away will be available from Total-E-Bound on October 18.

Congrats to Mary F, who won Blood and Alchemy (Drone Vampires, Book 11) and a bonus copy of The Third Floor by Stephani Hecht. How did Mary get so lucky? Well, after I kicked off the contest for Blood and Alchemy, the publication date got changed from October 15 to October 31; The Third Floor is being released today instead. Stephani’s giving Mary a copy of The Third Floor to help tide her over until the 31st – and you can still enter to win a copy of The Third Floor. 🙂

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Contests

• Katiebabs is giving away her f/f romance, Lovestruck, and her f/f pirate romance, The Princess’s Bride, in honor of National Coming Out Day. Comment by October 16 for your chance to win.

• Blodeuedd’s giving away two copies of Mr. Darcy’s Obsession by Abigail Reynolds. Comment by October 18 to enter. (US and Canada)

• Devon Rhodes is giving away an ebook copy of her latest menage romance, Falling for the Other Brother. Comment by October 20 for your chance to win.

• Tracy’s giving away a copy of Wanda E. Brunstetter’s latest Amish romance, Lydia’s Charm. To enter, leave a comment by 11:59 pm PDT, October 22.

Bookity

• New releases and more: Lily (m/m romance),  Literary Escapism (UF/PNR news, contests, new releases), Donna Fantasy Dreamer (UF/PNR/YA, etc), SciFiGuy (UF news, contests, etc), and All About Romance (romances available in November).

• Bookity linkity from ReadReactReview’s Monday Morning Stepback.

• KMont on why negative book reviews have value, too.

• Smexy Mandi has a great post on what author websites should and shouldn’t have.

• Can’t bear to get rid of your old books? Here are 10 DIY projects for repurposing your old books.

• Singing and dancing librarians!

Ebookity

• Jordan Castillo Price muses on whether having sales and giving books away devalues books. Jordan’s going to be a featured author at Rainbow eBooks this weekend and her excellent paranormal m/m romance, Among the Living (PsyCop, Book 1), will be free 10/16-10/17.

• Apparently there’s an ebook gap between the US and the rest of the world.

• Consumer demand for pirated ebooks didn’t grow in 2010.

• A recent study found that the Kindle has 76% of the ebook market.

• Dear Author shares some thoughts on Android tablets for reading ebooks.

• If you read ebooks on your iPad/iPhone/etc, a new app called Bluefire Reader will let you read encrypted epub and pdf books.

• Confused about DRM? The eBook Reader’s guide might help.

• TeleRead has an interesting post about how having an ebook reader changes the way we shop for books.

Think, Learn, Make, Do

• Be careful if you take up molecular gastronomy!

• Writing by hand instead of typing might give your brain a boost.

• Ever wondered why you look so different between photos and the mirror?

• Apparently we have a limited amount of willpower.

• Careful what you name the files on your computer – if you have to take your computer in for repairs and the repair people find your filenames alarming, they can call the police to investigate your files. At the very least, a big hassle even if you don’t have anything you shouldn’t on your computer.

• Five myths about federal taxes. (Thanks, CursingMama!)

• A video reminding us how important it is to vote.

• Opt out of getting the Yellow Pages delivered to your address. Or build a house from the Yellow Pages if you’ve waited too long to opt out.

• Get a six-pack without that pesky exercise stuff.

• I had no idea that there were 1.5 million mobile phone users in 1964!

• Peek at the desks of artists, writers, and other creative people.

• Ok Cupid analyzed its 3.2 million users (gay and straight) and discovered *gasp* that “gay people are basically the same as everyone else.“

• Crochet an angel duckie or a devil duckie… or both and have duckie smackdown! (Thanks, Kim!)

• Knit or crochet yeti baby booties!

Linkity Peeps

• Kristi has craft, photography, and food links.

• Sidney has links that caught her eye.

• Both Katiebabs and Eyre have NSFW WTFery links.

Halloweeny

• Find out what candy is gluten-free!

• Make a BP cleanup crew costume!

• Crochet a brain hat!

• Bake a salt dough organ plate!

• Make bloody brain cupcakes!

• DIY fuzzy-headed mini pumpkins!

• Make baked pumpkin oatmeal!

Cool

• An instrumental video featuring cats. (Thanks, Stephani!)

• A Lego letterpress.

• Maps made from typefaces.

• Star Wars as a papercraft video.

• A future coral reef made from (fake) people.

• The Simpsons title sequence created by a graffiti artist.

• The “Homophobia Kills” Flash Mob Die-In at NYC’s Grand Central Station.

• Check out some of the things that Improv Everywhere’s done.

• Pancake dinosaur!

• This one hovers between cool and huh: knitted tiger pelts.

Huh

• I think the Portable Armrest makes people look like escaped asylum patients…

• Slanket armchair?

• Surely you need spaghetti and meatball high heels?

• If you’ve always wanted to get married in McDonald’s, Hong Kong McDonald’s will soon be offering $400 wedding packages!

LOL

• Franklin on photo retouching…

• How the Leaning Tower of Pisa was really made. 😉

• The drama of Squirrel!Neo continues.

• All hail (and fear!) the God of Cake!

• Why you shouldn’t friend your mother on Facebook.

• The real Transformers.

• Curse that long piece in Tetris…

• Kitty as mood killer.

• Life cycle of a hairball…

• Cat-like typing detected.

• Basement Cat has many important decisions to make each day.

• Have you tried purrigami, the art of kitten folding?

Teh Cute

• Kitties playing in a yarn ball storm – but remember that it is very dangerous to let kitties play with string or yarn! It can kill kitties.

• Wee piglet! Kitten! Kittens! Coati! Kittens! Fossa! Kittens! Dog licking kitten! Hatching duckling! Kittens! Kitten! Kitten! Sleepy jaguar(?) cub! Baby sloth! Heart-shaped kittens! Leapin’ Lambert! Kittens! Zombie bunny! Cougar cubs!

Reading Update
Like Pizza and Beer (Dino & Seth, Book 2) by Elle Parker. ebook. Excellent m/m romantic suspense that you should not even pick up until you’ve read the first book, Like Coffee and Doughnuts. That won’t be a hardship. 🙂 Dino takes on two new cases: one for Seth, trying to find dirt on Seth’s sister’s scumbag boyfriend, the other for his own ex-girlfriend, which makes Seth very jealous. Add to that Dino’s own discomfort with anyone knowing that he’s dating Seth…
Between a Rock and a Hard Place by Clare London. ebook. Very good short m/m romance about a guy waiting at the airport for a very good friend who’s been overseas for a final job interview. Since his friend’s flight turns out to be delayed 12 hours, he has plenty of time to think about how much he’ll miss his friend and how much he screwed up the last time they saw each other. Some very unusual people sit near him and help distract him from his thoughts… or do they?
Picture Postcards by J.M. Snyder. ebook short. Very good short m/m romance about a guy, in love with his best friend, who drifts out of touch after his friend marries a woman… and then a postcard arrives in the mail.
Bittersweet Seasons by Fabian Black. ebook. Very good collection of short, poignant m/m romances, most of which touch on seasons or time passing.
Maxxed Out by Treva Harte. ebook. Good m/m romance about Max, a college student who hasn’t come out to his parents, who shows up at the door of his (deceased) brother’s best friend with an agenda… The one detractor was the alternating first person, which, while done pretty well, was confusing at times.
Sub for Hire by Claire Thompson. ebook. So-so kinky m/m romance about an author who works as a sub-for-hire at a professional dungeon until he can support himself with his writing. He can handle the job, as long as he’s able to keep his emotions detached, because he actually longs for a loving D/s relationship. Again, I just can’t engage with Claire Thompson’s older books the way I can with her newer books. This was particularly challenging, because I wasn’t overly fond of the dominant characters.
Burning Up by Z.A. Maxfield. ebook short. Good short m/m romance about a fire dancer, entertaining on the street, who gets heckled by a drunken idiot with a quieter, nicer friend.
Lockdown by Augusta Li & Eon De Beaumont. ebook short. Ok short m/m story about a superhero and a supervillain who are locked in a nuclear power plant after their fight damages the core…
In Knots by Celia Kyle. ebook short. Meh kinky short paranormal m/m romance about a human sub who goes to a werewolf bdsm club. At least there were some amusing editing fails.
Call Me Sir, Too (Sir, Book 2) by Stormy Glenn. ebook. Meh kinky m/m romance about a Dom and sub who met in the first book. Since then the Dom’s been gone on mysterious business and the sub’s been seriously traumatized and injured by an evil Dom. Will the good Dom be able to get the sub to trust again? My favorite line in the whole book (and I’m reproducing it exactly!): “That strange twinkled shinned in Dante’s eyes again.”
The Magic in Your Touch (Reed, Book 1) by Sara Bell. ebook. Meh m/m romance from an author whose more recent work I really love. Chicks with dicks, insta-love, stalker(s)… *sigh*
You Don’t Need a Doctor by Julia Talbot. ebook short. Doctors Without Borders Charity Sip Blitz. Good short paranormal m/m romance about an ER doctor who notices that the shooting victim he’s treating is awfully hairy and has very pointy teeth and is healing very fast… This would’ve been better as a longer story, because so much was crammed in.
El Cedral by Kiernan Kelly. ebook short. Doctors Without Borders Charity Sip Blitz. Very good short m/m romance about a doctor from NYC, taking a sabbatical from his cushy hospital job, who agrees to help out an old friend at his clinic on an impoverished Mexican island.

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“None of you better be thinking of trying to steal my stripey socks! I’m keeping an eye on you!” -Mayhem