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Congrats to Melanie M, who won More Than Anything by Shawn Lane! More Than Anything will be released by Amber Allure on October 30.

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Contests

• Babes in Boyland is giving away m/m romances for Halloween, including some that aren’t released yet. Contest closes 11:59 pm CDT, October 31.

• Joder’s giving away a copy of The Hunter by Theresa Meyers. Comment by 11:59 pm, November 3, for your chance to win. US only.

• Blodeuedd’s giving away two copies of Sins of Angels by Linda Poetevin (print or ebook). Contest closes November 3. US & Canada only.

• Book Lovers Inc is giving away a copy of Sleeper’s Run by Henry Mosquera. Comment through November 5 to enter.

Books

• New releases and more: Tor.com (urban fantasy, genre benders, fantasy, science fiction), Literary Escapism (UF/PNR), and Book Lovers Inc (a bit of everything).

• Amazon’s purchasing the Book Depository?!

• Have you heard of the 2008 British miniseries, Lost in Austen?

• How did Ursula Le Guin change science fiction and fantasy?

• Learn more about some romance cover models.

• Carolyn Crane has a handy dandy guide to the release of Head Rush, the third Disillusionists book.

• Heidi Cullinan shares her thoughts on the m/m community.

• The official Center for Disease Control comic book guide to surviving the zombie apocalypse. Download the pdf.

• Adding Daleks to classic literature.

• Read ultra-condensed (as in less than a single page) versions of Moby Dick, The Old Man and the Sea, and more! (via The Digital Reader)

Ebooks

• Anna Mayle has a free short story available through the Goodreads M/M Romance Group!

• Eden Winters also has a free short story you can download on Goodreads!

• And so does PD Singer!

• An infographic on how reading habits are changing.

• Ebooks sales are increasing; print sales are decreasing.

• If you want an Android tablet for reading, but think the Kindle Fire sounds too locked into Amazon, check out the Kobo Vox.

• The story behind the closing of ebook publisher Aspen Mountain Press.

GayRomLit

• Rarely Dusty Books After Party: Kassa, Tam, Brita Addams.

• My posts: First, Second

Think, Do, Make, Learn

• Primer on why the folks occupying Wall Street are pissed.

• Do geeks accept gay icons more easily?

• A novel way to get back at those noisy neighbors…

• Is web pr0n ruining your libido?

• What number human were you on the planet? I was (roughly) the 3,429,463,820th person alive on the planet when I was born, and the 77,402,259,003rd person to have lived since the beginning of human history.

• Climate change skeptics paid for a study to debunk climate change studies, but (to their disappointment, I’m sure) their study also found that things are heating up.

• Who knew it was possible to drive a car one million miles?!

• Eeek! Peanut butter prices are supposed to soar. 🙁

Halloweenity

• If you’re looking for some appropriate Halloween music, download Aquarium Drunkard’s 84 mb Halloween Mixtape.

• Spooky story recommendations.

• How to make a flamethrower jack-o-lantern.

• Make a skeleton out of milk jugs.

• Make a gory brain cap.

• Gluten-free Halloween candy lists.

• Lame last-minute Halloween costumes.

• Dress your dog as a chia pet. (Thanks, Seanna!)

• Braid your hair into kitty ears.

• See what an 1818 pound pumpkin looks like when carved.

• Decorate with fake specimens-in-jars that are actually edible. (via CRAFT) (Plus the rest of Evil Mad Scientist’s Halloween Archive.)

• Halloween cheeseburgers. (via The Kitchn)

• Best easy Halloween treats.

• Brains-in-jars cupcakes. (via CRAFT)

• Spiders in jell-o. (via CRAFT)

• Halloween skull truffles.

Cookity

So, The Kitchn’s gone a little crazy on recipe lists… which I can’t resist. Brace yourselves. 🙂

• 10 hearty vegetarian soups. 20 broth-based soups. 10 creamy soups without cream in them. 5 hearty meatball soups. (Why, yes, it is soup week at The Kitchn – how did you guess?) 6 chowders. 25 healthy and tasty soups. 5 quick soups. Egg drop soup.

• 10 breakfasts using fall fruit. 10 prune recipes. 10 dips for fall fruit. 10 ways to eat fruit with dinner.

• How to seed a pomegranate.

• 10 meaty pasta dishes. 10 vegan pasta dishes. 15 international pasta dishes. 12 salads and veggie side dishes to accompany pasta.

• 6 gluten-free (noodle-free) ways to use pasta sauces. Gluten-free conchiglie. (via The Kitchn)

• Pumpkin pie pop tarts. (via The Kitchn) Pumpkin cinnamon roll pancakes. (via The Kitchn) Pumpkin coffee cake. (via CRAFT) Bourbon pumpkin pie milkshakes. (via CRAFT)

• Gluten-free pumpkin pie. Gluten-free pumpkin cupcakes with maple cream cheese frosting.

Crafty

• Crochet a kitty bag.

• Knit a labyrinth rug.

Cool

• Best cross stitch to make for a couple getting married. (via The Mary Sue)

• Call of Cthulhu, Dr. Seuss style…

• Dr. Who, Dr. Seuss style… (via The Mary Sue)

• Semi-NSFW short film about a woman and a skeleton.

• Spooky LEGO kitties.

• TARDIS tea pot. (via The Mary Sue)

Cool or Wha…?

• Disney Face Swap. (via The Mary Sue)

• Knitting-themed hotel room. (via KnittyBlog)

• Snowball crossbow.

• TARDIS made from… balloons. (via The Mary Sue)

• Superhero socks… with capes.

• Giant spinning human head water fountain.

• Whiteboard skins for your laptop.

• Warning: If you follow the link and listen to this song (“Pink Fluffy Unicorns Dancing on Rainbows”), it will be stuck in your head forever. *waits for the whining from everyone who will ignore this warning*

Wha…?

• Paramedics confused by zombies.

• Zombie Muppets.

• The Cat Lady from the Simpsons getting it on with Batman… (via The Mary Sue)

• High heels for men as the next big thing? Plus more awful fashions for guys. And even more!

• Spectacularly failed poop-to-gold alchemy experiment…

• Two men stole an entire steel bridge.

• Apparently dresses made of chocolate are fragile. Who knew?

• I got nothin…

• How to make sure one of your cats kills you in your sleep… (Thanks, Bron!)

• It’s a bad thing when the Simpsons predicted the future… accurately.

• Spray your food gold?!

LOL

• Hopefully you’ve already seen the not-no-new Simon’s Cat, in which Simon gets a kitten.

• A cat’s map of the bed. (Thanks, Jase!)

• Does your cat earn more than you do?

• Sort of lol, sort of sad – Hyperbole and a Half on depression.

• Cupcake Ipsum.

• Why you can’t ever find a pen when you need one.

• If humans had sex like giraffes… (via The Mary Sue)

• Set Phasers on LOL… (via Escapist Ramblings)

• The United States of Scary Things. (via The Mary Sue)

• Top 50 autocorrects from Damn You Autocorrect’s first year: Part 1.

• CallerID fail.

• Traffic ticket backdate fail.

• Oh oh… And oh oh…

• Cannot be unseen.

• Nite who sez Nii!

• Too late!

• It’s an action figure, darn it.

• I have the same question.

Teh Cute

• Kitten! Baby tigers! Kitten! Red panda parent and baby! Kitten! Baby tigers! Kitten! Baby oncilla! Happy black kitty! Cheetah and baby! Baby meerkats! Baby black leopard! Baby cougars! Fennec!

Reading Update
With a Kiss by Kim Dare. ebook. Excellent kinky paranormal m/m romance loosely based on Sleeping Beauty. A young man who’s being mentally, physically, and sexually abused by his boyfriend comes to the hospital every week for three years to read to a vampire in a mysterious coma. And then the vampires is awakened… This book shines in not trivializing the process of recovering from abuse.
I Just Play One on TV by AL Turner. ebook. Excellent m/m romance about two actors in a suspenseful science fiction tv show with a lot of “subtext” between their characters. One actor is out, although it doesn’t seem to be public knowledge, while the other is deeply closeted and in denial… Let’s just say I spent the last part of the book crying.
Across the East River Bridge by Kate McMurray. ebook. Very good paranormal m/m romance about two academic rivals with an unfortunate chemistry who work together to solve the cold case mystery of two men murdered together in late 19th century Brooklyn.
Guarding Morgan (Sanctuary #1) by RJ Scott. ebook. Very good m/m romantic suspense about a guy being kept in an FBI safe house so he can testify about a shooting he witnessed. When the safe house is compromised, he ends up in the care of an intriguing agent for a special organization dedicated to keeping witnesses alive… Definitely looking forward to the next book in this series!
Private Eye (Liaisons #1) by SE Culpepper. ebook. Very good m/m romantic suspense about a PI who gets involved in the case of a missing teenager when he’s contacted by a cop who’s a friend of the family. Too bad the extremely hot cop is straight…
Just Desserts (Petit Morts #14) by Josh Lanyon. ebook short. Very good short m/m romance about a guy confined to a wheelchair after his drunken cousin crashed their car. Unfortunately, this story didn’t provide any additional insight into Chance and his own journey.
Loose Change (Petit Morts #15) by Sean Kennedy. ebook short. Very good short m/m paranormal focused entirely on Chance, set up as a series of brief scenes.
Media Naranja (Petit Morts #16) by Clare London & Jordan Castillo Price. ebook short. Very good short paranormal m/m romance about a young man who accompanies his dying grandmother and her friend to a tropical resort.
Immortal Coil (Petit Morts #17) by Jordan Castillo Price. ebook short. Excellent short paranormal m/m romance about a high school teacher and former coach whose life changed dramatically several years ago. When he wanders into a small street carnival, he doesn’t know that it’s about to change again. (This story is also the culmination of Chance’s story arc.) I loved this quote: “If everything were anything,” Chance said softly, “the barriers would break down, and we’d all lose ourselves to chaos. And then there would be no cotton candy.”
Independence by Clare London. free ebook short. Steamy, kinky short m/m scene between an established D/s couple.
Learning To Walk (City Hospital #3) by Drew Zachary. ebook. Sweet m/m romance about a guy, seriously injured in a motorcycle accident, who develops feelings for his physical therapist. Since there’s not much conflict in this one, I think it’d be a good read to help recover from an angst-fest book.
Cycle-pathic by Stefan Seabourne. free ebook short. Steamy short m/m scene between a bike courier and the lawyer whose car he dented… with a surprise ending.
Sugar on the Mountain (Mountain #8) by PD Singer. free ebook short. Cute short m/m scene between Allan and Mark in Allan’s catering kitchen.
Blood on the Mountain by India Harper. ebook. Good m/m romantic suspense about a security firm co-owner who goes to Rio to protect a client doing nonprofit work there. This ended with plenty of unanswered questions, although I fear the sequel might be m/f, featuring the other (female) co-owner of the security firm.
Gambling on Love by Jane Davitt. ebook. Good, slightly kinky m/m romance about two guys who fell in love with other in high school. When they were caught kissing in the locker room, one of them left town and didn’t return until 11 years later. He’s very different and he doesn’t want to stay… but the one who stayed doesn’t want to leave. While I’m a fan of Jane Davitt’s work (particularly that written with Alexa Snow), this book never fully came together for me – I couldn’t get invested in the characters or the story.

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Missed out on GayRomLit, but still want part of the experience? Read on!

I came back from GayRomLit (GRL) with lots of swag – not only swag that I’d picked up for myself, but also swag I’d accumulated from people who didn’t have enough space in their luggage, or who didn’t want to deal with hassles in Customs. In fact, I came back with enough extra swag to have a GRL Swag Giveaway Contest!

Wanna see? Ok.

*sniff sniff sniff* -Mayhem

*sniff sniff sniff* -Chaos

“Why are you giving away these great kitty beds and toys, Mom?!” -Mayhem

*sniff sniff sniff* -Chaos

Um. Well. You can’t see if very well, huh? But you get the idea!

Contest Rules

• To enter, leave a comment below stating that you are entering the contest. Leave your comments by 7 pm CST, Monday, November 7. CONTEST CLOSED.
• By entering the contest, you’re confirming that you are at least 18 years old.
• Cats not included in prize.
• If you haven’t commented before, your comment will not be visible until after I moderate it. Please do not leave a second comment because your first doesn’t show up! The blog gnomes will decide your comments are spam and then only luck and counterintuitive espionage will salvage your entry…
• If your comment is actually an advertisement or if your CommentLuv link turns it into an advertisement, your comment will be deleted. (Most of you do not need to worry – this refers to some pretty clever comment spam.)
• Winner will be selected by random number.
• You must leave a valid email address in the “Email” portion of the comment form.
• Please make sure that your spam filter allows email from stumblingoverchaos.com!
• If a winner doesn’t respond to my congratulations email within 48 hours, I will select another winner.
• This contest is US only, due to shipping costs. Sorry. 🙁