Once a Samurai Blog Tour - #Osaki is Coming!

Welcome to the Once A Samurai blog tour. 

It's funny. Once I got the idea for the SHIVERS, I  never thought anyone would want them. I mean, they were a species I created while in the shower, listening to one of my favorite, Canadian, pop singers, while singing quite off-key, really, really loud.  After many trials, things that tested me and my writing and tested me mentally/emotionally, I almost gave up and delete the whole thing. I mean, book one, CIRO was a 19, 000 word short story written for who I thought was a friend to open his own publishing house.  That ended in disaster and after CIRO was rejected by a publishing house I thought--I was done.

Then my best friend, I call her Tster, got into my head again. She is always telling me not to give up. To fight for what I wanted; to fight for my happiness. And writing made me happy. Well, writing MAKES me happy. I mean sure there are the bad reviews but those come with the territory and if you notice I don't even have a review page on my website or blog anymore. I don't really pay them much attention because if I do sometimes I'd curl into a ball in my room and never want to go out again.  Anyway, I had a long talk with the best friend and then after I hung up the phone, I turned on my computer, logged out of facebook and got into writing CIRO again. This time, I wrote until I the whole manuscript was red with track changes. By the time I stopped, the story had gone from 19,000 words to a whopping 48, 000. Then, I wrote the synopsis, and did all the paperwork needed and shipped it off to Totally Bound. 

Then the wait.....

I waited....

and waited...

And finally got a reply.

It wasn't an outright acceptance. No. It was a "we love the premise but we think it can be bigger, better...and here's how..."

Glad for these words of improvement and encouragement, I set to work again and soon, I was

finished again and resubmitted it. After another wait, CIRO had a home and they were asking me for a series. Colour me shocked! I had no plans for a second or a third book but it had the potential. And not only did they want more stories--they were willing to take the chance and put each book in print. 

That was how Osaki's story was born. 

Osaki has a lot on his plate and love is the last thing he has time for. Not only does he have to get used to his new powers as a Shiver and all the training it involves, but he also finds himself being drawn to a human—though Kofi makes it clear he’s into women—and Osaki must respect the man’s wishes. All Osaki really has to do is focus on training and being the best tour guide possible for Kofi. But nothing ever goes as planned and soon rogue Shivers are popping out of the woodwork, hell-bent on destroying Osaki for his inheritance. It soon becomes quite clear that they want him dead, and they’re not afraid to use Kofi as leverage—or as collateral damage.

Kofi Olabasu needs a vacation. He’s spent so much time looking out for his brother and working that he’s completely neglected himself. To make matters worse, feelings for a man are driving him crazy. The moment Kofi feels Osaki, he knows something is about to change. Confused about his attraction to Osaki, he agrees to take a vacation and accepts Osaki’s offer of being Kofi’s tour guide in Japan. However, nothing is as it seems. Soon every dark corner is filled with danger and those who wish to do him harm. 

On April 17th, Osaki will be hitting the virtual shelves in print and ebooks. But in the meantime - you can preorder your copy at Totally Bound!

There are prizes to be won. If you follow the tour, be sure to remember to comment based on the questions and you could win!

Give Kato About Town a click tomorrow, April 14th to check out my guest post and enter the contest!

Hugs,
Remmy Duchene

At this Festive time of the year Mr. Scrooge....

Hi everyone! It is winter time and I hate it! lol. Yes, I'm not much of a holiday person it seems. If you've noticed I haven't written a holiday story in a while. But oh well.

So yes, it is that time of the year again. You know me, normally I would have stopped writing by the end of Nano but this year I have a writing partner that I am writing with and so I kept going. The strange thing about it is, 2014 has been a wonderful when it comes to my writing. I am very happy to still have people who love what I do and encourages me when I feel like stopping. The truth is I probably will never stop because I love writing and creating worlds and people that others enjoy but who knows, right? They always tell you "never say never" right?

Yes, I know it's been a while since I've blogged here but it has been a hard last few months. With school, EDJ, trying to have a social life, finalizing edits on Captive to his Wonder as well as co-authoring Wounded Heart with the fantastic Sharita, to the rerelease for a few other books, it's been hella crazy in my life. This means, I have a few releases to tell you about.

The first is Talk Dirty To Me - This idea came to me while I was talking to Sharita on one of our many brainstorming sessions. It was only supposed to be a passing fancy but after some prodding by her, I got it written. Evernight Publishing liked it enough to contract it and you can now buy it anywhere you buy your Remmy Sexies. It is about a Doctor who is more than a little pent up and accidentally called a sex line run by a sexy, dreadlock wearing, dirty talking, soon to be teacher *wiggles brows* Oh, it's sexier than anything I've ever written - I think so check it out.

I tried my hands at paranormal and actually pulled it off, which was great! Ciro is now in print and Ebooks at Totally Bound and I am so proud!  This one a few of you already know but it has been

Now Available at Totally Bound in
Print and Ebooks

extensively re-edited and gutted and rewritten. I am very happy to say I am excited about it for it is now a part of the SHIVERS series. This story is about what happens when Hera gets pissed at and decides to put her foot down at Zeus cheating on her. Trust me, it doesn't end well.

The second book titled Osaki has just been contracted to Totally Bound.  It is about a Samurai that saved Ares' life and was given special entry into Olympus. He comes a Shiver but you have to read the first book to figure out how *winks* But think about it for - sexy Samurai with super powers!  I surprised myself that I even thought about that. I was so focused on writing one book but the publisher suggested a series and so far--so good.

Osaki has a sexy new cover too I am so happy with it. The funny thing is, with these covers, so car the cover artist (the Won-tastic Emmy) gets it right on the first try! Normally, I'm very easy with covers. If I see it and instantly it hits me in the face like a bat, I know it's the right cover. And so far both these covers did that. The first cover for CIRO has this vibrant green, with the Greek ruins of the aqua ducts running in the background that is perfect for me - I didn't even think to suggest putting the aqua ducts on the cover but she did. I loved that.

Osaki coming soon to Totally Bound
in print and ebook

Another story I'd like to tell you about is Captive to his Wonder. Now you may remember me mentioning it as THE MONSTER - why? Well, it took a while for me to come up with a title for it. Nothing I could think about worked--they just didn't feel right. Even after I came up with the title, I still caught myself calling it The Monster.

Anyway, this is the longest story I've written by myself to date. When I was writing this story, I thought for sure I'd have to self-publish it. I'm not sure why but that was just my feeling. You see, Captive, went a year without a title. It's a May/December relationship. It's interracial. So a year, numerous re-edits/revisions, four betas (you read right, four) later I took a breath and a chance and submitted it to Dreamspinner Press.

 I was so excited when I got the news they would take it--and not only would they accept it, they wanted print rights too! I was jumping up and down and acting a fool! You see, Captive to his Wonder is my baby. It's one of those books that you really labour over making it as best as you can. You spend hours re-editing and re-reading it until you could probably  tell someone the story, word for word without actually looking at the manuscript.  Then I had a few friends beta read it for me - I never used betas before but they came in handy because this novel was pushing 70, 000 words. I needed the extra eyes and all the help I could get with it. So thankfully, I have some amazing friends who didn't mind reading it and give me constructive criticism about what I needed to fix and what

Pre-Order at Dreamspinner Press

didn't really make sense and what they thought I should cut.  Finally, I was overjoyed because Captive has a home! You can actually pre-order it now at Dreamspinner Press in both print and ebook.

So as you can see, this year has been very productive. Next year looks like that too but I'm going to take it a little easy lol. Anyway, please email me what you think as usual I don't mind.

Hugs
Remmy Duchene

Ciro, my first Paranormal baby

Ever since I began reading about Greek and Roman myth back in school in Jamaica, I've been in love with them. There was something just so amazing about these Gods that always called to me. My favorite stories though was of Hercules and I loved Poseidon. When I moved to Canada about 17 years ago (god I feel old), there were television shows that brought those to life for me - Hercules: Starring Kevin Sorbo and Xena Warrior Princess starring Lucy Lawless. I remembered giggling that her last name was Lawless and she played a character with that nature. Anyway, I digress.

About a year (could be two) I had the inspiration to create a species and what better place to do that, than in Greek Myth! I wrote a short story titled SHIVERS and subbed it to a small publisher I thought would be going places. But things didn't work out quite as I planned and soon that publisher hit the skids and my SHIVER didn't have a chance to shine. Now I have the rights back for this short story and I had no idea what to do with it. I debated scrapping it until someone gave me the bright idea to expand it, edit it, change some things around.

It was right around that time I was reading the submission pages for Harlequin and what the editors had to say to authors who wished to submit to Harlequin. One editor said "no word is sacred."  I took that to heart and I went into the short 19, 000 word story like a woman on a mission.  I slashed and slayed and re-wrote and turned around and move things up and moved things down and by the time I was finished I had a novel. Whew....45K. I edited it a few tmes, further slashing and slaying and adding. Finally I was around 48K and it was ready to be submitted. I submitted it to one place and it was rejected - That was okay because I knew the story had two things going against it.

One - It was published before.
Two - It's different than most things I'd ever written for them or that was out there.

I took it back - read it again and edited again and for about a month or so I held on to the story, silent freaking out until one day a friend of mine suggested I try Totally Bound. They like "the different and entertaining," he said. "They understand that romance and erotica doesn't fall under the same boring lines."

I took those words and ran with them. I wrote SHIVERS up again and submitted it.

The wait was killer. In the mean time, I continued working on Captive to his Wonder which at that The Monster and tried not focusing on the late night checking of my email. But eventually I received an email back asking if the story was going to be a series.  I had to seriously think about that for a second - I mean for those of you who read my stuff you know I am no good at writing series. Sure, I did Sons of Eros but those were short, fun little treats. They were nothing to this magnitude.  And a paranormal series? Good grief what were they asking?
time I tentatively called

Yet I thought about it and decided...well, there ARE a few characters that could use a lil lovin' so sure, bring it on! I emailed back and quick stick I had a contract. I had to change the name of the story to SHIVERS: Ciro but I didn't mind.  So the second monster has come!


Ever since I received the cover and showed it off, you wanted to know when you can get this book in your hot lil hands. Today, I am happy to announce that CIRO is here in eBooks and can be pre-ordered in print! Totally Bound gave it a wonderfully, beautiful cover and you can get your hands on it finally!

Yes, I am very excited because this is my first try at paranormal!

NOW AVAILABLE in PRINT and eBOOK!

Hugs,
Remmy D

Showing off New Faces!!

Here are the covers for my upcoming releases!!! SHIVERS: Ciro, coming soon to Totally Bound and Ma Cheri coming to Evernight!