Help, My Boyfriend’s an Alien!
A Mad About the Brit Boys anthology by JL Merrow and Josephine Myles
Release date: 12th January 2016
Preorder link: mybook.to/boyfriendsanalien
Word Count: 14,000
Price: $0.99/£0.99/€0.99
ASIN: B019PFPJO2
Other titles in the series:
Boy Meets Boy Meets Boy (15th March 2016)
Anthology blurb:
Love—and desire—that’s out of this world...
It’s time to suit up, take those protein pills, and boldly come where no man has come before. Take a trip to the future, or do your bit for inter-planetary relations with some close encounters of a very unusual kind.
In this erotic science fiction triple feature you’ll meet a cat that’s anything but cute and cuddly, take a pill that’ll make you fall in love—for a night—and discover desire that transcends the limitations of a human body. It’s a brave new world as you explore the unknown in three short stories that push the boundaries of love in ways both thoughtful and tongue-in-cheek.
These stories have all been previously published, but are now available exclusively in this anthology.
Anthology introduction by JL Merrow (taken from the ebook):
They say you are what you eat: well, I spent my formative years ravenously devouring all the science fiction I could get my hands on. I read and re-read my mother’s ever-increasing stock of battered paperbacks: Anne McCaffrey’s Dragons of Pern, Frank Herbert’s Dune, Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot and Foundation, Larry Niven’s Ringworld... The list could go on and on. My local library introduced me to Arthur C Clarke’s 2001, Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and John Wyndham’s dystopian futures among many, many others.
Jo, too, started young—like me, she grew up watching Star Trek and Doctor Who, while her introduction to reading sci-fi came at the age of ten with the discovery of US children’s writer William Sleator, author of the acclaimed House of Stairs. In her teens she graduated to The Next Generation, and authors such as Ray Bradbury and Douglas Adams. Bitten by the bug-eyed monster, she studied The Matrix and Blade Runner at university, and even wrote a dissertation on Utopian fiction. But it wasn’t until after her academic career ended that she fell into writing her own science fiction, inspired by the gay love story on the Doctor Who spin-off, Torchwood.
I still remember all the fuss when the first Star Wars film came out (yes, I really am that old). I just didn’t get it—here everyone was raving about adventures in space, and I was thinking, so what’s new? I’ve been reading this stuff for years! What I didn’t realise at the time was the effect such a blockbuster film would have on revitalising the science fiction genre and massively expanding its popularity (hey, I wasn’t that old). Without Star Wars, would we have had Firefly? Alien? The Matrix?
It’s amazing to think how prevalent science fiction now is in popular culture. But then again, why shouldn’t it be? The worlds may be strange, the future may be another country—but at the heart of it all, it’s the people who matter. And people, whether human or alien, can’t go on without relationships with others.
I hope you enjoy these three short visions of relationships which might at first sight seem very different from our own experience—but at their heart, are all about people who want to love, and be loved.
Thanks for reading—and if you enjoy the stories, please consider leaving a review. Who knows, it might prompt Jo to finally write some more of her epic rent boy space opera, Storm & Lightning!
All the best
Jamie x
Individual story blurbs:
Better Than Cola
Human social etiquette. Physical contact. Pronouns. They’re not easy to handle, when you’re a swarm creature with a composite mind, newly fitted into a male human body. Especially when you find your body reacting to the human man assigned to help you acclimatise...
Insta-Love™
Skip likes to party, and he likes loving men. What he doesn’t like is the morning after, when the effects of the Insta-Love™ mood patch have worn off and he’s left with an awkeard social encounter. So when he wakes up next to a naked bear of a man, his first instinct is to kick the stranger out. But Wildman has other ideas, and Skip may have to learn how to snuggle.
Gifted in Tongues
Space pilot Torvald “Spitz” Spitzbergen wakes up in an alien jail with a hangover, no clear memory of the night before – and a six foot ginger Felid as a cell mate. How is he going to get out of this one? And more importantly, will he get a chance to check out the Felid’s legendary talents first?
Individual story reviews:
Better Than Cola
Summer Storms is a composite creature that has been assigned to Nathan Chambers, so Nathan can help him acclimatize to dealing with humans. They’re more than a little overwhelmed by all they’ve been experiencing, but can’t stop themselves from being drawn to Nathan and surprisingly it seems Nathan is equally drawn to them.
This was an interesting story. Short and sweet, I loved Summer’s reactions to all they were experiencing and well, how could you not love Nathan? He’s just awesome. Really enjoyable!
Rating: 4.5 Stars!!!
Insta-Love™
Skip wakes up the morning after partying with a naked bear of a man, who doesn’t seem as inclined to leave as Skip would have liked. Wildman is set on showing Skip that he doesn’t need an Insta-Love™ mood patch to relate to him.
I adore Josephine Myles writing and this short story was not the exception. It was sweet and kind of awkward, just like Skip and both Skip and Wildman were great and very hot together. Very recommendable!
Rating: 4.5 Stars!!!
Gifted in Tongues
Spitz wakes up in an alien jail with a hangover, no clue as to how or why he is in jail and a six foot ginger Felid as a cellmate. How is he ever going to get out of his plight?
This story was my favorite of the three. There’s just something about a sarcastic fun character like Spitz that draws me in like nothing else. Even in the worst of circumstances he just couldn’t or wouldn’t shut up, pushing and pushing and pushing some more. Never mind that I just loved Spitz and Tao together, they were definitely hot! A definite must-read!
Rating: 5 Stars!!!
Author bios
JL Merrow is that rare beast, an English person who refuses to drink tea. She read Natural Sciences at Cambridge, where she learned many things, chief amongst which was that she never wanted to see the inside of a lab ever again. Her one regret is that she never mastered the ability of punting one-handed whilst holding a glass of champagne.
She writes across genres, with a preference for contemporary gay romance and mysteries, and is frequently accused of humour. Her novel Slam! won the 2013 Rainbow Award for Best LGBT Romantic Comedy, and her novella Muscling Through and novel Relief Valve were both EPIC Awards finalists.
JL Merrow is a member of the Romantic Novelists’ Association, International Thriller Writers, Verulam Writers’ Circle and the UK GLBTQ Fiction Meet organising team.
Find JL Merrow online at: www.jlmerrow.com, on Twitter as @jlmerrow, and on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/jl.merrow
English through and through, Josephine Myles is addicted to tea and busy cultivating a reputation for eccentricity. She writes gay erotica and romance, but finds the erotica keeps cuddling up to the romance, and the romance keeps corrupting the erotica. Jo blames her rebellious muse but he never listens to her anyway, no matter how much she threatens him with a big stick. She’s beginning to suspect he enjoys it.
Jo publishes regularly with Samhain, and now has over ten novels and novellas under her belt. Her novel Stuff won the 2014 Rainbow Award for Best Bisexual Romance, and her novella Merry Gentlemen won the 2014 Rainbow Award for Best Gay Romantic Comedy. She has also been known to edit anthologies and self-publish on occasion, although she prefers to leave the “boring bits” of the ebook creation process to someone else. She loves to be busy, and is currently having fun trying to work out how she is going to fit in her love of writing, dressmaking and attending cabaret shows in fabulous clothing around the demands of a preteen with special needs and a soon-to-be toddler.
Website and blog: http://josephinemyles.com/
Twitter: @JosephineMyles
Lips garland his body with kisses, a tongue snakes down his spine and parts his cheeks. The world explodes into a thousand “I love you-s”. His face is wet with tears as he laughs, curses, shouts his pleasure into the night.
“Light!” Skip said, his voice thick with sleep. His eyelids unstuck themselves, and for a brief, innocent moment all was a haze of fuzzy colors and shapes; a luminous promise of delights. Then the Myo-Tech™ lenses adjusted themselves, and the pod shrank back into a startling precision. Skip groaned, staring up at the regimented tyranny of his ceiling tiles, the throbbing of his head and the tenderness of his arse telling him it must be a Sunday. Recovery day.
Throwing-the-other-guy-out-before-he-ruined-things day.
A soft snort from under the covers next to him confirmed it.
Fuck. Skip hated this bit.
Hands rubbing his scalp, gentle yet needy. Salty fluid against his tongue as he swallows down all the way, straining his jaw but it’s worth it. Worth it for this man he loves. This man whose body he worships. This man...
What was his name?
Skip yanked down the covers and stared the stranger in the face. He lingered over the graceful curve of his closed lids, matched by the arch of his brows and the Cupid’s bow of his upper lip. A fleshy, but elegantly formed face, the lower half darkened by stubble. The stranger must have money; features like that would have cost him a fair bit. Skip’s eyes flicked to his own extravagance – the tattoo a subtle gray under Dai-light, but which swirled with glowing colors in the Nite-light. It covered eighty-five percent of his body now, the only bits left to be inked the ones which were too expensive or painful to contemplate just yet.
It was the tattoo that had caught this guy’s attention, he remembered. Skip had been dancing, clad in nothing more than a pair of skimpy white shorts, high on Blyss™ and the prospect of Sunday’s brief respite from work. The music was pumping, the club heaving, but a circle had opened up around him – the sight of his colors blurring as he moved was always a draw.
And then this guy had stepped into the space, and asked Skip if he were an angel.
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