Long and Short Reviews welcomes Sarah Black who is celebrating today’s release of American Road Trip. You can read our review of it here.
In 1972, my dad was transferred down to Key West to go to Submarine School. We moved halfway through the school year, and I was sent off to St Mary’s for the rest of sixth grade. I was happy to be out of Pascagoula, Mississippi. I didn’t fit in. I thought Key West was right up my alley. I tried to read some Ernest Hemingway to get ready but nothing he wrote made any sense. Mother was reading Tennessee Williams.
It turned out the nuns at St Mary’s were not as free spirited in regards to uniform regulations as I was hoping. They did not appreciate my rainbow knee socks, the ones I wore to honor Janis Joplin. In fact, they pulled me out of class and made me sit on a bench outside the office until my mother could pick me up.
On the plus side, we could wear our Girl Scout uniforms on Wednesdays. My next opportunity I rolled up the hem and taped it to a reasonable 1972 level with Scotch tape. Then I climbed a tree on the playground and waited for an interesting boy to show up. One did, and he had red hair and a cigarette lifted from his dad. The nuns were not amused at this, either, and called Mother to come get me again.
Mother might have been on their side regarding the taped hem, but the nuns had made a couple of mistakes. First, she overheard the office staff referring to us as “transients” when we were enrolling. That did not sit well. Then the nuns gave me a group of placement tests, and I scored off their charts. So they asked me if I had been cheating, and did I need to go to confession? No, I did not, and I told them I did not need to cheat because I was smart and their tests were easy. They called my mother and reported both the tree and Girl Scout uniform incident, and told her I had been caught cheating. And she said she didn’t believe it. I didn’t need to cheat, because I was smart, and a reader.
Then they made their second mistake. A nun laughed at the idea that I was smart, and a reader. So my mother brought my library list to the office. I was back on the bench outside, my usual spot. My mother must have been working on her speech as she drove to the school, because she lit in the moment she hit the office door. She didn’t speak to me; just pointed a finger that I took to mean ‘don’t move.’ She described the history of my reading life, the libraries in which I owned a card, my current books from the local library, and the books the family owned, at great expense, including a set of Great Books that had been saved when a hurricane blew our house down because they had been wrapped in plastic and put up high because the Great Books, and all books, were more valuable to us that anything else.
It was a great speech, and unfortunately the nuns were then able to hit back regarding the tree and the red headed boy and the cigarette. Mother was game, though. She said she would deal with it, because she was the parent, and they were never again to misunderstand that they had a reading prodigy in their midst.
The best aspect of this drug is that it lets purchase generic viagra continue reading that you enjoy the moment rather than choose “the moment”. This is because generic manufacturers don’t incur the same high costs of marketing and developing the original purchase tadalafil online check drug. While there are treatments, many men aren’t buy cialis on line keen on discussing this problem with doctors, therefore aren’t aware that there is help available. Life satisfaction tends to be higher in egalitarian countries; people will experience less inequality and be able to choose that best fit their abilities and desires where equality is browse this link sildenafil professional more prominently displayed. In the car on the way home, her fingers were white on the steering wheel, and she avoided looking at the taped hem on my Girl Scout uniform. She asked me if I was starting to be interested in boys. I said yes. She asked if I had any questions. At this point, I was worried she was going to snap the steering wheel in two. I wondered when I could start dating, and she said she would let me know. She said in the meantime, she thought it would be okay if I started reading some romances. There were several Victoria Holt books she had read, and I might like to read The Mistress of Mellyn or The Bride of Pendorric.
American Road Trip, out March 16 from Dreamspinner. A free epilogue, Tino Takes the Cake, will be available free on the Dreamspinner blog on release day!
A single moment—or a single mistake—can change everything.
When Captain James Lee Hooker and his lover, Sergeant Easy Jacobs, were in the Army, they made a mistake that got a young soldier hurt. Three years later, they’re civilians again, living far apart, haunted by what they lost. Now that young soldier needs their help.
With his grandmother’s one-eyed Chihuahua riding shotgun, James Lee climbs into Easy’s pickup for a trip across the American Southwest. They set out to rescue a friend, but their journey transforms them with the power of forgiveness.
About the Author: Sarah Black is a writer, a reader, an artist, a veteran, and a mom. She has been a Lambda finanlist and nominated for a Pushcart.
Buy the book at Dreamspinner Press, Amazon, or Barnes and Noble.
Home, love, and possibilities he never imagined are waiting for Billy Joe to claim them. But first he needs to escape the horrors of his past.
Andrew grew up in western Michigan with a father who loved to tell stories and a mother who loved to read them. Since then he has lived throughout the country and traveled throughout the world. He has a master’s degree from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and works in information systems for a large corporation.
Sometimes the people we need most aren’t bonded by blood but by something deeper. 
Kelly Cannon is generally satisfied with his life—he has a great job that he loves, friends, and a wonderful family. But his love life has reached a new level of pitiful. Why? Well, his heart decided to break all the rules. Don’t fall in love with a straight guy. And definitely don’t fall in love with your best friend.
Two werewolf households, both alike in dignity….
Once upon a time, a prince lived in a magical kingdom called Turquoise, New Mexico.
Nick Caratelli flees the city in an attempt to escape a broken relationship and a career he never wanted. He plans to set up a bed-and-breakfast in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch country—despite the fact he has no experience in renovating the old building. Luckily his handsome neighbor Sam approaches him with a curious proposal: he’ll help with the restoration in exchange for Nick babysitting his niece.
THE PERFECT GIFT (Bobby and Paolo Holiday Stories, Book 2)
What reviewers said about A Home for the HolidaysK/I>, Bobby and Paolo Holiday Stories, Book 1:
Theatre professor Nicky Abbondanza is directing a Sherlock Holmes musical in a professional summer stock production at Treemeadow College, co-starring his husband and theatre professor colleague Noah Oliver as Dr. John Watson. When cast members begin toppling over like hammy actors at a curtain call, Nicky dons Holmes’ persona on stage and off. Once again Nicky and Noah will need to use their drama skills to figure out who is lowering the street lamps on the actors before the handsome couple get half-baked on Baker Street. You will be applauding and shouting Bravo for Joe Cosentino’s fast-paced, side-splittingly funny, edge-of-your-seat entertaining fifth novel in this delightful series. Curtain up, the game is afoot!
Bestselling author Joe Cosentino was voted Favorite LGBT Mystery, Humorous, and Contemporary Author of the Year by the readers of Divine Magazine for Drama Queen. He also wrote the other novels in the Nicky and Noah mystery series: Drama Muscle, Drama Cruise (Lethe Press), Drama Luau, Drama Detective, Drama Fraternity, Drama Castle; the Dreamspinner Press novellas: In My Heart/An Infatuation & A Shooting Star, A Home for the Holidays, The Perfect Gift, The Naked Prince and Other Tales from Fairyland, The Perfect Gift; the Cozzi Cove series: Cozzi Cove: Bouncing Back, Cozzi Cove: Moving Forward, Cozzi Cove: Stepping Out, Cozzi Cove: New Beginnings (NineStar Press); and the Jana Lane mysteries: Paper Doll, Porcelain Doll, Satin Doll, China Doll, Rag Doll (The Wild Rose Press). He has appeared in principal acting roles in film, television, and theatre, opposite stars such as Bruce Willis, Rosie O’Donnell, Nathan Lane, Holland Taylor, and Jason Robards. Joe is currently Chair of the Department/Professor at a college in upstate New York, and is happily married. Joe was voted 2nd Place Favorite LGBT Author of the Year in Divine Magazine’s Readers’ Choice Awards, and his books have received numerous Favorite Book of the Month Awards and Rainbow Award Honorable Mentions. 
The heir apparent to a vast international company, Henry Walker has focused his entire life on pleasing his cold and distant father, a futile effort that’s left him no time for life, love, or making his own decisions. He has just one friend—one dirty little secret—Archie Banks. Raised on the Walker estate alongside Henry, Archie is now Henry’s driver, bodyguard… and occasional lover. Archie is loyal, but he’s about to graduate from college and has plans for his life that don’t include living every moment at the beck and call of Henry’s father. Not even for Henry.
