Book Title: Reigniting Chase

Author: Jeanne St. James

Publisher: Double-J Romance, Inc.

Cover Artist: Golden Czermak @ FuriousFotog

Release Date: July 30, 2022

Genre: Contemporary M/M Romance

Tropes: Gay, mature (both characters over 40), small town, grumpy/sunshine

Themes: Dealing with loss, new beginnings

Heat Rating: 4 flames

Length: 368 pages

It is a standalone story with no cliffhanger.

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An unexpected collaboration between two authors that’s hot enough to spark a fire…

 

Blurb

Chase

After an excruciating loss, I’m desperate for a fresh start.

Away from the painful memories.

Away from everyone I know and anyone who knows my story.

That’s how I end up in Eagle’s Landing, Pennsylvania.

As a bestselling author, my main reason for moving to a remote mountain cabin is to overcome the writer’s block that crushed my creativity for the past two years. My hope is to rediscover my words in the quiet, small town where no one knows me. Or my past.

A place where I can blend in enough that I become invisible.

Rett

Even though Chase, one of my favorite authors, insists he wants to be left alone, I refuse to let him wallow in whatever’s drowning him.

As a local bookstore owner and author myself, I’m intrigued by the man who’s a master of the written word. Unfortunately, his social skills could use a lot of work.

Even so, I’m determined to pull the irritable and frustrating man out of the dark pit he’s fallen into and back to the surface, no matter how hard he fights it. I only hope dragging Chase down that fiery path just might reignite his spark and that I don’t get burned in the process.

Note: Please check the content warning before reading or purchasing. It can be found at the beginning of the book (accessible by Amazon’s “look inside” feature or by downloading the sample) as well as on my website. This standalone gay romance has a guaranteed HEA, no cheating and no cliffhanger.

 

 

In the distance, I could hear the clang of the cow bell as I read out loud. I didn’t know if it was someone coming in late or leaving early. Either way, I made a mental note to disable the cow bell before the next weekly event. It usually wasn’t a problem if I forgot, but in the rare occurrences that it happened, the bell could be distracting.

Like now.

I scanned the folding chairs set up in front of the tiny stage and when I didn’t notice anyone missing, I figured it was the mayor stopping back in to pick up Dolly. Chet never missed an opportunity like this to go face-to-face with the residents of Eagle’s Landing. Besides being a great mayor, the townspeople loved him enough that he’d run unopposed for that spot for the last twenty years.

However, not the avid reader that his wife was, Chet rarely stuck around for book or poetry readings. Most of the time he just dropped Dolly off, then headed down to The Roost to have a few beers until whatever event I was having at the bookstore was over.

As the latecomer appeared from between the rows of shelves and slid quietly into a seat at the back, I stumbled over a sentence at the end of chapter four from my current work-in-progress. It wasn’t like my store’s events got a packed house, so Chase sneaking in at the tail-end of me reading from my first draft didn’t go unnoticed.

I did my best to ignore him as I finished up, opened up the floor to questions and then encouraged people to grab more coffee, as well as a freshly-baked cookie as they browsed or to take along with them on their way out.

As a side hobby, I loved to bake. It not only made me happy, it made the store and my apartment above it smell mouth-wateringly delicious. So, every week I baked something from scratch for the attendees as a thank you for taking the time to stop in. By doing so, it showed they supported the store and the weekly “headliners,” be it an author, a musician, or even a child reading a story they wrote.

While this week it was chocolate chip cookies, next week it could be brownies, banana bread or even a cake. It all depended on my mood and by the end of the half-hour long reading or performance, the platter was usually picked clean.

I liked to think the weekly events I held both filled their mind, as well as their bellies.

“Don’t forget that I have a stack of pre-signed books at the register. I’ll be up there shortly to ring up anyone with purchases,” I called out, even though most people didn’t linger afterward.

From the table nearby, I grabbed my water and chugged down half the bottle since doing a reading was thirsty work.

Plus, I had gotten a little thirsty at seeing Chase slip in at the last minute.

While I had tried to concentrate on reading my own words clearly, I had a difficult time ignoring the man I now looked at with different eyes knowing he played on the same team as I did.

Besides the both of us being authors and readers, we were both gay and single. Chase moving to Eagle’s Landing could very well be kismet. If Chase didn’t have heavy clouds hanging over his head. But the fact was, he did and he’d be emotionally unavailable until those dark clouds cleared.

I doubted that would be anytime soon. A good indicator was him still wearing his husband’s ring, even though the man died a little over two years ago.

Chase was still that “devoted” husband.

While everyone dealt with losing a loved one differently and also at a different pace, after losing Evan, I had learned about and went through the five stages of grief myself: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and finally, acceptance.

I couldn’t imagine it was healthy for him to still be stuck in that fourth stage, the darkest stage, even though I had been warned that part could last the longest and be the most difficult. However, until Chase accepted the loss, he couldn’t move on. And I didn’t mean move on in a way he’d forget his husband, but more like adjust to living without his “other half.”

Maybe he simply needed a shove toward the last stage of acceptance

 

JEANNE ST. JAMES is a USA Today, Amazon and international bestselling romance author who loves writing about strong women and alpha males. She was only thirteen when she first started writing. Her first published piece was an erotic short story in Playgirl magazine. She then went on to publish her first romance novel in 2009. She is now an author of over fifty contemporary romances. She writes M/F, M/M, and M/M/F ménages, including interracial. She also writes M/M paranormal romance under the name J.J. Masters.

 

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