Z.A. Maxfield

Happily. Ever. After.

Happy Birthday America!

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Happy Birthday America!

Crossing Borders is free this weekend. Exclusively at Amazon for now, Free for the Fourth! Get it here.

Tristan knows he’s got issues. His latest ex-girlfriend knows it, too. He can’t blame her for dumping him—even if she sent her brother to do it. Since he can’t stop staring at said brother’s package, he figures it’s about time to put a label on those issues. He likes guys.

He heads to the local bookstore with a foolproof plan to find someone to show him what he’s been missing. But who should crash his little adventure? Officer Michael Truax, who gave him a really expensive ticket back in high school for skateboarding without a helmet.

Michael has been trying to catch Tristan for years…to give him a second ticket. Suddenly faced with “Sparky”, all grown up and looking to get laid, Michael’s protective instinct kicks in—and presents him with an opportunity that’s hard to resist. After all, the kid must know what he’s getting into, so why not?

But when a man with a plan connects with a man with a hunger, the result is nothing short of explosive.

from *ZAM* Since I put Crossing Borders back out in ebook format, I figured what the heck! Make it free for the Fourth!

New. Unfettered. Unabridged.

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CrossingBorders_AudioV1 I have been sitting on this news since RT. Waiting to announce it.

Sparky and Officer Helmet

The Audiobook.

The narrator, Tobias Silversmith, also narrated Vanessa North’s Blueberry Boys, and Anne Tenino’s Too Stupid To Live. They’ll be recording Hell On Wheels for me in the future.

For years, I’ve dreaded putting this book in Audio. I wanted a younger, California-sounding narrator. I wanted someone with decent comic timing.  I wanted someone who feels the rhythm of my words. And there are always cash flow issues. I mean, I originally wanted Ryan Reynolds for the role, but he was busy with that Deadpool project.

And to put a cherry on top of that, I positively HATE, HATE, HATE hearing my own work read out loud by anyone but me. (‘Cause I’m a control freak.)

So this wasn’t an easy task. I’d never even heard of Dark Night Sound until they read for Hell On Wheels. But as soon as I heart that reading, I couldn’t get Tobias out of my mind. I told Amelia Vaughn from Riptide, (who is the most awesome person ON EARTH) that I thought Tobias was absolutely perfect for Crossing Borders, and she agreed.

So, with regard to my little control freak problem, we created a new side job for Amelia. Audiobook Midwife!!! Fellow authors, I seriously cannot be the only person who feels this way. Who can scrape together the cash but dreads the process of creating audiobooks. Hit me up via email, and I will share the magnificent Amelia’s email address, so she might be able to help you too.

Thanks to Amelia, Crossing Borders was produced without me getting bogged down in minutiae, or tearing off my ears and shoving them down the in-sink-erator. And I still had time to write My Cowboy Freedom. (Which is available for pre-order and is coming soon. November, I think.)

To check Crossing’s sample out, simply click on Tristan. You’ll find it on the Amazon page.

CrossingBorders_AudioV1

   See what you think. This is the book that started everything.

 

 

 

Fall in love again!

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Tomorrow is the day!

Get ready for the re-release of Crossing Borders. It’s been nearly ten years since I wrote that book. I was naive about the publishing industry. I was naive about people. I had no clue what I was doing. I had to get my daughter and her middle school friends to teach me how to punctuate dialogue.

Since I’ve written it a lot has changed. People don’t close their cell phones anymore and you can use your mobile phone in hospitals. The Healthcare Information Privacy Act makes it tougher to get information on a patient, but domestic parters have rights they didn’t used to have, and now marriage equality is the law of the land.

I had to really think about what I wanted to do with the book. Did I want to update the material and fix all my glaring mistakes, all the obvious signs I was a newbie writer who didn’t know what she was doing? Or did I want to preserve the experience for the readers who have shared how much they liked the book when they read it. In the end, I left Crossing Borders alone for the most part. It’s dated. It has technical flaws and factual flaws, but hopefully, it still retains its charm. Let’s do a rafflecopter! I’ll be giving away one signed print copy and three (3) ebook copies! The giveaway won’t go live until midnight, when the book does, and then, good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

IF YOU HAVE READ CROSSING BORDERS THIS IS THE SAME BOOK. The only reason you might want it is for the very charming, handsome red-haired boy on the cover. Have you ever seen such blue eyes? Feel free to tell anyone you know who hasn’t read it how much you loved it. Spread the word far and wide.

Sparky is back in print and ebook from Samhain, Amazon, Barnes And Noble and BAM.

I’ve got a few copies I’ll be giving away at at GRL. But if the book means anything to you, please hit me up! I’ll get more if you want. Many people have mentioned Crossing Borders was their “male/male gateway drug”. LOL. My kids think that’s hilarious.

Here are five things you probably didn’t know about Crossing Borders:

  • When I originally wrote the book, it had an entirely different ending! One that, in retrospect, I am so glad I changed. Will I share what it was? No. Let’s just say that when an author makes an asinine choice and then changes it before the reader ever gets a chance to tell her all about it, it’s the better part of valor if she keeps it to herself.
  • Tristan’s and Michael’s mothers are both serious facets of my personality. I have been both those women (well, except the motorcycle part. I can barely ride a bicycle.) And that ginger boy Emma describes? The one who thought he wanted to be a priest? He sent me a sweet note after he read the book. *blush* I forgot I put that bit in.
  • One of my readers, who is now an editor for another publishing company, and had lunch Lucille’s after Border’s Bookstore closed. It was kind of a walk down memory lane. I’ve had readers tell me they live locally and they go to the places mentioned in the books for giggles. (Same with Long Way Home.)
  • I found out quite by accident that in California you don’t have to wear a bicycle helmet if you’re over eighteen. So there goes my plot! But some municipalities require helmets for all ages, as do many resorts, which is where I got the idea that it was illegal to ride without. As a side note: my husband suffered a crippling traumatic brain injury (as a young adult) in a pretty brutal bicycle accident. I recommend people wear them. All people. All the time.
  • I have received letters from people who hated the original Crossing Borders book cover and letters from people who LOVED it. And I mean…really loved it. Like…scary loved it. You can feel free to sound off about that or not. Writes don’t have a lot of control over their covers, but I picked the new guy. Totally, fell in love with all those freckles and said…”I want him.” Fortunately, no one thought I was a perv or anything and they liked him too.

Finally, Sparky!

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CrossingBorders300Cover art is an ongoing drama for writers. Sometimes we love it. Sometimes we don’t. Sometimes we have input and sometimes we’re only allowed to give a vague general idea. I can’t really blame the artists who work on my books for anything. I’m notorious for being extremely poor at filling out cover art request forms. If I’m not quite as happy as I could be, it’s entirely up to me to make appropriate suggestions, but as an artist, I’d make a really great doorstop. I have no artistic talent, in terms of images, whatsoever.

This is probably true of a lot of authors. I’m a word person. When I listen to music, words are what I remember. When I take a test, I need my question to be put into words, often I don’t make the appropriate associations if the question involves a picture. For example, if you were to ask me, “branch is to leaves as hand is to ?” I would answer “Fingers.” But if you were to show me a picture of a branch and some leaves, I would spend all my time figuring out what you are trying to ask. Is the question about colors? Brown and green? Or is it about size? Or photosynthesis? These things are difficult for me. Recently I took a personality test that consisted of a series of pictures, and I couldn’t answer ONE.

Which means, I guess, that without words, I don’t actually have a personality.

At any rate, I’m shit at filling out cover art sheets. But I think the folks at Samhain absolutely nailed it when they redid the cover of Crossing Borders.

Red hair, check

Freckles, check

Blue eyes, OMG check.

Insouciance. Innocence. Mischief. Check, check, check.

Bravo, Samhain! Available for pre-order at All Romance Ebooks!

 

Look at what my daughter made for me!!!

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My baby girl’s a really cool kid who makes Animated Music Videos from her favorite anime series Naruto. When I decided to make a book trailer for “Crossing Borders”.  I spent about a day trying to figure out how to write a script and it became pretty clear that it was going to be a long, straight up, learning curve for me. She kind of took pity on me and made me a video, using royalty free music, pictures I bought from iStock Photo, and Sony Vegas.  I’m delighted with the results.

She wants me to tell you to watch it at YouTube, on high quality, so her genius can be appreciated. (I said the part about genius, but I am, after all…her mother.)

surprise

What she said…

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