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Thursday, December 15, 2016

Author Anecdotes with Libby Doyle (The Covalent Series—a scifi romance)

Life informs fiction, and that includes stories about hot alien warriors 

Do ewe ever wonder how a writer’s experience translates into fiction? My sexy urban fantasies—The Passion Season and The Pain Season—are tales of intrigue and adventure, but their core is the love between a superhuman warrior from another dimension and a tough-as-a-mother FBI agent.

Tons of drama can be mined from a relationship between beings from such radically different cultures. The opportunities for misunderstandings are endless. The scenes can be sad or angry, but above all, they can be funny. We should never forget the humor. To bring it out, I rely on memories of my own cultural blunders and misunderstandings, in spirit if not in detail.

Beijing, near the Forbidden City. 
One of my favorites happened when I lived in Beijing, working as a copy editor for China Daily, an English-language newspaper. On the weekend I wanted to escape the city to a place in the hills with a famous meandering river. The day was hot as hell. Grit from the dirty air clung to my skin and the train station was packed and smelly. I had to plunge into the crowd to get my ticket.

Now, when Americans want to buy a ticket, we line up in an orderly fashion. Ditto for the British and the Japanese. The Chinese? Nah. They don’t line up so much as clump.

When I finally got to the ticket window, I struggled to communicate with the woman behind the glass (to call my Chinese rudimentary would be a compliment). People were crowded all around me. They lost patience. They reached around me and across my face to shove money at the cashier. They pressed me up against the hard counter, speaking in clipped tones. I imagined they were saying, “Give us our tickets. Make her wait if she can’t ask clearly.”

The frustration, the heat and the stink, the grit in my eyes, finally got to me. I gripped the counter, shoved off, spread my arms wide and shouted, “Back the f*** off!” They backed off. If they couldn’t understand my words they certainly understood their intent.

For a beat, it was tense. Then I heard a snort. I looked over and two little old Chinese ladies with merry eyes in wizened faces were laughing their asses off at me. I looked behind me. All the other people in the clump were laughing, too. Even the cashier. I cracked up. We had a grand old time. Eventually we all got our tickets. It’s a wonderful memory, one of many from my time there, and I feel lucky that I got to learn a little about the Chinese. Toughest people I’ve ever seen, and of course, there’s that great sense of humor.

Life is often absurd. If you have the luxury, it helps to not take it too seriously. I wanted to bring that sensibility to my books. They go dark from time to time, and the stakes are high, but I never want readers to be far from a chuckle. I hope I can make you laugh out loud.
Holy fried scorpions on a stick! Snacks at the Beijing Night Market. 

by Libby Doyle
October 31, 2016
352 pages

ON THE AUTUMNAL EQUINOX, ZAN O'GARA'S LIFE WILL CHANGE.
Tonight’s the night. Rainer Barakiel is going to tell me all his secrets. I thought I’d be excited, but I feel like someone shoved a knife into my gut.

Heh. Fitting, considering I met Rainer because of his expertise in edged weapons. The daggers used in that ritual sacrifice became our best lead, thanks to him. What kind of omen is it, that I met the love of my life because someone found a human spleen in the bushes?

I didn’t expect someone like him. When he opened his door I couldn’t talk, I was so stunned. God, how I flirted with him. Hell of a way for an FBI agent to act. This whole relationship is a hell of a way for an FBI agent to act. I didn’t want to face that he was hiding things from me.

What if he has something to do with this murder?

I’m being paranoid. He’s denied being a criminal and I believe him. I don’t see how my instincts could be so wrong. He can’t be bad. He can’t.

He’s hiding things from me, but he loves me. I feel it. I feel it. Maybe he didn’t expect to fall in love with me, but he did, and now he wants out. He’s going to confess, leave it all behind. For me.

Christ, O'Gara. Get ahold of yourself.

I wonder, after he tells me all his secrets, will this become a wacky story we love to tell? Or a story I tell only to myself, alone in a stale-smelling apartment, stewing in pain? The story of how my heart got damaged beyond repair.

WARNING: This book contains foul language, violence, and explicit sex. Adults only! Although not a cliffhanger, this is not a stand-alone novel. The story will continue in The Vengeance Season, arriving in 2017. Visit http://libbydoyle.com



Book One is currently $.99

The Passion Season:
Book I of the Covalent Series
by Libby Doyle
Genre: urban fantasy/paranormal romance
Publisher: Fairhill Publishing LLC
March 20, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9972985-0-5
ASIN: B01CCE4U8E
Number of pages: 556 in ePub
Word Count: 117,259
Cover Artist: Damonza.com
In loving him, she overcomes her pain, but to discover his true identity would shred the reality she thought she knew.

He is Barakiel. Warrior. Exile. Hopeless romantic. Barakiel is Covalent, a race of ancient beings who use their great power to keep the elemental forces of Creation and Destruction in Balance. The Covalent Council exiled Barakiel to the Earthly Realm as the price of the treachery of his father, Lucifer, who wages perpetual war against it. Lucifer also relentlessly pursues his son. The Council thinks Lucifer views his son’s power as a threat, but Barakiel knows his father seeks to destroy even the memory of love.

She is Alexandra “Zan” O'Gara. FBI Agent. Army veteran. Recovering drunk. Zan’s troubled past left her with little interest in men, but she had never encountered anyone like the stunning Rainer Barakiel. Zan believes Rainer is a wealthy businessman with expertise in edged weapons who can help her with a case. From the moment she meets him she wants him more than she’s ever wanted anything, but her intense attraction is as frightening as it is thrilling.

This is their love story. As Zan’s deepening feelings for Rainer lead her to confront her emotional damage, he struggles to meet the demands of his home world so he will be free to love her, and to reveal his true nature. Through the gruesome crime that first brought Zan to his door, Barakiel learns that his presence in the Earthly Realm has placed some of its most vulnerable citizens in danger. Compelled to protect them, he undertakes a series of duties he may not survive, even as Zan rescues him from centuries of a deadened heart.


WARNING: This book contains foul language, violence, explicit sex, and descriptions of sexual violence. Adults only! Please be aware that the story continues in The Pain Season, available now. Visit http://libbydoyle.com



About the Author:
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Libby Doyle is an attorney and former journalist who took a walk around the corporate world and didn’t like it. She escapes the mundane by writing extravagant yarns, filled with sex and violence. She loves absurd humor, travel, punk rock, and her husband.

3 comments:

  1. Thanks so much for the opportunity. I had fun putting it together.

    ReplyDelete
  2. What a human and humane (not to mention funny) anecdote. Your books, though much different, are as compelling and well-written as this story.

    ReplyDelete