QSFers A. M. Burns And A. T. Weaver have a new MM paranormal romance book out: “Visions of Rage.”
Blood runs deep in Jemez Springs.
Psychic cougar shifter Connor McGriffin is used to his visions leading him around. For years, he’s followed them back and forth across the country to the people who need his help. When his comfortable vacation in the mountains is interrupted by a vision of a woman dying, he can’t see enough details to find the killer and stop him from striking again. Facing the most dangerous foe he’s ever dealt with, Connor needs all the help he can get.
Small town deputy and wolf shifter, Danny Lupan is getting bored of chasing speeders and the occasional drug dealer. When the call comes that Sandoval County has its first murder in years, and it happened in his jurisdiction, he jumps at the chance to find the killer, no matter the danger involved. Little does he know, he might lose his heart, his life, or maybe both.
When a cougar and a wolf join forces, the bad guys better watch out, because the fur’s going to fly, in more ways than one.
Join Connor and Danny on their first adventure together in the start of the fast-paced, suspenseful thriller series Shifter Force.
Get It At Amazon
Excerpt
He picked up his tea glass and brought it to his lips. Suddenly a vision hit. Connor swallowed as the tea in his mouth went sour. As it hit, he relayed what he saw in vivid detail; sometimes when the vision came fast, in bits and pieces it was just easier to speak what he was seeing, and hope the people around him could remember the bits he wouldn’t.
“It’s happening again. She gets out of a white RV with green pinstriping like the one that passed me yesterday. She’s wearing black slacks, a white blouse with lettering embroidered on the left front of it, and low-heeled black shoes. I can’t make out the words on her blouse. Her hands are tied together in front of her. She has long red hair pulled back in a ponytail. He’s wearing jeans, a white t-shirt, and boots. I can’t see his face. His shirt is dirty, looks like food stains. She’s crying. He pushes her over the low wall. She turns and starts running. She trips and falls. He walks over to her and turns her over on her back. A single shot to her forehead. She isn’t happy like the one I found yesterday was.”
Angie fumbled the plate of burger and fries she was carrying but managed to keep it upright. She set it on the table and stared at Connor. The look on her face was one that edged on fear. He’d seen it and worse on other faces over the years when his gifts showed themselves in public. With practice, he’d learned to ignore the looks, but sometimes, they still hit him hard. He didn’t like being someone people feared.
He jumped up, yanked a $20 bill out of his wallet, threw it on the table, and grabbed the burger off of the plate. “Keep the change, Angie. Come on, Dawg. Let’s roll.” He ran for the door.
“You heard him, Danny,” Sheriff Callaway said loud enough the whole dinner must’ve heard. “Go.”
Deputy Lupan followed on Connor’s heels.
Connor grabbed the roll bar with one hand and swung into the open side of his Jeep. If he hadn’t had a shifter’s reflexes and strength, he’d have dropped his burger as he slid into his seat. He held the burger in his mouth as he fastened his seatbelt. The juices from the burger made him drool, and he didn’t care. He was hungry, but needed to get out to where the latest body was cooling in the New Mexico heat.
Deputy Lupan stood on the sidewalk, his brown eyes wide and questioning.
“You coming, Dawg?” Connor snarled as he pulled his keys out of his pocket, wishing he’d done that before he’d gotten in and fastened his seat belt, but then he might’ve dropped his burger.
Without a word, Deputy Lupan jumped into the passenger side.
Connor stuck the burger in Lupan’s face as soon as he had the seatbelt fastened. “Hold this.” He started the Jeep, backed out of the parking space, and took off.
“Will you slow down before I fall out?” The deputy grabbed the bar in front of him with his free hand. “Where’re the doors to this thing anyway?”
“Back in Santa Fe along with the top.” Connor figured he didn’t need to obey speed limits since he had the county deputy in the car with him; he never did in similar situations in Santa Fe. He put his foot hard on the gas pedal.
“Where are we going?” Deputy Lupan snapped as Connor turned hard to the right, and he white-knuckled the bar in front of him.
“Following the scent.” Connor reached over, grabbed the burger, took a large bite, and handed it back. “You’re a wolf. You should be good at that.”
Lupan lifted the burger to his mouth and also took a bite.
“Mushrooms? Yuck!” He spit something out the side of the Jeep.
Connor glared. “I said hold it, not eat it,” he hissed and snatched the burger back once he had the Jeep in fifth.
“You didn’t give me time to get my lunch.” Lupan growled.
Author Bio
A.M. Burns
A.M. started writing fiction in high school…nearly forty years ago. It was how he passed the time between class assignments. It was particularly effective at making teachers think he was busy with class work. In later years he also used it to look busy during corporate jobs. he completed his first book in high school and have never stopped writing.
He self-published his first public-ready book in 2010. “Perfect Love” is an LGBT Urban Fantasy novel. About the same time his first professionally published short story “Sticks and Stones” was published in the anthology “How the West was Wicked”. Since then he has published numerous books and short stories, both through traditional markets and indie, making him a true hybrid author. He currently tracks the sales of 130 different titles of various lengths, under several pen names, that he earns royalties on.
He has assisted various co-authors in editing their works for publication, both trad and indie. He has been the editor on several anthologies for Out in Colorado Fiction Writers, and been co-editor on two anthologies for Colorado Springs Fiction Writers Group. He has been an active member of the Colorado Springs Fiction Writers Group for eight years, and learned the fine art of critiquing and editing for authors of all levels of skill.
He’s interested in helping with the 2018 Whit and Whimsy anthology because he likes helping new authors grow their craft and getting good edits is a productive way to do that.
A.T. Weaver
A.T. is a 70+ great-grandmother who often thought about trying her hand at writing. Having been a prolific reader of romance novels all of her adult life, she was sure she could do it. Most of her working life was spent as an accountant and bookkeeper. Although she’d done some song writing back in her 30s and early 40s, it wasn’t until she was 60 that a friend said he’d “like to read a book where the boy gets the boy and they ride off into the sunset together.” She was unemployed at the time and decided to give it a try. The result was Acceptance: One Man’s Quest.
Since then, she’s self-published about a dozen titles, mostly with gay characters, in various genres: contemporary and urban fantasy, (such as time travel, shifters, and witches) all with a hint of romance.
A.M. and A.T. started as Facebook friends doing beta reads for each other nearly ten years ago. She’s one of the ‘new’ authors he has taken under his wing. Their first joint effort was a dragon-shifter, police drama called “The Black Fin Case”. During National Novel Writing Month a few years ago, she came up with the idea of a psychic mountain-lion shifter partnered with a wolf shifter chasing a serial killer through New Mexico. When A.M. did the beta on what she had written, he thought that with some additions, it would make a good series. Thus, Shifter Force was born.