Blog Tour Stop including Excerpt, Author Interview & Giveaway - Lodestones by Naomi MacKenzie ~ BFD Book Blog

Author Name: Naomi MacKenzie

Book Name: Lodestones

Release Date: September 8, 2015

Blurb:

On the eve of a new school year, several groups of college students cross paths as they seek out a secret end-of-summer lake party—including Robin and Charlie, two inseparable friends who discover of the course of the twenty-four hours that their relationship is something much deeper than simple friendship.

Pages or Words: 226 pages

Categories: Contemporary, Fiction, Gay Fiction, M/M Romance, Romance, Young Adult

Excerpt:

Larry holds up the flyer to study the map Florence drew. Barry is leaning to look at it, too, when it’s ripped from between Larry’s fingers.

A greasy man in a campus security uniform stands over them with a pinched expression. His faded nametag reads: Ron Anderchuk. “Another one,” he all but growls. “Where in heck did you get this, boys?”

Barry tries his best to look innocent. Which isn’t all that hard, since he knows nothing.

“Found it on the ground,” Larry lies.

“Uh-huh, uh-huh,” the security guy says. “Extra trouble for littering.” He glares hard at the paper for nearly a minute before looking back at them. “You do know parties like this are illegal, don’t ya, boys? And frowned upon by this here establishment.” He raps his knuckles on the table. “I think it best you stick around here this weekend. That would be best, don’t ya agree?” He widens his beady eyes while he waits for their assent.

Barry looks to Larry. Seeing him nodding, he mimics the gesture.

The security officer’s answering grunt sounds disbelieving. He mutters as he walks away; the flyer with their map is gripped in his fist.

“What are we—”

Larry holds up his hand, stopping Barry’s question in its tracks. “Not to worry; I have a photographic memory. I’ve got the map in here.” He taps a fingertip against his temple.

“Even after all of that? And we do have another problem, if Florence is to be believed.”

Larry hums and strokes his chin. He picks up Barry’s tray and they walk to the windows. The orientation officers are indeed spread across the entire expanse outside, handing out pamphlets and organizing games of lawn bowling and oversized croquet. The entrance to the student parking lot is completely blocked.

Barry should throw in the towel, admit defeat and convince Larry to do the same. And he would, if not for one thing. The one detail that has roped him into the excitement over the lake festivities fully and completely is Kate Zimmermann, captain of the Dicaroon Seadogs field hockey team. Barry was looking through the school’s website while Larry was plotting behind him and he caught sight of her picture. He informed Barry that she was one of the girls who was carrying the van’s bench seat into her dorm room and invited him to the party early that morning.

Barry is in love with Kate Zimmermann. He has been since seeing her on the Dicaroon University website the previous summer. Well, he’s in love with the image of her and her red hair and blue eyes and adorable freckles that are so voluminous that they connect on her face. He has dreamed of red-haired kids calling him Daddy and hitting balls with sticks. Possibly. And she’s throwing the party, so even if Barry will never get up the nerve to speak to her should he live for a thousand years, he has to go. For his future dream-wife.

“Well, then,” Larry says. He sets Barry’s lunch tray down on the bussing station and rubs his hands together. “I guess we are in need of a foolproof plan.”

“A stratagem,” Barry says. He feels immediately foolish for being such a huge dork.

But then Larry grins at him. “Ooh, yes, I like that. A stratagem.”

Buy the book:

store.interludepress.com

Amazon: http://amzn.to/1KmYeRG

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/557390

Indiebound: http://www.indiebound.org/book/9781941530375?aff=InterludePress

About the author:
Naomi MacKenzie is a writer and photographer from the eastern coast of Canada. She considers herself a Maritimer first and a Canadian second, or so she told the standardized testing people in essay form during the eleventh grade. She enjoys vegan baking, walks in the woods and, contrarily, hiding from the sun. Lodestones is her first novel.

Question and answer Today I’m very lucky to be interviewing Naomi MacKenzie author of Lodestones.

Hi Naomi, thank you for agreeing to this interview. Tell us a little about yourself, your background, and your current book.

Hi there! Thanks for having me!

I’m a Canadian from the east coast, currently living in the Toronto area and pining for the sea. I’ve been writing for myself since I was very young, mostly poems and short stories. I have several novels on the go at all times, but Lodestones is my first completed novel. It involves a large cast of high school and college-aged characters seeking out and attending a lake party on the last weekend of summer.

Tell us about your pets – past or present. Pictures are a must! (Not really, but they would be welcome.)

I have a 9 year old black lab/golden retriever mix. For the first few days that he lived with us, his name was Padfoot. But after those first days, we realized that the name didn’t really fit him. He needed something playful, yet would-be sinister. So I chose the name Crowley. People always assume the name comes from one of two sources: the Ozzy Osbourne song, or Aleister Crowley himself, about whom, I believe, the song was written. On very few occasions people do guess correctly. He is named after AJ Crowley, the demon in Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s Good Omens, one of my all-time favourite books. Ironically, the first time we left him alone in the house he got ahold of a paperback copy of Good Omens. He ate nothing but the last page.

He’s a funny thing, my dog. His greatest fears include: planes flying overhead, spraying water, and tiny dogs. He once peed on his own leg when faced with a snarling teacup chihuahua. Not even a regular chihuahua. Teacup. Whenever we have crossed paths with this miniature terror, Crowley has either hidden behind me and soiled himself, or pulled me all the way home, constantly looking back over his shoulder to be sure it wasn’t following. And although the teacup chihuahua was the most fearsome, he has also cowered at the bark of many a Yorkshire terrier, shitzu, corgi and the occasional adorable dachshund. All the while being the size of a small pony.

Here he is with a “stick” he found while out for a walk. He could barely carry it and we had to continuously adjust it so that it was balanced in his mouth. He spent half the walk with his head tilted to one side due to the branch’s weight. What is it with dogs and pieces of wood?