Guest Post and Giveaway: Counting Fence Posts by Kelly Jensen

Please help us give a warm welcome to author Kelly Jensen today, on the tour for her new holiday novella, Counting Fence Posts. Enjoy Kelly’s guest post, and then be sure to check out the Rafflecopter widget below for the chance to win stuff.

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The Freezer

There’s a part in Counting Fence Posts where Henry and Marc joke about their situation being like a bad reality show: two people trapped in a car together until they sort out their differences. They call their show “The Freezer.”

Henry and Marc know each other; they work together. They’re not much more than uneasy allies, though. Members of the same team that rarely end up in the same place on the field. So I decided to put them in the same place and see what happened. I hoped they’d figure stuff out. I entertained several fantasies about what exactly might happen after that. I narrowed down the possibilities of what they could get away with in the back seat of a car. Then I started writing and hoped for the best.

Counting Fence Posts isn’t all chatter. A lot of it is actually fairly deep conversation. It’s the beginning of Henry and Marc’s story, so what they talk about—and how, and why—is quite important. As for why they spend so much time talking, well, it’s the only way I could see these guys connecting.

Attraction wasn’t an issue. These guys want each other. Neither knew how to take the first step, though. Marc was working up the wherewithal to ask Henry out, but I don’t know if he would have actually done it or not. Henry can come across as somewhat aloof. Marc may have decided to save his pride—or he might have asked only to have Henry return an expression of absolute bafflement. Either way, that first date could have been all kinds of awkward. The conversation stilted—if they got beyond weather and work and trying to figure out why they were sitting on opposite sides of a table in a restaurant neither of them had ever visited before.

They wouldn’t have connected over dinner. These guys needed subzero temperatures and three feet of snow. They had to be packed into a closed space with the niggling worry they might not get back out.

We writers sometimes do horrible things to our characters. But trapping these guys together in a blizzard meant that after they sorted out some of their differences, they could turn their attention toward the best ways to share body heat! See, in romance it almost always turns out for the best. ;)

You can read an excerpt of Counting Fence Posts here. Follow the tour for more posts including a character interview and “The Freezer” playlist, and don’t forget to enter my giveaway for a chance to win copies of my previous novellas with Dreamspinner Press and a $25 credit at the Dreamspinner Press store.

~ Kelly Jensen ~

About the Book

There are over two hundred thousand fence posts between Syracuse and Boston. Henry Auttenberg likes numbers—it’s his job—but he isn’t going to count them all, even if the view outside the rental car is less confounding than the driver, his attractive but oh so obnoxious colleague, Marcus Winnamore. It’s Christmas Eve, and Henry would much rather be home with his family. When the blizzard that grounded their flight forces them off the road, however, he’s stuck with Marc until the storm passes—or a plow digs them out.

As the temperature outside plummets, the atmosphere inside the car slowly heats up. Henry learns the true reason for Marc’s chilly distance—he’s not exactly straight… maybe… and he’s been fantasizing about Henry’s mouth, among other things. Confession laid out, Marc is all for sharing body heat… and more. Henry isn’t interested in being an experiment, but as the night and cold deepen, he could be convinced to balance certain risk against uncertain reward.

Purchase Links: Amazon | B&N | Kobo | ARe | Dreamspinner Press

About the Author

If aliens ever do land on Earth, Kelly will not be prepared, despite having read over a hundred stories of the apocalypse. Still, she will pack her precious books into a box and carry them with her as she strives to survive. It’s what bibliophiles do.

Kelly is the author of a number of novels, novellas and short stories, including the Chaos Station series, co-written with Jenn Burke. A lot of what she writes is speculative in nature, but sometimes it’s just about a guy losing his socks and/or burning dinner. Because life isn’t all conquering aliens and mountain peaks. Sometimes finding a happy ever after is all the adventure we need.

Connect with Kelly: Twitter | Facebook | Website

The Giveaway

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Follow the Tour

7/23     Counting Fence Posts Gay Book Reviews
7/25     Counting Fence Posts The Novel Approach
7/26     Counting Fence Posts Love Bytes
7/27     Both Books!    Dreamspinner Blog
7/27     Best in Show   Gay Book Reviews
7/27     Best in Show   Queer Sci Fi
7/27     Best in Show   Here Be Magic
7/28     Counting Fence Posts Joyfully Jay
7/28     Best in Show   Diverse Reader
7/29     Best in Show   Foodie Friday
7/29     Counting Fence Posts Divine Magazine
8/1       Best in Show   Sinfully
8/2       Best in Show   Prism Book Alliance