Phoenix is coming

Phoenix releases on 17^th September.

Read a review here

 Blurb:

Young painter Alex Tatton has always loved music. When a tragic accident takes away his parents, he turns to a darker style of music and discovers the rock band, Death Rose. Feeling isolated from his own life, Alex develops a crush on guitarist Danny Death who, despite the name, is vivacious, full of life, and has a reputation for being 'the nicest guy in rock n' roll'.

After a gig, Alex finds Danny to give him a signed painting. Danny is everything a star should be: charming, sexy, a beacon of light in Alex's otherwise dark life, and after meeting him Alex is determined to see him again—and this time he wants more than just an autograph.

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• Pairing: M/M
• Content: Contains explicit content.

Hey guys,

So as my new novel Phoenix is almost here and the blog tour starts next week, I’m just doing a quick heads-up Q&A about the story, and show you some musical inspiration behind the music.

Phoenix Q&A

This isn’t the first rockstar romance you’ve written, is it connected to Crucifox?

Yes, in that Phoenix is set in the same universe and time period (late 1980s, England).

No, in that Phoenix is essentially its own stand alone story, featuring a different band called Death Rose. However, my readers may recognise Death Rose as one of the bands Crucifox toured with.

Are there any crossovers?

Again, yes, but they’re quite small and same goes for the cameos; they’re fleeting, but they are there.

Who are Death Rose?

I had this idea of a British rock band, more commercial and radio friendly than bands I’ve tackled in the past. If Crucifox are the black-clad, cranky goths in the band scene, Death Rose are the happy chaps dressed in spandex and doing whiddly guitar solos. Opposite ends of the spectrum, in fact.

Is this a series?

I did initially have in mind a series, but Phoenix can certainly be read as a standalone story.

What is the story about?

Essentially it’s a coming of age story about a young man named Alex, who is dealing with the tragedy of losing his parents and generally not fitting in at school, and he discovers a sense of belonging with rock music, especially the band Death Rose.

Alex develops a heavy crush on the guitarist, Danny Death, and in a sweet and naïve sort of way, basically sets out to meet his idol.

How is this story different from your previous rockstar stories?

In Crucifox it’s a very insular view of the life and times of a band on the rise. It was in first person, and quite the troubled tale of self discovery, pride coming before a fall, and in-band fighting.

Phoenix is different in that firstly, the view isn’t from within a band, it’s from the outside. I wanted to tell the story of a fan, a simple music fan who loves a band so much he has to meet them.

Phoenix is told in third person, which I think fitted Alex’s personality more, as he’s very young, comes from a sheltered, middle class upbringing and is thrust into this hot and seedy world of rock n’ roll. The story is told through his starstruck eyes, and I hope readers appreciate that while Alex is young and he is maturing, he still manages to stand his ground when it matters and stick to his guns.

What was the inspiration behind Phoenix?

I started off with one idea, that this kid who’d always been kind of a dork and uncool, followed his favourite band around to give his famous-celeb-crush personally drawn pictures. Then the kid grows up and gets a hot make-over, meets his celeb-crush again with the intention to seduce him, except that the celeb-crush remembers the dorky kid who’d been really sweet before, and they form a relationship from there.

And of course, the million dollar question when it comes to dealing with celebrity hook up: can it ever become anything more meaningful?

So that’s the basics covered! Please feel free to ping me and ask anything else. 

This is me on twitter

And this is me on Facebook

There’s quite a few shred-tastic references to music in Phoenix. (Naturally!) The blog tour starts next week over at Piper Vaughn’s blog, and I’ll be doing musical playlists on each post. But for now, this is a handy video guide to what shredding is, and what it sounds like.

As demo’d by the uber cute boys from Finnish rock band, SantaCruz.

 

And here is a fast and sweet song by the same band. I think it captures perfectly the sense of fun and style that I had in mind for Death Rose. 

 Cheers, guys. Party on!

Tush <3