A Hard Day’s Night
by Mia Kerick
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GENRE: YA LGBTQ Contemporary Romance novella
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BLURB:
High
school senior Kalin (Lennon) Macready knows several facts for certain: John
Lennon is his hero. Beaumont Finley Danforth II (Fin) is his best friend.
And—this is the complicated one—he feels more for Fin than mere friendship.
For weeks, Lennon
pesters Fin, who like Lennon admits to questioning his sexual orientation, for
a commitment to spend twenty-four hours together exploring “the gay side of
life.” Fin reluctantly agrees. Each boy will seek to answer the daunting
question, Am I gay? Lennon pre-plans the day, filling the hours with what he
assumes “gay life” is all about: shopping for fashionable clothing, indulging
in lavish dessert crepes, boogying to Taylor Swift’s “Shake it Off”, and yes,
listening to show tunes.
However, Lennon
quickly realizes that in creating his plan he has succumbed to the most common
and distorted of gay stereotypes. Can he be gay and not fit them? And more
importantly, is it possible that spending one very hard day and night together
will help Fin accept that he’s gay, too? If so, maybe Lennon has a shot at
winning the heart of the boy of his dreams.
“A Hard Day’s Night”
is an amusing young adult contemporary romance about two boys who seek to
discover if they must fulfill stereotypes to be together.
In the end, maybe all
you need is love.
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EXCERPT:
I park directly in front of the salon.
“The Best Little Hair House in Westfield?” Fin looks at me
incredulously but doesn’t dish out a criticism. My dear friend Fin has great
difficulty with that whole “calling it like he sees it” thing.
“I didn’t name the place,” I mutter as I jump out of the
Jeep. After shaking his curly blond head a couple of times in
what-did-I-get-myself-into disbelief, Fin does the same.
I’ll be sorry to see those pretty curls on the floor of the
beauty salon, but we’re gonna endure our mutual makeover, one way or another.
In my opinion, having mutual makeovers spells togetherness
as well as exploring our more feminine sides. “Come on. We have both of the
salon’s haircutters booked for the next hour.” Then I mumble in a manner
designed to be intentionally incoherent, “And we have a makeup artist for the
following forty-five minutes....” Fin doesn’t hear this part and I think it’s
for the best.
“Daaahlings, you must be Lennon and Fin....” Richard, I
assume, since I recognize his sing-song voice from the phone call I made to set
up our appointments, greets us at the door, air-kissing me and Fin, on both
cheeks. I know immediately that if my goal is to immerse Fin and me in all
things homosexual, we are in the right place. I find it hard to tear my eyes off
Fin as he checks out the salon. I’ll sum up the salon’s décor like this:
rainbow-glitter-velvet-jelly bean-explosion. And I’m pretty sure that Fin,
coming from a lifestyle enhanced by the subtle shades of Williams-Sonoma and
Restoration Hard- ware, has never laid eyes on anything quite this... this
vibrant. And Richard’s lilting voice one more time sings out proudly, “Welcome
to the Hair House!”
At this point, Fin, with extremely wide eyes, checks out the
slick-haired narrow-eyed man who is going to beautify him. Not that Fin needs
any enhancement in that department, whatsoever, because even if I weren’t gay,
I’d recognize that Fin is a stunner. “I... um... thank you,” he says and offers
his hand, which Richard grasps, lifts dramatically to his lips, and kisses very
slowly.
“And I must insist that you call me Chard—all of my dearest
friends do,” the stylist utters, a glimmer of hopefulness blatant in his sly,
dark eyes.
Fin’s lips move but no sound comes out. He’s probably trying
to formulate the words for what he is thinking: Are you kidding me—you call
yourself Chard? Hahahaha!! But with no success, as Fin, like I mentioned
before, has trouble with calling upside-down black heart shapes with tiny stems
what they are—yeah, spades.
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Mia Kerick is
the mother of four exceptional children—all named after saints—and five
nonpedigreed cats—all named after the next best thing to saints, Boston Red Sox
players. Her husband of twenty-two years has been told by many that he has the
patience of Job, but don’t ask Mia about that, as it is a sensitive subject.
Mia focuses
her stories on the emotional growth of troubled young people and their
relationships, and she believes that physical intimacy has a place in a love
story, but not until it is firmly established as a love story. As a teen, Mia
filled spiral-bound notebooks with romantic tales of tortured heroes (most of
whom happened to strongly resemble lead vocalists of 1980s big-hair bands) and
stuffed them under her mattress for safekeeping. She is thankful to
Dreamspinner Press, Harmony Ink Press, CoolDudes Publishing, and CreateSpace
for providing her with alternate places to stash her stories.
Mia is a
social liberal and cheers for each and every victory made in the name of human
rights, especially marital equality. Now marital equality is the law of the
land!! WOOT!! Her only major regret: never having taken typing or computer
class in school, destining her to a life consumed with two-fingered pecking and
constant prayer to the Gods of Technology.
Stop by Mia’s
Blog www.miakerick.com with questions or comments, or simply share what’s on
your mind.
Find Mia on:
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