Title: Critical Hit On
Series: The Games Of Love
Author: Deanne Dee
Release Date: 25th February 2015
BLURB supplied by Author
Molly Moreau used to be a geek with the
best of them—role playing games, multi-user dungeons, trading cards—the works.
Then she found her long-time boyfriend in a dark corner with a girl dressed as
Lara “boobs and guns” Croft. That was it for the relationship and for her
geekiness. After moving back home, she got a job at a normal bar and grill with
normal people to live a normal life. That is until Craig shows up with his RPG
character sheet.
Craig Lawrence has been rolling 1s on
the relationship front ever since his last girlfriend broke up with him because
he apparently spent too much time playing guardian to his rebellious little
sister. When he meets Molly, he wants more than anything to win her heart, and
this time he’ll do anything to keep his family problems from interfering.
When fate (Molly’s best friend) brings
Craig and Molly together (sets them up on a date), will this relationship roll
yet another 1? Or will it score a critical hit?
PURCHASE LINKS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Deanna Dee is strictly human and
does not, to her knowledge, own a hyena. She lives by the sea, which she takes
full advantage of in the summer time. Nerd culture and pop culture make up the
shameless downtime of her life. The rest of it is writing, and she’s okay with
that.
Social media
Blog/website:
Amazon Author Page http://www.amazon.com/Deanna-Dee/e/B00T88WP6M/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1423236096&sr=1-1
EXCERPT
Chapter 1: Craig
For a Thursday night, A’s Tavern is
dead. All the better. We don’t need an audience for the not-so-drunken
debauchery to follow. I stroll inside and head for the hostess desk, not
bothering to hold the door for Parker. He’s a big boy. He can handle himself.
There’s a crash behind me, followed by a
string of curses.
Or maybe he can’t. Should’ve known
better. Parker’s a klutz. I’m a good friend, though. I keep walking and
snicker.
Parker catches up to me and punches my
shoulder. “You, my friend, are chimera excrement.”
I shrug. “I’ve been called worse. Keep
up next time.”
“Two?” The host, clad in black pants and
a red shirt—poor bastard—greets us and grabs a couple of menus.
“For now,” I say. “We’re expecting three
more.”
Host pauses, and his eyes go glassy as
if two plus three is calculus. Then he grabs three more menus. “Follow me.” He
leads us to a rectangular table for six, where he practically drops the menus
and silverware. Dude’s dex score is down with his int. “Your server will be
right with you,” he says and then scurries back toward the front of the
restaurant.
I mumble a thanks and sit. The tables around us are empty, so I pull my chair
way out and make myself comfortable. In my twenty-one years, A’s hasn’t
changed. The place looks like one of those old train stations. The top halves
of the walls are white tile, and the bottoms are dark wood, a match for the
tables and chairs. Monochrome tiles make up the floor, and a black-lacquered
bar stretches the length of the restaurant. In honor of the recent Star Trek movie, there’s a neon sign
over said bar advertising Free Tranya. I don’t know why they have free tranya,
considering that line was from the original series and not the most recent
movie, but there’s the sign. Only the second r is out. So it reads Free Tanya.
“Free Tanya.” Parker sits across from me
and runs a hand over his black hair, which just makes it stick up more. Between
that and the glasses, all he needs is green eyes instead of blue and a
lightning scar on his forehead. “Now that, I can get behind.” And a less
Weasley personality.
I scoot up to the table and am about to
smack him over the head when a hand grabs my water glass and scares the hell
out of me. I hit the back of my chair and look up at our waitress…our really
hot waitress. Damn, how have I not noticed this girl before? Her brown hair
reaches her shoulders, and her curves make the tasteless
white-shirt-and-black-skirt ensemble of A’s uniform look good. My kind of girl.
“How you boys doing tonight?” she says
in a strong, confident voice.
Definitely my kind of girl.
“Magnificently,” Parker says.
“Yeah?” She replaces my water glass and
goes for Parker’s. “What can I get you to drink?”
Parker points to the bar. “I shall have
the free Tanya.”
I kick him under the table.
He squeaks like a little girl. “Tranya.”
Waitress nods as if dorky
twenty-something guys order free females all the time. “And you?” She turns to
me, and her brown eyes meet mine. They’re the kind of eyes dead white guys
wrote poetry about.
I’ll be a dead white guy someday.
Perhaps I should join their ranks. Or perhaps I should order a drink before she
notices I’m staring. “Have you had the tranya?”
“I have. I relished it.”
Whoa, girl knows her Star Trek. She and I might be the only
twenty-somethings in 2009 America to know that episode. That decides my drink
order. “As much as I will.”
Her eyes go wide, reflecting my
amazement. Then, without warning, they’re serious again. “Two tranyas. Can I
see some ID?” She barely glances at the cards before handing them back. “I’ll
have those right out, and my name’s Molly.” She dashes toward the bar.
Well, so much for that.
“Critical miss,” Parker says, patting my
arm. “Better luck next time.”
AUTHOR INTERVIEW
Did you always want to be a writer? If
not what did you want to be?
I don’t know if I always wanted to be a
writer. I wrote my first (very bad) story when I was seven, but it was just
something to do. My dad was forever working on a book when I was growing up,
and I wanted to follow in his footsteps a bit. Of course, I diverged and got a
B.A. in psychology before realizing where I really wanted to go with my life. I
don’t regret that academic decision, though, and now I’m here, writing, where I
feel I should be.
What genre would you place your books
into?
Geek romance. “I’m a geek. I write
romance. Allegedly, I write geek romance.” My goal was to write a romance novel
full of pop culture references. Here’s hoping I succeeded.
What made you decide to write that genre
of book?
Again, I wanted a
place to put all the geeky stuff running around in my head, and I needed a
genre that would let me do that. Romance supplies a story with an automatic
happy ending where all the light and airy geek stuff can fit right at home.
Match made in Nirvana.
What can we expect from you in the
future? ie More books of the same genre? Books of a different genre?
I don’t have plans to stray from
romance. That said, I may stray a bit from geek. I have a ton more geeky ideas,
but I also have some scifi romance ideas floating around. And really, that
counts as geeky because tech is just awesome.
Are character names and place names
decided after their creation? or do you pick a character/place name and then
invent them?
It’s funny. I
always wondered how pop culture writers came up with their puns. Did they just
let them happen or plan them in advance? Answer—at least for me—both. Yes, I
have to be contradictory. I found myself purposefully naming some places and
characters so I could make a geeky reference in the book or in later books in
the series.
Do you basic plot/plan for your book,
before you actually begin writing it out? Or do you let the writing flow and
see where it takes the story?
I begin with three things—an opening
scene, an ending-ish scene, and an idea of how I want things to go. From there,
I let the words take me where they will. It’s working so far, and if it isn’t
broke, I’m not fixing it.
What piece of advice would you give to a
new writer?
Get some training,
no matter what it is. As someone once wrote in an interview I hosted, natural
talent only goes so far, and there are a lot of people with natural talent.
That little extra edge, even if it’s just a few workshops, can make all the
difference.
Do you have a treasured book from your
childhood? If yes, what is it?
A Wrinkle in Time.
Love that book. Will always love that book. It was the first book that really
made me want to read and, more importantly, tell stories.
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