Today I am so pleased to welcome Christie Meierz to Joyfully Jay. Christie has come to talk to us about her latest release, Rembrandt’s Station. She has also brought along a great giveaway. Please join me in giving her a big welcome!

Exclusive Excerpt

Bertie tapped the disconnect and, too restless to lie down, headed out of his quarters and down into the gardens. A few other restless souls also explored the grounds, and he headed away from them, wandering into a darker part of the gardens, thinking about Eddie.

He’s sorry. Bertie snorted aloud. Sorry enough to be more forthcoming in future? No, that was unlikely. But surely his brother wouldn’t risk the Duke’s ire to talk to him if he didn’t still care at some level. It’s just that Lord Rijnfield had never yet let familial sentiment interfere with duty to Rembrandt, and he likely never would do. Someday, Eddie would become every bit as much of a frozen custard as His Nibs.

Bertie kicked at the ferny groundcover and realized he’d managed to wander into the family wing gardens. They were beautiful, on a moonless night like this, with bioluminescent fungi glowing in corners and sheltered nooks for no other reason than to surprise and delight the eye. Tolari focused on beauty in everything they created. It was one of the things he loved about them. If it was functional, then it was beautiful.

Their Monral, on the other hand… He could only be described as homely, and that was being generous. But that unhandsome face hid a quick intelligence, his unremarkable speech veiled the voice of an angel, and his robe concealed a body that—no, best not think about that. The casual nudity of the guard wing’s bathing areas was no different than that of the martial arts establishments on Britannia he’d once frequented, but the Monral used those in the guard wing after sparring, and that drew Bertie like a moth to flame. God, he’d been beautiful today after his daily exercise, all that glistening skin and rippling muscle. Bertie quashed the memory. Thoughts like that only made it more difficult not to do or say something rash.

A twig snapped nearby. With a sense of impending doom, he searched the dark and couldn’t quite identify the shape moving through the deep shadows, but in the family wing garden, it was likely the Monral—the last man he wanted to see when he was worked up like this. The Monral emerged from shadow into the dim starlight of the moonless night.

Don’t make a fool of yourself, Bertie told himself. Don’t.

“Guard.” The Monral’s voice was lower than usual, and a little rough.

Bertie bowed low. “High one.”

“How fares your brother?”

“Oh, he’s well enough.” Damn all information-obsessed Tolari rulers. The Monral already knew that answer. Nothing went on in a Tolari stronghold that its ruler didn’t know about, because they all eavesdropped. He’d had to get used to that as well as the lack of emotional privacy that went along with living among empaths. “What brings you out here at this hour?”

“What brings you?”

“I can’t sleep.” Bertie found a bench and sat on it. It was stone, chill even in the warm night after a hot day. Probably deliberately chilled by some hidden technology. It seeped through his robe, cooling part of his unruly anatomy, though what he really needed was a cold shower. God, he wanted to bury his hands in the man’s hair, pull him close, find out what his mouth tasted like. He shoved the thought away and hoped the Monral couldn’t sense how close he was to acting the fool. “Your turn.”

The Monral took a seat beside him. The bench was barely a bench, really, and the man’s shoulder pressed into him, warm and—

Bloody hell. Bertie jolted to his feet. He picked a direction and started that way, toward some splotches of light below the family wing balconies.

“Bertie.”

He stopped.

“Sit with me.”

Find joy with me, Bertie thought.

“No,” he replied, and got his feet moving again.

Blurb

Stationmaster and exiled aristocrat Albert St. John Rembrandt—Bertie to his friends—is in love with a man he’s always believed he can’t have, and finding out the hard way that some Tolari are as poisonous as their planet is only the beginning of his troubles.

A ship has gone missing. His station is in crisis. Bertie must somehow recover his health and manage the disaster while trying to decide whether to accept genetic modification in order to be with the man he loves.

And no Rembrandt has ever taken a gen mod.

Warnings: mention of past off-screen rape of a character who doesn’t appear in the book

Buy Link: https://christiemeierz.com/books/rembrandts-station/

Bio

Award-winning author Christie Meierz writes space opera and science fiction romance set on a world of empaths at the edge of a dystopic human empire. Her published works include her PRISM award-winning debut novel, The Marann, three more novels set in Tolari space, and several short stories. She is a member of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers Association (SFWA), spent 10 years raising sheep in Broome County, New York, and has been declared capable of learning Yup’ik.

Christie now lives in Rochester, NY, where she and her mathematician husband serve as full-time staff to two parlor panthers known to humans as Banichi the Assassin and Miss Myrtle the Hurricane Cat. (Their true names remain a mystery). When she’s not writing, she writes about writing on her blog, her personal Facebook page, where she welcomes comments and friend requests, and her Facebook Author Page.

• Author Website: http://christiemeierz.com
• Author Facebook (Personal): http://facebook.com/christie.meierz
• Author Facebook (Author Page): http://facebook.com/tolarispace
• Author Twitter: https://twitter.com/ChristieMeierz
• Author Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6550983.Christie_Meierz
• Author Liminal Fiction (LimFic.com): https://www.limfic.com/mbm-book-author/29733/
• Author Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Christie-Meierz/e/B009N3UB22/

Giveaway

Christie is giving away a $25 Amazon gift card with this blog tour:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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