Today I am so pleased to welcome Chloe Archer to Joyfully Jay. Chloe has come to talk to us about her latest release, When a Man Loves an Alien. She has also brought along great giveaway. Please join me in giving her a big welcome!

What Inspired You?

More broadly speaking, I was inspired to start writing the Tentacular Tales series during the pandemic. Like many people, I found myself reassessing my life at that time—especially during lockdown. For a long time beforehand, I’d told myself I was going to try self-publishing in M/M romance since I’d seen a lot of authors having success with that, and M/M is the genre I’d really wanted to write in. But life kept getting in the way and I kept putting my dream of being an author on the backburner. 

Then a major life-changing event happened mid-pandemic in 2020. My aunt, who I’d been very close with my whole life, died unexpectedly in a tragic accident. She was only 57 and recently retired. She didn’t get a chance to enjoy or do any of the things she’d been planning on. For a long time, I was in shock and had trouble processing it. I grieved for over a year, and all the while in the back of my head I was thinking–you need to start doing the things you’ve always wanted to do now because you have no idea how much time you have in this life! Losing my aunt so unexpectedly felt like a cosmic kick in the ass from the universe telling me to quit making excuses and just go for it because life is too short. So, I did.

I decided I had to start by writing the book I needed to read. Like most people, I was feeling down and isolated during the lockdown, then I was also feeling sad after losing my aunt. I desperately needed laughter and happy feels in a BIG way! Therefore, I wanted to work on something that would make me laugh and be super fun to write, something that would hopefully make other people laugh too. That’s when I came up with the idea for an M/M sci-fi rom com series that would be a very geeky but hilarious OTT marriage of Men in Black meets The Princess Bride–but hella gay! I started writing in summer of 2021 and published my first book, It’s Not Unusual to To Be Loved by an Alien, in fall of 2022. Book 2, Can’t Help Falling in Love with an Alien, came out in December 2022 and continues the love story of my main MCs River (sunshiny sci-fi geek extraordinaire) and Kai (grumpy-sexy alien with some hidden tentacles). 

Book 3, When a Man Loves an Alien, keeps building on different story arcs set up in the previous books as well as deepening the relationship between my MCs who face a whole new set of challenges now that they’re trying to get married—including a deadly assassin who’s been hired to kill River. As with all the other books in the series, I’ve taken a lot of inspiration from my love of sci-fi and pop culture as well as the wonderfully quirky setting that is Las Vegas to create a hidden world of aliens living incognito here on Earth. I veer more toward the light-hearted and campy side of humor, and River is very OTT or extra as he likes to say. 

The series also has a very metatextual side to it, with River writing his own online tentacle space-soap-opera called The Tentacular Tales of Captain Starblade. He discovers that although most humans don’t know his work, it has become a hit sensation among extraterrestrials across the universe! Each book contains at least one excerpt and shorter snippets from the ongoing serial story. I loved the irony of River writing his own, as he calls it, “tentacle porn” story—and then falling in love with an alien who happens to have tentacles! Needless to say, there are many internal jokes about this. I’ve also had quite a few readers asking me to write the entirety of River’s story! I don’t think that is super feasible at this point as River is on something like Chapter 145, but I have released a few free complete chapters from the story via my newsletter. Someday, I might write a more abridged version of the series as if River were trying to compile it into a few novels. Time will tell…

To check out the Tentacular Tales series, please visit my Amazon page. If you’d like to get a free prequel and some side stories in the series, please sign up for my newsletter. 

Blurb

A grumpy-sexy alien and his (mostly) human mate are just trying to get married for goodness sake! But the road to matrimony is riddled with obstacles that could prove deadly…

RIVER

Being engaged to my adorable alien boo is a dream come true. Too bad there’s a target painted on my back. Come on universe, quit messing with true love! For reals. Kai and I need to plan our wedding—which is going to be hella quirky and fun, because I say so.

Cue Shilgar the Deadly, who’s screwing up everything—what with trying to kill me and all. My life is becoming even more unbelievable than my fictional characters, Lord Vardox and Captain Starblade.

There’s no way I’m not walking down the aisle with Kai, so help me! I fully intend to ‘get me to the church’—I mean Vegas wedding chapel—on time. This fool of an assassin thinks he can mess with my dreams of wedded bliss? I don’t think so. He’s about to learn he’s met his match in River Sullivan!

KAI

My relationship with River is solid and wedding bells are in the air. Unfortunately, other parts of my life are…less stable. Between juggling a highly inconvenient Mating Fever that can strike at any time, and dealing with an investigator from Intergalactic Alliance Headquarters, I’m finding it hard to hold onto my usual equilibrium.

When Shilgar the Deadly finally shows up on Earth, gunning for River, the control I cling to is stretched razor thin. I’m desperate to do whatever I can to keep my mate safe—but I’m not sure if I can.

Yet things aren’t all that they seem. New secrets come to light and we’re all left reeling. Apparently, that famous Earthling playwright was correct when he wrote, “the course of true love never did run smooth….”

When a Man Loves an Alien (Tentacular Tales #3) is a (96k words) M/M sci-fi rom com and the third book in the series. It should be read in chronological order. This installment features an assassin who just won’t quit, little old ladies at slot machines who should NOT be messed with, a zipline action-hero moment, shocking secrets and revelations, a death-defying climax, and just maybe…a zany Vegas wedding? This book has an HFN ending and no cheating. Never fear—there is a guaranteed HEA by the end of the series!

Warnings: sex involving tentacles, some violence

• Universal Buy Link: https://mybook.to/whenamanlovesanalien
• Goodreads Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/75500949-when-a-man-loves-an-alien

Bio

Chloe Archer writes M/M sci-fi and paranormal rom coms with laugh out loud humor because she’s all about bringing the funny-sexy back. Oh, yeah!

She currently calls Minnesota home, but has lived abroad in places like Montreal, Edinburgh, and Tokyo. She’s hoping to relocate to Scotland permanently one day if the stars align.

Chloe is a fur mama to two adorable Yorkies, Jasper and Teddy, and she loves them in a crazy dog mama kind of way. When she isn’t busy writing, she enjoys visiting friends and family, traveling, reading, binge watching movies and TV shows, and practicing her karaoke skills. She does a mean cover of Pat Benatar and Cher, or so she’s been told.

• Author Website: https://chloearcher.com
• Author Facebook (Personal): https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100071621497295
• Author Facebook (Author Page): https://www.facebook.com/chloearcherwriter/
• Author Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chloearcher_author/
• Author Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/22694415.Chloe_Archer
• Author Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Chloe-Archer/author/B0BB1CCYM9

Giveaway

Chloe is giving away a $10 Amazon gift card with this tour:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

• By entering the giveaway, you’re confirming that you are at least 18 years old.
• By entering you are agreeing to the Terms and Conditions set out by Rafflecopter for entries.
• Winners may be announced on the blog following the contest. By entering the contest you are agreeing to allow your name to be posted and promoted as the contest winner by Joyfully Jay.
• Prizes will be distributed following the giveaway either by Joyfully Jay or the person/organization donating the prize. In order to facilitate prize distribution, the winner name’s and email may be provided to a third party awarding the prize.
• By entering you are agreeing to hold Joyfully Jay harmless if the prize or giveaway in some way negatively impacts the winner.
• Void where prohibited by law.