This is Antorno Lake in the Italian Alps. Not my usual mountains, but also very pretty, and you can see some resemblance to parts of the Colorado Rockies.
These are the Maroon Bells, up by Aspen, in Kurt and Jake territory.
What’s the connection, you wonder? I just found out that Fire on the Mountain and Snow on the Mountain are being translated into Italian!
Posted in Fire, Jake, Kurt, Snow
Tagged colorado rockies, italian alps, maroon bells, snow on the mountain, translation
I was searching for pictures of my fictionalized national forest yesterday, so I could write a particular description accurately. I spent quite a lot of time combing though some gorgeous shots of the Flat Tops, which is the real wilderness area outside of Meeker where my Mountain stories are set. I’m working on Blood on the Mountain, which is the fourth novel in the series.
This is Jake and Kurt’s lake by their cabin. There’s a couple of very important scenes in Fire on the Mountain that take place here.
No wonder Jake doesn’t want to leave.
Snow on the Mountain has been out for several months now, and the first bloom of reviews has passed, so it was a particularly delightful find today that Dark Divas looked at Snow. Reviewer Jaime had some nice things to say, and a couple of things that you will bet I’ll take a close look at for other works.
“All in all, I quite enjoyed this book. Both characters had things to learn, ways to grow, and I like that the author didn’t pull any punches in splitting them up. People do split up over misunderstandings and things that don’t seem all that serious on the outside. So if there were a few tiny details that made me look up from the book for a moment, the important thing, in my mind, is that the big picture looked like the real thing. Real people, who aren’t perfect and don’t always say the right things, getting into real trouble and having real misunderstandings.”
See the rest here - and thank you, Jaime, for the kind words. 4 Diva rating!
This ficlet started as an author’s extra for my new story, 8 Seconds on the Mountain.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“So how the heck did you learn to do all this stuff?” I handed Kurt a wrench when he stuck his hand out at me. The upper section of him was out of sight: he was standing on the bumper of the tanker, leaning over the engine, which had coughed asthmatically and died.
“Remember I told you my brother-in-law Cliff is a rancher?” A bolt squeaked as he turned it.
“Yeah, and…?”
“And that I spent my vacations with him and Vanessa every year after Mom died?” His voice, already muffled in the bowels of the engine, went softer. He’d told me back during the fire that Larry and Vanessa, his much older brother and sister, and later, their spouses Polly and Cliff, had helped raise him.
“You’d said.” I looked at the western horizon: the sun was approaching it fast.
“Think about it. A rancher can’t make a living if he can’t do most everything himself.” Kurt got his upper body out of the engine. “Try starting it now.”
I jumped into the driver’s seat and twisted the key. The big diesel growled to life, its usual ferocious rumble was back. Kurt slammed the hood, jumped down, and joined me in the cab.
“A rancher has to repair vehicles and equipment, do veterinary work, train animals, manage finances, gauge markets, and about a hundred other things. The more you have to hire done, the less money is left at the end of the year, and that amount can be awfully near zero anyway. So you learn to do it, just to stay above water.” Kurt smiled ruefully, his face decorated with a greasy smudge across his nose.
“When I was young enough to have a serious case of hero worship, I followed Cliff around, trying to learn everything to be like him.” Kurt laughed. So that was where he got the hyper-competence. “And then when I got older and developed a bad case of teen-aged smartmouth, he’d give me some tools and make me figure it out.”
I steered us up the single lane of dirt track that was our road home through the Uncompahgre National Forest. “He didn’t make you figure it out on the animals, did he?”
“No, he didn’t; he coached me or did it with me. Gentling and training the horses was a lot more pleasant than calving season or round-up.” A red rag that had been lurking under the seat waved in the corner of my eye; Kurt was cleaning his hands.
“I can imagine.” I hoped that when I did meet his family, those last two weren’t on the agenda. “Get the smudge on your nose, too.”
He scrubbed at his face. “Did I get it?”
I glanced over, enjoying the sight of blue eyes in his tanned face. “Mostly. Hey–” We’d talked about getting up to Wyoming for me to meet his family. Given that some of the cowboys who’d seen us together had been a lot less than accepting, I wanted to know. “You said he knows you’re gay, but — how did he take the news?”
“I was twenty- three when I told them. Cliff was kind of stunned, but he came outside later, just sat with me in the barn. I was mending tack; I needed something to do with my hands that kept me away from everyone for a while. Then he threaded a needle for me and he said, “You know your father, your brother, and I have tried to teach you everything we can about being a man.” I was braced to hear how badly he thought I’d failed–”
Kurt stopped, and the red rag was back by his face; I didn’t think he was trying to get the last of the smudge. “But Cliff just handed me the needle and said, “I think we did all right.””
Time to get excited — had the last emails with my editor and any minute now I’m going to get a shiny PDF file with lots of hot electrons. 8 Seconds on the Mountain will be available Saturday, so excuse me for a happy dance.
Kurt and Jake are back in a short story, which can stand alone, but hey, you want to know what else has happened. This whole story started with a ficlet prompt that grew completely out of hand. This has to be the fourth time I’ve thanked Jared for help with stories; he’s contributed in so many ways.
8 Seconds on the Mountain
A day off spent at the rodeo turns ugly when Kurt invades the area behind the chutes reserved for the bronc riders and the bucking stock, dragging Jake along for the ride. With hostile cowboys, dangerous horses, and a bet about a champion bucking bronco, is there any way they can get out of this in one piece?
Or will Kurt’s mouth get them both beaten to a pulp?
Link to the publisher coming soon!
