The O'Raven Chronicles!: How to Deal Blog Tour Post

The O'Raven Chronicles is pleased to present this tour stop post for T. M. Smith's How to Deal Blog Tour

How to Deal

An All Cocks Story

Book 3

Jon Brennan comes from a long line of men in uniform; all born and bred to both bleed and wear blue. His family and the majority of his co-workers support him every step of the way, so he doesn’t need to hide the fact that he prefers men over women. Between the job and his larger than life, loud and rowdy half Irish, half Italian family, there isn’t much time for dating, much less finding a guy that can deal with the stress and demands placed on the shoulders of an NYPD Detective.

Kory White is cocky and abrasive with most people, but it is all a mirage, a facade he hides behind to keep his heart safe. As a child, Kory lost his mother to an act of violence. Soon after, he and his baby sister Kassandra were separated by the system. Kassandra was immediately adopted, but Kory spent the next ten years cycling through foster homes before moving to the Big Apple. In an effort to keep everyone at a distance, Kory has meticulously built himself an alter ego: Hayden Cox, All Cocks’ cockiest model.

These two strong willed men definitely prove opposites do attract. Both are stubborn and hard headed to a fault, Kory more so than Jon. But Jon is used to being in control, the one calling the shots, and Kory fights him at every turn. Just when it seems they have found a way to navigate the uncharted territory that is love, tragedy knocks on Kory’s door yet again. Volatile and strong, even in the face of adversity, both men refuse to give up on each other - or their love.

Link to playlist on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLkehmrHrmCeMi_12N0fyc5tpx_iSrwqz2

Spotify link:

https://open.spotify.com/user/1299811243/playlist/1vh6gFRONDG9PP7La4GHDt

T. M. Smith speaks;

Hello everyone, and thank you to my muse for hosting me today on the How to Deal blog tour. I'm sharing the playlist for the book and how, specifically, certain songs relate to the story. I'm very much an inspirational person when it comes to writing, and music is a huge influence for me when I'm writing. Music is a powerful thing, it can make you laugh, make you cry, make you happy and at times, it can make you very angry. Every book I write has it's own playlist of songs that relate to people, places and things in the story. For instance, in Gay for Pay, Chris is a fan of Jazz music so that playlist has a lot of Jazz on it. I'm guessing that a lot of people are expecting dark, angry, metal music for Kory, but you will be sorely disappointed if so. Kory isn't the cocky, confident, jackass that he presents himself as.

Here is the playlist for How to Deal, I'll explain how these songs relate to the story...

Omen | Disclosure featuring Sam Smith

Where Are You Now | Skrillex w/Diplo featuring Justin Bieber

Whatya Want From Me | Adam Lambert

Where I Belong | Hometown

Handsome Man | Matt Abler

Just Breathe | Pearl Jam

Like I'm Gonna Lose You| Meghan Trainor & John Legend

Psycho | Puddle of Mudd

Lost Stars | Adam Levine

Another Lonely Night | Adam Lambert

Omen - One of the lines in this song is "I needed you to show me, without you I'm lonely." Well, if that doesn't describe Kory, what does?

Where Are You Now - There is a push and pull with Jon and Kory that is almost a constant, it is what makes them so strong in the end. But there is a time where the power shifts, Kory finds himself needing Jon more than he initially wants to admit and it scares him.

Whatya Want From Me - I adore Adam Lambert and he is almost always going to be on all my playlists. This song, in fact, is on several of them. Everything about this song is so Kory. Come here, I want you, wait, I'm afraid, what do you want? Don't give up on me even if I'm mental!

Where I belong - Love is a deep and mysterious road. Well, aint that the damn truth!

Handsome Man - This song is almost like a letter from one lover to another. They aren't always together, the one partner is asking the other about his day, a partner that isn't always the best at expressing himself with words. So he's telling him with the lyrics of the song. I just thought that was right for Jon and Kory, they don't always have the best communication skills, but they try to always be there for each other.

Just Breathe - Well, this is where the kleenex warning for the book comes into play. This song is all about love and loss and trying to survive in the face of tragedy. I will tell you it's not about Jon and Kory directly, though it could apply to their role in the tragedy. Someone else is going to loose something very important to them in this book and though it's fucking heart breaking, it's life. Life is about loving and losing and surviving, how we deal with that loss and move on. The title of the book isn't just about how Jon and Kory learn to deal with their vastly different life styles. There are more people in their worlds that experience things as well.

Love you, Like I'm gonna lose you - Kory is so afraid to love anyone for fear of losing them. What he should be doing is loving them LIKE he is going to lose them!

Psycho - Kory is pretty mental. There is a chapter toward the end of the book, oh my, can you say drama queen melt down?!

Lost Stars - My interpretation of this song is a man that is lost, he has lost his way in life and doesn't feel like he matters, he doesn't feel like anyone sees HIM. Jon sees past the pain and the persona, he sees Kory, and he loves every torn up, scarred emotionally distant aspect of him. He also brings out the genuine, loving, fiercely loyal, devoted partner in Kory.

Another Lonely Night - Jon and Kory have both been spending a lot of lonely nights at home and alone until they stumble into each other's lives. Will that change?

My Review of How to Deal;

This is going to be the shortest review I have ever done because I was not scheduled to do a review and was not asked to. I just had to share my thoughts about My Dear Friend T. M. Smith’s latest work. I am so amazed at how her skills are getting better and better. Her characters seem to be coming to life in new ways for me. In this story the characters go on an emotional roller-coaster journey and take you with them, and at the end you are happy they did; or at least I was lol. Despite the obviously troubling level of blasphemy against The Lord God, the story is very well rendered. I fell in love with the two main characters, and with the Irish family in this story with all their beautiful chaos and shenanigans. I have already fallen in love hard with “The All Cocks Family”. The bringing together of these two rowdy clans into one story is almost too much and too funny to take. The story had an interesting plot that drew me in, and kept my interest. The sexual scenes were art to me, and several of them had me stopping to have some um, “Gentleman’s time” lol. It was the love between Jon and Kory that I felt most keenly though. They love to drive each other nuts, to fight and push each other’s buttons. They love to fuck, to make up, and to make love. It was their love for each other however that made me love them. It was not only their love, but also the subtle feeling of the pursuit...the game of chase, that made me want to keep reading their story until I got to their happily ever after, or at least to the end of the book lol. I hope you will pick up their story and read it, and I hope you will enjoy it as much as I did.

If I had to sum up Jon and Kory's story in one phrase it would be, “Love can be a massive challenge but it is worth everything to attain it”!

I give this book (which to others is a full length novel, but what is to me a Novella length book) six out of seven quills.

Link to post on how I rate Book Lengths and an explanation of my rating system:

http://revloush.blogspot.com/2012/11/my-rating-system-for-story-lengths.html

I rate full length novels with a ten quill system

I rate novellas with a seven quill system

And I rate short stories with a five quill system

About the Author (Author Bio.);

T. M. Smith :

A military brat born and raised at Ft. Benning Georgia; Smith is an avid reader, reviewer and writer. She now calls Texas home from her small town on the outskirts of the DFW Metroplex. Most days you can find her curled up with her kindle and a good book alongside a glass of something aged and red or a steaming cup of coffee!
At 44 years young, she's decided to enter the next phase of her life by adding the title of "author" to her list of accomplishments. Smith is a single mom of three disturbingly outspoken and decidedly different kids, one of which is Autistic. Besides her writing, Smith is passionate about Autism advocacy and LGBT rights.