Please join me in welcoming back the ever-fabulous Holly Day. She’s popping in to tell us a bit about her new novella, How to Hook a Vampire. I don’t know about vamps, but she hooked me with that tag line: A vampire on guard. A psychic on the run. A cabin with one bed. 😂 Even if Holly weren’t already an auto-buy for me now, I would have thrown up my hands and yelled “SOLD!” after reading that, regardless.
Hello everyone! Thank you, Addison, for allowing me back on the blog 🥰
I’m Holly Day, and I write stories for all those crazy days out there. This month we’re celebrating National Go Fishing Day, so I’ve written a story called How to Hook a Vampire – logical, right? 😆 At least there’s a hook.
There is some fishing in it, so I’m not completely off-topic. And National Go Fishing Day doesn’t demand much. To celebrate, they want you to bait a hook, drop it in the closest body of water, and sit back and relax.
How to Hook a Vampire is about Jameson, who is a psychic, but despite having the ability to tell if someone answers a question truthfully or not, he’s always trusting the wrong people, and this time it’s bad.
To hide from a group of men who are trying to kidnap him, he runs to his uncle’s fishing cabin. What he doesn’t know is that there is a gun-crazed vampire living there.
It’s pretty fast-paced, with guns, evil men, and kidnappings, but there is also fishing, a cabin with only one bed, and a vampire who might like to blow things up but deep down just wants to be loved 😁
Are you one to fish? I grew up on the Swedish west coast. My uncle was a fisherman, and I have a lot of memories of fish and fishing, and yet I’m squeamish. When talking food, I most often tell people I’m a vegetarian, but the truth is I’m a pescatarian. I eat fish on occasion. But… There can’t be any skin, no bones, and the meat has to be firm or I’ll have a really hard time swallowing and there’s a great risk it might come back up again.
And if we’re to talk about fishing… I love fishing, as in sitting next to someone who is fishing. I love quiet nights on the pier, watching a floater bob, but I won’t unhook a fish, I’ll definitely not kill it, and there is no way in hell I’m putting a worm on a hook. So I love fishing – when others do it, and all I have to do is watch.
My son fish a lot, but he always let the fish back into the water, which in my opinion is the best way to fish 😆 Should the apocalypse arrive for real, I’ll rely on him to keep us fed, but for now, seeing a photo of him proudly holding up a fish he’s caught works great.
In How to Hook a Vampire, Jameson cooks the fish he catches. Which is fine too, as long as I don’t have to prepare it LOL. Overall, there isn’t a lot of focus on fishing, though. The main thing is finding out who wants to kidnap Jameson and why, and then how to solve the sleeping arrangements, of course. There is also a no-blood rule in the cabin – I won’t tell you if they manage to stick to that or not 😁
How to Hook a Vampire
by Holly Day
A vampire on guard. A psychic on the run. A cabin with one bed.
Jameson Whitlock trusted the wrong person. Again. As a walking lie detector, he should be able to tell when he’s being played, but so far, he hasn’t had the best of luck. After yet another kidnapping attempt, he leaves town in a hurry and runs to his uncle’s fishing cabin to hide.
Harland Duke comes back after having fed only to find a light on in the cabin. Had he known there would be takeout, he wouldn’t have bothered to go into town.
No one is happier than Harland that he didn’t snack on the man sleeping in his bed when it turns out he’s his boss’ nephew. Jameson isn’t pleased with having to share the cabin with a vampire, but it’s not safe to return home yet. To pass the time, he spends his days fishing, but what’s easiest to catch — a fish or a vampire?
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Gay paranormal romance: 34,072 words
Excerpt
Harland watched Jameson through the living room window. He was fishing. Who in their right mind fished voluntarily? Being out in the sun. Harland flattened his lips. He’d never be out in the sun again, unless it was the last thing he did, of course.
For about an hour, he’d debated calling Frank and telling him he’d fucked up. Or he hadn’t. Jameson was still there, and Harland was watching him. If someone approached, he’d kill them. Though the sun would be up for many more hours, and he couldn’t run out there. He hated that there wasn’t a window facing the driveway. He could shoot from most angles from the cabin, but not there. He didn’t know if someone was watching Jameson from there.
He should tell Frank about the kitchen incident. Let him know that if someone grabbed Jameson, a coma was a likely outcome, at least if they were human. He didn’t stand a chance against a shifter or a vampire, but the blind panic in Jameson’s eyes made him think he’d be capable of killing a person without meaning to.
He should have let go. The moment he noticed his fear, he should’ve moved away, given him space. Instead, he’d hugged him, or tried to. His balls would not forgive him for a couple of more hours. Thank fuck vampires healed fast.
Leaving Jameson to his fishing, he went back into the kitchen. He’d gotten started on the tripwires before Jameson woke, and he wanted to get them done, so he could install them when the sun dropped. He needed to rest. He’d been up all night, and fatigue was setting in, but he’d promised Frank to keep Jameson alive, so he would.
He put on another pot of coffee, but right as he was about to sit by the kitchen table, his phone rang. Expecting Frank, his heart sank when Carl’s name flashed on the screen. For a moment, he considered letting it go to voice mail, but since they hadn’t spoken outside of work since that day, and hardly at work either, he suspected it had something to do with Jameson.
“Yes?”
“I hear you got stuck babysitting, cupcake.”
Harland gritted his teeth. He was no one’s cupcake. “We’re building tripwires.”
Carl grunted. “You and your damn explosives. Do you need me to come over?”
What the hell? “No.”
“Seriously, Harley—” Harland winced at the nickname. “—we both know you’re great in the dark but come morning you’re pretty useless. I don’t think the boss would appreciate you getting his nephew killed simply because you can’t handle a little sunburn.”
Harland’s fangs dropped. How had he ever believed he wanted to spend time with Carl? How had he allowed him to touch him?
“Hello? Are you still there?”
Smug fucking bastard. “I don’t need your help.”
Carl chuckled. “You sure?”
What the hell? “Have you spoken to Frank?”
The front door opened, and Jameson walked in, bare-chested and with his T-shirt slung over a shoulder. For some reason, Harland’s gaze latched on to the barbells in his nipples instead of the huge fish he was carrying.
“Yes.” Carl’s voice yanked him out of his stupor.
“And?”
“What do you mean and?” Carl’s tone turned annoyed.
“And what did he say?”
“That I should check with you if you needed help.”
Jameson shook his head. Why the hell was he shaking his head? Maybe he got something in his ear.
“Look, Carl, we’re fine. Don’t come over, I have this place booby-trapped.”
“You’re insane. One day, you’ll blow yourself to pieces.”
“Yeah, well, don’t bother coming to my funeral.”
Carl huffed. “You’re such a princess. We had fun. Can’t you leave it at that?”
Harland didn’t reply, instead he ended the call.
“Who was that?” Jameson’s tone was snappy.
“Carl.”
“And who is Carl?”
An idiot. “A colleague.”
Jameson nodded, but there was tension in his expression. “Do you eat solid food?” He nodded at the fish. Harland had no idea what kind it was.
“If I want to. I don’t need it to stay alive, but I eat when I feel like it.”
He nodded. “Do you want pike perch?”
Did he? “Maybe.”
“Well, now I feel enlightened. I’m cooking this because I’m starving.” He waggled the fish while glaring at Harland. “Do you have potatoes?”
He grimaced. “I think you can dig some up in the garden.”
Jameson met his gaze, and the glare melted into wonder. “Really? Where in the garden?”
Harland fought a smile. So far, he hadn’t seen many other emotions than anger, fear, panic, and despair, but now there was interest in Jameson’s eyes.
“The garden bed closest to the house. I think they’re pretty small still.”
“I’ll roast them whole with garlic and—” He stopped short. “Do you eat garlic?”
Harland allowed a small smile and nodded. “I’m visible in mirrors, too.”
“Ass.”
He shrugged; he preferred ass to cupcake.
About Holly Day
According to Holly Day, no day should go by uncelebrated and all of them deserve a story. If she’ll have the time to write them remains to be seen. She lives in rural Sweden with a husband, four children, more pets than most, and wouldn’t last a day without coffee.
Holly gets up at the crack of dawn most days of the week to write gay romance stories. She believes in equality in fiction and in real life. Diversity matters. Representation matters. Visibility matters. We can change the world one story at the time.
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