#a cocky hero club production

[hooked-on-elvis]

Elvis escaped a crew-length haircut more than once before the army

It is widely known by the fans that one funny story of how Red West saved Elvis from getting his hair cut off by bullies when he was only a teenager attending the Humes High School in Memphis, Tennessee. For those who never heard/read this story before, well.. long story short, Elvis was kind of a misfit in High School because of the way he used to dress different from his mates. "He looked like a sore thumb," said Ronny Trout, a classmate who shared a workbench with Elvis in wood shop in school (as wrote by Peter Guralnick in one of his books on Elvis). While all the guys usually had crew cuts and dressed in jeans, Elvis had this "movie star" look. Apart from the flashy clothes — such as ascot ties and dress pants Presley is said to have worn while attending classes — he also would proudly show off his truck driver sideburns and a duck tail hairstyle around the hallways. Some of the kids in his school just couldn't stand it. Most of them thought Elvis looked weird, possibly they got the impression as if he was cocky or something but more likely they just found him strange, out of place. One day some guys corned Elvis in the bathroom and threatened to cut his hair right off. Red West came in just in time. Even tho they weren't friends yet, that selfless good deed of Red turned Elvis into a, let's say, fan of his. Presley was beyond grateful for the unexpected help. This was before Elvis was, you know, "Elvis". West and Presley became friends after this day, little by little - not immediately, and it turns out that a long, long term friendship between the two came out of that uncanny situation. At a point, Red West became part of Elvis' personal security guard and remained friends with him up until July 1976, a little more than one year previous to Elvis's death in August 1977. Anyway, Red's efforts only postponed Elvis' haircut. Presley actually had to surrender to the crew cut style in March 1958 when he was inducted into the U.S. Army. But did you know before the Army's intervention and after the High School incident, there was another time when Presley's hair almost was chopped off? That was during movie production of "Jailhouse Rock", in 1957.

The still photographs of Elvis wearing the short "Butch" wig were taken on Monday, May 13, 1957. William Tuttle (head of the make-up at MGM Studios) and his department produced very convincing results. This was the first time the wig was ready to be fitted, and the first scene shot using the wig was on May 20, scene 11 - Barber Shop. Elvis is wearing the wardrobe for Scenes 5 & 6 - Courtroom.

Having read the script for Jailhouse Rock, Elvis was fully aware that the storyline called for his character to be sent to prison, and was told by the studio that, to be authentic, he would have to get his hair clipped. Elvis set off a personal appearance tour, prior to reporting to MGM Studios in Hollywood. The short tour commenced on March 28, 1957. The first stop was Chicago, at a press conference at the Saddle and Sirloin Club at the Stockyards Inn that afternoon, when Elvis spoke to the assembled press. When the subject of his haircut for his new picture was raised, he revealed: 'When I get back to Hollywood, I'm gonna have my hair cut. They're gonna cut it down to crew length for this new movie. Personally, I don't care if they cut my hair, I don't think it makes much difference. Because it'll grow out again.'

March 28, 1957. Elvis Presley at a press conference at the Saddle and Sirloin Club at the Stockyards Inn, Chicago, Illinois.

Within a week, MGM Studios and producer, Pandro S. Berman, were swamped with four thousand letter and post-cards from Presley fans begging that the studio let their hero act with his original hair. "Don't Be Cruel - Don't Cut Elvis' hair," they demanded in varying terms. Some threatened to boycott the picture; some said they'd see it anyway because they'd always be loyal to Elvis - but they'd be "All Shook Up." It was decided something had to be done to save Elvis' hair and also alleviate the fans' feelings, so the Studio started to look at alternative ideas with tests quickly set up in the Studio make-up department under the stewardship of William Turtle, head of the make-up at MGM Studios. Elvis revealed the solution to columnist Aline Mosby, 'So now the studio has decided I'll wear a wig, a crew-cut wig, for the prison scenes.' During pre-production, tests were undertakes with the 35mm film camera, to establish any issue. It was realized by Director of Cinematography, Robert J. Bronner, that Elvis' hair required a red tint due to the black and white film. Elvis later confirmed this in an interview once filming had been completed: 'My hair will look the same, except it was reddened because in black-and-white it photographed like a cap instead of hair.'

The fans plea worked good this time but there's the old saying that goes like: "what's meant to be will be".

Elvis Presley gets his hair cut before entering the Army, at Fort Chaffee in Barling, Arkansas. Presley entered the service March 24, 1958 at Fort Chaffee Reception Station. Picture of the 23-year-old rock star and barber Pete Peterson.

On December 10, 1957 Elvis received a letter from the Memphis Draft Board notifying him he was up for the next military draft. Presley's fans, once more, confident that their pleas would be heard just as they were by the Hollywood people, begun sending hundreds of letters to certainly everyone they could find would be helpful on the matter. They begged, "Please, please, do not touch Elvis' hair!" — some of them even felt kinda "suicidal" about Elvis' hair being cut off. One of the fan letters addressed to then U.S. President, read: "Dear President Eisenhower, My girlfriends and I are writing all the way from Montana. We think it's bad enough to send Elvis Presley to the army, but if you cut his sideburns of, we will just die."

NO DEAL WAS MADE THIS TIME. On March 24, 1958 Elvis was inducted into the U.S. Army and finally had to surrender to the crew-haircut. Truth be told, his fresh unfamiliar haircut didn't affect a bit his exquisite beauty - if anything, Presley appealed even worse to his female audience as a soldier.

Well, that's it. There it goes the story of how it took at least three attempts, including one movie and the U.S. government, to finally get that famous sideburns and pompadour out of Elvis' pretty little head.

SOURCE: Excerpts from book "The Making Of Jailhouse Rock" (Book "Movie") by David English and Pål Granlund (2021).

#50s elvis #elvis presley #jailhouse rock #1957 #U.S. army #army elvis #1958 #elvis #military #elvis the king #elvis fans #elvis fandom #elvis history #us army #rock and roll history #elvis' haircut

[bookboleynreads]

Release Blitz! Noble Neighbor (A Cocky Hero Club Novel) by Nicole Ann Nielson

Release Blitz! Noble Neighbor (A Cocky Hero Club Novel) by Nicole Ann Nielson

Title: Noble NeighborA Cocky Hero Club NovelAuthor: Nicole Ann NielsenGenre: Contemporary RomanceRelease Date: August 15, 2021 Vi Keeland and Penelope Ward are excited to bring you the Cocky Hero Club: original works from various authors inspired by Keeland and Ward’s New York Times bestselling Cocky Bastard series. BLURB Escaping the publicity following the murder of his wife, Oliver and his…

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#a cocky hero club novel #a cocky hero club production #available now #cocky bastard series #cocky hero club #contemporary romance #give me books pr #mister moneybags #new release #nicole ann nielson #noble neighbor #penelope ward #second chance #single parent #vi keeland

[kodibitesback]

kodi !

⧼   banita sandhu, cis female, she/her  /   “heads will roll” by yeah yeah yeahs +  the aroma of garlic spilling out from the curry joint that you walk past on the way home from the ministry that doesn’t smell like your dads’ kitchen but still sets your mouth watering with a hunger insatiable that you must walk away from empty, empty, empty; the heartbeat tattoo of bare feet as you move through your mudras in the dark, a goddess of shadow, a creature of the night; the mirror that you stupidly brought across the atlantic and have subsequently left to gather dust among the unpacked boxes in your ground-floor apartment because you know when you look, you won’t know any better whether you like who you are, forever.   ⧽   ━━   hey, isn’t that POONKODI “KODI” ADALARASU? i read a daily prophet article on them, once ; the TWENTY-SEVEN year old muggleborn WITCH & VAMPIRE is an ILVERMORNY alumnus who has gone on to be an AUROR. i’ve heard she can be quite SCINTILLATING & UNFLINCHING, but i don’t know… she came off very RASH & EMBITTERED in that interview. it really is hard to know what to believe these days though, isn’t it? 

pinterest // playlist 

QUICK STATS

name: poonkodi rainbow hearts adalarasu [POON-koh-dee UH-the-luh-rah-suh]; goes by “kodi” almost exclusively [sees the use of her full name as more personal] age: 27 [technically physically 25 as she was bitten two years ago] gender: cis woman, she/her sexuality: lesbian/queer blood status: muggleborn, in british terminology. raised by two loving and bohemian indian-american no-maj fathers. her parents thought she got a scholarship to a boarding school and then became a cop. now they think she’s dead. creature status: vampire, brand new. bitten while on the job. nearly died. trauma central. she’s still working on finding a good british brand of glamour charms, which she uses on and off to hide or show her status.  alma mater: ilvermorny, wampus house.  patronus: was a kingfisher. is now a bat, to her consternation. wand: 11 inches, whippy, pine wood with a wampus hair core and pearl inlay. manufactured by a descendant of johannes jonkers profession: auror with the british ministry’s department of law enforcement, auror office. was senior for her age in her division back in washington, dc, was once a wunderkind. hired in london as part of the shacklebolt administration’s diversification and beings’ rights initiatives. residence: a very dark, windowless ground-floor apartment in london pets: none. animals don’t like her anymore.  likes: loud music, dancing (club or indian classical), stupid videos, working late, thick blankets, sandals, urban exploration, midnight conversations, quodpot, adventure, decisive action, aggressive flirting, inadvisable makeouts, dueling, bar brawls, making bad vampire jokes about herself dislikes: shy people, boredom, coffee (the smell alone), wet socks, sad movies, arts and crafts, meditating (but she’s trying to do it anyway), being psychoanalyzed, the prospect of eternity, people she doesn’t like making bad vampire jokes about her 

BIOGRAPHY

[Triggering subjects in backstory include references to suicide, blood, violence, death.]

Kodi was a much-loved, much-wanted child. She had two dads, both Indian-American, one a Tamil classical dancer from a whole line of dancers and one a Punjabi art therapist. Her biological mother is her fathers’ best friend, a classical dancer of Punjabi descent. She played the role of a quirky aunt in Kodi’s life; Kodi called her by first name. Largely, she was raised by a village of multicultural artsy queer people who encouraged unconventionality in her. Precocious and bright, Kodi had an unwavering sense of justice and purpose from an early age that often set her at odds with her more free-wheeling little community. She was a charming child but sometimes unnervingly serious for her age. While she was a skillful Bharatanatyam dancer, she never wanted to be an artist. She always wanted to be a hero. 

When she learned about her magic and what that could mean for her future, she had to make a decision. The strict division between No-Maj and wix in the United States meant that she was encouraged not to tell her parents that she was a witch. She thought that they would love to know about the existence of magic, but she wanted something to be her own for once. She wanted something to be her secret. She didn't think they could keep it secret at all. They’d probably do performance art about the role of magic in society or something. In the end, she decided to lie, not knowing that as the years went on, the lies would only grow. So her parents believed she had been accepted to a prestigious boarding school for gifted children, and in fact, she had: Ilvermorny in Massachusetts. She was a smash hit at Ilvermorny with dozens of friends, good at anything she really poured her heart into, which was mostly anything that had to do with fighting Dark wix. She decided from the day that she met her favorite professor that she would be an Auror like she once was, and she worked towards this with great purpose, networking as best as she could as a No-Maj-born. 

Her efforts paid off: right out of school, she was offered a position in Washington, DC with the Auror Division there. She maintained to her dads that she was a cop, which disappointed them deeply, but she decided she had grown past what her fathers thought. She knew what the world was now, and she was going to make it a better place. For a good solid stretch from seventeen to twenty-five, she was kicking ass and taking names. She had a sharp eye and great fighting instincts, and her rise through the Division was suitably meteoric. Her personal life was a bit of a disaster, however, with a string of girlfriends that she messily dumped when they got in the way of her career. She grew more and more estranged from her parents.

As she proved herself, her case-load grew more intense and more dangerous. She became especially known for taking on lengthy assignments that required travel. On one mission that took her into the Blue Ridge Mountains to investigate an illegal potions ring, she was attacked by a vampire. She thought that she would bleed to death, but instead, horribly, she lived, or at least became undead. Kodi, who had been born without knowing she was a witch but had fallen in love with the wonder of magic, had crossed over into the Dark. When she first came to consciousness, she was in the bowels of the Division’s Virginia building, sometime past midnight, and they were asking her what they should do, what they should tell her parents.

She swallowed with a click, intensely aware of why her throat was dry and why her teeth ached. She said, “Tell them I’m dead.”

She recuperated for a long time in a special ward in the largest wixen hospital in the country. She had a lot from which to recover and a lot to which she had to become accustomed. For weeks, her magic sputtered and failed. Even when it returned to her, the magic felt different--but at least it had returned. She was still magic. Eventually, Kodi grew restless. She took the remainder of the year off to travel the world and find herself, or more accurately, her new people. Along with sundry other beings, she met vampires who were loving their countless years and vampires who seemed to be looking to get staked as fast as possible. Kodi had a bad feeling she knew where she fit in that spectrum, and yet she had come too far now to give it all up.

Thus after her prolonged absence, she returned to the DC office, changed within and without. Everywhere she looked, she felt hunted. She could still feel the teeth in the back of her neck. Her old colleagues couldn’t figure out whether to show her sympathy or give her space, but she could feel how their eyes followed her around the room. She could sense the animal fear in them because even when she drank from covered pouches, a little blood would always stain her mouth. Kodi had been raised to be proud of who she was. She was spoiled with love and opportunity. At times, people accused her of overconfidence (though she would call herself cocky but competent). Now, though, Kodi hated herself.

She needed a way out. Always with an ear to the ground, she heard rumblings from across the ocean about a push for beings’ rights from the Ministry under Shacklebolt. Kodi sensed opportunity. She made a visit to the British Ministry, pressed some flesh, passed around her resume, and without too much effort--her superiors in DC had been eager, lately, to see the back of her--she secured herself a position within the Auror Office.

She accepted the job offer before the Warbeck benefit disaster and...made the decision not to back out of it. She went ahead and rented that dark little near-underground flat she’d picked out and called up those people she’d met on her first go-around. It was time to start her new life. 

Kodi endeavors not to have regrets about anything, as she figures she should get into the habit of that if the alternative is living far too many decades, even centuries of regrets. But she can admit that even if werewolves aren’t exactly her natural allies, the environment in Britain for all magical beings is tenser than ever. She feels out of place for so many reasons. She’s American, she’s “Muggleborn,” she’s not even human anymore. Still, she’s great at making conversation, making friends, and making trouble. Kodi works into the night and parties for what’s left of it, dancing til she should be sweating, trying not to flash her fangs when she laughs. Yet her past is a heavy thing; she can’t cast off the burden of it. Every time she tries to move forward, her future feels more fraught, another roadblock rising up in front of her. 

It’s a bad time to be here. She’s trying to have a good time anyway.

FUN FACTS

yes her middle name is actually ‘rainbow hearts’ bc she is a product of her dads’ beautiful gay love. she has a real love/hate relationship to it because admittedly she does love being second-generation gay. if she tells someone her middle name or lets them call her by her full first name, you know it’s real.

she was vegan before she was turned. she’s had some confusing ethical debates about blood-drinking and maintains that she is still vegan (she avoids animal products and only drinks from consenting humans or blood donations).

the legality of her using a wand in britain due to the wand ban (clause three of the code of wand use) is tricky and she’s hoping that continues to be hand-waved. her prepared argument is that she is a human with a condition, same as lycanthropes.

WANTED CONNECTIONS 

professional - she’s a workaholic! her ministry coworkers are half her social circle! maybe someone a lil nervous about her sipping blood out of a juicebox in the breakroom? personal - friends & flings. neighbors. people she’s punched. new gf. w/e! past - she’s traveled and met all kinds of people, wix and creatures alike. reunion time? ORDER ! - she could be a real asset to the order, as she is an experienced auror and also a vampire. i’m looking for someone to recruit her, since she is currently a civilian!

PLAYED CONNECTIONS

alicia spinnet - hooked up after a queer wix speed-dating thing and before the big ministry gala 

dudley dursley - bonding over non-magical backgrounds and kodi making fun of dudley mercilessly. ministry coworkers

heather pettigrew - always butting heads as private investigator and auror. 

#nox.intro #updated 10.14.2020

[billreeseblog]

Anime I Really Can’t Wait To See Another Season Of

I have been following a couple anime and manga, and I am hoping we will see another few anime series pop up with another season. Here are the ones I really can’t wait to see another season of.

Chiahayafuru

Here is a bit about Chihayafuru from Wikipedia:

Chihaya Ayase is a girl who has spent most of her life simply supporting her sister in her model career. That changes when she meets a boy named Arata Wataya, a talented karuta player. After becoming friends, he believes that Chihaya has potential to become a great player. As Chihaya takes on a new dream of becoming Japan's best karuta player, she is soon separated from her karuta playing friends as they grow up. Now in high school, Chihaya is reunited with her childhood friend, Taichi Mashima. Together, they form the Mizusawa Karuta Club. With her teammates and friends supporting her, Chihaya strives to become the best karuta player in the world and to one day be with Arata again. – Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chihayafuru)

At the end of Season 2 Chihaya (the titular character) is hospitalized, found to have a nerve disorder that may stop her from playing karuta without surgery, while her other team mates have progressed to higher classes for competitive karuta. The second season ended in a giant cliff hanger in summer 2013. Finally we get to continue the anime series (even though the manga series is still in production).

A Certain Scientific Railgun

Here is a bit about A Certain Scientific Railgun from Wikipedia:

In the futuristic Academy City, which is made up of 80% students, many of whom are espers possessing unique psychic powers, Mikoto Misaka is an electromaster who is the third strongest of a mere seven espers who have been given the rank of Level 5. The series focuses on the exploits of Mikoto and her friends; Kuroko Shirai, Kazari Uiharu, and Ruiko Saten, prior to and during the events of A Certain Magical Index. – Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Certain_Scientific_Railgun)

At the end of the second season of Railgun the girls were talking about their upcoming fieldtrip to Liberal Arts City. With this series interwoven conflicts caused by the existence of magic and espers you have to know that something is going to happen, and the girls are just going to have to deal with it Academy City style.

Natsume’s Book of Friends

Here is a bit about Natsume’s Book of Friends from Wikipedia:

For as long as he can remember, Takashi Natsume has had the ability to see spirits, inheriting the power from his grandmother Reiko Natsume. This ability resulted in his having a lonely childhood because children his age considered him strange. He had also been passed from one relative to another. Upon her death, Reiko bequeathed to her grandson her Book of Friends, a book containing the names of spirits she had bullied into servitude.

The Book of Friends is considered a highly prized item in the spirit world, and spirits - both good and malicious - haunt Takashi constantly because of it. Whereas Reiko formed the contracts, however, Takashi spends his time dissolving the contracts and releasing the various spirits that come to him for help. Malicious spirits on the other hand try to kill him to obtain possession of the book. Which is where Madara (called Nyanko-sensei by Natsume) comes in; Madara serves as Natsume's bodyguard and spiritual advisor of sorts, even though ostensibly he is motivated by his own desire to possess the Book of Friends. He later begins to become more attached to Takashi. – Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natsume%27s_Book_of_Friends)

This series is a favorite of mine. I have read much of the Manga, and I have watched all six seasons and the OVAs and the movie. I am sure that the series popularity will bring about a 7th season. I really cannot wait.

One Punch Man

Re is a bit about One Punch Man from Wikipedia:

On an unnamed Earth-like super-continent planet, powerful monsters and villains have been mysteriously appearing and causing disasters. To combat them, the world's government created a Hero Association that employs superheroes to stop the violent creatures and villains. Each of the Hero Association's superheroes are ranked from Class-C to Class-S. Saitama is an unranked hero, hailing from the metropolis of City-Z, who performs heroic deeds for his own entertainment. He has trained himself to the point where he can effortlessly defeat any opponent with a single punch. However, since Saitama became a hero for the fun of the experience, he has lately become bored with his superhuman power, and frustrated at the complete lack of strong opponents that can challenge him.

Over the course of the series, Saitama encounters various superheroes, villains, and monsters. He quickly gains a pupil, the cyborg Genos, who is on a revenge quest to find another cyborg that slaughtered his entire family and hometown. Eventually the two join the Hero Association in order to gain official recognition. Genos proves to be a prodigy and is instantly placed in Class-S, while Saitama barely passes the written test and is therefore placed in Class-C, making him the lowest ranked hero. Saitama performs many feats that go mostly unnoticed and unappreciated by the public, such as defeating the ninja Speed of Sound Sonic and destroying an incoming meteor that was going to obliterate City-Z. Saitama is promoted to Class-B after he defeats the powerful Deep Sea King, who reigns destruction on City-J. Monsters begin to appear in City-Z, searching for a mysterious Monster Association. Soon after, the great seer Shibabawa has a vision that the world is in danger. Panicking, the Hero Association calls all S-Class heroes to a meeting, begging them to protect the world. Immediately after the meeting, the leader of the Dark Matter Thieves, Boros, invades the planet and destroys City-A. Saitama duels with Boros and defeats him by using a serious punch. During the invasion of aliens, the S-Class hero, Drive Knight, warns Genos that the S-Class hero, Metal Knight, is his enemy. The Hero Association salvages City-A with the help of Metal Knight, and they build a new base of operations that will allow the Hero Association to deploy heroes more easily.

Saitama begins to gradually know other superheroes. He quickly becomes friends with the old martial arts master, Bang, and the "most powerful" superhero named, King, who is actually a cowardly nonviolent otaku who got his S-Class position by accidentally receiving credit for many of Saitama's previous victories. When the Hero Association executive Sitch tries to recruit villains to become superheroes, Bang's former apprentice, Garo, emerges and starts beating down many of the other heroes, prompting the association to make a small effort to stop him.

In order to learn more about martial arts, Saitama enters a tournament in disguise. During the martial arts tournament, the Monster Association leads an all-out attack on multiple cities causing massive panic and damage. The Hero Association struggles to keep up with the attacks. Genos fights monsters and protects the tournament so that Saitama can safely compete. Despite being the most powerful hero in the world, Saitama automatically loses the tournament due to being caught wearing a wig and impersonating another martial artist, Charanko. Saitama flees the tournament in fear of being arrested by the police. During the award ceremony, the powerful monster, Gouketsu, lays siege on the tournament after defeating Genos in combat. Gouketsu presents monster cells that can turn humans into monsters after being ingested to the people of the stadium, telling them that he'll kill them if they don't ingest the cells. Some people partake of the cells becoming monsters, including the martial artist, Bakuzan. Saitama returns to the stadium after hearing explosions and the winner of the tournament, Suiryu's desperate cries for help. Saitama defeats Gouketsu and Bakuzan before they can slaughter innocent people. Saitama humbles Suiryu and inspires the cocky martial artist to become a hero.

The B-Class hero, Fubuki, tries to have Saitama join her faction of heroes. Garo, determined to become the most powerful monster, continues to grow stronger and stronger and hunts more heroes down including S-Class heroes, Tank-Top Master and Metal Bat. The Hero Association ranks him at a threat of "Dragon" level, the second highest that is possible. They fail to capture him after sending a team of A-Class heroes to stop him. Bang confronts Garo and almost kills him, but the Monster Association rescues him at the last second to try and recruit him. The Monsters continue to attack people and continue to gather in City-Z, being led by the powerful psychic, Gyoro Gyoro, and the monster king, Orochi. Garo refuses to join the Monster Association and continues to defeat heroes. Meanwhile, the Hero Association leads an all out war against the Monster Association with hundreds of heroes, after the monsters kidnap the child of a high ranking contributor to the Hero Association. A new association known as, The Organization, consisting of powerful robots, allies itself with the Monster Association by sending robots such as G5 to help in the war. – Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-Punch_Man)

One Punch Man is the like the ultimate super hero. His battles are pointlessly effortless, and he defeats his enemies in just one punch usually ending the villain and destroying the stuff around him. The series isn’t about whether Saitama can defeat the villain, but how Saitama lives his day to day life, and the story of how he goes from being a loner hero to be a misunderstood member of the hero association. While dealing with the so called heroes who want him to look bad and making friends with other real heroes. The first season was amazing, and the second season should also be great.

Conclusion

Chihayafuru, and OnePunch Man will be released this summer, and A Certain Scientific Railgun Season 3 will be released sometime in 2019 … probably after the current season of A Certain Magical Index season 3. As for Natsume’s Book of Friends, Season 7 has not been announced yet, but with the popularity of the series I am sure it will show up sooner or later.

#William Reese #anime #Chihayafuru #natsume's book of friends #one punch man #a certain scientific railgun

[sebeth]

Young Justice: Welcome To Happy Harbor, Drop-Zone, What’s The Story

Warning, Spoilers Ahead…

 Episode 3: “Welcome To Happy Harbor”

The episode begins with Speedy interrupting one of Brick’s shipments.  Robin, Kid Flash, and Aqualad soon join the party.

Brick gets cocky and pays for it.  I’d completely forgotten about Brick’s appearance in this episode.  We see Brick in the trailer for the third season.  I bet he appears in Arrowette’s origin/recruitment episode.  It would be a nice callback to the first season.

The boys attempt to recruit Speedy to the team but he’s a manly man who doesn’t need to be part of a team.

“Recognized Robin B-01, Kid Flash B-03”

You know Batman programmed the codes and was all “Robin will be the first”.  It’s also a nice nod to Robin’s status as the first sidekick.

“Mission assignments are the Batman’s responsibility.” – Yep, poor Red is the one who has to reign in their shenanigans.  This Red doesn’t know how easy he has it – there should be a crossover between the Red of the cartoon universe and the Red of the comic book universe.  Comic book-Red can terrify Cartoon-Red with tales of his Conner and Bart.

“This team is not a social club.” – Kaldur would be the one most adamant about assignments and not wasting time on socializing.  He entered the Atlantean military at 12 years old.  He’s had structure and duty drilled into him at a young age.

“I cannot read his mind.” – Ooh, foreshadowing of M’gann’s later abuse of her powers?  That is a pretty clear violation of privacy for no other reason than convenience.  On the one hand, I cut M’gann some slack because even at 45 years old she is still a teenager by her race’s standards.  Teenagers don’t always make the best decisions and she’s obviously attempting to impress her teammates.  On the other hand, J’onn is a very ethical telepath and I’m positive he would have coached M’gann on the proper uses of telepathy.

“We all know what you’re thinking right now.” – Wally the horn dog is taken straight out of his solo comic in the late 1980s.

Wally and Dick competing over M’gann’s attention is hilarious.  I don’t think Dick event wants M’gann’s attention as much as he wants to annoy Wally.  Meanwhile, Superboy is not amused by their shenanigans.  At all.

Kaldur continues to be the only “adult” in the room.

“Granny Jones’ recipe from episode 17” – Subtle foreshadowing of an element that wouldn’t become prominent until much later in the season.

Wally needs to learn subtleness in his flirtations.

“Here, your powers are an extreme invasion of privacy.” – Wouldn’t that have been one of the first things J’onn would have gone over with her?”  

Superboy would be highly sensitive to telepathic intrusions due to his experiences in Cadmus.  If your entire upbringing revolved around telepathic manipulation, you are sure not going to want anyone randomly popping into your head.

“Helo, Megan.” – What we thought was a catchphrase is more foreshadowing.

The Martian bio-ship is cool.

“Fast with his feet. Not so much with his mouth.”

“Dude!”

Yep, Dick is having too much fun giving Wally a bad time.

Kaldur takes the lead and reaches out to Superboy.  Even before it was made official, the writers did a great job laying the foundation for Aqualad to become the leader of the team.

“Mimicking boys is a lot harder.” – Would it be?  Do Martians even have gender?  Their natural forms – green or white – are basically androgynous.

“Are tornadoes common in New England?” – A pretty sensible question.  Kaldur lives underwater, Conner’s a newborn, Megan’s an alien, and Wally’s from the Midwest.  Dick is the only one who lives in New England area.

The team battles Mr. Twister and comes out on the losing end.  I’ve always felt Red Tornado was one of the most formidable heroes around. How do you fight a tornado?

“That was quite turbing.” – Dick’s mangling of the English language is thrown back into his face.

Megan deduces (wrongly) that Mr. Twister is the Red Tornado.  To be fair, it was an obvious guess.

“Stay out of our way.” – Is this Conner’s catchphrase?  This is the second time in three episodes he’s stated a variation of it.

The rematch with Mr. Twister is going as well as the first round.

“First thing Batman taught me.” – Yeah, I can see Bruce believing “never be without a weapon” is a valuable life lesson.  

Where did Dick hide the utility belt? It’s rather bulky.

Megan devises a plan and the team makes short work of Mr. Twister.

“Cool.  Souvenir.” – Wally begins his collection of trophies.

The scientist at the end is Dr. T.O. Morrow – his search for Red Tornado sets up a future episode.

“Sorry.  I’ll strive to be more accurate.”

“And more respectful.”

Yep, Dick and Conner could both use lessons in manners and tact.

Conner mutters an awkward “Sorry” to Megan.  Judging from his expression, it pained him in his soul to do so.

Episode 4: “Drop-Zone”

For those curious, the first three episodes of the cartoon, along with the first five issues of the comic, took place from July 4th through the 12th.

“Drop-Zone” begins on June 19th – Kobra has forcibly taken control of Bane’s Venom-production facilities on Santa Prisca.  Bane is not happy.

Bane battles Mammoth for control of the island and loses.

I like Kobra and his minions visual design.  Very nice. I’m not sold on Shimmer or Mammoth (pre-transformation.”

We flip ahead to June 22nd.  Two possibilities for why we are now in June – which is before July, not after.  One – the creators messed up and put June in the captions instead of July.  Two – we skipped a year between episodes 3 and 4.  I’m going with the first option as the team still hasn’t elected a leader. Pretty sure you can’t have a year’s worth of adventures without an established leader.

That said, I’m pausing “Drop-Zone” and switching to the comic as the fifth issue takes place on July 20th. I’m trying to keep this in chronological order.

Issue 5: “What’s The Story?”

Wally is at the HQ – bored and flirthing with Megan.  Wally suggest a camp fire.  Megan enthusiastically agrees but dashes Wally’s hopes by inviting the rest of the team.

Tents are set, fires lit, and smores made.

Dick tells Wally to tone down his flirting as it’s “kinda bordering on the creepy.” Yeah, Wally isnt’ exactly smooth.

Conner’s not impressed with camping: “Sleep in these flimsy things called tents and sit around the fire?”

Dick scolds Wally again: “You’re about as subtle as a train wreck.”

Megan wants to learn more about her teammates.

Aqualad begins.  Here are the highlights:

·         Grew up in Shayeris, a city of Atlantis

·         Atlantis has many people, many cultures

·         Completed his education at 12 and began mandatory service in the Atlantean military

·         At 14 years old - Transferred to the prestigious Conservatory of Science in Poseidonis

·         Queen Mera is the headmistress of the Conservatory

·         Met Garth and Tula at the Conservatory

·         Garth Kaldur saved Aquaman’s life during an attack by the Ocean Master

·         Aquaman offered the boys a chance to become his protégé and later carry on his “suface duties” while he focused on running the Kingdom

·         Kaldur leapt at the chance while Garth continued his magical studies

Nice origin recap for Kaldur.  I love the inclusion of Garth and Tula as it is a nice nod to Arthur’s original sidekicks.

Wally goes next. Highlights:

·         Jay Garrick is still the original Flash!  Yes!  I love the nods to the depth of the DC Universe. Modern creators don’t seem to care about characters and continuity but Greg Weisman and company flawlessly incorporate all aspects and elements of DC’s history.

·         Barry’s next.

·         Wally desperately wants to be Kid Flash but Barry is “No! No partners! I don’t want the responsibility!”

·         Wally’s all “Screw that.  I do what I want.” and recreates the chemical combination that caused Barry to turn into the Flash.

·         Wally as a science nerd is unique to the Young Justice universe but it’s a nice addition to the character.

·         After a few weeks, Wally gains super-speed.  He campaigns to be Barry’s new partner.  Barry’s not thrilled but agrees as long as Wally does “exactly as I say, when I say it.”

The writers did an excellent job of establishing exactly why the heroes allowed the teenagers to run around in costumes:

·         Aquaman is training a protégé to assume his role as surface world ambassador/protector.

·         Batman doesn’t want Dick to turn out like him.  Bruce doesn’t want Dick’s “inner light” to face out.

·         Barry had no choice as Wally was hell-bent on being a hero.  Better to have Wally by his side than face the danger alone.

Roy is too busy being a manly loner to discover Ollie’s reasons.  Traditionally, Ollie doesn’t make the best life choices so it could have been the more typical “well, letting a kid run around in a mask and punch criminals seemed like a good idea at the time.”

Robin passes on story-telling time.  At first, Wally ribs Dick about Batman not letting him say anything but realizes he’s rubbing salt in the wound and passes the story-telling baton to Conner.

Conner doesn’t say much. He mentions the G-Gnomes and the containment pod.  Conner states he never thought for himself until his rescue.

Conner states the one thing that’s always on his mind is “Destroying Superman.

And with that bombshell, I’m off to work.

Up next, we continue story time and resume “Drop-Zone”.

#Young Justice #Wally West #Aqualad #Kaldur #Dick Grayson #Superboy #Miss Martian #Red Tornado #Kid Flash #Conner Kent #Robin #Kon-El #Roy Harper #Speedy

[sherryfundin]

New Release – Some Trust Can Be Rebuilt by Jane Blythe @jblytheauthor

Amazon /  Goodreads

MY REVIEW

I feel like I am on the verge of reading burnout. Soooo, I am going to a tried and true author that never lets me down…Jane Blythe and the next book in the Saving Seals series, Some Trust Can Be Rebuilt.

I have met Mia and Shark before and I am excited to get their story. Shark caught my eye early in the series, and even though the books can stand alone, I have enjoyed getting those early glimpses of him and Mia before their story was told.

Mia is the head of Search and Rescue in Rivers End. She has been involved in hundreds of searches, but there was something different about this one. They were looking for a ten year old boy. She knew what he was going through, because she had been lost in a forest for ten hours when she was eight years old.

Mia feels as if someone is watching her. You know, those feelings that make the hair on the back of your neck stand up and goosebumps rise on your arms. Knowing Jane, someone probably is…and who will be the one to come to her rescue? Julian, better known as Shark to his Seal teammates.

If you have been following the series, you will know why he had blown it with her. Can he win her back? They were high school sweethearts and he wants her, asking himself why has hasn’t gone after her? What is holding him back? What does he have to lose by trying to woo her back into his arms?

The break up was mutual. At least that is how Mia saw it. She missed him terribly, but, like him, she won’t make the first move. Why do WE make it so complicated? Communication seems to be at the center of many a misunderstanding.

The flowers….

A second boy goes missing…

Some Trust Can Be Rebuilt is like a Criminal Minds episode rolling through my mind. Hey Jane, I think you could be a writer for their show. Or how about having a movie of your very own? I can see Mia walking through the forest, trying not to show her unease. Would we pan around to see if…

I love visiting River’s End, but I’m not to sure about living there. For a town of a little over ten thousand people, they sure do get their fair share of evil dropping by. Thank goodness my friends are still in one piece.

Even though each book can stand alone, which I love if I find myself reading a series out of order, I love this series so much, I highly recommend beginning at the beginning for hours of suspense, love, tears, and laughter.

I voluntarily reviewed a free copy of Some Trust Can Be Rebuilt by Jane Blythe.

4 Stars

MY REVIEWS FOR JANE BLYTHE’S BOOKS

One & Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Christmas Hostage (Christmas Romantic Suspense)

Christmas Captive  (Christmas Romantic Suspense)

Christmas Victim  (Christmas Romantic Suspense)

A Secret to the Grave (Detective Parker Bell)

Winter Wonderland (Detective Parker Bell)

Dead Or Alive (Detective Parker Bell)

Little Girl Lost (Detective Parker Bell)

Flashes of Fate

The Diamond Star

Drowning in You (Conquering Fear)

Out of the Darkness (Conquering Fear)

Cracked Sapphire (Broken Gems)

Crushed Ruby (Broken Gems)

Fractured Diamond (Broken Gems)

Shattered Amethyst (Broken Gems)

Splintered Emerald (Broken Gems)

Salvaging Marigold (Broken Gems)

Some Regrets Are Forever (River’s End Rescues)

Some Lies Will Haunt You (River’s End Rescues)

Some Questions Have No Answer (River’s End Rescues)

Some Truth Can Be Distorted (River’s End Rescues)

Saving Ryder (Special Forces: Operation Alpha – Saving Seals)

Saving Eric (Special Forces: Operation Alpha – Saving Seals)

Saving Owen (Special Forces: Operation Alpha – Saving Seals)

Saving Logan  (Special Forces: Operation Alpha – Saving Seals)

Cocky Savior (Cocky Hero Club)

Protect (The Everyday Heroes Club)

You can see my Giveaways HERE.

You can see my Reviews HERE.

If you like what you see, why don’t you follow me?

Leave your link in the comments and I will drop by to see what’s shakin’.

I am an Amazon affiliate/product images are linked.

Thanks for visiting!

#jane blythe #romance #suspense and thriller fiction #series #rivers end rescues #read in 2021 #4 star review

[allthingsdarkanddirty]

★✩★ COVER REVEAL & PREORDER ★✩★

COCKY FLYBOY

A Cocky Hero Club Novel

By SUSAN HORSNELL

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58986318/

Release Date: October 3

Hosted by DS Book Promotions

AMAZON - Pre Order

US - https://amzn.to/3EJ3Ypo

UK - https://amzn.to/39sVeFq

AU - https://amzn.to/3o1dD4Q

CA - https://amzn.to/2W6myX5

Available in Kindle Unlimited.

Vi Keeland and Penelope Ward are excited to bring you the Cocky Hero Club: original works from various authors inspired by Keeland and Ward's New York Times bestselling Cocky Bastard series.

Blurb:

Tim Reisher is a debonair pilot with a cocky attitude.

He is well known throughout the airline community thanks to his penchant for beautiful women.

Melissa Hansen is a new member of the National crew with a past she is attempting to escape.

When the past does catch up, Tim finds himself caught in the middle.

Will the two bring an attacker to justice?

Will they lose their hearts to each other in the process?

A Cocky Hero Production inspired by Playboy Pilot

Author Bio:

My name is Susan Horsnell and for 37 years, I worked as a nurse. It was something I always wanted to do from the time I was a young child and I began treading this path as a 12 year old when I volunteered at the local hospital, helping the Pink Ladies sell magazines and sweets from a trolley. I have always had an overactive imagination and teachers noted I had a great ability for writing at a young age. When I retired I put pen to paper and a second long held dream became a reality with my first book - a Western Historical Romance was published in 2013. My love of the Wild West came from my father, an avid Cowboys and Indian fan. From there, my imagination took over and I branched into other Romance Genres. My aim is to take the reader on a roller coaster of action, emotion, mystery and of course - love.

Follow Susan Here:

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/susanhorsnellromanceauthor

Website http://www.susanhorsnellromanceauthor.com/

Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Susan-Horsnell/e/B00BXR5FMM/

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/horsnells/

Twitter https://twitter.com/SusanHorsnell

#coverreval #cockyheroclub #preorder #Books #keepreading #suspense #booknerd #reading #booklove #booklife #bookaddict #indieauthor #kindlereads #bookish #fiction #romancesuspense #bibliophilelife #authorsofinstagram #readers #bookbloggers #susanhorsnell #cockyflyboy #dsbookpromotions

@Susan Horsnell @DS Promotions

[your-dietician]

'You have to just love it'

New Post has been published on https://tattlepress.com/sports/you-have-to-just-love-it/

'You have to just love it'

Jazz Chisholm knows that baseball is difficult, that there remains a significant gulf he must cross to match his significant talent and overwhelming charisma to his production.

Right now, this is who Jazz is: A rookie infielder for the Miami Marlins whose stat line says his production is just above league average, but his swag suggests he’s anything but.

This is who Jazz could be: A dynamic, powerful, five-tool force, whose desire to disrupt the game could vault him atop the short list of burgeoning baseball stars with ever-elusive crossover appeal.

This is how he plans to get there: By sacrificing nothing – certainly not the vicious bat speed from his swing that ensures the home runs he does hit go very, very far. And certainly not the exuberance that vaulted him from the Bahamas to the big leagues, endearing him to fans and perhaps enabling him to join some of his athletic heroes – Kobe, LeBron, KD – as a wonder known only by one name.

And what’s the tune Jazz lives by?

“To this day,” he says, “I just always try to tell kids to be themselves. Don’t let nobody change you. You go out there and play the way you want to go play.

“That’s why I always do the crazy hair colors, I do my dances and I just have fun out there because I just want everybody to know, it’s OK to have fun on the baseball field.

“You know?”

If you don’t, you probably will soon.

Jazz Chisholm looks on before a game against the Braves.

Mark Brown, Getty Images

‘Why not bring it into the game?’

Perhaps you found out on Opening Day, when Chisholm fulfilled a promise made to Marlins ace Sandy Alcantara. Chisholm, whose hair changes color with the ease of South Florida weather patterns, was planning a platinum blonde look.

Yet as spring training wound down and Chisholm – who debuted on Sept. 1 in the pandemic-shortened 2020 – had a shot to make his first Opening Day roster, Alcantara had a suggestion.

Make the team, he said, and you dye your hair blue.

“I said, ‘I got you,’” Chisholm recalls. “It was history from there.”

Chisholm came through, breaking camp with the squad and showing up for the opener with a tone resembling a Louie-Bloo Raspberry Otter Pop.

Perhaps you noticed a couple weeks later, when Chisholm hit his second home run of the season, a towering shot off Atlanta’s Charlie Morton, and then, befitting his significant basketball skills, debuted a euro step as he crossed home plate.

Contrived?

Nope. Just a part of his personality, reflexive as a fist bump or handshake.

“I will walk around the clubhouse euro-stepping on people,” he says. “I’ll be in front of someone and last second, I’ll give ‘em a euro, you know, like, ‘Get out of the way.’ It’s something I do all day, every day.

“So why not bring it into the game? Why not misdirect it going into home, and then step on it?”

Chisholm has nine homers and 10 steals in 51 games.

Jasen Vinlove, USA TODAY Sports

It’s not like Chisholm is pimping home runs that scraped the top of the wall.

He is the only player this season to go deep on pitches of at least 100 mph, doing it first off the great Jacob deGrom on April 18 and then the Phillies’ Jose Alvarado a month later. He is, in fact, the only player with two such homers since pitch-tracking began in 2008.

Listed at 5-11 and 184 pounds, Chisholm – full name Jasrado Hermis Arrington Chisholm – seemingly manifested his skills by watching his grandmother play softball.

Yeah, Grandma could turn on one.

“The small person with the pop? Yeah, I think I got that from her, too,” he says.

Patricia Coakley, now 77, played on the Bahamian national softball team, and played the sport long enough for Jazz to see her compete both in slow- and fastpitch formats. He saw himself in her, from the aforementioned quick bat to the tenacious baserunning approach to her play at shortstop.

And so when Chisholm was barely old enough to hold a bat, he called dibs on the position, fully intending to never leave.

“I just loved seeing her play shortstop. I fell in love with watching her, too,” he says. “It was always like that from when I was probably 4 and 5 – just run straight to shortstop.

“Grandma’s a shortstop, I’m a shortstop.”

 Clearly, he picked an excellent role model, though there weren’t many others locally. Just eight players from the Bahamas preceded Chisholm to the majors, with infielder Andre Rodgers – who played from 1967 to ’77 – the only one to hold down anything resembling a full-time role. Antoan Richardson was the most recent, serving largely as a pinch runner from 2011 to 2014, and he’s now a coach for the San Francisco Giants.

Young Jazz focused on his grandmother’s exploits and fixated on televised games featuring Ken Griffey Jr., Barry Bonds and Derek Jeter.

And was convinced he’d play on their level.

“I always told myself that I was going to be a big leaguer, from a very young age,” he says. “It was not really tough believing I was going to be a big leaguer.”

Chisholm played plenty of ball stateside as a child, often in Miami, and attended a prep school in Kansas for a spell, eventually signing with Arizona as an international free agent. While he’s sanguine about his own rise, he’s humbled when he ponders his impact back home.

“Every time I go to the Bahamas I see a little kid telling me, ‘Hey, you made me start playing baseball,’” he says. “It makes me smile nonstop when I hear that.”

They have a dynamic hero to follow, even if he’s an unfinished product. Chisholm is on pace to hit 20 home runs and steal 20 bases this season; he clubbed his ninth home run of the season Thursday night in a loss to the Washington Nationals, pushing his batting average to .258 and his OPS to .766.

With just 276 plate appearances behind him, Chisholm has room to grow. That makes him a good match for Miami, which acquired him from Arizona for pitcher Zac Gallen in 2019. “I love the people out here,” he says. “This is just the life that I feel like I was here to live. My kind of place.”

Chisholm celebrates a home run against the Mets.

Andy Marlin, USA TODAY Sports

Fresh fish

The Marlins are 31-43 and lagging in the NL East, a pitching-centric club with a lineup that looks emaciated even within this season’s historically grim league environment.

Yet for a franchise dogged for decades by ham-handed ownership, they have a decidedly fresh feel.

They have a quietly beautiful ballpark still not yet a decade old, yet new owner Bruce Sherman bears none of the blame for bamboozling the city into a hideously bad stadium deal. In Jeter they have a CEO with star power but also patience, and the forward-thinking mentality to hire the first woman as a major league GM, the highly-regarded Kim Ng.

Alcantara and rookie lefty Trevor Rogers are worthy aces, with the injured Sixto Sanchez also capable of holding that role. At Class AA Jacksonville, pitching prospects Max Meyer and Edward Cabrera join outfielder J.J. Bleday, all consensus top 100 prospects nearing the big leagues.  

In Miami, Chisholm defers to veterans such as Jesus Aguilar and Miguel Rojas, who when healthy nudges Chisholm to second base. From a baseball standpoint, Chisholm says he goes to great lengths not to “get cocky with the veterans.”

Yet they share a desire to keep things loose, from the clubhouse to the kicks; Rojas has long used social media to amplify his shoe game, while Chisholm has donned footwear celebrating concepts as disparate as Miami Vice and Oreo cookies.

Earlier this week, he debuted a gold chain that commemorated a remarkable leaping catch against the Tampa Bay Rays.

“The Miami Marlins’ whole roster right now – you look at what they’re wearing on their feet, even down to the coaches sometimes, it’s just straight heat, I’m not going to lie,” says Chisholm. “Everybody is just into that stuff – having the swag, having fun on the field.”

 It all may seem a bit excessive for a second-division club, yet the Marlins also made the playoffs in 2020 and swept the Chicago Cubs out of them. Manager Don Mattingly says the veteran tone set by the likes of Aguilar and Rojas “helps your club create an atmosphere that guys like playing in.” He is confident Chisholm will develop greater consistency both in routine and performance, calling his development arc “pretty normal” for a first-year player.

As for Chisholm, he’s prepared for the roller-coaster the game provides. His homer Thursday broke a 15-day streak without a dinger, a period filled with too many weak ground balls. It is a hallmark of the game he chose that he might go days without making an impact, when instead of euro stepping over the plate he’s making an abrupt right turn back to the dugout.

He cannot control his fate in a manner that LeBron can or Kobe could, and if he’s given just one pitch to turn and burn on, he may very well miss it.

Chisholm knows this well and chooses not to dwell on it. Like the island kid who just knew he’d be a big leaguer some day, Chisholm may be right when he believes this game will reward his undying love for it.

“It’s not frustrating,” he says of failure, “because you know how hard the game is. It’s just like, ‘Man, I’m just praying I get another one. Give me another one.’ It’s not really like, ‘Man, I missed my only chance.’ No, because you still got two more strikes to play with. And you might get the worst swing of your life off, but it can be a hit.

“This game can really mess with your mind – because you could be hitting the ball as hard as you want every day and not get a hit. And then you can go break four bats in one day and have four hits. That’s why you have to just love it. Because even though it takes away, it gives back.

“And it gives back big.”

Source link

[daffylaura]

COVER: Doctor Desirable by Anjelica Naas

COVER: Doctor Desirable by Anjelica Naas

Title: Doctor Desirable: A Cocky Hero Club Production Author: Anjelica Grace Genre: Contemporary Romance Release Date: October 11, 2020 Cover Design: Emma Nichole – Literary Graphic Designs

Leaving Colorado wasn’t my first choice. It wasn’t even my second. But when the job of a lifetime in Rhode Island presented itself, who could say no? I could fulfill my two years and then…

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[bhillson]

Cover Reveal ~ Doctor Desirable by Anjelica Naas

Cover Reveal ~ Doctor Desirable by Anjelica Naas

Title: Doctor Desirable: A Cocky Hero Club Production Author: Anjelica Grace Genre: Contemporary Romance Release Date: October 11, 2020 Cover Design: Emma Nichole – Literary Graphic Designs

Leaving Colorado wasn’t my first choice. It wasn’t even my second. But when the job of a lifetime in Rhode Island presented itself, who could say no? I could fulfill my two years and then move back…

View On WordPress

[reesourire]

#TeaserShare: Cocky Protector by @AuthorKatMiz

#TeaserShare: Cocky Protector by @AuthorKatMiz

Cocky Protector by Kat Mizera releases on June 28th!

A Cocky Hero Club Production

SIGN UP to Kat’s Newsletter — https://www.katmizera.com/

Preorder the Audiobook Now — https://amzn.to/37HXc34

Life as a CIA operative might be exciting, but living under the radar gets lonely. Meeting someone, much less having a relationship, is the most impossible mission of all.

There was someone……

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[bookboleynreads]

Release Blitz! Creative Casanova (A Cocky Hero Club Novel) by K. Street

Release Blitz! Creative Casanova (A Cocky Hero Club Novel) by K. Street

Title: Creative CasanovaA Cocky Hero Club NovelAuthor: K. StreetGenre: Contemporary RomanceRelease Date: August 8, 2021 Vi Keeland and Penelope Ward are excited to bring you the Cocky Hero Club: original works from various authors inspired by Keeland and Ward’s New York Times bestselling Cocky Bastard series. BLURB “What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done?” When Ryder DeLuca posed that…

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#a cocky hero club novel #a cocky hero club production #available now #cocky bastard series #cocky hero club #contemporary romance #creative casanova #give me books pr #k webster #new release #one night stand #penelope ward #playboy pilot #second chance romance #sudden guardian #vi keeland

[asecretsummer-rpg]

Name: Alec Jonasson Age: 36 Sexuality: Heterosexual Gender: Male Portrayed By: Henry Cavill Availability: Deceased

“I don’t care what‘s happening here. I’m in town for business.”

→ Background

Alec had a bit of a tough start in life. His father was a drug dealer who roamed streets and clubs, selling his product, and his mother was an addicted prostitute. They lived in a basement in London for most of his childhood and Alec grew up with a fear of confined spaces thanks to the experience. It wasn’t the cleanest and he would have to listen to his mother and her “clients” in another room. Alec really hated this part of his life so when his parents got caught up in a drug raid gone wrong and died, Alec couldn’t say he missed them. He was whisked away by child services and placed in the care of a foster family. Who didn’t really want him so much as the paychecks but they weren’t cruel to him and he had his own room and pretty much whatever he needed. Alec was just a bit rough round the edges, a bit damaged, but he could have been saved. If it weren’t for Ivan.

Ivan was the tough guy of the neighbourhood. He had tattoos and a wild look in his eyes. No one really knew what he did for a living but everyone knew to stay out of his way, that he was dangerous. Alec got involved in his business, got dragged into it really, a kid with no mission and a bad start in life. It was easy to pull him in. Ivan and his crew would rob stores around the country. Put on masks and go in, knives at the ready, sometimes a gun if they could get one. It was a risky thrill and Alec got quite good at it. He liked the money it made him. Feeling part of something, a group. 

One day they’d gone to Essex. Harlow. It was far enough away from their home city that they might not be easily traceable and it was an easy job. Rob a newsagents. Nothing fancy but they had a cash register and a safe in the back. He and Ivan did this job alone, rushing the place with guns. They were quite a team by this point. It’d gone the way it usually did. Easy in, grab the cash, no one tries to play the hero, home in time for tea. What he didn’t count on was turning, mask off, and spotting the girl hiding inside the card shelves. He could see her eyes staring out at him; it was only by chance he happened to glance at the gap. He cursed himself for taking off his mask, letting himself get too cocky. The police arrived just as he was advancing on her and Ivan had dragged him out. But Alec couldn’t let go - she’d seen his face. Alec had tried to grab her off the street in a van but she got away from him. Then he suddenly couldn’t find her. The girl had vanished... with his features burned into her brain.

→ Back to Baberton

Flash forward to Baberton. A little nothing town somewhere north of London. Not a place that Alec would have chosen to come. Not a place he wants to stay long. It’s been years since he’d seen Ivan or the crew. He got out of that a year or so after the incident with the girl in the newsagents. He stayed in Essex, finding there were things there that interested him, and made money the way his father before him had. Drugs. Not dealing personally just overseeing a couple of dealers, making sure they didn’t pocket money that was rightfully his.

Alec only made the decision to come to Baberton a few short months ago. It wasn’t so much a split decision, he has his reasons. If people ask he tends to tell them that he works as a travelling salesman and is here to try and sell some of his products. It’s an easy way to get people off his back and not ask too many questions, though it seems this town has enough on their hands with the serial killer. He’s not too interested in that. Alec is in this town searching for the ghosts from his past. And he’s getting closer. It’s only a matter of time before he finds what he’s looking for.

→ What’s His Secret?

Is the man that Angel Frazier (Elisa Dalton) witnessed robbing a newsagents years ago. She was placed in witness protection as she’d seen his face and could ID him to the police and was therefore at risk, especially after her did try to come after her again after the event. Alec has always resented letting the little girl get away. She’d been thirteen at the time but that didn’t matter to him, he didn’t care. He can’t seem to let go. Alec looks out for himself and not getting caught for this has become something of an obsession, his first priority. He used her old best friend Madeline Powell as a way to try and find out where Angel had gone, going into Maddy’s workplace and getting to know her, then getting closer. Dating her in secret since he was older, and he felt like she really started to fall for him - which worked in his favour. Alec even acted like he had contacts that could help her future journalism career.

He caused the car crash that killed Madeline’s parents in a furious attempt to get her to stay in the country - or kill her, either way. She was planning to leave the country and that would ruin everything. She was his only link to the girl he was looking for and he wasn’t letting her get away this easily. Nobody leaves Alec and nobody gets away with pulling a fast one on him either. He followed Maddy and her brother to Baberton and is now staying at the bed and breakfast, figuring out his next move.

He attempted to kill Angel but there was a struggle and she got hold of the gun and it went off, putting him into a coma. [x]

→ How did he die?

-A killed him in January 2019, in the local museum. [x]

#town rp #secrets rp #scream rp #appless rp #henry cavill #inmemory

[culturespy]

Saying goodbye to my hero, Sir Roger Moore. Baby, you were the best!

When I was 15 years old, I wanted to be Roger Moore.

If you saw my bedroom walls back then, you would know. Roger Moore found a place on all four of them. I broke out the Scotch tape to put up full-page magazine photos surrounded by Moonraker trading cards, and of course the Bond film posters. I had Moonraker and The Spy Who Loved Me to start with because those were the films that got me hooked on Roger Moore and James Bond. The For Your Eyes Only poster with those sexy legs came along after a while, and an Octopussy poster went up a few weeks before my high school graduation.

My mother called this the shrine, and she wasn’t far off. Roger Moore was my idol. My teenage life was measured in the two-year periods from one of his Bond films to the next. In between I got my chance to catch up with his two earlier films, Live and Led Die and The Man With the Golden Gun, when they appeared on the ABC Sunday Night Movie. Sure, I was also excited to see the Sean Connery movies for the first time, but completing my Roger Moore 007 experience was more important.

And, oh, that glorious week in the summer of 1980 when a double feature of The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker played at Cinema 18! Cinema 18 was Erie’s sleaziest theater; it used to be a porno house. But not even a questionable cinema floor was going to stop me from seeing Spy on the big screen—the way it was meant to be seen!—for the first time.

Also to mark time between films, I scanned magazines for interviews with Roger Moore and the TV Guide listings for talk show appearances. When Roger was on the Merv Griffith or Mike Douglas shows, I sat in front of the television set with my tape recorder running. Every golden word had to be preserved.

It may sound shallow, but in a large part I am who I am today because I saw The Spy Who Loved Me when I was 13. I’ve written about that momentous first viewing before, but I should point out that Spy was not my first James Bond film. I had previously seen Dr. No, From Russia With Love and most of Goldfinger—the first three Bonds, all starring Sean Connery.

But even though I had seen the films I would later consider Connery’s best, I didn’t connect with him the way I connected with Roger Moore that first time I saw Spy Who Loved Me. So what was it that drew me to Rog? I think that extra bit of cockiness helped. Roger Moore exuded cool invincibility.

The scene that most struck me comes near the end, just as Bond arrives at the oceanic base of the evil Stromberg (Kurt Jurgens). Bond steps inside an elevator with a trap door in the floor. Bond doesn’t know about the trap door, but we the viewers do because Stromberg used it at the beginning of the movie to drop his double-crossing secretary into the shark tank below. The elevator doors close, and Stromberg hits the button to activate the trap door.

The first time I watched this, I was tense. “Oh no!” I thought. I expected Bond to plunge into the tank, where he would fight the shark. But the shark tank on Stromberg’s monitor remained Bond-free. Then the elevator pinged and the door opened and there, to Stromberg’s surprise and mine, was Bond, his feet straddling the trap door. “You were expecting me to drop in,” he drawled.

That was one of those corny lines that sounded so natural coming out of Roger Moore’s mouth. Moore would always undercut his own talent, saying that all he could do was quip and raise his eyebrows, but he made it seem so effortless. If you want proof it’s not easy to deliver a throwaway quip, watch the last two Pierce Brosnan Bond movies. (I don’t like being mean to Pierce, but he got stuck playing Moore half the time and Connery the other half, and the discomfort sometimes showed.)

What I grew to admire above all else about Roger Moore was that he was suave. I wanted to be suave. I wanted to charm ladies with that kind of a deep, smooth voice. I wanted to put on a tuxedo and saunter into a tony nightspot on the Cote D’Azure. I wanted to go to a Cordon Bleu restaurant and order red wine with anything but fish (OK, I did learn a thing or two from Connery.) I never got to do any of those things, but I did teach myself to raise my eyebrow RM style.

One of the benefits of being a Roger Moore fan in the early ‘80s was, thanks to the popularity of Spy and Moonraker, CBS started showing reruns of The Saint late nights during the week. This was my chance to get acquainted with Roger’s other signature role, and I grew to love Simon Templar nearly as much as James Bond and the works of Leslie Charteris soon joined those of Ian Fleming on my bookcase. However, because these episodes ran late on school nights, I tended to fall asleep in the last 15 minutes. I used to joke I had the endings to about a dozen Saint episodes locked in my subconscious. Several decades later I bought the DVD box set to finally learn how those episodes ended.

But it also wasn’t easy being a Roger Moore fan in those days, believe me. We had to contend with the older generation of 007 fans, the ones who condemned Roger Moore for committing the mortal sin of not being Sean Connery. The divide between Connery fans and Moore fans ran deep (nobody really talked much about George Lazenby back then). We Moore fans were constantly told we weren’t true Bond fans, as if we were less able to appreciate Ian Fleming’s novels because we came of age when Roger Moore was carrying the Walther PPK. The early James Bond fans clubs were run by people who hated Roger Moore and let us know it with every newsletter. The only book on the Bond films at the time, simply titled The James Bond Films, was written by a guy, John Brosnan, who also hated Roger Moore but had to grudgingly admit Spy was pretty damned good. 

Time and three subsequent Bond actors have made this issue largely irrelevant, but things were heated when I was young and I admit I still have a bit of a chip on my shoulder. I probably don’t appreciate Sean Connery as much as I should because of it, but, truly, I don’t dislike any Bond actor. I appreciate what each of them has brought to the role. I just appreciate Roger Moore best.

When pushed hard enough, I would defend Moore’s Bond as more than a smooth quip machine. It would have been easier if Moore himself had been on my side. A master of self-deprecation, Moore would insist in interviews he never took Bond seriously. Asked how he made acting choices as 007, Moore would reply, “Sometimes I wear a white dinner jacket and sometimes I wear a black one.”

Despite his protestations, Roger Moore did take Bond seriously. He may be remembered for the grins and the one-liners, but he had his tough and poignant moments as well. Listen to calm, assured way he tells Melina, “We’re not dead yet,” before they are keel-hauled in For Your Eyes Only. Watch how he winces when Anya Amasova mentions his deceased wife in Spy. Look at the anger in his face when he discovers General Orlov’s plot to kill thousands with a nuclear blast in Octopussy. These aren’t the only moments. The insouciance Moore projected was what first attracted me to his 007, but on the proper occasion he knew how to make Bond human rather than superhuman.

This leads me to Roger’s greatest 007 moment. It’s one that, curiously, won’t make many of the tribute compilations you can find online these days. It is a moment when he is at once smooth and steely and I can’t imagine Connery playing it so well (sorry, chip on my shoulder). You’ll find it near the beginning of Octopussy—the film containing Moore’s best performance, if you ask me—as Bond first confronts the villain, Kamal Kahn (Louis Jourdan, a dark reflection of Moore’s elegance) at the backgammon table.

Bond’s sharp eyes have caught Kahn cheating with a pair of loaded dice that come up double six when needed. Bond takes the seat across from Kahn and raises the stakes by betting the film’s MacGuffin, the Faberge egg. If Bond rolls anything but a double six, he loses. Bond connives to take control of Kahn’s dice, gives his opponent a cold stare, rolls the dice and—still locking eyes with Kahn—declares, “Double sixes.”

When I first saw Octopussy my good friend and fellow Moore Bond fan Brian Sheridan was seated next to me. “Whoah!” Brian said under his breath, “He didn’t even look down!” We knew we had just seen Roger Moore put proof to an earlier theme song: Nobody does it better.

I went to college and my Roger Moore posters came with me. Dorm rooms need decorations too. A new poster went up as Roger departed Bond with A View to a Kill—one film too late, but we’ll leave it at that. Another fellow came along, and a poster declaring Timothy Dalton as “The Most Dangerous Bond. Ever.” appeared on my wall shortly before I graduated Marquette University.

Roger Moore was no longer James Bond, but I was still his fan. Apartment walls also could use a few movie posters, I found. The burgeoning home video industry meant I could watch his movies pretty much whenever I wanted.

At the urging of his friend Audrey Hepburn (my all-time favorite actress), Roger Moore became a goodwill ambassador for UNICEF, and I found a new reason to admire him. He didn’t show up on the screen much anymore, but stories of his generosity continued.

When Pierce Brosnan’s first Bond movie, GoldenEye, was released in 1995 I was reading a magazine article about its production. One of the crew members interviewed for the story went off on an unexpected tangent. He said that the Bond film family, the regular crew that Cubby Broccoli had employed for decades, dearly missed Roger Moore. He treated everyone on set, from his co-stars to the grips, as mates and kept them all laughing. As improbable as it may sound, he said, a lot of the regulars would have loved to see Moore return as Bond.

Testimonials like that became common. It seemed no one who had ever worked with Roger Moore spoke an unkind word about him. Sometimes people would go out of their way to praise him. In a career retrospective for the AV Club, actress Nancy Allen started gushing—quite to her interviewer’s surprise—about working with Moore on a mostly forgotten TV movie called The Man Who Wouldn’t Die.

Although Moore was becoming more and more obscure on this side of the Atlantic, I could tell from press reports that the elder Moore was now regarded as a national treasure in the UK. After Desmond “Q” Llewellyn died in 1999, Roger gracefully stepped into the role of unofficial spokesman for the Bond franchise. When Roger became Sir Roger in 2003, I cheered.

In his later years, Sir Roger Moore became something of a magical person. Warmth and kindness and humor just seemed to flow from him. His tweets were hilarious, though he never missed an opportunity to raise consciousness about his beloved UNICEF. His speaking tours of the UK were interspersed with press reports of him grabbing a meal at a local restaurant, or even showing up at a pharmacy, and regaling everyone he met. It cheered my heart to see that my childhood hero was, by all accounts, simply a wonderful person.

In 2012, a dream came true for me. When Moore was promoting his latest book, Bond on Bond, to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the 007 films, I had the opportunity to interview him for the Chicago Sun-Times. It was just a phone interview, alas, but I still got to talk to my hero of 34 years. He was as warm and funny and gracious as I had hoped as we talked about kicking the car off the cliff in For Your Eyes Only and pulling pranks on Desmond Llewellyn. He broke my heart a bit when I asked about the Lotus Esprit from Spy Who Loved Me (still my dream car) and he said he didn’t like it. “My legs are too long.” Still, when I hung up the phone I was thrilled. It was one of the happiest days of my life. And when I concluded the conversation, I was careful to say, “Thank you for being my idol.”

Those words came back to me the morning of Tuesday, April 23. I had just arrived at the YMCA and wanted to take a quick look at Facebook before heading to my 8:15 aerobics class. Instead of the usual Snoopy cartoon, I got punched in the face by the first report of my hero’s death. I was angry at first. There were no other reports yet, so I assumed it was a hoax even though the source, the London Standard, sounded trustworthy enough. I went straight to Roger’s Twitter page, hoping to find a tweet saying, “Relax. I’m still alive.” Instead I found the statement from his children, and I knew it was real. My childhood hero was gone.

I didn’t make it to my aerobics class. I couldn’t look away from my phone as the tributes trickled in. I was grateful there was a box of Kleenex nearby in the lobby.

Several days have passed, and the Roger Moore tributes have continued. I was fortunate to participate in one on the Spybrary podcast. But of all the words said and written about Roger Moore since he passed, the ones that most struck me came from Ian Ogilvy, who succeeded Moore as Simon Templar in Return of the Saint. In a Facebook post, Ogilvy wrote: “If everybody could comport themselves in the style of Roger Moore, who was beloved by everybody and hated by none, the world would be a nicer place.”

When I was in high school, I imitated Roger Moore because he was suave. Now I plan to imitate him because he was good.

I am 51 years old, and I still want to be Roger Moore.

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Review – Saving Owen by Jane Blythe @jblytheauthor

Jane Blythe’s covers for the Saving Seals series is filled with eye candy. What do you think?

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MY REVIEW

Owen was at a loss. His wife, Maya, had died of cancer. Why was it her, instead of him? After all, he is a Navy Seal and puts his life on the line every time he goes on a mission.

He was heading to his apartment when he saw an open door. He entered to rescue the maiden, Evie, from being raped. She reminded him of Maya, so even though they lived in the same building, he was determined to put distance between them.

Of course, it’s romantic suspense, so it isn”t hard to figure out they will get together. The thing is, Jane Blythe throws twists and turns willy nilly, so we can never be sure how they will get there. And so…

Owen comes home from a mission to find Evie packed and ready to go. She is leaving him. His past came back to smack him in the face and it was too late to come clean. She had always felt like second best. Now, she felt used, was crushed, and, until the cartel came knocking at her door, she wanted nothing to do with him.

She becomes a threat to the Perez Cartel and the entire Seal team knows just how deadly they can be. They have dealt with them before. The cartel is deadly, dealing in kidnapping, torture, trafficking and murder, to keep the drugs running.

Every move they make to hide and protect her, they are found. How can he keep her safe and have a chance at winning her back?

The suspense builds and even though I have a good idea how it will end…wink, wink…the nonstop action and danger was one wild ride. I am tired and ready for bed, but I have to know…

…and Jane Blythe has me wanting to hear Shark’s story. He deserves a happy ever after too. What do I see when I reach the end? It is like Jane read my mind. Shark’s story is next in line. Hoorah.

I voluntarily reviewed a free copy of Saving Owen by Jane Blythe.

4 Starws

MY REVIEWS FOR JANE BLYTHE’S BOOKS

One & Two

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Five

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Christmas Hostage (Christmas Romantic Suspense)

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A Secret to the Grave (Detective Parker Bell)

Winter Wonderland (Detective Parker Bell)

Dead Or Alive (Detective Parker Bell)

Little Girl Lost (Detective Parker Bell)

Flashes of Fate

The Diamond Star

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Some Regrets Are Forever (River’s End Rescues)

Some Lies Will Haunt You (River’s End Rescues)

Some Questions Have No Answer (River’s End Rescues)

Some Truth Can Be Distorted (River’s End Rescues)

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