Love's Opening Night by Jeff Adams Guest Post, Excerpt & Giveaway!

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Hey guys, we have Jeff Adams stopping by today with his upcoming release Love’s Opening Night, we have a brilliant guest post where Jeff chats about his love of the theatre, we have a great excerpt and a fantastic giveaway! So guys, check out the post and click that giveaway link <3 ~Pixie~

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Love’s Opening Night

by

Jeff Adams

Can an onstage love story lead to a real-life romance?

Jeremy Steele is a veteran Broadway performer. For his latest role, he’s dancing alongside a man he’s fantasized about for years, TV star Ty Beaumont. Jeremy knows better than to get involved with a castmate, but when Ty has trouble learning the complicated choreography, Jeremy offers to lend a hand. When a rehearsal kiss turns into something more, Jeremy can’t help but wonder what a celebrity like Ty could ever see in a Broadway chorus boy like him. Will a relationship with his crush make it past previews, or can it become a long-running hit?

Release date: 28th December 2016
Pre-order: Dreamspinner Press | ARe | Amazon | B&N | Kobo

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Jeff Adams!

Hi! I’m Jeff Adams. Many thanks to Pixie for hosting me so I can talk about Love’s Opening Night, my latest novella that comes out from Dreamspinner Press on December 28. I loved writing this story because it ties back to my love of theater, which is always in a battle with my love for hockey. In fact this is one of the few stories I’ve written where there’s not even a mention of hockey. But that’s okay because this really goes full tilt for theater.

The first Broadway tour I ever saw was when I was in the sixth grade (this would’ve been around 1979 or ‘80) and got to go see A Chorus Line. I lived next door to a woman who owned a dance studio and her daughter and another neighbor’s daughter took dance class and they were hooked on this cast album. As a result, I ended hearing it a lot too. I became obsessed and managed to convince my mom that we needed to see this show. I was mesmerized by the show and the incredible dancing and to this day it’s among my favorites.

Living in Alabama, in the 80s, it was a mixed bag in terms of what we got for touring shows but once I was able to drive I could get myself to Atlanta to see even more shows. While I do enjoy plays, musicals are my first love and it’s been the most difficult adjustment in moving to far Northern California that I can’t go see a Broadway or Off-Broadway show more often.

Love’s Opening Night takes a look at a romance that starts off in the rehearsal room of a new musical. One of the ensemble members ends up helping the show’s star learn some dance moves and things take off from there. Below is a brief excerpt of Jeremy headed home after a heated rehearsal.

Once you’ve read the excerpt, I hope you’ll enter for the chance to win a free e-book copy via the Rafflecopter that’s below…or that you’ll take the plunge and pre-order one.

Enjoy!

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Excerpt

Days like this I wished I’d ridden my bike to rehearsal. Peddling home, going over the Brooklyn Bridge, headed for Fort Greene, was a great way to clear my head. And my head needed to not only be cleared, but possibly examined.

Unfortunately, tonight I was on the subway so all I could do was sit and overthink what had happened. It was nearly ten, and the subway was fairly empty; I got a seat easily because there were only a dozen or so people in the car.

Ty had initiated the kiss, and it was far beyond a kiss shared between performers acting out roles. My response was totally wrong, even though I wanted it, and I ended up encouraging him. It’d be one thing connecting with someone in the ensemble. People dated in shows all the time, sometimes for the run of the show or longer. Sometimes people met the love of their lives working together.

Ty Beaumont was different. He was a star. Okay, not an A-level star. It wasn’t like I was crushing on Hugh Jackman and getting all squishy over a kiss. But, still, Ty was way out of my league. If he decided I was a distraction, he could make the show very difficult for me.

He wouldn’t do that, though. I shook my head vigorously at the thought, which got me a stare from the woman sitting across from me. She probably thought I was having some sort of a fit. At least I wasn’t talking out loud.

Was he just horny and looking to get off? Or was there something there? Was I sending him signals of some kind?

I’d tried to stay focused on the work. This was my job, after all. Not working directly with him, of course. In fact, he’s the one who asked me to help after dinner. But help to ensure the show was the best it could be was my job. Yes, there might’ve been times I watched Ty with my libido more than with a critical performer’s eye. Maybe he saw that.

But was he gay? I really didn’t know.

I wanted more than just a random hookup, or to date someone knowing there wasn’t a future. Ty’s contract on the show was for a year from the start of previews. But if the show tanked, he could move on well before then. And even if we dated and lasted for a year, then what?

He was probably just caught up in the moment. We’d been working together, touching each other, two evenings in a row. Although the touches weren’t sexual, or at least they weren’t supposed to be, I got a rush every time. Did he get that too? Is that where the kiss came from?

God, I hoped things weren’t weird tomorrow.

I banged my head against the wall behind me. Maybe I could knock some sense into myself.

But what if? What if we could become a couple? What would he be like as a boyfriend? After being around him the last couple of weeks, he seemed to me like a great guy. Dinner was enjoyable. A date would be fun. From what I’d seen in this show so far, he at least knew how to act romantic.

It’d be amazing to wake up, my arm wrapped around him, sharing a quick kiss before we got breakfast. Going to openings and walking the red carpet together. Longing for each other if we were traveling for work. My mind flashed to the closing scene of The Goodbye Girl where Marsha Mason figures out Richard Dreyfuss is coming back because he left his guitar. What could our touchstones be?

I rested my head against the wall, a smile growing as I thought about the possibilities.

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About Jeff

Jeff Adams -BookLaunchJeff’s written stories since he was in middle school and became a gay romance writer in 2009 when his first short stories were published. Since then he’s written several more shorts and novels, including some in the young adult genre, and he plans to keep writing as long as wonderful readers keeping picking up his books.

Jeff lives in rural Northern California with his husband of twenty years, Will. Some of his favorite things include the musicals Rent and [title of show], the Detroit Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins hockey teams, and the reality TV competition So You Think You Can Dance. If forced to pick his favorite book it would be a tie between Michael Chabon’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay and David Levithan’s Every Day.

You can learn more at jeffadamswrites.com or on Twitter and Facebook Jeff & Will’s Big Gay Fiction Podcast: http://www.biggayfictionpodcast.com

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Giveaway!

Win an ecopy of “Love’s Opening Night”!

(Just click the link below)

Jeff Adams Rafflecopter giveaway!

(Ends 28th December 2016)

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7 thoughts on “Love's Opening Night by Jeff Adams Guest Post, Excerpt & Giveaway!

  1. I only watch “musical” on movies – I don’t watch it on live theater. I like Chicago (the movie) and Hairspray (the movie),

    1. Thanks for the comment, Ami!
      “Chicago” was an incredible movie. I liked how they adapted the stage show into the film so effectively. “Hairspray” was good as well. It’s always interesting to watch a movie become a musical and then become a movie again (same thing happened with Mel Brooks’ “The Producers.”)

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